Alex was busy trying to process all the brass that Merumeru had brought back in pipe form from the sunken ships in the harbor. Saying that Alex was doing it might not be quite true. There was a clockwork contraption that moved a couple dolls that stoked the bellows of a mini stone kiln. It had two inputs, one for yard debris, and one for wood debris. With the guts of an old egg timer that Alex found in a box that should have gone to the dump years ago she was able to use that to make the process almost automated. Though the dolls were small, and the amount of charcoal it made was also small and slow. But with some creative use of clockwork mechanics and a toymaking skill, once it got going it could go through a whole hopper of leaves and wood.

  “Meru!” Merumer cheered when another block of charcoal came down a conveyor belt that she and Alex made.

  “I would say that doing it like this is needlessly complex.” Alex chuckled, and watched charcoal go into the fire of the brass making contraption. “But with a toymaking skill this isn’t as time consuming as it should be.”

  Some other dolls were working the brass step in the production line. These dolls required Merumeru and Alex to make. Alex could create wooden dolls just fine but wooden dolls couldn’t handle molten brass well. The dolls would saw bits of the rger brass pipes off, throw them to be melted and other dolls at the next station would handle pouring the crucible. They had some forms that made pipes, sheets, gears, tiny wheels, springs bearings, and other things that brass was suitable for a clockwork toy boat. They needed an absolutely huge number of tiny parts to make a clockwork clipper ship.

  The nice thing about Alex’s momentum feat was that once things got rolling, then keeping the line going was easy. The charcoal was at the highest point (They set the whole line to be going down a hill near the shop) and rolling down the conveyor belt would turn the gears for the contraption running the dolls in the whole system. As long as something ran down one of the belts every 10 minutes then the gears kept going. So it would keep going until something backed it up, or they ran out of materials to feed it.

  Merumeru Alex and Fufi left the area to go check on other things. Did this count as multi tasking? The dolls could keep going without supervision or Alex to dance for them.

  “What do you think Fufi?” Alex asked the fmingo. “Do you think we’ll be able to pull off this heist and get Ariel a ship?”

  “Maybe.” The fmingo walked alongside the slime girl and magical girl. “Aqua might be a better person to ask. Her nereid cousins were keeping an eye on the harbor when we were there so they may know more.”

  The weather felt cold, a little bit colder than before they left. The capitol was warmer, but still with all the cold mist it felt like fall. Some gardens had been pnted in areas where Zeke and Trudy's extended family had picked out good lots.

  Alex expected to see some foundations getting set but it looked like just tents and sheds were present. “Are people not going to build their own houses?”

  Fufi guessed an answer. “Not information that I heard first hand, but I think that the general consensus is that people want to stick together in one pce when it starts snowing.”

  Alex turned to look at the castle construction site. “That makes sense.We got the first floor and the basement set up and if there is an area that has a roof over part of it then it wouldn’t get buried in snow. I don’t think we have enough firewood to keep the pce warm all winter.”

  “You are making charcoal.” Fufi pointed out.

  “We are also using it up just as fast.” Alex frowned. “I guess we could make another production line that just makes charcoal. “I don’t think the propane tank will st the whole winter. There is way too much stuff going on right now.”

  “I’m sure we’ll figure something out.” Fufi didn’t sound bothered. “If nothing else we can always trade with friends.”

  “Not for diesel or propane.” Alex said under her breath. “Also we won’t be able to get motor oil too.”

  “I’m sure we’ll find a way.” Fufi cheered. “Just believe in love and justice!”

  Alex did a quick walkthrough of the main part of the property. They waved and gave some small talk to farmers, and masons who had started mixing concrete and putting more of those giant concrete blocks into pce.

  One man was finishing arches on what looked to be the top floor of a turret on the corner of the build. Somehow they had cut and bent a few I-beams and used that to form a dome for the rooftop. Considering how they smashed those rebar enforced blocks with just mauls it made sense that they had some incredible strength.

  “Meru!” Merumeru pointed at a pipe with a conical hat on top of it that stuck out above the in-progress roof.

  “Did you make a chimney pipe for them?” Alex eyes the dark metal. It was likely iron or steel.

  Merumeru nodded repeatedly.

  “That works.” Alex thought a metal chimney wasn’t quite what the completely stone model the slime girl had originally created looked like, but it probably was better than a masonry one. “I didn’t see any smaller bricks, rocks or tiles that magical girl Cosmos brought. So it looks like concrete, steel and wood are the choices for the majority of the things.”

  Merumeru nodded.

  “If you were feeling up to it, you could make some windows.” Alex remembered the transparent, kinda-opaque blocks she made in the chicken-coup-wall-garden-tree-sanctuary.

  “Ru!” Merumeru liked the idea and ran off.

  “Um,” Alex lost her words for a moment. “Bye Merumeru, have fun making gss blocks.”

  Fufi and Alex continued their walk to the circle of shipping containers that had become Professor Copperpot’s little encampment.

  “Hello.” Alex knocked on a steel door that looked like it had been repurposed to be a main entrance. It had been switched around to open from the inside. “It is Alex and Fufi, may we come in?”

  A grunt came from inside. Alex guessed that was permission enough.

  The gnome had a bottle of 10w40 in his hands and several gss dishes with oil in it. He stuck his finger in one and then touched it to his tongue. “Hmm….” The old gnome pondered the oil like some fine wine.

  “You really shouldn’t drink that.” Alex got the words out awkwardly, astonished about the gnome’s ck of care for his own safety.

  “Aqua said that we needed some more of this stuff.” Professor Copperpot set the pstic bottle down. “Just trying to figure out what it is made out of.”

  “It is oil.” Alex stated the obvious. “It comes from the ground and they send it to a refinery.”

  “Is that like an alchemist’s b?” The gnome regarded the oil in a dish, poking it with a stick and swirling it around.

  “I don’t think so.” Alex hadn’t been to many alchemist’s bs, just this one gnome, and that might count more as a bioweapon research facility by his old word’s terms. “They are really big, and have all kinds of pipes and towers that go way up into the sky.”

  “Yes but what is the base material?” The gnome’s game didn’t leave the thick fluid. “Is it melted down animal fats or something?”

  “It is just crude oil.” Alex tried again. “It can be pumped from the ground and is thick and bck. It is mostly hydrogen and carbon, if that means anything.”

  “I don’t think we have such things on Terre.” The gnome pondered aloud. “At least not in big quantities. How odd.”

  “No oil?” Alex thought that was weird. “What do people use for lubrication and nterns?”

  “Mostly pnts or animal byproducts.” The professor shrugged. “I’ve seen some people back home do some creative things with coal but that is about it. Back when I was a kid we mostly stayed underground. To think that there are weird deposits of thick bck liquid in your world. Interesting.”

  “I don’t think we are going to be making any new engines.” Alex sounded a little sad. “It could probably be recycled somehow. Really, the problem with old oil is that it gets dirty and turns into sludge and doesn’t lubricate things like it is supposed to and the engine will seize up.”

  “Hmm.” The old gnome considered the problem. “We might be able to breed bacteria to do that. Can someone bring the old oil here?”

  “I don’t see why not.” Alex shrugged. “It is just sitting in the shop in an oil pan.”

  The gnome nodded and set down the stick, now with oil on the end.

  “How is your other project going?” Alex could hear the pigs even from inside.

  “Ah, I suppose I should thank you for helping with that.” The gnome fshed a toothy grin. “Aqua told me that you took some of the mosquito eggs with you when you went down the river.”

  “I did?” Alex blinked in surprise. “She didn’t tell me.”

  “So like a water nymph.” The gnome chuckled gruffly. “She probably thought it would be more fun to see how long it would take for someone to find out.”

  “Do you think the other nereids were in on it?” Alex felt foolish.

  “No doubt.” The gnome snorted and gnced in the direction of the ke. “Does that mean that the demons can get infected now?”

  The gnome shook his head. “No, that is just step one. When the weather warms up then the eggs will hatch. You know how insects work right?”

  Alex nodded, considering it a silly question.

  “The mosquitoes spread disease by biting one creature then biting another one.” He paused to let that sink in. “We’ll need to release the carrier pigs into the swamp and other pces.”

  “That sounds really slow.” Alex had hoped that the epidemic would spread fast.

  “It is slow and it is better that way.” The professor used his teaching voice. “It really won’t be spreading quickly until next summer. Hopefully we’ll have a hot and wet spring, that would help the mosquitoes propagate.”

  Alex hoped for better news. “Everything is taking so long. First getting everyone out of Yvne’s county. Then the ship that Ariel wants won’t be made for months. Even mister skeleton’s armor still is being made. I’d like to do something that makes a difference before winter gets here in full force.”

  The gnome froze up a bit when Alex raised her voice. “I..don’t know what to say.” He stammered. “This is too powerful of a force to fight head on.”

  Alex felt a little guilty. The old gnome had been mind controlled and forced to turn people into harpies. He’s obviously got some of his own baggage that he's working through. “Sorry about that. It is just that it has been the better part of a year and defeating the demon queen still seems impossibly far off.”

  Professor Copperpot nodded and took a deep breath. “I agree. But you’ve got to remember. Her forces defeated the rgest race on Terre. They’ve solidified their hold on all major human nds. It is not a fight we can win right now. But if enough nails are pulled out then maybe… their house of cards will colpse on itself.”

  They chatted a bit more and the pair bid the gnome farewell. Being social wasn’t his strong point so they left him and continued their inspection of the floating isnd. Aqua and Ariel were nowhere to be found. They were probably underwater scheming something.

  However, Yvne and her two children were out, doing the same thing as Alex, only attended by some maids.

  Right maids.

  Alex didn’t appreciate the reminder. She had to try to get the maids to the temple. But the carriage was too small to carry all of them.