Chapter 163: A look from the Core

A few weeks later, I have most of my negotiations done. It will take a few more weeks to get the drydocks and first line of airships done and probably a few months to get pilots trained.

It's likely going to take years for this technology to become widespread enough for the trial to be considered complete, it took planes decades to be fully integrated into society, cars, and trains, too; usually, something like this will take three or four decades, but this is a trial, so fifteen to twenty years is my deadline.

Also, I am considering the previous five years in that as well, so really I have a least ten years. It's not just the spread of the technology I have to consider but everything else that will make people want to use it. Safety features, infrastructure, a reason to use it. Most revolutionary methods of travel also came with monumental infrastructure, roads for cars, tracks for trains, enormous runways, and airports for planes.

All of this will take a lot of time, and even with my knowledge from my previous life, it will still be difficult to accomplish. The time this project needs to mature is going to take a while, possibly more than five years, which is why I made it my backup plan. Get it started now, but I should still seek another avenue to which I can purify my cursed skill.

This all leads to a new problem that has been around for years now. I have too much to do and not enough bodies and minds to do them with; I need to upgrade my minds and clones' capabilities to do everything in time, and this means getting my Bond to level one thousand to get Safyrs help in training my mental skills.

It's time for another dive into the dungeon, which my new tank buster capabilities I should be able to defeat enemies I previously could not; I wonder if I can take on that diamond Felin now? It's worth a try.

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The Dungeon Core has had a burning question in the back of its mind all this time: Why now? Why, after all of this time, the Runalymo have come back? Why did they stop in the first place?

The Dungeon core watches the illusion girl with interest. She reminds it of Kayafe, the things she does with mana is simply staggering, even more so than what Kayafe has done, and now it seems that she has done something new again, although it's hard to tell with her using remote bodies.

Kayafe is certainly stronger and has remarkable fitness with mana, more so than this girl, but the illusionist fairy summoner seems to have mastered the complex nature of mana; she knows more and thus knows how to do more with mana.

It watches as the girl flies off to the Felin Glade slaying monsters as she works her way to the Diamond Felin. So far, he has successfully fought everyone off; it wonders how she will be able to defeat it. Will she use something new?

The girl slowly approaches the Felin, who instantly recognizes something's wrong and looks around carefully. The girl starts charging up a few spells, five fairies, which become denser and denser. The Felin growls warningly, sensing the mounting danger, and starts prowling around with its diamond hackles raised.

However, the girl continued channeling her spell, safe in the fact that her body is not real. Her fairy summon hardens, becoming solid mana, a strange thing since solid spell mana is not always a good thing, but she still continues to compress it.

She's learned how to cast liquid spells? The Core guesses. It already knows this since Kayafe often used it when she made her way to it to negotiate a deal. However, it also knows that the girl is casting her spell too slowly for it to matter. The Felin will regenerate even if it's badly damaged.

Once the spells are complete, they fly at the Felin, thrusting deeply into it with a spear, and like an injection needle, the fairy's mana is pumped into the Felin before exploding. Blasting the Felin apart in half as a shower of diamond growths and gore rains down. The explosion rocks through the glade, frightening the surviving inhabitants and even damaging the walls of the boss room; but just as the Core predicted, it doesn't immediately kill the Felin; however, it did do a significant amount of damage.

The Felin starts regrowing, but the girl doesn't let up, engaging it with a flurry of weaker spells. Void blades mostly to whittle it down; however, it is clear that, while powerful, she doesn't have either a Class bonus or item bonus to those spells. The power difference is like night and day, but the Diamond Felin is resistant to the girl's beauty magic, so it really doesn't matter what she uses.

With most of its body missing, the Felin is helpless to the girl's attacks, but it tries to shield itself as best it can, but the girl doesn't seem to run out of mana

five spells at a time manifest, slicing deeply into the Felin as it bleeds out, a pool of blood soaking the grass under it.

So that's what she's after. The Core realizes that the girl is only attacking the regrowing parts, keeping the Felin injured and bleeding to death.

Realizing the girl's strategy as well, the Felin crawls toward the girl, snarling. She doesn't flinch; she doesn't even move as the Felin bites down on the fake body only to receive a mouthful of spells, fairies that attack its vulnerable throat.

The Felin thrashes around and screeches in pain, then starts charging up his own spell and blasts it at the fake body, tearing through the trees and blasting through the walls. However, unlike the last group, the girl doesn't teleport out; her illusion simply reforms as if nothing had happened.

They go back and forth like that until the Felin is dead. The girl doesn't celebrate her victory; however, rather she just gathers the materials and moves further into the glade. She continues fighting the Felins, going as far as she can, defeating several guardian-type monsters, gathering their materials, and once she reaches the end of the glad, she flies out toward another den.

After clearing another den, she moves on clearing through the forest zone, then the desert zone, then the grass zone. Day after day, she fights; she doesn't even through the night, only resting to recharge her mana, a relentless slaughterer.

The Core can't help but be inspired by this girl and adds new plans to making its ultimate creation. This time it won't just let magic create whatever it wants; it will be the master of this creation and use its authority to make the most powerful being, but not yet. Now's not the time for that, it still has a lot to learn, and this girl still has more to show.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Over the last three months, I've continued my inscription study, trying new patterns, and I feel like I have made significant progress in understanding what doesn't work. The mana gathering inscription was easy compared to trying how to burn the mana to fuel a magical effect. I'm not even trying to do magic; I'm just seeing what happens when I poke around, so I don't think that's the problem.

It's like Kayafe said, we can control the circumstances in which magic happens but not the result. The problem is I can't even get to that without straight-up copying skills from people. Eventually, I am going to crack the code after all the skill inscriptions produce a consistent result despite the nature of magic. I feel like there is something like divinity involved to rein magic in, but I don't think it's a true magic framework; even if there is divinity, I think the balance is off, or they aren't mixed into apotheosis or something.

Other than that, I've also made several deals to set up airship port stations in several villages to start with, and with the construction of the first airship, I am already training pilots... they've crashed three times now, each time the airship needed repairs.

I've continued to study solid vitality and super-solid mana stages, earning me six more levels in [Sense Magic]. I still have more breakthroughs to achieve in [Manipulate Mana], but I'm focused on doing other things right now, and after a marathon training session for it, I feel like doing something else for now.

As for my Bond Level, I have been training really hard, going as deep into the dens as I can, except the Gargoyle ruins; I haven't even stepped foot in there.

Ting! Your Bond has obtained levels 887-999!

I listen to the whispers of my Bond as I gracefully duck under the blade of the Grass Mantis Boss, and with a flick of my [Aurora Blade], I sever the Grass Mantis' scythe and follow up with a slash at the leg, but it barely dodges. I don't think I am particularly skilled at martial combat, and in fact, the Bond wants me to do some flashy moves that under normal circumstanced would only tire me out faster, but this isn't a normal circumstance; my clones don't tire out.

The boss screeches out and Five more Mantis join the fray from beyond the nearby grass, each attacking me from different directions while the boss retreats as its scythe regrows. I dodge the attacks as best as I can but being attacked by so many my clone is hit several times, which would have been deadly, but my clone can't die.

I try my best to act as if my clone is real just in case my real body is ever threatened; however, against these five, I should have just retreated at the first sign of trouble, and I am punished by having to take hits before dispatching them. By the time I have killed the five reinforcements, The Boss is back in action, charging at me with a new arm.

I try to parry the incoming attack but fail, too slow to match the boss's speed. [Inquisitive Perfection], aided by hindsight, chastises me and offers several things I could have done to avoid taking a hit; I absorb the criticisms and attack back, lashing out with a thrust. I hit the boss Mantis who retreats to heal. I press the attack to keep it on the defensive but realize too late that I was trying to lure me into a trap as two more Mantis jump out from the nearby grass and slice into my clone.

"That was obvious! If it wasn't your clone, you'd be dead several times over!" [Inquisitive Perfection] yells at me, once again aided by hindsight; it said nothing before I attacked.

Martial combat has always been a weakness of mine, a weakness I am trying to fix, my goal is to not take any hits, but I don't see that happening any time soon.

Each time I land a major blow on the boss, it retreats and summons allies to distract me while it regenerates, a very annoying boss to fight, but one I could have easily defeated if I used my spells. However, I am glad I am fighting it; if I always use my spells, I won't gain the combat experience needed to know how to deal with enemies like this one.

The Mantis jumps at me again, but with a lucky strike, I cut off one of its legs and follow up with a slash at its right arm, cutting that off too. I still took a 'fatal' hit to my head, but after an hour and a half of this fight, I just wanted it to end. While the boss writhes on the ground, trying to crawl away to safety, I catch up to it and cut its head off, and finish it up by blowing the head up with a spell.

Ting! Your Bond has obtained level 1000!