Since Lilith was certain there would not be any quick movements form the big players I planned a quick trip to Iron Rock. We still had the new and improved Lilith defending the gate. And the maid knights were here as well.

Shani wanted to hunt in hell so she stayed too. In the end only Lucy and myself went on the trip. Lily protested that we needed a maid with us but she was training her new wings with Lilith. Iris and Minerva were busy with training recruits and managing our forces. We could have brought a junior maid, like Nira, but I decided it was unnecessary.

Also, it was nice to travel alone with Lucy. We made sure to have a cosy magical tent with us. We also spent a lot of time running in our animal forms. I had not turned into a panther in a while. Playing in this form could be quite a bit of fun. Although I somehow felt a lot like lazing around whenever I became a feline.

I noticed that the construction of rail tracks was already in progress as we travelled. The dwarfs partially used existing tunnels but added some new ones with earth magic, to ensure the train could go mostly straight.

Once we arrived in Iron Rock I headed to the university to meet the train team. Well, first I had to find out where the team was, so we headed to the headmaster.

"Amaya, Lucy, it's great to see you!" Nicholas greeted us. "Have you concluded your business with Beira?"

"Sort of. It is handled for now. We are still working on a counter for the runes but Beira herself is no longer a problem." And hopefully she would stay dead.

"I see, that is good news! Beravis is trying hard to gain influence but they are wary of your patronage. And your train idea has brought more investment from the dwarves. We do have quite a few refugees from the former Empire though. Hopefully the growing economy will provide jobs for them." He said.

"The train should help, if we get it going. So, how far is the team?" I asked.

Nicholas smiled. "The newest prototype has not exploded, yet."

"Yet?" Lucy asked.

"Well, the first three designs exploded. But your funds paid for healing and repairs." Nicholas replied.

Magical healing was certainly helpful but I wondered if I should introduce safety protocols. It should not be necessary to get healing if you handled your experiments right. Well, if no one was permanently hurt it was probably fine.

Nicholas escorted us to a building at the edge of the academy. Inside was the prototype of a locomotive. There were 8 big metal wheels on an armoured metal wagon. On top of the wagon was the turbine. It was a metal tube, glowing with runes. I could also see the propeller. And some singe marks on the metal…

Stolen story; please report.

"Team, your sponsor is here to have a look at your hard work!" Nicholas said.

Four people emerged from the train prototype.

"This is Hans, our smith." Nicholas pointed at an older dwarf. His hair was grey but his body was in great shape.

"Then we have Arianne, air mage." He pointed at a middle aged human woman with light blue hair and striking blue eyes.

"This is Adva, our engineer." He pointed at a small woman with bright pink pigtails. Her eyes had the same colour as her hair. While she was about the size of a dwarf she somehow looked different. Was she a gnome? I had not met a gnome so far, I think.

"And the last one is Herbert, our rune expert." The man was a human with brown hair and a neatly trimmed beard. He had a kind face.

"It is a pleasure to meet all of you!" I greeted them enthusiastically.

"Are you really an archfey?" Adva asked.

I nodded. "Yes."

"Huh." She put her hand into her pocket and handed the dwarf a coin.

"I did not know there were any gnomes at the academy." I said, hoping my hunch was right and she was a gnome.

She nodded. "Most of us live in the north of the Dwarven Kingdom. We are the true brains and the dwarves are the muscles when it comes to their tech."

Hans snorted while pocketing his coin. She ignored him.

"I see. So how does it go with the train?" I asked.

"The runes you provided… We have problems with the air control." Herbert stated.

"We are sucking in air, compressing it with magic and then venting it in the rear. But the compression chamber exploded the first time. The second time the whole thing became too hot and started melting itself." Arianne complained.

"The third time the runes themselves seemed to overload." Herbert added.

I scratched my head. "Huh. Let me have a look."

The turbine was smaller than the train car so there was space on the roof to walk around it. They added a ladder inside to reach the roof.

"You should put a safety railing on the side of the roof. It would be easy to fall off." I pointed out.

"It's a prototype." Hans replied with a shrug.

"Also, how do you intend to control the turbine? There is not a space for someone to stay on the roof during the journey…" I asked.

"We can do controls inside the wagon. We connect the turbine to a storage crystal which needs to be filled with spell slots. Here we are going to have the controls to feed the turbine which should regulate the speed." Adva pointed at a panel at the front.

"That seems reasonable. You also need good brakes. You need brakes on every wagon, once we have multiple train cars. And you need to synchronize those brakes." I added.

Hans was stroking his beard. "Hm."

"We can probably do that." Adva added.

With that settled I inspected the runes. "This one here is wrong. You see those lines? They should be round." I pointed at an air control rune.

"That makes no sense. Making it round contradicts the third law of Arthienn's theory of runes." Herbert complained.

I looked at the man. "I have no idea who that is but you either use the runes exactly as I draw them or you are fired." I put a bit of aura into my gaze. The man's knees grew weak and he almost fell from the roof. I caught him just in time.

"See, that is why you want handrails!" I pointed out.

Herbert recovered enough to stand on his own feet again. "I… I apologize." He said.

"Good. Now let's get those runes fixed." I said.

Then I went over their entire design and offered helpful advice. I was not an engineer but I knew my runes and magic. And I could certainly help them achieve the desired results. After talking with Herbert some more he seemed genuinely impressed with my knowledge. He also made a confession.

"I consulted with another rune expert about some of the designs…" He admitted.

"Really? Who?" I asked. Was someone conducting sabotage? Or industrial espionage?

"She is one of the experts on runes, especially air runes! Her name is Kira, she is currently visiting Iron Rock. She, uh… she gave me a book and pointed out some things she called errors…" Herbert admitted.

"I see. I guess I should visit that expert." I said.

Was it an honest mistake, or was someone already sabotaging my project?

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