Chapter 261: Artifacts Are Like Building a PC

Where did all the strategy group members go?

Everyone knows that Hero vs Demon Lord is a fully immersive virtual reality game using… never mind the nonsense, I just want to ask one thing: did all the strategy group elites collectively quit?

Even casual players know this shitty game claims to be an open world but is essentially a tower-defense game—players must clear three demon boss dungeons of the current version before entering the Demon Lord's Maze, and only after defeating the three outer fortresses surrounding the human realm can they assault the inner cities.

In previous versions, the front-line fortresses held off the demon lord for about a year of game time, but in this new version, just two months after launch, two fortresses have already fallen, and even five-man parties rarely dare enter the new demon lord's dungeon.

Most absurdly, the strategy group elites who normally stayed online 24/7 didn't show up at all during this siege—could they have collectively quit? If even these top players have abandoned it, is this shitty game even worth playing anymore?

…

While the player forums were ablaze with discussion over the failed defense against the monster assault, the strategy group elites mentioned in those posts were all gathered in the Secluded Village, for they had finally completed the Four Trials.

In truth, compared to the absurdly complex and utterly useless spell calculator created by the Science Maniac, the Trial of Flow was child's play; after enduring the trials of the other three, players practically lined up to breeze through this final one.

They even finished slightly faster than the Science Maniac had completed his three trials.

The Science Maniac could have easily become the first player to master all four gates by simply withholding his spell from public release, but for one, Guan'er had already started open-sourcing, and for two, he was never the type to obsess over being first. If this shitty game had a title or achievement system, he might have questioned his conscience—but since it was just an empty honor, he saw no need to push for it.

"Might as well let them test the waters first…" With a touch of A-Q mentality, the Science Maniac stepped out of the Trial of Artifice, only to find a crowd waiting at the door. Before he could speak, Dragon Warrior waved his hand and shouted:

"Why so slow?! We've all lined up and passed our exams already! Hurry up!"

"Holy shit, you guys…" The Science Maniac was left speechless, but Guan'er shoved Dragon Warrior aside and said:

"Enough, come look at this—we all failed to understand it!"

"..." The Science Maniac's moment of emotion vanished instantly; he walked over with a cold expression, and saw that in the center of the square, a square table had appeared out of nowhere. Bao Long stood beside it, looking like he was straining on the toilet, his hands braced on the table's edge, while a glove in the center glowed faintly.

The Science Maniac recognized it immediately—it was a component of the Mage's graduation set from version 3.0, but in this current version, it was already obsolete trash.

"What's going on here?"

"That kid said this is a Spirit-Engraving Platform, used to inscribe ritual patterns onto items."

Bao Long then sent a video to the Science Maniac.

After confirming the kid had given no hints whatsoever, the Science Maniac was also baffled; he turned to the crowd and asked:

"You've all tried it?"

"We tried, but how do I put this?"

Guan'er immediately pulled out a ring; as he channeled Qi into it, a Rasengan materialized in his palm—

"Something like this—when you inscribe a single spell ritual, it becomes gear with a built-in skill, but beyond showing off, it's practically useless, worse than the original Talisman and Spell."

"Why inscribe spells? Shouldn't you inscribe the Four Foundation Skills individually?" The Science Maniac frowned.

Guan'er just shook his head: "We tried. Inscribing multiple rituals causes interference—they cancel each other out entirely. Inscribing just one Foundation Skill works, and it does produce some spell effect, but once you leave the Secluded Village, you can only use that single inscribed skill—completely meaningless."

"How can it be meaningless… oh, you mean you can't even control it yourself?" The Science Maniac cut himself off, then realized—Guan'er nodded.

"Like the Rasengan—it's mostly 【Transformation】, keeping Qi constantly rotating, but there are still fixed components, otherwise it couldn't stay held in your hand. But once you leave the Secluded Village, if you've inscribed only 【Transformation】, you can only use 【Transformation】; casting the Rasengan just results in a storm exploding in your hand. You could inscribe the full Rasengan ritual instead, but then you can only cast the Rasengan—nothing else."

"Then make one for each?" The Science Maniac knew they probably already thought of this, but asked anyway.

"No, each artifact's ritual is independent. If you carry four, you need to shuttle Qi back and forth between all four—forget whether your brain can handle it, first, Qi begins to decay the moment it leaves an artifact, and the energy cost is enormous…"

"Hmm, it feels like… right, you know video editing? Imagine the editing software split into separate programs: video player, audio player, cutter, merger—all installed on different computers."

"To edit one video, you'd have to first play the file on the video player, note the cut points, copy it to the editing computer to split into clips, copy those clips back to the video player, if you didn't mess up, copy them to the merger computer to reassemble, then play it, then send it to the audio player to check the sound—do you get what I mean?"

"Of course. So to cast spells outside the Secluded Village like we do inside, we need to integrate all Four Foundation Skills into a single artifact? Can't we just separate them?" The Science Maniac had studied circuit design in college; hearing Guan'er's analogy, his first thought was to draw all four circuits on a single circuit board.

"No, when you inscribe a second ritual, the first one gets disrupted—even forcing it on causes conflict. And doing something like one ritual on the hilt and another on the blade is the same as using multiple artifacts—they can't connect." Guan'er shook his head. Hearing this, long-dormant knowledge from the Science Maniac's university courses resurfaced: if the earlier spell calculator was writing "software," this was now hardware design.

"The core problem is how to link the four basic rituals together… no, considering we need any two rituals to trigger consecutively, we need multiple ritual combinations arranged in sequence, and for ensuring Qi flow order, we can solve it with 'wiring' and 'switches'…"

At this point, the Science Maniac felt his brain was overloaded; he immediately said:

"I'm logging out to sketch a design…"

(End of Chapter)