World Keeper

Chapter 1025: The Return

Fifty years. That is how long it took for the world the full recovery from the previous invasion, including restoring enough of Deckan and Sher Dien’s infrastructure to make them self-sufficient again. I was only made aware of this when I checked the time that had passed after the acceleration had ended.

By this point, things should have calmed down, right? I thought to myself as I stood from the couch, preparing to descend once again. I had told myself before the invasion happened that I would do my best to limit my time skips after it was over, and the world had recovered.

Not far away, Dana and Tsubaki were waiting for me, having arrived near the start of the acceleration. I gave them both a small nod, before focusing as blue light wrapped around my body.

Once I arrived in the body of my host, I found myself sitting in the familiar throne room of Olympus, rolling my shoulders. Even though Tsubaki had chosen to ascend, it seemed like my host had enough aversion to being covered in dust to take very slight action every once in a while. Which I was honestly thankful for, as it meant that I wasn’t smothered with it when I came back.

Udona. I mentalled called out to the kitsune goddess. How is everything with Deckan?

A lot better now, honestly. Udona spoke with a tone of relief. We’ve essentially remodeled the planet with all the new construction. Though, there is one slight issue, but I’m sure it will resolve itself in time.

What is it? I asked, unable to help myself from feeling concerned.

The magic system of Deckan. It takes time for something to adjust to the aura of dimensium to drop cards, so the first batch of monster spawns didn’t drop any. Even now, the drop rate is only a tenth of what it used to be.

Normally, this wouldn’t be a problem, because we had the ability to synthesize any of the cards for the first four tiers of magic, but…

Because all of the world’s technology was destroyed, you lost all of that, right? I asked with a groan, which Udona confirmed.

They’re rebuilding the database to get that started up again, but it’s slow going. The Metong aren’t any help, because they use runic magic almost exclusively. On the other hand, the March have been more helpful with this, though they only had the full collections for the first two tiers. Because dimensium isn’t as evenly distributed in their realm, it’s harder to get high tier cards.

Right… is there anything I can do to help? I asked, though I wasn’t really sure what could be done.

No, I was just letting you know. This will resolve itself in due time. 

Right. By the way, did Chelsea manage to get the admin plugin expanded for Digital Conversion?

Udona’s voice perked up slightly at that. That’s right. It was partly thanks to that that we were able to get everything done so quickly. I took part in a lot of the process, and could use that admin account to make things go a lot more smoothly.

I was sure that the people loved that. The God-Queen of Deckan personally taking part in recovery efforts, providing free housing for those who had been rendered homeless. And in truth, it really was a great thing for her to do. 

Additionally, by now the different games should have progressed a bit further, people picking up old quests again. I didn’t know if Sun was going to be making the machine empire again or not, but there would be time to get caught up on all of that.

As I was thinking to myself, I heard the door to the throne room open, with Tsubaki, Gerard, Dana, and Lifre all walking in. It had been quite some time since I saw Gerard, as he never used his access to the Admin Room, so I gave them all a nod of greeting. “Lifre, Gerard, is there anything that you would like to report?”

“Nope!” Lifre smiled brightly, shaking her head. “Everything’s been pretty normal on my end! Well, by my standards, anyways.”

Gerard hesitated, before nodding as he spoke. “Sir, I would like to report that the establishment of fifth-tier magic has had some success. With the coordinated efforts between myself and the Goddess of Magic, we have created some basic spells utilizing the fifth tier of magic.”

I gave a small nod at that, focusing on Gerard. “What can you tell me about this magic, then?”

Gerard focused, lifting a hand as a speck of mana appeared above his finger, no bigger than a grain of sand. “As we concluded long ago, the fifth tier of magic relies on miniaturization. Simply by shrinking the spell and updating the parameters to the fifth tier, it is possible to recreate spells of the fourth tier with minimal consumption.”

“However, the true benefit of this magic tier comes from the ability to combine a large number of these spells into one.” As he said that, a cloud of blue specks appeared, swirling around one another. “This is the core of my being, after I updated the spell components to the fifth tier. With this spell, it is possible to create an individual like myself with no more than five thousand points of mana.”

“Though that is the case, the difficulty of these spells have increased exponentially. Unless it is a being with some form of ability to instantly recall microscopic details or memorize extremely complex spell diagrams, I do not believe that they will be capable of wielding this ability in battle.”

“That makes sense.” I said with a faint sigh. “There are very few existences that can even use the fourth tier of magic in battle.”

Dana nodded her head quickly when I said that. “I’ve created tools to help with that before, but yeah. Also, fourth tier spells are really not needed in a normal fight. You can have one to serve as an autonomous battle spell, and then use third tier spells for the others, but there’s no need to have more than that. Anything else can be done more efficiently at the third tier.”

Gerard seemed to agree, dismissing the points of light above his hand. “Perhaps. However, the Goddess of Magic has expressed interest in using the fifth tier of magic as the foundation for creating a world. As of now, she has yet to make any breakthrough in her research, but she has used the old spell that your servants used to create energy-based worlds as the foundation.”

“That’s fine. We’ll get to that point eventually. Whether it’s Ashley that makes that breakthrough or Ryone, it’s bound to happen.” In fact, it would probably end up being a combination of Ryone’s magic with Ashley’s code.

“Oh!” Lifre suddenly opened her eyes wide. “I just remembered. The Another World Research Group said that they want to meet you whenever you are back in the world.”

“The what now?” I blinked, utterly unfamiliar with the name. Given that they were leaving a message with Lifre, they had to be a popular research group, but not one that I had heard of.

“That’s the new name for the group James is in charge of!” Lifre smiled brightly. “They came up with that name a few months after V-Day.”

It didn’t take a genius to understand that V-Day likely stood for Void Day, the day that the invasion nearly destroyed numerous worlds. Though, would it be V-Week for Lorek and Spica? “Right… I’ll go see what they want. Tsubaki, Dana?”

I looked at the duo, but Dana shook her head. “I’ve got to get back to work. I’ll let Tsuba join you.”

Tsubaki hesitated, before nodding her head. “Very well, I shall accompany my Keeper.”

“I’ll lead the way!” Lifre announced. “You don’t know the coordinates for their new base, so it’ll be easier with me along!”

I let out a sigh, nodding my agreement as I stood and gestured for her to lead the way. For now, Olympus was still positioned in Fyor, as I had not moved it away after the invasion. After my meeting with James and his group, I would have to start moving it around again like before.

Lifre hummed happily to herself, leading Tsubaki and I out of Olympus. Once outside, she drew a golden dagger, and cut open a gate through the void. I arched a brow at the dagger, to which she smiled. “Something that I had them make me! This thing can bypass the void barriers like a backdoor. Oh, right, those have gotten a lot stronger after the previous attack. You can’t just teleport around easily anymore. Well, Aurivy can, but not normal people like us!”

I doubted that any of us could qualify as normal people… Though, the fact that even Lifre needed a tool to help her establish the portal meant that the barriers must have been strengthened considerably.

Tsubaki seemed to have similar thoughts, staring at the dagger in Lifre’s hand intently. The two of us followed behind her, walking into a large lobby. Immediately, circular ports opened up in various points of the room, turrets deploying and scanning as they aimed at us. Tsubaki’s hair stood on end, manifesting a pair of daggers while Lifre calmly stood in place.

Sure enough, the turrets disappeared after confirming our identities, a digital voice speaking up. “Welcome, Keeper, Lifre, Tsubaki. Please proceed to Area 8-B to meet AWR staff.”

“Okay!” Lifre smiled again. “Can you activate the elevator to get us there quickly?”

“Affirmative.” There was the sound of sliding metal as a door opened along one of the walls, Lifre rushing over to enter. Tsubaki and I looked at one another, following behind. Once the door closed, the elevator slid down, and then rushed off horizontally.

“So this is what happens when you give someone like Chelsea an unlimited budget with the Digital Conversion system.” I muttered to myself. It took roughly five minutes in the elevator before we arrived at our destination. “Why didn’t she just make a teleporter like Olympus, though? She’s got to know how to do that.”

“Easy.” Chelsea’s voice spoke up as the elevator doors opened. “Any magic or technology that allows transportation without crossing the intervening space has at least some reliance on the void. I’m working on a subspace elevator that folds space without using the void, but that’s still in development. This facility relies as little on the void as possible with its daily necessities.”

“Given that we have the planet to ourselves, we constructed a solar farm roughly the size of a continent in the northern hemisphere, and get all of the power that we need to operate the facility through that. We’ll use the DC system when it comes to acquiring materials we need for work, but we want to make sure that there is no regular connection between this planet and the outside void that can be used as a channel for void beasts to attack.”

Chelsea cocked her hips, crossing her arms as she said that with a grin. I could only nod my head, stepping out of the elevator with the others. “That’s impressive. Though… what did you call us here for?”

Chelsea blinked, quickly entering ‘business mode’ as she gestured for us to follow. “This way. We’re keeping it in Vault 8.” She said, and we all followed behind her, not entirely sure what we were getting ourselves into.

“Ever since I finished the plug-in for the DC system and fully opened up the admin accounts to free creations, I’ve been working on energy combinations. After all, that was mine and James’s specialty when we came to this world.”

As she said that, she led us to a large, black door, which only opened when Chelsea separated a portion of her divinity to use as the key. “Because of this, I’ve been able to create a few powerful items, capable of drawing a theoretically limitless amount of different energies from the void, like chakra, elemental ki, and so on.”

When the vault opened, Chelsea led us through what appeared to be an armory, each item sealed in a clear container. I could see a staff brimming with fiery mana, a bracer radiating a dark energy, and even a bone wand that seemed to chill the air. However, Chelsea passed by all of these, opening another door at the end of the hall.

On the other side of the door was a single case in the middle of a room, containing a golden ring. “Once I got this thing working… I knew that I couldn’t let it get out.” She said, and I could immediately tell why, as I sensed the powerful divinity resting within the ring.