Chapter 1197: The Origin of the Problem

As everyone was working on their own preparations, I couldn’t help but journey to the Admin Room, looking for Terra. As I arrived, she seemed surprised to find me there, having been watching a movie on the couch with Irena. “Dale! What brings you here? I thought you were still in the middle of you simulation training?” She asked, and I shook my head.

Walking over, I sat on the chair next to where the two of them were sitting. “I decided to take a break for now. There was something that I wanted to discuss with you first.”

When I said that, Terra looked at me curiously, gesturing for me to continue as Irena paused the movie. “If I recall, it was during my last battle against Sanction where I truly understood that I could use all of the domains of the gods within my realm. That was a pretty big turning point for me, honestly.”

“That’s part of the core power of a Keeper, which you told me about on day one. A Keeper can use all of the powers of those within their worlds.” I repeated, and Terra nodded her head, seeming to understand the situation.

“You want to know why you can’t use the powers of an Origin, right?” She asked, to which I nodded my head in agreement. “Well, it’s only natural that you yourself can’t become an Origin. You could consider this a safety feature of the system, in a way. There are two times during the process where you would be declared dead. The first time is gaining the Perfect Self, and the second is during the actual Origin ascension, where your entire being is reconfigured to become similar to the void.”

“In both of those cases, a Keeper would essentially be killing themselves. Theoretically, you could have your World Host undergo the procedure while you were ascended. However, I wouldn’t suggest that if I were you.” She said in a serious tone, causing me to look at her in concern. “People that try to bypass system restrictions don’t tend to have a pleasant ending. In the best case scenario, your host will die, and you will thus lose the Illusion domain you cultivated with it.”

“In the worst case scenario, the procedure will succeed, but the moment you possess your host, the foreign energy will cause an imbalance that shatters a solar system. And you, with it.” After saying that, she leaned back with a sigh.

“But, onto the subject of you using the powers of an Origin. Of course, it’s possible. The only way it wouldn’t be possible is if the Origin themselves wasn’t considered as part of your assets as a Keeper. And if that was the case, they wouldn’t be able to be sent on invasions, meaning that anyone with a suitable Origin would be immune to any invasion threats.” Terra explained, lightly shrugging her shoulders.

“However, the method to doing so is rather convoluted. Remember that an Origin manifests the phenomena within their inner universe. In order to manifest that phenomenon, there are some steps that they have to take, and they usually do this as their own training. First, they must identify the phenomenon that they wish to manifest, and then locate where in their inner universe it takes place. Finally, they choose where they wish to manifest their target.”@@novelbin@@

“In the event of my incarnation, it’s pretty easy. Fate exists everywhere, as does misfortune. My incarnation simply chooses to extract purely one aspect of fate at a time, or peer into its flow. The training that I gave the twins before their ascension helped with that.” She said with a small smile. “Now, can you tell me what part of this process makes it difficult for you as a Keeper to replicate?”

Hearing her question, I couldn’t help but sigh. “The first two steps. For it to work, I would need to know exactly what is in an Origin’s inner world, and where to find it. So, if I wanted to copy a special shadow from Dana, I’d need to get her to allow me to observe her inner world, and guide me to where that shadow was. Is that right?”

Terra flashed me a thumbs up, confirming my suspicions. “That’s right. Theoretically, a Keeper can use the powers of an Origin, as long as they use the right process. However, when speaking from a practical standpoint, that’s a lot trickier. Not to mention that any universe is in constant motion. Using your own example, the shadow that you wanted to manifest from Dana’s inner universe wouldn’t be in the same position from one day to the next, unless it covered a very large arae.”

I let out a sigh of resignation. “So, I’m stuck at the level of a god, then?” I asked, though in truth I knew that wasn’t much of a disadvantage. I had learned enough about Origins lately to acknowledge that the raw strength of their abilities wasn’t what one should envy.

“From a practical standpoint, it would always be best to rely on your own abilities.” Terra agreed, before Irena took the chance to speak up.

“I think, with the amount of domains at your disposal, there’s no need for you to aim even higher.” She spoke in a gentle tone. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but you are capable of breaking the absolute limit of nine domains, if you use nine of your Keeper domains while suppressing your normal ones, right?” She asked, to which I nodded my head.

“In that case, there is a clear area for you to grow. The rule of nine prevents any more than nine from a combination of divine domains, saint energies, and fallen domains. Each of these energies have reached a level of density where more than nine causes an eruption.”

“Meanwhile, you yourself possess the domains of Souls, Illusions, and Mirrors. You also have the saint energies of World Sight, Ki of Beginning, and World Shadow. Your body could still hold three more saint energies without causing any negative side-effects.” Irena explained, and Terra grinned proudly at the winged woman.

“I knew there was a reason we loved you.” She said, before turning to face me. “Like Irena said. If you’re looking for a way to get stronger, there are three main methods. Continue what you’re doing now, and work on creating new techniques. Deepen your understanding of the base energies, developing new abilities that way. Or, gather new saint-level energies.”

Hearing these words, my eyes widened briefly. I hadn’t even thought about acquiring more saint energies. Honestly speaking, the two that I currently had felt rather… lacking compared to my other abilities. World Sight was an incredibly powerful scouting and detection tool, but it felt pretty commonplace to me. Ki of Beginning… it was decently strong as a special type of elemental ki, but it was just barely qualified as a saint-level energy to begin with. As for World Shadow, I didn’t get much use out of it.

“What energies would the two of you suggest?” I asked, and the two girls looked at each other with a smile.

“First, you need a suitable energy for defense. For a normal mortal, there is no better defensive energy than World Shadow, as it can substitute the life of a shadow when the user dies. However, as a Keeper, that brief moment of death before the substitution happens would still be fatal for you. You should never try to cheat death as a Keeper. Hide from it, fight against it, but don’t try to cheat it.” Terra explained in a firm tone, leaning forward as she spoke.

“You have a few experts within your world that you could consult to obtain a suitable energy. If they can’t help you, you can always turn to the market.” She continued, before chuckling. “If I were you, I’d completely abolish your Ki of Beginning. The only use it has for you is its restoration ability. All of its elemental attacks rely on interaction with physical matter. When fighting other energy, it is far weaker.”

Irena looked somewhat reluctant, but ultimately agreed. “You need to find a good offensive technique. The Eye of Ruin that James has trained would be an excellent candidate in this regard. This energy allows the total destruction of a target, as long as the user properly understands its composition. If you use it together with your World Sight, it would have a wonderful synergy.”

Terra nodded her agreement. “That’s why James favors it, since the race he was reborn as is one that naturally trains World Sight. Though, if you try to take his Dark Promise, I will find a way to make you regret that. Not only does it make your skin crawl to activate it, but it would be too easy for you to kill yourself from the side effects.”

I chuckled slightly, nodding my agreement. “Got it. Do you two have a third energy that you would suggest?”

The two looked thoughtful at that, before turning to face me. It was Irena that spoke, this time. “With proper usage, your World Shadow could cover transportation. World Sight covers detection. The Eye of Ruin would be able to handle offense. Once you get your defensive energy, there won’t be many other areas for improvement. Your divine domains are all focused on control-based abilities, or supporting allies.”

Terra smirked smugly, agreeing with Irena. “Normally, I’d suggest looking for a creation-type energy, that way you can make any tools you need as you go. However, since you have the Digital Conversion system, that’s a bit redundant. Focus on getting these two energies taken care of, and then practice using them. This is the advantage of your world’s archetype, allowing you and your people to wield energy thousands of times stronger than people from other types of worlds.”

I couldn’t help but blink at that. “Wouldn’t we still be behind cultivation-type worlds?” I asked, thinking about Lorek and Spica. Terra, meanwhile, simply chuckled.

“Setting aside that you can use the powers from those two worlds while you’re there, you could consider your own world to be a hybrid between the Cultivation and Game archetypes. Most game worlds rely more heavily on the system’s settings, and don’t directly evolve their inhabitants.”

Hearing Terra’s comment, I widened my eyes. “Why not? It seemed like an obvious choice to me while I was setting everything up.”

Terra gave a wry smile, nodding her head. “Yeah, I’m sure it did. However, because of this evolution, people who are too far apart in terms of stats have an incredibly hard time having children due to the differences in their genetics. You got a bit of luck with that, because you chose larger worlds, and thus had a greater starting population. By the time it would have normally become an issue, people recognized and adapted their culture to match this feature.”

“As for Desbar, your one smaller world, that place was isolated from the game system entirely until it hit the modern era, so there was no chance of a population crisis. Typically, an evolutionary game system is thrown out due to the problems it can cause, and the reinforcement type of system is chosen instead.”

“That’s why I said that this was the advantage of your world’s archetype, because it meant that you are able to reap the benefits of your choices over the years. An excess of raw power is one of the harder things to defend against for other Keepers, though many of them will surely come up with something.” She explained, reaching over to pat my leg. “Either way, just focus on developing yourself, and doing what you can.”

I gave a small nod, grabbing her hand and lightly pulling her into a hug. Terra let out a brief yelp, before laughing and leaning against me. “Thanks.” I said, both to Terra and Irena. “It’s a big help, having you all here to support me.”

“At least you recognize that.” Terra said in a cheeky tone. “Now, are you going to take care of your business right away, or can you join us for a movie first?”

Despite Terra’s cheeky tone, I could detect the faint longing in her words, and knew that I should take the chance to spend some time with her and Irena. Thus, I nodded my head, moving over to sit between the two of them.

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