Shadow Novelist
Star Energy
"How do we create Pure Energy?" Nick asked.
"That's far in the future! First, you need to produce much more Star Energy. It takes a lot of Star Energy to create Pure Energy. Star Energy is the meat, while Zephyx is the spice. It is called Zephyx, right?"
"Yes," Nick confirmed.
After talking with Nick for a while, the Specter started to use some of Nick's terminology to make it easier for him.
"You need a lot of Star Energy, and you need to be able to produce it with a machine that you can wear. Are you familiar with ATP?"
"The primary source of energy for cells," Nick answered.
"Happy: Good thing that you know human biology! Normal humans store energy in the form of fat because ATP has very little energy. Star Energy is like ATP. It takes up a lot of volume, and using it while it's in a storage container will not be practical. You would need to carry a huge container just to use a Seed for a couple of minutes."
"But we will come to that in the future."
"Softly commanding: For now, just listen to me, and don't waste time on unimportant things like trying to control Star Energy with your mind. It's a wasted effort. It's like trying to control pure iron ore. Instead of trying to control pure iron ore, you should focus on making it into a metal bar before transforming it into steel. Then, you can think about what to do with it."
"I understand," Nick answered. "Continue explaining."
"Good!"
The Adversary continued explaining to Nick how to produce Star Energy.
However, despite the Adversary's protest, Nick decided against telling the researchers what to research.
It was important to leave researchers some freedom so that they could make full use of their creativity.
Right now, the Adversary was leading Nick down a single path when there were many other paths to explore.
Instead of pulling the researchers down the primary path, Nick decided to let them explore the side paths.
While the end of these paths wouldn't be as important as the end of the primary path, it would still pay off.
For the next four years, Nick listened to the Specter.
Then, Nick's time was up.
He had used up the 15 years he had received from the Left Arm.
Nick wrote another book and delivered it to the researchers, who were still busy experimenting with Star Energy.
Luckily, thanks to Nick's books, the production of Star Energy ramped up even more.
By now, they were producing more than they needed for their experiments.
With the newest book Nick had written, they had the means to produce enough Star Energy to operate a couple of Seeds.
But now, the truly hard part had arrived.
They needed to shrink the machine to the size of a bracelet without compromising the output.
That seemed impossible.
But apparently, there was a way.
The Adversary just hadn't gotten to that part of the explanation yet.
Nick told Ghosty that he would be busy for the next couple of years and that he wouldn't be able to deliver a book in quite a while.
"While I don't want to tell you where to go, the Adversary is saying that we have to upgrade the production of Star Energy even more. After that, we have to make the machine much smaller. I know you don't need more Star Energy for your experiments right now, but please don't stop advancing in that direction. We need a lot of Star Energy in the future," Nick explained.
"I understand," Ghosty answered. "We will still continue going down this route."
"Thank you," Nick answered.
Then, Nick left the researchers and went back to his actual job.
The first thing he did was to extend the sentences of all the guards to return to his base level of Zephyx production.
Sadly, while the guards had once been at a much higher level than Nick, things had changed.
The guards used to be Governors, which meant they were Early and Mid Heroes.
Nick was a Late Demon now, and the Zephyx they gave Nick was not amazing anymore.
Additionally, while it sucked to do guard duty, they were also not suffering that much.
Sure, they felt stifled and suppressed, but they were not in constant pain and agony.
In a way, they still lived normal lives.
They were just humans with a shitty job.
"Your power has advanced significantly," the Left Arm commented when Nick entered her office.
"Thank you, Left Arm," he said.
The Left Arm nodded. "I expect more results from you. Your power has increased, and you should be able to accomplish even more impressive feats now."
Naturally, the Left Arm didn't want Nick to achieve anything besides growing stronger, but she couldn't say that openly due to the Champion of Light.
"I will just do that. In fact, I thought of a new way to contribute," Nick said.
"Yes?" the Left Arm asked.
"Specter hunting," Nick answered. "Specters can tell that I am also a Specter, which means they won't try their best to hide from me. Additionally, traveling across the world is not dangerous to me since all the powerful Specters wouldn't gain anything from killing me."
"I think I should focus on hunting Demons and Fanatics for Aegis. That should help humanity."
"That is fine," the Left Arm answered. "The important thing is that you contribute. As long as your results help humanity become more powerful, they are fine."
"Avoid the Grand Continent. We need Sloth to feel secure for now."
"Instead, focus on the Great Triangle. There have been reports of a new kind of influence on the cities, and we highly suspect that War has found a new servant to replace Pride."
"We are not yet sure what kind of servant it is or what it can do, but we can see a pattern."
"The new servant is still trying to establish a foothold, and we need to strike before the foothold becomes stable."
"The more wild Specters you capture, the harder it will be for the new servant to create a zone of influence."
Nick nodded.
"I will do just that."
'And at the same time, I will focus on my plan to increase my Zephyx production,' Nick thought.
'But it will be risky, and the Champion can't learn of this.'
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