“Hm? If you mean when I started gathering funds and materials, I did that right after taking the throne, you know?”
“Whaa?! Before you fought me and Amidonia?!”
“It was part of my plan to enrich the country and strengthen the military,” I said. “As a trump card against the Empire.”
With my arms crossed, I leaned back in the gondola’s sofa.
“I didn’t know what the Empire was thinking back then, after all. I was working on a plan that would give me a trump card when we had to oppose them. Up against the more powerful and more populous Empire, we wouldn’t stand a chance in a land-based arms race. I thought the path to survival might lie in expanding our air or sea power, where technology plays a much bigger role. Well… at that stage, I was just allocating the funds and materials. Construction only began in earnest after the end of the war with Amidonia.”
Besides, because I had been moving ahead with the new city project at the same time, I hadn’t been able to gather quite enough funds or resources for the project. If Roroa and Colbert hadn’t joined us, giving me a source of funding, and if I hadn’t been able to secure a source of resources by annexing Amidonia, construction might have started even later.
Still, once construction began, ship construction in this world went fast. Actually, I’d felt this way when rolling out the transportation network and building the new city, too but construction in this world went unusually fast.
Because they had magic here, there was no need for large pieces of construction equipment. For instance, if you try to build something large on Earth, you first need to build the cranes and such that will be used in building it. At worst, there were even times you might need equipment to build the equipment you needed to build the equipment… and so on.
However, because there were earth mages who could manipulate gravity in this world, that equipment wasn’t necessary here. Also, an experienced fire mage could handle casting metal and welding in no time. In this world with its strange balance of things that could and couldn’t be done, it felt like it actually took more time to secure the funds and materials than anything else.
I got up and stood in front of Castor, who was still taken aback by everything.
“Well, this is what I’ve been doing as king, Castor,” I said, looking him straight in the eye. “You rebelled against me because you thought I was a usurper. It seems your doubts had already been cleared up by Liscia and Excel’s attempts to dissuade you from doing so, but in the end, you still chose to oppose me, prepared to martyr yourself for your friendship with Georg Carmine. Then you lost and were placed in Excel’s custody.”
Castor lowered his eyes. “You don’t need to tell me that now. I lost… That’s all there is to it.”
“That’s not what I’m trying to say,” I said. “Right now, I’m showing you my power as king of this country.”
“You mean that carrier?” Castor asked.
But I shook my head. “No. The carrier itself isn’t my power. If there is one thing I can take pride in as king, it’s gathering gifted comrades, preparing a place for their talents to shine, and creating a country that could build that carrier. When you see what I’m capable of, does it not seem fitting that you should serve under me?”
Castor shook his head with a wry smile. “You’ve got me beaten completely. I can see clearly now… why King Albert left the country to you. But I’m not fit to serve you.”
“Can I take that to mean you recognize me as the king of this country?” I asked.
“Hm? Yeah, I recognize you. You’re one hell of a king.”
He’d recognized me as king. Now that I had dragged those words out of Castor, I was finally certain of it. I didn’t sense any of the arrogance Castor had had before. In his defeat, and with some polishing by Excel, he had grown as a person. Considering that… I could trust him with it.
I placed a hand on Castor’s shoulder, looking him straight in the eye as I said, “Castor, this carrier is an extremely unique weapon. Though it is a ship attached to the Navy, it carries the troops of the Air Force. In order to run it efficiently, it requires not just knowledge of handling a ship and fighting at sea, but the knowledge and experience to command the Air Force. I want to leave this ship under the command of someone with those skills.”
Castor’s eyes opened wide. “Huh?! No… You can’t mean…”
It looked like he’d figured out where I was going with this. He was a man who had been the former General of the Air Force, yet now he had trained under Excel to learn how to control a naval force.
I grinned as I asked him, “I’m sure you’ve kept studying, even now that you’re in the Navy, right?”
“…Yes, sir! Excel has beaten it all into me!”
Castor rose from his seat, then knelt, putting his hands together in front of him and bowing his head. I placed the captain’s hat I had brought with me on Castor’s bowed head. Because Castor had horns, it had been specially made with holes for them.
“Good,” I approved. “Now, then… Castor who has no family name! I appoint you as the first captain of this aircraft carrier!”
“Yes, sir! I humbly accept, my lord!”
My lord… huh. It was a bit embarrassing to be called that, but it was a sign that Castor had truly accepted me as his lord, so I was more than happy to take it.
While I was thinking about that, Excel, who had quietly watched over the proceedings up until that point, spoke up. “Hee hee, I’m glad. That’s one burden off of my shoulders.” Then she smiled.
I had already told her I wanted to make Castor the captain of this carrier before she’d begun teaching him.
“By the way, sire,” Excel continued. “I do think that carrier is a wonderful ship, but it wouldn’t do to simply go on calling it ‘the carrier’ forever. Why don’t you give it a name now?”
“Hm? Oh… You have a point,” I said. “What would be a good name for it?”
“Let’s see… I think the name of a place, or of the king who built it, would be the most common options. How does Aircraft Carrier Souma sound to you? When you build more of them, they would belong to the Souma-class.”
“Absolutely not.”
I didn’t want that. If I put my own name on the ship that would be the center of our navy, it’d make me seem conceited, and I didn’t want that. Besides, if it had my name, they were going to say things like, “Souma, departing!” and “Souma, withdrawing from the line of battle!” and “The Souma has been sunk!” right?
…There was no way I wanted that. I needed to propose an alternate name.
“Oh, hey, I know,” I said. “Why not give it the name of a carrier from my world?”
“From Your Majesty’s world?”
I nodded. If I had to give it a name, why not use one that existed my world? Let it be one that had never folded in the face of adversity, and that had never given up fighting. It was going to be carrying wyverns, so this was the perfect name.
I looked down at the island-type carrier beneath us and declared, “I hereby name that carrier the Hiryuu!”
Having finished appointing Castor as captain of the Hiryuu, my work was done, and we returned to Lagoon City in the Walter Duchy. Because the sun was already setting when we arrived, we decided we would spend the night at Excel’s mansion.
At least partly because it was a coastal city, we had a dinner that made ample use of seafoo;, and then Juna, Excel, Castor and myself chatted over tea in the parlor.