Demon's Virtue

672  Logic and Beauty n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Eiro walked along the roads of the city. The ones that he was passing through right now were practically empty; everyone that didn't absolutely need to be here was moved to other spots for now while Eiro and Partax were constructing the protective circuit of this city. It was a simple process; they just had to carve the magical array into the roads and walls into the places that Partax had built into the design. Of course, that was easier said than done. Things had to be just right, both in the sense of the physical construction of the carvings, as well as the density of magic flowing through them. Since these arrays were small enough, to most people they would look just like decorative carvings here and there, but they were incredibly important. They had to be perfectly balanced to make sure that every process worked as intended.

That being the case, it was particularly easy for some of these arrays to be damaged. Particularly the ones on the road, right where many different monsters were walking along every single day, it would usually be easy for the stones to crack. That was why they were using a different, far more expensive, method. One that would, at the same time, also help improve the quality of the final array. The lines of the array were carved a bit thicker than needed, and were then filled with hot metal. Luckily, since Eiro could control this metal through magic well enough, it was easy to fill them out. But then, they also had to carve the array a second time into the surface of that metal.

Since metallic materials tended to have a higher magical resistance, they would keep the magic infused into the array in its place, while at the same time simply being more resistant to physical damage that could be received through it over time. Obviously not completely immune, but it would take much longer for Eiro to have to return and fix things up. By the time it would really become a major issue, maybe some of the other monsters would be trained enough to at the very least work on the upkeep of this absolutely enormous magical array to make sure it would last for years and years to come.

The metal they were actually using for this was steal. A relatively cheaper, more available metal especially in these parts, partially thanks to the Mountain Goblins who were expert miners, especially now that they started working together with the Molemen. That being the case, due to the sheer amount of metal that was needed, it was still exorbitantly expensive, and Eiro had to make use of a substantial portion of his personal funds to get the materials needed for this. Not all of it was here or currently ready; this was a project that couldn't be completed in just a single day. Over the next few weeks, the Demon would have to keep coming back to continue the work on the array, continuosly bringing more and more steel with him. Luckily, the array itself would not end up working unless provided with a large amount of magic to create the inital magical spark needed, and amount of magic that only Eiro could provide at the moment.

"Be careful with that! Can't you see the stone is loose? The steel will bend!" Partax scoffed and shook his head in disappointment, while Eiro could do nothing but roll his eyes, "I know, don't worry. I've fixed it in place with some earth magic. Right now, it should be fine. And once the array has started, it's going to keep things stable anyway," the Demon pointed out, even though he has already done and said practically the same thing about half a dozen times since the process started. The halfling following after Eiro sighed.

"I truly didn't think you would be so sloppy. At least do the job properly! I'm the one that designed it, if you mess this up it's going to just reflect poorly on me!"

"Then why don't you help out and let us speed it up a little bit?" Eiro replied with a raised brow. He already knew exactly why; and truthfully, he preferred it this way, since that meant that he could monopolize all the skill experience that he needed to raise up his Artificing skill. Though, with how much Partax complained about basically anything and everything, he did wish for this to be over far, far sooner than it would end up being.

Though, compared to the speed of a regular artificer, even Partax's, Eiro's workspeed was rather ridiculous. Since Partax's skills with magic control were abysmally low compared to his knowledge of magical theory, one of his reasons for learning more about artificing and alchemy, he had to usually rely on his autonomous tools to do the process for him, especially for larger arrays like this. And while they were incredibly fast, they still ended up being a lot slower than Eiro was, who managed to plan everything that needed to be done out even quicker than the processing of those tools' hive-minds while also letting him apply this practically in an instant due to his superior magic control. He simply had to walk through the roads and managed to create the array perfectly around him.

Whether that annoyed Partax or not was something that Eiro didn't know; it would explain why he kept nagging him about every single thing that was even slightly off. And while Partax's reasoning was usually quite solid and something to consider, Eiro still felt it was rather petty. Especially considering that most of the time, Eiro had already fixed the issue by the time that Partax spoke up. Though, then again, that often came from Eiro's deduction of what Partax was about to say from his habits, where he was looking, and the way that his vocal cords were twisting and tensing up as he tried to start speaking.

"So, I think I have a rough idea, but could you explain to me why you used the 'magical influx' rune instead of the 'energy control' rune here at this spot?"

Partax's brow raised up. He wasn't sure if Eiro was just playing around or if he really wanted to know, "It's just faster! Using the 'energy control' rune might give you the opportunity to fine-tune the flow better, but what we need here in this area, particularly for the part of the array that controls the array, is speed. The 'magical influx' rune is pulling the magic toward it, and then once it reaches it, this 'transfiguration' rune will change it into a 'magical rejection' rune that pushes the magic away, while also being pulled by the 'influx' rune of the following node," Partax explained excitedly, happy to get into as much detail as was needed, though at this point, Eiro didn't need much more of an explanation. The halfling happily continued anyway, though, "While usually, this would end up causing issues within the flow, earlier in the magical supply process, the way we split the flow of magic is a bit unique. Instead of simply giving half the flow into one direction, and half the flow into another, we give the full flow into one direction for a brief moment, and then into another for the same amount of time. Like that we get 'chunks', or 'waves' of magic that can be affected by this method. And then by the point of reception that we need the actual magic for, this process also helps tremendously! By just changing the duration of each 'pulse', we can send unique instructions into different parts of the array depending on the circuit's overall needs."

Eiro smiled a bit. While he did understand the theory behind all of this, and was able to execute it practically as well, there was still something to the process of learning behind the motivations. There were always reasons why you chose one method over another, and not all of them would be because they were the most efficient method. While efficiency was always considered, a lot of the time Partax would make final decisions for his artificed circuits based simply on how he felt about the pattern. As though was trying to create a painting of intricate patterns. Something that was not simply ruled by logic, but by emotion and beauty as well.