Vivi remained shaken from the events in Paradise as she exited the Luminary’s palace. It was the dead of night; Vivi had only slept for three hours out of the intended six, having jolted awake upon her death in Paradise. She had a headache, and her eyes slightly sideways, but she wasn’t tired.

  They’re probably at the foundry right now, Vivi thought. She took a moment to recall where the foundry actually was. Her eyes struggled to connect the dark city with the layout she knew during the scorching daylight hours.

  Then she looked into her sixth sense, and suddenly, the city layout made sense again. The mental map in her head wasn’t nearly as clear as it would have been with void ether active, but Vivi if she focused, she could vaguely differentiate buildings and walls from ambient ether in the air, and she could sense the light amounts of ether in street lamps.

  Ether is a bit terrifying, isn’t it? Vivi asked.

  Lucius tilted his head. “What do you mean?”

  I can just feel the streets we’re moving to without even looking, Vivi thought. I could move with my eyes closed if the map in my head was just a little clearer. In Paradise, I could practically sense every blade of grass being ripped from the ground by the force of my ascension.

  Lucius shrugged. “Ether is energy, or power, or whatever. Of course it’s powerful. What are you trying to say with this?”

  I don’t know, Vivi thought. Just an idle thought, I guess. Let’s see what the ballista makers have come up with.

  A short walk later, Vivi entered the underground foundry, where they’d built the first missiles. She could already hear metal crashing and pounding from outside. Descending down to the warehouse, a wave of heat hit Vivi, akin to the hot forge of her smithy. The whole warehouse smelled like metal and hard work, with more than two dozen workers still awake and active.

  Freyven, Patryn, Civar, and three more demons, were gathered in the leftmost corner on a large U-shaped table, cluttered with blueprints, wooden blocks, pieces of steel, and other haphazard items, as well as rulers, dividers, and other mathematical tools. And of course, coffee mugs stood wherever they fit.

  Vivi was hesitant to interrupt them. Everyone was focused with no hints of tiredness, eyes glued on blueprints. While she was standing nearby, however, Patryn’s head lifted up, and he said, “Oh, Vivi. You’re back!”

  She walked up and took a look at the blueprints. “Any progress?” she asked.

  “We have a very basic design almost ready,” Patryn said. “Freyven would be the best at explaining, I believe.”

  “The design is essentially a slingshot combined with a barrel,” Freyven explained. “Or an aiming tube, if you’re unfamiliar with the term.”

  He showcased a drawing of the concept on a piece of paper. To an unfamiliar eye, the design looked essentially like a tube with knobs attached near the lower end of the cylinder. Only when Freyven showcased another drawing that showcased the insides of the tube did Vivi understand.

  “These four heavy-duty stretch ropes are pulled back, then locked into place with this lever,” Freyven explained. “The missile, or a cannonball, is placed on top. Upon releasing the lever, the stretch ropes are released, flinging the missile, and the barrel will guide its trajectory. For now, it’s a very simple design.”

  Vivi eyed the picture. Something seemed to be missing. “What about the string of runes? Where does it come in?”

  “There are two options,” Freyven said. “We can either enhance ammunition before loading the slingshot. Kind of like we did with the experiment. Your piece of ether root was already charged. When we tapped it with a stick, it exploded with momentum. Theoretically, this approach works with all projectiles.”

  “Could we do that with the existing ballistas and missiles?” Vivi asked.

  “That was our immediate thought,” Freyven said. “Tests, however, proved it impossible. We used your string of ether roots, with the help of a runesmith, to enhance a steel arrow, and we shot it with a regular bow. As expected, the arrow shot forth with tremendous force—enough so that its flight path was unpredictable, shooting off-target. Even professional archers, with experience shooting ethereal arrows, struggled to control its path. The arrow jittered in place while being aimed, much the same way the ether root we tested jittered on its platform before you poked it with a stick. This effect made the arrow impossible to aim.”

  The other designers continued discussing behind him. Freyven yawned audibly and said, “Excuse me,” before continuing. “So, we believe the same thing would happen with the ballistas. If we were to amplify existing missiles, it is almost certain that the missile would merely rip the ballista in half, possibly harming the operators. This is notwithstanding the forces the ballista would receive from launching a missile at such speeds, which our ballistas are not designed to perform.”

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  “What about recoil?” Vivi asked. “Did the arrow with your tests send force back to the shooter or the bow?”

  Some of Freyven’s tiredness disappeared from the question. He looked surprised to see her ask something like that. “Civar is the one studying that very thing. He would explain better.”

  “The recoil effects are very interesting,” Civar said. “Normally, increasing the speed of an arrow is achieved by storing more energy in the bowstring. In order to launch any object, force must be applied to the object. With the enhancement string, however, extra momentum is simply generated by the ether within the object.

  “For the archery experiment, we used a regular, unenhanced bow. The bowstring released its mild amount of force into the enhanced arrow. In turn, the arrow itself enhanced that given momentum. Simply put, an object enhanced with this string of runes turns into a momentum multiplier. Give the object a light tap, and the momentum received will be amplified exponentially. Opposite forces are, of course, generated as well. In our experiment, the bowstring and the wielder’s hand received a light jolt, though the force was not as severe as we had expected. It’s possible that ether itself absorbs some of the force. The exact mathematics are currently being calculated.”

  “I see, interesting…” Vivi said. Lucius’s head had long been steaming inside her core. “What about the jittering? Do we know why objects move in place when amplified with the enhancement string?”

  “It could be that the ambient air around the object pushes a light amount of momentum to the object, and this tiny momentum is greatly amplified,” Civar said. “Though that does not make much sense, unless wind is present. More realistically, the jittering stems from an inaccuracy in my string of runes. For now, it’s a fault we’re trying to fix. But I suppose some jittering is expected considering the nature of the ether inside the object.”

  He thought for a bit, then added, “Ah, and it’s important to note that the force that the object receives is not the variable that the enhancement string amplifies. It is momentum directly. If you hold an enhanced object, it will not feel heavy, since the force of gravity is not amplified. Only if you drop the object, gravity generates momentum, and that momentum is greatly amplified. The object will then promptly smash against the ground with violence.”

  This is starting to get complicated… Vivi thought. She still somewhat understood what was being talked about. “Regardless, new equipment will be needed to accommodate more powerful missiles. The new launchers need to be more stable and more durable.”

  “Exactly that,” Freyven said, examining the design. “The barrel slingshot design is not perfect. It won’t be as stable and easy to aim as the ballistas, and the insane momentum of the missiles might deform the barrel. The current design is intended to be used for ranges up to roughly two hundred feet, and the barrel must be inspected after every missile is shot. However, in theory, this device can shoot missiles at the speeds we’re dealing with.”

  “We could strengthen the barrel itself with inside-carving to make the weapon more durable.”

  Freyven blinked, thinking about it. “Ah. I hadn’t thought of that. Good thing you came, Vivi.”

  “What about the second method you mentioned?” Vivi asked. “Instead of adding ether to the ammunition before launching, is there another option?”

  He adjusted his posture. “For a more stable flight, we theorized that the enhancement string could be delivered to the missile during launch. Our two ideas are either to somehow delay the addition of ether into the missile, enhancing momentum only after it is already stably in the air, or to deliver the ether from the barrel while the missile is already launching. If the barrel itself could conduct the complex ether into the missile, stability would most certainly be improved. Although, developing such a weapon would take time.”

  “So we’re going with option one,” Vivi said. “We’re fueling the ammunition before it has even launched. And for stability, we’re instead focusing on making the launching device itself more stable and durable.”

  Freyven thought for a bit about the explanation. “Essentially, yes.”

  “The barrel will definitely need to be protected with inside-carving,” Vivi said. “Then there’s the missile design itself. Have you gotten to that yet?”

  “We have the dimensions and calculations,” Freyven said. “The inside-carving bit is still a work in progress.”

  “I’ll get to designing, then,” Vivi said. “Show me the design, and I’ll do my best.”

  For a moment, Freyven just looked at her. There were definitely lumps underneath his eyes. Then he rolled his eyes and laughed. “You’re crazy, Vivi. Let’s get to work.”

  ***

  Vivi switched her dress for a spare uniform and got to work.

  The missiles for the slingshot launcher were more like cylinders with a sharp tip. They had no shafts or complicated requirements. The shape just had to be precise to near microscopic levels to perfectly match the barrel.

  Vivi created two different designs. A simpler one, with merely a single ether root passing inside it, that was intended to be mass produced by inexperienced workers—one that used molds instead of precise vein-shaping and forging. The speed enhancement string of runes (they’d need to come up with a better name for that) would be delivered to it through simple outside-carving veins, which Shivenar’s average runsmiths could easily carve.

  The second design was one that only Vivi or Grandpa could create. Two runes, strength and crush, with an efficient but quick-to-shape network of veins inside. She got to work creating it right away, shaping the veins in a corner of the foundry. Usually, all the pounding around her would have been distracting. For this job, however, the chaos somehow fit.

  She was starting to feel tired, but not so tired that she couldn’t shape the veins. After an hour and a half, she moved to the next steps.

  With her design, it turned out that vein-shaping was actually not the most difficult part. That turned out to be blacksmithing. Forging such a precise shape was irritatingly difficult. Vivi felt like she’d need a ruler just to know where to swing. But she worked on it nonetheless, concentrating as hard as she had when forging blossom.

  Three hours in, Freyven showed up to remind her that she could simply get the shape roughly right, and they could sand the metal down to the exact dimensions. Vivi blinked, feeling like an idiot, and she took that as a reminder that she seriously needed sleep.

  Vivi and the demons took a short break, most sleeping for around four hours, before work continued once again. They created the barrel and all the small parts included, and fifteen hours later, the first iteration of the slingshot launcher was complete.