chapter 166
In my hand was currently a metallic rod. My fingers were in specific locations that allowed me to interface with this rod to the best of my capabilities. Not only that, but from both ends, there were cables that were connected to my two interface ports.
This design was somewhat modified from a spy device that was quite common back on Earth. What this thing was built to do was take data extremely rapidly and then cut itself physically off from whatever source it was pulling from.
When my innate ability triggered for a moment there, I knew absolutely everything about who I had just killed. While slowly I have been able to start retaining more of that information, there is no point in trying not to cheat the system.
My mind and my onboard storage are so connected that no matter where I try to store this information, it’s gone before I know it. Because it comes and goes so fast, FH also can’t help. Our connection simply isn't fast enough.
From the command chair, it was easy to see the surrounding space and the half-dead space monster that we were approaching. Over the course of us hunting all the space monsters in this solar system, we have come to understand the biology of this particular species and what shots kill and what shots maim them.
That space monster was still dangerous, but we were creeping closer, all our weapons aimed at the monster, ready to kill it. The closer we got, the more it started to struggle, trying to move toward us, but it could barely move with all the damage it had suffered.
The kilometres ticked down until the counter changed to metres. Ever closer we crept until we were finally about 200 metres away. Before I gave the order to shoot, I did a last check on the connections to make sure they were solid, and then I nodded.
The hard-light turrets made a lot less vibration when firing, but I could still feel it. Then it happened, the space monster died, and my innate ability connected with it. It pushed me to my limit almost immediately, as the space monster was close to 40 metres long, built like a cockroach, flat and wide.
Up to this point, I had only seen how technology was made to manipulate the fabric of space, but now I could see how biology did it. It was less precise, but it could be more powerful.
The way its carapace’s molecular structure was intertwined, and how that made it nearly indestructible by regular lasers, gave me so many ideas and made it clear that, in truth, I was still a novice at material science.
Where this space monster’s joints were, were the places where crystal grew. Those were the things that were needed to interact with the fabric of space. This one, because of how its carapace was structured, had a lot of these crystals embedded in large clusters.
So that’s how it was able to bend so much incoming fire without getting overheated and with such strength. They also had fascinating systems to deal with the internal heat. It seems that that was going to be a struggle for anything living or operating in space.
They seemed to be using the fabric of space itself to bleed off some heat or do the opposite and generate it instead when necessary. Never even knew that could be a possibility.
Their biology seemed so different, yet I could see commonalities with bugs, mammals, fish, even birds. It was theorised that these creatures were the very first complex life in the universe. I guess life seems to always find similar pathways to success.
These creatures didn’t see like we did; they sensed things so much better than any of our equipment could. They also used this to communicate with each other. If this creature were ever to go into an area without mana, they would be completely blind and deaf.
All of this I understood in a fraction of a moment. Doing my best to push this time as much as possible, I held on to this moment. The longer I did so, the worse the pain got. Finally, I chose an insignificant, barely attached part of the carapace and only turned that into currency.
The rod that was in my hand expanded, now being fully covered by an inert rubber, with both of the cables coming from both ends being cut as the ports were slammed shut at either end.
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What I remembered from all of that was the general location of its important body parts and a vague memory of being impressed by the molecular structure of the carapace.
From my nose, blood was trickling down. Not only was this space monster a bit too big for my ability, pushing that time when I knew everything was truly taxing.
My innate ability truly was in a class of its own. To be able to get that type of information might be even more valuable than just turning stuff into currency. And the fact that I could do this to any living creature, not just the ones inside space portals, was a cherry on top.
Of course, the biggest advantage was still my ability to make it more likely for me to get skill stones by choosing what I turned into currency and what I didn’t. That, however, wasn’t going to be as effective outside the portal, as the looting effect wasn’t as pronounced for 100% real individuals, but it was still there.
“Captain, should we go harvest?” Bob asked.
“No point in wasting time on this right now. Soon, there’s going to be a fleet of ships here going to take care of all of that for us.”
“It would be good practice.”
“In that you are correct, but let’s clear everything out and then we will have time to practise.”
“Yeah, I know… it’s just, there’s loot right there,” Bob said with a big smile on his face.
Looking at the screen displaying the dead space monster, prices started to flash in my mind on how much each part would be worth. It definitely was a nice bit of loot. No Remi, focus.
“We still have a couple of stragglers to finish off, then it’s time to start tackling the bigger clusters. Also, before that, we are supposed to do a flyby of the refining station?”
“Yes, Captain, we believe that there are some radioactive materials we can salvage there. We should pick it up as it’s only a small detour.”
“Let’s do that then.”
When I left everyone else to work, I took the rod to my workshop. As I inserted it into its reading device, the first thing that surprised me was how full it was. That was a lot of data.
It took the program FH and Lola made quite a while to decipher the gathered data. Nearly three days later, I could finally look at it. It was all there, my observations, the way I understood almost everything. The data was more corrupt near the end, most likely because of the pain, making it harder for me to concentrate.
So, there was really no point in pushing myself too much. But I now had a way to cheat until I grew strong enough to retain all the information I got from my innate ability.
The more I read, the more my mind started to race uncontrollably with all the different ideas I got. That clustered shielding system was absolutely brilliant. It would be expensive, but we could possibly have ourselves a secondary shield system that should make it so that most shots wouldn’t even hit us.
The biological components were also interesting, and while we certainly couldn’t grow them with our current technology level, with biocybernetics, we could certainly get close to mimicking them.
For a moment there, I had a flashback to games with technology trees. It felt like we were discovering more and more branches, but all of them would take time to research. The choice was what to pick first.
As always, that answer—if not in a critical situation—was something that improved your research speed. For us, that meant seed technology, as that would allow us to make truly high-end processors and help me build even better AI cores.
With that, we could improve our processing capability and perhaps even make a couple of dedicated AIs that would be focused on research. From what FH has gathered, truly high-end technology is a guarded secret to whomever owns it.
The cheapest and safest way to reach that level would be to build it ourselves. I could already see it. Ships and drones all built with the best portal materials, all powered by magic tech. Nothing would stand in our way. Worlds would fall.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa—relax there, you don’t want to become what you hate.” I had to remind my own mind.
It still amazed me how easily power could corrupt; it was so insidious. Always question your own actions, then compare them to your older self and what he would think of it. That’s the best way to see if something’s changed.
I am not chasing power to dominate. I am chasing it to remain free. But freedom means nothing if you need to take it from others to have it.
Breathing in and out, I managed to centre myself again. Mind’s Clarity skill helped with that. I really needed to focus more on that and rank it up. In fact, I’ll do that right now.
I had already gone through all my current skills and got a basic understanding of their complexity and what was needed to upgrade them. Mind’s Clarity wasn’t just about clearing your mind; it was about having clarity of yourself.
So that’s what I did. I let go of all distractions and, as best as possible, focused for the next few days fully on clearly looking at myself. My faults and strengths, what made me, me.
What I saw certainly wasn’t perfect. At best, I would describe myself as grey. Someone who tipped sometimes more into dark, sometimes more into light, depending on the situation.
This was who I was. There was no need to weigh my actions on an invisible scale to make my good choices balance out my bad; that wasn’t what this skill was about.
A truly terrible person could still use this skill to get a clearer picture of who they are. While change was inevitable, this allowed you to better see what influences you and what influence to fight against. I was comfortable with who I am, but I did not want to be more cruel just to chase more power.
These past few days felt like I had gone on a vacation in a wonderful resort. I felt lighter, my mind was clearer, and I felt fully me once again. Definitely going to have to do this more often.
“We’re approaching the station, Captain.”
“Good.”
The drones launched from the ship and accelerated as fast as possible towards the station. They would barely have enough time or fuel to make it back. While we slowed down quite a lot compared to the barely moving station, we were flying.
No life signs were detected, and we could easily see where parts of the station were ripped apart as the space monsters searched for food inside. That must have been a horrible way to go.
Those ripped-apart pathways also helped our drones quickly get inside, locate the two different sources of radioactive materials we detected, and secure them. We did have to slow down more than we wanted, otherwise one of the drones wouldn’t have made it back.
Thanks to FH being able to manipulate the entry portals for our deep storage, it was easy enough to transport the radioactive materials—which weighed almost 280 kilos—inside our power core.
While this was far from enough to run the ship silently, it certainly helped, and it was always good to have the raw materials needed to make some atomic bullets. Our next stop was going to be the first cluster of space monsters.