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Chapter 052: Offer

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Unknown to them, Siva was having a talk with his useful adjutant in his mind.

'Progress?'

[64%]

'Success Rate?'

[Brain integrity is normal. Success rate Increased to 4% from initial estimations.]

'It's still too low. What did we gain with Kyle?'

[Using your brain as a map, sir, I've discovered a few cranial patterns pertaining to his skills and a few memories of the last 24hrs. Although a little vague, those memories are still useful data with all other gains catalogued and recorded.]

Cortana had been fused with his brain.

Physically.

Yet even until now, Cortana had only mapped out 70% of Siva's entire brain because the rest of its 'memory region' was sealed by some kind of lock even she, with her level of imbedded technology, can't put a finger to test casually. In the end, Rex had to put up with experimentations along with all of her incessant wrong timing jokes and inserts in order to stimulate brain activity and thus enables her to map out his 'unknown' neural channels.

The [Seal] they thought that were already lifted is only half truth. A certain part of Siva's [memories] that pertained to his memories of Ragnarok was still inaccessible even with Cortana being already a part of his own body.

Rex Kingsley knew why Cortana can't fully map out his neural channels even though she is fully 'installed' into his brain.

It's because there was that —the missing part of what makes him [Siva], the complete form as both the person called Rex Kingsley, and the Immortal and God [Siva].

Right now, he was nothing more than Siva —and these memories that he has was nothing more than acquired memories from Rex Kingsley which now is finally a part of him.

When he first came back into this world of Terroa upon AG's compulsion, he was Rex Kingsley: the confused and desperate boy, his old self's 'wish' for a new life outside the pain and suffering of all the losses he'd felt as The Immortal. And then he remembered [everything] during the invasion that befallen Terroa lately, everything that was him as The Immortal... he remembered it all despite not wanting to but it also had its advantage. At least at that time, he discovered the truth of the matter of the reason that drove him to become [The God of Destruction].

If he should put it into words, to complete himself as the "true person" named Rex Kingsley... to be able to complete and perfect the kind of strength that he sought and required upon himself at the shortest time possible, Siva knew that he had to complete his [memories]... and that means Siva had to uncover the rest of this lock zone in his neural pathways —which is the problem they are currently facing at the moment.

Right now, he can't forcefully uncover it and so he had to slowly experiment with these NPCs and unlock it —which again brings them back to their original issue of not having enough of referential data to establish their findings into.

'Since we've gotten some useful memories from Kyle, are we able to use them practically?'

[I need time to analyze and filter useless data on them, sir. it may take half a day here in Terroa.]

Siva made a mental sigh in their thought-link.

'If only they didn't lock my brain and take away something from it...'

Back then, they implanted NanoMechs into him while he was online in Terroa. The other guy, the "Rex Kingsley" that Amanda met, was unaware of it, but he —the Siva of now— was fully aware of what they did to him back then.

And for some reason even he himself could not explain until now, because of that thievery, a part of his brain became inaccessible to his physically connected Nano-adjutant.

This was also the reason why Cortana can't fully scan his brain to help in making all of his projects pertaining to the 'brain' progress successfully to his desired pace.

As such, he was left with no choice but to carry on experiments manually and one by one. It will take time and that's why he was feeling a bit in a hurry about it.

The [Mechromancer Project] —it will be the very pinnacle of the BM-Puppets Project he started.

That was what he had hoped for it, and that's the reason why he had to kidnap that Demon back in Castle City Jeremiah... to make him and his ability to control fire a part of his Puppet Army.

With the IPU and its nigh-infinite versatility about the [rules] of the Time-Space Cabinet, the key to his future strength will be secured.

*****

Five minutes later, the screaming stopped. Siva shook his head and made a sigh. Those chaotic thoughts and ponderings all happened between only him and Cortana through their thought-link connection.

When the violet haired girl suddenly stopped her struggles, it brought Siva back to his chair inside the mansion.

'What happened?'

[Subject's brain integrity collapsed, sir. Subject is officially a vegetable.]

—just like Kyle...

Siva's thoughts stopped here though he was still holding the girl's face.

'A pity.... but what were our gains?'

At least he wouldn't deny that this was progress.

[Fragmented memories from the last 28hrs; some insights to their Blood Prison Magic; a few battle experiences; random personal memories; oh, she also have some Intel that might help in rooting out the remaining termites in the Terran Society. I need at least five hours Terroa Time to analyze all of these data and filter out the useless junk.]

Siva mentally nodded. 'What about our mapping?'

[Hypothetically, in definition of the word, by the real world standards, we are now currently three years ahead in accordance to the records we got from your parents' papers.]

Meaning, basing on the 'data' he got from what his parents had from the things he retrieved from their house —as the template— Siva's progress in Neural Science is already more advanced than what his parents had in record.

But Siva knew that those papers aren't the entire 'data' that his parents had because if it is so, then they wouldn't have been able to create the NL-D with the half-assed data of only of that amount.

Terroa is a perfect world with —as far as his very own experiences as The Immortal is concerned— perfect virtual rendering of all the human senses.

With this kind of technological breakthrough, one cannot create a soul (brain) translating device like the NL-D with only that much data.

This, Siva knew, was a fact.

His parents' research and knowledge in both the Human Genetics and Human Brain was still out there somewhere, and that the product of such knowledge is this world itself —Terroa!

To be able to perfectly reproduce this very virtual universe itself needed mastery in brain science.

It needed an entire map of the neural cortex of the brain to fully create a technology that had the capability as the NLD... it needed more than just mapping out the entire brain's structure. It need more than just neural map of brain activity. It was impossible to create the Terran Universe he had lived on once if Cortana's incomplete data was already three years ahead of what they got.

No.

That's why Siva was using himself as referential data source to create a useful template.

And oh yes, he was right.

—or at least, right now, he discovered he was in the correct path with all of his assumptions.

Just being able to compare the data and actually fail in mapping out brain structure of the NPCs is proof enough that the brain structure of the NPC is the same as the brain structure and capability of a real-world person like him.

The fact that he was failing proves that Siva's first doubts about this game was right———

Everything has a purpose.

This entire Terran Universe had a purpose in its existence, in its general pursuit to survive, that all of its events were all meant to a certain goal.

And that's what he was finding ironically hateful.

He hated it...

...everything—!!

He hated everything that had happened to him and his family! In fact, if he had the chance, he'd rather just destroy this world to stop it all from consuming even his brother's innocent soul. But until he kept Baron safe under his wing, Siva will have to keep this anger under control or else, an event similar to Horbe, to Alexandria, and to the rest of the Terran Universe —Ragnarok— will be happening all over again.

Siva accepted that fact... he was a ticking bomb.

Whatever goal there has for the existence of the Terran Universe, it had destroyed his family.

———and that the fact that all Immortals become aware of the existence of the other side of this Universe is one proof that these AIs' existences had their purpose for being aware of it... like a real person of the real world... only, they were all here, trapped, in this sealed universe.

Siva sudden thought of the words he heard back in the Genesis Chamber.

[...the Genesis Chamber is what separates this universe from the real world and the only person capable of protecting both the real world and the Terran Universe from colliding is him, Siva...]

Regardless of whatever purpose of this world has in the perspective of its creators, outside of his parents, from the day he became aware of all these facts he's thinking right now, he'd become destined to hate it all and eventually destroy it.

To achieve all of his goals...

To avoid and deny himself that painful defeat...

To survive...

He needed strength.

His current activities are all part of that long road to his desired level of strength.

'We can't use the data we got from our house but we can use it as a starting baseline reference. It's also a fact that these NPCs have brain structures that are similar to humans... we can proceed like this, right?'

[If we disregard time, yes, it's possible.]

Siva mentally frowned and thought it over.

'In short, unless we experiment in real living NPC over and over, we can't move on just by analysis of all of our gathered and available data?'

[Yes sir.]

'How much time —no, how many living NPCs do you think it would take us until we can succeed in fully establishing a complete Neural Map?'

[By my calculations, it's 800 Million NPCs, sir.]

"What?!"

Siva blurted this out verbally, surprising the eight other still living followers.

—800 million?!! By the Gods!

—–—just based on the Terrans alone, it's almost 90% of their entire population, if not all of it! And that is also outside of the over 100M population of the entire Player-base.

By now, the violet haired girl is already slumped on the floor, dead, liquid metal mixed in with the blood leaking out of her bodily openings.

Siva's execution was witnessed by these NPCs, and they, as definition of their higher-level AIs, are all scared at this moment.

Cruel... Siva was just utterly cruel. It may only have been five minutes but to make a pretty girl like that suffer a treatment worse than the death sentence was just too... brutally vicious.

And yet Siva didn't care about their stunned souls and silent apprehensions. He didn't even look at them as he pondered about that shocking reveal.

'We can't continue like this.'

Siva slumped back on his cheat and massaged his temples. The pain that should've been curbed earlier was now coming back to haunt him again.

[But there is a solution to minimize the number.]

Siva's eye lit up, 'What's the solution?'

[Experiment on stronger test subjects.]

Siva almost laughed at it.

'You mean to hunt stronger intelligent beings?'

[Precisely, sir. According to my analysis of their brain integrities, stronger people on the level of Kyle despite being in that damaged mangled state we conducted the experiment on, are still at least higher by 23% compared to last lab subject's total integrity rating. Meaning, sir, the stronger the test subject and the healthier they are, the more likely the brain mapping experiment will succeed.]

One can even say that such a 'talk' could incur a global-level hate and disgust from pacifists and all religious sects fighting for rights and principles of that thing called justice.

Experimenting on 'people' without the permission of The Law is a crime and Siva, right now, can be considered an evil scientist for being heartless in his manner of experiments.

Furthermore, his tone and voice didn't even look affected by the fact that he had just killed his test subject of such 'rarity' right now.

Gahd... 'he' even punched her teeth in earlier!

Upon considering, Siva asked, 'By how much will the increase in success rate be?'

[At the current state, a total of 31% success rate!]

Siva thought, if he had let Kyle heal and only then conducted the experiment, he could have had his success rate boost to 31% then.

It was such a waste of a rare test subject.

But then again, if he had let Kyle rest and heal, even by just a bit, he knew he would have died.

He was already at his limit by then and even until now, he was still trying to recuperate and recover from the after-shock of the battle.

Who knew if he could still win against Kyle now that he had no more other useful arsenal in him?

The [Black Knight] BMA is destroyed and those parts that can still be used were already put into maintaining the tornado.

His blades were also destroyed; all of them. And Siva didn't have any Artillery Shells left in him in addition to the fact that he had already lost four of the 16 High-Class Minion-level BM-Puppets.

Fighting Kyle again will definitely lead to a defeat.

And as if remembering something, Siva hit a fist on his palm and asked, 'Cortana, what if we scan the brains of much simpler, or rather, bigger test subjects?'

[Monsters, you mean sir? We have no data in that regard sir so it doesn't lose anything to try. After all, we have lots of NanoCubes and are out of test subjects. We can send the Puppets to gather a few low-ranked Monsters and Predators to start with the task.]

Siva felt ecstatic, 'Do that, then. Start now.'

[Then I'll send two of the High Class Minions left behind outside to begin the subjugation.]

Now that Siva had managed to solve an issue, he then put his attention back to the eight people in front of him after storing the corpse of their violet haired girl companion —since saying that it was a shell of the former person was inappropriate to its next purpose and distinction as an item now.

The entire thought-link conversation and Siva's other considerations took an entire minute.

—but it felt like it was the longest minute of their lives from the moment they were born.

Siva's cold voice echoed on their ears: "I will ask the questions. If you don't provide me with the answers I seek, you will experience pain; IF you don't answer me, there will be more pain... and IF you lie to me, hehe, you will end up like her."

None replied, but there was a visible change on how they look at Siva. The earlier defiance is now gone and replaced with a tangible amount fear in their hearts.

"But before we begin," he continued. "I will give you a chance to live. Follow me and become my minions and you will experience prosperity and a life you will never experience even within your bloody church."

Siva paused, looking at their stunned faces then said, "Also, in regards to the truth about all the Gods and shits you were talking about... if you choose to follow me, not only will I show you the right way to become Immortals, I will also tell you things that no man in the current age will ever be aware of. I can show you the Path to Immortality!"

This wasn't a joke.

What his offer contained was the truth. As things are now, he needed strong people.

Disregarding loyalty and devotion to their deal, his offer alone contained something that their red cloaked church cannot offer.

Truth.

Wisdom.

...and the true Path to Immortality.

Who was Siva?

Back then, he was the first Immortal. He was the progenitor of the Immortal Path.

He was the start of everything......

He......... was also the end of it all.

"I know things that your church doesn't. And I am the holder of some truths that your church will never tell you regardless of the cost." He teased with a devilish smile that showed his white teeth.

Despite the headache, Siva was finding this long lost feeling of scheming enticement somewhat a nostalgic sensation.

Siva meant the truth but the way he spoke had a charm of a villain. You couldn't help but to love the way he treated his enemies.

One of the eight remaining followers felt enticed by the offer. After all, not all members of their Bloody Church joined in because they wanted to.

Some joined because they wanted what the Church had that doesn't exist in other places.

"Truth!" the man stood to his feet and said firmly.

None of the two Persona Puppets behind them stopped the man's actions.

"What is the truth? I've seen and heard records, stories, and legends. I seek the truth of a few things and I know that in this life, none of the Elders in the Church will be able to answer my questions. If you can enlighten me with one of them, I will follow you. If you are able to answer all of them, then I will revere you as my God!"

A direct challenge.

"Blasphemy!" yelled one of the loyalists. "Traitor!"

"I'll kill you and sacrifice you as soon as I get out of here you backsliding traitor!"

Two loyalists were firm to their belief in the Church while the rest were either too afraid to be able to think straight or neutral, or even lost hope of living past this day.

That truth seeker was the exception.

Siva liked the guy already.

"Go on then, ask." He said.

The man took a step forward. His eyes looked at Siva straight without hiding his intent. He already decided that he'd either die where he stood than not take this chance to accept Siva's offer.

"Who is the Blood Dragon God?" he asked Siva.

"HOW DARE YOU!!!" shouted one loyalist.

"UNHAND ME!!! I'LL KILL THIS INFIDEL!!!" the second devotee roared.

Siva didn't speak a word but Tai Long moved and with a whirlwind, the two men flipped and flopped where they were before they vomited.

They were used as a 'staff' just now and rolled three times in midair in one second, both, at the same time.

"Vasuki." Siva answered and this stunned the two devotees of the Church.

They didn't know the name.

"Who is Vasuki?" the truth seeker asked.

"Good question." Siva laughed. "He was once my beloved pet."

This time, everybody was stunned silent.

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