[6th day of exploration]
Today"s the day we join up with Lainas.
We left the F rank demon stones with Bonnie-san and left the labyrinth.
Bonnie-san is looking after the demon stones in a small room near the entrance of the labyrinth since you cant take demon stones out of the labyrinth.
We pulled the cart up to the buying counter and left Meg to handle the sales.
It was a bit early for the meeting but Lainas and his group were already waiting at the gates and it seems their equipment has improved a little as well.
Before they were using kobold shields but now the 3 vanguards are equipped with round metal shields.
“Its been a while everyone! You"ve got some good shields now I see.”
“Aah. We stayed overnight in the 2nd ward and carried on hunting. We made some good money there.”
Lainas was also sporting a stylish forehead guard.
The [Red Boar"s] in the 2nd ward are numerous and their meat seems to have a good sale price.
Apparently, they can hunt goblins and kobolds smoothly now too.
“Is the rear guard equipment next?”
“Aah. If we get better bows and arrows we can go a little further in. My [Maximum Soul] is advancing one step at a time down the road to being an invincible party!”
“Tha…that"s right”
“Oh, that reminds me. The other day I was saved by Ippei"s potion after my thigh was pierced by a red boar"s tusk.”
Apparently, Lainas got careless when he going to deliver the finishing blow.
The red boar"s can be quite cunning sometimes pretending to be weekend or unable to move.
I"m happy that my potion was useful. After all, Lainas is one of my few friends though he"s a bit high tensioned at times.
As we chatted Meg bought the empty cart over.
“Can I ask you to bring the luggage to my house? Thank you for your help everyone.”
A group of 12 people consisting of [Phoenix Company] and [Maximum Soul] set off for my apartment.
The total weight of the luggage is just under 300 kg.
Most of it goes on the cart but everyone is carrying some on their backs as well.
Even though 300 kg is a lot, with 12 people we manage just fine.
When I bought it me and Gobu had to make multiple trips to the shop. The power of numbers is great.
Thanks to being able to get a room in labyrinth only 300 meters down from the entrance the transportation was completely done in 2 hours.
I got everyone else to leave and head back up while me and Gobu remained.
Finally, I can make the transportation type golem.
The parts have already been made so all that remains is to a.s.semble them while incorporating the demon stones.
Even a.s.sembling it didn"t take long thanks to my magic.
The finished golem closely resembled a small crawler truck like back on earth.
There"s a loading platform on the crawler and the control levers are behind the body. There"s also standing and riding steps as well. (1)
It"s possible to manually control it but normally the golem judges by itself and moves independently.
Its colour is an unremarkable matt olive drab and it"s equipped with lights for the dark labyrinth.
The loading platform has a function that senses if it"s on an incline and keeps itself horizontal at all times.
The size of the loading platform is 1480 x 870 mm. It"s small but it was not possible to make it bigger due to the size of the labyrinths rooms in places. Any bigger and it wouldn"t fit. It would get stuck in doorways or something.
Its maximum load weight is 730 kg and its maximum speed is 27 kph. (2)
It"s got enough capacity to load food and materials and because it uses magic for power its quiet like an electric motor.
I didn"t put any weapons on it though.
It would be quiet a good bit of war potential if I attached a machine gun to it.
It needs 50MP a minute to move and like my other golems I"m pouring my magic directly into it so it can move. If need be it can store 3000 MP which is an hours worth of energy.
While it"s charged I made it so the other members of [Phoenix Company] can operate it as well.
Due to its huge MP need ordinary people can"t use it though it would be a very different story if I"d used high ranked demon stones like those used in the magic railway.
I load Gobu up onto the platform while I stand on the riding step.
Takun launch!
It"s pretty smooth. There"s more vibrations than a car but I don"t mind it so far.
Some pa.s.sing adventures were looking at us with curious eyes but in this world, there"s the magic railway as well as magic ships and magic cars for the wealthy though they are small so it wasn"t something so surprising that people would fall over in shock from.
When I pulled up on Takun outside the shop where my friends were eating Jean was the first to jump out.
“Ossan! Is this a magic car!? Can I drive it too?”
Jean was very excited and while listening to my story seemed to be longing for the magic car.
Its the dreams of many adventurers to save up their money and buy a model T car by a manufacturer called Ward. (3)
The type T touring is all the rage with the young and wealthy people in the capital.
There"s only about 20 of them in Nepia but they are slowly growing.
Strangely though they consume demon stones as fuel.
I"ve heard that 1 I rank stone is needed to go about 5 km.
An I rank demon stone is about 1000 rims. That"s quite bad fuel economy.
The type T itself costs 5 million rims to buy so to the common people its a really high dream.
Due to this the primary means of transportation in this world is still carriages.
“Of course you can Jean but don"t expect any speed out of it since it"s for transportation.”
In the afternoon we went to the suburbs for some driving lessons. Takun is a golem so even if someone else is driving it will avoid obstacles if it thinks that you are about to hit something. Because of this, I feel safe letting the others use it.
I get the others to get on the platform and I get on the operator"s step.
Everyone was sitting on the edge of the bed since it was narrow.
Its top speed is 27 kph which is less than the legal limit for a moped but for safety reasons I never went over 20 kph.
20 kph is only slightly faster than a standard carriage.
“Ossan, more! Go faster!”
Jean is still excited.
“It"s amazing! The city is already so far away!”
Kuro is also in high spirits.
When Cecily-san heard that everyone was going on the platform she seemed to expect something but she was soon disappointed when Kuro went to the front with Jean.
Spring had progressed considerably while we were down in the labyrinth for 6 days.
Most of the snow had melted making all the roads muddy and in the places where it was exposed to warm sunlight, the ground steamed.
Takun progressed smoothly through the mud without getting stuck and somewhere close by a bush warbler called out.
Everyone got off the loading platform about 10km away from the city and we started the driver training.
“Let me go first!”
Jean started appealing to me as soon as he jumped down off the platform.
“Don"t go too fast Jean. Takun don"t go more than 15 kph at first.”
*Honk honk* Takun responds with his light horn.
“It"s okay I won"t break it.”
Jeans getting impatient to start riding.
Because the operation is easy it only needs a short explanation.
Jean stands on the operator"s step and timidly puts his hand on the lever.
I was watching Jean but he was being careful with his hands.
He should be safe.
The motor gives a quiet moan and the crawler starts to turn.
“Uoooooo! Awesome Takun! You"re the best!”
*Honk honk!*
It seems the compatibility between the 2 of them is good.
There"s also an MP gauge next to the speedometer so it will come back before it gets empty.
While Jean is operating it we have a tea break.
I boil the water and make the tea as well as handing out some brandy tea cakes that I bought from Cecily-sans parents bakery.
There"s an awful lot of brandy soaked into the cake.
Cecily-san is frequently recommending the cake to Kuro as well. Shes absolutely trying to get Kuro drunk so she can do something.
I like alcohol as well but I"m quite a weak drinker so this cake would probably get me drunk.
It"s okay though. If we all get drunk Takun will drive us home.
I remember research on self-driving cars was going well back on earth.
Looking around its almost sakura season here.
There are very few cherry trees in Nepia but there are almond tree"s and flowering tree"s that resemble cherry trees.
The flowering time of those trees seems to be early than cherry trees.
Will the cherry tree"s on the bank near my parents home bloom this year?
When I was a child we used to go with the other families from the neighbourhood.
Are my parents doing well?
I wonder if my friend has married his fiance yet?
I"m doing well. I"ve found my love as well.
Thoughts of a far-off distant world melted into the spring sky.
The sun is warm but the wind brushing my cheek still has traces of cold.
My first winter in this world was about to come to an end.
(1) What he"s describing is basically this though a bit modified . Thanks DemonCooler (back in chap 70) for the link.
(2) For those that use other measurements like me, that"s a maximum load of 114.95 stone and a top speed of 16.77 mph.
(3) Then go to WcDonalds in them presumably.