For as long as Claire could remember, she had always wanted to be a crafter. She saw the people of her city constantly going to the wall only to see fewer return. Her own father had been one of those that had not come back. There had not even been a body. Her mother had died to a sickness a few weeks later.
Even with Magic, there was only so much that common Healing Magic could do. Especially for those that can’t afford it.
Claire wanted to create something, anything, that would bring more people back from the wall. Some tool, device, or weapon. Anything to keep the soldiers alive while they defended the city. And if she could scrape a little profit of it, then she would. After all, it was hard to create something new when you were starving or without a roof over your head.
As it was, Claire had always been scraping by. Making just enough money off her Enchanting work to keep her Mother’s workshop.
It was difficult to do even that when her ‘colleagues’ constantly belittled and insulted her, both among themselves and in public. But Enchantments were always breaking down and needing someone to fix them. Claire made her money by always being available to be that someone.
It was not her Enchantments that caused her peers to sneer at her. In fact, many of the big companies had offered her a well-paying position. It had been tempting, but she ultimately turned them down. Any design she made while in their employ would be legally theirs.
They ridiculed her for her designs themselves.
The process of creating something new was quite standard, regardless of the style of work. First the inventor had to draw the design, some could do it mentally, but that was not a very trustworthy way to go about it, and any investor would certainly require something they could see themselves.
In that same manner, the next step was to create a prototype. It did not have to be fancy, it just had to work, whatever its use was. The idea could work in the inventor’s head and in theory, but until it was shown to work in practice, it meant nothing.
Then there was the fine-tuning stage. Simply making a working version was not enough. It had to be better. The Enchantments had to be durable enough, the pieces cheap and accessible enough.
Finally, there was the marketing step. How would they get the product out? How much would it cost to make it? How much would they sell it for? Where would they get the ingredients? Where would they store them? Where would they create the product? How many could they make in a certain time frame? How many people would they have to employ? What would their skill set have to be?
There were countless questions that had to be asked and answered. Likely requiring them to go back to the fine-tuning stage. Many Inventors failed this step, but it was a good trial and often brought the attention of potential investors interested in seeing what else the Inventor could make and if it would be profitable for them.
Claire had been at her work for years and had not yet managed to present a working prototype. Add on the nature of her project, and even Claire understood why they picked on her. But she was determined and had finally managed to make a working prototype just last month.
The problem? It had taken her an entire week of very careful work with expensive ingredients. The Enchantments that made it work were fragile and showed signs of deterioration after just a few uses.
There was no way she would manage to convince anyone to invest in her project if a single product cost more than what the average person made in a month and needed repairs constantly.
But it did work. And it worked well. At least until it broke. She had managed to fix her prototype after replacing a few parts and renewing the Enchantments, but it was still not ready to be shown to the public. If she presented it without enough backing, she risked others stealing the design for themselves.
Just as she had sat down to figure out how to make it more durable, an armored giant with a menacing aura of death around him knocked on her door and demanded to hear about her project, paying enough for her workshop’s taxes for the month.
“Do you have a prototype?” Alaster asked, unable to hide his interest.
Claire hesitated. Was the man before her going to steal the design? He had paid to just hear about it, quite a lot. But if the issues were dealt with, Claire suspected that her design would be worth more than a simple fortune. But she decided to trust him, after all, she doubted she would be able to defend herself against him if he turned violent. Not even long enough to attract the roaming Guard patrols.
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“I just finished one, but it is still quite crude.” Claire stood up and walked to the basement door, pulling out a key as she did.
The key was not mundane. It was an Enchanted Key. The principle was quite simple, so Keys such as this were quite common. Some only had to be in close proximity with the matched lock in order to open, but Claire’s had to touch the door. As it did, she heard the standard ‘thunk’ of the locking mechanisms moving.
She opened the door and turned on the Enchanted Lights, revealing her intentionally very empty basement. Ordinarily, so many Enchanted items would be quite costly, but as she was quite knowledgeable in various forms of Enchanting, she made and maintained them herself.
The basement was basically a copy of the room above, minus all the various items and papers. There was only a small desk against the wall nearest the door, and a target at the far wall, roughly ten meters away. Resting on the table, sat the item Alaster had come to see.
The Enchanted lights were bright and left the room without any shadows, explaining, at least in part, why his Shadow Assassins could not enter. But the bigger reason lay in the deep runes carved in the stone of each surface of the smooth stone room. Alaster did not know what they did, but he suspected it prevented spying or entry in any way, at least strong enough to prevent his Shadows.
Claire stepped beside the table, allowing her guest to see the project.
The ‘firearm’ was made entirely of metal and seemed to be mostly a tube. The tube curved down slightly, forming what Alaster imagined was a trigger, before coming back up and flaring slightly. In all, it looked quite like a heavy crossbow.
“Could you demonstrate it?” Alaster asked, his excitement growing slightly at the thought of seeing it in action. The blueprints he had seen had not really provided a clear picture of how it worked.
Clair carefully picked up the device, almost as if it was thin glass. She widened her stance and put the flared end against her shoulder, raising the other end towards the far target. And once she was ready, she pulled the trigger.
A loud exploding sound came from the end of the device, coupled with a small ball flying out at incredible speeds before exploding against the stone wall behind and to the left of the target.
Cringing to herself, Claire carefully set the device down.
“What do you think?” She sheepishly asked. The man before her was a stranger but was also the first one to see her prototype.
Alaster put his hand to his chin as he thought for a moment.
“I see several issues,” As the words left his mouth, Claire felt her chest deflate, “But I think this could change everything. The projectile was extremely fast, almost too fast for me to see, and I doubt many Experts would be able to dodge it. But tell me, how powerful is it?”
Claire smiled wide, “This current model could theoretically only kill D Rank Monsters, but I have not had the chance to test it against anything other than the target and wall. I do however know I could get it to kill C Rank Monsters, its just a matter of getting it to work.
Just that single shot damaged the internal Enchantments. It is only good for maybe three more before the firearm has to be repaired. I am still working on increasing that.
This prototype is still far from anything I would consider a final product.”
“Currently, how expensive would each one be, if you sold them?”
Clair blushed, “The materials are roughly a gold and twenty silver. The Enchantments would be another gold. The minimum starting price would be three gold.”
Alaster silently nodded, “How long do you think it’ll be before you have a final product?”
Claire sheepishly kicked the ground, “Progress is slow because it’s a lot of intricate work with lot of pricy materials. At my current rate, it’ll take another two years minimum, maybe even four if there is a lot of problems.”
“Hypothetically, if you had access to all the materials you needed, how long then?”
Claire laughed, “If I had all the materials I needed? Maybe few months? I have a lot of research already done that just needs to be put into a practical form.”
“Good, how does a hundred gold sound?”
Claire stared blankly at the man, wondering if she had heard him correctly and if her heart had just stopped.
“Uh, sir? What was that? I must have misheard you.”
“No. You didn’t. I am investing in you. I want firearms. I want the final product. Do you even realize just how much this could change how Humanity combats the Monster threat?”
“Kinda?”
“You don’t. I’m not surprised, you aren’t a fighter. But that is my point. The majority of Monsters are C Rank or lower. While the average Adept fighter can comfortably fight C Rank and contend against B Rank. But they are often killed by C or D Rank simply because of how many there are.
How fast can this shoot?”
“Every seven seconds.” Claire said on auto pilot.
“And it can kill D Ranks. You believe you can get it strong enough to kill C Rank and I believe that as you do, you’ll find some way to make it shoot faster.
What is its range?”
“Accurately? Fifty Meters. With power? One twenty. Theoretically.”
“The average C Rank Monster can cover a hundred yards in around ten seconds. That is long enough to fire once, and after you figure it out, maybe even two. And the range will likely also increase.
You don’t need any Abilities to use this, meaning that even the common person can use it. There are countless people who want to fight but can’t. They either have the wrong class for it, or the wrong Abilities. Maybe even the wrong temperament. With this? They could all fight.
While the fighters are dealing with the stronger Monsters, the mass of people using your weapon could be killing the mob of Monsters, from a range, meaning that very few, if any, would be injured or killed.
This weapon you created could turn the average person into a skilled combatant. You might have just created the weapon needed for Humanity to fight back against the Monsters. And I want it.”