As the Humvee launched itself forward, a mix of screams of terror and one scream of delight echoed, "Nee-sama!!! Please slow down!"
But only a devilish laugh came back, "Wahahaha! It has been a while! Although the engine's sound is disappointing, the power in this thing is amazing~! Ki-tan! Can I trust your craft~!?"
"How rude of you to question my skills, Sera-tan.", Kisuke became offended.
"That's not the problem!", the girls shouted in frustration.
But Kisuke ignored them and continued, "This is a good chance. Since this is a prototype, I haven't implemented any sort of limitations on the engine. I want to see how much of a beating it can get before it falls apart."
Everyone became horrified with his words and cried out loud, "No!!!"
Meanwhile, Serafall got even more excited and shouted in delight, "I love you, Ki-tan~!!!"
In any case, Kisuke's only concern was Claire's safety and he was already on it. He was also thinking about how he could let the little girl enjoy the situation instead of cowering in fear like the others.
Due to its shape, despite the motors' power, the top speed was about 200 mph (322 kph) and that was only possible on a flat road. Thanks to the bumpy dirt road, it couldn't get much traction and could only travel around 60-90 mph (97-145 kph). In a relatively flat, even and straight road, it could go up to 150 mph (241 kph). Even then, it was still an insane speed for an armored vehicle weighing more than 3 tons, almost twice as much as a normal car.
Within the 30th floor of Babel, there was silence. A silence like that was very rare among the Gods that had gathered for entertainment. Of course, that didn't take too long as Loki broke that peacefulness, "What is that!? I want one!!!"
Some other Gods then started calling out to Hestia, "Hestia! What's that!? Explain it!"
In response to that, Hestia hissed at them, "I don't know! And even if I did know, I don't have the responsibility nor the obligation to inform you! If you want one, go find one yourself!"
The others were momentarily speechless at her strong response, but not even a few seconds later, they started bothering Hestia with all sorts of questions. It was only thanks to Hephaestus, Loki, Takemikazuchi and Miach that the other Deities backed off, more specifically, it was because of the two leaders of powerful Familias.
Of course, the others thought that they were only doing this to monopolize the secret behind the strange steel carriage that could outrun a fast horse multiple times over without seemingly getting tired.
Apollo and his alliance, on the other hand, weren't too bothered and were just overall excited with this new device that could revolutionize many industries, especially trade and travel, which would also mean unimaginable wealth. In any case, they would be able to get their hands on it and its origin once they won this game. All they needed to do is to wait and harvest this unexpected gain.
After separating from the annoying Gods and successfully taking some distance from them, Loki whispered to Hestia, "Oi, do you really have no idea where that thing came from?"
"Right, I'm also curious as to what that thing is and how it works. It seems to be some sort of artifact similar to automatically moving carriages from Altena, but nothing too crazy like that.", pondered an interested Hephaestus.
"I really don't know. This is also the first time I've seen it.", answered Hestia with a low voice.
"Then we can only ask that guy, huh. Good thing that these retards are only focused on the girls and not the true monster of the group.", Loki and Hephaestus sighed in relief.
"Don't call my cute child a monster!", complained Hestia. But at the same moment, she recalled something, "Coming to think about it. Kisuke-kun does like to make a bunch of things, but there's one thing he has complained about before."
Being curious, Hephaestus asked with great interest, "What is it?"
"The fact that Magic Engineering is almost nonexistent."
"Magic Engineering?"
Hestia nodded, "If I remember it correctly, he described it as designing and creating tools and devices that use Magic Power to perform tasks."
Loki and Hephaestus looked at each other before looking back to Hestia and simultaneously saying, "Isn't that Blacksmith and Mystery Development Abilities or some other similar skills and abilities?"
Hestia shook her head, "He made it clear that it's different from those. In fact, he openly admitted his dissatisfaction regarding those abilities that could instinctively give the user the knowledge on how to make something just by thinking about the effects of what they intended to make or construct."
And true enough, Gods were the only beings that truly knew how to 'forge', 'mix' and 'create'. The people of the Lower World simply used abilities to directly tap into that knowledge. As such, aside from strengthening the soul in a marvelous way, he didn't like the fact that the people of this world had become lazy because of the Falna, effectively stagnating any kind of development in technology and magic.
After all, even though the Gods, or Heaven, collectively, had a vast amount of knowledge, they didn´t know everything. It was the reason why they were so shocked when Kisuke revealed the Humvee, a foreign vehicle.
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On the top floor of Babel, the silver-haired Goddess was also silently watching the screen in front of her before suddenly asking the boar person beside her, "Ottar... Just what is that?"
Before answering, Ottar stayed quiet for a few seconds as he watched how the armored carriage went over a rock at high speed and flipped itself multiple times in midair before miraculously landing on its four wheels again and moving forward as if nothing happened.
Although he also had a lot of questions right now, he was sure of one thing. The person sitting on the front left side seemed to be the one in control of the strange carriage. While a cheerful black-haired woman controlled it at first, after reaching the halfway point towards their destination, the 'coachman' changed and the carriage was now being controlled by a black-haired little girl with a stoic expression.
"I'm sorry, Freya-sama. I also don't have any idea to whatever that thing is, nor any clue to where it might have come from."
Freya silently looked at the screen and thought, 'Kisuke Urahara, what more surprising things will you show me, I wonder?'
And recalling something important, Freya asked Ottar again, "Ottar, how did it go with the thing that the Loki Familia sent?"
"We're still in the middle of testing it and due to its nature, it might take a while. We don't want to practice it without knowing if there are any adverse effects down the line. The chances of this being the Loki Familia's ploy to weaken us is high as of now."
"Stop thinking about it and just directly learn it.", replied Freya.
Ottar was mildly shocked, "Yes?"
However, Freya didn't explain herself further and just said, "Or else, you'll all be left behind."
Ottar wanted to ask more, but he also knew that his Goddess knew things that they didn't, "As you wish, Freya-sama."
Half an hour after they departed, the Hestia Familia reached the hill where they could see the Shreme Castle from a distance.
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AN:
This was posted on Chapter 726 on my pat.reon, but since majority of my readers are here, this needed here too. I can't fit it on the author's note section so I have to put it here.
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AN: Thank you for waiting~!
I was able to write five chapters before the month ended.
This month was quite hectic so I failed to deliver multiple times and my meager stockpile of chapters that are saved for the days I can't post has also run out.
Truthfully speaking, I'm feeling very guilty because all of you are paying for my subpar release rate, and quite possibly, degrading content as I swim through the unknowns of the fiction.
And I'll be perfectly honest with you, I have been thinking less about the plot compared to when I first started this.
Not to mention, I'm on the part, where even in my outline, it's very vague and I'm not sure which one to tackle first. The overall plotline or the character developments.
What makes it very hard is that I don't know the good timing for it so I'm just winging through it. Though I'll make sure it'll be as natural as possible (from my POV, at least).
As I have said before, this fanfiction is for me to gain experience for the original fiction that I'm planning to write after this. (But this isn't really an excuse since I've already written over 700 chapters, albeit, short.)
Of course, I'll try to fix these issues by regaining the habits that I lost when I first wrote this story like writing everything down whenever I daydream. (Be that as it may, it's also tiring to daydream when you think about the fiction's scenario only for your mind to wander off to IRL stuffs automatically.)
And I'm fully committed to this fiction until it reaches its ending.
Since I've already typed a long rant (I'm sorry!), I should also give you some information regarding this fiction's future.
Aside from DxD and Danmachi, there's one more world that would be 'explored'. I already hinted it before and most of you, or probably all, should have already guessed what that next world is, but I won't be naming it here.
Another thing to note is that I also didn't expect to write this long about Danmachi and one of the biggest reasons is because of the timeline. Danmachi timeline is way more compact than the DxD timeline and I'm trying to match that.
Finally, regarding the volume of content, according to my rough initial estimates, and I mean very very rough. This fanfiction would take a year more to finish. If that's long or short, I don't really know.
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Closing remark~
Whew~ That went way longer than I expected and I'm very sorry for that.
In any case, Thank you very much for all the support you have given. I really, really appreciate and cherish it.
Have a good day and enjoy the chapters~