It’s Time for a Fun Experiment

Author: Iwashi-zukushi
Raw: https://ncode.syosetu.com/n3388fm/47/
Translator: Lilia v4
Editor: Yuriko AYA

“Now then, shall we begin!”

When I said it, Nora and Lady Dominas both nodded.
We might inhale a little powder, so a mask, and goggles so it would not get in our eyes.
What we prepare first: paper and a pen, and Lady Dominas’s special-made ink.

Using that ink, we first write characters on the paper.

“…Oh, it writes ordinarily.”
“I only gave it a magical treatment.”
“Heh, so no mix-ins, then.”

I am a complete amateur at magic so I do not really understand, but it is probably something like a bestowal of magic.
At any rate, first we arrange characters somewhat evenly over the whole paper.
I pass the finished paper to Lady Dominas.

“Then, as arranged, please.”
“Understood.”

When I called out so, Lady Dominas laid another sheet on the paper with writing and applied a bestowal of lightning magic at an extremely weak power.
And one more… on the charcoal powder we had prepared as well.

“Being able to bestow magic this faint is probably only me.”

Lady Dominas said it, looking somehow proud. …A little cute.
No, no, this is not the time to be moe.

We peel apart the two sheets that have been bestowed with magic, and onto the paper with no writing Nora sprinkles the charcoal powder, likewise bestowed, so that it is uniform.
This sort of work Nora handles more deftly than I, so I left it to her.
As expected, or what, it truly falls uniformly. Fearsome.

Then, once the powder has been sprinkled over the whole paper, if we lift it gently the powder slides off, suru suru.
That is because both the paper and the powder have been given a negative charge, so they repel.
However, it is not so intense as to scatter, so until we lift it this way it had been riding lightly on the paper.

And the powder fell, but there was one exception.
In the left-right reversed shape of the characters written earlier, the charcoal powder remained firmly.

“…It is done.”
“Say, Doctor Asha, this is tremendous, isn’t it…?”
“I understood the theory, but seeing it in fact is astonishment.”

Nora and Lady Dominas were each surprised, unable to hide their excitement.

In fact, I had had Lady Dominas put a power that obstructs magic into the ink she made.
The sort used in barriers on important facilities.
And when she bestowed magic on the paper written with that ink, only the characters and the facing side stuck to them were in a state of not carrying a charge.
If you drop charged charcoal powder on the paper without writing, it sticks as powder clad in static to the places matched to the characters, but the unwritten places repel, negative to negative.
When you lift it, powder remains in the shape of left-right reversed characters, and the rest of the powder falls away.

“After this, like so…”

If you lay the paper with powder on it over the paper you want to copy onto, and stroke from above with a rod carrying a negative charge, the powder repels and falls onto the paper below in the shape of characters.
If you remove the paper on top…

“It has become characters one can read…”
“And almost indistinguishable…”

I desperately held down breathing that seemed about to grow rough with excitement.
After all, as it is they are only stuck by static, so there is even a possibility they would blow away with a breath, they come off so easily.
So we place another sheet on the paper with characters drawn and stroke it from above to fix them… with this, complete.
Characters like those written with a pencil had been properly copied onto the paper.

We looked hard at the finished… the copied characters.

“Ufu. Ufufufufufu.”
“Aha, ahahahaha.”
“Fufufufu.”

We looked at each other’s faces. And found ourselves spilling smiles.

“We did iiiit! It is dooone! It is done, it got done!”
“We did it, we went and did it, Doctor Asha!”
“It is done. Splendid.”

Each of the three in our own way rejoiced and raised our voices.
There is something that wells up, guwaa~, from the bottom of the body.
Even for me, the sense of achievement of having done it is amazing.

Ah, that is right, I must not forget.

“Lady Dominas, here, that.”

So saying I raised my hand toward Lady Dominas.
Seeing that, Lady Dominas thought for an instant.
…Then, with a smile as if shy.

A reserved high five, pachin.

“…Fufu, fufufu, this, is… likely to become a habit.”

She said it with a smile already shy and yet glad, so… damn, is that not cute!
As I was moe on the inside, Nora turned her hand toward me this time.
Of course I high-fived Nora as well. We both grinned.
Last, Nora and Lady Dominas high-fived as well.
Both of them had good smiles.

After we had tasted the sense of achievement a while, Nora opened her mouth.

“Still, Doctor, you think of things like this well.”
“Ah, well, it is not my idea; I overheard a little, long ago.”

Yes, this is not my original idea.
The root is the principle of a photocopier.
I once heard from someone who did photocopier maintenance that you write left-right reversed character data with a laser or the like on a charged cylinder called a drum, and put a powder called toner on it to stick.
Only the places the laser light hits come to generate a positive charge, or so it goes.
If you sprinkle negatively charged toner there, it sticks only to the characters.

Of course, there is no laser in this world that can write characters under computer control.
So I had the ink given the property of not taking a charge, and made the charcoal powder as a stand-in for toner stick by static.
I did not think it would go this cleanly… this part was probably Lady Dominas’s exquisite control of force.

“Being able to go this far from overhearing is, conversely, amazing.”
“Isn’t it. I wonder what is going on inside Doctor Asha’s head.”

Watching Lady Dominas and Nora both looking impressed… it is, you know, shy-making.
All the more because I am not the amazing one.

“There, there, leave me aside.
After we try making a few more and confirm, let us have Her Majesty and the others look as well.”
“Ah, that is so. …And then we receive a budget to make the equipment, don’t we?”
“Nfufufu, that is, you see, it will be for the good of the country?”

Nora and I laughed together with smiles of the Echigoya, you are a wicked one too sort.
Lady Dominas, comparing our two expressions, tried to make the same sort of face, and failed.
Very cute.

“Then I will go receive time from Her Majesty.”
“Ah, I am sorry, I would be grateful if you could.”

That is right, even if we brought it saying it is done~ we might not be able to meet them.
The other party is a king; of course they are busy.
I have been on familiar terms of late, so I had almost forgotten…

“We will make as many as we can in that time.”
“Yes. And I need Nora to form an image of how to mechanize this.”
“Ahaha, actually I already have a ‘like this’ in mind, you know~”

Oh, as expected; it was worth having Nora take part for that.
I was thinking that easygoingly, then.
Yes, having forgotten that the other party was the existence that had made a chemical industrial plant.