Chapter 391: The Sigil’s Secret
After winter came, the snow fell more gently.
Roland was humming as he read through three manuscripts spread across his table.
The first laid out a trial production plan for a new class of ammunition. The second was a blueprint for a next-generation light weapon. The third was a construction plan for a Spellcaster Tower. The first two had been gestating in his mind for months—but it was the third that made him lean forward in his chair.
With Agatha’s ability to freeze and regulate temperature now at his disposal, the town’s nitric acid output had multiplied. The stability problem that had plagued mass production of nitroglycerin was solved. All the conditions for manufacturing double-base propellant were finally in place.
He knew the theory: dissolve nitrocotton in nitroglycerin, work it into a viscous jelly, slice or granulate the result. What he still needed was an alchemist to determine exact mixture ratios through experiment. Kyle Sichi, fortunately, had grown adept at both quantitative and qualitative work. Hand the task to him and results would come back in a week, two at most.
New propellant meant new weapons. Compared with blackfire powder—which demanded a large-caliber revolving rifle just to achieve acceptable lethality—double-base propellant could do equivalent damage from a smaller barrel. The math was straightforward: switch from heavy-caliber repeaters to light-caliber automatic arms. Better firepower, lower material cost per shot. The specific parameters would depend on what Anna could produce, but the direction was clear.
Roland drank a mouthful of hot tea and set the third manuscript before him. This was what excited him most.
The plan called for a tower beside the Witch House—multi-story, dedicated to the research and manufacture of sigils. He let his imagination run: a lofty spire rising among the chimneys and foundries, incongruous and magnificent.
He laughed out loud before he could stop himself.
Nightingale, gnawing dried fish at the edge of the room, gave him a contemptuous look. “Are sigils really so interesting? The witches’ kingdom had plenty of sigils, and still lost to the demons.”
“There are some very interesting things inside.” He pulled a thick book from his desk drawer—the sigil collection translated from the Quest Society’s experimental notes, cataloguing every formula the Society had discovered across more than two hundred years. “Knowledge that’s new always seems especially attractive, even if it’s only basics.”
He had spent most of his nights on this book since Agatha completed the translation. Reading through the composite lists of magic stones felt like assembling runewords—the same branching possibilities, the same jolt of recognition when one combination unlocked another. He imagined Kyle Sichi receiving his copy of Elementary Chemistry for the first time, racing through the formulas with that same specific hunger.
“For example?” Nightingale leaned over his shoulder.
“Like this.” He pointed to a passage. “The ancient witches called it the Sigil of Listening. Long-distance communication—and like the Sigil of Tracking, it remains effective even when separated into parts.” His finger moved down the page. “The materials are simple. One Echo Stone, one Marking Stone.”
According to the book, the effective range ran to dozens of miles. No match for a mobile phone backed by satellites and relay towers—but serviceable as a walkie-talkie, and in a world where couriers still rode horses through snow, that was remarkable.
“Is it?” Nightingale glanced at the page, then caught his pointing finger and dragged it to the facing page. “But it says here—Echo Stones come from Fearsome Demons, and Marking Stones are commonly seen in Devil’s Town. How exactly do you plan to obtain either?”
“We already have the materials.” He said it with the satisfaction of someone who has been waiting to say it. “The red crystal Lightning found in the ruins—that’s an Echo Stone. The Marking Stone is a component material in the Sigil of Tracking. Tilly brought several back; they just need to be disassembled.”
“Even if Agatha assembles it, you’ll end up with only one Sigil of Listening.”
“Let her try. When we fight demons, we’ll acquire more magic stones.” He hadn’t had the technical foundation to research new applications of magic power before Agatha arrived. He wasn’t going to waste the opportunity now.
“Alright.” Nightingale shrugged. “And the Sigil of God’s Will—what stones does that one require?”
“Last page, I think.” Roland flipped to the back of the book. “By the way—how did your combat capacity test go?”
Nightingale went still. Then, with precise economy: “Secret.”
She had not forgiven Anna for something.
“Here.” He tapped the page. “The four required stones are all listed as unknown. The Quest Society likely omitted them for security reasons. According to Agatha, those stones come primarily from Senior Demons—so even if they were written down, no one could obtain them.”
“And yet you display this precious thing openly in the hall.” Nightingale groaned. “If the Transcendents find out, they’ll be so angry they’ll claw their way back from the dead.”
“Because it probably isn’t that precious.” He paused. “About as precious as a few dozen kilograms of TNT.”
He didn’t explain what he meant. Nightingale didn’t ask.
He waited until Agatha had finished her daily acid production before calling her into the office.
“Have a look at the Spellcaster Tower I’ve designed for you.” He held up his sketch. “Basement is a warehouse. Three floors above ground—apprentice lab, tower master’s lab, and an office.”
Agatha studied the drawing. Her frown deepened. “Why is it called a Spellcaster Tower? All I want is a chemistry lab like Kyle’s—a little more spacious and bright. A tower is unnecessarily complicated. In Taquila, towers existed because the city had no horizontal space. You have plenty of open ground here.”
That’s not fashionable, Roland thought with some force.
“The construction challenges aren’t insurmountable. Aside from the listed facilities, do you have other requirements?”
“No.” Agatha raised both hands. “If you insist.”
“Good.” He set the sketch down. “Can you assemble the sigils alone?”
“No.” She shook her head. “Sigils are created by linking magic stones, but the materials needed to conduct magical power between them are complicated. And most importantly—it requires the blood of demons.”
Roland stopped. “What?”
“You heard correctly. Fresh blood.” Her voice was flat. “When the Quest Society was investigating the nature of magical power, it conducted thousands of experiments and eventually proved that the flesh and blood of witches, demons, and demonic beasts are fundamentally different in nature, and different in function.”
Something cold settled at the base of his skull. “The flesh and blood of… witches?”
“To create the God’s Punishment Army,” Agatha said.
The words landed without ceremony, without inflection, without pity.
Chapter 391: The Sigil’s Secret
Translator: TransN Editor: TransN
After winter arrived, the snow seemed to subside considerably.
Roland was humming a tune as he read through the three manuscripts on his table.
They were, separately, the plan for the trial and production of the latest type of ammunition, the blueprint for the latest generation of small weapons, and the construction plan for the Spellcaster Tower.
The former two manuscripts were ideas which he had conceived for a long time. Now that he could make use of Agatha’s abilities to freeze and control temperature, the town’s nitric acid output increased manyfold. The problem regarding the stability of the mass production of nitroglycerin had also been solved, and therefore, all of the conditions for the manufacture of double base propellants were fundamentally provided.
Even though Roland knew that this type of propellant was created by dissolving nitrocotton in nitroglycerin, and eventually obtaining a viscous jelly that could be sliced or granulated, he still required an alchemist to test and find out the mixture ratios involved.
Fortunately, Kyle Sichi was already very experienced in conducting both quantitative and qualitative experiments. If this task was given to him, the results should be obtainable in one or two weeks.
Since Roland was already trying to produce a brand new propellant, naturally, the development of a new type of light weapon was also on the agenda.
Compared with blackfire gunpowder, which required the use of a largecaliber revolving rifle, only a small amount of a double base propellant was necessary to achieve an equivalent lethality. Therefore, based on firepower and cost-to-performance ratio, it was definitely better to switch from rifles to light-caliber automatic weapons.
Of course, the specific parameters were to be further determined according to the results of Anna’s processing.
Roland drank a mouthful of hot tea and placed the third manuscript in front of him. This was what excited him the most at present.
Compared to the other plans, the contents of this document looked very discordant. At Agatha’s request, he planned to build a Spellcaster Tower beside the Witch House and use it for the research and manufacturing of sigils.
He imagined a lofty Magic Tower standing high among the masses of chimneys and factories. It felt simply… too cool and fancy.
Roland started laughing uncontrollably.
Nightingale, who was at one side busy gnawing on dried fish, looked at Roland contemptuously. “Are sigils really so interesting? The witches’ kingdom possessed many sigils, yet still lost to the demons.”
“But there’re some very interesting things inside.” The prince took a thick book out of a drawer. It was a sigil collection that was translated from the experimental notes left behind by the Quest Society. It recorded all of the formulas discovered by the Quest Society over more than 200 years.
To him, this was a completely new territory.
After Agatha had completed the translation, Roland spent most of his nighttimes reading the book. As he read about the uses and composite lists of the magic stones, He felt as if he was assembling runewords. Probably, when the Chief Alchemist first received the book of Elementary Chemistry, he carried similar excitement as he studied the different chemical formulas.
“Knowledge that’s new always seems especially attractive, even if it’s only basics.”
“For example?” Nightingale leant over to Roland.
“Like this.” Roland pointed to a sentence in the book. “The ancient witches called this the Sigil of Listening. It is used for long-distance communication, and, like the Sigil of Tracking, it’ll remain effective even if it’s separated into parts.” He shifted his pointing finger downwards. “The materials are very simple. All you need is a piece of Echo Stone and a piece of Marking Stone.”
According to the book’s description, the effective range of this sigil was dozens of miles. Although it could not compare to the mobile phones of later ages, which were supported by many signal towers and satellites, it could still suffice as a walkie-talkie.
“Is it?” Nightingale glanced at the page and then pulled Roland’s finger towards the page on the right. “However, it’s written here that ‘Echo Stones come from Fearsome Demons, and Marking Stones are commonly seen in Devil’s Town.’ How are you going to obtain these two magic stones?”
“No, we already have the materials,” Roland said zealously. “The piece of red crystal which Lightning found in the ruins was an Echo Stone. As for the Marking Stone, it’s one of the composite materials of the Sigil of Tracking— Tilly has brought along a few of this, and they simply have to be disassembled.”
“Even if Agatha is able to create it, you’ll only be able to obtain one Sigil of Listening.”
“Just let her try. Anyway, when we fight demons in the future, we’ll acquire more and more Magic Stones.” It was too bad that, previously, there weren’t the conditions for research on new applications of magic power. Now that Roland had the technical support of Agatha, he was not about to let go of these resources which cost nearly nothing.
“Alright.” Nightingale shrugged. “As for the Sigil of God’s Will, what magic stones does it require?”
“This… I remember seeing it on the last page.” Roland flipped to the final page of the book. “By the way, how was the result of your fighting capacity test?”
Nightingale flinched for a while and then uttered a single word. “Secret!”
She seemed to have been frustrated by Anna.
“Found it, over here.” Roland pouted his lips. “The four required magic stones are all written as unknown… probably, out of confidentiality considerations, the Quest Society didn’t record them in the written form. However, according to Agatha, these magic stones mostly come from the Senior Demons, and therefore, even if they were written down, no one would be able to obtain them.”
“And yet you display such a precious object openly in the hall.” Nightingale groaned. “If the Transcendents find out, they’ll be so angry at you that they’ll even come back to life.”
“Because it’s nothing precious, probably… as precious as a few dozen kilograms of TNT.” Roland laughed but did not reply.
…
This time, he waited until Agatha had completed her production of acid for the day before he called her into the office.
“Have a look at the Spellcaster Tower that I’ve designed for you.” Roland held up his sketch. “The basement is a warehouse, and there are three storeys above ground. They are, separately, the apprentice lab, the tower master’s lab, and the office.”
“Wait… why is it called the Spellcaster Tower?” Agatha frowned. “All I want is a chemical lab like Sir Kyle’s, except a little more spacious and bright. It’ll be very troublesome to build a tower like this. In Taquila, towers
were built only because the land area of the city was small. You have lots of open space here.”
“That’s not fashionable already!” Roland shouted in his heart. “Anyway, the problems regarding the construction aren’t difficult to solve. Aside from the facilities that I have stated, do you have other demands?”
“No.” Agatha raised her hands. “If you insist.”
“Great.” Roland placed the sketch down and started talking about the idea he thought of in the morning. “Can you complete the sigil production alone?”
“No, I can’t.” Agatha shook her head. “Although sigils are created by linking magic stones, the materials required to transmit magic power are very complicated. Most importantly, it requires the blood of demons.”
The prince was stunned. “What?”
“You didn’t hear wrongly. And it has to be fresh blood.” She said solemnly. “When the Quest Society was figuring out the nature of magic power, it conducted thousands of experiments and eventually proved that the flesh and blood of witches, demons and demonic beasts are completely different in nature, and their functions are also remarkably different.”
“The flesh and blood of…witches?” Roland received a shock when he suddenly realized the meaning behind these words. He asked impulsively, “What are their functions?”
“To create God’s Punishment Army,” Agatha said stoically.