Eminence in Technomancy c2

“First, let's see if you know anything about what I am to say.” Marcus proceeded to question her.

“I will answer whatever I can,” Alpha replied seriously.

The Alchemist nodded as he started with the questions which were bugging him.

“Was the energy you emit the so-called ‘Demonic Possession’ implanted into you by someone?”

“No, anyone can develop the symptoms.” The blonde shook her head while replying.

“...Hoh? Curious…”

The boy wrote down on the ground. What he wrote was ‘inherited?’.

‘If anyone can inherit, does this mean it has been implanted by someone long ago, so long ago that it spread out through everyone?’

“I see. Then this leads to a question: is there a myth or legend where heroes fight against a powerful being, preferably a demonic of some sort?”

“...Umm… I guess the myth of Diabolos? It has been told over the years that the heroes of Humankind, Elf and Beastkin, came together to beat a demon named Diabolos.” Alpha explained to him.

“I see. I guess we have our starting point.” Marcus pondered as this myth fits the idea of the start of this phenomenon.

“Are you saying…”

“You said that everyone can have it. So, I asked for myths related to demons.

You gave me a story where all three races came together. This myth is just that. All three races have connections to this story. It's this myth. Now the question is if it is Diabolos who wants to return to life via heroes’ descendants or if it's something more sinister.”

“... more sinister?”

“For example, someone harvesting these possessed people.”

“F-For what?”

“Eternal life, more power. The preliminary results point towards many uses of this energy. If someone has the methods, such a harvest is possible.”

“!!!”

“...The church? Everyone who has ‘demonic possession’ ends up there.” Alpha, who mumbled to herself, started to put things together in her mind.

“So we know where the farm is.”

She shivered, and her face morphed into anger.

“My Lord, we need to investigate!” The blonde exclaimed with visible anger.

“Oh? So it's possible revenge?” He questioned her.

“...Yes. I can't rest until this is solved. I promised to follow you, but this will never disappear until I discover the truth.”

“Hmm, while my place is among the stars, I can invest my time in discovering the truth of this conspiracy. You shall have my help in uncovering this.”

Her gaze immediately brightened as the girl ended up hugging him.

Marcus, for a second, turned stiff, not knowing what to do, but then his hands slowly hugged her.

It has been a long time since he had someone else next to him working on something.

“Now, do you want to learn what I can teach you?” He asked her curiously.

“...Y-Yes! It will be my greatest honour to learn magic— alchemy from you.” Alpha even twitched while saying that. The girl was feeling like she was over the moon. Alchemy? By the Goddess, she never dreamed of even grasping such art!

“I promise never to share it with anyone!”

He nodded at her.

“You can teach someone with my permission. However, it depends on how long we will be in this world.”

“Eh?”

“I told you, didn't I? I belong among the stars; this is where I will return. Since you are mine, you will come with me. That is something which is not negotiable.” He said that with finality in his voice.

“I-I understand! I will follow you all the way!” With a stuttering voice, she agreed. Still, she didn't let him go.

The girl experienced a traumatic event; that much is obvious. From the scan, he understood that ‘demonic possession’ is not just biological transformation, but it damages the soul as well.

After a few minutes, she finally realised that and released her hug.

“Let's start with the basics.”

~~~~~~Later~~~~~~

Marcus was impressed by Alpha’s genius. The girl is very bright. She picks up everything rapidly, and he only needs to mention most things once, and only more complex theories require slightly more time for her to process.

The elf quickly picked up fundamental forces, like what is space and time. Then, basic magic theory, rapidly understanding the principles of Alchemy. The baseline principles of an object’s state from liquid to solid and vice versa.

However, learning his gravity magic method makes her frown as the frequencies are something one cannot simply learn without testing excessively.

Apart from teaching her things, the Alchemist used her as an extra pair of hands.

After making room for her, Marcus created an area for his main workshop and started to carve a reactor room, which is right under the workshop.

Well, more precisely, around three floors below. As the floor below Marcus’ workshop will be the assembly line, then below that will be the floor for the matter converter.

Once the Alchemist finished the initial basement floors, he went outside and used gravity magic to pick up the biggest boulder.

He then took it downstairs to the lowest floor. To start the process, he handed over a couple of gloves made for this occasion to Alpha.

“Your job is to turn the entire area into a hyper-compressed surface while I prepare the reactor.”

“I understand.”

“You remember the formula?”

“Yes, it's 2103214.” She responded automatically.

Marcus smiled upon hearing that.

“Indeed, I can leave this in your hands.” As he said that, he started to compress the central area; the rest he left to her.

Hyper-compression is something only planets around 3 to 4 times bigger than Earth create, thanks to the dense and heavy core.

In other words, he is creating something regular people can't find in the current world because it is just too small to find the necessary place to develop it in the first place.

“Yes, I won't disappoint you.”

~~~~~~Later~~~~~~

Alpha curiously looked at the creature of a miniature planet. Her curiosity is at an all-time high. What she is witnessing can be compared to the work of a God in her eyes.

He might call himself ‘Grand Alchemist’, but that's nonsense. His magic changes one to another; something like this is absurd. What he is performing is beyond the levels of what is considered alchemy, at least by what she learned at her time at home.

The conclusion she came up with is that he is here to ‘fix’ the world, fix the world and then continue on his grand adventure exploring the universe.

It sounds like something from a mythological book, but it's okay.

As she pondered the circumstances of her current life, the blonde elf continued to use basic hyper-compression of the alchemist clay. Her Lord made the whole room from it!

This clay is another proof to her how crazy is her Lord's achievements.

A material which can turn into anything? Won't that destroy the world’s economy?

Her Lord hasn't shared much about his past, but from her observation, she can guess he is incredibly experienced.

He answered all her questions: what is time, what is life, how people came to be, all of that. He knows everything about the fundamental forces of existence.

While he doesn't know about this world, she has complete confidence he will learn everything there is to learn; she will help him in any way she can.

As he says: ‘The Light of Technomancy will touch everyone’.

As time went on, Alpha noticed how the rock shrunk from a massive boulder to the size of a large egg. It turned utterly pitch black. It looked like it would consume light itself.

Once Marcus finished the form of the core. With the centrepiece completed, an array of magic circles made from liquid mana surrounded the reactor’s core.

The elf girl had never seen mana so thick before. Was it even possible to have mana in liquid form?

With the circles completed, Marcus turned the reactor on.

*SWISH*

*SWISH*

*SWISH*

The three rings around the pitch-black core shrunk in size before merging with the pitch-black ball. Second later, a translucent glass-like wall appeared around the frame of the reactor.

The core was online; it started to generate three types of power.

Those are Power itself, gravity and the boundary field.

To spread these three energies, three ‘hands’ spin around the core.

“You know, in a sense, this is amusing how I start with power first,” As the alchemist commented, the girl watched the spectacle of infinite power before her.

“...What do you mean?”

“What I mean is simple: one shouldn't start from the most challenging part. But I feel restless if I don't have something like this in my basement. Now that I have the power to run my technomancy, I can start with rebuilding my lost arts.”

The girl didn't comment back since she couldn't compare this to anything she knew.

“...Does this mean you will have the artefacts needed to find out the truth?”

“...hmm? That's— a good idea. I can test my arsenal, and you can get your revenge.”

The moment she heard that, she started to smile.

Finally, she can clench that feeling she had in her gut. As she thought about that, she watched how the core’s centerpiece started to glow red, and it began to heat up; friction caused heat, which absorbed and spread into mana.

Soon enough, all the extra lights turned on in their small facility.

~~~

“...So umm…are you to teach me how to fight?” Alpha asked him with a curious look.

“Fight? That depends. My fighting style isn't something like a frontal assault. I am an engineer. I make weapons which I use in a fight. But then again, I could teach you kenjutsu and some hand-to-hand combat.”

“Kenjutsu?”

“The art of sword. I practised it for seventy years. But before we begin, I need to create some basic infrastructure.” He walked towards his extremely lit-up workshop. It looked like a light grey square room.

To Alpha, it looked something like a ‘foreign’ place, something from a different world.

“What kind of infrastructure?”

“Workshop, workbench and tools. Alpha, our strength is not raw power but something—greater; it's technomancy. Once I have my armour online, there is little anyone in this place can do.

My armour could reduce this planet into a barren dust ball.

The only thing I need is time. That's all there is, not resources or workforce; if I need people, I can make people; if I need weapons, I can make weapons. But I know you need your revenge, so we will build a Mark II Iron Wolf armour and find info about this demonic energy you had.” He explained to her in a plain voice.

He might say some crazy things, but when he speaks with such a plain voice. Does it make it sound less destructive? Maybe? But ending life in the whole planet, that's—

From the teaching she got, the whole planet is an enormous place.

“I understand; what do you want me to do?”

“I will take your measurements, then create a mannequin. We will work from there.”

“Okay.”

…

…

…

When he said ‘armour’, she imagined those bulky things worn by Dark Knights.

But how wrong she was.

This suit of armour was nothing like the regular armour she saw.

What she saw was legitimate artefact creation. She has seen some pictures of the legendary Hero Olivier—his golden sword and emerald golden armour.

This armour was close to that. Maybe even more impressive because of how double-layered it was.

The underlayer was a mesh of small, round metals with carved runes—the so-called ‘linkage’ system.

Then, the pieces of armour themselves all protect but, at the same time, have secondary abilities like flight support, breathing support, and negation of gravity.

“Honestly, I am never good at rushed work.” Marcus scratched the back of his head as he looked at the Mark II.

“...rushed?” She looked at him with a complex look.

“Yeah, when I made Mark II, it was over 200 years ago. Back then, I was inventing new means and adding to the armour.

Since I already know these means, I added some of the Sky Wolf abilities. You can say this is a mix-and-match work.” He complained in a way. He was having an inner fight between engineer and combatant at this moment.

Prioritise combat abilities or pump it full of abilities?

“...as long as it helps.”

“...I guess.”