Soul of Searing Steel

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***

The Liege's Residence of Moldavia, the world of Mycroft.

A silver-haired girl was holding a small silver ball with curious designs between two fingers and studying it suspiciously beneath the light. After some time, she carefully asked the huge man before her, "Doesn't this thing… looks like bad news?"

The silver-haired girl's prudence was not unjustified—the silver ball was thumb-sized, making it considerably difficult to be stuffed into the mouth. What was more, it was metallic, inscribed with extremely complex runic circles, while also emanating a dominant lifeforce signature—it was threatening however one looked at it, and full of destructive force.

With what the silver-haired girl knew about her master's usual habits and the great devastation force contained in the small ball, she did not doubt that it would explode at once if she threw it away with the force to blast off a small hill.

Meanwhile, the huge man—Joshua, frowned. "I don't know either…" he replied very solemnly, "but Ying, you're not human. You could just try."

"Oh, right—I'm not human."

The girl, finally remembering that she was a weapon, simply gulped down the silver ball without restraint at once.

'Those two have issues,' Ling thought, having been watching silently from a corner. 'Or it might be me.'

Meanwhile, after swallowing the silver ball, Ying could not help blanking out for a moment, holding her hand over her mouth. "Eh?" She murmured softly. "How did the ball vanish as soon as it entered my mouth… Master, what did you actually give me?"

Ling turned to stare at Joshua curiously as well.

Joshua had recently come back from Fairyland, but had gone right to the workshop of a certain factory to the south of the city on his return. Hours later, he took that small silver ball back to the Liege's residence and called for Ying and Ling, handing it to Ying and telling her to eat it.

While Joshua's movements had always been irregular and extraordinarily active, prompting the thought of vomiting blood in anyone who was looking for him. Even so, it was much weirder this time that the divine armament siblings who understood him the most had no clue what he was up to.

"Looks like there are no problems."

Instead of answering Ying straightaway, Joshua appeared to be using Steel Vision to ascertain that the silver-haired girl was fine, his eyes flashing in silver radiance. He then took out another ball—a black-gold one—and passed it to Ling.

"This is yours. Eat it too."

"Alright…"

Ling naturally had no qualms and directly swallowed the black-gold metal ball, after having seen his sister did it coupled with his trust in Joshua. "Eh?" He uttered, gasping softly as well, "how did that thing suddenly vanished?"

Having ensured that both siblings had eaten the balls, Joshua nodded and smiled. "Alright, now try using your spirit to summon 'System'."

"System?"

The silver-haired girl blinked in return, and did as Joshua told, summoning the System in her mind. She was left shocked as a screen of light suddenly appeared before her eyes!

[Basic Panel]

[Name: Ying]

[Race: Unknown]

[Level: Gold-advanced]

[Attribute Panel]

[Energy Level: 326]

[Control: 193]

[Soul: 47]

[General Combat Ability Assessment: 265]

[Skills Table]

[…]

A long series of tabular data that did not affect vision appeared in front of Ying. She looked on in astonishment as the layer of pale green screen refreshed incessantly, completing itself, even listing each of her skills. "What's this thing?" She exclaimed in awe, "It's wonderful!"

Ling, having summoned his own System as well, saw the cluster of information before him.

[Basic Panel]

[Name: Ling]

[Race: Unknown]

[Level: Gold-advanced]

[Attribute Panel]

[Power Level: 394]

[Control: 310]

[Soul: 66]

[General Combat Ability Assessment: 321]

[Skills Table]

[…]

The black-haired youth could not hold back his shock for an instant. "This thing… digitizes our ability?"

"Of course."

Joshua could not help beaming, seemingly able to see both of their data. "Master Josh System, 0.1 beta version—the most basic of basics, and only some general data and skill table is available. It's crude now, but I would complete it in the future, adding at least Ascension and Verification systems."

Still, it now appeared that these were

"Is this something you learned from Fairyland, Master?"

Ying read the System a few times before closing it with her spirit. She then turned to Joshua, her eyes widening, "It's fantastic, but does Power Level, Control, and Soul mean?"

"Power Level is the aggregate of various energies and physical toughness contained in your body, while Control is the ability you have to manipulate those powers, both reflexes and spiritual included. As for Soul, it's simply your soul intensity."

Joshua went into detail as he sat on the chair in the hall of his Residence. "One standard unit is a normal Iron-class manservant of our Residence, Silver is fifty while Gold-tier is several hundred but no more than five hundred—above that would mean that the person has reached Supreme-tier on a certain aspect, surpassing human limit."

With that, Joshua frowned and muttered to himself doubtfully, "but it's curious. If that's how things are calculated, your Soul values are unexpectedly low… According to my initial data tests, these three data should be more or less the same without any huge gap."

Still, it is new and a little data was normal—Joshua did not mind that. For their part, Ling and Ying would not think about such frivolities. In fact, they were now playing with it carefreely, even comparing their data.

"Wait!"

For the third or who-knows-how-many time, Ying was left shocked. "Why is your data such a class above mine?!"

Ling thought about it, and replied seriously, "Hard work, focus, and talent."

"Urgh…"

In that very moment, the emotion known as 'shame' truly birthed in the depths of the silver-haired girl's heart. From that moment forth, she swore to train diligently—even if she were to die right there or jump off the roof of the Moldavian Liege's Residence, she would surpass her brother and preserve her honor as his sister!

Joshua laughed as he watched the two's exchanges, but his expression soon became serious again.

The artificial System was something he wanted to do a long time ago. After his own System had collapsed, its core fusing with his soul—a more utter form of destruction, he never saw a trace of it again. Most importantly, the System's data vault that knows almost everything, something of which Joshua had really wanted to grasp had vanished without a trace as well.

That was actually a great loss. Before he became Legend, Joshua could always rely on the System to rapidly learn about the true face of certain unusual things, but now, he could only rely on guesswork and analysis, and the truth might not be clear after half a day.

Naturally, there would be those who claimed that relying on the System was an act of cowardice, a yes-man who would only know how to procure knowledge from the System. They would be right under most circumstances since those who kept improving their strength and knowledge from the System without end would certainly lose their own ability to cultivate themselves and tread upon the unknown. Nevertheless, to not use the data vault as a simple method to improve was no longer an issue with cowardice, but with intelligence quotient.

You may use a knife placed idly before you to cut down enemies, as long as you did not become solely dependent on it, since there are other weapons such as batons, axes, swords or tomahawks. On the other hand, if the use of a knife was impossible against an enemy and only your fists were available, then…

Joshua glanced at his hands and thought about it, seemingly finding it not an issue.

Leaving that aside…

Joshua had no intention of deliberately destroying and freeing himself away from the System. He actually quite liked the Data Panel and Verification System, just as the Accomplishment System was truly interesting.

Even if the objective of that thing was to help him improve quickly and completely collapse after he had reached Legend, the warrior had no way of preserving it. Otherwise, keeping it as a collectible alone would make it valuable as well.

Moreover, he believed that the System may have a strong correlation to a Sage or some unknown World Will, or its omniscient data vault would not be explainable.

But now, the System was no more—and if that was the case, he could make one for himself.

Here, inscribed runes of Steel Strength can be used for producing various observation modules which precisely observes every information about the user. Then, with a ritual such as 'eating' that combines the Steel Strength module and the flesh that combines both by a hundred percent, fusing every ability and data of the System along with the user's physique and soul would make them a single, whole body.

Blood drops are not needed for that to be accomplished. With just the courage to swallow a single Steel Strength condensation (which looks completely like a bomb), anyone would be able to obtain the System.

With that thought, Joshua looked at Ying and Ling before him, his gaze softening.

Joshua had many intentions in creating the System. It was an important part of the project he would implement in the future, a step he must take that has strong links to Perfect Human Base Form and the External Exploration party. Apart from that, Joshua could also use the System to figure out the relationship between its 'Maker' and 'User'.

By using it, he would be able to learn about the intentions of the unknown maker through the emulation.

'At least, my current creation of the System is completely out of kindness,' Joshua thought calmly, analyzing himself. 'I just hope that they could become stronger and grow faster, until they could keep walking by themselves, and live independently, safely upon this world.'

As for what he himself intended to accomplish by relying on the System Users…

What intentions could there be? He was already so powerful to destroy a thing like System—was it necessary to rely on others and accomplish something so slow?

Either way, the warrior could not understand that logic. He would rather believe that the Maker of the original System had kind intentions, and not some bizarre, illogical malicious intent.

Just as the warrior thought about some peculiar questions, Ying and Ling who had ended their exchange some time ago ran to Joshua's side.

"Master," the silver-haired girl asked with an especially curious and gentle voice, "what's your data like?"

Ling nodded lightly beside her, seemingly interested in that as well.

Naturally understanding the little fellows' curiosity, Joshua smiled and materialized a System and attempted to observe his own data.

Boom!

Abruptly, the sound of a faint explosion appeared inside Joshua's body. Both Ying and Ling heard it, and looked up at Joshua's face puzzledly.

"A little accident," Joshua said quickly, blinking, and then tried again.

Boom!

The explosion this time was a little louder than the one before. Both Ying and Ling held their own stomachs nervously, their expressions uncomfortable.

"Ahem."

Joshua kept trying.

"Boom-boom-boom-boom—"

A series of explosions echoed alongside an unusual electronic voice, the latter which appeared to be murmuring something weird that sounded like "overload, system has experienced cyclical error…"

Both Ying and Ling's expressions turned odd; they both looked at each other's stomach anxiously. Joshua, on the other hand, remained impassive as he stood up and made his way upstairs.

"I'm going off," he said as he left, "to digest the information I got from Fairyland…"

He should have known. If the System made by the Unknown Maker had collapsed from his power, how would his inferior imitation survive the same thing!

Although the explosion from the System's collapse would not harm even Supreme champions, Joshua resolved himself to remove the explosions caused by the collapse.

At the same time, both divine armament siblings stayed on the first floor, poking each other's stomachs. As they leveled their gazes at each other, they were clearly suspicious.

'Sister, that thing really seems to be a bomb.'

Ling's eyes were filled with worry.

'Brother, it's fine, trust our Master.'

Ying calmed her brother with her eyes.

'It might explode, but it's not really a bomb.'

***

Meanwhile, upstairs.

Joshua was not lying.

He sat on the chair in front of his table, his eyes closed in deep thought as he recalled his exchange with the Fairy Queens in Fairyland.

It had to be said that the fairies' race was the supernatural race with the finest and most complete legacy, and Joshua definitely obtained many valuable information from their legacy.

Such as the Fairies' thought about the world, the galaxy and the entire Multiverse, and a certain unbelievable theory that unexpectedly held a hint of truth.