[MA] 297. Schrödinger's Bullshit (Patreon)

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[A/N: Sorry for the delay again. Yesterday was a tough day.

Chapters this week: 1/3

Delayed chapters: 2

Next release: In a few minutes]

The first Void Spawn that Shen saw in the Voided Subnode was a humanoid only a foot taller than him. It was made of the usual liquid darkness in constant motion.

He turned to Alicia, but she didn't seem affected. If anything, seeing the Void Spawn had birthed a fire inside her that seemed to stabilize her and give her the strength to fight.

"Schrödinger's bullshit," Alicia swore under her breath.

That was her interpretation of seeing the Void Farm materialize behind the creature.

The farm didn't appear in the far distance; it was less than a mile away from the brigade. Zyn had said this wasn't a spell or a technique but something else linked to how the Void twisted the Laws of Reality and superimposed space. Seeing a Void Spawn that had sprouted on the farm was the only way to see or interact with the rest of it.

Only two things made the situation less treacherous. First, the Void needed one Void Spawn to occupy the "real" space, or the farm ceased to exist. Second, if the creatures left the farm, they stepped into real space, thus becoming visible. That was the reason the Void usually focused on growing its numbers when a farm formed and only attacked after its numbers reached critical mass.

Calling the place a farm described it perfectly. It was a crop with hundreds of cornstalks, each a few miles tall. They were made of the same black Void liquid as the Void Spawn and evenly spaced as if someone had planted them. They were tens of miles apart from each other. Instead of corn, black spheres hung from them like apples, each plant with thousands of balls.

Shen looked back at the Void Spawn before the brigade. Without the system, testing it was the only way to be sure of its strength.

Liya had taught him that Void Spawn lacked the Expression of Energy. The space their bodies "occupied" was directly related to how well they could repel Energy, including all matter. The stronger they were, the more Energy they could push away, thus growing larger. Likewise, their defenses improved.

Liya's teaching wasn't entirely wrong. Void Spawn were always the "right" size when they arrived in Reality, and it was excellent evidence. However, that wasn't all there was to it.

Whenever one of the creatures grew stronger, it could take from minutes to days to grow bigger. Testing it was the only way to make sure it was as strong as it appeared.

At Shen's level, the test was done using a Law on the creature. Only a Law; no qi or mana.

That wouldn't kill Void Spawn. You could only kill them by pushing Energy—usually, matter, like a weapon—into them. Forcing Energy to exist inside their non-existence was the first step to destroying them. That sufficed for weak creatures, but some also repelled Concepts and Laws. That meant you had to add Concepts or Laws to go through their "carapace." They were hurt when the Concept or Law started existing where it shouldn't if either was backed by Energy, be it with qi, mana, or in a physical object. Any creature that took less than a Law to kill was instantly unmade when struck, while from C-rank onward, they might resist multiple attacks.

Logic dictated that pure Concepts and Laws, without Energy, were therefore useless against them. That was true if you only thought of it as a weapon. However, you could use pure Concepts and Laws as a scouting tool.

Zyn had revealed someone with a Law would fail to push it into Void Warriors, as were called the creatures that took Laws to kill. That was obvious. Therefore, you could tell that it was a Warrior.

However, weaker Void Spawn were strong enough to repel Laws. Any Law, even if not backed by Energy, just went through them as if they were just any other space without Energy.

It was harmless to them, too. Laws were isolated rules, while Concepts were how those rules interacted with each other. Shen's attacks were strengthened Laws, but the Concepts they carried were usually only from interacting with the environment, which caused no damage to the creatures. He had to focus on using the Concepts related to his Laws for it to work.

Not that he could use it as a workaround; if a C-rank tried to use a Law's Concept while the Law was inside an uninjured Void Spawn, it simply wouldn't work. Energy always needed to be inside the creature.

Back to the matter at hand, Warriors could be killed by Laws. If a C-rank pushed a raw Law, without Energy, into it, it would be the same as a baby trying to punch a wall. Someone with an unmastered Law would feel the same resistance no matter how strong the Warrior. Those with a mastered Law would feel a slight difference in the repelling force depending on whether the Void Spawn could only be killed with mastered Laws or any Law.

Therefore, Brigade Commanders and their Staff, who required a mastered Law to be appointed to the positions, were supposed to test a Void Spawn for mastered Laws as soon as they spotted it. If the creature could be killed by unmastered Laws, they let battalions deal with it. The Battalion Commanders and their Staff tested the creatures that went through with their unmastered Laws. If the Law went through the Void Spawn's body, it didn't require a Law to kill, and they let the Companies' D-ranks deal with it.

Then, things got inconvenient. D-ranks had no way to use pure Concepts outside their bodies. They needed to use mana or qi to support the Concept. Company Commanders, Platoon Commanders, and their Staff were supposed to constantly use minute amounts of their qi or mana in feeble attacks against all Void Spawn that got to them. The feedback would also be different depending on whether unmastered Concepts were enough to kill the creatures.

Finally, the E-rank squads dealt with anything that got through the others. When dealing with the Void Spawn, the strongest fought first while constantly testing all other enemies nearby.

That said, if you couldn't analyze all Void Spawn around you—say, you were busy in a life-and-death battle—you prioritized checking on the bigger ones and hoped none of the small ones going through you were stronger than they looked.

By size alone, Shen expected Zyn to tell the D-ranks to kill the first Void Spawn that appeared, but that didn't happen. Instead, the Commander kept running, and Uya dealt with it.

Either it had been B-rank, or Zyn had other plans. Regrettably, Shen didn't immediately find out. The Staff Lieutenant killed it just when it got within Shen's Law range but before he could check on its strength.

Passive Law feedback, the one Shen constantly got from his Laws, didn't work to determine a Void Spawn's strength. The same held true for Concept auras, even though it could be actively used.

Liya had once told Shen that auras were useless against Void Spawn. She hadn't been entirely wrong. Auras were indeed useless at D-rank. However, manifesting the elements out of thin air without qi consumption, as Shen could do at C-rank, might prove useful.

Uya went all-out on the creature, swinging two longswords, one on each hand, all filled with qi and her Sword Law. The enemy had kept still until now, and it didn't react. The blade pierced through it like a star on an iceberg, causing it to immediately turn into smoke, dissipating into the air.

Shen found it weird to think she might be killing a B-rank Void Spawn, but that's how things went; such creatures took mastered Laws to kill. He wondered if after those came the A-ranks, which required a Realization, or if something was in-between. Maybe some special B-rank Void Spawn could only be killed with domains?

The moment the Void Spawn died, screeches of pain and anger sounded from the entirety of the farm's space, and Shen felt like he was being stared down by an immensely powerful existence. It added to the stress caused by Karlov's domain, almost causing it to become a real distraction instead of the annoying fear constantly present in the back of his mind.

That was bad enough, but as the brigade kept moving forward, he stepped precisely where the dead Void Spawn had been, thus entering the farm's superimposed space.

It substantially increased the pressure Shen already felt in his mind from the time ring. He was sort of existing in two places at once, and it wasn't healthy. A commoner would immediately die, F-ranks would go crazy, and E-ranks would have to leave within minutes. The D-ranks had a couple of days before they were taken by madness.

Well, at least they should have under normal circumstances. The ring and Stress Discipline test might give them less time.

For the thousandth time, Shen really hoped Zyn knew what he was doing.

The screeches never stopped, nor would they. They would persist until this farm was destroyed.

The black balls on the plants started falling down. It looked like they were slow, but in fact, they hit the ground almost instantly. Shen only noticed it because even looking its way increased the pressure on his mind. The Void was bending Reality too much in this place.

Being on the Ethereal Harmonizing realm made this more difficult for him than weaker cultivators or any mana-wielding Guardian. The seven Laws of Reality in his Path were part of him. He was closer to Reality than anyone else present, maybe even more than those with a mastered Law. Seeing such a perversion of its rules hurt him.

Each ball hit the ground as if ice cream. It then slowly—for real, this time, at least for Shen's C-rank perception—unfurled into Void Spawn. Their heights went from as low as a child to as high as fifty men on top of each other. The former was the default size for Seedlings, which only took Energy to kill, while the latter was for Warriors, which could only be defeated using Laws. There was also size variation with each tier.

Most Void Spawn were humanoid, but there were exceptions, like a mass of what looked like a three-dimensional asterisk floating in the air. Almost all Scouts, which took Concepts to kill, and stronger had more appendages than a human or had replaced at least a limb with something else, usually in a weapon's form.

The first Void Spawn had just stood still.

These ones started running at the brigade as soon as they formed.

The Brigade Commander kept running silently beside Karlov for a few moments. They were less than a hundred yards away from the first incoming enemy when Zyn finally stopped.

"Stay here," he bellowed. Blessedly, Shen could hear him this time, even over the screeches. He was using a technique for that. "Uya, take the left. Xun, take the right. Karlov will act reserve." When there was urgency, it was not only acceptable but also encouraged to drop ranks when talking to or referencing someone. "Default arrow formation."

The arrow formation was the simplest of them all. The Brigade's Staff Lieutenants would filter all Void Spawn and stop Warriors that required mastered Laws to deal with. Zyn would stand some distance behind in case there was a need, but he would overall just ignore everything and focus on commanding his troops. The units behind him were supposed to do the same.

Shen used the Law version of his Lion's Roar technique and yelled, "Jin Qiuyue to the far left, Fu Wenqian to the far right. Mao Shun to the left, Shi Yanlin to the right. Wu Bai will be the reserve."

Despite Wu Bai being the largest of them, he was also the fastest. He had to be the messenger.

Shen placed the girls away from each other but somewhat close to the neighboring battalions' Staff Lieutenants. Those people had a greater chance of helping one of the women than they had of assisting each other. He had noticed in the past weeks that their hatred ran deeper than he had assumed.

He let the male trio together to help each other if needed. While there was a chance they might get together to betray him, it was unlikely. That said, they might let the wrong Void Spawn go through to make it look bad for Shen, which was also why they would be directly ahead of him. He doubted they would do it, though; even if Zyn didn't execute them for treason for some reason, it would look bad on them.

"I'm leaving!" Alicia yelled. He barely heard her over the screeches.

"No!" Shen replied. "The voices—"

"Are gone for now!" she pleaded. "We can talk later! Believe in me! My platoon needs me! And I need to work to grow stronger!"

Shen stared at her for a few instants and sighed. "Fine."

He didn't like letting her escape his reach, but the number of enemies exceeded his expectations. She would be safer further down the line. Also, while Wu Bai had done nothing to cause Shen to distrust the big man, what if he attacked Alicia while Shen was busy fighting Void Spawn?

Shen turned to see the D-rank Companies below him hadn't started moving. His orders hadn't reached them. Worse, only the female Staff Lieutenants under him were getting to position.

The men were had stopped running by force of habit when Shen did—the training the past weeks had been valuable—but were awe-struck by the farm and Void Spawn. Karlov's domain might also be a factor.

"What are you waiting for, Staff Lieutenants?!" Shen bellowed louder than ever before. "Wu Bai, forward my orders to the Companies!"

The three were startled awake from their dazed looks. Shen had to repeat his orders, and they went to obey.

Shen clenched his spear and looked at the incoming tide, preparing himself to fight while not letting his troops get too disorganized. If the trio's actions were any indication, this would be considerably more challenging than he had anticipated.

[A/N: I know things were a bit slow, but I found it necessary to recall how fighting Void Spawn works and introduce a few extra bits. From the next chapter onward, we'll go full Expeditionary Training until it ends.]

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