Weapons of Mass Destruction

Chapter 878: Good ant

While Tacita holds Fuci so it can’t try to go back to Lily and Tess, I, Savi, and Sophie get to work on the encrypted stone. Tacita spends the whole time watching Savant, who she still clearly doesn’t like very much. Though at least she is not trying to stab him outside the tournaments, where it generally seems to be her favorite way of passing the time.

The Ruler of Cowardice, a man who, as it has been rumored, would turn into the Fragments of Eternal Cowardice upon death, the most cowardly person since the System Wars–yes, I still remember the way he forfeited our duel–is the same as always.

“You and Sophie have been going about it all wrong. Rather than trying to get around the defenses and use the existing point of entry, it’d be easier to simply erase the defenses. Even if you do have to be careful so that the process doesn’t destroy the information,” he says.

“So what? You just absorbed the defenses or the knowledge out of the stone?” I snort.

“Something like that,” he says.

“Bullshit. There’s no way your [Absorption] works in such a weird way.”

“It’s a very versatile skill.”

“The fuck it is. Tess! Come here, declare this stone deciphered or something,” I call out to the blonde.

“I’m busy!” she calls back and then returns to sparring with Maya inside the temporary arena we’ve created.

“So you’ve entirely extracted the knowledge?” Sophie asks.

“I haven’t, but I used the progress you made and did-”

“Oh come on, stop being so mysterious. You already saw what we did and, from listening around, know like half of our skills. It is not like we’ve tried to hide it,” I groan in annoyance.

The green-eyed man returns my gaze, narrowing his eyes, and I can see thoughts spinning in his head. He looks towards Sophie too, who just shrugs.

In the end, he gives up. “I used my [Absorption] and [Severance]. I won’t be explaining exactly how, but the names of the skills should give you an idea of what I did.”

“What level are you?” I try my luck.

But there, he decides to stay quiet, so I do not even try to push it.

“What have you gotten out of it so far? Did you search for keywords?” I ask.

He nods, returning to look back at the mana stone, with cables still attached, now lying on the table in between us, surrounded by many inscription circles and a few fields we’ve set up.

“I’ve been searching for any mention of the gods and rulers,” he says, “but I didn’t get very much, and there are multiple levels of encryption, especially when it comes to this sort of information. I think you’d need a specialized Champion or an Absolute to break it, and honestly, it makes sense for corporations to safeguard their information.”

Sophie and I wait as he pokes the stone. “Pale Titan is suspected of being a Demigod. Demigods don’t have an Elysian Framework, sometimes known as a Divine Framework. Instead, he has a Divine Heart.”

“Huh, wouldn’t that make the Black Mana God a demigod?” I ask.

Savant, already knowing about some of that stuff we shared with him, shakes his head. “I think it’s more complicated than that. The Pale Titan is likely the descendant of a god, while the Black Mana God wasn’t a descendant, but born from the concept, or whatever black mana is, only lacking an Elysian Frame. No one born normally can become a god, and new gods haven’t been created ever since the System War.”

“Some Empyreans had a Divine Heart as well, so that would make them demigods. Maybe that guy, the replica of the Last Elf used to awaken Starless Sky, was a demigod as well,” Sophie says.

“Very likely,” Savant nods. “There was also information that it was likely Pride and Kindness who developed a means of shattering the Elysian Frame and killing gods that had, until that point, been immortal and would otherwise have returned sooner or later.”

“Oh?” I lean closer. “Anything else?”

“Yes,” he says. “Some records called Pride the System’s Champion, or even its Executioner. This is just history most people already know, so it wasn’t strongly encrypted, but during the System War, the original races of the universe almost won. Led by the Black Mana God, the other Godkings, the Dragon Emperor, and the Elven Queen, they were pushing the forces fighting for the system towards the First Dungeon to end it all.”

I know it is not on purpose, but he does a pause that makes it seem more dramatic. “It’s been rumored that Pride waited until the perfect moment. To ensure that the system detected the situation as the highest level threat to its function, whatever that may be, and to start giving the best rewards. Only then did he join in and, over the following years, killed many gods and destroyed allied forces.”

“Oh, that’s smart,” I mutter.

For some reason, Sophie looks at me like I am weird and asks, “Anything on Justice?”

“Nothing, but it does mention that there were more Rulers like that during the System War. Hate, Vengeance, Grace, Devotion, and…” he pauses. “Ruler of Oblivion too, the rest I wasn’t able to pull out, but there’s probably a lot more.”

“Ruler of fucking what?” I feel my eyes widen.

“I almost reacted the same when I read it. It just sounds-”

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“Too fucking powerful?”

“Something like that,” Savant agrees. “After the System War ended, the system pruned it down to the 14 we know now. While it didn’t, or was otherwise unable to take the powers of the other Rulers, they either died out or are still somewhere in hiding, waiting for. It’s possible they’re acting as the system’s safeguard against the current Rulers, kept in the background and sometimes given their own system quests.”

I look towards the sky and send a prayer towards Diligence.

Dili is indeed a good ant, and I am sorry for causing him trouble, as that poor guy likely deals with more than my feeble, mana deficient self can imagine.

“So, if a Ruler outside of the current 14 we know dies, they likely aren’t replaced… or maybe they are. Hell, maybe the system’s been keeping a bunch of hidden cults and families around to pass on the title of said rulers, while hiding it from everyone. Who knows. But if the Rulers outside the current 14 aren’t being replaced, that means the ones that are still alive are veterans of the System War and would probably smoke most of the current ones, with the exception of maybe Charity, Greed, and Wrath, and obviously Pride.” I sigh and lean back.

“Then...” I say and pause, “Wait. Dili is a good ant. I bet on his planet, he would be very dangerous. You remember how the Colony shared powers with him on the 4th floor, right? Imagine how much he could get now. But anyway, with Pride messing stuff up, Ruby messing stuff up, Lissandra messing stuff up, the one winged wyvern messing stuff up, and Starless Sky messing stuff up, we might soon have System War 2: Electric Boogaloo.”

There’s a quiet moment until Sophie says, “We’re talking about beings that are very, very ancient. Soon might mean a few hundred years.”

“That is possible,” Savant says, letting go of a mana stone. “Obviously, there are still gods and likely a godking or two hiding somewhere, the Last Elf and his many replicas, especially the Prime replicas. And from the historical data, it seems that dragons and wyverns have been suspiciously quiet for a long time.”

“Before we start pitying the Rulers and stuff, we should remember that Earth is currently caught up in a Pairing, though it, obviously, should not be,” I remind them.

“I don’t think anyone here is pitying the Rulers, Nat.” The mind mage shows no pity at all, unlike my sensitive self, and then asks Savant, “Anything else useful?”

“Not that much, but I’ll try to dig deeper,” Savant says. “Just constant reminders of how impressive the Aurate Consortium is. Did you know they create their battleships out of the body of the Ruler of Kindness? Weapons, armors, they were even able to purify some of the blood and adapt its properties a little to create what they call a Tissue Enhancement and Regeneration Ambrosia that heals you and provably slows aging. Then there are things like warp gates, which require materials with ridiculous levels of durability as a base.”

“That sounds like something Nat would come up with,” Dennis chuckles as he slides over beside us.

(In the next hundred years or so, we’ll be making similar stuff out of Nathaniel’s body.) Aaron shares.

“Nat, your silence worries me,” I hear from the mind mage, and as I look at her, she frowns. “You think it’s cool, don’t you? You’re already thinking about what you’d have done with your body.”

“Perhaps.”

“Imagine,” Dennis spreads his arms, catching even Savant’s gaze to himself, “A dagger made out of Nathaniel’s flesh and bone with his blood flowing through it.”

(It would explode the moment it broke and evaporate you, the opponent, and the city around you!)

“Or, a spear made out of Nathaniel’s flesh and bone!”

(It would also explode upon-)

“Okay, we get it,” Sophie hisses, dismissing him. “Now, show me how you broke through the defenses, and I want to check the data myself,” she tells the Savant and reaches towards the stone, putting her fingers on it.

“As I said, you were looking at it the wrong way, if you…” He reaches and puts his fingers next to hers, and then they both delve into the deciphering.

Dennis looks at them and then at me, lifting both of his eyebrows multiple times with a dumb smirk on his face.

Releasing a weak burst of kinetic energy that he, because of his carelessness, only partially redirects, he coughs from the impact, while I use my defensive layer to deflect the projectiles he shoots my way in response.

I ignore these attacks even as I begin to walk away as they bombard my back, and I head towards where Izzy is to observe her Glacial Veins a little more.

Izzy’s new trait is interesting. As I thought before, it’s basically an extremely cold coolant that regulates her body so the Fragment of Eternal Fire doesn’t burn it. It’s obvious that the fragment’s either changed or became a bigger part of her, if it had remained a simple fragment, it would’ve been easier to control it.

Here, I have to blame Noodle, though blame is too strong a word.

Noodle’s a good snake.

He continues to serve as some sort of storage for Izzy and often throws out any items she needs, all while shrinking and expanding in size.

He’s like a poor man’s version of a Spatial Cache, I would say, even though he can’t store stuff for too long. Things with too much mana or energy are also a no-go, and the same goes for living things. Doing so also restricts the sizes he can shrink or expand into.

But even with all of that, it’s still kind of amazing. Is it rare, or common? Is it not as cool as I think it is?

Sometimes I wonder what this snake actually is. For now, though, I continue to feed him my mana orbs, which he absorbs instead of storing as food. Fuel. Something. I don’t really know.

In exchange, I can study him a little bit. I suspect he has something like the stomach I was offered for my 3rd trait, the one even Elian was curious about.

As for Izzy’s Glacial Veins, of course, we’re working on a way to abuse it. Izzy’s already learned she can cut herself and let her blood drip out as a supercooled liquid. We try to store it in a vial, but we don’t have any capable of keeping up with it, and all of them freeze, shattering in the process.

Lily joins us too, and it freezes her hand as well, but of course, the Lustdozer still continues to move her fingers, breaking them, ignoring the frostbite, and healing herself to deal with it.

The limitations are also clear. If Izzy loses too much blood, the Fragment of Eternal Flame will damage her, and if she uses too much of the fragment, her blood will freeze her instead.

So. Holy fuck.

I bet her 3rd trait at level 400 will be something else.

Myrra also comes to mind, given the way that silly lynthari uses fire and ice to create her Aurora Glass. She could be a nice inspiration and teacher for Izzy. I don’t even need to worry about the lynthari being a bad influence, in fact, I’m pretty sure Izzy would just tame the catgirl instead, wherever she is at the moment.

A bit later, we also learn a bit more from the info Sophie and Savi deciphered.

Apparently, the mora Raga is the Absolute representative of the five corporations present on Xyphos. She’s also one of the Aurate Consortium’s strongest and someone who in the past, could've taken the title Ruler of Gluttony if she wanted, yet decided not to, choosing instead to stay with the Corporation.

All of this is so fucked up.