Chapter 395 - 384: Awakening
Chapter 395: Chapter 384: Awakening
The Incantation Hub, a special type of Control Core, was both a home for the soul and the spellcasting core for the Puppets Allen would design.
Miniaturization was an unavoidable hurdle.
Gabriel’s Incantation Hub was, in essence, a "Magic database" that relied on six book-sized Rune Boards. To shrink it down to a Puppet’s scale, each Rune Board had to be compressed to the size of a playing card.
This meant that the precision of the Rune inscriptions needed to increase by an order of magnitude.
Fortunately, Allen could solve this problem with the "Miniaturized Parallel Rune Inscription Technique" he had learned from the Association’s knowledge base.
But he soon discovered a new problem.
After increasing the precision, the number of Runes per unit of area skyrocketed, and the Magic Power interference between them rose exponentially. It was like a highway jammed with tens of thousands of cars, where a chain-reaction pileup could happen at any moment.
However, this wasn’t an especially difficult problem for Allen.
"Jarvis, pull up the ’Staggered Peak’ theoretical model."
This was an original theory he had developed while creating triple-layered Runes for Gabriel.
"Couple the ’Staggered Peak’ model with the ’Parallel Inscription’ technique. Establish a simulation environment for verification."
Nine sub-threads of his thought process ran at full capacity, and a massive amount of data collided and reorganized within Allen’s Sea of Consciousness.
He categorized the Magic Power oscillation frequencies required by different Magic models, then used the ’Staggered Peak’ algorithm to map out a unique ’timetable’ for the Magic Power path of each miniature Rune.
It was like setting a precise departure time and speed for every car on the highway, ensuring they would never converge at the same point.
This was an extremely difficult technique that required forcibly grafting together two completely different systems of knowledge.
The first three Rune Boards all shattered during testing.
For the fourth, he adjusted the inscription sequence, letting the Runes solidify before nesting them. This solved the shattering problem, but the output efficiency was only sixty percent of the theoretical value.
From the fifth to the ninth attempt, Allen gradually fine-tuned the frequency interval parameters for each layer, optimizing the inscription process based on the experimental results.
It wasn’t until the night of the fourteenth day that the eleventh Rune Board passed all tests, and the technique was finally perfected and usable.
The core, now suitable for a Puppet, was soon created. The final product was only the size of a coconut and replicated about eighty percent of the original Incantation Hub’s functions, with four built-in slots for micro Rune Boards.
This was a far cry from Gabriel’s twelve, but each board could still hold two instances of Low-level Witchcraft or one of Intermediate Witchcraft.
For a Puppet at the level of a First-level Wizard, this was barely sufficient.
Allen began to load the Rune Boards.
First, a [Defensive Type], containing Magic Shield and Deflection Force Field.
Second, an [Offensive Type], containing Heat Ray and Magic Energy Burst.
Third, a [Support Type], containing Shadow Walk.
For the fourth, he hesitated for a moment before inserting a "Daily Life" Rune Board.
The spells on this board included: Light, Clean, Wizard’s Hand, and Communication Magic. These four cantrips were specially made for convenience in daily life.
He loaded these four Rune Boards into the micro Incantation Hub one by one, then carefully installed it inside the Puppet’s head.
Allen had also created other offensive Rune Boards that could be swapped in as needed.
Next was the protective armor system.
Allen didn’t use the same magnificent, white porcelain-like material as Gabriel’s. Puppet Zero was not designed to be a war machine, but an existence that could walk among people.
He chose a bionic-treated polymer coating layered over lightweight alloy armor plates. At room temperature, its texture and elasticity were almost indistinguishable from human skin.
The final step was facial modification.
Allen pulled up a 3D hologram of Ryan from when he was alive, meticulously refining the Puppet’s facial contours.
The height of the nose, the curve of the lips, the depth of the eye sockets.
When he got to the left brow bone, he paused, then precisely replicated a faint scar on the smooth "skin."
It was a mark Ryan had carried in life.
「On the morning of the thirty-sixth day.」
In the center of the laboratory, Puppet Zero stood silently on its support frame.
It stood about two meters tall, with a straight and well-built frame, short, light-brown hair, and features that were gentle yet resolute. The faint scar on its left brow added a touch of a weathered past to the young face.
Allen had dressed it in a gray, form-fitting base layer, making it look like a young man taking a nap in the afternoon.
"Begin system self-diagnostic."
[COMMAND RECEIVED.]
A screen of light unfolded before Allen, data streams refreshing at high speed.
[SKELETAL STRUCTURE OUTPUT NORMAL. POWER MODULE: FULLY CHARGED.]
[MICRO INCANTATION HUB: ONLINE. RUNE BOARDS 4/4 LOADED.]
[FACIAL EXPRESSION DRIVE SYSTEM: ALL ONE HUNDRED TWENTY-ONE NODES RESPONDING.]
[BODY TEMPERATURE SIMULATION SYSTEM: ACTIVATED—36.8 DEGREES CELSIUS.]
"Empty shell test."
At Allen’s command, the Puppet’s eyes lit up with a red diagnostic glow as it stepped down from the support frame.
Walking, running, jumping, punching.
A series of movements flowed with effortless grace, filled with a precision and power that surpassed human limits.
[REACTION SPEED: 200% INCREASE COMPARED TO RYAN HART’S PREVIOUS LIFE (NO NEURAL TRANSMISSION DELAY IN MECHANICAL BODY). MEMORY AND LOGICAL COMPUTATION ABILITIES: 1000% INCREASE.]
[WITCHCRAFT OUTPUT STABILITY: 40% INCREASE. SPELLCASTING SPEED: INCREASED THREEFOLD.]
[OPERATIONAL ENDURANCE: 230% INCREASE (MAGIC POWER STORAGE MODULE CAPACITY APPROXIMATELY EQUAL TO A FIRST-LEVEL WIZARD, BUT REQUIRES RECHARGING).]
[PHYSICAL IMPACT RESISTANCE: 500% INCREASE.]
Allen had inscribed the skeleton with Rune Matrices for anti-gravity, anti-interference, and illusions, granting it permanently active Witchcraft abilities like flight.
Aside from not having a school’s signature Core Witchcraft, it completely outclassed a First-level Wizard in every other aspect.
Allen closed the test report and walked over to the soul preservation container.
"Are you ready?" he asked softly, addressing the faint mist of light within the container.
The mist of light flickered once in response.
"Let’s begin."
The soul migration officially began.
Complex Runes forming the Skill flowed around Allen’s fingertips.
The container opened. The misty light of the soul, which represented everything that was Ryan Hart, was drawn by an invisible force, slowly drifting toward the Puppet’s head.
The light merged into the Incantation Hub, bit by bit, until it vanished completely.
At the core of the Incantation Hub, the drifting mist of light coalesced into a solid, quiet, warm-colored point of light.
’Success.’
But the Puppet remained still, its eyes tightly shut.
The soul and its new body needed time to integrate, to establish tens of thousands of connection points, like the roots of a tree slowly taking hold in new soil.
[PREDICTED AWAKENING TIME: 6 TO 24 HOURS.]
Allen didn’t leave. He brought over a chair and sat down directly across from the Puppet.
He just sat there, his gaze calm as he watched the quiet face.
Time ticked by, second by second.
The only sound in the laboratory was the low hum of operating equipment.
[SOUL CONNECTION POINTS ESTABLISHED: 12%...]
[BODY TEMPERATURE SIMULATION SYSTEM ACTIVE. CURRENT SURFACE TEMPERATURE: 36.8 DEGREES CELSIUS.]
[SOUL CONNECTION POINTS ESTABLISHED: 34%...]
[MINIATURE MAGIC CIRCUITS UNDER BIONIC SKIN ACTIVATED. PULSATION FREQUENCY: 72 BEATS PER MINUTE.]
[SOUL CONNECTION POINTS ESTABLISHED: 56%...]
Fourteen hours passed.
[SOUL CONNECTION RATE: 97%]
Suddenly, the Puppet’s right index finger twitched, an almost imperceptible movement.
Like an unconscious spasm during sleep.
Allen’s gaze instantly locked onto that finger.
Next, the left hand, and then, the corner of its mouth.
The Puppet’s brow furrowed slightly, as if it were having a restless dream.
This wasn’t a programmed expression, but an emotion from the soul, reflected for the first time on this bionic face.
Fifteen hours and seven minutes.
[SOUL CONNECTION RATE: 100%]
In the silence, Puppet Zero—
or rather, Ryan—slowly opened his eyes.
They were a pair of warm, brown eyes, their color nearly identical to that of a human iris.
The optical observation modules adjusted automatically upon contact with the light; the pupils contracted, then dilated again.
His gaze was unfocused for about three seconds, his consciousness seemingly still struggling in an endless darkness.
Then, his eyes slowly began to focus.
They looked past the bright lights of the laboratory and finally settled on the man sitting in the chair directly opposite, who had been waiting for fifteen hours.