Volume 20 Chapter 127 Air Magic Stone

"Slow down, slow down, I didn't even hear you clearly!" The old man shouted anxiously when I asked him. 【 】

When I heard what the other party said, I remembered that I might have asked too quickly, but even though I understood, I didn't give up on researching this wheelchair. Although this is just a small wheelchair, its value is quite terrifying. You must know that this thing can fly, and it is not ordinary flight. This thing can actually hover vertically, and what's even more amazing is that this thing makes no sound at all.

Although the gravity resistance device we bought from Ashford's Iron Crusaders can resist gravity and levitate in place, not only does it make a lot of noise when working, but more importantly, it cannot fly once it flies. Movement, if this defect had not been circumvented in disguise by the crawler transmission mechanism, the gravity resistance device could only be used as a suspension elevator. But the old man's thing obviously doesn't have those problems. When the old man came in, it was clear that the wheelchair could be levitated and moved, and there was no problem with steering or anything like that. I just didn’t know whether it consumed a lot of energy, whether it could be enlarged, and the most important thing was—this thing could. How high?

"Sorry, I was too excited just now. Could you please tell me what power this thing relies on to levitate?"

"Oh, you're talking about this." The other party didn't take it seriously and motioned to an assistant who came with him to help him lift a cover at the back of the wheelchair. I quickly went over to take a look. What is quite surprising is that what is under the lid is not the complex mechanical system I expected, but...empty. It's really empty. The wheelchair, which looked like a toilet with armrests and side baffles, was very large, so I thought I would see a bunch of complicated precision instruments when I opened it, but it turned out to be empty inside. And looking at the shape, it seems to be made exactly according to the design goals of the storage box.

"Where is this thing's power system?"

"Here it is." The old man directly raised a ball in his hand. This is a very standard round ball with a bright blue appearance. It looks like plexiglass. Of course, that material is definitely not available in the game, so this thing should be made of some other material. The diameter of the blue ball is about seven or eight centimeters. It fits just right in your hand and is very comfortable to hold. It doesn't feel too big or small, but...

"Is this a power system?" I never expected that the power system of this wheelchair was actually external, and what was even more outrageous was that it overturned all my common sense. Let's not talk about the principle on which this small ball is suspended. The transmission problem alone is very puzzling, because the ball is not connected to the wheelchair at all, but is caught in the old man's hand. According to this situation, if the ball generates buoyancy, how does it transfer power to the chair? Could it be through the old man's body? But if the chair is hung on the ball by the old man's arm strength, then what does he need the chair for? Wouldn't it be easier to sew the balls directly onto the clothes? Besides, even if the clothes can't withstand the tension, can you just put the sphere in the storage box behind the chair? What's the point of holding this in your hand?

The old man didn't know if he was slow to react due to his age or if he simply didn't know how to watch people's actions. Anyway, he didn't react until the very tall guy next to him discovered the problem. Instead, the very tall guy explained to me: " Did you misunderstand something?"

"Misunderstand?"

Seeing me looking at him blankly, the muscular man immediately explained: "What the doctor means is that the thing in his hand can provide power to move the suspension chair. The buoyancy of the chair itself is not provided by the ball!"

"So that's it!" After hearing this explanation, I finally understood. Fortunately, there were only two people at the scene, me and the old man, otherwise I would have been entangled in this problem! The floating wheelchair does not move very fast, and after it is suspended, there is no friction at all. So if it only provides the power to move forward and backward, it can indeed be done with only the old man's arms. After all, this kind of power It is not larger than pushing a real wheelchair. On the contrary, because this is a suspended wheelchair, the resistance will definitely be much smaller. "Well, if this thing only provides horizontal power, then what does it rely on to levitate?"

"Of course the levitation relies on the air magic stone."

"Air Magic Stone?" Because the Iron Empire has little contact with the outside world, and the direction of social development is completely different, many things in the Iron Empire have their own unique names. For example, this Air Magic Stone, I have never seen it outside. I've heard of it, but I don't know if it's a mineral that is a specialty of the Iron Empire or some kind of known ore. It's just that the name of the Iron Empire is different. "Where is the air magic stone you mentioned? Can you show it to me?"

"The piece in the chair has been fixed. If you want to see it, you need to remove the cover. It's very troublesome. If you want to see it, we can go to the weapons warehouse. There are ready-made air magic stones there."

As soon as I heard what the other party said, I immediately asked him to take me there. The order he received before he came was to show me around, so when he heard that I wanted to see him, he agreed without hesitation.

To get to the so-called equipment warehouse, you have to enter the dungeon. As mentioned before, the main body of the Iron Empire is actually underground, and the part above ground only has some military facilities. Although the equipment warehouse is also a military facility, it is located underground because it belongs to the logistics support department.

The road leading underground from the city is located in the mountain in the center of the island. Although this mountain looks like a very ordinary mountain on the outside, it has actually been hollowed out inside. Almost one-third of the entire mountain's interior has been converted into functional areas, and only two-thirds of the vegetation covered on the mountain's surface are real, and the rest are disguised. As long as the operator presses a switch, , those plants will automatically separate together with the camouflage board to reveal the defensive cannon below, so it is more appropriate to say that this mountain is a fortress rather than a mountain.

The entrance to the mountain is at the foot of the mountain, and there is a camouflage door at the entrance, but I think this design is completely unnecessary. After all, there is a wide road paved with gravel outside the disguised door. Even if you hide the door, the road is still there. At that time, as soon as people see a road extending directly to the mountain, it suddenly disappears, and even fools will know that it is a disguised door.

After following the guides through the huge camouflage door, what appeared in front of us was not a downward tunnel, but a slightly upward slope. After rising for more than one meter, the road became horizontal again, but what appeared in front of us was The landscape reminded me of Longyuan’s underground base. The huge hall is supported by several huge stone pillars. The empty space is full of busy people and machinery, and the walls and floors of the entire hall are covered with metal, and it seems to be quite thick. It is estimated that this place Even if another American's ground-penetrating bomb hits, there may not be any damage.

I was still observing the situation in the hall, and the muscular man over there had already found a car. Although this thing is different from a car in reality, it is also very different from a carriage in the game. In fact, I think this thing is more suitable to be called a mobile platform than a car, because this thing is just a big flat plate with a bunch of wheels underneath. Those wheels are not big, only fifty centimeters in diameter at most. The metal plate on the wheel is two inches thick, about five meters long, and more than two meters wide. There is no cab or steering wheel on the metal plate. The control device is an upright stick at the corner. This thing is just like the joystick of a fighter jet. All you need to do is grab the stick in which direction you want to move. Just push in that direction, and the more you tilt the joystick, the faster you go.

Such a simple control method is quite surprising, but it just gave me the opportunity to ask to get out of the car. Because there are no seats or anything like that on the tablet, don’t expect comfort. Fortunately, the metal floor is flat enough, so there is no bump at all. After getting permission, I personally took a test drive and found that the response of this thing to the operation is very sensitive, and the response time is almost imperceptible. In other words, this thing may be a mechanical direct-connected structure similar to a bicycle, which controls the direction of operation and travel. , because whether it is a magic circuit or an electronic circuit, there will be a response delay, which may not be felt by ordinary people, but I can definitely detect it with my reflex nerves.

In addition to its sensitive movements, another feature of this car is that it is very powerful. I don’t know whether it is the result of gear adjustment or the power unit itself is very powerful. Anyway, this thing is definitely powerful. It feels quite powerful when starting. Even if I Push the joystick to the bottom in an instant, and the car will immediately pick up speed. However, although the horsepower is strong and the speed is very fast, the speed of this thing is very slow. Even if it reaches the limit speed, it is about 30 kilometers or more. It is faster than normal people running, but it is also very limited.

According to the explanation of the muscular man, the reason why this thing is not fast is mainly because it is specially responsible for transporting materials back and forth above and below ground. It is a commuter vehicle in the base. Its function is similar to that of a forklift in a factory, so it needs power instead of speed.

After playing with it for a while and roughly testing the performance of this thing, I gave the car back to the muscular man to drive. He drove the car to a gate. Inside the gate was a closed space. I knew it was an elevator at first glance, but the area was very large. If it was squeezed, it would be no problem to park a dozen tanks inside.

After we entered the elevator room, many more cars came in from behind, but these cars were all empty. There were three people standing on each car, who seemed to be transportation personnel. When those people saw me, they all showed curious eyes. It felt like we were seeing aliens on the road. Fortunately, the guides around me seemed to have identities, so the people over there Although he kept staring at me and pointing, he didn't come around to watch the fun.

After the thing that seemed to be an elevator was full, it lowered the gate and began to move downwards. I calculated based on the falling speed. I found that the underground city is actually more than 180 meters below the surface. Even a direct elevator can't reach it. It took more than thirty seconds to reach the end.

When the elevator door opens, the first thing we see is a wide passage area. This passage is just like a subway platform, except that the rails are replaced by a row of elevators, and the space in front of it is much higher than the waiting area of ​​the subway station.

Due to our different identities, we were the first to get off the elevator. The muscular man drove the car into the passage and immediately turned into the fork on the left. After running forward for a short distance, we saw a road on the left wall. The gate is five or six meters high and nearly ten meters wide. Different from ordinary warehouses, there were not only guards outside this door, but also a bunker. We were first inspected by the outpost about ten meters away from the door, and were only let through after passing. After passing through the bunker and arriving at the door, the muscular man motioned for us to get out of the car, and then led us into the inside of the door through a small door on the edge of the door.

"This is our equipment depot, how about it? It looks pretty good, right?" The muscular man was obviously a military representative, because he looked quite proud when introducing the equipment depot, and the fat man next to him and The half-demented old man didn't react at all.

I looked around the entire equipment library under Muscle Man's introduction, and I have to say that Muscle Man is indeed proud of it. The area here is very huge. I feel that Longyuan's experimental weapons reserve is not as big as this place. The wide storage area looks to be at least tens of thousands of square meters, and the rows of shelves inside are lined up like a supermarket. Each shelf is equipped with equipment. Of course, the variety cannot be as wide as the products in the supermarket. After all, this is a reserve. A library, not a supermarket. Most of the shelves were filled with the same gorgeous rifles I had seen before. I glanced at them and saw thousands of them. I guess these are labeled equipment here. These are the ones I saw. If all are distributed, it is estimated that everyone in the Iron Empire will be able to distribute one.

After seeing the surprised expression on my face, the muscular man guided me with satisfaction: "Please come over here. The air magic stone you want to see is right here."

In fact, what the muscular man calls air magic stone is not a pure ore. This is an equipment warehouse rather than a simple warehouse. It is impossible to put things like ore directly here. What the muscular man showed me was actually a piece of equipment that had been processed, but because the equipment itself was just polished ore, it could also be considered as raw ore.

"Is this the Air Magic Stone?" I asked in surprise as I looked at the Air Magic Stone in my hand. The air magic stone in front of me is a long strip, about fifteen centimeters long, about five centimeters wide, and about one centimeter thick. It looks a bit like the paperweight stone used in the study, but the color is weird. The color of this thing is a very dazzling orange-red, which looks similar to the reflective clothing worn by cleaners. I have never seen such a color in natural ores before.

After I picked up an air magic stone, the muscular man also took one and explained: "This is the air magic stone, but the raw ore is not long, but has weird shapes and all kinds. The one you see now is our The finished product is made by separating raw ore from impurities, crushing it and re-bonding it.”

"Is this glued back together with powder?"

"Yes, the shape of the separated air magic stone itself is irregular, and usually there are not such large pieces. After being crushed and re-glued, it can be shaped at will, and the process of separating impurities must also be crushed, so if you want to get the whole It’s not easy to block, but fortunately there is no change in the performance of the Air Magic Stone that was re-glued after being crushed.”

I nodded and asked, "Do you have a lot of this ore on your island?"

The muscular man shook his head and said: "In fact, the reserves of air magic stones are not high. What is in this warehouse is almost one-third of the island's reserves. Half of the remaining two-thirds are in use, and there are still One-third are proven reserves and have not yet been mined or processed.”

"Did you find this mining area?"

"Yes, we have only discovered this mining area so far, and the area is very small. However, we estimate that this kind of ore is not the only one that exists. It should be found in other places, but it has not been discovered, or the person who discovered it does not know its value. .”

I nodded and asked again: "What is this thing glued with?"

"Just add water."

"ah?"

"Air magic stone is a very strange ore. It has a characteristic that is different from ordinary ores in that it slowly dissolves in water. We crush it and dissolve it with water, then pour it into a mold to dry, and wait until the water has completely evaporated. It becomes this finished product in your hands.”

"It actually dissolves in water? Why does it sound almost like salt?"

"It's a bit like salt." The muscular man said: "Once this air magic stone is formed, it will become relatively strong. Its hardness is very high, but it is a little brittle, but it will not affect our current use needs. big."

"What are you doing with this thing?"

"Of course it's used to reduce weight." The muscular man showed off his muscles first, and then explained: "You should have noticed that most of the residents of our Iron Empire are very thin. A strong person like me is very weak. Less. Although our inventors have tried their best to consider the weight issue in the weapons they created, sometimes they still feel too heavy, so we use this air magic stone to reduce the weight. When we encounter situations where we need to lighten the weight but there is really no way to reduce the weight. We just put a few pieces of air magic stone into the equipment, so that the originally heavy equipment will become very light. And as you know, this air magic stone is soluble, so we can make it into any shape as needed, so even if Even if it is a close-fitting armor, you can easily add a layer of air magic stone inside to reduce the load."

I immediately became excited when I heard that even armor could be added with air magic stones. It was not because I planned to reduce the weight of the armor of players in our guild. After all, the armor itself in the game ignored part of the weight, and the game system did not allow it. Players can change their equipment randomly, so I have no intention of changing their equipment. What I really thought of was the Mobile Angel. These guys are artificial creations themselves. If they are given air magic stones that can reduce their load, wouldn't it be possible to greatly increase their mobility without changing the power system?

Just when I was thinking about the bright prospect of adding air magic stones to the mobile angel, I suddenly realized a problem. After weighing the air magic stone in my hand, which weighed at least half a kilogram, I asked the muscular man in surprise: "Didn't you say this thing can help you lose weight? Why does it feel so heavy in my hand?"

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