Jindi hung a "Closed" sign at the entrance, then led Herad into the back room and activated a lift platform to descend into the basement.
The basement lay more than a hundred and fifty meters underground, deep enough to withstand an ordinary nuclear blast.
Of course, no one would dig that deep for some small-scale operation.
It was a circular space covering at least a hundred thousand square meters.
Judging by the passages branching off in every direction, this enormous underground space clearly connected to other places.
Herad was not surprised by the sizable undertaking before him.
Gnomes and dwarves were practically born rats, especially fond of digging underground where the sun never shone.
They either hollowed out mountains or dug entire cities beneath the ground.
An underground shopping center was nothing unusual.
Dalaran's powerful rulers kept a tight watch on everything aboveground.
Somewhere this deep underground, however, lay beyond their surveillance.
It reminded Herad of Dalaran's sewers in the game.
Naturally, such an enormous underground space housed plenty of shops.
There were quite a few customers coming and going along the streets, too.
The shops here all carried at least some contraband.
Their main purpose, though, was to avoid Dalaran's heavy taxes.
Jindi had a shop in the underground black market several times larger than his one aboveground.
Inside, a little gnome sat behind the counter, reading a book out of boredom.
When he saw his boss arrive with a visitor, the little gnome hurriedly hid the book and scampered over to greet him.
In an excellent mood, Jindi paid no mind to his employee slacking off.
"Go bring out our big one."
"Boss, which one?"
"The biggest one, of course."
"All right."
The little gnome dashed into the storeroom at the back to get to work.
The merchandise displayed in this shop consisted entirely of legitimate engineering creations.
All sorts of engineering tools and accessories lined the counters and shelves.
There were also plenty of guns, grenades, and mortars displayed on the walls and along their bases.
However, Herad saw no large war machines such as Steam Tanks or armed helicopters.
Those were probably not for sale and would not be put on display.
Herad was rather curious about the "big one" the two little gnomes had mentioned.
Gnomes rarely stood more than a meter tall, so their idea of "big" was probably somewhat exaggerated.
The mortar in the corner offered a clue.
Its caliber was fifty millimeters at most, making it practically a copy of the Japanese grenade dischargers.
Only broke bastards would use such pathetic little guns with their pitiful firepower.
Any mortar with a caliber below a hundred and twenty millimeters was just a feeble little pipe.
The guns hanging on the wall were decent, with calibers starting at ten millimeters.
Some exceeded twenty millimeters, putting them at the opposite extreme from the small-caliber mortars.
Gnomes were clever, and there was actually nothing wrong with the designs of these weapons.
The mortars were for the gnomes themselves, so naturally their caliber could not be too large.
The guns were intended for dwarves, so naturally they made the caliber as large as possible.
Dwarves were short, but only somewhat short compared to humans.
They were also known as children of the earth, and their strength ranked among the greatest on the entire continent!
Apart from mutant Trolls, no race could currently match dwarves in strength.
Herad hefted a gun and felt that it would suit high elves as well.
Gnome mages could bring these guns to Dalaran to sell.
That meant their recoil was still within most people's ability to handle.
Guns were far more powerful than ordinary bows and arrows.
Even many weaker enchanted bows were not necessarily as useful as guns.
Guns were also very easy to learn to use.
Even ordinary civilians could quickly get the hang of them and handle them competently.
By all rights, High Elf Commoners should have been quite powerful themselves.
They should have had no need for such simple, brute-force weapons as guns.
After all, they had such long lifespans.
Even a pig would become a pig demon after cultivating for hundreds or thousands of years!
Yet high elves somehow still had so many useless slackers who did nothing but eat and wait to die.
Talented high elves who worked hard were immensely powerful.
Those High Elves who lacked talent and made no effort naturally had little strength to speak of.
When disaster struck, civilians' half-baked martial skills and archery would be nowhere near good enough!
Introducing guns with decent firepower could give civilians the ability to fight when it mattered.
Having made up his mind, Herad selected a suitable gun.
"Is there somewhere I can test this? I'd like to see how powerful it is."
Seeing that the high elf mage was interested in guns, Jindi cheerfully led the way.
As they passed the storeroom, he called inside.
"Gelbin, bring the big one to the firing range in a bit."
"Got it, boss. I'll bring it right over."
Through a narrow gap in the door, Herad glimpsed what appeared to be large mechanical constructs stored inside.
The gnomes' technological development had taken a rather strange path, but overall, it was already quite advanced.
The Steam Tanks they produced for dwarves were very old-fashioned.
Yet the mechanical Hawkstriders they used themselves looked like something out of science fiction.
This peculiar technological path rivaled steampunk!
It looked old-fashioned, but it was packed with technology that defied explanation!
Herad guessed that the mechanical constructs in the storeroom were some kind of robots.
Given how stingy gnomes were, they probably would not bring out a robot.
Still, a "big one" stored alongside robots gave Herad plenty to look forward to.
The shop's firing range was a straight tunnel just over a hundred meters long.
Electric lights overhead lit the tunnel as brightly as daylight.
Humanoid targets stood at various distances.
Sandbags were piled at the entrance to serve as cover for shooters.
Although the setup was crude, it was no less safe than a shooting club on Earth.
The gun Herad had selected was a long-barreled model popular among dwarves.
This gun was renowned for its accuracy.
It was just over a meter long and weighed around ten kilograms.
Its appearance and construction were fairly simple, much like an old bolt-action rifle on Earth.
After a brief explanation from Jindi, Herad pulled the trigger with a reasonably practiced air.
Bang!
A crisp gunshot rang out.
A dazzling flash burst from the muzzle.
The gun had considerable recoil, pushing Herad half a step backward.
Though the kick was already quite strong, he could still handle it.
The smoke produced by the burning powder was very faint, much like smokeless powder.
He was very pleased with that as well.
As a novice, however, Herad's accuracy was atrocious!
Although he had not fired into the ceiling or the floor, he had missed the target twenty meters away.
Watching from beside him, Jindi was unsurprised and handed Herad a box of ammunition.
"It's not that easy for beginners to hit the target. You'll get there with some practice."
Herad ejected the spent casing, reloaded, and continued firing at the target twenty meters away.
Crisp bang, bang, bang sounds echoed through the tunnel.
A target twenty meters away was already very close.
Yet Herad's talent for shooting was quite ordinary.
After firing several shots in succession, he finally managed to hit it.
The solid wooden target splintered under the shot and broke in two.
Looking at the broken wooden target, Herad nodded in satisfaction.
"Hmm, this gun packs a decent punch. I reckon even a Troll would have a hard time taking a shot from it!"
Hearing that assessment, Jindi beamed.
"You have a fine eye, sir! The Dwarf Mountaineer units love using it against Trolls."
The daily routine on Azeroth was eating, sleeping, and beating up Trolls.
Killing Trolls was a form of political correctness.
Even gnomes, who were not particularly fond of violence, hated those seemingly endless Trolls.
After all, Trolls liked eating people.
No one wanted to be eaten by a Troll.
In fact, these weapons developed by the gnomes had originally been intended for fighting Trolls.
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