[x] Do more science and try to create something new.
-[x] Harpoon. Damage witches and immobilize them. (Or atleast slow them down.)
-[x] Improve mortars. Efficiency and damage.
-[x] Shotguns. Even if your role is primarily long ranged, circumstances change and at times a powerful short-mid range weapon may be more ideal.
With your howitzer and basic gun practice done, your mind turns to the rest of your repertoire. With your goals seemingly being oriented to offensive firepower tonight, there is something else you can do. You still have to enhance your mortars, that have gone through some recent field testing now.
Tick, tock
They work well enough in their role, but it's still quite expensive to use them. Grief seeds are not infinite and you can always be more efficient with your magic.
Tick, tock
With that decided, you summon the chassis of your multi-mortar to your mind, and get to work. Gears turn and furnace are set ablaze as you go over the design, looking for possible changes to the ammo. The dilemma is to make them more explosive, but also less costly for yourself, which is not an easy task.
Tick, tock
But with the same lessons you used for your howitzer, you think you can do it, even if it feels increasingly unlikely. It's not the same gun, and you're not sure if the effect will even be the same.
Tick, tock
Yet you still need to try. You summon the multi-mortar to real world and fire the new formula to the distance, observing the results. The explosion is a bit bigger than before, you give it that. But maybe if you just tweak it a little, and then…
Tick, tock
You fire again, and then again, the cylinder setting itself into furious spin as you focus on fixing the explosive formula with constant tweaks. You need to do better, it s not enough to get only slightly better…
Tick, tock
You fire about a dozen or so rounds into the distance before you run out of ways to change the shells in any meaningful ways. The mortar is somewhat cheaper and destructive now, that much you're sure of. Whether this will make any difference remains to be seen.
Tick, tock
But that's for another time. With the mortars and your howitzer, you have plenty of long-range highly explosive firepower at your disposal. You're set on that front. But for all the other times, you have your magical blaster rifle, which-
Tick, tock
You frown mentally. For a quick-paced combat against tougher witches, your normal weapon, comparatively powerful as it may be, might not suffice. You cannot keep the distance forever with everyone running around, and circumstances change. No plan survives first contact with the enemy, after all.
Tick, tock
So what you need is a weapon more powerful than your rifle for shorter ranges. A natural thing for that would be…
Tick, tock
You close your eyes to think. A shotgun should work well enough in place of it, and you can work on the details from there. However, you've never really looked at the military details for such, having preferred longer.range weapons and general mechanics magazines for your blueprints. Not to mention the cost of using an artificial gun as a mainstay weapon.
Tick, tock
You look at your rifle. A Magical Girl's weapon gives her instincts to use it, that much you know. So maybe you can try adjusting your own?
Tick, tock
You focus your thoughts on your weapon, picturing its image in your head and morphing it to your impression of a shotgun. Shorter barrel, a forestock handle, larger projectiles… You're only half-surprised to see and feel the weapon in your hand change its form mostly along your ideas.
Tick, tock
You run into some problems while you do this, since there are clearly limits to what you can change. But once you're done pumping magic into your weapon, you're left holding a futuristic looking shotgun, and one that you can feel is ready.
Tick, tock
You pull the trigger, and watch a rain of plasma scatter around in a wide arc, burning metal and ground all around you. The range is nothing to write home about, but the spread and the damage is greater than with your rifle only. Another pull of the trigger gives you nothing until you pump the fore end to release another shower of projectiles. You'd count this as a moderate success overall.
Tick, tock
Just in case, you summon a copy of your rifle and another shotgun to make sure the change is not permanent. Both of them appear immediately, proving that you can effortlessly summon both types of weapon without much trouble.
Tick, tock
You suppose it's handy.
Tick, tock
At the same time, you're struck by a sudden idea… Your thoughts travelled to shotguns due to a need for getting a better weapon for fast-paced close-quarter combat. But what if instead of a weapon better adapted there, you could negate the entire scenario? And not only that, but also make sure your target is going nowhere?
Tick, tock
You've done this before with the silken bird that dared to prey on your friends, the first ones for so long... But that was a desperation move you were not even entirely sure know would work out. Lassoing a gigantic bird is not an easy task, and given how badly everyone was hurt then… You're going to need something more reliable to keep them safe.
Tick, tock
...And you have the technology for that already, don't you? Your Savior's Crane, the device you created from the same desire a few days ago, scaled up and the hook replaced with something- wait, a harpoon, should do the trick. A harpoon with a heavy anchor machine attached to it, with multiple copies ready for heavier targets...
Tick, tock
It's the machinery that needs the most attention, but you don't think it's impossible. You take a look around you and start hopping around. You're going to need some additional proper machines for this...
Tick, tock
It's a good thing you're in an old industrial junkyard. There remains a lot of old pieces of junk unneeded by anyone, but useful to you. It takes a while to find proper reels, but you're still left with a plenty of time to create a functional design.
Tick, tock
The forge churns once more for this evening, with more power than before. This is a project larger than anything you've done in a long time, after all, and you'll need a lot more time and magic for this one, even if you have some blueprints prepared already.
Tick, tock
You're not entirely sure how long you stay there to forge your new devices, but in the end you're left with four huge reels, each one equipped with two huge harpoons and four drills to bind them to the ground. You don't really have anything big enough to test them on yet, though, but they should work
Tick, tock
Then again, you've screwed up many times in the past… Why would this be any different?
Benefits:
- Multi-Mortars have become more effective at their role, with the cost down to 60 per a cylinder, and the damage increasing a bit.
- Kishi can summon up to 4 harpoon turrets, that require her to stand next to them for aiming. Each one is heavy, but if they hit, very few witches have enough power to escape.
- Kishi can now summon a shotgun as her weapon, which is more effective at close range and against crowds, but next to useless at hitting anything further away.
Grief: 829/1300
Seeds:
Irma 1229/2000 (Not used unless absolutely necessary)
Thamyrissa 2339/2500
Elsbeth 0/2000
===
You're Tamiko Higekino, a Magical Girl and a third year Middle School Student. It's already late into the evening, but you're coming home from school only now. Most of the day you've spent hanging out with your friends in the arcade and the mall, and later in the abandoned amusement park you use to train.
Held tight between your arms is the most adorable and fluffiest stuffed dinosaur you've ever laid your eyes on, Mr. Fluffy, your new mascot! Just to emphasize your point, you give him a tight squeeze to hear the squeaky sound from him once again. The sound is music to your ears, and you immediately squee right behind it.
Too precious!
"...Well, I do get it that you really like the plush," your unc- well, aunt right now sighs in somewhat amused exasperation. "But that doesn't really answer my question, how was your day? What did you do?"
"Fluffy…" you mutter back quietly and gaze at the beady eyes of your dino in obvious wonder, as if expecting that to answer any questions.
"Tamiko."
So soft and cute…
"...Hmm? Actually, did you perhaps get that as a date gift? That would make quite a lot of sense."
That one actually draws your attention away from your dino to stare at your aunt in abject horror. Curses! You got careless...
What do you do?
[] With Kishi:
-[] Name your Harpoons: ___
-[] Telepathy someone?
-[] Cleansing maybe?
[] With Tamiko:
-[] Talk with your aunt while you eat dinner.
-[] Telepathy someone.
-[] Read your books?
--[] Sword Manuals
--[] Harry Potter
-[] Don't be lazy, and do your homework.
-[] Go to sleep, you need to get ready for tomorrow.
[] Write-in.
===
You might want to remember to use grief seeds more actively when doing costly science. I might not decide to be as merciful the next time someone you control hits numbers like these.
. They just came in bulk due to Kishi's guess of needing that much to at least slow down a Thalia-esque witch.rofl: