Chapter 128
Marcel-san spread the magic iron into a thin, plate-like shape and placed five magic stones on it. The five stones were clustered together at the center.
"Shall we try this arrangement first? If all five magic stones are touching a single piece of magic iron, perhaps that will increase our chances of success."
"Yes, let's try it this way for now."
"Let's take turns trying it. Martine-sama, would you please go first?"
"All right."
Martine touched all five magic stones with a serious expression and imbued them with mana.
"It doesn't work. I can only imbue one magic stone with mana."
"I see..."
Then Marcel-san and the senpai took turns trying it, but everyone failed. Now it was my turn.
"You're the last one, Leon. Give it a try."
"Understood."
I imagined all five stones connected so that they would form a single magic stone, then imbued them with mana.
...This won't work. Since there is no connection between the magic stones, it's impossible to imbue all five with a single spell. If only I could create some kind of connection between them, I feel like it might work...
"How did it go, Leon?"
"This won't work."
"I see..."
"However, I feel like it might work if we could create some kind of connection between the magic stones."
The problem was how to create a connection between the magic stones.
"I felt the same way. Perhaps the problem is that the magic stones aren't connected to one another, so there is no path for the mana to flow through."
"You thought so too, Martine-sama?"
"Yes, but I can't think of any way to do that."
"Marcel-san, what do you think we should do?"
When I asked him that, Marcel-san thought for a while before speaking.
"What if we crushed one magic stone and fitted its fragments between the other stones? Wouldn't that connect all the magic stones through the fragments of one stone?"
"That might actually work!"
If we connected them with fragments from the same type of magic stone, it might work! At any rate, it seemed worth trying.
"Let's try whatever we can think of for now. Do we have any cracked magic stones?"
"I'll go ask Buela."
Marcel-san said that and went to Longo-sensei. Apparently, he found one magic stone that had broken and returned with it.
"There happened to be exactly one. I brought back fragments of a suitable size, so let's arrange them between the magic stones."
We tried imbuing them with mana again. Martine went first this time.
Martine struggled for a while with a troubled expression as she tried to channel mana, but it seemed that she had failed.
"It doesn't seem any different from before. While I was trying it, I realized something. If mana can flow through a broken magic stone, shouldn't it also flow through the unbroken magic stones?"
That was true... Since mana couldn't flow between the unbroken magic stones, it probably wouldn't work with a broken one either.
I hadn't noticed that before.
"Martine-sama is right, of course."
Marcel-san said that and looked a little dejected.
"Well, failing means we've learned that it doesn't work, so we've still made progress! Let's think of the next possibility. But first, why don't we all try it once?"
We took turns trying it again, but no one succeeded. I tried it too, but it felt exactly the same as before.
We ran out of ideas and fell silent. Loic-senpai was the one who broke the awkward silence.
"We only placed the stones on the magic iron before, but what if we firmly wedged magic iron between each pair of magic stones?"
"That might be worth trying..."
Marcel-san said that and changed the shape of the magic iron from a thin plate to one with several partition plates sticking up from it.
Then we fitted a magic stone into each space between the partitions.
"All right, this should do it."
This had to work! I psyched myself up, but everyone failed again.
Hmm... No matter what we do, it doesn't feel like the stones are truly connected. Mana flows from the magic stones into the magic iron, but it doesn't seem to flow from the magic iron into the magic stones.
It felt as if the magic stones were somehow repelling it. In that case, would connecting the insides of the magic stones work? But how could we do that...?
As I thought about it, something suddenly came to mind. Could we connect them with wire?
In Japan, even charging cables had copper wire running through them. If so, maybe we could connect them with magic-iron wire?
Making wire from magic iron would be easy. The question was how to connect it. Could magic iron be embedded inside a magic stone?
"Marcel-san, can magic iron be embedded inside a magic stone?"
"Embed magic iron inside a magic stone? I've never even thought of that. I suppose we won't know unless we try."
"Then I'll try it."
I said that and first made a wire from magic iron. Then I applied force as if I were inserting it into the magic stone.
However, the magic stone was smooth and round, so the wire wouldn't pierce it. The stone was also extremely hard. I might need to make a hole some other way before I could insert the wire.
But if I forced a hole into the magic stone, it would probably count as cracking it, rendering the stone itself unusable...
It would be better if the magic stone could absorb the magic iron on its own. I decided that drilling a hole in the stone would be my last resort, and tried every idea that came to mind, one after another.
After trying various things for several dozen minutes, I finally did it!
With mana flowing into both the magic stone and the magic iron, I imagined joining them together and threaded the magic-iron wire through the stone. To my surprise, the magic iron was absorbed into the stone without the slightest resistance.
Amazing! I had the other magic stones absorb the magic-iron wire as well, then connected the ends of the wire to complete it.
Could this work...?
I showed the completed item to everyone, who had been watching the entire process.
"I've managed to make it, at least. All that's left is to see whether we can imbue it with mana. Also, even if we can imbue it with mana, it won't be usable if the magic activates continuously, so that will be important too."
I handed the five connected magic stones to Martine, hoping with all my heart that it would work.
"Martine-sama, would you please try it first?"
"Are you sure I should? Leon, you could try it yourself if you wanted."
"No, I'd like you to try it, Martine-sama."
"In that case, I'll give it a try."
Martine said that, adopted a serious expression, and imbued the magic stones with mana. Almost immediately, her expression changed to one of surprise.
"It worked! This is a success!"
"Martine-sama, really!?"
"Yes. As expected of you, Leon. You should try it too."
"May I try it?"
"Go on, try it."
With everyone urging me on, I stepped up to the magic stones. Nervously, I held my hand over them and channeled Purification magic into them. I felt the magic flow into them as though all five stones were connected. Amazing!
And the magic hadn't activated. It was a huge success!
I put only enough mana into all five magic stones to fill a single magic stone. Now we had to see whether this had improved mana efficiency.
Since I had only put in enough mana for one magic stone, using the item would show us exactly how much mana efficiency had improved.
"I was able to put mana into the five magic stones as though they had become one. And since the magic didn't activate, it was a huge success!"
"We did it!"
"Since I only put in enough mana for one magic stone, may I test how much mana efficiency has improved?"
"Let's try it right away!"
To accurately measure mana efficiency, we filled a small wooden box with mud and measured how many times we could clean it. This time, I imbued the item with mana while imagining the wooden box becoming clean.
Mizel-senpai and Loic-senpai had apparently prepared the wooden box right away.
"Thank you. Then I'll give it a try."
I held the magic iron in one hand and the magic stone in the other, then activated the magic by bringing them together.
The inside of the wooden box became as clean as new. That was the first use. With a Purification magic item made from a single magic stone, the mana always ran out during the second use before it could finish cleaning the box.
If the second use left it perfectly clean, we would have succeeded for now. With my heart pounding, I used Purification a second time.
...Oh! It's perfectly clean!
At the very least, this meant that mana efficiency had improved. Even though nothing we tried had raised it before... we finally did it!
I looked up at everyone with a huge smile. Marcel-san was smiling gently, while Martine was jumping for joy.
Meanwhile, Loic-senpai and Miguel-senpai were hugging each other and crying. They had been researching this for years, after all. It must have been far more moving for them than it was for us.
"We did it, Loic! The results of our years of research have finally paid off! Martine-sama, Marcel-sama, Leon, thank you so much!"
"Miguel, we really did it. Thank you all so much!"
"It was only possible because of all the research and help the two of you have given us. We did it."
Martine held out her hand to the two of them. They each cautiously took it and shook her hand.
"This is all of our achievement. Let's be proud of it."
"Yes!"
The two senpai answered in perfect unison, and their eyes filled with tears again. I was glad they seemed to be getting along well with Martine too.
"Then may I check exactly how much mana efficiency has improved?"
I felt bad saying it while everyone was caught up in the emotion of the moment, but I couldn't stop thinking about it.
Apparently, my words brought everyone back to reality. Their expressions became serious again.
"That's right. We need to verify it. I'll prepare more mud right away."
Miguel-senpai prepared it, and we resumed our testing.