Ding

Skill [Detach] advanced to level 16

Skill [Extended Health Pool] advanced to level 7

Skill [Mana Sight] advanced to level 18

I stood stupefied, my heart pounding in my chest, doing its best to drive my precious blood out through my severed wrist. Thankfully, between [Regeneration] and my large health pool, I wasn't in any danger, because the pool of blood I was coating the floor with was the last thing on my mind.

My severed hand dropped from the crystal, released from whatever was pinning it there. It hit the floor with a thud.

"I... don't think so," I replied to Kari. My head was a mess, but I wasn't sure how much of it was my mess. There had been fright and panic at the surge of soul affinity, which was perfectly normal and expected; I'd seen what soul affinity could do. But there was also an intense confusion.

Yes, I should be confused; I had no idea what had just happened. But it shouldn't be so overwhelming, and it shouldn't have started just as the mana brushed my fingers. I hadn't severed it quite in time, and had taken a brief touch.

I wouldn't say I had a huge amount of experience with telepathy, but between my communications with Erryn and not-Blobby, I knew what it felt like. I was fairly sure the confusion I felt was the System's.

"If that wasn't an attack, what was it?" she demanded.

"I think... it was an attempt at communication."

Now I was faced with another 'now what?' And this time, the consequences were far more immediate. Did I risk touching the crystal again, to let the System do whatever it was trying to do? Gluing my hand in place wasn't exactly polite, and I hadn't a clue how safe it was.

"Let's... get out of here," I suggested, still shaken. I didn't want to risk it. I'd cast off the [Self-Destructive] title, and had no intention of regaining it. Perhaps that was a silly thing to say right after asking someone to shoot me, but that was a known thing, with an acceptable worst-case scenario. Exposing myself to soul magic had no bottom to how bad it could get.

"I concur," said Serlv, sounding highly concerned. She'd remained quiet for most of that, and I wasn't certain how much she could perceive. As a rank five dragon, I'd bet my other hand she had at least some esoteric perception skills, and in her own way, was likely as shaken as I was.

We turned to leave, only to find a wall where the passage used to be.

"Umm... When did that happen?" asked Kari.

"I have no idea," I answered. I'd been focused on the System interface and what was happening below me, and if anything Kari had been even more blinkered. Nevertheless, it had built a wall without any of us noticing? Serlv included?

"Nor I," she confirmed.

"I think it really wants to talk to me," I said, hoping that was all it wanted to do. "I can teleport Kari out, and myself, but..."

Serlv would be difficult. She had far more mana than me. Even if she tried to drain herself, I didn't fancy my chances of succeeding a cast of [Item Box] on her.

On top of that, using System abilities to escape the System seemed like a losing proposition.

"... I don't think it's leaving us much choice," I concluded. "Can you give me a [Heal]?" I asked Kari.

"Oh, right!" she gasped, apparently the situation having pushed the fact she could heal out of her mind. She wasn't a delver, used to high-pressure situations. She didn't immediately cast it, though, instead grabbing my severed hand.

"Oh? You can reattach severed bits with [Heal]?"

"Kinda. I still suggest you visit a hospital later, but I can do a patch-job."

She held the hand in place and cast [Heal], knitting my flesh back together. Within seconds, my feeling returned and I could flex my fingers. "Awesome. Thanks."

"It shouldn't have worked that well," she replied, looking a little surprised. Maybe [Regeneration]? Or the fact that the cut was so clean? Either way, it saved me another hospital trip, not to mention having to explain to Cluma why I'd lost yet another hand.

Speaking of Cluma, I still needed to get back to her before mating season started... Dammit, why was this mess happening now?

"Right, if this all goes horribly wrong... Tell my family I love them, I guess."

I tapped my restored hand against the crystal, and the mana immediately started building up below us once more. For a second time, a cloud of soul affinity surged along the pathways below us, working its way into the control crystal and heading for me. This time, I let it.

Incomprehension. Contradiction.

I gasped as something akin to emotions washed over me, mechanical and sterile, but orders of magnitude bigger and older than my own, giving me some clue as to what I was communicating with.

The System was neither sentient nor sapient. In some ways, it was a computer; incomprehensibly good at what it did, but limited in scope, programmed to perform a specific set of tasks. In another, it was an animal. Instinct-driven, but adaptable. And now it had been driven into an impossible corner, where its programming was at odds with itself. It didn't know what to do, and was frozen by the way any action it took would have results counter to its purpose.

Why wasn't it sapient? If monsters could be sapient, why not the System?

... It had no soul. It could use soul magic with impunity because there was nothing for the blow-back to harm. Soul magic wasn't just something its subjects had access to, but was an essential part of proceedings; it integrated with its subjects' souls, after all. It could never have a soul of its own and still do what it did. Instead, its intelligence was more along the lines of one of Erryn's automated cores, but on a far grander scale.

But where did that leave Zephyr? He had clearly been intelligent, despite being soulless.

Whatever—that was just an aside, and I had more important things to deal with. The System was trying to work out what to do next. It had been trying to integrate Earth, recognising the humans there as something it was supposed to protect, but I'd given it my opinion that to do so would destroy Earthen civilization. Now it was planning its next step.

We needed to cut Earth off completely.

Denial.

Apparently, that went against its programming. I had the right to detach individuals, but it seemed that wasn't enough to get it to withdraw from Earth. In that case, can't it just spread but not infect people?

Denial.

That was against its programming, too. It had to infect people, with individuals being disconnected on an individual basis afterwards. So much for being adaptable. I could come back here once a season or so, to disconnect everyone on Earth, but that would hardly be ideal. How about spreading, but deliberately destroying their more dangerous weaponry on the way?

Denial.

It was supposed to discourage innovation, but direct interference was apparently forbidden. I suppose that explained why it let the previous civilization of this world blow itself up. Dammit. No wonder so many people hated computers back on Earth! Won't it do anything other than spread? Could I at least disconnect the people already infected?

Error.

Better than an outright 'no'. It more or less confirmed it currently didn't have enough access to Earth to operate correctly. Then how did they level?

Automation. Limitation. Progress.

Much to my surprise, it replied. The System shards embedded in each individual had been adjusted to function independently, despite the lack of a connection. It wasn't a great solution, though, because skill or class download wouldn't work. No-one could buy skills. But that was fine, because they were all less than one year old, and hence were not permitted to buy skills anyway. Construction of a communications solution was expected to take no more than two seasons.

Okay, putting aside the way it incorrectly thought everyone was less than one year old, why was it having so much trouble building portals when Darren could do so instantly?

Recognition. Integration.

... Oops. I made an attempt at pulling away, but my hand was once again stuck, and I watched helplessly as the portals below dissipated and rebuilt themselves one by one. The only redeeming feature was the way in which they were carefully controlled, and didn't immediately suck the System dry of mana.

ding

I didn't bother with the messages, skipping to the bottom line. More than three hundred thousand...

"Stop!" I yelled out loud. "At least wait until we're done talking!"

Denial.

Apparently, something else that was part of its programming was a requirement to reintegrate detached shards as quickly as possible. Did I mentioned how much I hated computers? I was trying to debate with a bloody paper-clip maximiser. No wonder I was failing; it didn't give a damn about our opinions, and would just plough on following its programming come what may.

"What's wrong?" asked Serlv.

"I think it just learnt how to make proper portals," answered Kari in my place, staring downwards in awe.

"It's ripping every thought from my head, whether I want it to hear me or not," I complained. At least I still had access to the regular interface, so I brought up the list of everyone on Earth and hit the now-active disconnect button. The mana below stuttered as a population the same order of magnitude as this entire world disconnected again.

Discontent.

I was fairly sure it wasn't capable of happiness, yet in its mechanical way, it seemed unhappy about detaching that many people. Not that it intended to rest on its laurels.

ding

I spent the next few minutes firefighting as it swept across the entire planet, with me being helpless to stop it. Perhaps we could have attacked it—I bet horrible things would happen if I'd blasted raw space and time affinity mana into its inner workings—but I wanted to protect this world too. Suddenly losing the System would be as disastrous for this world as it would for Earth gaining it. We'd have crop failures, no delvers capable of retrieving resources, no craftsmen capable of producing homes and goods to useful standards... Putting the System at risk wasn't an option.

Eventually, with me having detached billions of people—very thankful I could do so to an entire list at once instead of one by one—the flow of new dings ceased. People were still listed, thankfully, so I could assume I hadn't just killed the entire planet. I wouldn't have been surprised if everyone on the planet had lost their names, though.

Understanding.

Oh, that wouldn't be a problem, at least. The 'conversation' thus far—insofar as our communication could be described as a conversation—had clued it in that it was dealing with an existing population rather than a bunch of oversized newborns. Although, now that I thought about it, weren't demons born fully sized? So maybe it thought that was normal?

"Well, now what?" I grumbled at the System, in case it had any further ridiculous stunts in store.

Discontent.

Thankfully not, and it still wasn't happy about it. Well, tough luck. No infected individuals on Earth for you to muck around with.

ding. ding. ding.

Oh, for goodness' sake... Hadn't it infected all of Earth yet? A scan of the list showed yet more infected people, all a few seconds old.

But I'd corrected its misconception that the first time it came across someone wasn't necessarily their date of birth... Were these actual babies? What was the birth rate on Earth? Hundreds of thousands per day, at least. And I was going to get dinged at for every one of them? Worse, I needed to disconnect every one of them. If I left, would I even be let in again? Had I just pushed Earth's System apocalypse back by a decade, rather than fixing it?

Earth humans outnumbered us by orders of magnitude, so based purely on numbers, weren't we the abnormal ones now?

The dings cut out.

Oh, please don't tell me it just took me seriously, and now I was going to get dinged at for every birth here. And what if it decides to start modifying us to conform to Earth norms. Wouldn't that break the Law?

Oh hell. Don't think about the Law. Don't think about the Law.

Inspiration. Solution.

And there we had it. I'd given our friendly local paper-clip maximiser the suggestion it needed to keep Earth safe forever. But I'd already disconnected everyone. The Law wouldn't work on them, and with everyone detached from the System, it couldn't make them vulnerable.

That only counted for the current population, though. Any newborns would be affected. All the System had to do was keep me out of here, and I wouldn't be able to stop it.

The System didn't respond to any of my further thoughts, but withdrew from me, the mechanical presence departing my mind. I quickly pulled my hand away while I had the chance, and glanced at the exit, which was once again open.

Whether I'd just made things better or worse, I had no idea...