Mansion Tour Part 6

After they descended the stairs to a new platform, the lights activating as they entered the space and deactivating after they left their space, Yuri said, “This is the second basement, there’s supposed to be an industrial water heating system on this level, but it could could have been moved down to the bottom level. So, let’s see what we have to work with here.” He headed off to the chamber on the right, the women following shortly behind him. A large chamber opened up; it was filled with metallic square cabinets and a strange box with a screen in some sort of strange glass box was on either side of the room; there was a considerably large blue table made from a strange material that dominated the room with four strange looking chairs. “Okay,” said Yuri as the group entered the room, “this is my file and archive room; looks like it’s been modified to take water leaks and the like into account.”

“What are these strange cabinets,” inquired Thelsia as she inspected one of the cabinets, noticing something written in an unfamiliar script on the front of some of their spaces.

“Filing cabinets,” said Yuri, “they’re each equipped with drawers that come out as long as the casing is deep towards the back; I use them for storing physical copies for my proofs of transactions and letters from people that send me messages. I’m a bit of a squirrel in that regard; I don’t really like throwing things away; so they just end up in a place I hardly ever visit.”

“I’ll be letting the guild master know about these,” said Thelsia as she moved away from the cabinets and went over to inspect the table.

“What is the table made of,” inquired Althana.

“PVC,” said Yuri, “it’s a kind of plastic that is designed to be rigid yet durable; it’s also pretty cheap to produce back in the world I grew up in.”

“Is that short for something,” asked Althana.

“It’s short for Polyvinyl Chloride,” said Yuri, “but I’ve basically told you the extent of my knowledge on the subject. Personally, I don’t know the details of how it’s made or formed, but I do know there were some places where you could custom order anything you wanted and have it made entirely out of PVC; I got the table from a company that specialized in making PVC furniture.”

“And the chairs,” inquired Thelsia as inspected the strange white chairs.

“Just some mass-produced lawn chairs I bought at a store that had them in stock,” said Yuri, “they’re cheaply made, and they really aren’t all that comfortable to sit in. Plastic has a few benefits over metal,” continued Yuri, “it can be made almost as strong, won’t corrode as easily, and it’s considerably lighter.”

“Sounds great,” said Althana, “what are some of the downsides?”

“It’s usually more susceptible to heat, is usually considerably harder to repair than any metalwork, and can usually become brittle much faster in colder conditions,” said Yuri, “and drinking from it can put an odd taste in your mouth, even if it is considerably more durable than glass or clay cups. Everything has a few drawbacks; remember that.”

“What is this device in a box,” inquired Usagi as she stared at it intently.

“It’s a computer, an older model that was at least a decade old when I got it,” said Yuri.

“Does the age of the machine matter,” inquired the rabbit woman.

“It can,” said Yuri, “keeping up with all the latest models back home was next to impossible; almost every company that made them rolled out a new model practically every year. As for our resident technology person, there are some older models that have been put into storage for one reason or another in one of the storage chambers; when we find it, you’re free to try and disassemble it to see its components.”

“Aren’t you worried about what she’ll do once that happens,” inquired Inoshana.

“Not really,” said Yuri, “the components of these machines are distinct; replicating them and their functions could be possible, even with magic, but hardware is just half the equation with these machines. And I doubt any of you even have an idea of what the concept of coding language for a machine is like.”

“The back half of that sounded like he was just spitting out combinations of words,” said Thelsia as Usagi moved away from the machine and inspected the room.

After a moment, Yuri led the group to the other side of the chamber; there were shelves lining the walls, a set of shallow counters on three of the walls, and a small collection of drawers. As the group looked through the room’s adornments, they found some strange envelopes and a collection of small squares on some kind of paper.

“What is all of this,” inquired Usagi.

“Mailing envelopes and stamps,” said Yuri, “in the world I grew up, those are required for most forms of physical mail, which is usually in the form of letters and the like.”

“How is that supposed to work,” inquired Thelsia.

“The stamps are required for the messages and packages to be legally delivered by the postal service,” said Yuri, “there’s a lot more to this, but I usually didn’t pay attention to the details; I often need to check when it comes to doing things related to the postal service. This room is just here because of how far I made my residence from the nearest town…now that I think about it, the mansion and its ground came in here at a similar distance to how I had it before all this. Let’s get going to the next floor.”

“Sounds good to me,” said Malza, as the group all made their way back to the stairs.