Chapter 177: Background Processes
"A dungeon? Like a prison?" Zephyr asked.
No. Not like a prison — Just think of it as a lair. Kind of like a game, but not really since you could actually die.
"What...?" Zephyr was even more confused. "Like a game...? How would you know that just from the outside? And what kind of game are we talking about here?"
...You will understand when you enter, host.
"You know, I would perfectly understand what you mean if you just feed me an image directly..." Zephyr grumbled.
It had been a while since Aegis had held out information on him. He didn’t get the ’User Privilege Insufficient’ message this time, but he could tell Aegis was dancing around the topic.
’Hey Aegis. What are the requirements for Level 2 User Privilege?’ he suddenly asked.
Reaching Tier 4 or finding your father.
’...’ Zephyr’s next train of thought was halted immediately.
He didn’t think Aegis was actually going to respond to his query and was already preparing a perfunctory response to Aegis’ incoming denial...
But instead he’d gotten a response.
"Reaching Tier 4... or finding my father..." Zephyr whispered in a daze.
Reaching Tier 4 looked the easier of the two with his current capabilities.
He knew finding his father was a long term endeavour. Even up until now, the coordinates he had been given in that message looked like pure jargon, something he couldn’t even begin to decipher yet.
"And what would the Tier 2 User Privilege entail...?" Zephyr asked hesitantly, probing whether Aegis would give a response yet again.
Near-full access to all information about my origin... and to some extent, yours.
Basically... answers to all the pressing questions you obviously have, host.
’Finally!’ Zephyr bit his lips to hold back the surge of excitement that followed Aegis’ response.
He let out a soft breath, calming himself. At least now he finally knew when he would get answers.
Answers to Aegis’ true origin. The things Aegis kept holding back from him — sometimes major information, and sometimes petty things that shouldn’t even be held back, like for example, this ’dungeon’ thing.
It was almost like Aegis was holding back because giving some ’little’ information would lead to revealing another ’greater’ or ’major’ information.
But now he had a clear timeframe for when he’d get to know everything.
He turned his attention back to the dungeon, walking up closer to observe.
Host. Pending the time you would wait to investigate the previous monster settlement, I suggest staying here for the day to observe for any changes.
I need to ascertain a few assumptions in regards to this dungeon. If I’m right, then you might not even need to be wary of a monster breakout from here for the time being. You would be able to focus solely on the puzzling monster settlement instead.
’I’ve got no problem with that.’ Zephyr started to make himself comfortable.
The sun was already reaching higher in the sky, heating the red, rocky earth rapidly.
"Damn, gotta find somewhere better..." Zephyr made his way further back, hiding amid an even more recessed part of the rocky terrain.
He used earth magic to push further back in, creating a hollow space with a clear line of sight at the dungeon opening.
He watched intently for every change, using the first hour to do just that as his mind wandered around various topics — like his mana node, his home world, his parents...
Eventually even that had to stop as the sun rose way higher in the sky, nearly reaching its peak, bringing with it the full brunt of the desert heat.
Heat that even in his recessed enclave, still made him uncomfortable.
The air in the distance swam with the distortion of the broiling yet dry heat he felt, which after a while, he couldn’t take anymore.
"Why am I suffering when I have magic?" Zephyr huffed, facepalming at his lack of imagination.
He immediately started up a wind spell. But it simply made things worse. The air around was already hot, and all he was doing was cycling that hot air faster. It provided no relief whatsoever.
So he changed tactics.
He first thought to target the little moisture in the air around him, chilling it rapidly, thereby reducing the overall temperature around himself.
But he held the thought. He wanted to try using his ALU to create a merged effect instead. Consciously.
The last time his ALU had been put to work, the whole process was subconscious, as he had been in danger, fighting for his life, at risk of dying at any moment.
Now, there was no such danger, so he wanted to see what he could make with a merged spell effect.
Instead of the normal wind spell, he instead visualized a ’cooling wind’ by thinking of the little moisture in the air being chilled as the wind spell moved.
He closed his eyes in concentration, already feeling the wind spell take effect and subtly cooling as the ALU in his mana node executed the spell effect.
A grin couldn’t help but spread on his face as he felt the air cool rapidly after the first go.
The wind that blew across his face was a cool, refreshing one, compared to the basic wind spell he used just before.
If an outsider had been there with him, it might’ve felt like Zephyr just cooled the air and then cycled a normal wind spell afterwards, but only he knew that wasn’t the case.
The cool moisture was embedded directly into the wind spell, like as if a symbiosis, existing only where the wind cycled across, and everywhere besides that was still dominated by the hot desert air.
He marveled at the feeling.
"I wonder how long I could run this for?" He muttered, enjoying the cool effect.
As he thought about it, he suddenly frowned, questioning why he’d never thought of it before.
He remembered that back in the military camp, one of the soldiers — the one who was good with the battle-axe — had said something about soldiers coating themselves with a prepared spell at all times.
A low-requirement spell that could be run nearly at all times, with minor rest periods where, if executed well, would make it look like the soldier even never took a break at all.
And that was with low level soldiers from his world – from two and four node awakened soldiers.
Zephyr at the moment was equivalent to a sixteen node awakened with his FinFET transistor build. And that was only accounting for Transistor count alone, not to talk of efficiency, or even further, about the logic gates, registers and ALU he had built.
He was way above their league, and yet they could already do that for nearly a whole day because of knowledge of the low-requirement, Ryvelin-made spell.
While he didn’t have the exact spell they used, creating spells similar or even better than that was not an issue for him.
"I should even have the capacity to run a few more spells at the same time too..." Zephyr muttered in thought.
Like background processes. Aegis chipped in.
"..."
Zephyr didn’t even bother to ask, instead he moved on. "Aegis, you can keep monitoring the dungeon gate while I do my thing right?"
As long as you keep watching it every now and then...
"Nice." Zephyr quickly started to try a few things out.
He wasn’t about to waste a whole day doing nothing but just watching a gate.
He thought of spells that would be very useful for him.
The major points he could think off the top of his head were – Attack, Defence and Concealment.
The attack part was easy enough. He already had spells saved up in his register memory that he could release at a moment’s notice. So doing something else felt redundant.
But just for the sake of it, he also gave it some thought.
The first idea that came to mind for a constantly running attack spell was something like a pre-loaded explosive spell, a spell half-primed that could fire the instant he willed it.
He grabbed a handful of rocks, crushing and making them float just above his hand, encased in a wind orb that was rapidly rotating, waiting for a small trigger to send the rocks scattering in the air at blistering speeds.
Zephyr put up a mana barrier to shield himself, before letting the spell loose and watching it pelt the surroundings with holes.
It wasn’t enough to be life threatening, but it would hurt his opponent like hell, and if it caught a soft and vital part of their body, it could even prove fatal.
"Ha ha! I’m a genius!" Zephyr cackled.
No you’re not. It’s nothing new. Aegis chipped in with a monotone voice.
"Would you let me at least have this one, Aegis?" Zephyr grumbled.
He had felt Aegis about to bring up spell suggestions as it read his intentions to create spells that he could keep running at all times, but Zephyr had wordlessly chosen to shut Aegis’ attempt down.
He had chosen to do it himself.
So far it felt like Aegis had been the one giving him spell combinations, suggestions, charting out paths for him to follow... so he wanted to do this himself.
Aside from some spur of the moment spells Zephyr had cast in the past, this was basically one of the only few he had purposefully created himself.
Hence, his glee.
And yet Aegis still didn’t let him fully have it.
Just so you know, host. This was the first spell suggestion I had on the list. It is that obvious...
"Fuck! Are you mocking me right now, Aegis?!"
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A/N: This Chapter’s special thanks goes to Lee_Mcculloch for the Golden Tickets! Thanks a ton!