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“Spirit Computation Beads?”

Murphy looked at Miriam with an expression that was one-quarter puzzled mixed with three-quarters curious and three-quarters confused.

He could understand those three words individually, but combined he had no idea what they meant.

Beside him, Maxim also looked completely baffled.

Miriam only told him that this matter was serious, but the loyal vampire worshipper’s understanding of “steam engineering” was also limited to just those two words themselves.

He and his master were both true novices in this regard.

“Ah, let me explain from the beginning.”

Miriam knew from their blank expressions that they simply did not understand her concern.

She took out another bead array from the box under her butt and held it up at a special angle above her eyes, saying to Murphy:

“Look at the bead from this angle and tell me what you see?”

Murphy held up the bead array according to Miriam’s instructions.

Vampires have quite good night vision, and when the gems were turned to a certain angle, he immediately saw unique structures reflected inside the semi-transparent beads.

It looked very much like tiny gears and mechanical structures combined into an extremely complex system, densely packed together yet arranged in an orderly and visually appealing industrial manner. There were exactly three such systems inside the transparent bead, which was only a little bigger than a thumbnail, interconnected by a geared lever system into one larger whole.

“This is impossible!”

Murphy immediately refuted:

“If I’m not seeing things… no, I must be seeing things! No matter how advanced the industrial level of the Halflings, they could not possibly make components this precise on such a micro scale!

There are at least tens of thousands of parts combined here.

Is this some kind of illusion?”

“To be precise, it’s a third-generation triple-linked micro spirit differential engine with 44,327 parts combined, updated to the latest version.

It’s said to have extremely fast computing speed!”

Miriam shrugged smoothly as she said a rather complex phrase in Transian that made Maxim’s head spin a little.

But Murphy understood.

He continued looking at Miriam with a questioning gaze, and she explained:

“Don’t look at me like that, I don’t understand how it works in detail either. I’m just a liberal arts student. Those terms are from old Professor Bach Gaslamp’s writings, which I read just to get credits for the Mechanical History elective course. I never expected it would come in handy in this kind of situation.

Anyway, the micro differential engines inside the Computation Beads aren’t real, of course!

The prototype took up an entire exhibition hall that big in the underground museum of Shaldor Engineering Academy. But the halfling mechanics got inspiration from the ‘spirit erosion’ phenomenon found all over this world.

They and their dwarven brothers used special techniques to manipulate spirit energy, using spirit formulas with the help of Circle Tower’s spirit mages to coordinate the spirit factors widely present in nature into some kind of esoteric art, eventually simulating the operating principles of differential engines on a microscopic level.

After that, micro computational beads were born, and the halflings’ steam engineering entered a new era.”

Miriam shook the bead in her hand and said:

“All the automata in Shaldor Harbor have these things. This is a pure computation type without control attachments. You just need to infuse it with spirit energy and it can help the user do many things.”

“Like what?”

Maxim asked naively.

His brain, too muddled from excessive exposure to the occult from a young age, simply could not comprehend everything Miriam had just said. But his question came at just the right time.

The red-haired girl rolled her eyes and patiently explained:

“Like translating an entire book of elvish poetry in a minute, or planning how to spend your salary next month and how much you’ve spent this year in a few seconds.

If necessary, it can even make you an income statement. Just activate the spirit projector and you can see the calculation results with your own eyes.

When I enrolled at the Engineering Academy, I was also issued a second-generation Computation Bead the size of a fist as part of the student welfare.

Now many campuses at Greater Shaldor University are undergoing a ‘storage reform’, where those professors plan to use spirit beads and databases to replace ancient paper documents.

It’s really convenient!

You only need an area the size of a castle to store all the information in an old library as big as Kadman City, and if you need a book, just tell your Computation Bead and it can retrieve and copy it for you.

If you’re lazy enough, you can even have it read it out loud for you.

Of course, an external spirit microphone costs extra, and only those rich noble boys would use that service. I heard they use Computation Beads to read some really vulgar stuff at certain gatherings for entertainment.”

“That’s not the point!”

Murphy had a general understanding of what these Computation Beads were. Although not necessarily exactly the same, he could basically view them as this world’s “computers and operating systems.” But for now, they seemed to have only sprouted and been put into use in the halfling territories of Shaldor, without spreading to other parts of the continent yet.

So he asked:

“The point is, why is the Goldflower Kingdom making a huge effort to smuggle Computation Beads back from the Shaldor halflings? And marking them as military supplies?”

“Because they can indeed be used for war, Murphy.”

Miriam sighed and said:

“That’s what I heard from my halfling tutor when I first entered the academy, supposedly because the Circle Tower took the side of the Goldflower Kingdom in the Ten Years’ War.

When the situation was unfavorable in the early stages of the war, the spirit mages proposed utilizing Computation Beads for military purposes. They also participated in the development of Computation Beads and were second only to the halfling mechanics in understanding them.

They modified the internal logic and simulation algorithms of the Computation Beads, and in three months built a communication and command system covering the entire Greenleaf Corps, using each Computation Bead and its user as a communication node and even calculating artillery firing positions, dramatically improving command efficiency.

In the first two years of the Ten Years’ War, the old theocratic rebels and their allies took sixteen months to conquer two border provinces of the Goldflower Kingdom. But after Computation Beads were deployed in the war, the refitted Greenleaf Corps and old Royal Guards took only three months to drive the rebels out of the country.

I cannot imagine how they used these things for war, but after that, the Steam Lords immediately ordered a ban on the outflow of Computation Beads.

It was clearly the Goldflower Kingdom’s use of their life’s work for war that angered the mechanics. It’s said that because of this incident, they also completely cut off joint research and development with the Circle Tower afterward.

The 3,000 bead arrays we seized were ordered by the Pioneer Corps, perhaps that legendary General Loren also wanted to emulate the reforms of the Greenleaf Corps and upgrade his own troops.

But if I had to guess, these beads probably didn’t come from the Shaldor halflings.”

The red-haired girl looked over the bead array in her hand a couple times and said to Murphy:

“There’s no production serial number on this, and the style is a bit different from the official ones I’ve seen. These things were likely made by someone else.

But honestly, apart from the halfling craftsmen, I can’t think of any other force on the continent that could make something this precise?”

Murphy nodded.

Miriam had told him all she knew. As she said, this batch of goods was of great significance to the Goldflower Kingdom and was indeed a hot potato.

That General Loren likely wouldn’t let it go easily.

However, Murphy was still a bit puzzled. He pinched the bead array in his hand and used Item Appraisal. A second later, an information tag popped up before his eyes:

Name: 3rd Generation Spirit Computation Bead – Cracked Version

Effect: By resonating with higher nodes, can build regional spirit encrypted communication network, preset standard permission tree, enable simple information transmission between parallel and upper/lower nodes, multiple communication modes and relative position calculation, custom coordinate marking and sharing, simple spirit projection, multi-language simple translation, etc.

Note!

This Computation Bead’s encryption lock has been completely cracked, so it supports user custom edited additional functions.

But this operation requires some understanding of microscale steam engineering, spirit erosion phenomenon, binary information storage theory, 3rd generation spirit differential machinery, and control theory.

Note!

Please find the upper node to activate and initialize the same batch of Computation Beads.

Manufacturer: Ryuk Flywheel

Item Description:

【After I left Shaldor Harbor, the steam engineers’ research into wondrous machinery ground to a halt. Especially when I saw the so-called 3rd generation Computation Beads, I could confirm the depravity of those idiot colleagues of mine. Breaking their vaunted seven-layer encryption was no harder than tricking the last piece of meat out of a cannibal goblin’s pot.

The fact is, I not only cracked it, I upgraded it too!

They want to monopolize this wonderful technology, but I insist on giving it to everyone who needs or doesn’t need it, while earning myself a little pocket money along the way.

Ah, thank goodness I was born into this world where smart people make the rules and gobble up the fools! – Ryuk Flywheel】

Murphy narrowed his eyes.

He immediately thought of the best use scenario for these Spirit Computation Beads and began to thank fate for its blessings in his heart.

“Find it!”

He looked up at Miriam and Maxim and said:

“Search the cargo! If that General Loren plans to use these to build his own command system, there should be a higher node, the commander’s bead for his own use. Find it!”

“Oh right, how did I forget that!”

Miriam immediately jumped up.

Murphy was correct, the Spirit Computation Beads had a strict permission tree design, and the whole system couldn’t be activated without the higher node.

She instructed Maxim to lift up the overturned wagon, but it was too heavy and the injured blood servant couldn’t do it. Murphy shook his head and stepped up, gripping the wagon’s edge with both hands.

Exerting his rare 10.5 strength template boosted by the night, he easily lifted one side of the entire wagon.

The two assistants immediately crawled inside, first pushing out the crushed soldiers before removing all the large and small boxes from inside.

In the deepest part of the wagon, Miriam found an exquisite brass box.

She carefully brought it out and placed it before Murphy. There was a metal panel on the lock area with just 0 and 1 buttons.

“It’s a binary encryption lock, I’ve seen these safes in books! A rather traditional pure mechanical structure, but very useful. It has inert materials inside so it’s unaffected by spirit spells. They’re usually configured with acid vials or masterwork combustion gold bombs, powerful enough to destroy anything within ten meters.”

The red-haired girl rubbed her head and said:

“This is tricky now, entering the wrong code could destroy whatever’s inside.”

Murphy didn’t speak, only placing his hand on the brass box.

Item Appraisal activated! The information tag popped up:

Name: Ryuk Flywheel’s Self-Destructing Safe Model 400

Use: Storing valuables.

Item Description:

【Ryuk Flywheel was a brilliant halfling mechanic from a prestigious family who went rogue. He had many bad habits! Like using a uniform passcode for all his lockboxes, one of the countless little secrets of that genius madman now living in the Dark Mountains.

People still don’t know the background of the arms dealer Ryuk Flywheel, but there are rumors that his favorite girl’s birthday was April 14th.】

“Click click click”

As a former professional software tester, Murphy unhesitatingly entered the binary string 110011110, making Miriam look at him in horror.

She thought Murphy was just randomly pressing and quickly backed away, crouching with her head covered in case the safe exploded.

But a miracle happened!

As Murphy lifted his fingers, the little brass box clicked open, revealing the round Computation Bead inside.

Larger and more exquisite than other spirit beads, about the size of a baby’s fist, with the halfling mechanics’ factory serial number on the decorative silver-grey base.

This was actually an official product?

But why did its appearance differ so much from regular Computation Beads?

With this puzzlement, Murphy reached in and took out the core Computation Bead serving as the higher node. But the moment he touched it, his semi-transparent character card blurred for an instant, like TV static interference.

It returned to normal a second later.

Then, to Murphy’s surprise, a prompt jumped out before his eyes:

Special tech item【4th Generation Spirit Computation Bead Prototype – Codename 003】detected. Its spirit tech level is sufficient to partially recreate simplified test admin system functions!

Please designate functions from the currently unlocked list for simplified recreation by Alpha.

Note!

Due to this item’s outdated manufacturing process and convoluted principles as an early stage of this tech tree, its data memory is limited, so do not designate complex functions for recreation.

“My luck today is just fantastic!”

Murphy whistled, his face beaming with double joy.

Although he still didn’t understand how this thing worked or comprehend the strange level this world’s eccentric steam engineering had developed to, that was unimportant!

Because the player interface he had longed for was now here, wasn’t it?

Ah, thanks to nature’s blessings!