The hall glowed faintly, supported by the linked Magic of countless Elves through Empathic Communion, barely managing to deflect the attack. Even so, a huge chunk was torn away, more like a taste than a true repulse. The battle continued, though hope did not.
What was the point of fighting a battle with no chance of victory?
Vivian looked back and spoke to the Grand Elder. "Can your space Laws send someone out now? Just one person…"
"You mean Luna? No. The outside is covered by its tentacles, and my range cannot reach that far. And now… it seems to have rooted itself into the Barrier's wall."
The Grand Elder looked up at the former sky, now covered in dark green despair, with only trembling golden patterns holding on. If it were possible, he would have done it already. As the oldest of the Elven Race, he valued the world tree more than anyone.
Vivian took a deep breath and followed his gaze. "As expected. I have an idea. We might be able to activate the Barrier's teleportation mechanism."
The Grand Elder's eyes widened. "You mean… I see."
"If Luna cannot leave, then we will."
She nodded, resolve set. Beyond the Elves's duty to the world tree, there was also her own selfish wish. At least that child would live.
"…How is Vivian outside?"
Curled within the crowd, Luna covered her ears, her thoughts in chaos. She worried about everyone and about Vivian, and the roaring voice that spoke of eating its own kind grew louder. The sickness made her want to vomit, but she forced herself to endure it in the crowd.
The triangular mark on her forehead glimmered faintly, laced with dark green mist. The neighbor uncle was dead, the old grandfather whose beard she tugged was dead, the older sister who promised to play together was dead. Did that mean Vivian could die too?
Death had never been rare in her six years of wandering, but the past few years had made her forget that shadow. She could borrow strength from animal friends, run faster than a leopard, and strike harder than a bear. She knew this.
"If that is the case… I am stronger than others, right?"
"Then I want to help Vivian!"
With that small resolve, Luna quietly tightened her grip on the short bow on her back.
After three hours of coding, Belial was drawn by something else.
"Hm?"
"Why did a red dot light up on my map?"
"Verification of the fourth revision of Experimental Plan Three in progress…" "Experiment begins!"
Bella watched the whole process with a serious face and carefully took notes. Belial spread out his Energy Field, mixed with increasingly strong electromagnetic force that lifted iron-rich rocks into the air and made them circle around him. The readings surged again today, and Bella felt glad she had the foresight to add electromagnetic shielding, or all the instruments nearby would already have been turned into Shard.
The originally massive Energy Field rapidly shrank and condensed to a point about the size of a fingertip. At that point sat nothing more than an ordinary stone. On the microscopic level, the stone was broken down into its most basic particles and then slowly reassembled, while Belial used very little Computational Power in the process.
Only a tiny area at his fingertip warmed slightly as electrical signals flowed through temporary calculation matrices formed from muscle fibers. Guided by information engraved in advance, the matter was directly reconstructed. Under the focused gazes of Bella and Belial, the stone became a golden Gold Rank object that symbolized the sin of gluttony itself, the unbelievable result being Thursday Golden Arches Feast.
It was even still hot. "S-Success! Um… the taste data is almost exactly the same as in the records…"
Bella dug in without hesitation, then tilted her head back and gulped down a large mouthful of soda before letting out a satisfied burp. She nodded as she chewed, clearly pleased with herself. "Mm, the first programmed surgery went pretty well, and it really can record the information after matter is broken down. The reconstruction speed is much faster than before."
After more research, and with Lilith working overtime to scan Belial's body structure using Mental Power to provide a blueprint, Bella successfully designed a basic plan. This allowed Belial to carry out the first step of modifying his own body. After barely modifying an area about the size of a grain of sand, the two of them spent half a day acting like programmers and finally wrote part of the material data into it.
From now on, as long as he used matter reshaping again, he could simply apply this stored information and generate it in one step. It was like setting a shortcut for a specific molecular structure. Put in terms that fit the current world's style, it meant Mephist now came with a built-in "Magic that can turn anything into a Golden Arches meal."
Breaking matter down itself was not hard at all. The electromagnetic disassembly field attached to his claws finished it with a single tap. That same day, Belial disassembled a gold coin and almost turned Bella into gold as well.
"The second step of composite matter reconstruction is complete. If that's the case, then Lilith… good, give one to Lilith first!" At a small mobile floating pavilion in the distance, Lilith was reading while drinking afternoon tea. She naturally noticed a fool with the exact same face as hers running toward her with a Golden Arches meal in hand.
She curled her lip in disdain. She could not understand why those two idiots were so obsessed with such low-end food. As a great mage, she was always treated as an honored guest wherever she went, and there was no high-class banquet she had not attended.
"It's just fried potato strips with jam and fried poultry, bread with lettuce and cooked meat patties, plus sugary water with bubbles." "And they even say I'll get addicted."
Lily only found it ridiculous. Those two had been tinkering with this for half a month, and she herself had eaten it for half a month as well, yet she felt no addiction at all. Still, she was willing to give them a bit of advice, such as lowering the spiciness in the bread and meat patties, since Lilith was not used to spicy food.
"Hehe, Lilith, this time I switched it to a grilled chicken thigh flavor. Hurry and try it!" "Hmph, boring food." "Oh right, your birthday is coming up in a few days, isn't it?"
"…I think so?" Lilith froze for a moment before reacting. Birthdays were something she seemed to have stopped having after the age of ten.
Back then, she had been desperately cultivating to solve her own problems, pushing herself to extremes, her mind full of thoughts like, "I'm going to become a great mage, birthdays are just a nuisance." After she moved alone into Sky Island, she completely forgot about it, and without occasionally going out to buy supplies, she would not even know how many years had passed.
"…So when you asked for my birth date before, it was for this?" "Of course… hehe. Once I record the cake data too, I'm going to make an entire mountain of cake. And roast duck, steamed bear paws, steamed deer tail…"
Watching Bella sink into her own fantasy, Lilith merely sighed in a way that showed she was used to it, then let the corner of her mouth lift slightly. There were still more than ten years left, and that was not bad.
After finishing this, Belial continued tinkering with the small modified area on his hand. The blueprint data he had obtained should be applicable to most of his body. By then, his entire body could serve as a casting area, and as long as enough spell data was recorded, his body would automatically calculate and combine the corresponding Magic.
Added to his matter reconstruction ability, it would likely result in something close to words becoming reality. "At that point, I might just wave my hand and shout something, and it'll happen. Wouldn't that make me exactly like that guy who only plays with red, happy-style stuff?"
Come to think of it, he really did have a red form. After imagining the results of the completed modification, Belial felt he should be careful about what went on in his head. Otherwise, one day he might think, "So bored, let's destroy the world," and his hands would move on their own.
That would be a real problem. Still, the modification would probably take a long time. Even with the combined efforts of Bella and Belial, two absolute powerhouses, they had only managed to modify such a tiny area. The energy and focus required for body reconstruction were not small.
In other words, it was slow work. "Maybe it'll take a few decades. Forget it, that's nothing to me. I might just sleep once and it'll be over."
After all, of the two people he knew, one was basically a radish, and the other would soon have her problem solved, so there was no need to worry about waking up and measuring time in eras or years after death. He treated it like a long-term class assignment.