Chapter 498

Since the Tianchao experts arrived, the Floating City project became much more viable; they quickly formed specialized teams according to their divisions, each producing comprehensive reports on design, feasibility, budget, key technologies, and more. Each report exceeded eight hundred pages, and for interrelated projects, combined reports reached over two thousand pages. Every report required review meetings by the Ministry of Magic, and they had to draft response reports—and even responses to those responses—in accordance with feedback. In short, the experts quickly adapted to the locals’ work rhythm.

Through this, Harry truly understood what the Minister of Magic had to do: endless meetings, listening to piles of reports unrelated to him, and being expected to offer commentary—something brutally cruel for a seventh-year student who just wanted to enjoy school life. Of course, Arthur and Snape, who dragged him to these meetings, thought it was easy work for the Boy Who Lived.

After another dizzying meeting, Harry rubbed his slightly sore neck, preparing to leave the conference room and Apparate somewhere quickly. But he noticed Donald wasn’t walking out with the others—he was following the expert team.

After a brief hesitation, Harry decided not to eavesdrop as he used to; instead, he walked up openly and asked, “Mr. Fontroy, do you have new ideas you want to discuss with the experts?”

“Ah, yes,” Donald didn’t try to hide it. “After thinking it over, I decided not to abandon that excellent idea—the city-scale teleportation array and the use of the Focusing Rainbow. So I’m considering building a smaller city for strategic deterrence… or, less seriously, don’t you think a city that can teleport would be incredibly Coooool?”

“So you plan to build another floating city with teleportation and offensive capabilities? Is that feasible?” Harry tried to mask his skepticism, but his tone still betrayed doubt. “And if the experts are already busy with our main city…”

“It could be integrated,” Donald explained. “A satellite city—you understand? Like Crawley is to London. Of course, if it’s in the sky, I believe the main city and satellite city could be much closer.”

“The satellite city concept is theoretically sound,” Lin Shuanghe turned back and said. “But Mr. Fontroy, we’ve already explained the contradiction: we cannot achieve large-scale city teleportation. If the scale is too large, too many unstable factors arise; if too small, teleportation loses all meaning.”

“So I think we should try to find a balance point…”

“There’s a ready-made balance right in front of you,” Lin Shuanghe tapped the Ministry’s wall. “TARDIS. By sacrificing some positional accuracy, it maximizes the mass it can transport while maintaining stability—but clearly, TARDIS cannot support military use.”

Harry felt confused. From his experience, the Doctors had filled TARDIS with many rarely used rooms and piles of junk—if teleportation had a mass limit, this seemed wasteful.

“That’s actually a good idea,” Donald immediately began daydreaming. “Yeah, TARDIS can carry a lot. If we carefully plan the weight…”

“He’s not just thinking about weight,” Lin Shuanghe shook his head. “In magical teleportation, people and objects are calculated separately. The biggest factor affecting stability is the number of people involved. If you’ve ever traveled in TARDIS, you’ve noticed: the more people, the worse the precision.”

One expert turned back to explain carefully: “Actually, the city-scale teleportation you value can be understood as a ritual casting of Apparition. No matter the method—joint incantation, rune casting—it’s ultimately bound by Apparition’s limitations. And unfortunately, Apparition’s emphasis on [determination to reach the destination] is easily disrupted by thoughts, causing spell failure.”

“A clear example: when multiple people travel, you must rely on other transport, not Side-Along Apparition. Side-Along Apparition itself is an advanced technique, usable only by the most skilled wizards.”

“So that’s why I said earlier: multiple people can’t teleport stably; too few, and teleportation is meaningless,” Lin Shuanghe summarized again.

“What about a Key Charm?” Donald proposed another wild idea. “Turn the entire city into a giant Key Charm?”

“The magical cost would be enormous—better just fly there,” one expert couldn’t help laughing.

“What if we build a satellite city equipped with the Focusing Rainbow, keeping it aligned with our main city, and… when needed, deploy it independently for combat?” Donald persisted. “We could even build a second satellite city carrying Muggle troops—since both just fly, we don’t need teleportation at all.”

Harry frowned, displeased. “That’s not a floating city anymore—that’s a military fortress.”

“Exactly. That’s what I want: a military fortress,” Donald admitted without hesitation. “We absolutely need military power. Put bluntly, if the floating city has no defenses, it’s a sitting duck—it’ll crash eventually.”

This time, the Tianchao expert team fell silent. Their eyes shifted, as if acknowledging Donald was right.

Harry also considered: building a completely peaceful floating city would indeed be dangerous. Muggle weapons could threaten it easily. If Donald’s idea couldn’t create a revolutionary deterrent, then a satellite city with conventional defenses might be acceptable.

No—Harry suddenly realized: he should separate Donald’s idea from the current floating city. If Yanayev learned “the satellite city of the floating city has military power,” he might target the entire floating city. But if he learned “there are two floating cities—one has military power, the other doesn’t”—then the peaceful one would be safe.

Just as Harry opened his mouth, Lin Shuanghe offered another suggestion: “We’ve discussed this too. A floating city designed for military use is unreasonable—too expensive, too long to build, and ineffective. If you only want an aerial fortress, our advice is: don’t make it a floating city.”

Donald’s eyes brightened. He clapped his hands, suddenly enlightened. “Of course! I can think differently. If I just need an aerial fortress, I can use technology to build a large aircraft—or an aerial platform.”

“But if it’s just to carry fighters, it’s pointless,” Lin Shuanghe kindly warned. “Muggles have perfected their fighter combat systems—an aerial fortress is merely decorative.”

“Not at all!” Donald said firmly. “I’ll equip it with strategic weapons—like the Focusing Rainbow!”

“Unbelievable,” Lin Shuanghe rubbed his forehead. “The Focusing Rainbow is just a magical cannon. It’s slightly better than a standard Muggle main gun—nowhere near a strategic weapon.”

Harry nodded inwardly—the Tianchao experts clearly understood the Focusing Rainbow. But then, a recent conversation surfaced in his mind: when discussing the Werewolf Kingdom’s infiltration by the KGB, Zhang Qiu had hinted that Yanayev feared the Focusing Rainbow because he was developing a massive weapon using a hybrid defense system—she compared it to an airship.

Donald was still lost in his aerial fortress fantasy, but Harry sensed something alarming: Yanayev might already be ahead. Though airships couldn’t easily penetrate air defenses to threaten floating cities, in direct combat, their numerical advantage from being first-mover might easily overwhelm any aerial fortress.

“Mr. Fontroy,” Harry tugged his sleeve. “I have another idea: instead of flying around with one Focusing Rainbow, deploy multiple ones on the ground.”

“But we don’t have enough wizards to operate them all,” Donald replied instinctively.

“I think,” Harry urged, “if we need wizards moving around anyway, maintaining several ground-based glass spheres might be easier than maintaining an aerial fortress. Also, we still don’t control the Iron Curtain tech—an aerial fortress would struggle against Muggle conventional weapons.”

Donald fell silent. Harry felt he had briefly convinced him.