A Chronometric Defect

"Rewh!"

I kinda like being treated with such respect. I glance around at the dragons. Rokay, maybe not. I think I'm scaring the everliving crap out of them by existing. Hrem. But why does that also make me happy?

Reh, whatever.

I use a smidgen of my immense magic power to break, move, fuse, and create new rock. I mold and extend the already-rocky area around this region. It stretches into a huge platform several kilometers in each direction.

Some parts extend out into the ocean. Greh, this is no good! Those parts will erode. I recast the huge mesa into solid reptillium; a metametal I've recently invented. It's a specially constructed alloy of several normal metals plus two atoms I invented from scratch.

Who says the periodic table must contain only one element per proton? I can substitute in other sub-particles and sub-antiparticles to create exotic atoms! I bound them carefully, so they don't fly apart through radiation or annihilate.

The quantum unpredictability of an atom only applies if you don't know what you're doing. I'm a Demigod.

...

Mrah! I'mma dragon. A physics-breaking dragon. Rawr.

I don't 'rawr' aloud to avoid scaring the other dragons.

Hrem. I should stay focused on what I'm doing.

Right. Reptillium has extreme corrosion resistance, strength, and can heal large fissures over time assuming the two parts are still in contact somewhere. That last property makes it problematic for many things, but it's very useful as a foundation.

I next cast a huge inscription array on the whole foundation. I ain't cuttin' a single corner. As such, it contains the following inscriptions:

Mana Gathering, Mana Densification, Hardness, Self-repair, Resiliency, Corruption Dissolution, Damage Protection, Deformation Protection, Elemental Protection, Spatial Protection, Time Protection, Void Protection, Consolidative Improvement, Reconfigurative Improvement, Interconnective Improvement, Sigil Detonation Isolation, Sigil Repair, Sigil Replication, Sigil Encryption, Array Repair, Array Encryption, Keystone Mana Linkage, Vertical Top Propagation, and... Cleanliness.

I've already applied each of these to myself, except for Vertical Top Propagation. That one propagates every other sigil in the array to everything residing within the space a given distance above itself.

So, while I don't feel too different from before—

"Woah."

"Haah?"

"What is this?"

"Wow."

"Truly god."

"Amazing."

They definitely feel it. Feels nice right? You must be envious that I have this all the time. Hraw, I know you are.

I'm not gonna risk putting so many directly on anyone other than myself, though. Not yet at least. If there are any bad side-effects to these, those afflicted can simply leave the area. All the more since I've tested them a lot via the copies I've had running experiments. I've completely stopped suppressing that draconic mad-scientist urge.

It's only been what, one day?

Jeez, is that all? It seems so much longer. Maybe that's because I have several copies doing scientific testing at all times. It's been helpful for improving my mental faculties, of that there's no doubt. I'm getting much better at controlling my copies. In fact, I don't need to control them directly, even for science. Even that's become an autonomous task.

"Rawr!"

Happy dragon roar.

Roh. I look over the dragons. They're all still scared, but they don't seem to have noticed my rawring.

Now, as for what these inscriptions do— some of them are self-evident, so I'll skip those. Like the protection sigils. Those simply protect against various effects. Why bother describing their exact function?

Let's start with Cleanliness. This inscription only applies to what it can define as 'non-living and upon an external surface.' Though there may be random bacteria in the mix, it'll try to figure out what's contamination and what's really a living material, so a little bacteria doesn't stop it. That said, if there's ever any doubt? It won't do any cleaning in the dubious area. It'll clean tooth plaque, but not junk inside an old injury. A mouth IS technically an external surface, if open.

And yes, this inscription will be popular for toilets. Not just for cleaning the toilet itself; it also removes the need for paper or water. Entirely.

Hraw hraw!

Granted, it has another conditional to only affect toxic, noxious, or concentrated waste materials when a connected surface is majority living or cellular. So it won't, yanno, eliminate non-living bodily fluids or flesh.

When I tested on bugs? It eliminated their chitin and blood. Later, I created bodies that had functional tissues with magic and tested with those. Though, I didn't do this with dragons this time, to avoid creating another Aitia situation. Cleanliness eliminated compound fractures by, rhum... Removing the whole bone. It left the blood vessels and marrow, though. Raugh that looked horrifying. Rurrh.

Once I thought I had it right, I tested on a rabbit I found with a congenital defect: its brain leaked cerebrospinal fluid. The inscription removed part of the rabbit's brain.

I guess parts of its brain were dead? Or maybe it considers amyloid plaques 'non-living?' I don't know. What I do know is that this caused the poor rabbit a nasty seizure. I felt so bad. Now I know why my previous world often banned animal testing.

To ensure the rabbit didn't suffer— I ate it. I have no idea how it could suffer without a functional brain. However, since I lack a brain entirely, I'm not going to risk it.

Rah. Cleanliness was awful in testing. There was no way around it after that last test. I was forced to figure out how to define 'connected,' which I wanted to avoid because it was super-difficult. I just had to figure it out. Luckily, my incredible dragon... Non-brain, had less trouble than expected.

Weird though it may sound; I need to be more self-confident! As if a dragon needs an excuse to be more self-confident. But no, it appears I truly can't understand my own greatness. All the praise I've received is very well-deserved.

Also? It's not enough praise. I require more praise! Rawh!

"Reeh, rewh."

My efforts indeed got it working wonderfully. Cleanliness is an amazing cleaning tool with no obvious downsides.

As for Corruption Dissolution? It affects magic, but also microbes. Which means it has to figure out which spells and microbes are bad by determining their effects on a case-by-case basis. Rawh— this one took several copies working together to develop.

It's constantly checking the structural and genomic sequences of both spells and microbes! Possibly, millions or billions per second.

Spells tend to look pretty unique, but two visually identical microbes may have different genes. Which means each one needs to be checked and marked. It then checks what it finds against every single cell that it deems a valid target, based on whether said cell is part of a multicellular organism. If it's not, or its cells are a monoculture, then these pathogens get the boot. Reeh. I only bothered to invent Corruption Dissolution as a precaution since I don't seem able to get ill.

Actually, forget illness.

After learning about my lack of internal organs; do I have genes? I can't test myself. I don't produce saliva or body fluids. None at all. I didn't notice when that stopped, either. It's not like I pay attention to my maw's wetness.

I'm not sure what that sticky clear stuff I've been drooling is, since I don't seem to possess saliva. I do know it's not saliva.

Weird.

Why am I becoming a freak show?

Never mind, I simply need more praise.

Raa! More praise is indeed the best solution.

I nod my dragon head.

Anyway, Corruption Dissolution 'learns' as it works. It does this by identifying and storing incompatible genetic and/or Mana sequences. Eventually, it can group those sequences into classes based on various properties, so not every sequence needs to be stored inside the inscription's storage sigils. It can also share what it learns with other Corruption Dissolution inscriptions. Kinda like those AI chat programs in my previous world. It can talk to other copies of itself.

I'm VERY proud of this one— it was worth all the effort.

That said, I don't know how to define a tumor or a genetic disease, so I've had to put off creating a proper panacea.

...

Ragh, that's not good enough!

I'll put a few more copies on it and tell them to merge their changes with the main inscription whenever ready. I don't need to keep an eye on that directly.

I create several additional copies and set their instructions.

...

Great, they're good to go.

Thankfully, Mana Gathering produces way more than enough Mana to offset all these arrays. Never mind Mana Densification, which compacts all Mana within a given area. That one turns a decent net positive into 'holy crud, loads of Mana!' It doesn't create more Mana from nothing, though. Rather, dense Mana is more efficient for inscriptions and arrays as it causes less heat loss. Some of my inscriptions require dense Mana to work in the first place.

These two don't have any effect on me because I have infinite Mana. I only inscribed them on myself to fuel my body's array solely with external Mana. Thus, I'm not using even a small fraction of my own Mana pool to fuel them.

I'm a bit worried about their long-term effects on mortals. Hopefully, it won't cause Mana overconsumption; a state where ingesting too much Mana induces illness. My testing suggests they don't— but I have no idea why.

A random thought pops into my mind. Dang, my intellect really is getting better. Rawh!

Actually, it seems I do have an idea. Likely the same 'lack of heat' Mana Densification causes within inscriptions. Are the symptoms of Mana overconsumption caused by heat stroke? That'd be weird, but in line with my discovery of dystonia from the Dragonblood Sigil. I'll test it, but just in case, I think these two should only ever be cast directly on a dragon. Which similarly makes the rest of my body array dragon-only.

Roh well! I shrug. We dragons deserve to keep the best stuff anyway. Moving on!

The 'Encryption' inscriptions work by altering the fundamental properties of the sigils or the overall array.

As for Sigil Encryption, the design of each sigil in an array will seem to appear nonsensical to anyone trying to figure out how everything works. Each sigil still has the same basic function, but Sigil Encryption will cause every sigil to slowly morph over time even whilst the array isn't in use. This happens because the sigil maintains the same 'fastest Mana path' despite being shaped differently and having different routes. It'll also randomly add errant paths and hide the real ones. Finally, it changes the local physics randomly but keeps the sigil shaped in a way that works for the redefined physics. It's not easy to crack. At all.

A clever sigil engineer might be able to read the Mana inputs and outputs of the sigils to undo this warping, but...

I can add more of these. They stack. Eventually, even that won't be doable with all the physics warping.

Reah, it's a pain to decode! Even for me.

As for the Array Encryption variant, that one alters the way every single inscription must be joined for the array to function. This makes it far more difficult to reconstruct the design and purpose of each inscription within the array. It has the same 'slow-warping' feature as well.

As such, even if you do know which inscription is the Sigil Encryption Inscription, their inputs will be constantly changing. Plus, maybe you can't tell the exact construction of said inscription? Perhaps that variant has extra effects like providing Mana reduction or heat dissipation to the rest of the array. Maybe you rebuild the entire array from scratch without the encryption and it combusts? Rahaha.

These two Encryption inscriptions, when combined, turn an easily reverse-engineered array like Aitos' communication array into a mind-numbing exercise in futility.

I initially learned about this weakness from The Purified Heavens. Though it seems the former Dracon State possesses the same reverse-engineering skill set. At least, judging by the altered communication inscriptions they possess. Their alterations are different, but they both altered the stat-reading portion. As such, these two Encryption inscriptions should protect my future work.

Lastly, the Improvement inscriptions. These three try to improve various aspects of the things they affect. They have no set parameters; they simply seek to find disarrayed, non-optimal, or disjointed 'whatever' and make it less.

That.

It's vague, so I can't be entirely sure what effects they might have. However, since it's meant to be beneficial, these have been the easiest to test. They don't do anything particularly awful. Reeh, that I've witnessed, at least.

I've tested them on big injuries with great success. Old scars? Gone. Dislocations? They pop right in. Festering wounds? Vanished. It's pretty remarkable. These buggers easily do the work which Cleanliness can't. They don't seem to work on genetic diseases, or at least not right away, but I'm running tests on that right now. Plus, I'm also developing new ways to direct their effects, so they can work within a 'pick your improvement'-type of array. All three put together plus a guidance mechanism could be used for some pretty crazy experiments.

My hope is that all of these inscriptions will make my soon-to-be Chronometric Palace into a nice touristy destination. People will come here to enjoy the powerful inscriptions whilst they take in the beautiful sights.

That, plus, I want to give my dragons a place to call home. If they have a secure home where they feel absolutely protected— in my name, under my power— it should be good for them.

I look at my dragons.

Nnnnope.

My immense display of reality-altering powers, spell-casting prowess, and inscription competency has totally offset any comfort they should be getting from these arrays. I shake my dragon head.

This is gonna be a tough nut to crack.

I look at the arrays shining with their smooth and subtle white light. Hopefully, in the long run they'll be soothed by the clean yet warm glow and positive feelings these inscriptions convey.

Inscription colors are based on the type of Mana they use. Mine are white because of the Mana Densification inscription. Normally, they'd be blue otherwise.

General Mana is blue, flame Mana is neon red, water Mana is neon blue, and so on. The reason Mana tends to skew blue isn't because Mana IS blue; unbound Mana is actually clear. This planet simply has a lot of water.

Mana Densification strips out the elements and solely provides raw Mana. I call it Densification rather than Purification, though, because the resulting Mana is much more compact than what merely stripping out the elements can provide. This inscription also arranges the Mana into an almost fluid-like form, which allows it to move less chaotically.

That's why my arrays and their inscriptions all glow white. Any light emitted as waste energy is lost from the various sigils, and that waste energy should be minimized. The only waste my inscriptions create is that which is necessary to create the inscriptions' various effects. They're super-efficient.

The white color comes from the fact there's no other elements, plus the fact the wasted mana is very, very compact. As a result, my inscriptions actually produce more light than a normal inscription— but that's because their effects are so powerful.

Now, one might think flame Mana would be useful for a flame inscription. In testing, this wasn't the case. Flame-bound Mana heats up the inscription which results in far too much waste heat.

Though, Mana Densifcation tends to increase the power of those elemental inscriptions. When stripping out all these various elements, I learned that those so-called 'elements' are nothing more than Mana-bound atoms of chemicals.

So normal! Somehow.

Said atoms tend to congregate outside of the inscription, but nearby. So when Mana Densification does its job? In the case where an array is focusing on absorbing flame Mana, it then produces excess flammable gasses. Now let's say we have these flammable gas in the air. Next, the inscription throws a spark. Boom!

Yep! It's so perfect, I almost want to cry. I can't, as I lack tears, but still. It's amazing how magic works exactly like I expect it should. It also seems all of the physics I learned in my past life still work. Despite the presence of magic.

Somehow.

Alright, whelp. Dragon whelp. Haha, I'mma dragon. Rawr.

Whelp, the most fundamental part, the foundation...

Is done.

Let's construct an epic palace!