An Unbound Soul

"The model of memory core used by the System?" I tried.

"Identifier 'System' unknown."

"The big computer in the room two floors down?"

"Fourteen items on floor E match identifier 'big computer'. Additional parameters required."

"The biggest one!"

"Schematics unavailable."

Did that mean it didn't know which one was biggest, or it did, but didn't know which model memory core it used?

"Why don't we head back to the control room and ask for more details of the memory core it requires?" suggested Krana.

"That would probably be advisable for my sanity," I agreed, leading to a quick trek there and back for all three of us.

"Please fabricate a mark three, class L memory core with a type two spatial interfacing board," I requested, having carefully memorised exactly what the System had asked for.

"Insufficient resources."

I waited a few seconds, but no further information came regarding what resources it was lacking. With a great force of will, I barely managed to avoid kicking the thing.

"What resources do you require?" asked Serlv, who apparently had more patience than me now that she was fully under the control of the Law once again.

"Two point seven units of hihi'irokane. Point three units of adamantite. One point one units of orichalcum. One point five units of mythril. Point eight units of contulite. Point two units of tempulite."

"That's a lot of hihi'irokane," I commented, wondering why it needed any at all. Dungeons made most of those materials from nothing, so why couldn't this thing? Maybe it only glued stuff together, and there was another machine responsible for making the base materials?

"I shall fetch some from the great dungeon," offered Krana, reminding me that he, well, could. After all the effort we'd gone to to manufacture the stuff, it was a little annoying to know he could pop to the great dungeon and bring out ingots of it whenever he wanted. "Do you possess the other materials?"

"I don't have any adamantite on me, but I can do the others. But before you go, check out the rest of the machinery. Given that dungeons produce the stuff from nothing, maybe there's something here that does, too."

He looked around the room. "I see a mana compressor, which appears to be connected to a matter synthesiser. The final machine is labelled a circuit imprinter."

"Matter synthesiser sounds promising," I said, switching my attention to the other machine. "Please produce two point seven units of hihi'irokane."

The connected mana compressor lit up to [Mana Sight] as it... did something. It drew in surrounding mana, where it brightened as if it were ten dungeon floors deep, and then released it again. The end result was that the surrounding mana seemed to increase, which was a neat trick that flew in the face of how conservation of energy was supposed to work.

Some dissipated, merging into the less dense background, but the rest got drawn back in, undergoing another cycle. It kept going, until it had mana dense enough for the bottom floor of the great dungeon, and then, finally, poured some into the matter synthesiser. It went pop, and a perfectly sized ingot of hihi'irokane suddenly existed.

It was in mid-air, though, so it immediately fell to the floor with a clang.

The dense mana in the compressor was released, blowing out into the room and dissipating.

"That took longer than dungeons take to produce chests," observed Krana.

"It had to compress the mana first. In a dungeon, it comes pre-compressed. Now point three units of adamantite, please."

Why did I keep adding a please? I was fairly sure these machines weren't intelligent. Still, I suppose it didn't hurt, just in case.

The machine took almost as long to produce adamantite as it did hihi'irokane. The actual amount produced seemed to make no difference; the time was required to compress the mana. Why did it release the mana as soon as it produced what I asked for? Maybe if I asked for lots of things at once, it would save time?

"Unable to produce non-homogenous material," it complained when I tried.

"That's defeatist talk. A floor twenty chest would be ashamed of you."

"One point one units of orichalcum," ordered Serlv, ignoring me and getting the machinery going again.

Before long, we had everything the fabricator had demanded, at no cost to the contents of my [Inventory].

"Point one units of a rank five, spatial affinity material, please," I requested, just to see what would happen.

"Identifier 'rank five' unknown."

If this was part of the equipment used to build the System, maybe it didn't know what ranks were? I would be surprised if the System used contulite if there was a higher ranked version available, though. Or perhaps it would be detrimental to its surroundings, like the way using flame-touched steel in a staff was fine, but making it from ignitite would just burn the wielder.

"Again, I must repeat myself. Do not abuse your access here," said Serlv, treating me to a glare. There went my plans to completely fill my [Inventory] with hihi'irokane, then.

Or did it? Would abusing my access so outrageously trigger the Law again, and make her blind to my actions? But even if it did, would her memories return if I freed her? I reluctantly stepped away from the synthesiser.

"Fabricate a mark three, class L memory core with a type two spatial interfacing board," requested Serlv of the fabricator, having inserted the various blocks of metal into a likely looking opening. This time it didn't complain at the request, but a panel closed across the alcove and it started humming.

With [Mana Sight], I watched the various ingots decompose. The insides were largely opaque, and what was happening was far too complex for me to understand even had it been transparent, but I could see mana continuing to swirl. Then it focused in the alcove, and started building something from the bottom up.

I'd watched 3d printers in operation on Earth, and they were cool enough, but this thing was another level. It was mere seconds until it had finished.

"Fabrication complete," declared the machine as the panel slid open once more.

"Then let us insert it into the System," said Serlv.

"Wait. I don't think it's finished," I said, looking at it with more than my eyes. It lacked the complex magical circuitry of everything in the System chamber.

"Then you have a different definition of 'complete' than I do."

"No, it's built the thing, but it still needs enchanting. That must be what the circuit imprinter is for."

That wasn't going to ask for resources too, was it? If it sent us out to collect wolf fur and snake fangs, I was going to scream. I'd decided on my very first foray with enchanting that the materials were superfluous, though, so hopefully it was okay.

"Insufficient resources," complained the implanter, once we'd shoved the memory core into it.

I screamed.

"Patience, child," snapped Serlv. "What resources are required this time?"

"Five units of structured mana crystal."

"What the heck is a structured mana crystal?"

"A monster core, perhaps?" suggested Krana.

That made some sort of sense. A monster core was structured, tended to crumble to nothing if you took out the mana, and could be described as crystalline without overly stretching the definition. What was a unit, though? Weight? Different level monster cores weighed the same, as far as I'd noticed, so would it accept level one monster cores as much as level thirty? That seemed odd, even given what I knew about mana's lack of respect for basic rules of conservation.

I took out a level thirty monster core and put it in the only available slot.

That was obviously correct, because a repeat of Serlv's request caused the machine to start buzzing. It continued for a few minutes before finishing up with a loud bing.

The memory core looked the same to regular sight, but [Mana Sight] showed it was now heavily enchanted. The monster core still looked the same, too, but to [Mana Sight] it had dimmed. [Eye of Judgement] showed it had dropped to level twenty-five. It had lost five 'units'.

"Huh," I commented, not having much more to add.

ding

Skill [Eye of Judgement] advanced to level 4

Oh, cool. About time that levelled again. It was slow.

"I suppose our next task is to figure out how to insert it," said Serlv as we walked the corridors once more, new memory core in hand. It was a hexagonal prism, with the bottom face shimmering in an interesting way that made it obvious contulite was involved. It was also rather small. Could the little thing really fulfil all the data storage requirements of the System? I knew it was advanced, magical technology, but it was still impressive.

"The System chamber doesn't have an entrance," I pointed out.

"As the System has demonstrated an ability to place and erase walls, perhaps it can make one."

"It wasn't half destroyed back then, though."

"True, but we can do nothing more than try."

And it had summoned up walls of adamantite around the portals. Which, now that I considered it, it had done instantly without any mana compression time. Where had it got the material from? Could it teleport it straight from a dungeon?

"We have a replacement memory core. Will removing the damaged one cause a further loss of System functionality?" I asked once we arrived, not wanting to risk making things worse when we had no idea where to get a backup of the data from.

ding

Information: Removing the damaged core will terminate all System activity. Action not advised.

Great...

"What he means to ask is how should we go about installing the new memory core in a safe manner," said Serlv.

I assented to the resulting prompt, and it dinged once more.

ding

Information: Replacement memory core should be placed adjacent to primary control crystal.

Well, that was easy enough.

"Please don't break anything," I muttered as I took it out of [Inventory] and put it down.

The memory core vanished in a flash of spatial affinity and reappeared below, the opposite side of the chamber from something I spotted with a similar shape, but with the top half obviously snapped off.

Beyond that, nothing else happened.

"I don't suppose you have any information on where we can find a backup now?"

ding

Information: No information available.

Nope, same response as before.

Seeing the way it had installed the intact memory core, and now that I knew what I was looking for, I could see debris that I was fairly sure used to be multiple memory cores. It likely had multiple redundant copies. But even so, keeping an off-site backup was common sense back on Earth. Perhaps the calculation was different here; off-site backups were protection against such disasters as a data centre burning down, rather than simple hardware failure. This was the best defended place on the planet, up until the System poked holes through the universe and let Earth right into its guts. The extra redundancy probably didn't compensate for needing to protect two locations.

"I suppose there's nothing we can do but explore room by room, and hope we find something unlabelled."

"There is one other option," said Krana. "The subsidiary core we collected from this place contains a copy of Erryn's memories. Perhaps knowledge of a solution is contained within."

Ha! I knew it! But...

"In Erryn's current condition... I suspect that returning her memories would break her. She needs more time to heal."

That wouldn't be too bad. As long as houses didn't start collapsing, we could coast along for a few years with everyone's existing skills. It would be inconvenient, but I'd be willing to bet Erryn's soul would heal before the world fell to pieces.

"I was not proposing returning the memories to Erryn. Indeed, in the message she left behind, she declared that any attempt to return her memories within the next couple of decades would be fatal to her."

Decades? That was way longer than I'd assumed, from my own inspection of her! But she was the expert here, so if that's what she said, I'd need to trust her.

"Then why mention her core?"

"Because of another stipulation she provided; that if the world was to be faced with an emergency so dire that her presence was required to save it, the memories in the core could be downloaded to another."

Oh...

There were limited options for who she meant as 'another'. The Law was already interfering in our attempts to repair the System. Someone under the Law could never hope to successfully integrate the memories of Erryn. It had to be me. I... would have to... There was no way! This was not a good option! I didn't trust me with this, so why the hell would Erryn? Even waiting a few decades sounded better. I could think of nothing worse than anyone trusting me to take over Erryn's legacy!

"The slime Blobby possesses a compatible dungeon core," continued Serlv. "We must grant Erryn's memories to her."

Nope, never mind. It just got worse.