Orphan At The Edge Of The World 67 Crystal Cage 5

Orison already had a decent idea of why artificers had such a hard time keeping a foothold in a world that valued combat prowess over utility but he came to a realization on that two day underground dungeon crawl. Artificers were responsible for the current prosperity and comfort of Osomo but they had long ago ceased producing wonders that kept them relevant. Orison blamed that mostly on the training devices.

The people of this world had grown lazy and indulgent in easy learning and swam like fish around the devices, awaiting the moment they qualified for a little more 'fish food' instead of trying to tease things out for themselves. Ultimately, paths that were theory and resource heavy were either too difficult to master or not rewarding enough to pursue. Artificer was the absolute pinnacle of bad in those aspects. It's little magic created constructs were meant for delicate work, not fighting.

Everything of value had been stripped systematically from artificer and studied in detail by the Children to produce a steady but relatively stagnant supply of magic tech convenience. With little combat value and even less gold earning potential, it was doomed to continue fading into obscurity.

It was pure irony in Orison's mind, that both summoner and artificer had so much going against them as they were perceived, when both of them together were the foundation of the world itself. Whether by accident of design, much of what was needed to create actual artifacts had been removed from the artificer branch and the s.p.a.cial/dimensional aspects had been removed from summoner. Despite this, the knowledge to fill in those gaps was hidden in plain sight within the transporters and the training devices themselves.

Alta broke Orison out of his thoughts. "This set of double doors before you leads to one of the last remaining great constructs. During the golden age of Osomo, this fellow had taken the same dysfunctional path as you, starting out. He was a demented nut job but he was also a genius. More importantly to us, he was wealthy.

"He predicted the decline of artificers and summoners, openly despised the training devices and was considered a heretic in the eyes of most of the known world. His views were so radically suppressed that even his name was stricken from history. It could also be because he was blamed for the removal of certain knowledge from the trainers.

"How you want to view him or his works, I've done my part getting you here. Beyond these doors lies a series of challenges and how well you do will determine how much I get for bringing you here. If you can make it to the room of triangles, request to be transported out. I doubt you can actually solve it but if you do manage through sheer luck, what lies after that is death if you don't actually understand the challenge from the room of triangles."

Orison looked at her suspiciously as she walked to the doors and said, "Registered examiner Alta has brought student Orison for testing."

An emotionless voice came from the door. "Acknowledged. Student Orison, please present mender drone construct for scanning."

The young mage called on the starting artificer's magic model that created a self propelling ball. Within the ball was a miniature toolbox complete with needle-like soldering pen and arc welder.

"Ectoplasmic and etheric signatures registered. Please proceed to testing area one. Note, at anytime during testing, the process may be terminated by saying abort test. You may take the test only once every astral rotation, approximately every 361 years in Osomo's locality," the door's voice monotonously informed.

Before Orison opened the door, Alta said, "There's going to be a lot of nonsense terms thrown at you. I told you that the man was cracked but he's also a genius. Try to get from this what you can. If, beyond all hope, you get to the room of triangles, I'll personally hand-hold you through getting your second trip to the artificer trainer for 'power supply' and 'power surge'. At least you'll be able to use the little bug we get for something other than armor mending and sewing after that."

Orison nodded at her and headed through the double doors. After pa.s.sing through the laser looking scanner device, doors closed behind him and a plethora of menacing machinery tucked itself back into the sliding compartments they had unfolded themselves out of.

Orison chuckled and thought to himself, "I feel sorry for the greedy folks who undoubtedly have tried to force themselves in here over the years. Being simultaneously burnt, electrocuted and subject to who knows what else would keep even the strongest would-be thieves out of here. There's probably some closer to the top of the power charts who could get through but the damage to the capital above would be so immense that the merchants and powerful families' own self preservation would stomp them flat before they had a chance... The man who built this truly was a genius."

Any further contemplation was derailed by another monotone message. "Reconnect electrical distribution for the closed circuit panel on the theater table. Time limit is one hour."

Orison stepped up to the worktable that raised from the opening on the floor. After a quick look, it was apparently a quick soldering job with the only quirk being to disconnect the plug on the right first. Worst case scenario would be a heart stopping electrocution but Orison doubted it had that much juice supplied to it. After unplugging and soldering the obvious break, the young mage scanned for any less obvious ones and found out that the more he looked the more fine and complex the malfunctions went. Keeping in mind the original request that only took about five minutes with the help of his little conjured magic toolbox, Orison went about solving the majority he could, giving himself a fifteen minute leeway.

After plugging the supply back in, the monotone voice evaluated. "Main current stability, 87%. Sub-structure stability, 48%. Self repair function restoration 24% with less than 5% failure to initiate. Please follow floor arrows to testing room nine."

Perfectionist that he was, Orison tried hard not to resent the poor evaluation on topics unrelated to the main test. To make himself feel better, Orison decided to see going to the ninth test room as 'skipping tests'. It dawned on him that he was a bit too petty for his own good but chose to focus on what was in front of him instead of dwelling on it.

Once he had stepped into a thickly s.h.i.+elded room where he had to pa.s.s hand through gloves to access the circuit board on the other side and see what he was doing through a window, Orison heard the voice again. "This is a magic free and essence s.h.i.+elded room. Without using magic or external spiritual aids of any kind, please proceed to repair closed circuit panel. Time limit is two hours."

Orison saw the same circuit board that he had been working on before but all the magic generated fixes had been stripped off, presenting him with the same 'exact' board he'd been presented with when he first came in. On the table were an old fas.h.i.+oned soldering iron and arc welder rod with a few of the materials one would expect to get with them. The personal difficulty had raised exponentially by that fact but more of the delicate fixes would be easier due to it to. Precision responses from the mending drone to that degree would take months at a minimum.

It took nearly twice as long to get as far as he had with the drone while free handing it but the smaller fixes were a great deal less sloppy. With a half hour left, Orison tackled even smaller fixes. With fifteen minutes left, he switched to the hair's width tool that was even smaller than the one his drone had and continued with a magnifier lowered down over his viewing window. With hands getting a little too shaky, Orison ended his repairs two minutes remaining. A scowl was plastered to his face for not having the ability to fix everything that he could see as he plugged in the supply. With a small break and a little more time, there were at least seven more he felt confident enough to handle.

The monotone voice evaluated once more. "Main current stability, 92%. Sub-structure stability, 74%. Self repair function restoration 57% with less than 3% failure to initiate."

Orison was disappointed with himself. Even with the training device's boost and his knowledge from a more advanced society that was built around gadgets far more complex, that was the extent of his ability to leverage that knowledge. Half convinced he'd failed, Orison followed the arrows to a room with a chair and nothing else. He looked around the room until the monotonous voice requested him to sit.

After sitting down, nothing happened until he went to stand back up a couple minutes later. Something within the seat s.h.i.+fted enough to make a click. A panel opened up behind him, almost causing him to dive for a corner of the room until he saw that it was just a projector of some kind. It didn't work. Orison got up and fixed the old device. After some trial and error, he finally got it back into the wall, reactivating it by flopping back into the chair.

The lights in the room dimmed and a white haired old man with fuzzy features due to the slightly unfocused lens was projected onto the wall. "If you're seeing this then either my worst prediction has come true or my predecessor has decided to keep using my construct as a teaching tool. Although I hope for the later, the prior haunts me as I see the shadow of my life grow longer. No tool, no matter how well made, will see the end of it's time.

"The A.I. has deemed that remedial tests have become too much of a burden on resources. When this place was made, a first time failure would lead hopefuls through a few presentations on materials and award a second chance as long as the original try resulted in a four percent or lower chance of failure to initialize. To pa.s.s, the rate would need to be less than two percent and even that bothers me but now circ.u.mstances require me to relax that guideline further. If you qualify for a second chance then you qualify to continue. I fear that your current standard might even be the best available in your current time. I don't want to discourage what must have been great effort and perseverance in what I fear is a world that no longer appreciates it but please keep the hope alive."

The monotonous voice cut over the old man's voice to say, "You are the thirty-first person to view this recording."

The old man continued, "If the artificial intelligence followed your number by a warning of failure to complete preparations for further testing, then go no further. Terminate the test and mourn the pa.s.sing of my legacy without an inheritor. If no such message was given, then proceed to the next room or use whatever barbarism you must to open a hole in the wall to your left after you have counted to ten."

Orison counted silently as the wall to his left raised to reveal torn metal and a jagged hole in the wall. With a growing sense of apprehension, Orison made his way through the hole. On the other side was a room completely encased in what looked like high impact gla.s.s with several dents and even a few cracks in it that only ran a quarter inch deep. On the other side of the gla.s.s sat triangular pieces that had sliding parts to three slots on the far side.

A crackling recording of the old man's voice said, "For the sake of future generations, perhaps the future of this world itself, don't try to guess a correct answer if you don't understand what's being tested. Until this point it wouldn't have mattered much but the small transporters in the construct have been deemed a luxury of power usage or no longer function safely. This test is to open the way to intermediate tests.

"Without an understanding of what's being presented, you would only be wasting the dwindling resources of this construct attempting to go further. As much as I value each and every one of you that enter this creation of mine, I will allow the A.I. to dispose of the testers who proceed further without heeding what I say in the most efficient way possible. If not in consideration of future hopefuls, I implore you not to proceed further for your own safety if you do not understand."

Orison thought, "Some people who'd made it this far must not have liked that request much."

The A.I.'s voice kicked back on, "Failure to initiate test room interface. Please use manual placement."

Seeing no way to physically grab and slide the triangles and still feeling the s.h.i.+elding against magic, Orison muttered, "I take that back. Obviously the person thought that the only way they could move on was to bust their way to the triangles."

Orison reasoned that couldn't be the case or Alta wouldn't have given the warning she did. Looking around again, the young mage saw a circular piece of stone above the hole he came through. Inspecting it closer, he saw that it could be pulled from the wall. It was also connected by a thin but strong cable with light scratch marks on it. Someone had tried to rip it off but failed miserably.

As Orison moved it to the gla.s.s, a nearby triangle was pulled out of its recess slightly. After inspecting the triangles and the circular stone in his hand, Orison came to the humorous conclusion that the manual option worked off magnetism. With the problem on how to move the triangles solved, Orison inspected them.

He muttered, "The diagram above the slots are easy enough to figure out. I need to find the three isometric triangles that make an equilateral one but what's underneath? Upwards bar is above a sun, sideways bar is above a moon. Three triangles that make an equal triangle coinciding with a sun, a blank and a moon are on the door.

"The triangles along the walls of the room have degree parts and they also bear one of the two bars or are blank. There is a line that pa.s.ses through the door which lines up with... It's friggin binary! Pythagorean theory and binary are on the door. Hahaha... The blank isn't blank, its just that the bars are smaller and there are so many that it just looks irregular. On, open and then off...

"So that's what the warning was about. A person could figure that out without knowing what it means. There's even a chance that they'd think they know what it means if they weren't that bright. I walked into a d.a.m.n Darwin trap."

Once he had it down, it didn't take much time to fit them in the door. With a click, a small stream of current ran through the triangle pieces, turning on the sliding part of the door, opening it and then shutting it off. The whole room rotated slowly as Orison moved with it until the bottom was facing the open door, giving Orison only one way to go.

Upon stepping to the other side and seeing the levitating triangle, Orison withheld rising panic. With the failing parts of the giant construct apparent, it wasn't difficult to see how the people who had made it to this point would fare if the floating device stopped working or was returned to the slit in this room's wall. Out of curiosity, Orison tossed a piece of iron ore down into the pit below him. Just shy of five seconds later, he heard a din come from it. The s.p.a.ce was just big enough to fit all the testing rooms he had already been through, back in.

"Please begin testing. Estimated reserves remaining before testing cannot be completed, 65-64-63-62. Testing has begun," the merciless A.I. said, forcing Orison onto the levitating bit of metal to end the countdown.

To make the floating platform move forward, Orison had to do some speed math while following the directions on the wall to keep the basic code work from sending the platform back. It would have been easy enough and there was even room for error but Orison didn't dare to afford himself such a thing with a countdown clock going off every time he paused for more than a couple of seconds. After one simple mistake made him return two sections back, the countdown had reached into the teens before he made it up, plus some extra.

By the time the floating platform slid its way into the slot on the other side of the pit hallway, Orison had earned himself almost three minutes of 'reserve power'. It felt paltry next to what he believed had been taken off his life from anxiety and stress. Opportunity or not, Orison deeply regretted his decision to continue past the triangle room but knew that he'd probably do it again if offered the chance. The young mage couldn't remember a time when the current extreme duality that existed within him had been ill.u.s.trated so clearly to himself.

Taking a deep breath, Orison stepped into the next room and thought, "What fresh h.e.l.l is this!?"