The main body of the Alchemical Cannon was a hollow metal cylinder, ringed by three metal prisms that served as sturdy supports. It rested on a rotatable, millstone-shaped base, its entire surface covered in dense, intricate inscriptions.
To ordinary people, these inscriptions were like advanced calculus problems. Simply seeing those symbols was enough to make their heads spin and their vision swim, even giving them the feeling that they might go mad from gazing upon something indescribable.
But to those who could understand them, the inscriptions on an Alchemical Cannon were actually quite simple.
"Let me see... Hmm, that city guard was right. There's nothing wrong with the cannon's overall structure, the gunpowder is dry, and the Crystal Sand is very pure... As expected, the problem is with the ignition inscription."
The inspection should originally have taken several minutes, but thanks to Scott's hint, Ian found the problem immediately. With Viscount Grant battling the native monster right now, every second was worth its weight in gold. He carefully examined where the inscription had gone wrong. "Huh, so it uses the sixth inscription for ignition. Stable, sure, but it won't function in damp areas or underwater."
"Who maintained this thing? That's downright lazy!"
There were a total of one hundred and three basic inscription structures. Whether high-grade or low-grade, nearly all inscription circuits were built from these foundational inscriptions.
The igniter of an Alchemical Cannon was not complicated. Generally, it used the twelfth inscription, which produced extremely high temperatures, as its core. But that was somewhat more complicated and failed more quickly, so the person who had maintained it last time had cut corners, simplifying it into the more stable and simpler sixth inscription, whose range of application was far narrower.
"Replacing it with the twelfth or eleventh will do."
Ian