A New World, an immersive game experience

Eldrian's condition had not really changed much, but he could tell that he was getting better. However, he was clear that the implications of these past events would not disappear anytime soon. And at this point, he was not sure if he should be happy as it was 'just' punishment, or be angry as it was slowing the design. Currently, he was split in the middle on this.

"So we've successfully managed to record audio and even play it back. But we keep overwriting the data when we try to record new audios." Eldrian mumbled after another failed test.

"And we can't even verify if we are saving the picture until we can make that water screen of yours a reality."

"Maybe it's time we abandon trying to rely on existing runes?" Eldrian suggested, no matter the combination they have only made failures. Luckily, thanks to Eldrian's ability to virtually add runes to materials they were not wasting much.

Sadly, he had only thought of this on the second day, after already having wasted almost a hundred gold's worth of Mithril and mana crystals.

Myropsis snorted hearing Eldrian's suggestion, certainly very unladylike but Eldrian didn't even blink. Instead, he replied with a rhetorical question, "I know it sounds insane to ask now, but what are runes?"

"I still don't get what you've been mumbling about," Myropsis replied, she understood that his question was not superficial, it was just how Eldrian tackled complicated topics.

"It isn't something that was found, it was made," Eldrian answered his own rhetoric question.

"No, it was discovered." Myropsis corrected.

"Maybe, but if you want to classify it as such then is it how you would discover what gravity is? No, gravity has always been there-" Eldrian paused, there was a possibility that runes were something intrinsic like gravity, but he did not feel that this was true. At least not in the same sense.

His argument why however faltered at the first step, wanting to say that the AI made it. Did they? Eldrian had no proof of this, if he was to believe what he had been told thus far they had found mana and magic, not made it. GAIA had simulated physical possible conditions at the extreme, which brought mana to the foreground.

However, Eldrian was also aware that their control of the world surpassed the magical. Yet, he was unsure if this meant there was something after or if they simply played with the code.

'But it is possible...' Eldrian realized with shocking clarity that magic might be the least impressive thing in this simulated universe. That it was only the most apparent. There was no proof of this, but the fact that he could consider it shocked him. And the fact that there might be proof in the legends and gods was even more shocking.

'No, don't jump to conclusions. It might just be what ultimate control of magic appears like, allowing you to alter the very fabric of the world.'

'But, then it is still possible that runes are something like an intrinsic language of the universe. While some of them don't make sense in form, they might be like how math is the language of our universe. Of science...'

"Enlighten me," Myropsis said, bringing Eldrian out of his thoughts.

"Okay. What if runes are like a language, the written language of magic. Words of power are the spoken, then this is the counterpart."

"While that makes sense, what are spell modules then?"

"They are a way of envisioning what the spell will do. After all, spell modules do take the form that you can link with their effect. Runes are not always the same, granted there are similarities but there are also cases where it is like a symbol or letter instead of a picture."

"Okay, that still makes sense. But if it is the language of magic then isn't it something that has always existed. So it would be discovered like gravity?"

"Maybe, but unlike gravity, language evolves. So why don't we try to evolve runes?" Eldrian answered, unsure of if this was possible but itching to try.

"Is that even possible?!" After the past few days, Myropsis had gotten used to Eldrian's outlandish ideas and his way of thinking, but sometimes she still found herself stunned by what he said. Especially when he said it so calmly, as if it was normal.

It was truly fascinating how he jumped from topic to topic, and now she understood why he was always so all over the place.

He needed someone to pull him back to a topic before he strays too far. Luckily, this project was something he seemed to be really dedicated to finishing as quickly as possible so it didn't take much effort on Myropsis's part to keep him on track.

"I think so..." Eldrian answered, at least he felt that it should be and so far his feelings have always turned out to be right. Though the consequences were often far more than he was willing to accept. At this moment he was in the zone and not quite able to consider the consequences.

"I mean, if I make a 1 equal/mean positive and a 0 negative..." Eldrian drew the first with mageia in the air. Having it float there, however, his mana would not fill the 'fake' rune. His mageia was just floating there doing nothing.

This was something new, through the past week's efforts he had become far more proficient in runic magic and was able to control mageia far better. He found that it was actually just another part of mana, not something separate as he had always thought.

Though, it was distinctively different compared to 'normal' mana. Eldrian had pondered if this was the lifeforce that Athtar had mentioned, or possible if this was an attribute of said lifeforce in action.

Regardless, he had become able to form it without it being a rune, before it would have quickly dissipate but now he could keep it in existence without much effort. For now, there had not been any benefits, outside of making experiments like this easier.

Rubbing his chin, Eldrian pondered for a bit why it would refuse 'normal' mana. 'Does it not understand what I want, or am I not focusing enough?'

Dispelling the '1', Eldrian redrew it but again the same happened. Next, he tried writing out words but those had no effect either. Not 'one', 'positive', 'agree', 'active', 'activate', '...' none of the words he could think of worked.

After a few more failed tries, he looked at Myropsis who was cheering him on. While she did not believe he would succeed it did not mean she hoped he would fail.

Smiling, Eldrian nodded and returned his sights to the empty air before him. 'Can I artificially symbolize something as existing and nothing as absent? Would that even be possible?'

After thinking about the forms this idea could take, Eldrian made a small dot. Basically just a full stop. Strangely, this one felt different. Noticing this, Eldrian tried sending some mana into it and it accepted just a tad of mana. Exactly one point of mana to be precise.

'Wait, that's too precise!' Eldrian was shocked, he felt confident that this would have other meanings.

"Wait?! Did you actually succeed?" Myropsis asked in disbelief, looking a the dot that was persisting even after Eldrian took a step back and seemed to shift his focus from it.

"It seems I did, though I'm not sure if it means what I want it to mean," Eldrian mumbled, turning to one of the failed experiments where they had actually engraved the runes, he picked it up and started adding some more runes.

"Ah, I get it." Myropsis smiled as Eldrian gave the dot exactly 1MP, upon doing so the new runes started glowing. He had added some simple illumination runes for the test.

AN: A big thanks to everyone who continues to support the story by simply reading on Web, voting for the story, or sharing comments. It is all greatly appreciated.