Apparatus... Technical equipment used for a particular activity or purpose.
Bomb... A contraption designed to explode either within a set time or through remote control.
Concept... An abstract idea, a general notion.
Device... Drone... Electron... Fiasco... Generic... Genome... Habitat... Industry... Jam... Kudos... Laboratory... Machine... Neuron...
A brown-haired youth was sitting alone in a penthouse suite, rigorously utilizing a 'Runic Series' info kiosk to expedite his integration of Regis' vernacular into his own. In other words, he was trying to learn vocabulary, fast. The various symbols of arcane origin continued crawling across the machine, translating data outputs into magical streams of information.
For the fifth time that day, the process was abruptly halted as the youth clutched at his head in pain. Learning a hundred words a day was taxing on the average Basic Mortal, let alone a thousand. The task was made easier with the invention of transference technology, but it still required the recipient to have a strong and/or flexible mind, traits the person currently suffering from a migraine was lacking in.
A clicking sound broke up the silent atmosphere. "Haagh, Rowan. Are you done yet?"
The new arrival who joined the youth in his oversized apartment was a member of Regis, an interdimensional organization of powerful individuals who have achieved immortality through unraveling the mysteries of the multiverse (Their hub world shared the same name). These immortal individuals tended to spend their days either entertaining themselves through various means or acting as emissaries when visiting new universes. Recruiting new members was a rare occasion, hence why the youth named Rowan was getting visitors almost every day.
"Nearly there. If you would all stop barging in while, nghkk, while I am trying to meditate on Regis' wordage, I might have finished by now."
Rowan, on the other hand, was not very warm to his reception. Having hailed from a land of warriors and magi, and being a proud warrior himself, he was not used to being belittled or feeling inconsequential. Especially not after the fact that he had attained the position of Arbiter, the greatest height of power imaginable where he came from. That was not to say there were no kindhearted souls in Regis, but the fact that some have treated him like a mere burden has been nothing short of troublesome for his psyche.
"Cheeky, aren't we?"
This was one of the culprits. A metallic avian lifeform standing 1.4 m tall named Avisec, colloquially named Avy. Her head was some strange combination of a beak and a helmet, with eyes located on the sides. She was a regular, for reasons unbeknownst to Rowan, though he hazarded a guess that it was due to the encouragement of friends or higher ups. After all, despite having pestered him for several days in the past four months, it appeared as if Avy did not enjoy being around Rowan either.
"Please... just leave me be."
"Wish I could," said the grey and red bird as she leapt onto the open kitchen counter. Despite her steel composition, she hardly left a mark on the marble surface, indicating the use of some weight-defying force. "But you're about to finish, and I need to be here when it happens. Regretfully." She proceeded to peck at the grapes in a fruit bowl sitting on the counter.
Rowan did not mind this sort of appropriation, as he could always request some more to be warped in at no charge. The citizens that resided within the city of Equinox were provided welfare in the form of ample housing, access to public infrastructure, and enough food to stuff their bellies. Their incentive to keep from completely sinking into a life of complacency came in the form of premium goods and services. Things like hair dyes, tourist trips, lavish furnishing, and tasty treats were unnecessary, but coveting when exposed for long enough. They could all be purchased with the city's virtual currency, credits, and since there was hardly any pressure besides one's own hedonistic desires, civilians could all be streamlined into generating primarily a single resource without any particular fear of uprising: innovation.
Anything that might constitute as progress towards this goal would be rewarded with credits, including education, which was also provided for free. All this was made possible by the city's mechanical autonomy, which produced no shortage of menial labor. Several other subtle factors like policies and propagating 'herd mentality' helped, but the main driving force behind it was still the vast array of service drones' constant maintenance and production of goods.
The new recruit was unaware of all these intertwining processes, however. Simply put, he merely perceived Equinox as a city of wondrous convenience. With his status as a member of Regis, he was given a virtually unlimited number of credits. And yet, he had remained conscious of his reputation here, refusing to spend money on anything luxurious for fear of becoming a drain on resources. It was only because of the other members' insistence that he caved and took up residence within Twilit Hotel's most expensive living quarters.
A holographic interface displaying Regis' standard Operating System appeared above the desk Rowan was sitting at. Similarly to the floating mechanical Pads that pervaded the streets of Equinox, one could access their personal accounts simply by gesturing at designated nodes within buildings to summon a HoloPad.
Wireless earbuds came out of a slot within the table as Rowan selected a soundtrack to play. Listening to music had quickly become one of his favorite pastimes here at Regis. "Then I hope you would not mind me taking a short nap in the meanwhile." And with that, he rested his aching head on his arms, not bothering to listen to any further comments from Avy. His thoughts wandered as he gently wafted into blissful sleep, aided by the soft reverberations of piano.
...
"Pfeh, what an idiot. Has a bed right next to him and doesn't even use it."
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In the frigid mountains of eastern Regis.
For whatever reason, Jin was cooking a doner kebab in the middle of a blizzard at the base of one of these mountains.
A curious being approached him, his first guest of the day (or rather, night). "Shouldn't you be training Rowan right now? Weren't you in charge of that?"
"Hey there! What's up, Rooney?" The being he just acknowledged was none other than Ruonis, a fellow member of Regis. They were a magical existence made entirely out of runes revolving around a nucleus to form an upright circular formation half a meter in length. Arcane energies flowed in and out from under the disc-like being, creating a connection with the ground beneath it and subsequently generating a field of ambient mana wherever it went.
"Enough with the monikers. I heard that Avy is the one teaching the newcomer right now, and that worries me. Is that true?"
"Ee-yup."
"What! Jin, I understand that you have a rather chaotic disposition at times," said Ruonis while swiveling in the direction of the kebab. "But shirking your duties is unlike you."
"You kidding? That's exactly like me! I figure she could do a heckuva lot better job than I ever could, so that's why I sent everybody's beloved snappy bird on the job."
"But what of her temperamental nature? Wouldn't that impede her ability to efficiently teach Rowan? Wouldn't almost anyone be better? In fact, I should head over there right now-!"
"Hey wai-wai-wait, hold it, hoooooold it...!" Jin grabbed the magical entity before they could teleport away. The bewildered construct faced him, awaiting an explanation. "I figured this would be a great chance for the both of them. Avy's mature enough to not do anything too rash. Both of them need the experience of clashing personalities now, because in the future, when they meet a similar situation, their first response wouldn't be to do anything crazy like killing'em and be done with it."
"Right... right! You're absolutely right. A learning experience for the both of them. Brilliant! But what would Avy say if she found out that was your motive?"
"Iunno?" The robed man shrugged. "Eh, I'll deal with it if that happens. Hey, want some?" He deftly scraped off chunks of meat into a bun, offering it to the runic disc.
"...Why do you insist on someone who lacks gastric functions to eat food?"
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The hours trickled past. Gradually, Rowan recovered enough to resume absorbing the last vestiges of knowledge in the info kiosk. Avy was roosting on one of the mahogany cupboards, granting him some reprieve as he finished up.
That would not last long, however. As soon as the progress bar on the kiosk's screen hit 100%, Avy's yellow eyes opened up as if on cue.
"About time," she yawned.
"Indeed it is. Now can I move on to the actual meat of the Fundamental of Science?"
"That's what I'm here for, I suppose." Avy ruffled the feathers of her wings, which resulted in a harsh cacophony of clashing metal, before hopping onto the ground. Her pristine steel exterior gleamed as it passed under the lighting on her way to Rowan. She pulled up a HoloPad at the same time.
Rowan had been waiting for this moment. Enduring headaches for the past four months, acquiring the Regis language, it all felt monotonous, but he knew it to be necessary. Over that period of time, he found himself able to comprehend the entirety of what the ordinary day-to-day civilian said without having to ask for clarification on what a specific word or phrase meant. If he had to do that constantly, he knew it would get annoying and rapidly drain the patience of everyone involved.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
But now that was all over. He would finally embark on an exciting journey reaching new heights of power, if his adventures involving the Fundamental of Might were any indicator. At last, he would learn about their transdimensional gateways, artificial life, and all manner of interesting topics which he overheard Jin and the others talking about in casual conversation.
Many within the world of Regis lacked complex, free upper limbs to handle items of interest, but compensated for it through other means via technology, magic, qi, etc. Usually, these unorthodox methods were visible to the naked eye, but the avian in front of him operated the manifestation without any such faux appendages. Maybe higher level individuals preferred it this way, but somehow, Rowan felt as if it was currently being done in order to unnerve him.
Whatever was on Avy's screen was sent over to his, overriding the music playlist UI and replacing it with a colorful mishmash of an educational program. Though when he looked more closely, he had to question her intentions. "Are you mocking my intellect?" From what he could tell, the general design for the program had been assembled in a way he could only assume was meant for appealing to children, as was the material involved: basic addition.
"No, I'm insulting your intelligence," She said, shooting him a sidelong look. One could argue that that was all she could do, however, considering the orientation of her eyes. "But... your intellect could use some work too."
"So be it. Tell me then, how is this meant to be useful to me?"
"Says here you experienced syncope with your first couple tries using an info kiosk. It's a little pathetic passing out from having words spoonfed into your mind, isn't it? So, we decided the best course of action was to develop your brain a little by having you take Equinox's standard curriculum. Overseen and modified by me as deemed appropriate, of course."
"And you would have me start at the very beginning...?"
"Precisely. Have any issues with that?"
Rowan gazed upon the amalgamation of puffy textures and spoofed numbers once more. "Well, if you could at least... tone this down a tad bit-"
"Fine, fine." Avy rolled her eyes as she simplified the program to be a bit more bare-bones.
Left to his own devices, Rowan began solving the now text-based, yet still demeaning, math problems. There was a timer in the corner where, if he managed to complete five questions without mistakes before it ran out, he would be given new problems of a greater difficulty. Otherwise, another set would appear for him to work on. It was short enough to ensure that he had become proficient in that area, and the five consecutive correct questions proved that it was not a mere fluke.
Whenever he failed too many times, some windows would pop up and offer advice or helpful tips on how to figure out solutions faster (e.g. Assembling numbers of multiple digits on top of one another to make it easier to carry over). There were also short sessions in between new areas where information would be provided on how to solve functions he had never seen before.
Speed was not a particular issue, at first. Impeccable memory was something inherent to his being as one who had reached the Ascendant level in the Fundamental of Might, so things like multiplication tables were a breeze. However, memorization could only bring him so far; as the numbers grew larger and the operations more complex, he could not keep up with the exponential increase in solutions; they were meant to temper his skill after all, not his knowledge. While the obvious choice would be to master the equations and properties themselves, Rowan felt... betrayed. This whole time, he believed that the Fundamental of Science merely involved a deluge of information he needed to take in. Now he felt himself to have been led on by the four months of accessing the info kiosk, only to end up doing something so mundane.
It was enough, he felt. He would simply learn the other Fundamentals instead of this one.
"Oh? Done for the day?" Avy had been watching astutely until the point where Rowan began to need minutes to complete a single question. She quickly grew bored, and began fidgeting with a HoloPad, stopping when she saw Rowan close the teaching application.
"We need not suffer each other's presence any longer. I have decided that the Fundamental of Science is not necessary, and request I be taught the others instead." Rowan expected one of two reactions out of Avy. She would either breathe a sigh of relief and let him go, or grumble in frustration and say that she was obligated to finish teaching him.
Contrary to his expectations, she scoffed at the notion instead. "Ha! I knew it! I knew you were all the same!
"'Cultivators'," she said with derision dripping from her beak. "Always so brash, so arrogant. All they ever care about is 'saving face' or gaining power, and whenever they can't get an extremely valuable something? 'Oh, I was never destined for it', hahaha!"
Needless to say, Rowan was taken aback. From what he could tell, 'cultivators' referred to individuals who practiced techniques that allowed them to absorb and utilize the latent energy of their respective universes. More specifically, there were commonalities that these universes had which placed them in the cultivator archetype: tribulations, century-long meditations, information transferring items, scattered treasures, etc. It would seem that Avy was making a jab directly at the cultures and traditions, or rather, at the behavioral developments that resulted from being raised in such an environment. Such a personal attack on his very existence riled him up to no end. "And yet, it is thanks to us cultivators' thirst for greatness that we have perfected the art of information transference. Quite unlike your faulty info kiosks."
"HAHAHAHA! Oh, you poor soul. You don't even know why you can't go two hours without getting a migraine, but you still blame it on us?!
"Let me ask you this. What exactly do you keep in your 'scrolls'? Sword arts, secret arts, maps? All of them are absurdly one-dimensional; there's only so many ways you can swing a sword, why would you need centuries to meditate on something like that?! What did the info kiosk grant you? Not only the entirety of the Regis dictionary, but also idioms, phonemic awareness, and semantics! Compared to ours, your transference technology is like being shown a picture book!"
Rowan would agree with her assessment, but who in their right mind would ever readily admit inferiority, especially when they took great pride in their achievements? "And yet, our 'picture books' teach something practical for survival. What good are such mundane subjects like linguistics and mathematics in a fight?"
"Yeah? What good are martial arts when there's no more fighting? Ever think about what happens then?!"
Ah! At last, some leverage in this uphill verbal battle. He spoke with confidence, "I would live out the rest of my days in peace and tranquility, of course."
"Oh really? Someone like yourself who's spent his entire life adventuring across worlds would be content lazing about on the porch of his newly built home with his wife and kids until death by old age? Get real, your wanderlust would slowly build up until you'd want to relive the old days of thrill and danger, only to find that there's none to be had at your level of strength anymore! Who knows? You might just get bored of life and end it prematurely. A retirement like that would be agonizing for you!"
The words clicked with him, having heard the same ones before with Jin. To grow bored of eternity... was a distinct possibility. He had brushed off that warning before, thinking it was ludicrous that someone could get tired of living. Considering the implications now after it was brought to his attention again, he decided he should try and defuse the situation and go back to learning what they had to offer. That, and he did not particularly want to make an enemy out of someone who could easily kill him in the blink of an eye. "I... apologize for my transgressions. Your words have merit to them."
Avy cocked her head to one side. "So you want to keep going on these lessons or?"
"Yes." Simple and straightforward. The flustered avian was actually rather shocked at how the delinquent in front of her managed to switched gears all of a sudden.
"No more acting up then, okay?"
"Of course. But might I ask you something? What is the purpose of teaching me math? Is it not an elementary subject?"
She sighed. "Well, think of it in terms of cultivation systems. There are tiers to progress through, and you'd need a strong foundation to have a shot at reaching the top, right?"
"Ah! So mathematics is the foundation of the Fundamental of Science?"
"...In a manner of speaking, yes." Upon uttering this confirmation, Rowan immediately turned back towards his monitor and began fervently studying and completing the arithmetic program. Avy was stunned. She knew that certain individuals required proper motivation in order to do things, but this was shockingly efficient. Looking at the question completion rate going up, Avy felt more or less satisfied at the resolution of their argument.
Rowan on the other hand, was feeling a nostalgic drive. Now that he had a clearer idea of where he was headed, he could tell the similarities this start had to when he first began his journey as a warrior. There may not be any threats to his well being, but he still delighted in learning more about the universe and, as much as he wanted to deny it, becoming more powerful. After he learned all of the Fundamentals, he planned on bringing his close friends and family here to Regis, and perhaps they would embark on an expedition to explore the endless multiverse.
Indeed, everything appeared perfectly set for Rowan's eternal future.