Ranier and Violet spent the next few days in Nolar, just listening to gossip in the tavern, the tales of the wandering bards singing songs about the news and they spent quite a few days in the library

For a small town, Ranier was surprised that the town had a sizeable library, which was housed in a double story building the size of a small cottage. 

Perhaps because Argabad was now a country of technology and knowledge rather than that of sword and sorcery, books seem to be more readily available, rather than the domain of only the mages and nobility. 

As someone unfamiliar with this dimension, Ranier absorbed all the knowledge he could find about the history and geography of Argabad. While he did try to catch up on his knowledge in his family library, their books were limited to knowledge of Acturia and he knew nothing outside of his former country, which had now been absorbed into Argabad. 

Acturia, in comparison with Argabad was backwards indeed. They didn't even have a different name for the capital city where the royal family dwelt. They called the city Acturia, the capital city of Acturia! And even most of the territories were simply part of Acturia and most of the population were centralized near the city. 

The population of Acturia was actually quite small, being that of around 2 million inhabitants in comparison with Argabad's 16 million. However, initially Acturia had the upper hand as they had many powerful warriors, including their King and Queen. 

However, when Argabad mastered the dwarven technology, together with their much larger population, they simply steamrolled over the forces of Acturia. 

Ranier sighed as he read all this, seeing that the falling of his country was simply an forgone conclusion since both countries were constantly at war over the centuries. 

They entered the workshop of Magnimus who greeted them with a bright smile. 

"Quickly, lets try these on" he said, bringing out two flesh colored arms. On each hand, the fingers and thumb formed a C shape as the hand stated in a loosely open position. 

Ranier helped remove Violet's cloak and clothes, leaving her only in a bra as Magnimus showed them how to attach the artificial arms to the stumps at her elbows. 

He showed her the two hidden buttons at the inside of each wrist where if she pressed them button with the other hand, a blade suddenly popped out of her forearm of the hand which button was pressed. 

She used her right hand to press the button on her left hand, and a blade shot out of her forearms, then she used the left hand to press the button on her right hand and the blade on the right forearm came out!

Not only that, the hand which button was pressed clenched to become a fist as if ready for battle. 

She looked a bit like Wolverine from the X-Men, only that she had one blade from each arm. 

She pressed each button back and both blades retracted into her forearms.

"The blades are finest Damascas steel as is the fist itself. Now, twist your hand this way" Magnimus said

Violet pointed her right arm outwards and twisted her forearm so her thumb pointed upwards. 

The hand suddenly changed as the thumb went from being in front of the palm to the side, like a open palm to high five someone. 

"Point hour hand over there" he said and Violet complied and pointed her hand at a target dummy used for shooting arrows. 

"Now, pull your thumb backwards" he instructed

Violet used her left hand to pull the right thumb backwards and suddenly, the pointer finger fired a bullet at the target, hitting the target, but not the bullseye. 

"Again!" he said

This time, Violet aimed and pulled her thumb and the middle finger shot a bullet that hit the bullseye

"Again!" he asked

Ranier and Violet realized that every finger was a gun capable of shooting a bullet each. 

"How many bullets can it fit?" Ranier asked

Magnimus removed the right arm and opened the inner forearm to show where to insert bullets. Each finger could accomodate 5 bullets, allowing Violet to fire 20 bullets per hand. 

While the inner forearm could store bullets, the outer forearm stored the blade

Ranier watched carefully to see how to replace the bullets as obviously he was the one going to rearm Violet. 

Seeing that Magnimus did such a fine job, Ranier decided to spend a little bit more to buy an expensive mithril chain garment for Violet to wear under her cloak. 

It was only a top, but because it was made for a larger person, it was long enough to cover up to her hips. 

Having plenty of goal as they cleared out Nicodemon's total amount of wealth, they paid Magnimus and exited his shop. 

They walked around town only to find that there was a large group of people gathering around the middle of the town square. 

"What's going on?" Ranier asked a passerby. 

"They are burning a witch!" the woman replied

"Witch? You mean a mage?" Ranier asked.

"Witch, Warlock, Mage, Sorceror... they are all banned now in Argabad. We have technology now and that leaves no place for these pagans" the woman proudly said

"Oh... I agree" Ranier suddenly nodded, and pushed his way nearer with Violet

There was a raised platform in the middle of the town square and there was a tall beam with several gallows which already had dead women hanging on them. 

Another witch was standing in the middle of the platform. 

She saw a blonde haired beauty, wearing only rags that barely covered her nude body. 

Surrounding the wooden platform were metal platforms with orbs on each corner which crackled with electricity as they shot electricity at each other. 

"What is that?" Ranier wondered aloud

"Those? Those are anti magic devices. They help disable the witch's magic so we can hang them" a passerby said

"Oh? There is such a thing?" Ranier answered

"You must not be from here" the man said

"No.... I live in the outskirts and this is the first time to this town" Ranier replied

"No wonder. The Church of Purity has been working with the Scientists of Argabad and created these devices to counter magic. This is how we could conquer Acturia so easily" he said and laughed

"I see" Ranier said, when he suddenly realized that he has seen the blonde somewhere before. 

Like Violet, she was someone from manga he knew off before!

"We must rescue her!" Ranier thought to himself as his mind raced to see what he could do as she was going to be hanged in moments.