"Shit! Everyone! We need the balloon up today, that forest fire will be visible for miles." I began giving orders as I reflected on the fight.
'That fight exposed the biggest flaw with Changeling Armor, it can't protect against more than one attack at a time, it was protecting me from all of the copies when the Lynx got through and bit me.'
I molded the makeshift wings I had created back into my armor.
"Hey! Watch it! That crane is unstable!"
'I also wasted these wings, I need to be more focused when I fight, I got so distracted that I forgot about them. I could have used them to fly high and look for the real Fire Lynxes without interruption.'
Ben carried some hides near me and nearly dropped them, I used a branch to give him a hand.
"Alright! Pressure mages on me! We're putting out a fire!"
Dad, Teo, Orin, and Bella all walked over, Teo and Bella looked slightly confused.
"We have to take all of the air away from the fire. Fire needs heat, fuel, and air." I answered their question before they asked it.
They shrugged and just accepted my reasoning, they just assumed that I was right. We all started to rob the fire of air.
"Don't make a vacuum or the logs will never cool and will just reignite once you dispel the vacuum." I turned my attention behind me "Bock! Come over here! I've got a lesson for you!"
Devin echoed my call for Bock, Fabiru followed, this continued until my message made it to Bock. Bock came over a minute later once the message made it to him via voice chain.
"What do you mean you want to teach me a lesson?! I may be nearly spent in Eneru, but I can still take you in a scrap pipsqueak!" Bock was quite obviously offended.
I facepalmed. "I'm not going to fight you, I'm going to teach you how to be an ice mage."
"Wha- Yo- oh. Sorry."
"No problem, let's get to it, follow me."
I walked us to a particularly hot spot that Dad was suppressing.
"Cool this down. All you have to do is the exact opposite of what you do when you heat things."
"Like... this?" Bock reached out and a blue aura surrounded his hand.
The coals slowly cooled until they were safe to touch.
"Wow, you learn fast." I patted Bock on the back.
"Well, I already kinda did it with Flaming Knight so that I wouldn't become a roasted royal. I just didn't realize what I was doing." He smiled at me, embarrassment long gone.
"Hmm, perhaps it's because you are royalty, for some reason, it's easier for them to learn both sides of what I like to call thermal manipulation. Either way, that's a story for the future, I need you to help stop the fire."
Bock walked off to help, and they all finished off putting off the fire while I worked on making the gas that we would need to fly: Hydrogen.
"I've built my specifications around this gas, so we will have to use it." I filled a glass pot with water.
"Ok, old me did this a million times before he died, it shouldn't be hard."
By this time, the fire was out and all hands were on deck to finish the balloon.
I turned my attention away from them and worked on my electrolysis machine. I made a copper wire from my stock, the area I was in had no copper, so I was limited. I stretched the copper into a wire and set up two electrodes.
"This one is done, but this will take forever by itself."
I got to work building more and more electrolysis machines. I made glassware needed in my spare time for months.
In the end, I had three large electrolysis machines.
"Ok, now the easy part is power, I got three lightning mages, although one is nearly out of Eneru."
I left to help finish the balloon.
"Alright, we're done, what's next boss?" Fabiru said to me.
"Everyone but Ben, Vincent, Ward, Teo, and John should go pack up," I said. "We're going to fill the balloon."
With my new group, I explained the plan.
"John, you will do all of the physical stuff like holding the balloon while it's filled, Teo will keep the balloon from flying away. The rest of you just have to discharge into this thing when I tell you to." I pointed to the electrical inputs.
I started hooking the hydrogen outputs of the electrolysis machines to the balloons.
'Everything about this airship scares me, it's far too fire-prone. Hydrogen is flammable, hides aren't fire-retardant, and believe it or not, wood isn't exactly fire-retardant either. Too bad this is all we have.' I sighed.
Once I was ready, I put some salt in the electrolysis machines so they would conduct electricity and gave the signal.
The balloon filled at a speed visible to the naked eye and a whistle could be heard from the oxygen side of the electrolysis machines. The machines themselves were split into two chambers with a wall in the middle that went most of the way to the bottom, leaving enough room for water and electricity to move freely between the chambers while trapping the gasses at their respective ends, hydrogen was on the negative side of the current and the oxygen was on the positive side.
A little while later Teo started condensing the gas so it would be denser than the air, this stopped the balloon from floating up too fast.
"We're done!" I shouted. "Everyone on the ship!"
Orin stepped into my shadow and everyone worked their way to the ship while the Knights finished grabbing the rest of the gear.
I did a headcount and made sure everyone was there.
"Alright! Let the pressure go and get on the propellers! We're taking off!"
The balloon shot up and started slowly lifting us off of the ground. We all cheered at our success.
"First stop! Gond! Let's pick up everyone else!"
I pulled out a sextant and jumped twice with my Airstepper Boots and unfolded my wings, I landed on top of the balloon and looked at the night sky. After a bit of figuring, I opened a mind link with Fultz.
'Tell Teo to go south by southeast.'
Fultz did as instructed and we were on our way.