The small hill that had once been covered in dense trees had completely changed its appearance.
The area had been ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) cleared for a radius of roughly one kilometer around the hill, and the entire surface was covered in thick concrete.
The outer edge was raised slightly, and numerous mobile batteries had been deployed inside it.
Underground passages connected to openings placed at regular intervals, allowing heavy machines such as multi-legged tanks to rush out immediately depending on the situation.
Most of the hill’s interior had been divided by concrete walls into transit corridors, putting it in a state where large numbers of automated machines could be sent in from the central area.
Even if monsters intruded underground, their movement would be obstructed by prepared voids and metal shutters, and they would be showered in crossfire by the many weapons gathering around them.
In addition, living spaces had been prepared near the surface, in the middle levels of the position, and the Chimiya Family stationed here lived there.
If a threat organism was discovered, the Chimiya Family members on standby were ready to rush out.
And at the center of this fortress.
Numerous large cannons and missile launchers had been installed here.
Also, in the central underground section, a fusion reactor was operating under strict sealing and shielding.
That reactor supplied abundant energy to the entire fortress while suppressing any external influence as much as possible.
“Hmm. It’s finally time, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Big Sister. The cargo will arrive in about five minutes.”
This was the fortress on the front line of the <Demon Forest>. <Iris>, who administered it, was using a doll-machine communicator to explain an important event to Eve.
“Still... we’re really relocating that thing.”
The “thing” Eve was talking about.
It was the giant <Magic Stone> and its component tissues that had generated the magic barrier protecting the Holy Capital of the Prava Divine Kingdom.
The biological tissue that had stretched throughout the entire Holy Capital had been dug out without leaving any of it behind, then carefully packed so the tissue would not adhere to itself during transport.
At present, it had been loaded onto a freight train and was being transported to the front-line fortress.
An image of that freight train appeared on the projected display in front of them.
The heavily armored cars, built to guard against attacks from monsters and threat organisms, ran down the steel road while loaded with all manner of supplies.
Inside the Prava Divine Kingdom, a railway network was currently being built at a tremendous pace.
Border security. Transporting supplies to various regions. Long trains loaded with massive quantities of excavated resources, carrying them to large-scale production bases.
And refrigerated freight cars that went around each village, collecting agricultural products.
Within the Prava Divine Kingdom, this railway network had become the bloodstream that revitalized the entire region.
In the image, the slowing freight cars entered the front-line fortress.
They were loaded with enormous quantities of supplies, but the main attraction was, of course, the giant <Magic Stone> and its component tissues.
From here, the <Magic Stone> would be placed at the center of the fortress, and the tissue would be spread throughout the entire fortress.
Pipes for laying the biological tissue had already been installed inside the fortress. Inside those pipes, ultra-fine work machines were waiting.
Those cord-like automated machines would grasp the ends of the biological tissue and crawl through the pipes, ensuring it was embedded inside the fortress.
And in future operations, similar cord-like automated machines were scheduled to monitor and manage this biological tissue.
“Hmm... It still doesn’t look pleasant, does it?”
“This biological tissue creates that magic barrier. Hard to believe.”
Apparently, even <Iris> found this magic-barrier generator unpleasant.
Well, it was essentially like taking some mysterious living thing whose principles they did not understand and holding it inside her own belly.
It was perfectly understandable that she would find it disgusting.
“If there’s anything you don’t understand, make sure you ask the Chimiya Family. They should know more about handling it than anyone.”
“Understood.”
The stopped freight cars opened, and the cargo loaded inside was carried out one item after another.
As she watched the scene, Eve stroked the back of <Iris>, who wore a conflicted expression.
◇◇◇◇
“Hm-hm-hmmm-hm-hm-hm-hmmm.”
Humming in an excellent mood, the fantasy adviser, No. 6 <Asahi>, paced restlessly around the control room.
This was inside a base built near Fratara City in the United Kingdom of Aphrasia.
Asahi had come to this place, which she had somehow managed to receive permission to use, so she could directly connect to the large-scale research facility near the royal capital.
In terms of distance, it was just barely within direct-connection range. Asahi herself had wanted to be closer—preferably on-site—but naturally, that had been rejected.
And what Asahi was about to carry out now was the disassembly of the wyvern they had kept in storage.
“Now, finally. Finally, finally! Finally, we have permission!”
Asahi’s excitement shot through the roof, and she threw both hands up with all her strength.
“Wyvern disassembly! Experiments! Research! I’ve set up hypotheses until I’m sick of them, but now, at long last, it’s time for practice!”
Small-scale experiments using threat-organism corpses had continued, but the large-scale experiments Asahi had proposed had been rejected again and again on the grounds that there were too many uncertain factors.
But this time.
With the precedent of installing a magic-barrier-generating organ, a clump of uncertain factors, in the front-line fortress, permission had been granted to use the corpse.
“That said, this is the precious body of a threat organism. It would probably be best to think of a method that traces the actual thing and turns it into something like a barrier-generating organ...”
While connecting to the research facility and exchanging information, Asahi wandered around the room.
Because she was accessing the network wirelessly, there was no need for Asahi to directly operate any equipment.
The other five sisters spent most of their work time sitting quietly in chairs, but Asahi’s default was to move around. According to her, stimulating the motor cortex improved the operating efficiency of the entire brain unit.
Whether this was true remained unknown.
“In that case, using the blood vessels really does seem best. Splitting the muscles thinly and using those doesn’t seem bad either. Then there’s the skin, perhaps? It seems like we could use it normally as leather by cutting it into long, narrow strips.”
Glancing over the measurement results again, Asahi muttered to herself.
“That said, connecting different tissues to each other seems a little difficult, as expected. In the first place, if we connect them like that, they may be recognized as separate objects and rejected.”
At the site Asahi was connected to, the <wyvern> that had been left in storage because it did not decay was carried into the work area.
A huge mobile machine prepared for this day was moving with the <wyvern> loaded onto it.
“Hmm, it really hasn’t decayed at all. Well, I knew that because I was observing it regularly. Maybe it was a waste that the blood leaked out? That said, it’s full of holes, so hoping to seal them all is going a little too far.”
As she talked, the <wyvern>’s body was lowered into the designated position and fixed in place.
“All right. Now, now, then, then. It’s time for that!”
Then, what Asahi instructed the local control AI to bring over was the <Cutting Sword>, obtained in the adventurer town of Northend City.
Normally, what <The Tree> used to disassemble threat organisms were high-energy devices such as plasma cutters. Without that level of effort, even cutting them was difficult, but because they reached ultra-high temperatures, they had the problem of altering the tissue.
So, they had obtained a magical tool confirmed to exist in Northend City, one with high cutting ability.
“Now, let’s use this and take it apart slowly and carefully! First, let’s expose the blood vessels!”
