58 - Chapter 57 - Day 2182

Another two days had passed and Jarel had yet to be located. Given that he was under Adya’s loyalty formation, he had either been captured or killed.

The problem was in determining which. If he had been captured, and if it was by someone related to the council, then there was a significant risk of her ability to take control of people being leaked. The council would assume that they could give him instruction, and when he failed to respond, it would be obvious that he was no longer under their control.

If that was what had happened, it would leave Adya even more exposed. Not to mention that Jarel was the only point of contact with the mysterious elder who could potentially protect her. Adya had known her controlling side would cause her problems, she had just not expected it to happen so fast.

Given the limitations in communications, and the need to protect the estate from this unknown threat, Evelin and her team were struggling to find out what had happened. The longer it took, the less chance there was of finding out what had happened or to rescue Jarel if he had been captured.

The lack of information, and the inability for Adya to act herself left her feeling distracted and helpless. This was the first time that she truly felt like she was not in control. She had been excited and confident in her plans, she had not even considered that she may not be the one who was targeted.

She asked Evelin to send out more tier 5s to help widen the search, still it would take time for news to filter back to them.

If not for Sai or Mai, she would not have managed to get anything done at all. Everything had hinged on Jarel to contact the elder and progress things, but now she was stuck. None of the other agents she had converted worked for that one elder, and so trying to reach out would not work. Additionally, given the uncertainty, Adya was not in a position to be travelling to communicate directly. If any of the other elders found out, then she would be trapped.

She did make some progress on the communication formation, though it would be more accurate to say that Sai managed to integrate more theory into the overarching language she had created. To distract herself Adya tried to discuss the mechanics with Sai and Mai.

Adya: So have you worked out a theory on how this formation works?

Sai: I would need to do extensive testing to confirm my suppositions, but in theory the way it works is rather rudimentary. There is a master formation, at the council I am guessing, or more likely multiple master formations at the council. The rest of the formations act as a relay with the messages being encoded in mana and sent in the general direction of a node which is closer to the council. The message hops across the network, and messages return via the same nodes.

Adya: So anytime you want to add a new node, you would need to update the address map?

Sai: That is actually the most complex part and what most of these runes are dedicated to. There is no storage or memory. The formation has to be kept constantly active, and that is why it is so expensive to run. The formation queries the network and updates and holds the map in short term memory. It also sends out identification pings regularly to keep the map updated.

Mai: Are the locations, the pings, or the messages encrypted?

Sai: No, if we built our own, we could basically listen in to the whole network. We could even pretend to be part of the network and hijack the whole network, though that would be noticed.

Adya: I am guessing either they are confident that no one has the knowledge to be able to do any of that, or they just don’t understand that it’s possible.

Sai: Our understanding of network principles is much more mature compared to this. However, if you were to compare the network to the earliest recorded networks that were created, then this would be about the level of security that would have existed.

Mai: So someone created something that worked, and everyone copied it without understanding how it worked. Either that or the person who created it left it open so that they could listen in.

Adya: If that was the case why not secure it and then leave a backdoor. Why leave it open to everyone.

Sai: I think the issue is cost. Because it costs so much to run, adding any form of security on top would increase the cost significantly, so they may have gone for the simplest solution they could get to work.

Adya: So could you make it more efficient? Could we create something that we could use, either as a passive skill or an artefact?

Sai: We would need to recreate the whole thing from scratch. And we would need to create the infrastructure to support it. I am not sure, again without extensive testing, if it would be easier to adapt this, or if we would be better served by creating a communications network based on electromagnetic radiation.

Mai: Or we need to work out how the system is able to communicate with everyone and piggy back on that. It seems like this is a workaround when we should be using the system.

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Sai: We don’t even know where to start with that. The system is not using mana. When we have received messages, or when others have, there has been no fluctuations in any of the three energies that we are aware of.

Adya: Could the system be using radio waves or any of the other forms of communication technology that we had in our old universes.

Sai: Again without creating the appropriate tools and extensive testing there is no way for us to know. We need a lot more data.

Adya: So we may be stuck using this archaic form of communication while we wait to work out how to really make it work.

While Adya was lost in her musings about the communications issues, there was a knock on the door.

“We have found him,” said Evelin. “He will be here by this evening.”

“What happened?” asked Adya.

“He was attacked,” said Evelin. “He is still unconscious. Hence the slower travel speed. We don’t know who attacked him or how he survived.”

“What do we know?” asked Adya. “Will he recover?”

“We don’t know yet, he will need to be assessed once he is back here,” said Evelin. “The other groups seem to have started to group together,” she continued, disgust evident on her face. “The attacks are becoming more brutal. If this is not resolved soon, it may break out into open war between the groups.”

“Has there been any further news from the various elders?” asked Adya. “Also why are we only just finding out?”

“Things changed around five days ago,” said Evelin. “We missed things as we had recalled everyone back to the estate for protection. The other groups of elders have ordered their own teams to group up and take out any other groups still searching.”

“They must have learned that they are close to losing control of the situation,” mused Adya. “The same way they knew to look in the first place. So they are escalating, trying to stop anyone else from finding the target first.”

“This is going to disrupt the council's ability to enforce its rules for the foreseeable future,” said Evelin. “It’s so shortsighted.”

“Unless they are going to engage their tier 7s or tier 8s,” said Adya. That would cover the shortfall while more tier 4s reach tier 5. With the agents under their control, it would just mean setting back the cultivation of the agents.”

“That will just put off the problem until later,” said Evelin. “It’s idiotic!”

“If they can gain faster ways of gaining power,” said Adya. “Then it will still be counted as a win in their books. They treat everyone as a resource anyway.”

“I suppose so,” said Evenlin. “Let me go and recall everyone else. Hopefully we will have more information.”

“Tell everyone to be careful,” said Adya. “If they have already escalated so much, I am guessing they have sent out tier 7s already.”

“That would be a major escalation,” said Evelin. “It would threaten to split the council itself.”

“You have seen my mana concentration device,” said Adya. “If they are thinking of gains on that level, they could be thinking that they could take direct control of the council. We don’t know how much knowledge they have access to. Let us hope the team makes it back safely with Jarel, and that he has managed to get the item he was sent to retrieve, or at least that it has not been lost to us. We are seriously lacking knowledge right now.”

Evelin went off to see what she could do to boost security and recall teams. Adya went back to alternating between brooding and musing. The hours dragged by.

Finally Evelin returned. “He is back,” said she. “He is in a bad state. We don’t have any high level healers, so we have given him what health potions we could.”

“How much total health does he have?” asked Adya.

“We would need tier 6 health potions or better,” said Evelin. “Ideally tier 8 health potions to maximise chances of recovery. Those are not easy to come by.”

That left Adya in a quandary. She could create tier 8 stamina potions that could in theory work in place of a tier 8 health potion. It would mean revealing yet another ability to Evelin. She would also need to do some testing as she had only tested on herself.

“Is it only a health potion that would work?” asked Adya. “Would a stamina potion have the same effect? What’s the difference?

“Stamina potions cost thousands of platinum,” said Evelin. “They would work even better, but no one has one. They are almost impossible to get a hold of. A tier 8 one hasn’t come up for auction in a long time. The people who can create them, trade them for favours. A stamina potion works immediately, a health potion works over time.”

It seemed like it was about the release of energy. Adya had Sai work on creating a tier 8 stamina potion.

“Go and clear the room,” said Adya. “I am going to see if I can raid the family heirloom collection.” She decided to make it look like it was something the family already had. It would feed into the story about having found an inheritance of an old and powerful cultivator.

Evelin went off to do as told, a complex expression on her face. Adya went off towards the family vault to not raise suspicion.

Thankfully Sai had already created some tier 7 and tier 8 stamina stones as part of her experiments and managed to synthesise a simple tier 8 stamina potion in short order. Adya placed the potion inside her robe and rushed off to where Jarel was being cared for.

“Are you sure this will work,” said Adya, handing over the potion to Evelin. “If we waste it, then I will be in serious trouble. As it is, people will not be happy about me taking it.”

Evelin inspected the vial and was shocked by what she found. “How…how do you have this?” she asked.

“I can’t tell you that…yet,” said Adya. “Will it work?”

Evelin turned to the unconscious Jarel and administered the potion, massaging his throat to have him swallow.

“Now we wait,” she said.

They hoped that Jarel would be able to recover and provide them with much needed answers on what exactly had happened out there.