Chapter 211 — The Heretical Undercurrent

Jenny explained from beside him: "Once the force shield is activated, the scorching ray's shot count drops by half. But the shield isn't something that needs to stay on constantly—you can add a new rune trigger to switch it on and off. As an energy shield with limited defensive coverage, it lets soldiers raise the force shield only when they're in close combat."

Rebecca chimed in at once: "We were going to just make a tier-three eggshell shield, but then we found out it drains way too much—the armguard couldn't hold out a few minutes—so we had to settle for putting the tier-two spell Force Shield in there first!"

Gao Yang lifted his eyes to glance at the iron-headed girl. "What the hell is an 'eggshell shield'? That's Mage Armor! Don't just make up names because it looks like an eggshell, all right?"

Rebecca scratched her hair. "Heh heh, as long as you know what I mean…"

Gao Yang looked at the girl, at a loss. "How far along is the next generation of armor?"

"Oh, oh, we've successfully integrated the combat pack with the armor, and it's detachable, so the arrays on the armor can draw power straight from the combat pack. When necessary you can also drop the pack to reduce weight, or swap it out. And because there's a mana capacitor built into the breastplate too, it can keep fighting for a while even without the pack," Rebecca said enthusiastically, pulling out the blueprints she'd drawn overnight to show Gao Yang. "Look—first we integrated the tier-one Breeze Shield into the breastplate. It costs the least; it doesn't offer much physical protection, but it filters toxic vapors and plague-type spells, making soldiers safer in harsh environments. Then, following your suggestions, we added heat-insulation and weight-reduction runes to the armor's inner layer. Those are all cantrip-level or tier-one spells—with the combat pack as a power source, they can run continuously…"

Rebecca described it excitedly while Gao Cen nodded in satisfaction—the functions realized were all basic, but the approach of using new rune arrays to approximate enchanted equipment was clearly the right one. Yet as she talked on, Rebecca trailed off, her expression a little downcast: "But that jet device you mentioned before, strapped to the back of the armor, where a soldier just has to shout 'Char!' and charge forward breathing fire—I really can't figure that one out. I thought about putting a fireball array on the back, but it turns out it blows all the comrades around you sky-high…"

Gao Yang nearly choked to death on his own spit. "Pff—didn't I tell you at the time that was a joke!?"

"But it sounds so cool!" Rebecca said, eyes sparkling as she looked at Gao Yang. "And adding a bunch of glowing streamers to the back of the armor, so that just by jumping three meters high you can fire arcane missiles in every direction…"

"You forget all of that this instant!!"