Chapter 1391: Miracle Engineering

"Teacher, I have arrived."

"Hmm, Badijiaer didn't give you a hard time, did he?"

"No, he just spoke of some ordinary matters."

Xia Duo did not intend to continue on this topic; he was well aware that Iolum might not necessarily approve of his approach, but some things were better left unsaid for everyone's sake.

Fortunately, Iolum was more concerned with the Independent Arcane Fire Device experiment at this moment than with other affairs, so after a brief inquiry, he did not continue to press the matter.

In the Laboratory, although Xia Duo had only been away for two days, the Static Field he had privately constructed to preserve the David String had already been replaced by a formal storage environment covering a larger area.

In the new Static Field, over a hundred David Strings, resembling ice silk and filled with a faint blue Magic Aura, were already preserved; it seemed that although he hadn't come for these two days, Iolum had not been idle himself.

"Teacher, shall we begin now?" Xia Duo asked.

"We begin now. Try your best to ensure there are over a hundred David Strings ready in the Static Field. In your spare time, you may come over to observe my process of crafting the Arcane Fire Device."

After speaking, Iolum activated the large Levitation Field in the center of the Laboratory, then took a David String from the Static Field and flew it into the Levitation Field to begin the first step of the crafting.

Since there were already over a hundred David Strings preserved in the Static Field, Xia Duo did not rush to craft more, but instead walked to the edge of the Levitation Field to carefully observe Iolum's movements.

The David String is essentially a material Projection of Magic Net Strings onto Arcane Energy; it is not true matter and its properties are very unstable, capable of maintaining itself for only a very short time under normal conditions.

Therefore, after leaving the Static Field, it must be linked to the Magic Net immediately.

Xia Duo noticed that Iolum was treating this special material entirely as a substitute for Mithril, first manipulating the David String to form a component that mapped to a specific Spell Element, then linking it to the Magic Net; as energy flowed through, the properties of the David String temporarily stabilized.

If only this level of energy flux were maintained, the David String would be able to exist indefinitely, and due to its "superconducting" characteristics, it would not deteriorate like Mithril does due to "Elemental Transmutation" reactions.

It is indeed a new material with very broad application prospects!

……

As the first David String component was completed, Iolum waited and observed for a moment before beginning the crafting of the next component.

This method of crafting the carrier component while simultaneously linking it requires an extremely high tolerance for error; generally, for Magic Items, the link to the Magic Net is only made after all carrier components are finished.

This way, if there is any mistake earlier, one can simply redo a specific carrier component; when finally linking to the Magic Net, because the Spellcasting is more concentrated and relatively complete, the difficulty of the link is about the same as the actual Spellcasting difficulty of the spell.

Yet with this method of crafting the carrier component while linking to the Magic Net, if any step in the middle goes wrong, there is no opportunity for modification.

It is like a Programmer writing code while running tests; to ensure the final program meets the design requirements, the code cannot have errors, but in many cases, one would not know if the code is faulty without testing.

This requires the Programmer to consider everything thoroughly before starting to write the code, equivalent to having simulated all possible scenarios in their mind beforehand, and then choosing a complete plan that includes all code and ensures the program meets the requirements.

Of course, this is only theoretically feasible; in actual situations, one must also consider the human factor.

Humans are not machines, so mistakes are naturally possible, similar to pressing the wrong key while typing code; in fact, even machines have errors, they are just more stable compared to humans.

In practice, it requires the crafter to carefully deliberate before every step of action, ensuring there will be no errors before proceeding.

Xia Duo had seen the design drawings for the Independent Arcane Fire Device; a single Arcane Fire Sequence alone contains thousands of elements, each element corresponding to a David String component, and the entire device has 124 Arcane Fire Sequences.

(When an Advanced Rank Mage advances to an Advanced Arcanist, the Arcane Fire created also contains several thousand Spell Elements; the Spellcasting time is very long, not a conventional spell, see Chapter 501 for details.)

Counting other auxiliary support elements, such an Independent Arcane Fire Device contains at least millions of Spell Elements; by the same logic, that means millions of David String components, and millions of actions of linking to the Magic Net where the probability of calculation error must be independently assessed.

Calculating it this way, the probability of this Independent Arcane Fire Device being successfully completed is almost 0; that Iolum was able to complete one experiment before is simply a miracle!

Watching Iolum meticulously busy himself, Xia Duo felt nothing but full admiration in his heart!

……

As the reserve of David Strings in the Static Field grew fewer and fewer, having fallen below 60, Xia Duo knew it was time for him to play his part.

The spell to craft David Strings is very simple, but the point is not the spell itself, but the Spellcasting environment; as a "material Projection of Magic Net Strings onto Arcane Energy," the most important thing is the Arcane Energy that acts as the spell medium.

If the Spellcaster is not an Arcanist, then when casting, they can only choose to consume Arcane Crystals; when Daiwei first researched the "material Projection of Magic Net Strings onto elements," he consumed a large reserve from the Tower of Time's Element Pool as the Projection medium.

But when an Arcanist casts a spell, the Arcane Energy acting as the Projection medium is consumed first, but after the David String is generated, it is returned to the Arcane Fire, which is equivalent to zero consumption.

At the current stage, the Independent Arcane Fire Device has not yet achieved a positive return; if it were to constantly consume Arcane Crystals, even a Great Arcanist could not sustain many experiments.

Xia Duo's current Arcane Energy limit is around 1000, and the Arcane Energy medium required for one actual Spellcasting is at least 10 points; one can also invest more Arcane Energy, and the more invested, the longer the David String generated in a single instance.

The David String can be seen as a kind of "true 2D" material; this point is also similar to Magic Net Strings, having only the concept of length, without the concept of thickness.

The thickness seen by the normal naked eye is actually a combination of the Magic Aura and the glow of the spontaneous interference field.

If it were a true Magic Net String, there would be neither Magic Aura nor a spontaneous interference field; everything would be introverted, and Magic Aura would only appear when a Spell Element is formed.

And the interference field glow only appears when the closed state of the Magic Net String is broken.

Such a manifestation of the David String is more like proof of its incompleteness, while also indicating that it still has greater room for improvement.

Of course, if it were truly exactly the same as a Magic Net String, one would have to consider the possibility of being assimilated by the Magic Net.

An Arcanist's Arcane Fire is made using true Magic Net Strings, but it must be combined with the Spellcaster's will to avoid being assimilated by the external Magic Net environment.

Another development direction for the Independent Arcane Fire Device is actually to avoid Magic Net assimilation and use true Magic Net Strings for production; if that were the case, the prospects would be even broader!