Civilization Chronicles: Rise of the Divine Creator

It was a shame, really.

However, there was nothing Lucas could do about it right now.

Even in the other universe, overcoming the issue of rail integrity had taken decades of research.

Eventually, the problem was solved and railguns slowly began entering standard arsenals, supplanting chemically driven firearms briefly before pure energy and plasma weapons eventually overtook them.

That said, according to Lucas’ inherited memories, certain types of highly advanced railguns were still in service when his mysterious benefactor perished as they had some special use-cases, like when solid shots were more effective than particle beams.

A few types of warships apparently even featured massive, extremely advanced railguns that were mounted along their spines, capable of launching enormous 10-ton slugs at nearly 3,000,000 metres per second, roughly 1% the speed of light.

Compared to such weapons, Lucas felt that the small railgun he had somehow cobbled together, whose firing systems took up an entire warehouse, and was powered haphazardly with a source of electricity he didn’t even understand the principle behind, was literal garbage, but you have to start somewhere!

In Pauline’s mind, however, the half-melted railgun was a revolutionary weapon, one that once perfected would allow even regular mortals to kill Spirit Adepts!

As one such Spirit Adept herself, Pauline certainly felt a bit complicated about this, but she wasn’t so arrogant as to believe that no one weaker than herself could ever harm her.

Even the most powerful Cultivator could be killed by a mortal if they fell into a trap or were caught off-guard, a lesson Celestina had made sure to teach her daughter.

Pauline would never forget when her mother had tricked one of the kitchen helpers, a 15-year-old Body Tempering Realm boy, into slipping poison into her meal.

It wasn’t a deadly poison, of course, but it did block the flow of her Internal Qi and cause her to pass out.

When she awoke to find her mother standing over her, playing with a small dagger, Pauline broke out in a cold sweat, realizing that had this been a real plot against her, she would have long been dead.

Needless to say, Pauline carefully checked her food before she ate it for quite a while after that incident.

Was such a scenario unlikely to happen in real life?

Certainly.

Were the chances it would succeed highly improbable?

Most definitely.

But was it truly impossible?

No, it wasn’t.

Knowing this, Pauline had never again looked down on those who were ’supposedly’ weaker than her.

Underestimating an enemy could result in being killed, while undervaluing your allies would make winning a battle more difficult than it could have been.

Overestimating people was also dangerous, but like with everything in life, it was all about risk management.

Project Thor and Lucas’ railgun only reinforced that idea in the Pauline’s mind.

.....

With the test firing of the Lucas’ experimental weapon having been successfully completed, the young boy and his companion for the day decided to leave the cleanup to the rest of the research team and head back to the mess-hall to grab a light dinner before heading to their final destination for the evening, Celestina’s private training room.

Along the way, and even during the meal, Pauline and Lucas chatted rather casually, like the two of them were old friends or colleagues, rather than new acquaintances with a more than 100 years age-gap.

”So, what’s your current priority?”

”Project Revolution. If we get that working, then everything else will be simpler.”

”What made you think of trying to collect World Qi from sunlight?”

”Everyone kept telling me that World Qi is everywhere, in everything, so I figured that sunlight wasn’t an exception.”

”I see... pass the bread, please.”

”Oh, sure, here.”

”Why use flat plates for the Thunder Spirit Silver? Those were surely very hard to forge.”

”They were. Braxton complained incessantly about it at the time, but how much elect... how much lightning you can get out of Thunder Spirit Silver seems to depend greatly on the total surface area of the object, so we went with plates.”

”Did you have to build it so large? Wouldn’t it have been better to start smaller?”

”We tried that, but precision in the manufacturing became an issue. Basically, anything smaller just resulted in the whole thing melting or exploding before we could get any usable test results.”

Honestly, it was mostly Pauline asking questions, trying to fill the gaping holes in her knowledge and understanding, while Lucas answered as specifically as possible without revealing any sensitive information, they were now in a public space, after all.

It should have been an odd sight, seeing the young boy and mature woman interact like this, but everyone in the Balfour Manor had basically gotten used to Lucas’ odd quirks, so no one even gave it more than a passing thought.

As the two of them were just finishing up their dinner, Eris and Christina happened to walk in together with Yuki.

The girls were chatting happily with one another, seemingly quite excited about something, while Yuki was busy sniffing the air, apparently more interested in stuffing her face than whatever conversation was going on.

And yes, Yuki could participate in the conversation. She had learned to shake her head and nod to answer yes or no questions, and Eris, Tina, and Lucas were slowly getting used to what her different yips meant, though sometimes that became difficult when there was food nearby.

”Ah Lucas!” Eris called out upon spotting her little brother, dashing over while carrying Yuki and dragging Christina.

The two girls didn’t forget their manners and politely greeted Pauline, who in turn waved her hand and told them to just act casually.

Having received permission, Eris plunked herself down beside her Senior Brother, beamed happily, and announced, ”Guess what? The guild is almost ready to open!”

”What? Already?” Lucas was slightly taken aback, he had thought it would take at least another half-a-month before Eris’ new school/guild hybrid organization would open.

”En en! Everyone has been pitching in to help, so things went faster than expected,” Eris explained, and Lucas immediately understood.