Chapter 115 — The Spinning Wheel and the Bearing
Blade of Dawn · Page 2 of 4
Gao Yang paid no mind to the latter half of that speech; his attention had been entirely captured by the fact that "magnetic fields affect mana," and he sank into profound bewilderment: "Are you sure the 'magnetic field' you generate is really the same 'magnetic field' everyone in this world knows? You know, the same term in two different worlds can very well refer to completely opposite phenomena!"
"That I can really confirm," the Nikolai Egg bobbed vigorously up and down, as if imitating a human nod. "A magnetic field is a magnetic field. Of course, the people of this world don't seem to have the concept of a magnetic field—they only know magnetic force, the kind of force by which natural lodestone attracts iron. But I've confirmed it: the magnetic field I generate with my magnetocytes is the same as this world's natural lodestone... Why do you ask?"
"I don't know where the problem lies," Gao Yang spread his hands with a bitter smile. "I've run plenty of experiments with magnetic fields and never once found that they could affect the flow of mana. Could it be that the magnetic fields I used weren't strong enough?"
There was another half-sentence he left unfinished: apart from using magnetic fields to affect mana, his experiments in generating electricity from magnetism had also failed...
"Strength? I don't think that matters much—the magnetic field my magnetocytes produce isn't strong," the metal ball said, swaying to and fro. "Maybe it's frequency. You didn't use a high-frequency magnetic field, did you? I remember a thousand years ago those 'mage-masters' used an oscillating magnetic field to try to scan me—what was the frequency... several million oscillations per second? That seemed to be the highest frequency they could produce, and it still wasn't even a tenth of my magnetocytes' frequency. Why don't you try pushing the frequency of your magnetic field higher?"
A vein throbbed at Gao Yang's temple: in this godforsaken medieval backwater with its broken chain of technology, where on earth was he supposed to get a high-frequency magnetic field of tens of millions of hertz!
The Nikolai Egg was probably the only high-frequency source in this entire world capable of generating such a frequency!
Knowing there was simply no way to set up a qualifying experimental environment at this moment, Gao Yang silently filed the matter away in his mind and then made to ask about the other's metal-controlling ability. But just as he was about to speak, he saw the door of the brick kiln factory flung open, and a silly roe deer... fireball launcher... ironhead... Rebecca came charging over in a whirlwind.
"Ancestor Yanren! Ancestor Yanren!" the viscount's daughter shouted excitedly as she ran. "Come quick! Come with me, hurry!!"
Seeing the girl's excitement, Gao Yang's first instinct was to dodge aside: he dreaded that this silly roe deer might have a brainstorm and fling seventy or eighty great fireballs right into his face on the spot...
Only after Rebecca had run up to him and finally gotten her breath back did Gao Yang unhurriedly ask her: "Did you finally blow up Heidi's laboratory with a fireball?"
"Ah... ah?!" Rebecca had barely caught her breath when Gao Yang's words startled her, and she promptly waved her hands frantically. "No, no! I was very careful, I tell you—that mana engine you proposed, we've got it assembled over there!"
Gao Yang's originally composed expression was instantly replaced by astonishment and delight.
"It's finished?! Have you test-run it?"
"Not yet," Rebecca said, waving her hands. "We're waiting for you to come and test it! But Aunt Heidi has already tested every component—they were all made according to the blueprints and all meet the intended performance, so there shouldn't be any problem..."