Chapter 249
As I held the ominously glowing lantern in my hand, Tiffany’s eyes grew fixated on it.
“That’s an evolutionary tool.” She spoke breathily. “Entire paragon families can be built on such an item.”
“Evolutionary tool?” I glanced into the light, trying to get a grasp of its function. “It just converts energy.”
“Just?” She tore her gaze away from the lantern to shoot me a glare. “You know, for someone who appears so knowledgeable, can read antecedent, you can say some of the dumbest things. Just, where did you come from?”
“It doesn’t matter.” I coughed, lifting the lantern between us. “Alright, you enlighten me. What makes this lantern so impressive? It releases ambient free energy, right?”
She stared at me for a little bit longer before responding. “Evolutionary tools are just a collective name for any tool that aids in evolution. Some tools add to the absorption of energy, while other tools collect and concentrate it. Of course, some tools help people expand their senses and stabilize their foundation, as well as make mutational changes. However, the most common time is a collector. If you have a collector, it allows you to double your evolutionary speed with half the effort. Any paragon family could rise with such a consistent advantage.”
“It’s not collecting energy, though.” I frowned. “It’s just releasing energy from inside.”
“What did you say?” She stepped forward and looked at it with shock. “You’re right, the energy isn’t being drawn to it. If anything, it’s pushing out energy. This…”
“So, it is special?”
“I’ve… only heard about them in myths. They call them perpetual energy machines. If you can obtain one, then you can enhance the energy of any area you reside in. No wonder the underground is so energetic, even though it’s a prison. Prisons are typically built in energy-deficient zones. You want to prevent your enemies from evolving. This device must have evolved this entire underground realm. It really is an endless power source.”
“I’m sorry to burst your bubble.” I gave a light shake of my head. “Perpetual energy machines are impossible. Energy can be converted, but it cannot be created or destroyed. The total energy in an isolated system will always remain constant. That’s a law of thermodynamics. There is no such thing as an endless power source. It has to be coming from somewhere.”
Tiffany rolled her eyes. “Now, you’re going to act smart again? You can read about the laws of thermodynamics, but you don’t even know an evolutionary tool when you see one?”
“Ahem… that’s not important.” I cleared my throat.
“Well, if it’s not a perpetual energy machine, then where is the energy coming from?”
“That…” I looked at the flame again.
It wasn’t like I knew how to build artifacts. None of the books I had encountered so far had mentioned a thing about artifacts. From what I understood, few paragons could even make artifacts. All those that existed were relics from the era of antecedents. It might not even be possible to remake the tools used back then. It was no wonder that they were all considered incomparably valuable.
“I don’t know…” I finally gave up with a shrug. “Maybe zero-point energy?”
“Zero-point what?” Tiffany furrowed her brow.
“Zero-point energy,” I explained, turning my full attention to her. “It’s a concept from quantum physics. Think of it like this: if you had a sealed box and you cooled it down to absolute zero, the temperature at which all thermal motion ceases, then all movement inside would stop. Everything would be perfectly still.”
“Absolute zero…” Tiffany repeated as if she was letting what I said sink in.
“But that’s not what happens at the quantum level. Even at absolute zero, there’s a residual energy. The most fundamental particles, the ones that make up everything, still have a baseline vibration. It’s the lowest possible energy state a quantum field can have, but it’s not zero. This residual energy, this constant, background hum of existence that permeates all of space, is zero-point energy. It’s the energy of the vacuum itself.” I gestured to the lantern. “This device isn’t creating energy from nothing. It’s tapping into that fundamental background energy, the energy of space itself, and converting it into a usable form. It’s not breaking the laws of thermodynamics; it’s just drawing from a source so vast and fundamental that it seems like it’s creating something from nothing.”
I stopped speaking as I noticed Tiffany’s eyes glazing over. I put it behind me, storing it within my luminal space. It wasn’t the light that disappeared that she seemed to snap out of it with a shake of her head.
“Are we really going to give it back to him?” She asked.
“The prisoner? Do you actually think it was his the begin with?” I asked.
“I don’t know… maybe he stole it.” She shook her head. “Either way, it doesn’t appear to be a weapon. It probably wouldn’t be dangerous giving it to him.”
“No…” I responded. “I’m not going to depend on him. I’m currently working on another way out of here.”
Boom!
The entire facility shook. The pair of us turned our heads in the same direction. I could feel the distant energy signatures a level or two above us.
“Someone is fighting.” Tiffany declared.
“Let’s get going then,” I told her, grabbing her and turning in the opposite direction.
“This way leads deeper into the facility,” Tiffany warned.
“Don’t worry, there is a way back up,” I told her, offering her my hand.
She gave me a suspicious look, but she still reached out and took my hand. I was a bit surprised I didn’t have to argue with her more. There was a hidden path that the mycelium had revealed to me that could allow us to climb back up unhindered. Unfortunately, it involved progressing further down into the prison. Since the prison appeared to be baron, the pair of us moved a bit quicker, emboldened by the threat of the lunatics behind us. The oppressive miasma grew thicker and thicker, and Tiffany, who was a lower evolutionary level than me clung to my hand a bit tightly,
It was only when we could stop descending that we came out before a short corridor ending in a thick cell door. The door was barred from the outside, as if all that mattered was that whatever was inside couldn’t escape. The pair of us walked down the corridor and removed the bars. It required a bit of effort, but I was far stronger than I looked, and despite the rust, the door soon creaked open. A single look into the colossal cell caused Tiffany to audibly gasp. She stumbled back several steps as if she was afraid.
I glanced in to see a massive skeleton. It was large, even when compared to the dinosaur fossils of my old world. The monstrous beast was lying down, or perhaps it was better to say it had been forcefully tied to the floor with a series of chains that were only slack since the beast itself was just bones. It had a long, serpentine neck and thick, massive claws. The bones were jet black and covered in mysterious runes not dissimilar to the antecedent runes, except that for some reason I couldn’t make them out.
As I took a step forward to try to understand them better, I felt Tiffany grab me back and pull me. “We can’t go in there!”
“Huh?” I looked back to see Tiffany was shaking violently in a way I had never seen her before.” What’s wrong?”
“That beast… It’s extremely powerful. I have never felt anything so powerful before. It might be an Antecedent Lord!”
I blinked. “And?”
“You don’t even understand this?” She stared at me with disbelief. “Antecedents are stronger than their paragon counterparts. He’d be like a King paragon.”
“A king…” I tilted my head thoughtfully, but she only shook her head.
“A king is powerful enough to vaporize someone like us with a thought! This beast would have the power to rule the provinces!”
“It’s… a skeleton,” I told her helplessly.
“Foolish!” She growled. “You need to be more careful. Tombs are very dangerous. When a powerful thing dies, its energy doesn’t completely disperse. The energy it’s releasing can keep its corpse active for years.”
“Active? You’re saying it could attack us?” I asked in disbelief.
“It can attack us if we’re lucky!” She shot back. “Look, those who evolve to prestige and higher gain something called will. Even if they die, their will can remain behind. Some use it to pass on their skills and find a successor, but an unsatisfied will might try to attack or possess the living! A beast as powerful as this one surely has left behind an unsatisfied will. If we get too close, it could destroy us or worse, take over our bodies!”
“I s-see…”
That actually explained some things I had been wondering about. I had met that antecedent inside the Schrödinger box. Apparently, it was a remnant will from the original antecedent. However, this thing wasn’t a kindly man looking to pass on his legacy. This was a beast forcefully suppressed and then left to die at the bottom of a giant prison. It undoubtedly had a will that wouldn’t take too kindly to trespassers!
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