Chapter 545 - 544: The New Laboratory

Cecil’s primary Administrative Office, inside Aunt Heidi’s office, the aunt and niece were staring at each other intently, while Kamel floated quietly beside them, as silent as a light bulb.

"Aunt... this is the entire budget request..." Rebecca sensed Aunt Heidi might not be in the best mood, but she still bravely handed over the plan and budget application form she had worked on all night, "Theoretically... as long as the lab doesn’t explode for two months, you won’t need to add funds in the first quarter..."

Aunt Heidi’s eye twitched slightly: "Do you know that you’ve caused four explosions in six days, destroying eight amplifiers and two engine prototypes?"

Rebecca shrunk her neck a bit: "But didn’t you say once... failure is the foundation of success, the Mage’s research path is always accompanied by the cost of failure..."

Heidi covered her forehead: "Did I also say the second half of that sentence—the rational Mage will find ways to minimize failures, while overly straightforward Mages typically end up broke."

Rebecca raised her neck: "You never said that."

"..." Heidi was speechless, looking at the Cecil Marchioness in front of her, then sighed under the girl’s pure and persistent gaze, and sat back behind her desk, "Let me see that plan first."

"Oh, oh, okay!" Rebecca hurriedly handed over the plan, her face already blooming with a smile, "I knew aunt, you are the best!"

"Don’t be too happy just yet, I need to carefully review your plan first," said Heidi, accepting the plan without raising her head, "Remember, before I became the Chief Administrative Officer, I was also a Mage—"

She meticulously examined the follow-up experiment plan Rebecca had developed, and soon noticed the existence of two entirely different approaches and verification processes. She couldn’t help but raise her head: "Simultaneously verifying both the centralized and distributed power schemes, and also testing the impact of Weight-Reduction on balance for both types of vehicles?"

"Yes—don’t worry, I’ve already arranged the manpower."

"It’s not a manpower issue..." Heidi frowned, "Aren’t you being too hasty?"

Rebecca herself was an extremely action-oriented girl, always acting a bit impulsively since childhood. Seeing the plan this girl came up with made Heidi worried she might be too rash, but seeing Kamel, who came along with Rebecca, left her uncertain—Rebecca might be impulsive, but Master Kamel, without his nerve endings, shouldn’t be heated up with this kid, right?

"...I’m a bit hasty, but there’s no choice," Rebecca answered Heidi’s query without hiding anything, speaking openly about her thoughts, "Ancestor has already signed a mining agreement with the Duke of the East, transporting the ore from White Sand Mine won’t be easy. Although the ore can first be transported to Gran, then loaded onto ships following the White River to the internal industrial area, there’s still a long land route to cover. To adhere to Ancestor’s planned mining method, even with Magic-guided Vehicles to transport, it still wouldn’t be enough..."

Rebecca paused here, showing a determined look: "So I want to resolve the train issue before the ore at White Sand Mine becomes severely piled up... Even if we can’t produce the best one, we should at least make one that can run."

Heidi couldn’t help but show a hint of amazement in her eyes after listening to Rebecca.

So the child has thought so much...

No wonder Ancestor always reminded me not to always treat Rebecca as a child, saying that this girl is just lively in character, but what she considers... is not shallow at all.

"Your thinking is excellent," Heidi sighed softly, "Ancestor should be very pleased. Alright, I’ll allocate the funds to you, but I also..."

"Wow!"

"Don’t ’wow’ just yet, I have a few things to remind you," Heidi glared at Rebecca, who was about to jump up, "You said something correct earlier, even if you can’t produce the best one, you should at least produce one that can run—However, you seem to have overly high expectations for the Magic Train. We just managed to create Magic-guided Vehicles, and now you’re dreaming of producing a train engine with traction a hundred times that of the Magic-guided Vehicle... you’re going too far. Keep in mind, the powerful magical devices you desire don’t just represent a quantitative change. I suggest you set a smaller goal for the Magic Train—since there’s the concept of ’tracks,’ even a Magic-guided Vehicle pulling four or five carriages surpasses the current horse-drawn carriage teams by far, doesn’t it?"

Upon hearing Aunt Heidi’s words, Rebecca reluctantly showed a slight expression of dissatisfaction.

But she had to admit, her aunt’s words held some truth—facts have been proven, once a set of magical devices reaches a certain scale, its mechanical pressure, Magic Power load, and environmental demands concern more than just quantitative changes.

Watching the change in Rebecca’s facial expression, Heidi helplessly shook her head, then picked up the pen to write her name.

The upfront funds received from the royal family... hadn’t warmed up yet, and were to be turned into explosive materials by Rebecca.

Cecil’s Great Steward sighed a long sigh in her heart, her hand trembled slightly while approving the funds.

Just then, the Magic Web Terminal placed beside the desk buzzed and came to life, accompanied by flashing lights, this unexpected communication disrupted everyone’s movements.

Rebecca watched her aunt place the signing pen down, watched as Aunt Heidi opened the communication, and watched as Ancestor’s figure appeared above the communication device.

The three people in the room immediately stepped forward: "Ancestor." "Ancestor." "Sir Byron."

"Heidi—ah, Rebecca and Kamel are there with you too," Gawain on the communicator quickly noticed the people in the office, "Great, no need to go searching for them."

Aunt Heidi curiously asked, "What’s happening?"

"Come to the Magic Guide Technology Research Institute, Pittman, Jenni, and I are waiting for you here," Gawain showed a slight smile, "We have something good to show you."

The three people in the room exchanged glances. After a brief moment of daze, Kamel suddenly realized, "I might have guessed what it is..."

Upon arriving at the Magic Guide Technology Research Institute, Kamel’s guess was confirmed—

In a specially cleared large laboratory, several silver-white capsule-shaped magical devices were neatly arranged on hexagonal platforms. Compared to the prototype, their structure was obviously more complete and compact, with an added shell that could close from both sides. Below the capsule, the floor around the platform was inlaid with flashing rune triggers, and behind the capsule extended the neural cord connecting the platform and the base. Apart from this, the laboratory only had some monitoring rune terminals against the wall, with no extra decorations or furnishings, making the room appear quite spacious and making the silver-white capsules in the center more mysterious and striking.

Just as Kamel guessed: after the first "Immersive Neural Capsule" test was successful, more capsules were created.

Gawain was already waiting beside one of the capsules, with technicians in white short robes busy near the monitoring devices against the wall. Pittman and Jenni were checking the operation of the neural cords and rune arrays around the capsules. As Kamel and others entered the laboratory, Pittman immediately turned around and greeted them, "Ah, you’re here—take a look at these fun gadgets!"

"These..." Kamel looked at the scene with some surprise, "are they already completed?"

"While you were busy figuring out how to blow up the engine group, I adjusted the neural cords of these capsules," Pittman said smugly, "Of course, there’s also Miss Jenni—the rune array part was adjusted by her."

Rebecca, at this point, was already circling one of the capsules in excitement. She only stopped when Aunt Heidi couldn’t help but lightly cough to remind her. This girl looked at Gawain, eyes wide open, "Ancestor, was the appearance of these devices adjusted by you?"

Gawain smiled and patted Rebecca’s head, "Actually, there wasn’t much adjustment—just added shields on both sides of the seat and an enclosure that can close."

Compared to the prototype from the other day, the "enclosable shell" was the biggest change to these officially modeled capsules. Due to the non-implantable neural cord’s "immersion" effect on the brain being inferior to the implantable neural cord, users were easily disrupted by external interference during network connections, which was the biggest issue with the immersive device. To address this, Pittman, with a Druid’s mindset, came up with many technical methods to increase neural coupling and improve thought synchronization rate, but ultimately, Gawain thought of a simpler and more straightforward solution: just add a cover.

After adding this "peripheral," these things that originally looked somewhat like seats truly looked more like capsules.

"This is such a simple but effective method..." Aunt Heidi watched these strangely styled magical devices with great interest and admiration. She was curious about how the ancestor thought of such a simple method, but she quickly noticed the appearance of these capsules—a long container, a person could lie inside, and there was a lid on top...

emmmmm...

Cecil’s Great Steward had a quite reasonable and justified association.

Of course, the mature and steady Aunt Heidi just thought about it without speaking out.

But there was someone with an iron head on site.

Rebecca immediately jumped in front of Gawain, "Ancestor, did you get inspiration from the coffin you lay in back then... Wow!"

Rebecca was knocked back by Gawain, but after this silly girl’s shout, everyone present showed a tacit smile.

"Ahem," Gawain had to lightly cough to bring the scene back on track, "Enough of that, let’s do some real work."

Aunt Heidi looked at him curiously, "You called us here... to prepare for testing these devices together?"

"In fact, the tests are already completed," Gawain said, "Offline testing, connecting to the Magic Web, and connecting to the Eternal Sleepers’ mental network, all have been tested. Today we are performing the formal connection."

Then he paused and continued, "I will enter the network with you."

Gawain’s idea was simple—since the first batch of immersive neural capsules was completed, a certain plan he had made a long time ago could be implemented: merging his experimental personnel into the network to conduct scientific research in the ready-made "virtual laboratory."

That virtual experimental environment had been completed for some time, but since only he could connect to the network, the experimental space’s potential was quite limited. Although he did throw around some blueprints in that virtual environment, after encountering the local technical personnel of this world and witnessing the "wisdom of the otherworld people," he had long recognized one thing: he, as a transmigrator, was far from the center of the world, at best a regional focal point, and couldn’t compare to specialists in many areas, especially in technology. Such a large virtual space, if he couldn’t integrate the domain’s professional technicians into it, having just him occupy it would be a waste.

Fortunately, that waste was finally about to end.

But he still needed to be cautious—technicians are valuable, especially those most trustworthy and able to access confidential information; they are the treasure of the entire Cecil Principality. He had to prevent any accidents from happening to them, stop them from being taken out by the Eternal Sleepers, and the best way was to connect to the network with them together.

If any Eternal Sleeper discovered them as intruders, they could just throw something huge from above or below spanning millions of years, at least ensuring a safe retreat for everyone.

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