Date: Þórri 9th, 598 AD. (Alt: 21st January, 599 AD.) Location: Götaland (Ancient Sweden.)
"-that is why I am sorry, Heath." Freyja came in with a sudden apologetic testimonial during their previous meetup about 4 days ago.
The topic? She had set up a few deactivated traps within the shielding around the Cavern when it was first built in case he was a threat, which was during the first day Heath had come around to build the underground false realm.
These traps included twisting vine tethers that could lock onto a person's soul signature, and those that would sap their energy away until they could be dealt with, a similar fate to how Mímir was treated in God of War. Or the homing callers that would focus incoming scouts to his direction to gank him when he would least expect it. But after seeing him meet with the local mortals and his development of further technologies, her guilt built until today, where she finally chose to tell the truth. . . It was inevitable, as he would have found out in a week.
"So that is why you tried to trade your body for that without any strings, 'not a test'?" Heath forlornly deadpans with the face of a drill sergeant upon a collapsed private who failed her testing. "You saw me as someone so shallow as to accept that?" He snarled.
"I did see you as a good potential partner, I only told the truth as of now, I swear upon my name." She stated it upon the highest order of contractual truth-testing for a Goddess such as herself, the room darkened a moment with no internal stimulus before turning back to normal. Heath waited, but saw that with no sudden fated punishment arriving, it was obvious she told the truth. Heath turned away, fingers upon the bridge of his nose. 'Well, I can gather her paranoia with the brutality of this world, but I cannot forgive her.' His jaw clenched tightly.
After that burst of anger towards her, he quickly calmed himself to rationalise and see it from her point of view, with so many enemies even within her own ranks, who would not see a newcomer under the growing personal bias and hyper-generalisation?
She felt one had to prove themselves, which Heath had after mass-healing the Völsung clan. Even so, it was too late. It could only be deactivated, not deconstructed over a slow stretch! If one part of the system was removed, all would follow at a resonant cascading motion. He understood it all too well how such devices were fragile, yet so powerful, a stereotypical, eh, glass catapult? trebuchet? Whatever would match best for the time period. Now ignoring the monologuing awkwardness, Heath looked upon her again with understanding, yet contempt.
"I have no idea if you can regain my trust, a threat not just on my life but potentially thousands once I had led them there to safety?" He stared her down, yet she was unflinching, her blue ethereal eyes betraying nothing. "It will take time." He shrews.
The courtesy he felt obligated to provide to most in this case was closer to mockery, yet he still tried to remain civil. "What do you wish for?" Her question was met with a raised hand, almost aiming to slap himself. 'No.' He stopped himself. "Do you truly believe all I cared for was a transaction? A political system only built through cold transfers?" He took a step back. "I had shared with you knowledge unbidden, we gave each other history neither of us knew to each other. All for what?" Heath no longer sat upon her chairs, he floats cross-legged.
A potential lead clicked, for the shield Brijga gave him, how could it have been oh so easily dismantled by beings lesser than the Pantheon ahead of him? "I cannot even trust if the scout you first sent to see me was also an outlier that allowed the Dǫkkálfar to find us." . . .
"I will keep to this alliance for those who have not caused such harm. But you-!" He closes his eyes, unsure if it is to hold anger or tears, only heaving. "-will not hear of me." He warps back, unable to do any emotionless forms of bargaining, even if he knew the processes and had perfectly replicable memories, it feels wrong to the very core of his persona. He stares down towards his feet, angrier than any other moment in the past few weeks from any other moment. He sits down, defeated, too many batterings from known and unknown alike.
"I shared with her." He holds his head, gripping his false skin until indenting. "Ghiliana." They pierced through, showing polychromatic flashes. "What have I done?" Heath stops, then organically lets go of his head to then fly up to strengthen the seal around his home.
To work is to break out of this depression, so he absorbs extra material while reinforcing the shielding with all of this knowledge that he has been provided. Every rune, every seal, the very surrounding protective barrier that was once 'graciously' provided has been overturned. All working in tandem with a brute-forced method that was tied to his soul. The magic rippled and conjoined under a new incomprehensible pattern to put a fog-of-war effect upon the interior of the Cavern. This one-way visual shroud would keep it all hidden from strangers.
He became his gaunt self again, now appearing closer to a skull with a beard. He flies down to give this magnum opus a wiring that would determine it all. . . With connections to the sigil's blip below, it is synchronised to a ticking that was identifiable only by Heath himself.
Still not enough. He needed to protect what is important, not caring that he appears malnourished, Heath understood that it is an instinctual representation of how it feels to be 'hollow' from the missing internal mechanisms that guide his spells. He does not care, only increasing the absorption rate to deal with such a 'hunger.' (Like father, like daughter.) Twice his form faded in parts before resolidifying and convening. He spent two nights working tirelessly, believing he was successfully hiding from all presences until the job was complete.
With it now being the 11th (23rd January,) he still does not feel ready to return, but not much had changed in such a small amount of time. The siphoning is going as strong as ever, the Autos and Bus golems continue their routes in unionised tandem, and the people are happy.
'What compelled me?' He grinds his teeth. What insidious plot forced him to tell his deepest secret when they had only met that same day? He pushes the question away from the forefront of his thoughts to think up portions of such grand projects. 'A power source.' Three words unspoken, where the air currents pick up from the artificial rains as discussed before. He taps into his vast will to create the technology, using the base prints of what they had discussed a week ago, he begins moulding the materials to reach these properties.[1]
Heath creates the entire multi-purpose factory upon a floating reverse-pyramid platform that would slowly glide around while in a spin-resonant orbit, locked upon the edges of the farm where the winds would blow, gyroscopically stable and ready for power generation now.
To maintain it, it has a copper bowl-like casing hidden within its internal structure that would maintain it under any and all damage that is <= 50%; if greater, it would notify Heath directly. "Should I place weapons platforms?" He talks to himself, unaware that he had company watching him from behind. Valyria has been seeing him toiling within his own emotions, stewing for long enough and with enough determinable awareness that it was due to the Goddess he had talked about, Freyja.[2]
'It seems Uncle was right.' Egill's statements to not trust the Æsir wholeheartedly have been proven true, she had heard from his mutterings about his other contact with this 'Móði', and if his name suggests his personality, she will be keeping a close eye on any further dealings.
'I am sorry, Papa. Let us hope we are proven wrong.' She slinks away now, refocused on finding a fighting style that would best suit her monstrous strength and dexterity. While many of the already prevailing techniques work well, her body's durability and height make her feel that grappling would be a better fit for her. Her much larger hands may also allow for the reforging of an extra handle, but into a thin glove-like gauntlet that would wrap around her. She could form the blades upon her fingernails, like Sabretooth or Lady Deathstrike.
'When should I make such a device?' She internally mutters, as knowing how to make them does not mean she could reforge them without help. 'I will talk to the blacksm-' Before she had time to process it, a loud explosion rang out from the reverse-pyramid power plant.
"DAMNIT!" Heath yelled out with renewed anger, unexpectedly exploding when trying to transfer power through a portal network that led to a newly formed lightbulb within his hand. He shook off the soot that is now on his palm and collected the metal and glass shards strewn across the floor, rumbling within himself that he should be more careful in case of a chain-explosion. Valyria comes over to check on him. "Papa?" Her question caused the grumbling to stop, and he then looked over, expression softening.
". . . Hey kid." He raised his arms, which made her instinctively reach for a hug. "Seems you got my anger issues, huh?" He depreciatingly chuckles into her torso. "Yeah." She kisses the top of his forehead before they let each other go.
"Over the past few days." He pauses, trying to word it nicely. "I felt your sadness and frustration, where you would train against the Autos. Is there any way I could help?" He hopes this could also help with father-daughter bonding. "And have you had time to meet your brother?" He raises an eyebrow. Both questions back-to-back allowed her to feel the warmth that is family. "No, It is okay, I am working alone to understand myself. And I met him yesterday." She feels a playful jab to her arm. "Were you doing it daily?" He toothily smiles.
"Mhm, brother appears fond of weapons making, he stayed close to Yufren and Artkrea." He shows his memories of the matter. "And Adal?" His question was met with a look, not answered. "I can see you do not trust him. But he is our best chance to gain knowledge."
"But your knowledge is good now, no?" Valyria overestimated her father's reach, she understood much of his powers and prophecies, but she had not known much of it was blind luck and flukes. "Still not enough, so we will keep an eye on him. We do not wish them to report any 'insider information.'" He breaks one of his personal vows for free will that had been set up when he came to this realm. 'But for the safety of his people, it was absolutely needed. I hope you understand, Adal.' Heath internally laments his old idealism.
He closed his eyes, digesting it slowly to understand possible consequences while patting her arm for them to move further into the machinery of the false pyramid, their floating around the archaic electronics stirring unrest from the rare few people that walk below.
He opens his eyes again to give a greater look, he spots a few flaws from his increased emotional reactivity and rushing that had been done from the rushing, which are just as quickly fixed with the aid of his personal magic. Where the electronic cabling would go through the portal had been melted down and is a burnt black sludge on the floor, an incredible overload that could be due to the electrons' destabilisation through a magical medium. "Hey kid, thinking of any ideas?" She may be young, but she is not inexperienced.
She looks at the sludgy material below, grabbing a pinch that when rubbed together turned to an ash that blew in the slow winds, she sees it fly off and tries to gather some bearings to how it could work. 'Maybe that could work?' She gains an idea that she wishes to voice.
She looks towards the portal's rim, how the magic condenses to a near-opaque colour. "Could we make the magic dense, like a bar or ingot to mould?" She sees Heath get an idea. "Are you thinking of making an alloy of copper and solid magic?" His question was met with a giddy reaction from Valyria, who was happy he got her partial explanation. "Good idea, Valyria!" He hugs her for the inspiration, he only thought of material compounds for alloys, never of combining with ethereal materials in case of reactivity, but. . .
Now that this problem has arisen, what could be the issue that would stop him? 'This world is getting closer to Percy Jackson now, should it also be called celestial bronze?' He laughs at his internal oration to then go to the (elemental farm) for this process.
"Divine magic, natural magic, all as a semireactive pseudo-gas substance, maybe I could try them as differential alloys~?" He gathers the natural magic around him, spending his own power at an inefficient rate for it to densify, a process he will come to tweak for sure. He pictures it as an extension of himself, an object who has no true corporeal form, yet made into the illusion of a solid object, this process took ≈ 8 Model minutes / 1-Model Meter^(2), where it is turned to a cuboid across twice the surface area of his palm.
It was still too transparent, appearing like a thinned glowing cotton. It has no texture and is extremely lightweight. Even so, from Heath's view, he could feel the POWER from it. If one reactive component was introduced, it would probably equal a few KiloTons of TNT.
'Denser.' He forces more magic into it, twinkling spritzes of his own at a non-descript percentage to act as a glue, those globs of himself reacting in a way of epoxy resin within wood, creating bonds stronger than the original material itself. About 45 Model minutes have passed before a quantifiable change occurred. IT WAS FINALLY OPAQUE! And if he were to describe it now, its weight became close to styrofoam, and a texture that reminded him of fleece. Now he saves this recipe within himself to retry possible combinations later.
It cast no shadow, for the glow did not interact with objects around itself. It was visible only to eyes that can cast or trace the magic itself. Otherwise, it only had a nondistinguishing presence in the mind, fully invisible to every other sense.
'It is time.' He places the copper bar next to the magic block of the same size beside each other, then ever so slowly pushes them together. He forces an interaction between the magic and the metal, molecule by molecule. It shines oranges and greens, interacting with time and space in a way that it ages, destabilises, obfuscates and returns to its original form. It appears a colour combination so vibrant that it dulls its surroundings just by existing, scintillating between 'oranges' and 'light browns' that are impossible to picture.
Finishing it now, he covers it in a layer of pure iron to block any potential magic escapage, but even that allows him to see the spiritual light that causes an extreme form of grey to bore through his vision. He holds it within his hand to bring to Valyria behind him.
"Want to test it?" Valyria prepares herself by rubbing her hands enthusiastically. "I will prepare the portal, you hold the metal in your hands." He passes the glowing bar and crafts the lightbulb again, fuse and protective glass layer holding a noble gas. The set up is ready and workable, begetting little to no issues now that he has a helper, there is a space between the cables on either side and the portal, aligned to allow for a direct connection. Heath measures the distance between them, and she asks Valyria to morph it to such.
It was successful, she created hundres of slices using this material to transfer the electricity. The cable itself being nowhere near strong enough to hold all of this current, so it is limited to a small portion that, once placed, immediately travels through to send the power.
The light bulb turns on, its incandescent technology bright enough to form shadows even if it was daytime, they hold it up for a Model hour in case of circumstantial issues but it went along swimmingly, which Heath ticked as a great win. He tests the wire now on either end of the portal for temperature or corrosion damage, and what he found was that the side outside with the light was hotter than the second from the power plant, meaning that it was less coherent from some hidden factors. 'But that is an issue that is quite fixable.' Heath nods.
He is thinking of running a closed-loop londsdaelite anvil chain that works better against a standard diamond anvil cell from his home realm to continue the system on either side of the portal, providing the gigapascals needed for the yttrium decahydride superconductor.[3]
By putting it on either side of the gate that is the magic copper alloy slice, it would mean a clean, efficient transfer between them with little to no energy loss and heat. But to maintain that constant pressure would require an airtight sealant that is long-lasting and applicable to this idiosyncratic ruling. 'More copper runic structures it is.' He prepares a shell that goes around the anvil chain, now finally finishing it throughout. All of this testing made it to the dawn of the next day, where there are now 250,000 different cables to individual grids.
The chain and copper covering with an additional insulation around it is made of sheathed reinforced pyro-gel (treated aerogel) that makes the cable nearly 2-Model Meters (0.6465-m (2.1209-feet)) thick, but they can be easily hidden or adapted under the soil or in connective structures.
Heath's head feels like it is going to explode now, so he takes a break by sitting on the grass and watching the clouds go by with Valyria, a simple end to the beginning of a new day.
[1] "I had a solar panel system on my roof in my old realm, and if I remember right, the record of the most efficient photovoltaic setter was a III-V four-junction concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) cell, using gallium indium phosphide (GaInP) and aluminium gallium arsenide (AlGaAs), which was bonded onto the lower tandem solar cell made of gallium indium arsenide phosphide (GaInAsP) and gallium indium arsenide (GaInAs) in a flat structure, set under a four-layer ARC film stack." He reminds himself of the details, even if they are ever so vague.He tries to imagine how it would be. "And I know the process of how to motorise a three-bladed windmill, and with possible added reinforcements from graphene, it could be placed through with a CrCoNi and nanotube mixture for support, then copper for runic inscriptions."
[2] ᛉ (Protection / Shield / Elk,) ᛇ (Yggdrasil / Yew Tree / Dream Rune,) ᚱ (Horse / Ride / Journey / Thor Rune,) ᛟ (Heritage / Estate Rune,) ᚾ (Need / Hardship Rune,) ᛗ (Man / Human / Self Rune,) ᚠ (Cattle / Livestock / Wealth Rune,) ᛖ (Horse / Twin Forces Rune,) and ᚨ (Odin / Inspiration / Wisdom Rune.)
[3] A hypothetical YH10 superconductor that has a super-critical temperature of ≈ 1500 °K (1226.85 °C (2240.33 °F)) that would be built up naturally once insulated and a pressure of 375 GPA or 3700962.2502 Atmospheres, which can be reached easily with this setup. By using super-insulative materials such as a thickened layer of aerogel.