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The Gamer Chapter 1412 – Thorough Grinding 5 – The Shape of Artificial Sapience
🕑 Added 2023-03-28 13:50:29 +0000 UTCFrom the front, a circle crossed by a vertical line. From the top, an X with a thin halo. From the side, a swirl speckled with clusters. Only the first was a shape that John really wanted to attribute to the final structure. The other two were patterns that his brain probably pushed onto the immensely complex combination of thousands of connected pieces.
He looked upon his creation like he would at the replay of a finished campaign in Civilization. He had successfully mapped out the central magical matrix of a Metracana. Pride at the accomplishment of the past 87 hours filled him to the core. It was still the fourth day, by the margin of dinner, sex, a shower, and sleep.
That he wasn’t a true researcher dawned on John as he looked at the structure and all the parts about it that he didn’t get: which was all of it. He now knew the shape of that matrix, but he had no idea what of it did what. Where was the control of the limbs? What allowed them to store memories? What about the shapeshifting between contracts and their changing Attributes? Where in all of this laid the touch of Tiamat, of Enki, of Sargon and the many others part of the original creation? Would it even be part of this or was this so fundamental that none of them would have any influence over this?
John had all of these questions and the urge to explore them was easily overpowered by his desire to select a few Perks and get a blowjob while feasting on whatever Aclysia had cooked for them today. As much as he had enjoyed learning something about deep magic by himself, this was not his calling. He was a leader, a pervert, and a gamer, not an academic of the magical arts.
“Momo, can you call some of your faes over?” he requested. Once she had, he turned to them and said, “I want you to take this,” he pointed at the model of the Metracana matrix, “and create a 3D model of it on this laptop. I then want you to give that laptop to Scarlett and tell her what you did. You’re not allowed to meddle with any part of the data in any way, understood?”
“Oooookaaaaay,” one of the three responded in a manner that made John slightly doubtful. The grin on her face made clear that it was his doubt that was the goal.
The Fae Maids had 5% of Momo’s Intellect and Wisdom, which came out at over 50 for both of them. In mundane terms, that put them far above the average person. Certainly high enough to copy the model 1 to 1 to a 3D modelling program.
It was nice to have a bunch of servants around that such mundane labour could be pushed off to. Had it not been for them, John would’ve left it to Scarlett. The technomancer could do it in a fraction of the time, but she had better things to do and the Fae Maids existed for the purpose of taking care of the menial tasks.
While they got to it, John, Metra and Momo left. “Still not tempted?” Momo asked.
“Tempted? Kind of, yes, they do have your proportions,” John stated. “Interested? No. Why do you keep asking?”
“I don’t know, it’s just the first time we have permanent, attractive help in the house… plus they’re extensions of me, so I don’t even know if that’d technically violate our polygyny.”
“It’d violate the spirit of it.” John smirked at her. “It’s a thick concept.”
Momo blew air out of her nose, between amusement and annoyance. They passed one of the Firefae that sat on a door frame. She was in the small, insectoid form that they had always had before the recent Perk. Since they were capable of transforming back and forth and there was never a need for the full group of 50 to be in operation, they spent much of their time either in this or their most basic firefly forms.
They were scattered about the house, sitting in whatever form suited them best, ready to transform into maids when called upon. Aclysia had decided on double-clap being their signal. The closest few Fae Maids would move in when they heard it and be ready to take the orders of all those Momo had designated as ‘superiors’.
Between those orders, they just idled the time away. A cruel way to treat people, to have them sit in random corners of an empty house, with nothing to do whatsoever. The Fae Maids were not people. They weren’t even capable of getting bored. They could be entertained. Work and little pranks were entertaining to them and they did both when they got the chance. Otherwise, they entered a standby mode that turned them into little more than set pieces. They were as close an approximation to a person without leaving the realm of NPC as possible. Sometimes they did things that almost made them seem like an individual. Any inspection of their minds or long term observation revealed that to be false.
They did help keep the house nice and tidy, although Aclysia refused to hand over any more of that responsibility than she had to. Her, the other maids, and Lee were all supposed to do work before the Fae Maids did. Most of the time, the Fae Maids were tasked with cleaning the living room, the bathroom, or the bedroom, depending on where there had last been an orgy. Post-coital cuddles were higher on the totem pole of maid duties than chores.
The living room was in the middle of such a cleaning session. Ten Fae Maids, all armed with a bucket and a rag, were cleaning every surface in the room of sexual secretions. They lighted scented candles, polished the floors, and treated the leather. John entered the bath, to join his harem and his doubles. He had full confidence that he would find a room as good as new by the time he returned.
“I wonder if they could become an effective support force if Aclysia gets a good enough Maid Aura,” John said, as he unequipped his clothes.
“I don’t know if they’re loyal to you or loyal to the me that’s loyal to you.” Since that was part of the conditions, that was a question to have.
“Guess we’ll see when this month is over,” John responded and stepped into the bath. Rave and Hailey greeted him with a unified wolf whistle. “Drink it all in, girls,” he said and struck a confident pose for them. Lorelei started to fan her face with her hand, blushing intensely. Gnome sunk up to her cheekbones into the moving water.
It was the pool in his house, Magoi understood that it had been required to have a jacuzzi function.
The moment he was in the water, keeping Momo and Metra by his side, he opened his character sheet to distribute the points of the level he had gotten earlier that day. An important one, since it got him another Max Class Level.
He wasn’t sure what to do with the Skill Evolution Point at the moment. He had nothing he really wanted to evolve. He was in a position where the fundamentals of his kit were what he wanted. Possibly, he would save it up to use it to buy a Perk for an Artificial Spirit or lower the upkeep cost of an elemental by a miniscule amount. It would remain to be seen.
What he wanted to do now was use his two available Class Levels to get a level in Metracana Master and Golemcrafter each. The Final Perk for one Class and the eighth one for the other. This promised to be exciting. He decided to start with the latter since there would probably be other windows involved with finishing up the former. He was not entirely sure. It would be the first Advanced Class he finished. Only Gaia knew if there was a follow-up to that.
‘Well, she and every god-buddy she talks to about it,’ John thought and pressed the button.
John rubbed his chin, trying to find any angle that made Elemental Resonance not the choice he went with. He found none. Giant Puppet was not what he wanted out of this Skill and he did not care to pilot the ‘slow giant’ experience again. He had done so by means of Possession before, back before that became an unviable strategy due to the weakness of readily available materials.
There was an argument to be made for Arcane Resonance. Arcane Resistance 5 was really good. On its own, it was the most frequent damage type and it was harder to come to this specific resistance than it was for the elemental ones. Most of the bodies John created for Creator Puppet inherently had a good defence against the elements just because of the metals used in it. The current models, Swirls, had Elemental Resistance 5 by its creation. Whichever the Perk provided would therefore be useless. Unless otherwise stated, his mechanics had always only used the highest one that applies.
So that was all that spoke in favour of Arcane Resonance. When it came to the aura, neither won out. Elemental Resonance had a selection. Arcane Resonance had a minor debuff.
What gave Elemental Resonance the win was that the Creator Puppet was supposed to wield Inkaryl. If there was a way for Jake to activate the enchantments of the weapon, then it laid down this path. Therefore, that was the obvious choice.
“Alright, let’s hope this is awesome.” The excitement in the room was almost graspable. Finishing a Class was an event, and after what they had been given last Perk, the Artificial and Natural Spirits were naturally enticed. Would there be another Monster Girl Ascension Perk? Something even more powerful? They couldn’t wait to find out.
These choices were awesome, in a dull and mechanically sound way. All of them were powerful, extremely powerful even. They just weren’t exciting, like the Monster Girl Ascension Perks had been. It was the typical situation where a boost of 50% Strength was the best and most boring option.
Disregarding his complaints about that, he had to make a choice. Disconnected was what his heart wanted, since it would allow Aclysia, Beatrice, and Momo to survive him. Claire, Delicia and Metra would anyway. He did not have to look up from the window to know that those same three maids he would wish to save were giving him various flavours of judgemental stares. This option was out from the start. They would never wish to survive him at the cost of Perks that would aid tremendously in his survival.
That made it a binary between Metracana Master and Double Trigger, which was yet another instance of the question of current versus infinite value. Double Trigger would make each cycle of Artificial Spirit 33% more effective, when it came to Perks. A tremendous bonus, definitely not the usual noob trap given the power of each of those Perks.
Metracana Master would, right now, save him 84 MP per second and give him a grand total of 3360 Stat Points to distribute (560 for each of the 6 contracted AS/NS). That was insane value. The Stats would continue to pay back until they reached the max of 1000, at which point it would have given them 6000 Stat Points, assuming he did not contract any further Metracanas.
The choice was not as immediately clear as one might think. Typically, John went for options that freed up his mana supply. However, he was not so burdened by the current arrangement that he would sacrifice that for the extra Perks without proper considerations. Yes, he would like the freedom to distribute his Perks with less focus on Wisdom. He would like to. That was the operative part. He did not need to. Wisdom was his core Stat anyway.
So, on balance, was the immediate pay-off worth it for the continuous value generation of Perks?
Yes.
Perks had two detrimental aspects to them. One, they were hit-and-miss. The Skill Level 100 Perks were typically decent, but even then there was no guarantee he wouldn’t be handed two inventory upgrades, which had no direct impact on the individual tasks they had. Two, Perk acquisition would continuously slow down over time. It was infinite value with a softlock.
He raised his gaze from the window, to pass it around the room, while he explained his decision. No objections were raised and so the decision was made. Immediately, three other windows opened.
“Well, that’s an Overclock that’s unwieldy,” John wheezed. A cubic metre of Astrotium was an absurd cost he wasn’t sure he could pay for anything. Then there was the 1-month hibernation. John’s life wasn’t predictable enough to let any one of them go out of commission for a month. The 10-year cooldown was the least worrying part of it, somehow. If it ever got used, it wouldn’t be soon.
Boring, as most of the Modifications were, but potent. A genuine contestant to replace the Lover Boy Mod, especially during these grinding sessions. Whereas Experience of Love reset every 24 hours, the Lover Boy Mod still counted down each day. The 10 GP reward for the 8 hours of sex was good, but the time dilation effectively ‘wasted’ 9 days. John would have to remember to switch back after the grind ended. For now, he took the Metracana Master Mod.
‘Master Class, that sounds final,’ John thought, as he read the choices.
Monster Girl Creator was immediately attractive, because he had developed a thorough liking of the exotic. Fangs, horns, tails, slit pupils, all of those things that added unusual parts to their attractive forms.
Soulforger sounded like he would be able to understand the secrets behind the Sylkarions or create an equivalent himself. To have the key to giving people immortal bodies was enticing and dangerous. John was not certain he wanted such a power and whatever else was unlocked by this path. Then again, if not him, who else? Would he go beat the tyrant of another world every time someone like Delicia needed help?
Core Industrialist was not entirely clear from the description. Creating Artificial Spirit cores on an industrial scale was simultaneously incredible and not particularly worth it. As Momo had said a couple days ago: Artificial Spirits were used in everything from self-moving wastebins to actual people. To have a vast quantity of them would boost Fusion’s automation capacity immensely. If there was a time to radically replace entire fields of labour with untiring automata, it would be while the economy was still in its infancy and people could retrain. The reason why this wasn’t that impressive was because people had been making Artificial Spirits for hundreds of years already. There was no reason they couldn’t just upscale the production the regular way. Still, he could feel Scarlett’s demanding eyes on him, after she passed the window on to the next girl down the row.
“I want the Monster Girl Creator,” Aclysia declared.
“Are we putting it up to a debate?” Scarlett asked eagerly.
“No.” A cold smile spread on Claire’s lips. “None will keep strength from the descendants I shall bear from my John’s seed. Your industry can solve its own problems.”
That was an angle that John had not immediately considered, but that certainly reinforced his leaning towards that Perk. He expected the Breeder Class to have similar Perks, alongside those that allowed him to procreate with Artificial Spirits in the first place, and it still was a good idea to have this boost secured.
Scarlett stared calculatingly at Claire. Red eyes mirrored each other across the bath. There were no sparks, not yet. It appeared the redhead was still contemplating whether she was going to argue the merits of Core Industrialist. Against his expectations, Scarlett closed her eyes. “I’ll accept that reasoning.”
With that, the Perk selections were done and John went to distribute the Stat Points. Thankfully, there were clear core Stats for each of the girls, making it a swift affair.
For the rest of the fourth day, they did nothing productive.
Comments
Funatic
Kept open for Stirwin
Askance
It is very odd John has an accessory slot open, if I am reading it right
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