Although she was impressed by her new Disciples, Celestina quickly realized she had gotten too absorbed in what she had been teaching them and let out an awkward cough, "Ahem, we've gotten a bit off-topic"
"Ah… en," Lucas and Eris both nodded, pulling their hands back from the 100-Weight crystal they were fiddling with, looking a bit embarrassed.
Composing herself, Celestina steered the conversation back on track, "In short, the Sunchaser is powered by fifty 100-Weight Low-Grade Spirit Crystals. The 50 which were initially installed into the ship's core have already been drained significantly, and I could only bring 25 more with me on this trip as that was all that was available at the time."
"Is there no way to get more of these 100-Weight Crystals?" Lucas asked hopefully.
Unfortunately, Celestina shook her head, "100-Weight Crystals aren't very common in the Rockwell Kingdom because there are very few uses for them. and those families and forces who possess them don't like sharing them with others."
"Even though this is an emergency?" Lucas persisted.
Pursing her lips, Celestina thought it through but ultimately shook her head again, "It might be possible to borrow the necessary 100-Weight Crystals, but trying to convince others to part with them for such a… trivial reason would likely take many days of hard negotiations. We don't have that kind of time to waste."
Hearing the safe evacuation of Redwood Town being called a 'trivial' reason caused many frowns to appear among the locals, but none of them raised any objections. After all, those gathered in the Lord's office understood that in the eyes of the higher ups, their lives truly were insignificant.
Lucas grumbled a bit, but eventually nodded, "Alright, then I guess we'll have to hope the 25 crystals Master has is enough."
"Enough to do what?" Sasha asked, re-joining the conversation now that the lesson about different types of Spirit Crystals seemed to have ended.
Charles also looked at his little nephew curiously, wondering just what kind of crazy plan Lucas had cooked up this time.
Hesitating for a moment, Lucas asked his Master, "The absolute maximum capacity of the Sunchaser is 100 adults, yes? If we loaded that many people aboard the Skyship, would it affect how quickly the Spirit Crystals were drained just to make it float?"
Thinking about it for a moment, Celestina shook her head, "It shouldn't make much of a difference; after all, the weight of the people themselves is minimal compared to the weight of the ship."
"100 adults per trip, that means we'll need to make roughly 60 round trips for everyone… It'll probably also be slower to move it this way, and we won't be able to do so continuously, so 80 hours definitely won't be enough for everyone," Lucas muttered to himself, seemingly revising his plans on the fly, "However, it should still be sufficient to get all the kids, injured, and elderly out of Redwood Town, with plenty of room to spare."
"Round trips? Moving slower? How exactly are you planning to get the Sunchaser to move if you just need it to float?" Celestina asked aloud, now also quite confused about what her Disciple was thinking.
If he only expects the ship to hover, how is it supposed to fly back and forth from Redwood Town to Herald City? Without using the Propulsion Array, there's no way to move the Sunchaser, it's not like we can just get out and push it or hitch it to a horse and… wait…
As Celestina was musing to herself, imagining the funny image of her Skyship being towed along by horses, when she suddenly realized that while that would be impossible, horses weren't the only domesticated beasts in Redwood Town!
The first thought Celestina had was, That's impossible.
However, the more she went over the idea, the more she began to think it just might be doable.
Seeing his Master fall silent, and her expression rapidly changing from comprehension, to shock, to disbelief, to contemplation, to interest, Lucas knew that she had figured out what his crazy idea was.
Even Lucas had to admit that what he was proposing was a complete long-shot; something he had absolutely no idea whether it would work or not.
The fact that from just his ramblings his Master had managed to discern what he was thinking also went to show how flexible Celestina's mind was, which was impressive in its own right.
"You continue to surprise me, my Disciple," Celestina let out a sigh before a fierce smile appeared on her face.
"Huh?"
"What do you mean?"
Charles and Eris both called out, unclear about what had just taken place.
On the other hand, Sasha seemed to still be thinking through the matter and was slowly beginning to understand what her nephew was planning.
It wasn't like it was a complicated idea, or one that was particularly difficult to come up with, but it was so outrageous that even after she got an inkling of what it might be, Sasha found it difficult to comprehend.
"The longer we remain here, the greater the danger we face. Evacuating is our best option, and using the Sunchaser is the safest way to do so," Lucas spoke up to justify his idea.
"While I agree with you in principle, there are a lot of unknowns with this plan; and given how limited our World Qi supply is, we won't be able to run many tests," Celestina quickly composed herself and began pointing out the various issues.
"I understand that, Master; however, if we try and fail, we lose nothing, but if we succeed, we can safely evacuate all of the vulnerable population in Redwood Town, reducing our problems greatly," Lucas argued.
"Um… try what?" Eris finally couldn't contain her curiosity and cut in, hoping to get an explanation about what her little brother and Master were discussing.
"Lucas, do you really think it's feasible to use Tartans to pull the Sunchaser?" Sasha spoke up, having finally come out of her daze after figuring out what the young boy was proposing.
"Pull the Skyship with the Tartans? How could that be possible?" Charles immediately blurted out.
A few days ago, when he was first meeting his grandmother-in-law, Charles had barely been able to express himself in her presence without stuttering, but after numerous harrowing experiences at the barricades and getting to know the Balfour Matriarch a little better, the small countryside Baron slowly began to relax and slip back into his rather crass way speaking.
Meanwhile, Eris was staring wide eyed at her little brother, wondering just what went on inside of his head to come up with such a strange idea. Just imagining the giant birds she had seen before, hitched to the flying ship, dragging it across the sky… it was like something out of a fairytale, not real-life.
"The Tartans are all quite large and strong, capable of flying from the capital to Redwood Town non-stop in just over half-a-day. One of them might not be able to tow the Sunchaser on its own, but if we could tether all 8 that are here to it, like using multiple horses to draw a heavy carriage, it should be possible," Lucas explained his thinking.
"8 Tartans definitely wouldn't be able to lift and carry the Sunchaser, but if they didn't have to worry about holding the ship up, just pulling it along might work," Celestina concurred, adding, "Even if we can't get everyone out this way, we could still significantly reduce the number of people we need to evacuate through other means."
"But how will we attach the Tartans to the Sunchaser? It's not like we have some kind of harness we can strap to them and then hitch to a Skyship," Sasha brought up a key point.
Thinking it over, Lucas proposed, "From what I saw, the Sunchaser has six large rope anchors that are used to tie it down and secure it when it's on the ground, or presumably in its dock. We could probably modify them together with the existing saddles into a harness system. It might not be comfortable for the Tartans, but it should work."
"If we're going to do this, we should get started right away. There's no telling how long it would take to make all these modifications," Charles commented grimly.
"Agreed," Celestina nodded, "We'll need to make some adjustments to the Sunchaser, but those should be relatively simple. The difficult part will be in crafting workable harness attachments. None of the subordinates I brought with me have much experience in the production professions, so we'll need to assemble the best local tailors, leather-workers, and blacksmiths and hope they're up to the task."
"I should be able to help with that," a new voice suddenly called out, drawing everyone's attention.
Lucas whipped his head around to the office door, his eyes bulging before becoming wet as he dashed out and hugged the man and woman standing there.
It took Drake and Anna quite a while to calm their son down and reassure him that they were alright, though Anna didn't appear all that convincing with a large, bloodied bandage wrapped around her abdomen, forcing her to lean on her husband for support.
Eventually, Lucas regained his composure and began blushing furiously at his childish display. Even if no one else in the room saw anything wrong with a 10-year-old boy venting all the frustrations and fears he had been holding in when he reunited with his parents, it was still embarrassing for him.
Only after they settled their son did Anna and Drake both turn to the others in the room. Having heard a thing or two from the Spirit Initiate Commander who had shown up in Herald City, they knew exactly who the silver and crimson armoured woman before them was, so the first thing they did was try to kneel.
However, before they could even bend their knees, Celestina moved forward and held them up, "You've raised an outstanding son, and I have taken him as my Disciple, so that makes us family. There is no need for such things between family."