Air Supremacy (part one)

Speaking of which, after Du Wei brought back the garrison officer from the city of Colo – A third level knight – George Bush felt his choice of coming to the Rowling Household was absolutely correct.

Originally an officer of a small northern city, his pay wasn't all that bad; unfortunately, he was stuck in a place with little prospect for his future. But most importantly, the amount of supplies and equipment's the garrison army was given is much lower when compared to the formal battle legions. Day in and day out, he watched on with envious eyes at the people from the Storm Corps traveling to and fro in the city.

Now that he has arrived at Du Wei's old home, he was formally fused into the castle guards. Luckily for George, Knight Robert found out he was accepted by Du Wei so George was easily promoted to the position of a Captain, with a hundred soldiers under him.

The Rowling family is an imperial military family of the Empire. For this reason, their private army is better equipped than soldiers from the regular garrison by several times. Even when compared to the empire's regular legions like the Northern Storm Corps, the Rowling household's private army isn't any inferior. Rejoicing at the high quality armor and weapon he was given, his new mount was also a solid steed that he could not find any fault with it!

Most importantly, Du Wei was also looking favorably upon him because Du Wei's situation is very different than before. Despite being very wealthy, Du Wei didn't have any confidants that he can send out to handle his private matters. Other than Marde, the rest of his people like Hussein cannot be known to the public.

This way, George became the best candidate: no background, no father or mother, comes from a humble beginning, and most importantly, he offended the Holy Knights Platoon. With him wholeheartedly following Du Wei – Hussein secretly observed this kid's martial arts talent is quite good – So of course he would vigorously promote George.

According to Du Wei's instruction, Robert was ordered to teach him some intermediate Dou QI practicing methods that were usually only taught to the commanding officers of the Rowling army. George is not a fool. In order to prove his worth, he would train every day to not disappoint his new master.

Originally the Rowling army has a tendency to exclude outsiders. For this reason, George would have had a hard time gaining a foothold inside the army. Luckily for him, Du Wei invented soccer. Although the game has been largely transferred to the public populous, but the camp would still organize a few games here and there.

This George could surely be considered a soccer genius. Within a few days, he actually played like a veteran and quickly built a good relationship with the regular troops. Even some of the soldiers that disliked him at first were gradually changing their opinions of him after a few games.

Du Wei had big plans for George in the future. Going the extra length, he specifically asked George and Robert to secretly observe the 100 soldiers under George's command and pick out the ones that not only has brains, but also a smart mouth.

George knew this was his new master's way of cultivating him. So without neglect, he spent the next few days secretly observing his subordinates and wrote down the names of certain outstanding individuals to report back to Robert.

With the backing of Du Wei, Robert gave the green light and allowed George to freely pick out 100 soldiers to act as Du Wei's personal guard. The only problem lies in the fact that George's marital skill is too common. As a solution, Robert deliberately spent some time to tutor George and even passed on his own martial skills to him.

In a blink of an eye, it has already been a month since Du Wei returned home.

During this time, he had his people expand the small building in the back of the castle by three folds. In addition, he also had his workers clear out a patch of land in the woods to construct a small manor facing the Rowling River, away from prying eyes because of the three wooden walls. (Emerald River).

Stored inside the manor is all the gifts from the Marquise of Lister and magician's union. Not only that, he had Marde move all of the Soccer Association's so called service point records inside for safe keeping. Of course, Du Wei himself had also moved in. As a form of security, he tasked George and his 100 subordinates to act as guards around the perimeter.

Unless Du Wei gave the command, not even the old Butler Sier is allowed inside.

After Du Wei got into trouble the previous time, he was grounded by his father; however, that order has already been revoked with the arrival of the Earl's newest message. It's just that the order to call him back to the capital still hasn't arrived like he expected. At any rate, Du Wei didn't care anyways because his home in the Roland Plains is promising and free, so he's in no rush to return to the capital.

Every day, Du Wei would study magic with the genius Solskjaer; but now, the mouse Prime Minister Gargamel has joined the group. Gargamel's magic level may be way inferior to Gandalf by a hundred fold, but the mouse is still after all a fifth level mage. Compared to Du Wei and Solskjaer, his knowledge is still superior to the two.

Since Solskjaer have already decided to whole heartedly join Du Wei's camp, he had no choice but to put up with the mouse. At first the guy still had his suspicions towards Gargamel, but after listening to his explanation of how he was stuck in his form due to being hit with the rebounding transformation magic, Solskjaer's worry was somehow reduced.

Subsequently, Gargamel was absolutely surprised at Solskjaer's effort to carve out a new road in magic. If his research succeeds, it would be a ground breaking event! As a demonstration, Solskjaer pulled out his 'gunpowder' invention and easily gained the respect of the fifth level mage.

Fortunately Du Wei's wealth is quite deep. Even though magic experiments burn a lot of money, but he could still afford it.

The only worrying matter for him right now is the female knight he sent out to sea to hunt pirates with the violent Joanna. Counting the days, it should have been three months since they departed. The fact that they still haven't returned is making Du Wei feel quite anxious.

However, there is also good news.

The development team Du Wei had left behind for the hot air balloon has successfully produced a working product after many days of trial and error. Of course, they were only able to achieve this thanks to Du Wei indirectly guiding them. Once they have flight tested the balloon a few times, (Of course, Marde would rather be killed before he goes up again) the directional controls have been lavishly installed. And with further development, this senior magician Gargamel was able to effectively upgrade the burning materials for the hot air balloon by adding in a few species of magical herbs into the mix. With all these improvements, the current version of the hot air balloon not only could rise higher with less effort, it could also carry a heavier payload.

Struck with a thought, Du Wei started to think.

In this world, there is no such thing as an air force. The sky is almost undefended. With a thing like the hot air balloon, it would be equivalent to having total air control! If this was a war torn era, the hot air balloon could be used to quietly transport large amounts of supplies and troops behind enemy lines….. Such a use is no small matter! And let's not forget air assault and so on….

The only problem is that the continent is in an age of peace right now. Therefore, the hot air balloon has no military purpose or use.

Changing his way of thought, Du Wei started to come up with different concepts: No use in a war, but he still can't just waste it. With so much gold already invested into such a device, he can't just use it as an ornament and throw the gold into the water!

A slap across his head, Du Wei made up his mind: Home use! Transportation!

The newer version of the hot air balloon may have raised its payload limit by a lot, but it still can't match up to the amount of a horse drawn carriage.

Then again, the speed of air travel is still much faster than the speed of a carriage by many times. In addition to that, air travel is much safer and doesn't have the issue of having its previous cargo breaking due to bumpy roads on the ground. More importantly, the cost of a carriage is much higher due to the fact that the owner has to pay for: the horse, the groom, and the feed.

Making up his mind, he decided to follow through on this path.

On the continent of Roland, there is a transportation industry; however, it is all horse drawn carriage based. Not only is it slow, the cost is also quite high.

To make it fast, there are methods one can use in some big cities where a branch of the magician's union is located. By inviting a mage to lay out a magic circle, one can take advantage of the power of magic to send out important letters in an instant. Essentially, this method is no different from the webmail service in Du Wei's previous life. Unfortunately, such an important magic circle can only be found in the branches of the magician's union or in some important military base!

Ordinary people, or even wealthy individuals, can only rely on fast running horses to deliver anything they wished to transport in a hurry.

In this way, the usefulness of the hot air balloon is born.

This day, Du Wei tasked Marde to gather the wealthy merchants in the small city located south of the Rowling castle. After tasting the sweet nectar known as the soccer league, these individuals would of course show up without hesitation.

This small city is just less than 30 miles south of the Rowling Castle and the daily necessities are all bought from this place. Because it is so close to the Rowling castle, this little city was given a unique name: Rowling complex. According to the Roland continent's wording, the meaning of the name is the Rowling Households place.

On this day, all of the wealthy merchants of the province came rushing to the city after receiving a request by the young master of the Rowling House. Even the ones that couldn't make it have sent a representative just in case. Of course, the one with the best relationship with Du Wei at the moment is the leather merchant that has supported his soccer league in the past.

In order to prepare for his presentation of the hot air balloon, Du Wei has carefully prepared a sample. Using ten high quality cowhides to braid the air balloon, he also acquired a set of sturdy vines to weave the huge bowl shaped chassis. And as a safety measure, the guardrails are at least half a person high. After calculating it in his head, Du Wei believed the hot air balloon can bear the weight of 15 adult me, which is about a ton in weight.

Moreover, under the chassis, he specially invited Gargamel to cast a few low leveled wind spells to dampen the wind resistance when they go into the air. This way, it would also increase the buoyancy of the hot air balloon and increase its carrying capacity.

"I have invited everyone today because I am about to open a new industry." In front of these businessmen, Du Wei did not bother saying any useless kind words. Once they see what he has in store, their hearts will definitely be tempted: "The transportation business in the Roland Plains have always been monopolized by a few caravan troupes. Although everyone has their own caravans, but the blockades in different areas make it very inconvenient. The new thing I came up with will be able to help you ship any urgent or precious cargo to anywhere at a fast pace. North, south, east, and west, as long as the weather is good, we can deliver it anywhere within a maximum time of two days!"

As soon as his words came out, the people below burst into an uproar.