The storm arrived much faster than Amora's estimated "one hour."
Old Bart drove the carriage to the east gate, only to find it had collapsed along with a large section of the city wall. Determined to press forward, Bart decided to dismount and clear a path. He laid planks and flat stones over the rubble, creating a bumpy makeshift road just wide enough for the carriage wheels to pass.
Amora wanted to jump down and help but was promptly stopped by Bart. "Forget it. Can you lift these stones? And then I'll have to set up the ladder for you again…"
Amora suddenly felt how frail she was—so weak that even climbing onto the carriage was a challenge.
The old horse proved to be remarkably clever. As Bart paved a little ahead, it advanced bit by bit, keeping the carriage and Amora stable. Once it crossed a section, Bart would retrieve the boards behind and lay them ahead. Together, the man and the horse moved as though they were a single entity.
The carriage soon cleared the rubble at the gate. Amora peeked out and noticed the sky had darkened further. She asked Bart, "Is there anywhere nearby we can take shelter from the rain?"
"What do you think?" Bart replied gloomily. "I haven't even seen an intact roof."
"That's not good…" Amora sounded even more worried.
Rainwater comes from the evaporation of substances on the ground, which condense into liquid with the help of nuclei not soluble in water. Unfortunately, the Death Radiance left behind a large amount of such particles in the sky—highly toxic, radioactive, and energy-charged. This rain wasn't something that could be purified by mere distillation; it was a carrier of extreme pollutants.
"We need a rain shield," Amora concluded quickly. "And we need it within the hour."
"Where do we find such a thing?" Bart asked, his furrowed brow deepening. In his lifetime, the only magic device he'd ever owned was the recently purchased refrigerator—a simple civilian-grade magical appliance.
Amora hesitated. "I don't know."
Bart snapped the reins with frustration. "So what now?"
"I can make one," Amora declared as she pulled away the cloth covering the essential supplies and located the refrigerator. She emptied its contents and cut off the power to its energy source. Inside, the large cabinet was filled with ice, radiating a bone-chilling cold.
Hearing the clattering from the carriage, Bart turned his head and asked, "What are you doing?"
"Making something to block the rain," Amora replied, examining the connections between the refrigerator's energy source and its buttons. She tried to deduce its energy circulation system. "Do you have pen and paper? I might need to draw diagrams."
Amora planned to create precise cross-sectional sketches, calculate the energy consumption for collecting and expelling rainwater, and figure out how to modify the existing energy circulation to meet her needs. Magical theory, capable of scaling from strategic-level spells to mundane household modifications, enabled this transformation. While this was routine for Amora, it appeared miraculous to Bart.
"Good heavens, you even know how to do this!" Bart exclaimed, astonished. "But I don't have pen and paper. You could sketch on the floorboard with a stone."
Glancing at the dark wooden floor beneath her feet, Amora instead scratched detailed energy circulation diagrams on the frost inside the refrigerator using her fingernail. Politely, she said, "Thank you. Actually, my mental calculations are decent. May I borrow some tools? Pliers, a knife, a hammer, nails, and some rubber tubing?"
"There's a pair of scissors under the feed, but that's about it," Bart replied curtly.
Amora retrieved the rusty scissors and used them to pry open the refrigerator's casing. The appliance wasn't particularly well-made and soon came apart entirely under her efforts. Inside, the magical components were arranged simply and clearly, much to her relief. Without drafting tools, however, she had to rely on memory to reconstruct more concealed parts in her mind.
For the first time, Amora truly longed for a magical system to assist her. Visualizing dozens of component diagrams simultaneously was mentally exhausting. She now suspected that Mengel likely had a magical system of his own, as the computational demands of creating such devices seemed beyond human capacity.
Amora disassembled the refrigerator, reshaping its casing into a funnel-like container. She retained the energy circulation system, recalculating modifications as she worked. Using the scissors, she detached the drip pipe and wrapped it with magical resistance material.
"What are you trying to do?" Bart finally asked, unable to comprehend how she intended to craft a magical device with nothing but rusty scissors and a pile of supplies.
"Reconfigure the cooling system into a sort of spiral water intake," Amora explained, her hands deftly twisting spring clips into a spiral shape and locking them at the base. She continued as she worked, "Like this—create a low-pressure structure inside. That way, the rainwater outside will get sucked in and then expelled through the pipe."
"The energy core will be the original cooling unit. You know the relationship between temperature and pressure, right? If the temperature drops, then…" Amora's thoughts became increasingly clear as she worked faster, muttering continuously under her breath.
Bart, utterly confused, interrupted, "Sorry, I don't understand a word you're saying."
"Oh…" Amora paused briefly, then continued focusing on her work.
"What you're studying is just…" Bart struggled to find the right words, certain that this wasn't part of any curriculum he'd known.
"My teacher had a peculiar interest in these things," Amora replied, once again attributing everything to Mengel. She wasn't wrong.
"Your teacher must have been quite…" Bart trailed off, his thoughts brimming with astonishment.
Amora connected the rubber tube, now covered with the magic-resistant material, to the device and tried pressing a button.
Bart heard crackling sounds emanating from inside and quickly turned back. "Are you okay in there?"
"Ah, I'm fine," Amora replied, tugging her sleeve out from between the spring clips. "…Maybe not so fine."
"I also think not," Bart said, his tone growing serious. "It's started raining."
Amora poked half her body out of the carriage. "Stop the cart and put this on top."
Bart pulled the reins, and the black horse came to a calm halt. Looking back, he saw Amora pushing forward what looked like the disassembled remains of the refrigerator. The former door of the fridge was now propped open like a giant metal funnel, lined inside with magic-resistant material. Beneath the material, protected by waterproof clips, was a simple set of magical components. At the bottom lay the cooling unit—the core of the fridge—with a rubber tube extending slightly above it to expel collected rainwater.
Bart lifted the contraption and asked, "Where does this go? On the roof?"
"Yes, with the opening facing up, and the open door shielding you," Amora instructed while shrugging off her jacket and tossing it to Bart. "I've lined the inside of the cart with magic-resistant material, so it's safe here. Outside is less certain. You can use my jacket to block the rain for now."
Bart tossed the jacket back at her face. "Too small. It'd only cover my nose."
Amora put her jacket back on, rummaged through the supplies, and pulled out a tattered old umbrella. She cut the magic-resistant material into strips and carefully adhered them to the inside of the umbrella.
She handed the umbrella to Bart. "You've got a helmet and the cabinet door, so let's give the umbrella to the horse."
The black horse snorted in response. While its gear was already quite complete, an umbrella would definitely be a bonus.
"It's going to fall off. Did you design any anti-slip mechanism?" Bart placed the makeshift rain shield on top of the cart, but he knew the bumpy ride would easily dislodge it after a few shakes. As he finished speaking, Bart realized he had started to rely on this girl without even noticing—she exuded an air of capability, as though there was no problem she couldn't solve.
Amora handed him the string used to tie the feed sacks. "This? It's pretty basic, but it should work…"
Bart wiped his face and took the string, tying the rain shield securely. "Where's the switch?"
"Oh, it's in the middle—the original refrigerator switch," Amora replied, leaning out of the cart and pointing.
Once everything was set, Bart resumed driving the cart eastward.
By now, the rain was pouring heavily. All around them were ruins—not even a single tree in sight. The cart, outfitted with its crude rain shield, trudged forward in the torrential downpour.
Squinting through the sheets of rain, Bart seemed to see visions of the once-thriving town and his lost son. As steaming tears mixed with the icy rainwater on his weathered face, he wiped it with the magic-resistant material and began to hum a song, almost instinctively.
Inside the cart, Amora sat alone, knowing that no matter how harsh the weather, they couldn't afford to stop. The death radiation constantly threatened their lives. The city's drainage systems were likely destroyed, meaning the rain could soon lead to floods. If they didn't reach higher ground quickly, they might become trapped within an hour.
The black horse plodded through the storm, its armor riddled with holes from the corrosive rain, yet it didn't let out a single cry. It moved silently, listening to Bart's song. Amora also listened, accompanied by the symphony of lightning and thunder outside. Somehow, even the cart's jarring jolts felt heartbreakingly poignant.
Bart's voice was rough, but the melody he hummed was gentle and melancholic. The thunder and pounding rain clashed sharply with the song's soft tune. The lyrics were few, perhaps because Bart was too old to remember them fully. As the cart journeyed on, Amora found herself hearing the same lines over and over again.
"My dearest girl,
I carve my love letters on the birch tree,
Waiting for you to forget them in winter's freeze.
My dearest girl,
I light a candle in the dark of night,
Waiting for you to leave my heart's sight.
My dearest girl,
Do not hold onto hope for me,
For my life belongs only to the battlefield, you see."