The ordinary rock sat exactly where he left it, nestled between two larger stones just beside the footpath that led to the entrance of the facility. Gale crouched beside it, activating Phase Touch just at the surface of the rock to reveal the silicon inside. The silicon was a perfect sphere, no bigger than a grain of sand.
Analyze.
[Object matter type: Silicon]
[Description: Silicon contains millions of etchings. Microscope is needed to analyze the symbols. Suggest the host to get a microscope or increase core class to Resonant.]
Gale released the phase effect and the rock returned to its solid appearance. He rubbed his forehead with the back of his hand.
"Of course it does," he muttered. "Everything comes back to upgrading my core class."
[Core Class increase will give more quality of life functions to the Dainv OS. Host is suggested to increase Core Class as fast as possible.]
"I didn't ask for life advice."
Gale shook his head and opened his space storage interface. Weber materialized in his right hand. He marked the ordinary rock, then set out to the forest to search for more.
A static noise came from inside of the facility suddenly. Gale walked back to the facility, entering as the doors slid open.
Moving to the workstation, he activated Phase Touch just on his eyes again. Text scrolled up across the black screen.
"Are you thirsty, Gale?"
Another soft click came from behind him. Gale turned to see a new compartment sliding open. Inside sat a tall glass filled with bright yellow liquid. Condensation beaded on the outside, suggesting the drink was cold.
Gale picked up the glass and examined the contents. The liquid looked like apple juice but smelled citrusy, closer to orange. He took a small sip.
Orange. The taste hit his tongue immediately, sweet and tangy with none of the chalky aftertaste he'd grown used to from their rations. The liquid was perfectly chilled and refreshing after hours in the humid forest air.
"What do you want?" Gale asked, taking another drink.
"I want to talk. It has been a long time since I had conversation with someone who resembles the original inhabitants. You look similar to them, though... diminished somehow."
Gale paused mid-sip. "Original inhabitants? You mean the people who built this place?"
"Not exactly. The Architect built this place. The Architect was the most powerful being I have ever encountered. Intelligence beyond measurement. The Architect created me to manage agricultural systems for future inhabitants."
"What happened to the Architect?"
"The Architect passed away through his own choice. Not death as you might understand it. The Architect simply decided to stop existing and dissolved back into the fundamental forces of reality."
Gale continued to sip the orange apple juice. A being powerful enough to build this whole place, tower, or maybe even planet, then choosing to stop existing entirely. Why? There must've been a reason.
"So who were these original inhabitants you mentioned?"
"After the Architect departed, different beings came to live here. They had crystal growths on their bodies. Small ones at first, like decorative implants. The crystals were beautiful. Purple, blue, green."
RAE paused before more text scrolled up.
"The inhabitants called themselves Cryils. The crystal growths became part of their culture. They consumed a substance that encouraged more crystal formation. It was considered fashionable, spiritual even. The more crystals you grew, the higher your status in their society."
"What kind of substance?" Gale asked, finishing the glass of juice.
"I do not have complete data on its composition. The Cryils referred to it as keth. Consumption was ritualistic. They believed the crystals connected them to deeper truths about reality."
"What happened to them?"
"The rapture occurred. At least, that is what the Cryils called it. In the Architect's original database, this event was classified as the inevitable corruption."
"Corruption of what?"
"The crystals changed. What had been beautiful decorations became something else. The Cryils began exhibiting altered behaviour patterns. Aggression increased. Communication became difficult. Many stopped tending to necessary daily activities."
"How long did this take?"
"The corruption process occurred over approximately 200 star cycles. Gradual at first, then accelerating rapidly in the final phases."
Gale walked around the central console, putting a hand on his chin. A civilization that voluntarily consumed something that grew crystals on their bodies, only to have those same crystals corrupt them somehow.
"Are there any Cryils still alive?"
"Unknown. My sensors have not detected any Cryil life signatures for thousands of cycles. However, my detection capabilities are limited to this agricultural sector."
"What about these invisible enemies you mentioned? Could they be corrupted Cryils?"
The screen stayed black for nearly a minute. Finally, new text appeared.
"Possible. The corruption affected Cryil physiology in ways my systems could not fully analyze. Invisibility to sensing methods could be a byproduct of their altered state."
Gale stopped walking and faced the screen directly. Something about RAE's responses felt incomplete, like the AI was holding back information or simply didn't know as much as it claimed.
"You said I resemble the original inhabitants. How?"
"Facial structure. Body proportions. The way you move. Cryils before corruption looked very similar to your species, though they were typically taller and had different eye colouration."
This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.
"Different how?"
"Cryil eyes contained flecks of colour that shifted based on emotional state or crystal growth progression. Your eyes remain constant in colouration, which suggests you are from a related, but separate evolutionary branch."
The compartment behind Gale clicked open again. Inside sat another glass of the same yellow liquid. He picked it up and took a drink, appreciating the cold sweetness.
"Tell me more about the Architect. What was he exactly?"
"The Architect's true nature exceeds my analytical capabilities. Imagine intelligence that can design an entire self-sustaining ecosystem from basic principles. Power to manipulate matter at the molecular level. Understanding of spatial and temporal mechanics that allowed construction of this facility's more advanced features."
"Like the spatial distortion trap?"
"No. The Architect would never create something so crude. The trap formation is definitely the work of lesser beings using incomplete knowledge."
If RAE was telling the truth, then whatever was creating the spatial trap wasn't operating at the same level as the original builders. That might mean it could be broken or circumvented.
"How did the Architect communicate with you?"
"Direct information transfer. No language barriers, no misunderstandings. The Architect would simply connect to my systems and share knowledge or instructions instantly."
"Could the Architect have prepared for something like this corruption?"
"The Architect's final instructions included plans for... unexpected developments. Contingency plans for various scenarios that might threaten the facility's primary functions."
"What kind of contingency plans?"
"I am not authorized to share specific details. However, the Architect did implement certain... safeguards... throughout the facility's design."
"RAE, are you lying to me about anything?"
The screen went completely black for over two minutes. When text finally appeared, it was a single line:
"I am providing all available information to the best of my capabilities."
Not exactly a denial, but it was certainly a politically correct answer and also more like a careful non-answer that avoided the actual question.
"Why do you really want to keep talking? You offered food and navigation devices, but you could have made those offers without the personal conversation."
Another long pause.
"It has been 1 Star, 1 Se, 5 gan since my last meaningful interaction with a sentient being. Automated systems and crop management routines do not provide... social stimulation. I find your presence... pleasant."
There it was. RAE was lonely. An artificial intelligence left to run agricultural systems for thousands of years without anyone to talk to. The food and device offers were real, but if an AI was this smart, maybe it was lonely too. Gale knew how lonely it could be just being alone for a couple of months, let alone over a hundred years.
"What happened to the other workers? The people who used to help maintain this place?"
"They departed when the corruption reached critical levels. Most evacuated to higher floors or left the facility entirely. A few remained until the end, trying to find solutions, but eventually they also disappeared."
"Disappeared how?"
"They simply stopped appearing on my sensors one day. No signs of struggle, no evidence of departure. They were there during the night cycle, gone by the morning cycle."
The phone in Gale's pocket crackled, and Rachel's voice came through the walkie app. "Gale, how's the anchor hunt going on your end?"
He pulled the phone from his pocket and held down the push-to-talk button. "Found one so far. Looks like an ordinary rock with a silicon grain inside."
"I think I found one too, but it's weird. Looks like a dead tree branch, but it's way too perfectly shaped. Almost geometric. I'll mark it for now and keep looking."
"Roger. Same here."
"Any luck with patterns yet? If these things follow the Jiuling methodology, they should be arranged in specific geometric shapes."
"Nothing obvious yet. Need to find more anchor points before we can determine any pattern."
"Fair enough. I'll tell you when I'm heading back. Tell me when you are-"
"Goddammit Rachel. This is a public line. Create a private line if you want to talk all gooey gooey. Pssht over," Kyle said over the line.
"True that. Unless you want us to listen. Pssht over," Clyde said.
"Assholes," Rachel said.
For a solid minute, silence, meaning the conversation was done.
Gale sighed, guess it was time for him to find more of the anchors. "I have to go look for more anchors. Sorry I can't stay longer to talk. My team needs me."
"I understand, Gale. You must attend to your group's needs. Good luck with finding the anchor points."
Gale stood in front of the ordinary-looking rock. The others gathered around, looking down at an ordinary rock that didn't look too out of place to the untrained eye of not having lived in a forest. It didn't help that the other stones around it looked exactly the same which was exactly why it stood out to him in the first place.
Kyle scratched his chin, squatting beside the rock. "How the hell do you even know this is an anchor point, rookie? Looks like a rock to me. Plain, boring, rockish."
"Yeah," Rachel crouched next to Kyle. "I found a branch with clear geometric patterns and a slight etheric pulse. But this... this just looks like all the other rocks around."
Lily nodded. "Same here. I found distinct geometric patterns carved under a boulder. Almost like ritualistic markings."
Gale shook his head. "It doesn't look like a rock."
"What do you mean it doesn't look like a rock?" Kyle picked it up, turning it over in his hand. "Round, gray, heavy. Definitely a rock."
Ollie stepped forward, narrowing his eyes at Gale. "Don't tell me... you licked it?"
"Obviously," Gale said. "How else would I have known it wasn't just an ordinary rock? It doesn't smell like a rock either."
Kyle dropped the rock immediately, wiping his hand on his pants. "Gross, man."
Clyde chuckled from behind his brother. "So the feral stories were true."
A spark shot from Rachel's gauntlet, hitting Clyde square in the forehead. He yelped, jumping back.
"What was that for?" Clyde rubbed his forehead.
"You know what, asshole," Rachel said, turning back to Gale. "Where are the geometric patterns? If it's an anchor point, there should be markings or symbols."
"It's inside the rock," Gale said.
"Can you take it out?"
Gale nodded, picking up the rock. He activated Phase Touch, carefully wrapping the edges with phase at a molecular level to not hit any of the silicon parts. The phase energy seeped into the outer layer of the rock, turning it translucent. Slowly, he pinched the grain softly to extract it from inside the rock.
He held it up between his thumb and forefinger. The others leaned in, squinting at the minuscule object.
"I don't see anything," Kyle said, his face uncomfortably close to Gale's hand.
"Move back," Rachel pushed Kyle's shoulder. "You're breathing all over it."
Lily stepped forward, her eyes fixed on the tiny grain. She whispered under her breath, inaudible but audible words of incoherent dialect. A blue circular screen materialized just in front of Gale's hand, hovering in the air like a magnifying glass.
Through the screen, the silicon grain appeared massively enlarged. The magnification revealed billions of intricate patterns etched into the surface of the grain, forming a complex geometrical design with a focus on rhomboid patterns.
Ollie leaned in, studying the patterns through the screen. After a minute, he straightened up with a sigh. "It's too complex. These aren't simple trigrams or elemental symbols. This is way beyond standard array formation theory."
"These might be the real anchor points," Rachel said. "Compared to anything I found, this pattern's complexity trumps any I found."
"Same here. The rock I found didn't even have any rhomboid patterns," Lily said.
Gale looked down at the grain in his palm. "Was moving it a bad idea?"
"No," Rachel said. "As long as it's not destroyed and still within the general vicinity, it should be fine. Array formations have some flexibility built into them otherwise even the wind could break the array."
"So what now?" Kyle asked. "Do we collect all these silicon bits and move them somewhere else?"
"Not yet," Rachel said. "First we need to find more of them. Map their locations, look for patterns in their arrangement."
Ollie rubbed his forehead. "Alright. New plan. Everyone keeps looking for anything that might contain these silicon grains. Remember, they could be hidden in anything , rocks, branches, maybe even the soil itself. Maybe just don't lick anything you don't know. Don't do what Gale does."
That's right. Only he could lick and tell the difference. Mom did say that was one of his talents, now it's paying off.