Back home...
A package had arrived. It contained Axionite.
Ian quickly made his way to his laboratory. He had been trying to create storage bracelets for some time now. He had experimented, laid out designs, and broken a few in the process, but now, with this rare material finally in his hands, he could make real progress.
Axionite was incredibly difficult to obtain, especially in its raw form. He had to ask Master Ordan to use his connections to acquire it. The old master had reluctantly agreed, warning Ian that working with Axionite required absolute precision. Even the slightest miscalculation could render it inert.
Now that it was here, he wasted no time.
He went straight to his laboratory, a sprawling space filled with intricate mechanisms, scattered blueprints, and an assortment of tools, some of which he had designed himself. The dim light from overhead lamps cast long shadows, giving the lab an eerie atmosphere. His workstation was already prepped.
Ian placed the Axionite on his workstation and took a deep breath. He had already examined the structure of the bracelets in detail. They functioned as miniaturized warp bubbles, capable of storing objects in a pocket of space. However, such a technology wouldn't work in Earth's universe. The fundamental properties of this universe were different. Unlike a universe that had expanded from a singularity, this one had come into existence in an instant; one moment, there was nothing, and the next, everything existed. It had started as a timeless quantum field, forming matter in a slow, natural process, reaching equilibrium without expansion.
Because of this, a stable form of negative mass existed here, something that could create a localized warp bubble without collapsing. This was the key to making storage bracelets functional, but Ian knew that understanding the principles behind it was one thing, building it was another. He was well aware that someone at his level shouldn't even be attempting this. But he wasn't going to let that stop him.
He began the process by etching circuits onto the Axionite, carefully inscribing each delicate pattern. Failure after failure followed. Even with the assistance of Mindbloom, a tool that helped visualize the optimal circuit paths, his reaction time wasn't fast enough to execute the process with the precision required. The circuits would either misalign, overheat, or outright collapse upon activation.
"So, it fails, huh..." he muttered to himself, exhausted.
Frustrated, he decided to rest. He needed to clear his mind before trying again. He turned off the workstation and leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.
To progress, he needed to be prompted. Right now, he was essentially a novice, not even in the first stage. Awakened beings were referred to as zero-order lifeforms, and to craft something as complex as the storage bracelet, he might need to reach the first order. Master Ordan was a first-order being. He held the title of Master because he was certified by the Archen Conclave. Then there was Aeson, the only second-order beings in the entire town, well atleast on the surface.
Ian had two potential paths to follow. The first was the Architect Path. The first order of this path was called the Framer of Forms. This required constructing intricate mental lattices, each storing fundamental rules and information about a material he wished to create. For example, if he wanted to manifest an iron sword, he would need to form a lattice for it, and the energy would then convert into matter following that blueprint. But that was still far off; his mental energy hadn't reached the level needed to open even a single lattice.
However, this wasn't creation from nothing, matter was simply being converted from energy, but only for very basic objects. To craft more advanced things, he needed deeper understanding and more lattices.
The second was the Eldritch Path, which required necessary materials before any significant progress could be made.
For now, he had other responsibilities, like teaching Myrra.
Over the next few weeks, Ian regularly explored the ruins, mapping everything he could. The crumbling halls and shattered archways told silent stories of the once-great Cerok civilization.
Each trip into the ruins brought new discoveries. He uncovered a wealth of knowledge, their ascension techniques, medicinal advancements, and various technological blueprints. Some of their mechanisms, though rusted beyond repair, bore an uncanny resemblance to modern contraptions. Ian meticulously documented everything.
One afternoon, he stumbled upon a chamber. Its walls were adorned with a vast mural, spanning the entire length of the room. The artwork depicted a timeline of Cerok's greatest achievements: their mastery of energy refinement, their ability to harness nature itself, and, ultimately, their downfall.
At the mural's end was the final era, a stark contrast to the grandeur before it. It showed the Cerok leaders, yet one of them had been deliberately scratched out, leaving only faint traces of their form. Beside them was an eerie image of a being, its details similarly defaced, leading the Cerok into war. Unlike the previous depictions of prosperity and progress, this scene was filled with figures displaying both reverence and despair. Their banners, once a symbol of a rich multicultural heritage, had all been replaced by a single, ominous emblem.
Ian spent days studying it, cross-referencing the symbol with everything he had found throughout the ruins. Yet, despite his efforts, there was no record of it anywhere else.
"It might be related to that being…" he muttered, staring at the defaced figure.
Then, shaking his head, he dismissed the thought.
"Well, anyway, it has nothing to do with me."
He quickly dropped the matter. Whoever- or whatever - that being was, it made no sense for its influence to persist. The best-case scenario? It had been lost to the flow of time. The worst-case scenario? It was still alive. And if that were true, it would be utterly terrifying. From his estimates, the Cerok civilization had existed hundreds of millions of years ago. How powerful would a being be if it had been alive for that long?
But such concerns weren't his to bear. If the sky ever fell, there would always be giants to hold it up. The Elven civilization had existed for several billions of years, and some of them had settled on this planet a few million years ago. This makes this planet technically a part of Elven territory. And if that being still existed, Ian was fairly certain of one thing, no matter how powerful it was, the Elves were far stronger.
With that, his ventures into the ruins came to an end.
Meanwhile, he also spent time at Lirian's plant, working alongside Oryn to construct new mechanisms. It was slow work, but rewarding. Each successful test brought them closer to a working prototype. Even when things went wrong, like the time a misaligned lever nearly crushed Oryn's foot, there was always something to learn.
His studies with Myrra also became more frequent as he helped her prepare for the upcoming examination. Myrra was already talented, but after the encounter with the Zephar Heralds, her abilities had drastically improved. She absorbed new concepts with ease, her control over energy refinement becoming almost instinctive. Ian guided her patiently, challenging her with difficult problems and encouraging her to think beyond conventional methods.
"You're getting too predictable," Ian remarked one evening as they sat in his home laboratory. "Try approaching it from a different angle."
Myrra furrowed her brow before adjusting her technique. To Ian's satisfaction, she figured out an optimized method almost immediately. The time they spent together brought them closer, strengthening their bond in ways he hadn't expected.
Speaking of the Heralds, the Zephar Petals he had received from them were an enigma. Unlike any other material he had examined, the flower seemed to defy the very laws of nature. Using Mindbloom, Ian had dissected the intricate inner workings of countless materials, both organic and inorganic, but this flower revealed nothing.
Even stranger was the flower's behavior. It followed him, literally. No matter where he placed it, it would always reappear near him. He tried storing it in his bracelet, and at first, it seemed to work. But after walking a certain distance, he turned around to find it floating beside him again, as if space itself had bent to accommodate its presence. It was as if the flower existed on its own terms, unbound by conventional spatial laws.
Despite its odd nature, it posed no harm. It simply existed, floating near him like a silent observer. Out of curiosity, he tried giving it basic commands. To his surprise, it responded. With simple intent, he could direct its movements, make it hover, spin, or even shrink into a compact form. Eventually, he willed it to take the shape of a ring around his finger. It obeyed, solidifying into a smooth, petal-like band.
For now, he would let it be. Whatever its true purpose, he had a feeling it would reveal itself in time.
On another front, Ian received news about the paper he had submitted. It had been accepted, but not without some resistance.
Reviewer No. 2: "Although the method is unique, I don't understand why we need it. The material creation cost is high and outweighs the benefits of efficiency."
Ian sighed. It seemed that the curse of Reviewer No. 2 extended to this universe as well. Though the critique made sense, it wasn't the real issue. Once the paper was published, material scientists would work on reducing the cost of production. They might even develop similar materials that served the same function at a lower expense.
Additionally, Ian had found a way to adapt the design to standard materials. He had spent time examining how the original material influenced circuit pathways, attempting to reverse-engineer the effect using more common substances. Encouragingly, the results were promising. He and Master Ordan continued refining the process, and while they didn't yet have the complete picture, it was only a matter of time before they achieved full functionality. By then, material costs would no longer be a concern.
But for now he needed to reach the first order, to break past his current limitations.