We fixed the bug where players had no interface and optimized the more realistic physics engine

When Murphy had first crossed over into this world and seen the broken Steam 800 refrigerator in Triss's courtyard, he had realized that this world possessed some "unique technologies" that defied common sense.

Later, when he saw the steam-powered repeating crossbow in Morland Village, he had thought that using steam power in warfare was probably the most outrageous thing steam engineers could come up with. As it turned out, the words he'd used to persuade the little players to stay humble as they learned about this new world applied just as well to himself.

"Psionic. Calculating orb?"

Murphy stared at Mirian with an expression like a pie chart divided into four parts confusion, three parts curiosity, and three parts bewilderment.

He understood the six characters individually, but had no idea what they meant together.

Maxim, standing beside him, looked just as dumbfounded.

Mirian had only told him this was serious, but the loyal vampire worshipper's knowledge of "steam engineering" was limited to those five words themselves.

He and his master were both truly illiterate in this field.

"Fine, I'll explain from the beginning."

From the bewildered expressions on the faces of the master and servant before her, Mirian could tell they didn't understand her concerns at all.

She took another orb array from the box beneath her, raised it, and held it above her eyes at a particular angle. Then she said to Murphy,

"Look at the orb from this angle, then tell me what you see."

Following Mirian's instructions, Murphy raised the gemstone array in his hand.

Vampires had excellent night vision. Once he turned the gemstone to the right angle, he immediately saw unusual structures reflected inside its translucent surface.

It looked like an incredibly complex system of tiny gears interwoven with mechanical components. They were packed tightly together, yet assembled in an orderly way that possessed a certain industrial beauty. In a transparent gemstone only slightly larger than a fingernail, there were three such systems, linked together by a set of nested levers to form an even larger whole.

"That's impossible!"

Murphy immediately protested.

"Unless my eyes are playing tricks on me. No, they definitely are! No matter how advanced halfling industry is, they couldn't make components this precise and microscopic!

There must be tens of thousands of parts in there.

Is this some kind of illusion?"

"More precisely, it's a triple-mounted, simplified psionic differential engine made up of 44,327 parts, the latest version, now in its third generation.

They say it's incredibly fast!"

Mirian shrugged and smoothly rattled off a complicated Transian phrase, leaving Maxim's head spinning.

But Murphy understood.

He kept giving Mirian a questioning look, and she explained,

"Don't look at me like that. I don't understand exactly how it works either. I'm just an administration student. I read about these terms in Professor Old Bach Gaslamp's books, just so I could get credit for the elective 'A Brief History of Mechanics.' I never thought they'd come in handy like this.

Anyway, the miniature differential engine inside the calculating orb isn't real, of course!

The original prototype takes up an entire exhibition hall in the underground museum at Chardo Craftsman University. But halfling mechanical artisans found inspiration in 'psionic erosion,' a phenomenon that occurs all over this world.

They and their dwarven brothers used special techniques to manipulate psionic energy. With help from the psions of the Tower of Rings, they used psionic formulae to draw upon the psionic factors found widely throughout nature and combine them into a peculiar spell formation. This let them simulate the operation of a differential engine at the microscopic level.

And so miniature calculating orbs came into being, ushering halfling steam engineering into a new era."

Mirian shook the orb in her hand and said,

"All kinds of automatons in Chardo Port have one of these inside. The kind we have here is for calculations only; it doesn't come with any control attachments. Just feed it psionic energy, and it can help the user do all sorts of things."

"Like what?"

Maxim asked blankly.

His mind, muddled from a lifetime of contact with the occult, couldn't make sense of anything Mirian had just said. But his question came at just the right time.

The red-haired young woman rolled her eyes and patiently explained,

"For example, it could translate a book of poetry written in Elvish in a minute. Or work out how you should spend next month's wages and how much you've already spent this year in just a few seconds.

If necessary, it can even put together an income-and-expense report for you. Just activate the psionic projector, and you can see the results of its calculations with your own eyes.

When I enrolled at the craftsman university, I was issued a second-generation calculating orb the size of a fist as part of the student benefits.

Many campuses at Chardo University are currently undergoing a 'storage revolution.' The professors plan to replace old paper documents with psionic orbs and their accompanying databases.

It's really convenient!

A space the size of a castle can store all the information in an old-fashioned library as large as Cadman City. If you need a book, just tell your calculating orb, and it can retrieve and copy it for you.

If you're lazy enough, you can even ask it to read the book aloud.

Of course, an external psionic microphone costs extra. Only rich noble brats use that service. I hear they have the orb read them some pretty filthy stuff to spice things up at certain parties."

"That's not the point!"

Murphy had a rough idea what the calculating orb was. It wasn't necessarily exactly the same, but he could basically think of it as this world's "computer and operating system." From what he could tell, the technology had only just emerged and entered use in halfling territory around Chardo, and hadn't spread to the rest of the continent yet.

So he asked,

"The point is, why is the Plantagenet Kingdom going to such lengths to smuggle calculating orbs back from the Chardo halflings? And why are they marked as military supplies?"

"Because they can be used in warfare, Murphy."

Mirian sighed.

"When I first started university, I heard about this from my halfling adviser. Apparently, the Tower of Rings sided with the Plantagenet Kingdom during the Ten-Year War.

When things were going badly at the beginning of the war, the psions proposed using calculating orbs for military purposes. They'd also helped develop the orbs, so they understood them almost as well as the halfling engineers did.

They modified the orbs' internal logic and simulation algorithms, then spent three months building a communications and command system that covered the entire Greeni Legion. Every calculating orb and its user became a communication node. The orbs could even calculate artillery firing positions, dramatically improving the army's command efficiency.

In the first two years of the Ten-Year War, the Old Church rebels and their allies spent sixteen months conquering two border provinces of the Plantagenet Kingdom. But once the calculating orbs were put to use, the refitted Greeni Legion and the old Royal Guard needed only three months to drive the rebels out of the country.

I can't imagine how they used these things to fight a war, but afterward, the steam lords immediately ordered that calculating orbs be barred from export.

Apparently, the mechanical artisans were furious that the Plantagenet Kingdom had used their painstaking work for war. I heard they cut off all further collaborative research with the Tower of Rings over the matter.

The three thousand orb arrays we've just seized were ordered by the Pioneer Legion. Maybe that legendary General Loren wants to copy the Greeni Legion's reforms and modernize his own troops.

But if you ask me, these orbs probably didn't come from the Chardo halflings at all."

The red-haired young woman turned the orb array over in her hands twice and said to Murphy,

"There's no serial number on it, and the design isn't quite like the genuine ones I've seen. Someone else may have made these.

But honestly, aside from halfling artisans, I can't think of any faction on the continent capable of making something this precise."

Murphy nodded.

Mirian had told them everything she knew. As she'd said, this shipment was extremely important to the Plantagenet Kingdom, and a real hot potato.

General Loren probably wouldn't let it go.

Still, Murphy was a little puzzled. He gripped the calculating orb array in his hand and used Item Identification. A second later, an information label appeared before his eyes:

Name: Third-Generation Psionic Calculating Orb · Cracked Version

Function: By achieving psionic resonance with an upper-level node, it can establish a regional encrypted psionic communications network. It has a preset standard authorization tree and allows simple information transfer between parallel and upper- and lower-level nodes. It also supports multiple communication modes, relative position calculations, custom coordinate markers and sharing, simple psionic projection, basic translation between several languages, and more.

Notice!

The encryption lock on this calculating orb has been completely cracked, so users can edit and add custom functions.

However, this requires some understanding of steam engineering's micromechanical field, psionic erosion, binary information storage theory, the construction of third-generation psionic differential engines, and cybernetics.

Notice!

Please locate an upper-level node to activate and initialize the calculating orbs from the same batch.

Maker: Siuke Flywheel

Item Description:

After I left Chardo Port, steam engineers stopped making progress in their study of beautiful machines. Seeing their so-called third-generation calculating orb only confirmed how far my foolish colleagues had fallen. After all, cracking their vaunted seven-layer encryption was no harder than tricking a troll out of the last piece of meat in its pot.

The fact is, I didn't just crack it—I upgraded it!

They want to monopolize this marvelous technology, but I'm going to give it to everyone, whether they need it or not. And I'll make a little pocket money on the side.

Well, I'm grateful to be born into a world where clever people make the rules and fleece the fools! —Siuke Flywheel

Murphy narrowed his eyes.

He immediately thought of the best way to use the psionic calculating orbs and began thanking fate for this gift.

"Search!"

He looked up at Mirian and Maxim.

"Search the cargo! If General Loren intends to use these things to build a command system for his legion, there must be an upper-level node too—the commander's orb, for his own use. Find it!"

"Oh, right! How did I forget that?"

Mirian jumped to her feet.

Murphy was right. Psionic calculating orbs had a strict authorization tree. Without activating the upper-level node, there was no way to activate the entire system.

She sent Maxim over to lift the overturned wagon, but it was too heavy, and the blood thrall was injured. Murphy shook his head and stepped forward, gripping the wagon's edge with both hands.

With the 10.5 Strength granted by his upgraded Rare character template, he exerted himself under the enhancement of night and easily lifted one side of the wagon.

The two assistants immediately climbed inside. First, they pushed out the soldier who had been crushed to death, then took out all the large and small boxes.

At the very back of the wagon, Mirian found an exquisite brass chest.

She carefully carried it out and placed it in front of Murphy. The lock was fitted with a metal plate bearing only two buttons: 0 and 1.

"It's a binary combination lock. I've seen this kind of safe in a book! A very traditional, purely mechanical design, but quite effective. It contains inert materials, so psionic spells can't affect it. They're usually rigged with a bottle of acid or a finely crafted gold-burning bomb inside. Either can destroy everything within ten meters."

The red-haired young woman rubbed her temples and said,

"This is a problem. Entering random numbers without the combination might destroy whatever's inside."

Murphy said nothing. He simply placed his hand on the brass chest.

Item Identification activated! An information label appeared:

Name: Siuke Flywheel's Self-Destructing Safe, Model 400

Function: Stores valuables.

Item Description:

Siuke Flywheel is a brilliant halfling mechanical artisan, born into a distinguished family but a rebel by nature. He has many bad habits! For example, he uses the same combination for every lockbox. This is one of the many little secrets of the mad genius now living in the Dark Mountains.

To this day, no one knows the background or origins of Siuke Flywheel, the black-market dealer in mechanical weapons. But a rumor says the birthday of his favorite girl is April 14.

"Click, click, click."

Murphy, a former professional software tester, entered the binary sequence 110011110 without hesitation. Mirian stared at him in horror.

She thought he was pressing buttons at random, so she hurriedly backed away and crouched with her hands over her head, just in case the safe exploded and hurt her.

But then a miracle happened!

As Murphy lifted his fingers, the little brass chest popped open with a click, revealing a perfectly round calculating orb.

It was larger and more refined than the other psionic calculating orbs, about the size of a baby's fist. The silver-gray plate on its exterior, which served as both decoration and protection, bore a factory serial number left by the halfling mechanical artisans.

Was this actually genuine?

But why did it look so different from ordinary calculating orbs?

Puzzled, Murphy reached into the chest and took out the core calculating orb, the upper-level node. The instant he touched it, the translucent character card before his eyes blurred, like a television screen disrupted by static.

A second later, it returned to normal.

Then, as Murphy watched in surprise, a notification appeared before his eyes:

Special Technology Item detected: Fourth-Generation Psionic Calculating Orb Prototype · Codename 003. The psionic technology level of this item is sufficient to simplify and reproduce some functions of the Test Administrator System!

Please have Alpha select a function to simplify and reproduce from the currently unlocked functions.

Notice!

Because the item's manufacturing process is outdated, its principles are complicated, and it is still at the initial stage of this technology tree, its data memory is limited. Please do not select complex functions for reproduction.

"My luck's been pretty great today!"

Murphy whistled, his face alight with the joy of two good things coming at once.

He still didn't understand how this thing worked, and he wasn't entirely sure what bizarre level steam engineering had reached in this world. But none of that mattered!

Because the player interface he'd been longing for was finally here!

Ah, thank you, bounty of nature!