After being forced to step down, the once-annoying nun eloped with me.

Things will definitely not go as smoothly as she hopes—whether it's out of malice or passionate loyalty, there will always be people who hinder her decisions for various reasons.

She still has ways to deal with treacherous traitors with malicious intentions.

But a loyal servant who is devoted to the country but whose limited knowledge prevents him from believing the truth is... well, that's troublesome.

Margarita sighed inwardly. This time, it was her loyal servant, devoted to the country—one of her staff members—who was trying to dissuade her.

It's important to understand that even factions that are completely loyal to themselves can give rise to numerous opposing factions due to differing paths or plans they want to take.

Although their fundamental goals are the same, in a sense, questions such as whether Isgard should rely on industrial or agricultural development in the future can give rise to two factions that are almost mortal enemies.

Naturally, the question of whether or not to tap into domestic mineral reserves arises...

Margarita's faithful servant.

"...Sigh. I know what you're worried about—but the problem is, distant water can't quench an immediate fire. At this stage, aren't we limited to utilizing domestic resources?"

"But...do we really need to be in such a hurry? Aren't the United Nations our allies?"

There are also two distinct factions.

Leaving aside the other faction for now—the guy currently pleading with Margarita to "preserve the resource reserves" is a member of the "hoarding faction."

On the one hand, they were excited by the alliance of the United Nations, and on the other hand, they were excited about the transfer of abundant resources from the continent of Elusia. Naturally, with the additional income, they felt that it would be better to hoard domestic resources as much as possible.

Even without demons, Margarita still felt that some of them were far too naive...

Although Ysgard and the United Nations have indeed become allies, there are still distinctions of rank among allies.

Those who share both hardship and happiness are naturally allies.

They bear hardship alone and share only a small portion of good fortune; they are allies.

The difference between allies can be greater than the difference between a person and a dog. And the most important reason for this difference is the gap in what is called "national power".

It's certain that the hoarding faction naively imagines "national power" as something "important but unnecessary"... But as Margarita says, while Isgard can currently maintain a brotherly alliance with the United Nations, if Isgard remains stagnant for decades to come, then the United Nations might just devour us whole and treat us like dogs...

Although she's practically a dog now due to the monopoly on magic trading, Margarita still feels she can at least put up a fight...

Far away.

all in all.

Margarita was truly troubled—this obstacle consisted of her own loyal servants, especially since these servants genuinely failed to grasp the incredible truth she had acquired...

...well.

In the end, Margarita gave up on explaining further.

The people and their servants need time to understand the facts—but the problem is that time is what we lack most... What should we do?

"...So we can only wait for His Majesty to arrive...?"

She muttered to herself.

Ysgard and the world were also going through their own routines.

.......

January 15, 006 in the Imperial Calendar.

After searching diligently for several days, Yang Hao and his companions finally found the answer.

Finally, thanks to everyone's efforts...

"Great!! It's finally finished!"

In the Finger Weapon Testing Grounds in Gaparia, a weapon that can be enchanted was successfully created, possessing characteristics of large size, high destructive power, high penetration, and long-range precision shooting.

One that needs to be fixed to the launch pad.

It is a weapon that requires complex calculations to confirm the target index before launch, and is uncontrollable after launch. It is extremely powerful and expensive.

On Earth, this weapon is called the V1 missile—but in reality, the missile developed by the United Nations is merely a missile in appearance; its core is the magical technology of the Kingdom of Eden, the industrial knowledge and technology of Bayern, and the enchanting magic of the elves.

Of course, this also involved the ingenious ideas of Yang Hao, Arthur, and Joseph. The final product, nearly 12 meters long and with a radius of over 5 meters, was named the "Joint Missile" by Yang Hao.

Theoretically, after the missile's body is enchanted, it will have a range of approximately 200 kilometers. Furthermore, according to the Edenians' calculations, the missile's accuracy should theoretically not exceed a radius of 30 meters.

When loaded with a warhead composed of refined explosive ore, its theoretical kill radius is 70 meters—if Yang Hao were to harden his heart and add highly polluting weapons to its warhead, its theoretical kill area would only be larger.

At the same time, the Joint Missile is also a highly customizable modular weapon, from the warhead to the missile body, from the propulsion unit to the stabilizing wings... As long as the makers want it, and as long as the times progress further, the Joint Missile will become the M2 heavy machine gun of the earth, a family heirloom that can be passed down for decades.

In terms of the performance and cost of early ballistic missiles, what the United Nations developed was a groundbreaking and outstanding product.

But in the end... these are just good numbers on paper.

There is no shortage of theoretical data in the world; in the end, everything must be judged by actual results.

So after the missile was completed, Yang Hao and the others only jumped for joy for a short while. They quickly calmed down and, after repeatedly ensuring that the missile was ready for testing, they went to the safest office at the test site.

After each of them mentally prepared themselves for the possibility of the experiment failing, Yang Hao, while rubbing the cheek of the elf who had been sulking lately, took the nun's left hand and said:

"No matter how impressive the data on paper is, it's not as good as actual testing... So, are our selected test targets ready?"

In response to Yang Hao's question, Elena, who was standing behind Yang Hao whispering something to Lalumia, nodded:

"Confirmed: Preparations are complete. Mr. Arthur and Mr. Joseph have erected a target on the flat ground in the Monster Forest, 157 kilometers away from the weapons testing range... If all goes well, our missile will trigger the flesh magic on the warhead upon impact, followed by a violent explosion."

"Tell them to prepare for safety—but then again, I didn't expect that the missiles would ultimately be launched using a crude method of stacking a large number of enchanted runes... This directly led to a severe shortage of missiles?"

"It's because we don't currently have the technology to directly launch certain products."

The elf in Yang Hao's arms puffed out its cheeks and muttered to itself. After being vigorously rubbed by Yang Hao, the elf, who was still recovering from Nia's incident, finally relaxed a little.

However, what she said was also true. Yang Hao felt helpless about this, but he also understood that there was no way to accelerate development this time.

The way the missiles were launched was reminiscent of an elf.

The launcher uses a massive amount of [Propulsion] enchantment runes compressed into its base, which then activate during launch according to a strict sequence—to use a simple analogy, it's like breaking down a multiplication problem into addition and subtraction, and then presenting all the formulas at the end...

Although the final result was still correct, the complexity and meticulous pressure involved required an extremely patient elf to withstand. This directly led to extremely low production capacity of key components for the joint missile, and made Yang Hao realize that the Magic Industry was now facing a major problem.

Just as the elves' ability to regenerate severed limbs is useless against magic-immune creatures... Yang Hao may really need to find another path for his country.

But not now.

(Perhaps we'll find something in Isgard.)

That's a matter for the future. Whether the future is far off or short-lived is unknown—in a sense, it seems to depend on whether Yang Hao accepts Nia's feelings.

Thinking of this, he sighed. After patting Finn's cheek to make the elf feel better, he rested his head on the nun's shoulder and nodded slightly to Elena.

As Elena communicated through the magic network, the joint missile was successfully ignited and launched on the screen in front of them.

Pushed by countless enchanted magic circles, the combined missile ascended into the sky, leaving behind an overly conspicuous trail of enchanted magic circles against the azure sky.

"...It's too conspicuous, isn't it? Although it's quite fast, I always feel like the demons have the ability to avoid it..."

Theresa was the first to offer her opinion—to her, if the Joint Missile was to be considered a weapon to deliver a fatal blow to the enemy, then the weapon seemed too conspicuous.

She frowned slightly, then tilted her face slightly to rest on Yang Hao's head, and sighed:

"You could probably see the light emitted by those magic arrays from more than ten kilometers away... But really, it would be better if we could fly above the clouds... With the clouds covering the view, it might not be so conspicuous."

"Impossible. At least not with current technology—our materials and technology can at most guarantee that they won't fall apart when flying below the clouds, okay? If you don't believe me, Teresa, you can ask Elena."

“I know! I already asked, and didn’t Elena say there’s still room for improvement?”

"Question: I did say I had the ability to improve, but I didn't say I could now...?"

"Sigh... so there's nothing wrong with fantasizing about the future, right? Hehehe."

The dazzling trajectory created by the enchanted magic circle might cause problems in the subsequent strategy—but at this moment, Yang Hao and the others were more concerned about whether these weapons could achieve the most important results.

Under their breathless gaze, the joint missile finally hit the target that Arthur and his team had set up 157 kilometers away with an error of less than 30 meters.

The moment the missile made contact with its target, the flesh-and-blood magical runes etched on the massive warhead took effect.

With the help of excessive magic, it successfully turned the target into a fragile mass of flesh and blood. If everyone originally thought that the composite target, which was more than 10 meters thick, should be able to withstand a direct missile strike, then after the flesh and blood magic took effect, the 10-meter-thick target was completely turned into a fragile lump of flesh.

Perhaps missiles do not have the ability to directly destroy ten meters of steel.

But faced with a ten-meter-thick block of tender meat.

It not only penetrates easily.

It even slammed it backward for more than ten meters before triggering the impact fuse. In the end, the violent explosion blew flesh and blood everywhere, leaving a huge crater on the ground that nature could not repair itself.

Finn was somewhat dissatisfied with this, muttering that if they were to conduct experiments next time, they should find a place outside the forest.

After careful consideration, Theresa said that the impact fuse might need some modifications—at least when it was equipped with the enchanted magic circle of flesh magic.

"Otherwise, it's easy for us to send missiles over, only for them to fail to explode and be captured and studied by the enemy... Although it's estimated that it will take human adversaries several years to replicate a suitable product, it's truly worrying if the target is a demon..."

The nun's deep concern was understood by everyone. And just after Arthur and Joseph sent congratulatory messages via the mage's communication system, Yang Hao sat up straight and asked Elena:

"Elena, what is the maximum number of Joint Missiles we can produce by July?"

All signs indicate that, no matter how slow the Ice Calamity's actions may be, it will clash with the United Nations in the Monster Forest in July.

Yang Hao needed to acquire as many new weapons as possible before July—and Elena's head-shaking made him somewhat disappointed.

"Calculations show that we can produce a maximum of two more Joint Strike Missiles before July. The limiting factor for our production capacity is the design of the propulsion system..."

"...Ugh."

Two missiles, two missiles—if we only consider breaking through the [domain] of the Ice Calamity, two missiles are more than enough...

However, if the goal is to gain an absolute advantage over the Ice Calamity using missiles, unless the second missile can directly hit the Ice Calamity's moving body, then... it's still necessary to compensate for the lack of accuracy with sheer numbers.

Ultimately, the Ice Calamity is a demon that can move. While the combined missiles do have a large kill radius, their destructive power outside the core area is negligible...

At the very least, it shouldn't be able to break through the Titan Demon's defenses; at most, it can only cause some harassment.

But Yang Hao doesn't have the ability to increase productivity in less than a month... So in the end, he can only face the facts and say that he still has to rely on Naruja.

Yes, it's Naruja.

Besides the combined missiles, another trump card to deal with the Ice Calamity is Naruja's Golem—but this time, she is going to create the Golem with the simplest structure and the largest size.

But I wonder how things are going on with Naruja...

Just as everyone was preparing to go and see what Naruja and the Ling people were doing, a message from Constantinople brought them to a temporary halt.

The content of the communication was very simple.

It seems that Hutot Khan wanted Yang Hao to open the passage to the western ranch so that his people could travel to a safe place to take refuge via a faster and safer route.