The Cathedral Is Dead

This building had a rather different style from the other churches.

It had none of the soaring spires or pointed arches, and its roof was no longer a pointed rib vault, but a square, boxlike shape.

Thick pipes covered its exterior, interspersed with all manner of mechanical structures.

For some reason, the sight of this building made them all relax inexplicably, even giving them a sense of reassurance.

It reminded them somewhat of Castel.

But upon closer inspection, they all frowned.

They had all passed the advanced class assessments. Needless to say, Gaia possessed deep expertise in mechanical engineering and chemistry, and she even served as the chief engineer of a military factory.

Zoe came from an academic background. Not only had she attended advanced classes, she had even taught them. She might have been lacking somewhat in research and development, but her foundational knowledge was still solid.

Although Erwin had started out as a soldier in the training corps, he had properly tested into Empire Truth. Combined with the studious atmosphere of the Faithguard Army, his practical knowledge was no slouch either.

So they all recognized the... awkwardness of these mechanical structures.

Take the steam pipes, for example. The flanges on them should have connected two sections of pipe, yet these pipes inexplicably had a whole cluster of them in one area, while a long stretch beside it had none at all.

Or the valve wheels and pull rods. Both controlled the opening, yet two had been installed at the same time. Not only did that fail to add any safety redundancy, they actually interfered with each other.

Then there were these gear assemblies. One extra driveshaft would clearly have solved the problem, yet they had insisted on piling up a huge number of gears with different ratios. Other