A/N: Might be a little boring in the first summary part, sorry. I'm too lazy to re-write it. Don't worry, it's not all summaries.
Maturity Warning: Morally conscious readers beware, proceed with caution.
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If you think I'm the one that's going to expose the truth about the witches, think again. You're looking at the wrong person to deal with that problem.
If anything, I want to keep the war going. War drives this world's economy; it's what keep the citizens loyal to its government, and it's the drive I need to fuel my industries.
So sorry witches, but sacrifices must be made if I am to make any progress.
Here's the thing, I can't just conquer the world through sheer military force. Sure, that might be the short term solution, but that won't fulfill the quest requirement. If you recall, the goal is to bring Terra to 'peace', and peace by military force is impossible unless you kill everyone that can possibly rebel. The way I see it, it's either peace through unification or peace through annihilation of all humans.
Naturally, I would love to chose annihilation. It's so much faster and easier. All I need is to develop kinetic orbital bombardment. The biggest issues would be building a projectile durable enough, getting up to space, finding a way to calculate the retry angle and speed, and a way to speed up the projectile.
Nevertheless, that's much easier than nuclear weaponry. No radioactive-protection suits, no need for refinement facilities, no need for protection details in case someone comes to steal the nuclear warhead.
The projectile must be solid, ridiculously durable, but that's still easier to engineer than a complex nuclear warhead. Getting up into space in a medieval setting is impossible, but I know for a fact that inertialess engine is possible. After all, I was one of the researchers leading that project back on old Earth, I just need to build another one. If I can get the first two done, the last two parts are almost laughable.
Perhaps some of you doesn't know this, but the greatest computer mankind will ever build isn't a quantum computer, that's just science-fiction. Nor is it a computer base on silicon or even graphite, they have their own limits. Its a biological computer; the human brain is the greatest processor there is for parallel computing. A few unfortunate victims, most often death-row criminals, and a network connected by quantum physics means as long as you have enough brains, you can build the smartest & fastest computer on the planet.
In fact, that's how I managed to build Lucy, my AI daughter, on old Earth. She was the collective will of the connected, brainwashed brains of the bio-computer. I did some modification to make her... friendly to the human society, but in truth the 'will' manifests itself the second you wake the brains from drug induced slumber. Not that this matters for the present.
The last part is the easiest: Attach a small-scale inertialess drive engine to the projectile and use a railgun to speed it up first. Good thing about a solid projectile is that there's no need to limit the inertialess drive engine, since there's nothing to break in the projectile. Railgun? Just aligned magnetic coils and electricity.
Developing these technologies would be the hardest part, for anyone else. It would take centuries, even thousands of years, probably. But I'm an exception. I already know what needs to be done and how. Manufacturing them is so much easier after you have done it once.
And if anyone steals some parts of it? Who cares, what are they going to do with a 50k ton solid rod of composite materials? Bio-computer? To heavy and fragile to steal. Railgun? Just cut the power source, or overload it and it will melt itself into scrap metal. Inertialess drive system? You'll only kill yourself playing with the zero-point field without a proper understanding.
See, so much easier than the radioactive way of achieving total annihilation.
But forget all that, there's a much simpler way. I just need to develop a way to distribute biological weapons and deploy them. In other words, a plague. But there's the problem with annihilation... One of the condition for failure of the quest states that if Terra is completely destroyed, its over.
And a plague that cannot be defended against? That will kill all lifeforms on this planet. It's impossible to design a virus that only targets humans permanently without targeting other creatures; virus mutates and evolve by the second.
Which means, I'll fail either through kinetic bombardment or a virus outbreak.
That leaves one option: Unification.
I need to unify Terra, and if the witches are going to pay the price, then so be it. I'm only human, and we humans are selfish creatures. If I can be with Melinda again, nothing else really matters to me; screw moral duties!
Now then, how to go about unification? The answer is obviously to control the world economy. Economy is what rule the world, not any military forces.
There's a saying: The pen is mightier than the sword.
If the sword is too sharp to defend against, just go for the handle. The unprotected, vulnerable handle...
So that's what I'm doing, building up my industry, riding on the river of blood flowing down from the battlefield.
And it has been going according to plan so far. let's do a quick summary of last four years since I first started learning how to be a warlock and a priestess from Grandma Garcia.
Yes, she forbid me from calling her Mrs. Steiner after a week, for some reason.
From her I learned that using Freya's 'Divine Power' of healing is not just prayers, you also need to understand the wound that need to be healed. I suppose this is the difficult part for most people, but I already know the human anatomy. At the same time, we learned how to identify poisons, where and which prayer to use to invoke the divine power.
For half of what she lectured on, I already knew. What I didn't expect was the other half on mana poisonings. Now that was interesting, my first intro into how mana works on the body and mana poisoning spreads. While Anne and Jill continued to work on memorizing what little of human anatomy these people understands, I spend every morning for two years learning all I can about mana and other supernatural types of poisonings.
It certainly broadened my understanding into the inner workings of mana. I had thought mana particle cannot be materialized from the memories Ascathon showed me, but there are ways, however limited.
At the time, I had already given up on mastering my esper ability through alkahestry, though I sat through all of Mother's lesson how to use alkahestry. Who knows, perhaps it will be useful one day.
Then came one of my greatest discoveries. It just so happened that I was training my Alpha Stigma skill that afternoon and doing maintenance on Narukami at the same time. I realized that the kagune blade is... teeming with crystalized mana particles.
No, to be more specific, the kagune itself is entirely made of different types of crystalized mana particles. That's how ghouls with the same type of kagune as Narukami can fire lightning without being an lightning esper, a warlock, or a magician. The type of crystalized mana particle near the base naturally absorbs mana and chi. The other crystalized mana particles combined with the flesh of the ghoul allows for it to flex around even without a inner skeleton, convert mana to electricity, or hardens the surface based on how much mana channeled.
It got me thinking, if I convert electricity to mana, then use that mana to manipulate the mana muscle- that's the name I gave the crystalized mana particles merged with ghoul flesh- I can build machines that originally would require a much higher level of technology.
It's a cheat code, in a sense. And it greatly sped up my plans. I finished up the last alchemical improvement we were contracted to do by the government, and switched the entire lab to focus on developing technology based on the kagune.
For me, it's quite exciting. Who knew I would come across an entirely new field beside the obvious field of magic? Instead of just building the same old stuff I used to on Earth, I'm inventing new ways to use ghoul flesh. It's a nice feeling to have again.
First, we needed to artificially grow more ghoul flesh. They're on short supply, I'm afraid. The Immortal Emperor's personal forces did their job too thoroughly, unfortunately.That means I need cultivation tanks to grow more. That and acquiring more from the Isle of Sword Saints.
The last part required me to sent agents into the Reim Empire, in order to reach the Eastern Seas. That, too, brought a surprise to me.
You see, I am, and always have been, a collector. Mostly just knowledge, but sometimes specimens as well. That's what drove me to became what my adversaries called me, a mad scientist. Of course, I'd always deny those charges, but it is true nevertheless.
After Anderson Corporation got on its feet, I made the collection of every known specimen in Terra one of its prime directives. It's always better to have them on hand than just in writing.
That's how I came across this, a mounted beast commonly used in the Reim Empire. It's eight feel tall, ten feet long, with a body of wolf, if the wolf is a giant dire wolf. It's feet may have muscles on it, but it's definitely the same structure on a kangaroo's feet. but They call it a Destrier. Mine does not have horns, but the ones the Reim Legionaries use do.
Spoiler :
Without the useless spikes, of course. The body is also more proportionally distributed, no stupidly large chest to stab into.
http%3a%2f%2fzam.zamimg.com%2fimages%2f6%2f7%2f672169d...44af1c.png [http://zam.zamimg.com/images/6/7/672169d86aaddef2817046623f44af1c.png]
These people has no idea what it really is, but I do. To them it is just a carrier beast, the Reim equivalent of a horse, but to me it's different.
The Destrier is a genetically modified beast. That much is clear at first glance; none of its features make sense in the wilderness.
Why would it have claws if it's not a predator? Why would its feet be structured like a kangaroo's feet when they are from different branches on the tree of evolution? There's so many things wrong with beast that anyone who knows his theory of evolution knows it cannot possibly have evolved naturally.
From the earliest records on them, the Reim Empire began using them approximately five hundred years ago, before the Xing Empire became part of this world. And the destrier is not all. There has been writings of giant, wingless beasts that could fly, Leviathans, used by the Reim Empire to transport its Legionaries. Other modified beasts that help the Reim empire function. Even giant monsters of the sea, krakens, has been attributed to Reim Legions. I've always read those books with a grain of salt, but now I finally have proof. The Reim Empire relies on unnatural beasts to function.
Spoiler :
Great Air Beast, the Leviathan:
http%3a%2f%2fvignette3.wikia.nocookie.net%2flevi...0428034922 [http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/leviathanscottwesterfeld/images/9/9b/Leviathanapproaches.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110428034922]http%3a%2f%2f4.bp.blogspot.com%2f--ZWkNOdie3A%2fUS...1_s600.JPG [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--ZWkNOdie3A/USp5B_T1-cI/AAAAAAAAQIM/BFgz9pCYlyw/s1600/9781416971795_p1_v1_s600.JPG]
Spoiler :
Giants of the sea, the Kraken:
http%3a%2f%2ffc00.deviantart.net%2ffs71%2ff%2f2011%2f3...4ju669.jpg [http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2011/355/0/c/kraken_by_elmisa-d4ju669.jpg]
That means there's someone else capable of body modification on this planet, but I'm supposed to be the only one from a higher technological world for another decade at least.
So it must be a resident of this world, one who has access to all the natural animals, access to plenty of ghoul body parts to experiment on, and the power to do so. There's only one person who fits that profile: The Great Priestess of Reim.
Coincidentally, or perhaps not so, she also came into power approximately five centuries ago. She was the priestess who stood by the Reim general who took over in a coup d'état and transformed Reim from just another kingdom into the Empire it is now. And according to what the Reim Empire's propagandas say, she's still alive and well. A powerful, immortal priestess, and a magician. Possibly a warlock as well, but nobody has seen her spirit familiars.
I'm still a bit reluctant to admit that she's an immortal. After all, it is in Reim's best interest to keep up the image of a powerful Immortal Priestess behind their Legions. For all I know for now, they could have replaced her with lookalikes to fool their enemies. It's certainly a powerful moral booster to the Reim citizens and its Legions.
Despite the ambiguity surrounding this priestess, just in case she's real, I'm staying well away from her path for now. I'm not nearly strong enough to take on an immortal hag yet.
Unfortunately, I found that the other modified beasts are limited to the Reim Legions, and they keep a close watch on their beasts. Only the destrier and a few cute pets are available to the public.
The people of Amestris are a bit... disagreeable with the beasts of Reim in general, despite the alliance between our two nations. Alchemy forbids human transmutation, as well as transmutation of natural life forms. That much is deeply rooted in its laws, especially for State Alchemists.
The three most basic laws that all state alchemist obey by are 1. Obey the Military, 2. Do Not Create Gold, and 3. Do Not Create Humans. By extension, as the people has been interpreting it for decades, the last law also applies to natural animals.
Though these laws are meant for state alchemists, they have basically been taught to every single citizen of Amestris, even myself. We aren't a militaristic nation for nothing, after all.
As such, though the people of Amestris may believe the beasts of Reim to be natural in public, the rumors always float around that some rogue state alchemists defected to Reim and created the beasts through forbidden alchemy. It has always been a strain on the diplomatic relationship between the Reim Empire and Amestris, but nobody else knows for sure, or so they say.
I know how to use 'forbidden' alchemy to transmute living organisms myself, all competent alchemist with the Gate of Truth and some knowledge on the human anatomy does. And nearly all alchemists with the Gate of Truth are recruited as State Alchemists. It's only the iron laws and the fact that Amestris is not yet that desperate in our war to go that far that keep us from practicing human transmutation. I suppose I have some blame to take for that last part, since I'm the one who bolstered the power of Amestris alchemy by quite the improvement through my new techniques.
Let's take a short detour here. Why are almost all alchemists with the Gate of Truth State Alchemists? The answer lies in the sacrifice needed to obtain a Gate of Truth. It used to be that a part of the body, often the most treasured part, would be used as the sacrifice.
There were many cases of death as a result, some soft-hearted idiots even sacrificed their heart. Not that the alchemist can choose once he begins the human transmutation on himself, the Gate of Truth gazes into you and see your desires directly.
But after the war with the witches started, Amestrisian alchemists found a safe substitute to body sacrifice that doesn't violates the fundamental laws of alchemy. The witches' hats, their outer mana cores.
Legend has it that the hats of the most powerful witches can take on human form as the witches' Sorellas, the witches' blood sisters. We alchemists know that for a fact. The hats of witches are like their second heart, able to be used as the proper sacrifice in a human transmutation.
Perhaps, I muses sometimes, That's part of the reason alchemists are so willing to participate in the war, to risk their lives for the country.
No pain, no gain. I would say the extended version: No pain, No Game; No game, No life, but games aren't the foremost thing on these people's mind, that's war.
In any case, a witch's hat is by law the property of the Amestrisian government, the property of the military. Private ownership of a witch's hat is forbidden unless it can be proven that it is sourced from other nations. We're currently the only nation on land that borders the territory of the Witch of the South, holding off the witches' armies from the rest of the continent, so the chance of that is rather slim.
That's why many aspiring alchemists are desperate to be granted a witch's hat for his sacrifice. I blamed my Gate of Truth on Ascathon in front of the Führer, but nobody else has received theirs through divine means.
Let's bring the points together. Amestrisians typically dislike Reim beasts, so they are not welcome here. That's why we still use horses despite having better options just next door. And if just destriers aren't welcome, the Reim merchants sure as hell won't come trade on a Leviathan.
Which is why I have not obtained one for myself until now. Hohohoho, I've waited so long for this moment!
And yet as I examined the destrier, I found that the rumors of rogue alchemists creating them to be completely wrong. This isn't regular genetic modification.
They added the mana flesh of the ghouls to the mix. It makes sense, since the Isle of Sword Saints can only be reached by one nation from the connected supercontinent, the Reim Empire. The mana flesh greatly enhances the beasts' speed and durability, and is also probably why they can reach such gargantuan sizes they have in written descriptions. They are basically large, living kagunes in beast forms, mass produced on a national- no, Empire- scale.
It makes me fear the Priestess of Reim a bit more. If she can manipulate mana flesh to this expert level and massive scale, she's not one to be underestimated.
But this is a goldmine for someone like me, someone who knows the true value of the beast before her. No need for expensive kagunes sourced from the Isle, I just need a herd of these destriers. Plus, they will give me a chance to practice 'forbidden' alchemy. A little modification through flesh transmutation on a beast that already looks unnatural shouldn't attract the attention of anyone important, and I'm always prepared to silence a few mouths.
In fact, I have been. Hiring spies as my assassins, through the Anderson Corporation of course. There were a few... disagreeable person in our government who consistently opposed the bills I presented to the Führer, so I had them go on extended vocations.
I mean, this is the best cover ever. Who would ever believe a seven year old girl would be ordering assassinations? Despite that, I am taking safety measures. Compartmentalization is one of the basic structure of all of my companies. It's why I separated Meyer Trading Company into so many different entities under the same umbrella. It costs me some efficiency, but I'm working on a way to circumnavigate that.
Within the secret basement of my Brentwood Lab I painstakingly used my power as a warlock to clear out and reinforce, I have been gathering specimens of... ok more like captives, since they're not yet dead. Captives stolen from the death rows of prisons in Amestris.
It's amazing how willing they are to be free again if you offer them the chance. It's equally amazing how far money, in large sums, could go. People would do anything if you offer them enough. And I'm simply speeding up the death sentences for a few criminals, nothing more.
Or am I? In fact, I could be doing them a favor. Most of them are probably destined for hell, or reincarnation as some animal for slaughter in a herd. But since I'm the one killing them, they are immediately reincarnated. I'm 50/50 sure that when Kruphix said they would 'return to the stream of souls awaiting reincarnation' he means they will be reincarnated as sentient beings. If a souls is to be punished by being reincarnated into an non-sentient being, it probably won't have to return to the stream. See, I'm doing nothing wrong here.
Humane treatment? No Cruel and Unusual Punishments? When I was a scientist on old Earth, I hated those social rules! They're what prevented me from reaching half of my research goals. Those environmentalists even got the governments around the world to ban many animal testings.
Damn them! Not all animal testings were for stupid make-ups or whatnots. Some researches through animal testing were actually important, and what's 'important' was defined by myself then. It frustrated me to no end when they shut down my research on genetic modification to create six limbed monkeys.
It's ridiculous. People clamor for dragons, catgirls, and other fantasy sh*ts to be made by us scientists, and yet they take away our hands and feet at the same time. Don't they realize that those dragons in lores are polymelias? That just mean they are creatures with five or more limbs. How the hell do they expect us to make what they demand if we can't do animal testing, much less human experiments?
I would never go so far as saying that I want to be a Nazi or Japanese scientist during WWII, but it's damn near that point.
Surely you don't believe that just because I have been reincarnated that my values will change? That my mindset would become all life-loving, like some cliche hero in fantasies that wants to save every f*cking living organism that lives? The hypocrisy of the hero and demon lord type of stories always gets me so mad! Demons have rights too, if you are going to argue about the intrinsic value of human lives, damn it!
If anything, this technologically backward world is more open to human experimentation overall, if only I was reincarnated in a different country. But that damn Kruphix just had to reincarnated me here in Amestris, in the arguably most humane country on this planet that forbids human modification.
Why do you think I insist on calling him bastard? If he truly is the One True God, and so far the evidences has unfortunately pointed in that direction, then he could have made this world one without a hint of concern for human life.
If he had done that, I could have started on my homunculus projects, or the cloning project long ago.
I suppose that would bring about slavery, and yes slavery is bad. Blah blah blah I know all the arguments on it. It's the most evil thing humankind has ever done, when combined with goo' old American racism. Murica!
Don't get me wrong, I'm not changing my mindset here. I don't endorse lifelong torture without legitimate reasons or actual need.
A quick, painless death like the ones I give my criminal captives bears little strain on my mind, but I still oppose continuous suffering of innocents. Continuous suffering of criminals, on the other hand, is more open to debate. Sometimes out of necessity, you don't have the time to negotiate nicely with criminals. Torture, mental or physical, is and always will be an effective tool, no matter what criminal rights activists might say.
Of course, I don't indulge in senseless torturing, let's just make that clear. I'm not some psycho or heartless monster you might see in other dark fictions, yet.
In any case, I have been building a bio-computer down here. If brain acquisition is not a problem, establishing the quantum links would probably be the biggest obstacle to building one.
But I have the cheat codes, remember?
How does a kagune relies the correct mana or signal to other parts of itself? How does it know that it shouldn't just twist around randomly? What allows the ghoul to control its kagune?
The answer is simple, a crystallized mana particle infused nervous system. And true to the swifty reputation of the ghouls, the crystallized mana particles in the nerves vastly speed up the process, to the level of near instantaneous speed.
That's exactly what is needed to connect the brains together into a parallel computing network. Ignoring a few safety regulations and bringing the brains close together help eliminate potential lags.
And it is fast enough, as my testing showed. On its first start up, the 'will' of the bio-computer was quite hostile to me, probably a lingering effect of the criminals' mindsets, despite my brainwashing beforehand.
The thing is, my 'Impose' skill rank and level has risen up to Advanced lvl2, probably a result of the other me continuously 'taming' spirits while I sleep. I may not yet be as powerful as a full-fledge warlock that has been alive for decades, but I'm damn well close enough. I simply used my 'Impose' skill on the newborn will of the bio-network, crushing it and replacing it with the second other me I copied.
Oh, speaking of being a full-fledge warlock, do you believe fifteen hundred weak little spirits is too much? Allow me to clarify the field for you. A spirit is a will, spawn from the collective will of several humans. But mindsets can change, a human might change religions many times in her life. That means there's at least one weak spirit, if not more, for every human that has existed since the Second Age of Terra, when mana awakened within them.
Given that I know there have been eight ages on Terra before this current age of witches and alchemy, and each one seems to last long enough that the next civilization always forget about the last, it's inevitable that I conclude that there are easily trillions, if not hundreds of trillions, of spirits in the spirit plane alone.
A full-fledge warlock or spirit medium, like Grandma Garcia, has countless, perhaps millions of spirits contracted. One little spirit alone could only guide enough mana to make a slight change in immediate air pressure for a fraction of a second, in the radius of maybe a hair's width at best. If a warlock wants to make a gust of wind strong enough to throw off enemies, even lifting them around in a tempest, he must have millions of spirit contracted to him.
The world's not so easy that a normal warlock or spirit medium could just contract several very powerful spirits that can blow winds on a scale large and hard enough. The reality of the situation is that many hidden spirit mediums only contract several weak spirits in their entire life, and never becomes a warlock that can use spirit powers offensively. That's why the majority of this world's human population are still civilians despite the constant war against the witches.
Anyways, I decided to keep a copy of myself in my inner mind permanently, it's been doing wonders for me so far. Remember, while the me in a biological body needs sleep, the me in my inner mind doesn't. And can't even if I want to in there.
My new bio-computer is how I intend to solve the efficiency problem of compartmentalizing the entire Meyer & Anderson Industries. A computer is always better at computation then a normal human, unless you have autism and great luck that it leaves you with some usual, enhanced ability.
Autism. I took that as an inspiration, and modified... brainwashed the brains of the bio-network a bit. Optimizing them for higher math computation, all overseen by the other me in there.
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And the good thing about being copies of myself? Our mind synchronizes when in body contact. That's a bit of a restriction for me at the moment, but I know I will find a way around that eventually. For now, this way suits me the best. I can't risk having someone else access the bio-computer, especially because if anyone finds out the specifics of my quest, it will be failed.
Other than spending my time conducting experiments, practicing at Grandma Garcia's, or acquiring material for my bio-computer, I spend most of my time and effort building factories. Traditional method of production are all good and intimate with the customers, but not money making. I started with the textile industry and food industry. Both are the basic necessities of life, and they're doing above expectation at the moment.
Afterward, I took on the paper industry, about four months later. It always puzzled me how this world could have newspaper but not mass-produced books. I solved that when I acquired the printing company through hostile takeover. What do you know? They had an ancient artifact that takes the role of a mechanical newspaper printer you'd find on old Earth. It runs on mana... but it's not as fast as the normal newspaper printer.
In the end I decided to go the traditional route for printing books since magic artifacts are not my strong points. And without a complete understanding of the artifact, I can't copy it.
Moving on, these people have the basic concept of insurances... mostly for trading ships. The closest thing they had to an insurance company was a couple of rich families along the Western coastline that provides the service to seafaring merchants.
That changed when I introduced Meyer Insurance Agency. Of course, I'm not an idiot when it comes to that. I would never introduce the idiotic American system of health insurance, that's just ridiculous. I proposed a universal health care system to the Führer, which is still under consideration at the moment. It does frustrate me sometimes that any nonmilitary policy or technology I proposed to be implemented are given secondary priority... but we're at war, so that can't be helped.
About two years ago, I finally pushed through the general education bill, after heavy lobbying. Can't they see apprenticeships are limiting themselves? The first academy is in the capital, primary attended by rich kids that doesn't have much to do. How wasteful they are, playing around when they can be running for world domination... I guess that's just me.
I also teaches one class per week upon the Führer's insistence... a class of more than three hundred state alchemists. They're the ones who didn't get what I was writing in the textbooks on how to use the new alchemy techniques. Answering all their questions was a nightmare... until I decided I had enough of questions. So I started the fourth class on basics of the new techniques, and ignore their questions. I think it works well, if they stick around by the end of the year, then they're definitely more prepared than their peers who didn't.
Speaking of alchemy techniques... remember that the circle is the base of power to use alchemy? I had an inspiration one day... what if I made the base of power... a ball? An orb? That's infinite circles!
Unfortunately my dream of drawing out infinite energy was defeated, but the orb-base is still much better than the 2D ones they have been using. It's even better than the stacked circle technique I developed! To think I spend half a year developing ways to overlap alchemy circles when i could've just made it orb shaped... Damn it!
Either way, though the orb shaped base is much harder to inscribe runes at the correct location because it's 3D and curved, it's how Amestrisian Alchemy looks like now. No more paper and ink, or engraving alchemy circles into clothings. Now, it's all the orb-shaped formation created with steel that I produce... Hehehehehehehe that was the biggest military contract I've taken to date! It alone accounted for half of the profits these past few years!
The second most profitable contract I had, and still is ongoing, is the one to build radio towers.
The communication technology they had before I showed them radio was fulcan messengers at best. Mostly just pigeon messengers. Not the most reliable way, but they've had it for centuries. Radio changed all that.
And the best thing other than overcharging them on the construction and maintenance cost of radio towers? I gained access into the minds of the military. Hehehe, all their little dirty secrets too. The only part that backfired is that I realized how ruthless they are to witches... like sacrificing towns of thousands of innocents just so they can have a chance to kill a high-ranking witch. Yikes, even I'm not cold enough to order cruel strategies like that.
Now then, what else have I done over the past four and a half years? There's countless little things I introduced into Terra that they are not worth mentioning, but there are some significant enough to summarize in detail like I've done so far.
Perhaps there is one other detail worth mentioning. Most ignorant people on old Earth may take this for granted, but lighting is a huge industry, and a major problem in technologically backward world like Terra.
I skipped the Edison-era light bulbs and jump started their lighting technology directly to light emitting diode technology, otherwise known as LED lighting. It's so much more energy efficient.
Back then I was divided between fully mechanical development like it was on Earth or the new bio-fusion development for Terra. In the end, I couldn't resist the urge to explore the potentials of biotechnology merged with old Earth-style technology. I guess everything we're building looks... weird to an Earthling, but it's a fantasy world, who cares!
There's also the overhead network of electrical wires I'm building above the re-paved roads. Buuuuut... as it turned out my later invention replaced the need for overhead power line network.
The road's I'm paving now are not paved with the stones as they originally were, or even cement or asphalt. All three of them cracks too easily and too often. No, I used modified ghoul flesh to introduce self-healing properties to the plant cells. That and modifying the top layers of the cells to perform photosynthesis allows for self-healing solar roads. The photosynthesis on the top layer creates the fuel that fuels the layer of electric eel cells underneath it, generating power. They're harmless by themselves, but when you have billions of little cells in a block of road, the electricity generated is enough to power a house.
Developing the 'road' material alone took about two and a half years, even with my knowledge beforehand. Lots of trial and error went into it until I found how to harden the surface layers without making them too brittle. Just in case I introduce maglev cars in the future, There's three thin layers of modified electric eel cells for magnetic induction underneath the hardened top layers. They're like copper coils that usually do the trick on old Earth, but self-healing hehehe.
Why did it take all two and a half years? It's not that my knowledge are lacking, it's that my tools are lacking. I had painstakingly use true alchemy to create the rudimentary ones, use that to create more precise tools, then repeat. It took several iterations until I got my tools up to the level I need them to be. By the time the plant road was mature enough to bring onto the market, I had already introduced LED lighting and refrigerators, both of which relies on electricity through my power line networks to function. It didn't take much to persuade the government to contract me to replace their failing roads with my new plant roads, since they replaces the expensive power plants.
It also means I'm abandoning the power line networks, because with the new plant roads it's pretty much local power generation, or distributed generation, so long-distance power lines became obsolete.
Not that I'm abandoning the power plant I already build, it's just that I'm switching it for my personal use. A cool thing about the power plant I had build is that it takes in ambient mana and convert it to electricity. I figured out that the best way to do that is by modifying a wide tree... which is what it end up being. A strange, electricity generating tree. Quite deadly if you go near it without insulation. The leafs absorb both sunlight and mana. It also generates electricity through modified electric eel cells, now fueled by photosynthesis like the plant road. Phew, that last part was pretty hard to modify, but it works at around 30% efficiency at the moment. Good enough, since it doesn't cost me a thing. No need to build oil wells, to find and extract natural gases, no need for hydroelectric power plants
But I did propose several dams, to be build in case of droughts for better water management. And a new water canal to the western region near the desert, which is always in droughts much like old California. Both of them are under review by government at the moment, but they aren't that important for now.
What else? Hmm, oh yeah, plastic. I was trying to make a substitute material for plastic, but honestly nothing's as good as it is. And I didn't find any oil reservoirs in Amestris, not large ones at least. Not for the first three years.
It was only the year before my tenth birthday that I found a major source of crude oil... on the battlefield. We paid a visit to the Southern region as a family vacation, and to my surprise... the black swamp the borders our Southern border... is a swamp of crude oil in some parts. Too bad it is also the primary battlefield we're fighting the witches on... that was the first time I personally took interest in the war.
Though I don't need plastic yet, it will be convenient to use later on... but I don't have the firepower to wipe out the witches' forces.
Railguns are powered by the network I control, so I'm not so worried about them. But firearms? If someone else steals how to manufacture them from my factory, my plan for conquering the world would be jeopardized. For now, railguns is the only kind of firearms I'm providing.
Quite the busy four and a half year don't you think? Just a few more months and it will be my tenth birthday! You know why I love birthdays? It's not just because of the party and the gifts I receive, it's because of the lack of holidays.
Frequent holidays, where everyone just enjoy a day off, isn't a realistic concept in Terra. Besides Birthdays, national independence day, and two other days, we have no day-off holidays. There are many that are celebrated in private, but not with enough government recognition. So yeah, I look forward to birthdays, they're fun celebrations, and a nice break from the research I stuff myself with.
I'm also pretty sure there's not much left for me to learn from Grandma Garcia, unlike Anne and Jill. And from what she allowed me to sense, I'm about halfway to being a full-fledge warlock. As usual, I'm only keeping 10% of the true number of spirits I have out at any given time. I'm also pretty sure I'm ready to start on the homunculus project. I want an army of clones, fully functional ones. The problem with the cloning technology I know from old Earth is that clones never live long.
Idealy I need clones to be my eyes and ears everywhere, settling into the local population. If they die too fast, it will definitely be noticeable. Even if I can produce enough clones at a constant rate to replace the ones that dies, that will make it easy for my enemies to track down the source. Cloning is harder than I thought it would be, even with my alchemy to speed things up.
The copy ability allows me to make one limb a day at most, if I don't rest and keep at it the whole day. For now, it's not practical to use it as my method of production. Copying an spiritual being is much easier than copying a physical object, as I discovered. I also discovered another unwritten limitation to the skill. When I copied Raijin twice and tried to merge them together, they did but only had double the power of the original. When I tried it again, there was no increase in power at all. It seems copy and merging can only be applied as a power-up once, for now. I need time to level it up more.
Speaking of skills, I took a month off to explore the skills I received from the other Primordial Gods, or Overgods, as I like to refer to them as. Primordial Gods is just too much of a mouthful for me.
My Song of Ulosis is probably the most used skill out of them. I use it often to speed up plant growth, which is how I can produce as much 'plant roads' as I am, about fifty miles a day. All taken immediately to replace the major roads, of course.
The 'Intimidating Presence' passive can scare off mighty enemies like the rats in my lab. It can't do much else, but it's enough for me. Keeping the bugs and vermins away from me? Sweet, don't even need chemically harmful solutions. I have no clue how to level this passive up... am I supposed to sit in the witches' camp and let the hostility raise the level?
As for Kratos' Rage... I have plenty of 'Rage' Stats. Probably the result of all the failed experiments. Still, my success rate of about 12% is nevertheless excellent compared to the usual back on Earth. That one time I tested Kratos' Rage... I destroyed half a month's work in ten minutes, which I spend in a red, hazy and trippy world. At least that's how it seemed to me until I managed to reclaim my sanity.
Never going to use that skill unless I'm out of options. Or Song of Moirae. Since it says the usage can be stacked, I'm saving all the uses I can. At the current initiate level 0, the time limit I can use it is only five minutes... but hopefully long enough for me to destroy my enemies.
The one I was most interested in after Ulosis was the 'unblockable' skill I got from the God of Destruction. I'd thought it would mean I could punch through solid steel, so I tried it... big mistake. The full power of the skill will only be unlocked after I reached the highest level at rank God level 10... and I can only use 1% at the lowest level. Each level represents 1% more I can penetrate, very much like an armor piercing skill you might get as an archer in a game.
That doesn't mean I'm spending my day hitting the tree to level it up or something like that. I don't have time for these skills, there's so much to do and I wish they have coffee in this world. At least I made do with tea for now.
Aha! That's what I forgot! I opened convenience stores in the Capital, with an isle that sells pre-made tea products in each store. The bottled Milk Tea is the current favorite among the customers, with synthetic energy drink following that.
Won't the 'players' be surprised when they arrive mwuahahahahahaha, I'll bet I can conquer the world's economy by then! Or try to, at least. It's my goal to have a unified trading system by the time the players arrive... I would hate to have any competitor in catering to the players. Maybe I would be able to give out quests? The allure of next-to-free labor through the newbie players almost make me drool when I think about it. Free slaves...
Think about it, in most games, there's a major guild that you can trade in, get quests, and redeem rewards. There is no such guild in Terra, this is a real world after all. If I have to guess, the 'developers' would probably introduce a guild by modifying the event of this world. Suddenly making up a guild would be too never fit into the society. Now if I can dominate the world economy... there's a good chance that my company would be taken as the base for the guild, or as the quest-assigning guild itself.
It's a gamble I'm willing to take. Either way they go about it, I'll profit. It's an amazing feeling to be funding your own research and development. No more petitioning the stupid state government for funding, no more trying to teach ignorant but rich monkeys what parallel computing is, nor more need to look for private investors. I am my own investor, and I'm investing everything I got.
Research unhindered by politics or funding restriction? This is heaven! I can get most of the materials I require, and my factories are finally producing enough high enough level materials to meet my requirements! I had already more than doubled the mills and steel forges in Amestris. Thirty-fold, to be exact, after I introduced factories to do things on a more massive scale.
Where was I? Ah right, factories. My chemistry complex next to Brentwood is a little behind schedule, but it's doable for now.
Now then, I've been testing my newest factory for months now. It's the accumulation of the advances I have brought to Amestris, and I intend to officially start it on my 10th birthday.
It's a semiconductor fabrication plant.
Arguably one of the most labor-intensive project I have taken on so far. Almost every single machine within it was either crafted by my own hand, or constructed en masse with the more advanced tools I finally finished building just a year before. Prepare yourself for the modern age world!
After the plant's completely up and running, I will finally be able to start for real. Flooding the market without harmless modern devices! As long as there's no way it can be used against me, I'll sell it. Toward that end, I've been writing out textbooks much like the instructional textbook I wrote long ago for my alchemy techniques. It was hellish torture to write a whole book without a computer and printer setup, so I settled for a typewriter.
Which is also selling well, but I will phase it out in a few years when I start manufacturing smart devices. I don't think I will be introducing the internet to this world... it would give the people too much freedom. And freedom is dangerous..
But who knows, I just might. I've been researching a way to bypass the mental defense and directly inject information into the brain. A mix of hypnosis, drugs and a few modern techniques. I planned it originally to serve as the tool to educate my clones once I find out how to create long-living clones, but now I've been considering a new potential market.
You see, the equipment is very much like a virtual reality stimulator. In fact, that's the basis I based mine on, but the one I'm building now is biological. There are many advantages to making one based on biotechnology. For one, it's self-healing to certain extent, which cuts down on maintenance. It's much more comfortable, though admittedly a bit alien-looking. Most importantly it's interconnected by the same type of mana infused nervous system the ghouls have in their kagune.
I just need to find a way to create long-distance mana infused nerve system. At the current stage of development, it's still limited to a few meters of each other. Not so practical, but like I said, I have another plan for this.
Take the projects on old Earth that provides free premium service in return for a portion of the smart device's processing time. It's the same concept I'm going for here. Letting the people of Terra have a fully immersive virtual reality, in return for using their brain while they're plugged in. I decided to call it bio-stimulator, if I'm ever going to sell this. On Earth, this would be shut down the second it's proposed, but nobody else would understand enough to suspect me of invading their mind.
Kukuku, I've already established that ghoul's nervous system is almost instantaneous with its infusion of mana particles. If I can get my bio-stimulator out into the market, I'll have the largest bio-computer in the world! Forget kidnapping criminals and using their brains, I just need a small portion of the people's brain power!
And there's another advantage: Once it's up, it cannot be shut down. A centralized bio-computer might be vulnerable, but a distributed network of bio-computer? There are three timezones in Amestris alone, and Amestris is the smallest world-class nation. Of course, they didn't have timezones before I introduced it, but that became necessary after they purchased my radio network. Someone somewhere would always be on, and I plan to make my bio-stimulator ubiquitous, even if I must take a loss on selling them. It will be worth it.
Not that it will be ready for another five, six years. At worst, it could take a decade to set it all up.
So far so good, right? Not quite... I received a major bad news last week... the experimental high altitude balloons I've been testing has been encountering an unexpected obstacle. Literally.
I can't get any to go further than the stratosphere, out into real space, even when I launched a test rocket attached to the balloon. It's like there's a barrier preventing my rocket from going high enough.
I have my suspicion. From the black box I recovered in the Great Desert, there' s nothing wrong with any part of the rocket until the last second, before it fell apart.
Could it be... a 'zone' of some kind? In some games, you must conquer a zone before the next one is open to exploration. It could be the same setup here. And if that's true, it's possible that I can't get anything to beyond the areas surrounding this supercontinent and the nearby islands.
Last week, I received my confirmation. You see, in the stratosphere, there's two directions of airflows, separated by elevation. It's the cheat path I've been using to move my balloons around without building a jet engine. Lower it, and it flows East. Go higher, and the airflow carries it to the West. Finding and mapping out the major airflows that are consistent enough required me to sacrifice more than two hundred expensive high-altitude balloons and recording equipments.
in regard to the last part, I've researching a way to modify a creature to substitute for it. From what I understand of the Leviathan that the Reim Empire uses, it produce lighter-than-air internally. I'm going for the same concept here, just on a smaller scale. There's no need for a Leviathan, my goal isn't to transport troops and heavy equipments, just mapping out Terra. A pseudo-GPS network, if you will.
So far, my prototype beast modification is a combination of jellyfish and octopus that has many of lighter-than-air pockets within it. I'm not that stupid to make it with hydrogen pockets. The jellyfish is the main body, like the balloon part of a hot air balloon. The octopus tentacles replace the need for ropes to hold the equipments underneath it.
Spoiler :
http%3a%2f%2fvignette4.wikia.nocookie.net%2flevi...0428020927 [http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/leviathanscottwesterfeld/images/e/e0/Leviathan_4_westerfeld.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110428020927]
For now, I have yet to find a way to make the beast produce lighter-than-air gases themselves, but I'm working on it.
I suppose the last significant thing over the past four and a half year is that I handed the management of the industry over to a handful of professionals I personally scouted. They're better at managing a gigantic group of companies than I am, since they're full time managers. I suppose I should call them the CEOs of the various companies under my Meyer Tech Corporation banner.
It's more convenient too. I don't have time to do everything myself, so I leaves instruction for the management to know which way to take the company and which market to invest in. After that, I typed up a few rudimentary textbooks on the technologies I'm working with and distributed to the scientists working under me. That way they can figure it out themselves instead of relying on me for everything, which saves me tons of time and allows me to focus in on my personal projects listed above.
Now then, tomorrow will be my third-to-last official birthday before the players come. Though unofficially, I've been finding excuses to celebrate my other birthdays. Mostly celebration on a new factory's opening, new profit record, new... anything, really. It doesn't matter what it is, as long as I can celebrate my birthday hehehehe.
I've prepared as much as I can... though I left the guest list to Mother, whose much better at keeping track of all the people and employees than I am. Remembering people's names was never my strong suit.
I can't wait... kukuku I have a feeling that tomorrow will be more than it seems... Wait is that a good feeling or bad? Hmmm... oh well, whatever.
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Woohoo! The guests are coming in, amazed by the modern-style building I constructed for this occasion. It's reinforced glass and steel beams, very different from the typical structures you'd find in Amestris. I haven't got enough capacity to start building skyscrapers yet, but it's in the work. Of course, this building won't be wasted just for this one occasion. I plan to convert this into the first multi-level farming building.
If it works out, I won't have to buy up lands as fast as I am now, saving me a good few billion dollars. Sorry if you expected mithril, platinum, gold, silver, copper coins you'd find in most games. They're just too impractical. Who would use mithril to make coins? Morons, morons without a sense of financial responsibility for the nation, that's who. Paper bills... is under consideration. I don't know how they will take it, since it is pretty unconventional.
Anyways, I need to increase the food production rate for Amestris. I didn't realize this until I started going big in the food industry, but a damn half of Amestris' foods come from Reim and Britannia... too reliant on other countries. It's inevitable until now, given that both other countries dwarves Amestris in land size. If it isn't for the War against the witches, I'm convinced that Britannia would be busy reclaiming this land as theirs, with Reim invading to their share as well.
Multi-level farming and genetically modified plants are the answers I know. They're what we did on old Earth, after the ice caps melted and our land resource dwindled. Multi-level farming saves ton of space, they're like skyscrapers for farming, the bigger versions. GMO foods... well the Europeans are still whining about the nonexistent side-effects but most foods are GMO now on old Earth anyways. Pfft, can't they understand allergies aren't caused by GMO foods? They're increasing because our foods are too sterile for good bacterias to grow in them... and without those good bacterias we don't have immunities we used to have against the bad ones.
Wait a second, is... is that... Amy?!
I haven't seen her in... 8 years! If I remember correctly? Or is it? 5 years? 6? Whatever, long time! Mother invited her?
"Amyyyyy!" I scream in happiness as I leap forward to hug her... that was strange. It's like a part of me really likes her, though the real me is more indifferent to her presence. A consequence of merging with little-me, I guess.
"Pray! You have grown up so much!" Amy picks me up and swings me around! Ugh, nobody does that anymore! Damn, I still look the same when I was 8! This is too embarrassing!
"Amy no swinging!" I protests!
Good thing she puts me down after two more spins, "These are my aunt and uncle, Pray. Say hi!"
"Hi!" Pfft, unimportant people judging by their clothes. They're like country-side peasants looking in wonder at the modern building they are in.
Already out of mind. No need to let them take up any space in there.
We exchanged greetings, before Mother moved me on to greeting other important guests.
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Author's Note: It's time to get realistic people. The world isn't a nice park to have picnics in, its a cruel hearted b*tch who would stab you in the back the second you look away. Same applies for the world of Terra. No, we're not exactly going to war or massacring innocent here, but some of you might not like the concepts I will be using here. And I know my personal morals as a realist are not exactly... conventional.