Herta did not require as much formalities around her, as opposed to what most expected in the outside world. Sirius, being her ‘servant’ to their eyes, performed the duties of a ‘butler’. His position made countless people gnash their teeth in envy.
In reality, he is Herta’s research assistant. The administrative work passed to him was merely an extension of his job. Aside from that, he is her personal chef, too…
‘Wait a minute.’
Sirius’ footsteps halted.
‘Aren’t I a servant at this point?’
He stood still across the long spiral hallway. The gray bricks’ outline could be seen from the inside. A thick red carpet was laid across the entire path. Embedded deep within the ceiling were mini-chandeliers.
The ‘dilemma’ he faced made him scoff.
‘I wanted this.’
Sirius no longer thought of it. He shook his head as he continued walking along the corridor. The arched windows revealed the chaotic scene outside. Dust had long filled the entire streets. It formed high clouds that reduced the visibility of the entire city. The collapse of several tall buildings formed a chain reaction, turning the entire city upside-down.
Rumble-!
The ground quaked strongly. Sirius regained his balance on his own. His strong core allowed him to do so in a blink. The green trait, [Heaven Sometimes Rewards Hard Work], activated the most during physical activities. Moreover, Herta developed several drugs that could permanently strengthen one’s physical body—with zero side effects at that.
‘This place is flying?’
He adapted to the sudden weightlessness. His eyes stared at the scene outside. His point-of-view kept ascending. Soon, the entire city could be seen below with bare eyes.
‘Just how much technological content does this have?!’
There are several reasons why spaceships are made in a flat, fork-like shape. It accounted for aerodynamics, fuselage, and efficiency. This flying tower defied everything these principles taught so far!
The Blue’s technology was fifty to a hundred years ahead of Earth at best. Artificial intelligence was the norm, and so was space travel. In terms of technology, it would require centuries, if not millenia to be able to build something like this.
Herta did it all by herself.
Sirius stared at the city beneath him before sighing.
‘I just need to do my best.’
He no longer thought about the future, or rather, he dared not to. Ignorance is bliss. He was not ready to face that future. He chose to play the fool that he always was.
Sirius became resolute. It was a spitting image of his face on the day he decided to aim for Herta’s validation. Only, he looked more of a fool than he was before.
His complex thoughts died down. His footsteps became lighter as he went to the end of the corridor. A sealed iron door welcomed him. It did not have any handles nor indents to hold on.
Click-!
The door opened on its own. Sirius did not stand still and went inside.
Swoosh-!
The lingering humidity within the corridor disappeared once he was inside. The door closed automatically, letting out loud clicking sounds akin to a vault door. The cold air carried a faint scent of flowers.
In front of Sirius was another dim corridor. Its walls and floors were made out of cold black iron. Faint white lines were present atop them, taking the shape of the brick walls from earlier.
He walked through the short corridor and turned left. What greeted his sight was a place akin to a theater. The wide staircases lacked the seats that should have been present on it, making it appear spacious.
To his right was a huge virtual screen. It is filled with real-time experimental reports and charts. The vast majority of them was something Sirius could not understand. The remaining few were based on fundamental mathematics—something he understood well enough.
‘...It’s time. She’s experimenting with something related to time.’
Strangely enough, he did not feel as much shock. His heart skipped a beat and his throat ran dry, but that was it. He no longer felt that surge of weakness when he stood still at the tower’s entrance.
“Why stand there in a daze? Did your head suffer a blunt trauma outside?”
The voice carried a blunt and sarcastic tone. Sirius looked up and saw the witch standing with her arms crossed. Her presence made his heart skip another beat. When he met her gaze, he saw a scrutinizing look.
He kept up this “dumb” expression long enough for Herta to raise her eyebrow.
‘Something’s different.’
The addition of another puzzle caused the corner of her mouth to tip upwards. Her smile was so stunning it added another duration to Sirius’ dumb look. It wasn’t until five seconds had passed did he snap out of it.
The flight of stairs was swiftly climbed by him, reaching her side in a blink.
“Sorry about earlier. I thought you were preoccupied by something.” He paused before continuing, “I never expected for this tower to fly.”
“It will stay in its place for as long as we like. Its materials are extremely expensive.”
Sirius didn’t think much about this ‘disadvantage’. The Federation fully opened its coffers for Herta; money wasn’t a problem to her. Replacing them was a matter of signing a document or two. Such was the ‘exchange’ given to her by the Federation. Even, they would think to themselves it wasn’t enough. Everything Herta contributed to them advanced the entire planet’s technological level by hundreds of years in that field. Compared to that, the Federation’s material reserves seemed trivial.
Herta flicked one of her fingers, sending a small virtual screen in front of Sirius. It was the analysis of the massive earthquake just now. His eyes widened as he looked at that massive iceberg crashing onto the planet’s core.
‘...I almost forgot this is a high-dimensional world.’
The Blue was identical to Earth, down to its lack of supernatural elements. The previous calamities were severe drought, endless rain, and the collapse of the ozone layer. All three were connected to each other, with the last event serving as the ‘worst event’ of them all. They stemmed from realistic phenomena unlike the massive iceberg piercing the planet’s core now.
Herta’s eyes never left Sirius. The moment he flashed that look of familiarity and acknowledgement, a surge of curiosity grew in her heart. She felt uncomfortable keeping it to herself…
Hence she confronted him.
“Oh? It seems like you have an idea. Tell me.”
Sirius felt her penetrating gaze. He turned around and met her eyes. Herta’s scrutiny made him feel like an open book. No secrets of his were left untouched whenever she acted like that. Now that her study and application of Imaginary Energy were exposed, he involuntarily exposed his familiarity with them.
‘I won’t lose out much, would I? Then again…’ His thoughts came to an abrupt halt. ‘I have no other choice.’
Between lying and telling the truth, he chose the latter. Just as he could not hide secrets from her eyes, his lie won’t stand under Herta’s scrutiny.
“Our world isn’t as it seems. Imaginary energy existed as an independent system in the three-dimensional plane. It might as well be magic.”
Once he started talking, his voice became more steady.
“If there is magic, then there is fuel. Imaginary energy functions as such. Even if we cannot grasp magic itself, there is proof it exists.”
“Well said.”
Herta nodded at his words. His chain of thought was the exact same as hers. This was how she thought of ‘magic’ after discovering its ‘fuel’. ‘Paths’ are the magic; ‘imaginary energy’ is the fuel.
Still, there was something she could not put her finger on. To her, Sirius was holding something back. That something deeply interested her. Her interest towards him reached an all-time high.
Nevertheless, she knew better than not to press him excessively. Taking small bites every now and then was fine.
“The thing you called ‘magic’ are ‘Paths’. It was something I discovered after becoming a ‘Pathstrider’...”
Herta explained the basic gist of Paths, Pathstriders, and Aeons. It was more or less the same as what he knew. Only, he discovered more about the Path of Erudition through her mouth.
‘Analysis, deduction, simulation…’ He thought. ‘It came in a complete package. Her knowledge must have come from Erudition, much like the library visited by Fu Xuan…’
In the future, Herta gained the power to know every single planet (world) Nous had gazed upon. The Path of Erudition is akin to an endless library filled with knowledge and data captured by them. Nous does not give answers, but rather, the capacity to ask more questions. That could only be done through having more knowledge. It was reasonable for something like a ‘library’ to exist for the Pathstriders of Erudition.
‘If only I could become a Pathstrider…’
Just then, a sudden realization struck Sirius.
A ‘Pathstrider’ is a person who has been gazed upon by an Aeon. He tried doing many things over the past years such as breaking the limits of a human’s physical body as well as coming up with well-founded research. Limited by the green trait’s effects and limitations, however, he could not come up with something ‘ground-breaking’.
Sirius lost hope because of that.
What he overlooked throughout the years was his green trait’s capability to ‘create’ something out of ‘nothing’. The strengthening of his physical body came out of thin air whenever it was activated. The same went for other physical activities such as Baji, dancing, walking, and so on. His body gained the reflex and habits related to these activities.
If he could work on something that gives him the capability of a Pathstrider while not being one, there might be higher chances of being gazed upon by an Aeon.
‘I am so fucking dumb!’
He clenched his right fist in frustration. His eyes, which were glued to the small virtual screen, sported an annoyed look.
‘I got stuck at a dead end. I should have thought about this earlier!’
Blade Mantra.
It was a technique that originated from another world. There, a high-dimensional entity similar to ‘Aeons’ existed. It converted imaginary energy into a more manageable version, known as Honkai Energy. The former could not be controlled without a corresponding Path, but the latter was the opposite. It could be controlled as long as someone meets a criteria.
Luckily enough, several humans had achieved it.
That meant Sirius could do it too!
“...Shit.”
His regrets spilled out of his expressions. It was so obvious Herta saw it. She watched as he froze in realization, followed by his curses. He placed both his hands on his mouth. It was a classic ‘why didn’t I think of that’ pose.
An entire minute passed by silently. Only then did Sirius realize he was in the middle of a discussion with Herta!
If he wanted to slap himself before, he wanted to beat himself now. It was disrespectful to act out of place in front of her. Embarrassment filled his face—turning it slightly redder.
“Sorry about this one.” He said and explained further, “I realized something. The ice… the reason it’s tough is because of a Path, no?”
“Hm. That’s right.”
“I thought of three ways to destroy it.”
Herta became somewhat interested in what his plan was.
“One is to use something born from your Path. You are already a Pathstrider. You can make things others could not. As for the other one, that is to use the ice to destroy the ice. Lastly, we can opt to remove the ice itself.”
“Remove the ice…”
She already thought of the first one. She was ready to send an orbital strike from one of her creations. It leverages on light’s nature. Its speed was constant. Changing its direction does not ‘accelerate’ it. The best that could be done was to absorb the surrounding atoms, increasing its energy. It was the closest it could come to ‘acceleration’.
The Path of Erudition changes this landscape entirely. It finds the truths and allows them to be controlled at will. The world’s physics can be modified through the intervention of Imaginary Energy, and in turn, Paths. What Herta did was rather simple.
She accelerated light itself.
Once light ‘accelerates’, it gains ‘momentum’, and then, ‘energy’. An ‘accelerating’ light turns into an orbital laser capable of affecting objects related to the other ‘Paths’.
It was the most direct solution Herta has in hand when it comes to resolving this crisis. The only problem was its targeting systems. If it happens to affect the core’s activity, The Blue might as well go ‘poof’ in the cosmos.
As for the second option, it wasn’t as if she never thought of it; just that it was too complicated to do. The method she thought so, at least. The third one was even more so. The special ‘ice’ that penetrated the planetary core possessed huge mass. It was not something that could be pulled by steel fiber ropes and the likes. Its weight was also proportional to its mass; it was hard to do as well.
Knowing Sirius, he would not propose a plan he did not think through. Hence she asked:
“How are you planning to do it?”