In Another World With My Smartphone: Volume 10 Page 8

  “The one I’m carrying is different to the standard ones in my old world. I’ve enchanted it a lot since coming here, after all. It was originally created as a communications device, capable of talking over long distances, recording events, and other utility features.”

  “Hmm... Can I please analyze it a little bit? I’m wondering about replicating it and distributing the results to others.” Hmm... It’d be pretty convenient if everyone had one for communication, I guess. If we worked magic into it, we wouldn’t need phone networks or anything. Plus she already made radio-wave communication in the Frame Gears, right? If anyone can do it, it’d be her.

  Only my smartphone would be able to connect to the internet of my old world, anyways. I didn’t see the harm in letting her try.

  “So, can I borrow it a little?” The Doctor took my smartphone into her hands and began to focus magic energy in the hand that was holding it. I had no idea what she was doing. “[Analyze].” A small light came from her palm and flowed into the phone. It must have been some kind of Null magic.

  “Hoh... Interesting. I see, I see. I know how it works now. We should be able to make something like this with materials in our world, but there’s a small issue...” I took back the smartphone and looked it over. The Doctor started muttering and complaining about something, though.

  I was actually curious about that spell, though, so I tried it myself.

  “[Analyze].” Whoa, whoa! What the heck?! Design schematics and annotated information began flowing through my mind. I understood the construction of a smartphone, where every part went, what every part did. It was an incredible, suddenly enlightening experience.

  I also knew all the materials that went into the construction of a smartphone. Aluminosilicate... What’s that, anyway? I wondered if in the Doctor’s case, the materials had been translated into something she could understand.

  Either way, she had an incredible analysis spell. If I used it on a human, it would probably make me the equivalent of a walking MRI scanner. It’d be extremely useful magic for a doctor, though I’m not entirely sure having full knowledge of someone’s innards would be a good thing...

  “Well, whatever! I’ll manage one way or another! I might not be able to make the exact same thing, but I can definitely make something along those lines! Come, Rosetta! To the Workshop!”

  “I wouldn’t mind, ma’am! But you can’t order me around anymore! Touya’s my master, yessir! So he has to give you permission...”

  “Hmm? Oh, right. Touya, may I borrow Rosetta?” I certainly didn’t mind, so the two of them left in a hurry. Rosetta seemed especially keen to get back.

  “They’ll probably hole themselves up in there for a while now.”

  “Indeed, she hasn’t changed at all. In fact her current body will probably be even harder to stop. With her endurance and lack of need to sleep, she will indeedily become a most industrious force.” Cesca and Liora let out little sighs.

  Hm... I hope they don’t overdo it. They better end up okay. Mass producing smartphones would certainly change the playing field, but I hope she doesn’t add anything weird to it.

  When I voiced those concerns to Cesca, she just stared at me blankly and pointed at my phone.

  “The only one who’s added reckless and unusual things to their device is you, master.”

  She was right, honestly.

  ◇　◇　◇

  “Touya... What is this?” Every member of the alliance was staring at the thing I’d handed to them.

  It was a little larger than mine, and it was white. That made it pretty easy to differentiate from the original.

  “This looks somewhat similar to the artifact you have, Touya, but...”

  “That’s right. It’s called a smartphone, but you guys can just refer to it as a phone if that’s easier. The ones I’ve distributed to you all are a basic edition, somewhat inferior to mine.” I began to explain the situation to the king of Lihnea.

  “Press the button on the upper right, and it should start up. Give it a go.”

  “Whoa?! Something happened?!”

  “Small images...? Hm...? This display is curious...” I was relieved to see they all worked fine. The interface had also been translated into the written language used commonly in this world.

  “If you look at the top, you’ll be able to see the time, and the battery- er, magic power. If it goes down to 0%, it’ll switch off and be rendered useless. But even if it turns off, you just need to pour some magic into it to charge it back up.” I scrolled down my contacts list and chose “Emperor of Regulus,” then opted to make a call.

  “Eh?!” The ringtone suddenly started playing, and the emperor was so surprised he ended up dropping his phone.

  Everyone stared over, and some of the people had stood up in shock.

  “Don’t worry. This is a phone call. It’s a means of contact. Emperor, can you tell me what it says on the screen?”

  “Y-Yes I can. It says Grand Duke of Brunhild.”

  “So, the image displayed is who’s attempting to talk to you. Try touching the green button underneath the name, and put the phone up to your ear.”

  The emperor very cautiously touched his finger to the screen, and the call picked up.

  “Hey, hey. Can you hear me?”

  “Ooh! I can hear your voice in my ear, Grand Duke! So this is how it’s used for communication?” Everyone was familiar with the Frame Gear’s comms network, so they were fast to grasp how it worked.

  “Touch the button that says Contacts on your phones, it should show a list of names. If you touch a name, it’ll contact that person. Let’s try contacting the people sitting opposite us, as a test.” It started to feel like a technology session for the elderly.

  After that I slowly taught the rulers of each nation how to use their phones.

  There weren’t a lot of apps installed on their devices though. It looked like a smartphone on the outside, but on the inside it was Babylon’s derived design.

  I installed the phone, the camera, map and compass, calculator, personal notes, clock, texting, flashlight, calendar, and basic game apps on each. That seemed enough to me.

  The maps didn’t really give them the edge that my [Search] did, so their phones were inferior to mine. They could still use it to find their current location and nearby landmarks though.

  They looked like children with brand new toys, every ruler was eagerly playing around with their phones. They were texting and calling each other gleefully, but eventually I had to get them to settle down.

  “I’ve told you all you need to know, and these phones are yours now. But if you lose it, or if it’s stolen, let me know. I should be able to recall it for you.”

  “My my, this is rather impressive... Won’t international communications become trivial with this?” Doge Audrey looked over her phone with a satisfied expression on her face as she spoke.

  “Touya. I’ve been curious... This application here, the one called Games. What is that, exactly?”

  “Ah, right. Consider this a little trial. There are a few games and activities installed in that app. You can connect to others to play Shogi with them in two-player sessions. Connecting four will let you play Mahjong with them over long distances, too.”

  “OOOH!!” The four old men from Belfast, Mismede, Regulus, and Refreese all cheered in excitement. That was only natural, given their inclinations.

  “However, I’ve placed a limit of two hours per day on this app.”

  “NOOO!!” Don’t give me that! It’s important. You guys’ll just keep playing forever. If you guys just game all day instead of doing your jobs then there’ll be a political crisis! I’d have to apologize to your nations.

  I believed that allowing them to text and call each other would deepen the bonds between nations, so I had high hopes for the new communications functionality.

  “If you take pictures using the camera app, I’ll be able to print them out for you, so let me know if that ever becomes necess
ary.” I showed them all a photo of Karen that I’d printed earlier as an example. The king of Belfast rose from his seat right away.

  “...I must return home. I need to take a picture of my little Yamato at once!” He was a crazily doting dad as usual...

  Things were wrapping up, so I decided to call the meeting to a close for the day. Her Holiness the Pope decided to come up to me after the meeting. “Ah, uhm... are there any pictures of Lady Moroha? If there are, I would like to have two copies printed out!” Hm... I wonder if that’s quite alright... Ah well, I suppose you’re a devout enough lady.

  After the meeting wrapped up, I received a phone call. It wasn’t from one of the world leaders, though. The only words on my screen were ‘Doctor.’ Service was never an issue, as she’d engineered the phones to connect based on the magic in the atmosphere instead of electromagnetic signals. Apparently such a thing was a trivial technology during the renaissance in which Doctor Babylon had been born into.

  “‘Sup.”

  “Yo, Touya? What’s ‘Sup’ mean? Supper or something?”

  “Oh, it’s just a basic greeting from my old world. It’s like a contraction of “What’s up?” So you usually expect the other person to say something next.” That’s how I understand it, at least. I never really thought about it too deeply.

  “Ooh, I see. Anyway, how did the world leaders react to their phones?”

  “Very well. Everyone took them back happily.”

  “That’s wonderful news. But I’m disappointed you gave them such a neutered edition of my master work.”

  “The first version you showed me was way too complex! Who the hell needs a self-destruct function for a phone anyway?” She’d added way too many stupid things to the original build, like a supersonic frequency generator that could shatter glass, and a camera that could see through walls or clothes. All kinds of weird crap like that.

  I wasn’t too surprised though, Doctor Babylon was a weirdo. The saying “There is a fine line between a genius and an idiot” flashed through my mind a little.

  “Ah well, no worries. Oh, right. The new Frame Gear that Rosetta and Monica are so busy with... How about you let them focus on that, and let me focus on making the Frame Gears for Leeny and Linzey?”

  “Oh, sure... I was thinking they’d both be more attuned to magic, but the Phrase are resistant to magic. So I was thinking of something that would take advantage of the Fragarach system, or magical defenses.”

  “That’s a good idea. Were you thinking of employing the Satellite Orbs? Are you thinking of weapons based on stuff from Earth?”

  “I guess.” Well, more like based on anime from Earth. I kept quiet about that part because I didn’t want that dastardly doc knowing about that stuff too. I didn’t want her trying to make an extravagant space battleship or something.

  After I put down the call from the doctor, I got another call from Sakura. I wondered what she wanted. “‘Sup.”

  “Ah, uhm... ‘Sup. Grand Duke, is it alright to talk?”

  “It’s fine. Is something bothering you?”

  “Ah, well. My mother wants to talk about the school.”

  “Fiana? Alright.” Fiana was scheduled to work at the upcoming Brunhild school, which was about eighty percent complete. We decided to run it as a test to begin with, and add more buildings as more students showed up.

  “Where’s Fiana right now?”

  “She’s with me at the school site.”

  “I’ll be over in a second.” I dropped the call and opened up a [Gate] to the schoolgrounds. I saw Fiana and Sakura once I got there, along with old man Naito and Mr. Mittens.

  “Ah, Touya. Sorry for calling you here so suddenly.”

  “Not an issue. What’s wrong?”

  Fiana gently bowed her head. I wondered what had happened.

  “Uhm, well. I spoke to a lot of families when we first started discussing, but word spread faster than I expected it to... There are a lot of people who want to get their children an education. More than I can actually handle at this point...”

  “Huh? How many?” I turned to Naito and asked him for hard numbers.

  “Almost eighty prospective students in total.”

  “What? I didn’t even know there were that many kids in Brunhild.”

  “We’ve had more immigrants lately. Retired adventurers, land workers, merchants, builders... They’ve brought children with them too.” That made sense. Not everyone was single, after all. Entire families had moved in.

  I’d originally only planned for about twenty or so students. The projected number now was four times that much.

  “Alright, then. Should we get one or two more teachers brought in?”

  “That would be wonderful. I’d truly appreciate the support.” Fiana let out a small sigh of relief. More work for me... Guess I’ll have to conduct some interviews.

  I needed to tell Kousaka about the new staff I’d be calling in. I also needed to have Naito extend the buildings to accommodate the new numbers.

  I turned my attention to another matter.

  “What’re you doing, Mr. Mittens?”

  “It’s D’Artagnan! Purrlease remember that! Naturally I’m guarding the meowther of my venerable lady!”

  “Heh...” Mr. Mittens puffed out his chest pridefully. I thought for a moment that Sakura might have assigned him to the job since he was a pain, but I didn’t feel like hurting his feelings too badly. He was probably happy to be doing a good job anyway.

  “D’Artagnan is really useful, he’s a lovely kitty.”

  “Ah, venerable meowther... You call me by my pawsitively proper name... Even milady was calling me that cursed name...”

  “It’s easier to say, that’s all.”

  Sakura answered with a nonchalant shrug. It seemed like Mr. Mittens had taken quite a liking to Fiana.

  The problem had been sorted out, so I decided to drop by the Silver Moon for lunch. I decided to go with Sakura and Fiana.

  Just as I was about to invite them, my phone started vibrating again. Huh? Who is it? I checked the screen, and it was Kousaka.

  “Milord. Please return to the castle via one of your [Gate] spells. There are various documents that require your approval.”

  “Ugh...” I should never have given out these phones...

  I felt a lot of pressure all of a sudden. Or it was more like the reality of my situation was now within closer sight.

  I sighed and walked through my portal, internally grumbling about the problems of easy contact.

  Chapter III: Daydream Believer

  As the world leaders got used to their smartphones, they realized just how useful a tool it actually was.

  As far as foreigners went, I handed them out to leaders associated with my alliance. In Brunhild, my fiancees received one each, and the Babylon Gynoids all got one as well. Along with Karen, Moroha, the former Takeda Elite Four, the Knight Commander and Vice-Commanders, Laim and Micah from the Silver Moon.

  I also made sure that their contact addresses only had people they were familiar with in them. I didn’t give Micah the king of Belfast’s number, for example. She had mine, though. Otherwise, the highest rank in her phonebook was Lain.

  She’d be able to register the king’s number if he personally told her it, though. But I didn’t want just anyone having a direct line to a national leader.

  There were some unintended negative consequences to my introduction of smartphones, though. People would just send texts or make calls for every little thing.

  The novelty wasn’t lost on them, so they were using it as much as they could. I could understand how they felt, though. They’d likely calm down after a while, so it was fine.

  “This is... tremendous... It’s even better than the artifact I currently use for communication. Are you saying I can truly have this?”

  “Yup, I am.” I explained the general functions of the phone to Guildmaster Relisha, and then handed it over to her. I’d come to the guild on important busine
ss.

  Relisha had made some tea, so I was drinking it down. It was a little different to the usual kind, but it tasted great. Relisha had a preference for black tea. She had a large variety of tea leaves on her office shelves.

  “How’s the Phrase situation looking?”

  “Two Lesser Constructs in Hannock last week. They were taken out by a party of Red-ranks. It’s the third emergence this month. They’ve been appearing a little more frequently lately.” She wasn’t wrong. It seemed like the boundary of the world was being torn at again. It was good that the ripped areas weren’t too close together, though. If they connected up, then the tears would become even larger.

  If that happened, then they’d open up to the point where Upper Constructs and Dominant Constructs could come out. That wouldn’t be good.

  Our options were limited for the time being. We had a few courses of action, however.

  Method One: All-out Phrase Purge

  This one was a little extreme. I didn’t know how many Phrase existed on the other side, after all. There’d also be massive loss of life on humanity’s front.

  Method Two: Phrase Diplomacy

  Only the Dominant Constructs seemed capable of intelligent speech. I didn’t think talking with them would do much though, they clearly wanted us dead. Even if I’d only encountered a couple, the two Dominant Constructs I’d met so far were volatile and dangerous individuals.

  Method Three: Take the Sovereign Core, and Push it Somewhere Else

  The world would definitely survive if we sent on the Sovereign to the next world, but I wouldn’t feel comfortable with the ramifications. I’d be putting the crisis on another society instead. I also had no idea how to do that. It wasn’t like I could just ask God Almighty for advice, either. He had a firm policy of non-interference.

  Method Four: Destroy the Sovereign

  That would make Ende my enemy. I wasn’t keen on that. Plus I had a feeling that the Sovereign itself wouldn’t go out without a fight. I didn’t want it to wake up and for things to get really bad.

  Method Five: Repair the World Boundary

  I had no idea how to do that.

  Each option I had was inconclusive. Realistically, method one would be the best for tangible progress. Method two would be my default if I met another Dominant, but even then...