Ada continued with her inquiries. "I want to ask about your abilities in particular. What are your powers and how do you activate them?"

"Activate? What do you mean? Like all gods, I manipulate the divine ether. Are you not doing the same?"

"Look, I'm the one asking the questions here. You already had your one question. So, how do you manipulate the ether? What's the difference between normal ether and divine ether? Actually, go back one step. What is the ether?"

Yuano sighed. "Basics again. I tell you it's very simple. Even a mortal child knows this."

Ada ignored his condescending tone. She was used to it by now and she didn't want to waste any more time berating him when she could just push ahead to garner more data. "Humor me. What is the ether?"

"It must be kismet for me to have to explain the basics to a newborn in this rather pathetic state. I hope you appreciate my time here."

Appreciate? This god's arrogance was stupefying. "Newborn?"

"What else could you be? A newly created demigod with an unfortunate lack of a nearby tutor or guide. I wonder what strange circumstance created you and just let you drift into this world without any knowledge of the ether."

It seems that all I need to do is just probe him with one word questions for him to open up with more information than I expected, Ada thought. "Strange?"

"Yes, strange. Usually, demigods are formed by the strong concentrated confluence of divine energies with mundane energies."

"Uh..." Ada's mind didn't want to go down the gutter but she couldn't help but wonder if he was talking about sexual relations between gods and mortals.

"And yes, we gods are typically responsible enough that we stick around at least to explain things to the new demigod. I wonder who in the world didn't do their duty. You don't know who created you do you?"

No need to reveal her hand here that she had no deity in this world as a creator. Ada said confidently. "As I said before, I'm the one asking the questions here. And also, time to move on from this topic on to my original ether question."

"The ether? It's the flow of energy that permeates the world. It's ubiquitous but it's only of high concentration in living beings."

"What do you mean by living beings?"

"All those stones thrown at you earlier have as much ether as you or I. Well, actually maybe just you. I have infinitely more. However, you are much smaller than the rocks. The density of gathered ether within you is far greater than those rocks. Furthermore, the ether in those rocks are primarily static. In other words, they have a very hard time flowing. In living beings, even without training, the ether naturally flows like a mortal's blood. With the right concentration and training, the ether can flow smoother and your own ether can be used to manipulate the ambient ether."

"I'm guessing that your artifacts also contain highly concentrated ether?"

Yuano sounded impressed. "That is correct. Artifacts can be made to hold a large quantity of a particular type of ether. The artifact could be built such that its contents stay dormant until activated or it can be activated continuously."

"Interesting. That's kind of like storing energy in a battery with a circuit that directs the electrons to flow and do useful work."

"I assume a battery is something which can store ether and a circuit is a series of channels for ether flow. In that case, I imagine it's similar to what you stated."

Right, batteries don't exist here, Ada reminded herself. From her memory, Alessandro Volta in 1800 made the first ones of stacks of copper and zinc separated by cloth soaked in salty water. Ada had tried to make one when she was seven. It didn't work very well but the concept was good to test. If she imagined Yuano handmaking an electronic device, she could believe that it would take him a while. This would likely mean that he has no idea of the System. Hmm, was there a way to insinuate the System existed without explictly mentioning it? "Do you find creating artifacts to be a better system of usage than using the ether directly?"

"That depends on which god you ask. Artifacts require time to build but once you do, it's to use them if you know how to activate it. I have always favored them over the raw power or control that some others seem to love. Now, for a mortal, they don't really have a choice. They have to use artifacts for any kind of extended or powerful magic. The amount of effort and energy required to continously alter the ambient ether is exhausting for their feeble minds and bodies."

"Why do you choose to create artifacts? Is it because you're like the mortals?" Ada couldn't resist adding the snide remark.

"Don't mock me, little girl. I may not be able to create the most powerful or controlled ether flow, but I'm second to none when it comes to ether-enabled artifact creation. No other gods know how to create such fine lines of geometries for ether flow."

"Is there a more fundamental system than either method you described?"

Yuano sounded puzzled. "What do you mean better system?"

Scratch out Yuano for knowing anything about the System, Ada thought. He did seem quite knowledgeable about ether though so she would ask more questions on that. "Hmm, you keep mentioning ether density. I don't see any instruments here. How do you detect and quantify ether?"

"Detect? What do you mean?"

If he's going to say 'what do you mean' one more time, I think I'm going to drag him out of that mud and slap him, Ada thought. She wondered how the gods learned the divine tongue and whether they all had quirks of this nature -- certain words repeated ad infinitum. "What I mean is how do you observe the ether? For instance, our eyes are detectors of visible light so we can see things. Our ears are detectors of air vibrations so we can hear. How do you observe the ether?"

"Do you not sense the flow of ether around you? I don't need any device to sense the amount of ether in any area around me."

"But mortals do right?"

"From what I know, most of their magicians require such detection devices for calibrating their primitive artifacts. I would imagine that your terribly untalented Academy friend would know more."

She would ask Ruciella later on how these devices worked. It seemed that Yuano did all this intuitively. That was not a good method of doing science. The people who he looked down upon were actually those he should be learning from. He had power compared to the mortals but in terms of intelligence and wisdom, he was bankrupt in both. He was also bankrupt in morals and humility. What else could she ask that he might know something more about? "You said there were different types of ether? From that you deduced I had an affinity for stone?"

"Yes, there are a near infinite variety of types. Most of the mortals believe there are only a few elements -- typically of the variety of wood, stone, air, fire and water or some combination of such. In truth, as you probably don't know but should, there are so many that there should probably be a table for it."

The periodic table? Rather, maybe it was the equivalent of the periodic table. Maybe she could expand the realm of what's perceived as magical knowledge in this world as well. She couldn't sense ether though so she would need to get an Academy's device. How does the ether relate to the System? There must be some process controlling the rules for the ether in the System. In physics, there were the four fundamental forces. Perhaps this was a fifth force?

Her attention turned back to Yuano who was droning on. "Yes, and I should probably inform you that I have almost completed writing a book on this matter. Not sure if any of it is right but it should bring quite the boon to my coffers when I start selling some of this knowledge incrementally. I do have a few pseudonyms ready as well."

A conman as well which really doesn't surprise me, Ada thought. Hearing no response, Yuano must have thought that was tacit consent for continuous boasting. "You might be surprised that most of the magical tomes in this book had my hand in there at some point. These mortals have such a hard time figuring out even the basics. It's really interesting what kind of information you can throw in there that they find interesting. For instance, a spell to cook meat to the perfect temperature. Useless to gods but apparently mortals love it."

Ada decided that now was the time to interrupt him before he went any further on his tangent into topics of no irrelevance to her. "You mentioned divine ether? How's that different from the usual ether?"

"Every type of ether actually has two classes - one called mundane and the other called divine. The former can be manipulated by any mortal who has some talent and training. The divine ether is the type that only gods can create and manipulate. We call those divine ether. They are richer and more powerful in terms of affecting the physical environment. The fire that I sent out used divine fire which has a temperature much greater than the usual fire contained by a mundane artifact. All the artifacts created by gods use divine ether."

"Can mortals ever learn to use divine ether?"

Yuano laughed mockingly. "Mortals? They can't even sense divine ether much less use it. I haven't known any mortal to have invented any device to detect it either. To them, it might as well not exist."

"What about me?"

"What about you?"

"Can I use the divine ether?"

"All demigods should be able to sense the divine ether. As far as using it, that depends on the individual's talent and experience. Looking at you, you were using it without even realizing you were using it. Though rare, that does happen. What is ridiculous is that you as a newborn actually won."

Ada doubted that she was really using it. Activating systemhelper and interacting with the System directly negated the need for interacting with the ether. Mysterious as it was, it was still in the physical environment of this sandbox and not something more fundamental. If this was something Yuano believed though, she wasn't going to put any doubts into his mind. "Earlier you mentioned geometries for ether flow in artifacts. What are they?"

"Geometry - shapes. Certain types of ether flow best in certain flat geometric shapes. Most gods only know about rectangles and circles. I have created twelve other shapes no other gods have ever used."

"What about a Lissajous curve?"

"A leesa what?"

Some of the ancient Greeks thought geometry was pure and divine. In this world, they would have been right. Still, just twelve? That was rather pathetic for a god that had millenias to investigate this. Ada felt more of a sense of profound disappointment rather than intellectual superiority. She still held hope that there was someone in this world who could be intellectually as knowledgeable. Maybe she should eventually create her own Academy if she has the time. There was no need to reveal her hand here. "Nevermind. I was just thinking about something else."

"I grow weary. Are there any more questions? You should finish soon unless you wish to encounter the guards. You may be a demigod but I doubt that you can protect all your friends in time. I still have no idea why you're interested in helping Ayula."

"That is none of your business."

Before Yuano could reply, there was a shout in the distance. Ada looked up and saw a mass of armored men riding on ostriches rapidly approaching them from several hundred feet away. She could imagine the smirk on Yuano's face. "Too late."