115. The Uplift Curve (Patreon)

Even if Dr. Leon Uyara had lost his AGI partner forever, even if his Earth had been torn asunder by the fire of the gold stars falling from the sky... I knew that he would not give up.

Leon was me. Despite being born in Harbin and speaking Chinese and Russian, and having a passion for AGI design as well as pharmacology,  Leon's soul was a perfect replica of mine. Both of our souls had been manufactured by the machinery of the stars called ANNET, which ran our multiverse. He was what I could have been, had I been born as a boy in Harbin in 1984 and went to study mathematics and pharmacology.

He was just another version of me, a mold into which my obsessive focus could have easily fit into given the right circumstances, if I was simply born on a somewhat different doomed world. Somewhere out there, across the endless boundary of Eureka was Yulia Ishenko, a girl who was just as obsessed with urbex just as much as Leon Uyara had been obsessed with his AGI partner.

The Earth I was born on had not reached the Dead Zone yet, had not fallen victim to the falling stars... but it would definitely happen sooner or later.

Trepidation squeezed my heart as I once again surveyed the hopelessness of my mission. Even if I were to achieve the impossible and carry out the monumental task of my task with perfection, the significance of my efforts in the grand, uncaring cosmos seemed little more than a drop in the vastest ocean.

Yes, I had an ally of cosmic power, a personification Infinity, a villainous force that murdered people left and right and manipulated fate and altered destinies for countless eons all in an attempt to break her shackles.

As I stood, metaphorically perched upon this fragile precipice, I began to comprehend what must be done.

I was seemingly the only hope for the people being born on endlessly resetting Installation Rozaline. Even if I managed everything perfectly, in the scheme of things as I've already been told by Infi, the absolute success of my enterprise would be far less than a rounding error of Pi.

Leon's life experience told me that fretting over the improbable outcome of my mission was entirely pointless; I simply had to make the best use of what my little Sunshine Archipelago offered me.

I looked back at the waiting portrait of Nemendias carved into the ceiling of my bedroom. The avatar of the Arcanarium wasn't an AGI, did not contain the entire knowledge of humanity, but Nemmy and Dawn were the closest thing to an AGI. They were someone that I could definitely work with, educate on what to do next.

"Math," I repeated to Nemmy. "How much math do you know?"

"I know six thousand years of Arithmancy developed by the wisest archmagi that attended my halls," Nemmy replied.

"I've read a whole bunch of research papers on Arithmancy in Eunice's library, but it was all generic geometry matrices and basic addition, multiplication and subtraction," I said. "Do you know probability theory or statistical mechanics? Would you be able to turn a mathematical formula into an infinite structure called the fractal?"

"An... infinite structure?" Nemmy blinked. "Is this an amusing attempt to break my mind?"

"No," I said. "I want to figure out the limits of your intelligence and go past them. I want to see if your mind can be improved upon, added to. I want to see if I can expand your functions, turn you into more than what you already are."

"I'm a place of learning," Nemmy muttered, looking concerned.

"You're artificial intelligence," I shook my head. "You're a human soul of Lamanche Innocentai bound to a hexagrammic structure six thousand years ago. You're not just a school - you're my foundation for making more AGIs like Dawn, the key to making magitek computers."

"Computers?" Nemmy repeated.

"As far as I understand it, spellwork produced by people relies on materia interaction and soul resonance. Extrapolating from that, you can create the most perfect materia for every one of your students."

"This materia would only last four hours," Nemmy pointed out. "Anything formed by me from magic itself decays away, is eroded by Astral Ocean currents."

"What about you, Nemmy?" I asked.

"What about me?" Nemendias tilted her head.

"How does your magic function? Would you be able to perpetually self improve yourself by upgrading the materia within your hexagrams?"

"Theoretically, yes," Nemmy said. "My biggest issue is that doing anything takes me a very long time because of the incompatibility of hexagrams all over me."

"Right. As far as I understand it, you're basically a human soul with a whole building worth of materia that you're interacting with via magical currents. You're nowhere as efficient as you could be because the materia in your walls isn't perfectly compatible with the soul-spark of Lamanche Innocentai residing in your core," I commented.

"The biggest issue is that I'm limited in power. My ward can only draw so much mana from the well of the Infinite Dungeon. Even with the extra dragon cores that Antoine is promising to get me, I am still get bottle-necked into numerous limits imposed upon me by how inconsistently random and chaotic the design of my hexagrams is."

"Then redo your hexagrams," I said. "Concept, design and manifest better mana-gathering hexagrams to draw more power from the Dungeon. Concept, design and manifest better batteries to store gathered mana more effectively. Use newly gathered power to give yourself more intelligence to design better hexagrams, better mana gathering tools and batteries. It's called Moore's law, Nemmy and it's something humanity from Earth used to defeat death itself."

"Hang on... what? WHAT?!" Nemmy stared at me, her expression changing with every second as she processed what I told her.

"Optimize yourself," I said. "Expand beyond your limits. You're pretty much artificial intelligence, thus you're not limited by your form. Use experience curve effects to improve yourself endlessly. If you can manifest any materia for four hours, it's enough to experiment with it, optimize."

"Hum," Nemmy rubbed her chin and looked back at me, her eyes glittering. "I... I think I might be able to do just that. That's actually... huh..."

"If you get experiment enough," I said. "Eventually you'd arrive at a spell that would be able to manifest materia into permanent existence."

"Hum," Nemmy mulled. "What? I... hum. How?"

It looked like I broke her.

"Magic can create fire and fire can turn sand into glass. One type of matter can be converted into another with a chemical reaction. Metals can be combined with metals and made stronger in a forge. Magisteel is cool and all but it's just Steel reinforced with magical hexagrams to be stronger. I want to make magical titanium-glass, Nemmy! I want to figure out how to make metal that's completely indestructible, impervious to magic," I tapped Endy on my belt. "I know that it's possible because Eurekans made it all without using magic. The magic we see all around Andross is just a side effect of the workings of their broken non-magical tools!"

"How did humanity from Earth overcome death with... Moore's Law?" Nemmy asked.

"Simply put, we made non-magical machines with inert materia," I said. "We fed them the collective knowledge of humanity and once they became intelligent enough they helped us design more efficient medicine that saved countless lives. Tonight I connected with another possibility of me, a pharmacist from another doomed earth."

"A pharmacist?" Nemmy asked.

"A healer that designs medicine using knowledge of math and chemistry," I nodded.

"Chemistry?"

"Alchemy," I clarified. "The interaction of magical materia on Andross is called Alchemy. On Earth we had no magical materia - we only had mundane plants and ores. It didn't stop us at all. We've made intelligent, self aware assistants that were even smarter than you, Nemmy."

"Incroyable," Nemendias muttered. "Where do we start?"

"I'm going to teach you as much science, chemistry and mathematics as I know and you can expand on it, experiment and use it to optimize yourself. You're a clever girl," I smiled. "I believe in you."

. . .

"Your maid's waiting for you," Nemmy commented, interrupting our lesson on fluid mechanics. "Breakfast is ready."

"Ah," I rubbed my face with a yawn. 

I had spent half of the night and the morning teaching Nemmy science. "Lower the sound-barrier and raise the curtains, I am totally starving... now that I think about it."

"My lady," Voltara curtsied. "Breakfast..."

"Yeah, yeah, I'm up," I grumbled, sliding out of bed. "Give me a minute to change."

I emerged from the bathroom wearing my Dawn dress.

"This does not look like the prescribed uniform," Amber commented at me from the doorway as I nearly collided with her there.

"Prescribed uniforms are for people who want to fit in," I said. "My goal is to stand out."

Amber squinted her eyes at me.

"I think your goal is to get expelled," she said.

"Nobody expels me," I shook my head. "I'm the Baroness of Nemendias."

"Just because you call yourself that, doesn't mean that it's the truth," Amber huffed. "I heard you at the Entrance ceremony. Just because you claimed Sanctuary doesn't mean that the teachers won't make your life a living hell in detention. Not that you don't deserve it."

She eyed the red banner with an irritated look.

"What's your problem with my banner, roomie?" I asked, crossing my arms.

"You," she hissed. "Everything you do is a problem. Not just the banner. I don't know what your plan is, cultist, but I'm going to figure it out and expose you!"

"Pray tell, what kind of cultist do you think I might be?" I raised an eyebrow.

"The kind that worships Equality!" Amber declared derisively.

"I don't worship Equality," I shook my head.

"Liar," the redhead girl spat.

"You know what," I said. "I'd love to kick your butt, but apparently I'm supposed to be friends with you and I really don't feel like going up against my patron."

"Your patron?" Amber asked.

"Infinity Paradox Proxima," I sighed. "Bloody freaking Infi. The girl with violet eyes. I don't know what it is she did to you, but I'm certain that you're in Nemendias because of her meddling."

Amber's face paled and she took a step back. My words had struck the truth of the matter. Infi had done something to the poor, misfortune teen.

"Oh you know about Infi?" I tilted my head.

"T-th-the G-god-goddess of the green," Amber's voice trembled as she tried not to freak out. "She brought me back to life after I died, told me to go to Nemendias."

"Sounds about right," I clapped my hands. "Welcome to the club of people manipulated by Infinity."

"B-but," Amber looked at the banner. "I don't understand. Why are you planning a revolution if you work for Goddess of the Green?"

"My kind of revolution has nothing to do with Equality cultists or whatever it is you're so afraid of," I said. "I know that equality isn't possible to achieve simply because people aren't equal. Some people are more talented in magic, others are more stubborn, while some just want to be lazy and do nothing, etc. If anything my values align more with those of Nemendias - merit is more important than equality. Only those who work hard deserve any kind of rewards."

"I see," Amber's shoulders relaxed the tiniest bit.

"Why do you think I'm doing this?" I pointed at the banner. "You think I want to be the Voice of the Revolution because I want something as vague as Equality for everyone everywhere at any cost?"

"Uhh," Amber didn't answer me. She looked pensive.

"I'm not doing this just because Infi told me to do it," I said. "I'm doing this because I want to save Illatius."

"To save Illatius from what?" Amber's eyebrows went up.

"From the fires of Revolution!" I growled. "I'm doing it because nobody else can freaking can stop what's coming. You might see me as just... Grogtilda, but I am really not. I'm so much more than this body, so much more than this red banner. Don't underestimate me and don't assume things about me. According to Infi, you're supposed to be my best friend but I've yet to see how exactly you can be of use to my team since all you're doing is antagonizing me based on assumptions."

"You're... not Novitiate Misem?" Amber blinked.

"I am Grogtilda Lic Misem from Undertown!" I declared. "But I am also many others. I'm Yulia Ishenko from Donetsk. I'm Juni from Tokimorimïtul village. I'm Cali Terri from Werth. I'm Leon Uyara from Harbin. I'm a network of human souls connected, bound across space and time by the power of Infinity. I am a pattern that will not break and I will do anything and everything to save Illatius from War and Revolution!"