Adil opened his eyes and saw how he was still in the war room — collapsed against the side of the wall. Swift had appeared in the doorway, having likely had the same dream.
"D'you uh, get your-"
"Yeah, I got my memories back..."
"I... Haven't seen Seras so... or she hadn't been this happy. For a while."
Swift walked over to slump against the wall beside Adil.
"Makes you think doesn't it. Is there even a world to go back too."
"Should we tell her?... Rosi- Seras I mean."
"We can leave it. No point bringing up old memories." He said solemnly.
"And it's better if we focus on what's happening now."
A voice talked form across the room.
"You squires are surely a fascinating bunch," Adil and Swift jumped at the sound of Morgana, she was tirelessly inspecting the spawn crystal, she seemed to be looking into it and trying to figure out its workings. There was a panel-like interface in front of Morganna. She seemed to be staring at it, scrolling through streams of information.
"How... long have you been there?"
"Well, I had thought it best not to wake you, though it has been at least a few hours... I hope I am not a bother."
"What are you doing?" Adil asked.
She seemed to close her interface and looked towards Adil with a teacher-like appearance.
"Researching, I think."
"You think?"
"Well, the spawn crystal seemed to respond to me inspecting it with a prompt, then I got some sort of information about developments, progress. It's just; I think the crystal appears to have a set layout in which an external influence can refine. However, it appears unable to function effectively at the moment."
Adil got up from the floor and walked over to the crystal. Its glow seemed to meld with the Dryad in her new form, ivory horns and all. The crystal still rotating around, as usual, orange spikes coalesced with lightening as they surrounded the silvery-blue hexagonal rock at its core.
Notification
Grant Elder: 'Morganna' research and design privileges?
yes/no
he chose yes, and Morganna jumped a slight amount, seeing more information rush through her interface.
"How very, interesting." She said, engrossed in the information as it was parsed through the spawn crystal's framework.
"I don't quite understand what this means, but if I use that... and open..."
Notification
Research progress: schematic created
Irrigation system developed.
Research in the spawn crystal has developed a system for irrigating plantlife. This can create mana-infused water flow to crops the village wishes to develop. Plants grown with the help of this irrigation system will have enhanced growth speed and may develop unique properties.
"Oh, damn. What did you do?"
Morganna gave Adil a funny look before she let out a sly smile.
"I do so hope your use of damnation is to emphasise pleasure. It appears that your spawn crystal is continuously gathering information from the outside world. Using a sort of trial and error mechanism. The only problem is that it does not know the correct way to use this information. with my advanced knowledge of this world's magic, I could, well basically figure out how to use this information."
Swift awkwardly whistled tone of bewilderment.
"You seem to have a pretty good grasp of it," Adil stated, "D'you have a project in mind, something that could help us win the coming fight?"
She was still engrossed in the interface, her facial expression seeming to change with every bit of information, confusion to wonder, even a few retracted eureka moments. "Ah yes, I think I found something that might... no... well maybe... oh! ah no but.... Give me a moment."
She walked around the spawn crystal basked in the changing glow of the rotating mass.
Adil moved over to the forge and picked up one of the tools, he looked around at the space, the war-table, forge, and now seemingly a research lab appeared to all be in the same room. He moved towards the forge.
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"You're not going to do that here, are you?" The dryad wearily asked.
"I could hear the racket from the other side of the cave." She gave a stare more pleading that he had seen her before.
"The forge can't work too far from the Spawn crystal." He replied.
"Are you sure?" Morganna asserted.
"I think-"
Morganna feverishly scoured through the information displayed by the spawn crystal and soon a notification popped up for Adil and Swift.
Notification
Forge upgrade unlocked.
Forge allocation can now be within two hundred meters of the spawn crystal. As long is it is within a base of operations accustomed to the spawn crystals mana.
"Thanks," Adil said
"It was my pleasure, lord squire," she replied with a sly smile.
Adil ignored her and looked over the side to see what progress the drones had done. They still appeared to be digging into the walls but had built numerous buildings around the citadel. The drones had turned what was a small pit into an endless cavern though they were still unfinished.
Adil looked around the War room; he really liked the idea of the table having sight of the citadel from where it was. They could stare over their home and all they had built as they planned ahead. That, though meant the spawn crystal and forge must be moved.
He opened his mind to the design mode, connecting with the crystal and looked across the area before him, a blueprint of his designs plastered over it. When he compared it to the buildings that had been created, It seemed as though the drones were not... Colouring inside the lines.
Everything seemed messy and slightly lo- sided. Their excavation though was precise and well-cut. The excavation had left piles of compressed material ready to be absorbed by the spawn crystal.
Adil gathered the builders together and began constructing a room for the spawn crystal. It was going to be just above the ground, space for the spawn crystal to be observed for Morganna's research, an observation deck which surrounded the spawn crystal with glass. The lower part leading into the crystal allowed for drones to move through, and when the drones were not present, could be streamlined to allow for more efficient resurrection.
Transport appeared to be a necessity. A fast way to get back into frontline action and ease of travel between the facilities. Then Adil remembered a major function of the spawn crystal. Teleportation.
He accessed the screen.
Spawn crystal functions
Passive boost
Weather control
Teleportation hub
Mana forge
Adil selected the Teleportation hub.
Teleportation hub
This is an ability which allows connection to other spawn crystals. To access a teleportation hub, the spawn crystal Administrator must interact with the host crystal whilst their crystal is active. Thus linking the crystals.
Do you wish to create the teleportation hub
yes/no
Adil chose yes and saw a small light seemed to shine from the crystal, grabbing Morganna's attention. A stream of mana seemed to fall into a small ball just outside the crystal. This ball rotated around the crystal until eventually it was reabsorbed by the crystal again.
Notification
teleportation location is undefined, the portal hub function is unlocked but will require other teleport locations to be attached for the portals to work.
Morganna looked into her interface, back towards the crystal and back again.
"You seem to have unlocked a teleport function."
"Yeah, do you think you could find a way to allow faster travel around the cave?" Adil asked.
"My experience with teleportation suggests it would be faster to walk than wait for the teleport to come into effect. I will try, but it may require more time than is readily available."
Notification
estimated time until research complete 4 hours 27 minutes +- 20%:
short-range base teleportation
2% complete
"Ahh!" Morganna exclaimed.
"This incongruent device has reached into my head and caused me great pain."
She looked at her interface again.
"Is...Is it estimating how long until I figure out how to add a function that the crystal itself would have done if..."
"This crystal... Is fucking with me."
Morgana walked off in contemplation again.
The completion tick changed to 6 % at that moment.
*now that's happening, I can focus on construction again.*
Finalising the location of the research centre, he decided to place it just above the ground, far below the war room. The centre was just above pathways drones could take to drop off the excess materials acquired from excavating the rock. The idea of glass was though, short-sighted as the drones would not know how to build out of it without glass given as an example.
He sent the drones away with the task, hoping glass would be found soon, as he would need to send a team into the surrounding dungeon, Adil assumed there would be a heap of sand available to harvest and turn into the glass he required. Besides, these locations he needed to build would only be practical when the teleportation was fixed.
All that was left to build was the forge. The forge was a place of trial and error. But also, It was something that in the future Adil hoped could be taken over by residents of the cave. He looked to expand, allowing more tools, anvils, hearths and anything he could think off — a place where weapons and armour could be made to the highest quality in the greatest quantity. The forge was built into the wall in a space the size of a warehouse, enough ventilation to create constant moving fresh air that would likely be cold without the heat of the furnace.
Finished with the design Adil saw the drones scurry about, he saw the mana pool was still quite high and decided to up the number of drones by 50%. The increased bustle of drones wouldn't cause too much trouble to the people there, and the mana pool of the spawn crystal only lowered to 63 %.
Now Adil needed to get some crystals and make the mana shield tokens. For that, he needed to go into Swift's dungeon, preferably without the monsters killing them.
But luckily Ressurection wasn't too far away, Adil paused to think about how he rationalised death so easily now.
After setting out the call, they had managed to get one of the most experienced in the dungeons so far. Steve, his other 'experienced' friend, had slept in too long and was still drunk from the night before. Seras, Horatio, Aku and Swift were enough firepower that if anything went wrong, he assumed it would be ok.
They gathered a decent set of equipment, a few bags to fill with supplies and few drones to trail behind them as they moved towards the dungeons. They only had to take a few odd directions within the cave's tunnels before the atmosphere seemed to change.