Chapter 73#

Gears of Fate 15#

The number of people exiting the classroom hadn’t decreased, and their gait was quite relaxed, especially for Chen Tong and Bai Song. These two walked in front, waving happily upon seeing Yu Feichen in the train car, and came over to report.

Then Bai Song recounted their spell lesson. They had to study an entire bookcase of books within class time, synthesize the knowledge, then apply it according to lesson requirements—namely, writing a spell collection. They expected to crash and burn on these incomprehensible symbols. Surprisingly, the people skilled at drawing found it as easy as drinking water.

After those talented artists discussed and studied, not only did they complete their own spell collections within the time limit, they successfully helped others finish their assignments too.

Among them, the spells for Yu Feichen and Vincent were all drawn by Anphiel alone. Chen Tong and Bai Song’s spells were completed collectively by five people: Lingwei, Lillia, Jililigulung, Xue Xin, and Zheng Yuan.

Reaching this point, a strange excitement appeared on Bai Song’s face. He leaned toward Yu Feichen’s ear and said: “Yu-ge, Anphiel-xiongdi is really something.”

As he spoke, the others arrived too. Xue Xin and Zheng Yuan discussed theories related to “patterns.” Lingwei and Lillia looked serious, also in conversation. One practiced cultivation, one practiced magic, yet their dialogue proceeded smoothly.

In contrast, Chen Tong and Bai Song’s happiness appeared exceptionally pure. Like exiting an exam—people who studied would worry about their scores, constantly comparing answers, while those who hadn’t studied but copied from the straight-A student would be complacently confident about their marks, completely carefree. Far better than the past two days when they’d attempted the problems themselves.

Chen Tong’s evaluation was just one word: “Awesome.”

Anphiel passed through the corridor and returned Murphy’s badge to him. Yu Feichen watched coldly. Murphy still seemed in a fragmented state. When accepting the badge, he didn’t even say “thank you,” merely lowered his eyes, staring at the left hand delivering the badge.

This reminded Yu Feichen of the time when he and Murphy had been alone. That person had also gazed thoughtfully at his own left hand once. But his limbs were all intact, with nothing unusual on his hand. The person had quickly looked away.

Anphiel sat beside him. The train quickly started. The moment they disembarked, Chen Tong rushed to the table: “I need gasoline to drink.”

He hadn’t exerted much labor, yet was quite eager at mealtime, looking famished.

Yu Feichen asked: “What did you create?”

Anphiel pointed at his own badge, his voice somewhat drifting due to dizziness, and said: “We placed the badge into the spell reader’s sensing section and the spell collection into the reading section. We processed the badge with spells.”

Yu Feichen held his own badge in hand and asked: “What new functions were added?”

Anphiel didn’t respond verbally. He took the badge from Yu Feichen’s hand. They were just approaching the dining table. Yu Feichen understood and sat in his dining chair. Normally, the moment someone sat, the tin-beast fountain on the table would spray dinner liquid into the cup. But this time after he sat, the tin-beast remained motionless until Anphiel placed the badge nearby, then the tin-beast spurted liquid.

Zheng Yuan explained: “Based on our discussion, the badge can now resonate with more machinery. Anphiel said that if the written spell is wrong, depending on where the error occurs, we might be unable to receive dinner, unable to enter the dormitory door, unable to pull the train’s safety latch, or unable to obtain materials needed for future tasks.”

Yu Feichen: “The principle?”

This time, magical girl Lillia provided the explanation: “According to knowledge we learned from books, spells are divided into ‘waiting spells’ and ’trigger spells.’ Different spells correspond to different machinery states. When a waiting spell encounters its corresponding trigger spell, it triggers that ‘state.’ Um… let me give an analogy: right now in front of us, the tin-beast has a ’tin-beast awaiting activation’ spell on it. Our badge has an ‘activate tin-beast’ spell. When they’re close enough, the spell takes effect and the tin-beast dispenses our dinner. But if someone’s ‘activate tin-beast’ spell is written wrong, they won’t get dinner.”

Reaching this point, Lillia stopped. Xue Xin smiled and said: “The magic in this world really isn’t chaotic supernatural nonsense. It’s too scientific—isn’t this just signal transmission and reception?”

Yu Feichen: “We could activate the tin-beast before taking this lesson.”

Lillia shook her head: “Originally, the badge probably already had this spell. But the book says that after machinery is sensed by the spell reader, the original spell gets erased and new spells are written in. So now what’s active is what we wrote. I asked Anphiel if we could escape the test by not doing anything to the badge. Anphiel said if you still want to attend class tomorrow, don’t do that. Thinking about it, that makes sense.”

The young girl’s tone was already filled with trust and affection toward Anphiel.

After finishing the lesson content, Murphy finally returned to Vincent’s state. The chestnut-haired young man calmly recounted what they’d witnessed outside the classroom.

The train, full of ore from outside, transported it to four “workshops.” In the workshops, the ore was processed into materials the fortress needed. In procedures pure machinery couldn’t handle, countless mechanical dummies that once housed human souls worked numbly.

“The crystals, papyrus, and metal produced in the first three workshops are all things we’ve seen. But the white substance produced in that fourth workshop you mentioned—we haven’t encountered it yet,” Xue Xin said.

Then Anphiel softly said: “I have.”

Xue Xin turned his head in confusion, seeing Anphiel staring at his cup of dinner. At that moment, Chen Tong, who had been gulping down food, suddenly froze.

White—wasn’t there some right in the cup?

Yu Feichen looked at his own cup of three-ringed “dinner”—black, red, and white. Coincidentally, the two types of crystals representing “motion” and “heat” happened to be black and red.

Black is “motion,” red is “heat.” The core principle of the steam world is converting heat energy into kinetic energy. So what would white represent?

The professional, Xue Xin, admitted helplessness.

However, one thing was nearly certain: their understanding of this world was gradually deepening. Since the white substance remained unexplained until now, it must play a crucial role.

“Heat energy, kinetic energy, and white substance’s unknown energy…” Chen Tong examined his dinner. “So eating is basically me charging up like a robot?”

Essentially true, though no one responded. After the meal, Anphiel and Jililigulung brought stacks of papyrus from the dormitory and began drawing on the spot. The two had no verbal communication, simply continuously drawing complex patterns on paper.

Yu Feichen asked what he was doing.

“Jililigulung and I believe we’ve already understood the entire spell system of this world through the existing spells in the books,” Anphiel said. “Now we want to try creating a… universal spell that can activate all spells.”

The others were shocked upon hearing this. Yu Feichen had skipped class and couldn’t draw any spells, but he understood that waiting spells and trigger spells were like locks and keys—one key opens one lock. Today’s lesson was teaching everyone how to mechanically reproduce keys. Yet after taking this class, Anphiel was already contemplating how to invent a master key.

Yu Feichen sat beside Anphiel, watching his concentrated, quiet profile while he drew, finding this person truly amusing.