CH266 The Promise of R&D
"Crossbows?" Drake frowned. "You do realise that crossbows are practically useless beyond the Intermediate rank, don’t you? Their bolts are slow enough that even an Elite-rank Mage can dodge them unless caught by surprise. Worse still, their redraw rate is abysmal. They’re single-use weapons at best."
"I understand that all too well, Father," Alex replied evenly.
"And yet you’re suggesting them anyway?" Drake stared hard at his son.
Drake leaned back in his chair, studying him. His son had already surprised him with ideas he would never have considered. For now, he kept his judgement in check.
"Alright then. What are you seeing in this weapon that the rest of us aren’t?" He said.
Instead of answering directly, Alex lifted his palm. A glowing spell circle formed above it—the formation for the Magic Ball spell.
"Father, did you know that the Magic Ball is often considered one of the most useless spells for a mage? Beyond the Intermediate rank, its mana-to-effect ratio is so poor that almost no one bothers with it. And yet today, a ’glazed tower’ like the DragonHold Enclave and other reputable mage towers insist that their acolytes master it."
He paused, letting the question hang. "Do you know why that is?"
Drake didn’t respond. He merely folded his arms, waiting for his son to answer his own riddle.
Alex smiled faintly. As he spoke, the spell circle in his hand shifted and morphed.
"It’s because the Magic Ball forms the foundation for countless advanced spells. With only slight modification, the ’useless’ Magic Ball becomes the Fireball—the staple spell almost every mage worth his salt knows. And from there come its other elemental derivatives –such as Water Ball, Lightening Ball, Wind Ball and others— as well."
He closed his fist, snuffing out the Fireball spell circle, and instead projected a new spell circle from his Beta Bracer.
"But it doesn’t stop there. Even the Fireball can be modified into the Grand Fireball, the battlefield-levelling spell of Great Mages and above. A spell so devastating that even many Legendary Mages still rely on it in large-scale wars. Some, as you surely know better than I, have even refined it further—creating their own variants powerful enough to serve them in duels between Legends."
Earl Drake gave a single grave confirmatory nod.
"All of this," Alex concluded, his eyes sharp, "is because one day, someone looked at a useless spell like the humble Magic Ball and asked—what if?"
Alex smiled as he continued,
"And Magic Ball is no exception. It is but one in a long line of things that have continuously grown and remained useful today only because they are constantly being updated to meet the world’s ever-growing needs.
"Swords, bows, armour, inscriptions, siege weapons, agriculture, finance, bureaucracy... many of the things we consider indispensable today have only endured because they were refined and adapted. And those who innovated them first have always been the ones to reap the greatest benefits."
He placed his fingers on the paper containing his proposal for the Crossbow.
"The crossbow isn’t useless because the weapon itself is inherently weak. It is useless because the world has abandoned it—never updating it... never bringing it in line with the demands of the current era. I wish to change that."
Earl Drake remained impassive, his face unreadable, showing no sign of being swayed.
So Alex pressed on. "I focused on the crossbow because I saw in it the promise of a future. A future where an atypical force can wield a light but lethal, underestimated weapon. A weapon that can serve both at long and short ranges. A weapon simple enough to use with minimal training—simply point and shoot. Its main resource can also be sourced almost anywhere, making it practical for countless situations.
"And most importantly, its breakthroughs can be scaled upwards, feeding directly into larger and more significant weapon systems. After all, at its core, a ballista is nothing more than a gigantic crossbow."
If it wasn’t obvious, the "promise" Alex spoke of was guns—the staple weaponry of modern armies in his previous life.
Guns did not exist in this world. Not even the humble flintlock. That discovery had shocked Alex, and it left him wondering what on earth the dwarves of this world were doing if they had neither perfected the crossbow nor invented firearms.
Since that was the case, and being the humble innovator that he was, Alex decided to gently nudge this world toward the single most revolutionary small-arms weapon system humanity had ever known in his past life.
[A.N: Ah, what a saint.]
Alex put aside his ’dream’ and shifted his attention to more practical matters.
"The problem of power in a crossbow can be solved much like it was with bows—by introducing stronger, more advanced strings. Strings that either draw strength from their own material or channel the Internal Energy of their wielder. In either case, the stronger the user, the stronger the crossbow becomes, and the more devastating each shot will be.
"Similarly, the issue of reloading can be overcome through more sophisticated engineering. Back at the Enclave, I once designed a compound bow structure using pulley systems for an Engineering class. While that exact design might not directly apply to crossbows, it does show what dedicated engineering can achieve when improving a weapon. Off the top of my head, I can think of several solutions.
"For instance, we could introduce a cartridge or magazine system, where multiple bolts are loaded into a chamber-like mechanism that automatically feeds them into the crossbow. Reloading would become almost entirely mechanical, with speed depending only on how quickly the user can switch out cartridges. Such an innovation could even usher in an era of rapid-fire bolts.
"Imagine it, Father. A crossbow capable of firing three, six, or even ten bolts in quick succession. Would such a weapon not strike terror into the hearts of enemies on the battlefield? And if this system could be implemented on a humble crossbow, then what might happen if the same principles were scaled up for a siege weapon like the ballista?"
He leaned forward slightly, his eyes shining. "This, Father, is the true beauty of research and development."
Once again, Drake said nothing. His expression remained as cold, unreadable, and stoic as ever.
He merely lifted the document on the R&D proposal and set it aside, moving on to the final paper in the stack. Tʜe sourcᴇ of thɪs content ɪs novel·fire·net
"War Reparation Proposal."