Chapter 315: Beyonder Mechanical Armament Technology of Ninglan New City
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 315: Beyonder Mechanical Armament Technology of Ninglan New City
"Are their vital signs still normal?"
"Everything is stable."
In the infirmary, everyone tasked with caring for the senior sisters afflicted by the sleeping curse wore a specialized alchemy mask.
These masks were unique alchemy items crafted by Transcendent Witches, specifically designed as a countermeasure against the sleeping curse. The academy distributed them free of charge to any senior sister or student who needed to come into contact with the "patients" currently tainted by the curse.
Furthermore, the academy had issued an announcement stating that the transmission route of the sleeping curse had been severed. Several infirmaries had been placed under quarantine, and regular teaching activities were proceeding as usual.
Other academies had implemented similar measures. As for the source of the curse, an investigation and source-tracing operation was currently underway.
Naturally, many were dissatisfied with this outcome, but even so, the academy showed no intention of taking further action.
This didn't stop the student body from speculating. Given how widely the incident had spread, rumors gradually began to circulate that the source of the sleeping curse was the Witch Academy's own dream devices.
After all, a curse wouldn't be selective about which academy it struck—so why hadn't it spread to the outside world?
Moreover, some senior sisters provided evidence pointing out that the academies affected by the sleeping curse were primarily those participating in the Dream Exchange Competition. Furthermore, every single contestant from the Witch Academy had succumbed to the curse one after another.
The academy offered no explanation. Instead, they silently shut down several dream device access points across the campus.
This caused the Witch Academy’s reputation in the outside world to take another hit.
Of course, this was merely a tactic used by the academy to divert attention.
Admittedly, the academy's high-ranking officials didn't particularly care about these students who hadn't even reached the Transcendent level. However, the institution still bore the title of "Academy," which necessitated this symbolic display of management.
As for the various alchemy items supposedly targeting the sleeping curse, they were nothing more than window dressing. Any Transcendent Witch who understood the situation knew this wasn't a curse at all, nor was the "sleep" in other academies a contagious infection.
This was a different kind of struggle—a war without smoke over the contention for Luck.
It was essentially an extension of the Dream Exchange Competition. The Luck being contested now originated from that very competition, and the battlefield remained within the dreamscape.
The difference was that while the previous competition involved cannon fodder like lesser demons and the undead, they were now facing the elite shock troops of the Abyss: the Dream Demons.
This was a true struggle where death was a very real possibility.
How could a battle for Luck be anything but bloody?
Minor skirmishes were meaningless. The Witch Academy was not a nursery; no one was going to play house with you. The Luck at stake in this struggle wasn't just a redistribution of the first-place prize from the previous competition. When the script nodes were fulfilled, Luck would also converge upon the only surviving human city on the outermost edge of the Main World. This could potentially push this struggle for Luck to an even higher level.
* * *
"It’s so pitiful. They’re just freshmen who just entered a Transcendent academy, yet they’ve been dragged into something like this."
"Tell me about it. And it seems to pick only the good students. Do you think there’s some kind of inside story?"
"Maybe... but they aren't all top students, are they?"
Two senior sisters working part-time as nurses in the infirmary were gossiping while they complained.
"Eh? Wait... is this Xiao Han?"
"It really looks like her! Xiao Han is such a low-profile person; how did she get caught by the sleeping curse too? Hasn't she been silent since the exchange competition ended?"
"I told you, that senior sister’s analysis on the academy network was spot on! It’s definitely an issue with the dream devices! Nothing like this has ever happened in previous years, right?"
"True. You know, the academy isn't even lending out dream devices anymore. There’s definitely a problem; they’ve probably taken them back for maintenance."
"Sigh... poor Xiao Han... why did she have to be a flash in the pan?"
* * *
In the Underground District.
After living here for a few days, I had finally adapted to the environment. The promotion of Transcendent knowledge related to rune rituals had gone more smoothly than I anticipated. It seemed that the more people knew, the more open they were to new things. I had found many "scholars" here who were willing to exchange ideas about runes and inscriptions with me.
The people here were generally divided into two groups: theoretical scholars who explored and developed Beyonder inscriptions, and developers who used the power provided by those scholars to guide the creation of Beyonder techniques.
Without hesitation, I chose to become a theoretical scholar.
Because of this, I was able to integrate seamlessly into the local scholarly circles. The rune system I brought as an outsider opened the doors to a new world for them. Sometimes, a theoretical breakthrough requires exactly this kind of external force to be violently pried open.
So far, I had only provided the ritual for the Fireball Spell.
The thousand years of foundation they had accumulated burst into new life the moment I introduced it, much like a technological explosion triggered by learning how to boil water. The vitality it sparked was so intense that even I found it hard to keep up.
Think about it: a single simple technology can cause a technological society to develop at breakneck speed, producing a dizzying array of derivative technologies. Given their millennium of accumulated knowledge, the single Fireball Spell technique I provided seemed to have achieved a similar effect.
However... their development seemed a bit different from what I had expected.
Following their previous line of thought, they believed that combining Beyonder techniques with mechanical devices was the most efficient way to utilize energy.
The power unique to Ninglan New City—the Beyonder Mechanical Armament—formally underwent a theoretical generational leap right before my eyes.
Beyonder Mechanical Armament was a method developed by the geniuses of Ninglan New City to utilize Beyonder power with extreme efficiency. The armor and weapons I had seen on the City Guard earlier were "First Generation" armaments, weapons that used inscriptions to drive Beyonder power.
They were classified as Type I Beyonder Killing Weapons.
Indeed, before the energy tide, the City Guard on the outskirts of Ninglan New City utilized Type I common light external armor.
There were many models of Type I Beyonder Killing Weapons. The City Guard, the City Defense Force, and even the Ground Patrol currently in the Underground District all used different models of Type I Beyonder weaponry.
Depending on the intensity of the enemy, they would swap to Type II or even tactical Type III Beyonder Killing Weapons. The long-range Beyonder-powered firearm that had heavily injured that Dream Demon earlier was a Type III Beyonder Killing Weapon.
Although I felt that the Beyonder Killing Weapons they manufactured leaned more toward the category of alchemy items or perhaps enchantment techniques, I still requested their research results. After all, sharing theoretical results was the prerequisite for me providing them with knowledge of runic studies.
Furthermore, I was an outsider. Although the technical data for Type III Beyonder techniques involved confidentiality levels, I was allowed to bypass them. This was the result of their comprehensive deliberation.
Firstly, if I truly wanted to know, they couldn't stop me anyway. Secondly, we weren't people of their world—at least, that’s what they believed. Finally, there was the matter of signing a confidentiality contract. Although it was just a scrap of paper to me, we still had to go through the motions.
By now, I had become one of the core figures at the Underground District Beyonder Research Base. Here, the skills you possessed were the only standard by which others respected you. Although Ninglan Qiuyue had said these geniuses were highly individualistic and had their own quirks, they were genuinely willing to listen when it came to academics.
In fact, many people were currently dropping their own research just to come and learn theoretical runic knowledge from me.
This phenomenon seemed linked to Ninglan Qiuyue’s information campaign. She had emphasized my status as an outsider and hinted at my special identity and the possibility of my imminent departure, which made them appear quite desperate.
After all, when such an opportunity is right in front of you, if you don't seize it, you'll only realize how much you regret it once it's gone.
But this didn't negate the importance they placed on runic studies.
I had also benefited greatly over the past two days, engaging in discussions with many scholars. However, as more people came, I couldn't answer everyone individually. I eventually switched to a Q&A format. I also had my own private life, so many scholars would leave letters for me when I wasn't around.
This method was imitated by others in a very short time.
Perhaps it was a matter of "face" for the older scholars... rather than humbly asking questions in front of a girl who was decades younger than them, they preferred communicating via messages. Personally, I still preferred discussing problems face-to-face.
As for the writing work, I entrusted it to the Fool's Dreams here. The Fool's Dreams seemed to naturally know my current language and script. I suspected this was learned through the witch contract the Academy Dean had signed with them. This understanding of language was a power of the contract; even if their nightmare memories and cognitions were stripped away, the information attached to the contract would not be separated.
I had discussed the common knowledge of using contracts to learn languages with Teacher Ji Niang. Unfortunately, using contracts to learn knowledge wasn't very realistic. The knowledge to be learned would have to be written into the contract bit by bit. The difficulty of creating such a contract was even greater than simply learning the knowledge itself. However, the advantage was that contracts could be rubbed and duplicated. This type of contract was commonly used for languages, and creating one required a profound mastery of contract techniques—it wasn't something a common contract could achieve.
If you ask me, rather than going through all that trouble, a Memory Bookshelf spellbook would be much better.
It’s far more convenient to use.
"Sister Xiao Han, I’ve finished writing the response to this question according to what you said. Should I go deliver it to that grandpa who asked?"
"Mm, go ahead. Be careful on the way, and don't let anyone step on you~" I nodded with a smile.
The petite Fool's Dream carefully folded the written pages and placed them into an envelope. Then, she hopped down and landed steadily on the floor. The counter she had been leaning on was taller than she was, but for a cat-girl Fool's Dream with a small, nimble body, it was nothing. Perhaps these Fool's Dreams had inherited the agile bodies of cat-girls as well.
Watching them hop around in the clothes the research base had custom-made for them was truly adorable.
I really couldn't understand why some residents of the Underground District would reject such cute creatures.
After handling the questions at hand, today’s work was essentially over. I needed to balance work and rest; I couldn't let my spirit fall into excessive fatigue over this.
The clothes I wore were also the uniform of the Beyonder Research Base, though this specific set was one I had changed into using a dream rewriting spell. I couldn't fit into the clothes here, so this was more convenient.
Of course, I didn't actually need to wear this uniform, but I found that wearing it in the Underground District saved me a lot of trouble. Ordinary people living here didn't dare provoke the scholars, and the Ground Patrol was extremely biased toward the scholars of the research base. It served as a massive deterrent against the local punks who bullied the weak and feared the strong.
Don't be fooled by the fact that the Underground District seemed more prosperously developed than the Ninglan New City above; the quality of the people here wasn't necessarily high. In fact, it was quite the opposite. There were many street punks and plenty of shady dealings happening in the shadows.
It had already formed a sort of "high-end Beyonder arts, low-end lifestyle" punk society. The Ground Patrol naturally couldn't manage all the street security on their own.
Almost everyone here had an ancestor who had spent time in the Beyonder Research Base at some point. You could say the people here took their innate sense of superiority to the extreme, especially when facing people from the surface.
It was only because of the Ground Patrol's presence that they didn't cause even greater trouble.
My desire to use this identity also had its own purpose: it allowed me to protect some of the Fool's Dreams. With their fragile bodies and innocent personalities, the Fool's Dreams were at the very bottom of the social ladder here. Even though the Ground Patrol had been instructed to look after them slightly, many things that happened in the shadows were still irreversible.
"Let’s go~ That’s it for today." I clapped my hands and spoke to the Fool's Dreams. They immediately began to briskly pack up the tools and equipment, waiting for my next command.
Perhaps because of the "social beatings" these Fool's Dreams had received here over the past few days, they hadn't fully accepted their roles as workers yet and appeared somewhat restrained. However, they should be able to adapt given enough time.
As I walked out of my laboratory, several apprentices I passed would stop and salute me with great enthusiasm. They were just apprentices doing chores, not formal scholars or masters of craft—essentially the lowest level within the base. But even so, once they went outside, they could claim they worked at the Beyonder Research Base, and no one would dare touch them.
When I stepped out of the base’s main gate, my gaze caught a group of petite figures peeking timidly from a corner.
Once I saw clearly that they were Fool's Dreams, I had a rough idea of what was happening.
Although the Fool's Dreams were trying to integrate, not all of them could find jobs that provided a stable living.
There were even many people with ill intentions toward these cute creatures. Once they realized a Fool's Dream was being persecuted, they would subconsciously seek help. The Ground Patrol was naturally their first choice, but the Ground Patrol wasn't a nanny for the Fool's Dreams. If they were bothered by every little thing or minor trouble, they would eventually get annoyed.
Thus, huddling together for warmth and seeking other forms of help was their only choice.
"Come here... be good, little ones. Have you run into trouble again?" I approached the Fool's Dreams, and the ones who had come out with me hurried forward to comfort them.
After a brief conversation, I understood the gist of it. It seemed another Fool's Dream had run into trouble, and it wasn't a small matter—it had reached the point where even if a Fool's Dream went to the Ground Patrol alone, they would find it too troublesome to handle.
After all, it was all about social connections and worldly wisdom. The Ground Patrol wasn't a purely righteous official force dedicated solely to maintaining the safety of the Underground District.
"Tsk... what a pain..."