Volume 8 - Chapter 29 – Hourai Island’s Troops, Mobilized (1/2)
08-29 Hourai Island’s Troops, Mobilized
While Jin was lamenting his naivete, the troops were preparing to sortie.
And after worrying about it, he told Elsa on Kunlun Island that Reinhardt had been kidnapped. As he thought this development would result in him not having lunch with Elsa tomorrow.
And in doing Elsa wouldn’t be able to be in contact with Jin, so as not to unnecessarily worry her he decided to explain the situation at once.
“Unifilers…Even Rai-nii…”
Elsa’s voice sank.
“Jin-nii, save Rai-nii.”
“Yeah, I’ll save him. Well then, I’ll be going.”
Jin cut the call and continued the preparations.
The VTOLs from Falcon-1 to Falcon-3 were possible to dispatch so he had them included. The Air Force golems from Sky-11 to Sky-13 would be in charge of the piloting.
“Let’s see, looking at this now the means of travel are still lacking, huh.”
Jin felt that the means of travelling to the exact location where things were happening were lacking.
“I guess supersonic aircraft is needed…No, something more than that.”
What came to his mind was Warp Gate malfunctions. Without one on the receiving side the warp location would be unknown, but supposing that it could be controlled…
When the perparations to sortie were in order, Jin boarded Falcon-1 and left Hourai Island.
Along with him on Falcon-1 was Reiko, and the 10 SP members following Jin. Reiko had also diligently brought the railgun with her. Furthermore a small Warp Gate was loaded on board.
On Falcon-2 were the Army golems from Land-41 to Land-60.
Finally on board the Falcon-3, just in case, was the Navy golem Marine-5 along with the boat Hydro-5 which had been suspended. Ann had suggested this to have the possibility of using it on the large river Azul.
Falcon-3 flew in the night sky at its maximum speed. About 600 kilometers per hour. It was an astounding speed for its large fairframe.
“If I had an aircraft carrier ready and had deployed it to the western seas, getting all the way there would be fast with a Warp gate.”
Mid-transit, while Jin was worried about Reinhardt there was nothing he could do about it so he thought about parts where he was lacking and of ways on how to improve them.
“Right, Reiko.”
“Yes, Father?”
“I want to ask you. Do you think a Warp Gate’s malfunctioning could be controlled?”
Jin asked Reiko who had gone around the world with Warp Gate malfunctions multiple times to search for Jin. He was trying to get some hints from Reiko’s experience.
“While they were malfunctioning there didn’t seem to be any directionality to them. Neither could I sense anything in common with the locations to which I was warped.”
“Is that so…”
Jin was a little disappointed.
“But, there was one interesting phenomenon.”
“What was it?”
“Yes, there appeared to have been a connection between the Magic Energy consumption of the Warp Gate and the end point’s distance from the research laboratory.”
In other words, according to the impression Reiko got it seemed that when it consumed a lot of Magic Energy the warp distance was long.
“There had been no way to measure it until now, but the current measurements point to that. In other words, the northern mountain of Kaina Village, the forest on Blue Land’s outskirts, and Port Rock all are nearly the same distance away.”
That was good news. If the Magic Energy consumption could be controlled, only thing left was the direction.
Warp Gates were Magi Tools that connected two points in space.
During a warp, the receiving side merely marks where to go, and the propelling side could be said to do almost all of the work. Jin too understood that much.
“So that means that if only the receiving side could be marked without equipment…”
During the one hour and a bit journey to Dali, Jin devoted himself to thinking about this.
“Father, we’re soon above Dali.”
“Ah, is that so.
Jin stopped speculating and returned to reality. Here too it was night. Jin could see nothing with his eyes.
“Falcon-1, cancel stealth. Reiko, please look down. Do you see anything conspicous?”
Reiko received the order from Jin to look for suspicious objects with her eyesight. He himself also put on the reinforced clothes and the helmet.
“Nothing in particular at the moment.”
Unfortunately however, nothing was found.
“Shit, so we really are too late.”
Jin thought of ways to find Reinhardt.
If he knew Reinhardt’s Magic Energy Pattern he could search for him with the detector on Hourai Island, but right now he didn’t have something like that on hand.
“There’s no Magic Energy left in the Guild card case either, huh.”
Then he suddenly had an idea and got in touch with the SP units Sage and Cosmos who were supposed to be in Dali.
“Yes, Chief. Sage speaking.”
“Alright, listen, in order to search for Reinhardt, isn’t there anything that has Reinhardt’s Magic Energy pattern in it left behind?”
Jin asked and the reply came immediately.