Sacred Flame Echo Console
Shien followed Victor inside, stepping on the blackened rock slabs baked by the high temperature.
The deeper they went, the more the stone walls blocked out the noise of hammering and steam rising outside, leaving only the sound of footsteps and Victor's heavy breathing.
Shien glanced at the hunched back in front of him and said calmly, "I left the blueprints with you before I left the city, and it hasn't been long since you put them together. You've done it much faster than I expected."
Upon hearing this, Victor's withered shoulders straightened slightly. "It's just building up the basics; it's far from being a finished product. Besides, it's mainly because the blueprints you left, Lord, are detailed enough."
As they spoke, the two had already walked to a standalone black stone platform, where a strange and rudimentary device was placed.
A ring of unpolished Black Iron was fixed to the stone slab with rivets the size of a thumb. Several Crystal Board engraved with fine Rune interlocked with each other, and in the center was Rune core resembling a miniature Sacred Flame pedestal.
Victor looked at the assembled machine and let out a somewhat dry laugh, "My lord, this thing does look rather rough because it's Prototype."
"As long as it works, that's fine." Shien reached out and hovered his hand above the white chip, feeling the subtle but steady heat wave.
Before heading to Tear Knight City, Shien had already anticipated that he would eventually extend his reach to Blackpine Fief and take over the surrounding territories.
With such a large territory, a specific problem arose: orders were transmitted too slowly.
[LV.4 Warzone-Level Cluster Command] is enough to clearly illuminate Blackpine Fief and the surrounding terrain, but no matter how powerful this skill is, it is impossible for Shien's Divine Power to transmit it any further, so other ways of transmitting information need to be considered.
In this world, there are roughly three ways to transmit messages.
First, the signal or sound is only enough for one territory to use, and it can't be transmitted at all in this area full of Gray Fog.
Secondly, Alchemical Courier Bird can fly far, it is too expensive to build, and if placed in the Eternal Night, it will most likely be torn apart by the Blood Moon monster before it even reaches halfway.
Third, the Rider's Station has the same drawbacks as the Alchemical Courier Bird: the Knight can deliver messages under the Blood Moon must be at least Third Tier, the journey is dangerous, and most importantly, it always has a time difference.
So Shien wanted to design something to connect a nerve to these seven nodes.
Victor stared at the components on the black stone platform, his single eye filled with barely suppressed shock. "My lord, this is simply a genius idea! For the past few hundred years, people's application of Rune has always been limited to reinforcement, protection, and attack; no one has ever thought that they could be used like this."
What amazed him was not the crude machine, but the fact that Shien had carved out a technological path that the world had never seen before.
Shien looked down at the still-heating white chip, his expression unchanged. "Just luck, I happened to think of it."
However, the inspiration for this machine actually came from Victor [Lv.4 Alchemical Mechanical Transmission Construct] and [Lv.4 Alchemical Rune Matrix Energy Construct] that Sheen completely replicated from Shien by spending four thousand Reward Value points.
The most advanced alchemical knowledge from this other world, combined with the radio principles from Earth derived from the Sacred Canon, collided and ultimately forged this "Sacred Flame Echo Console."
The principle is not complicated. Each Sacred Flame Altar emits a faint ripple into the Gray Fog. Then, Rune are used to cut that ripple into pulses of different lengths, which are then transmitted in a fixed rhythm.
Once the receiver detects a wave of the same frequency, the Rune on the chip will light up in sync with the wave, and by comparing it with the codebook, the military order will be generated.
As for transmission, it also has a distance; it will attenuate over long distances. So, we knock it out station by station. For example, Blackpine Fief the way, Grasshawk Fief records it, and then we pass it out even further, so that the entire defensive line can be connected.
"Don't wait until tomorrow." Shien looked up at Victor. "Let's start testing now, before the Blood Moon rises and the Gray Fog disturbances are at their lightest."
Inside the Inner Fortress relay station, Victor's only remaining left hand kept rubbing his thigh, and he was very nervous.
This is the first on-site joint test of the "Sacred Flame Echo Console".
The test route was personally determined by Shien: the North Wall Watchtower sent the message, the relay station in the Inner Fortress forwarded it, and the temporary receiving rack in the Southside Sapper Camp received it.
He didn't rush to test long-distance communication between the Seven Fiefs right away. Instead, he first used the interior of Blackpine Fief as a testing ground. After all, if he couldn't even make it through Blackpine Fief, there was no way he could spread it outwards.
Testers have already been assigned to the North Tower.
Victor raised his left hand and pressed it down sharply, signaling to his apprentice to activate the first activation Rune.
The Rune slot was activated, and a faint golden light shone from the inside of the Black Iron. The cracked crystal in the center trembled slightly and emitted a low, high-pitched hum.
All eyes immediately fell on the few small Rune on the receiving end.
The Rune lit up once, then again, and began to flash on and off in a fixed rhythm.
The apprentice responsible for recording immediately bent down and quickly noted down the changes in length.
As planned, the message transmitted from the North Tower should have been "enemy approaching from the north," but what was reproduced on paper was "enemy approaching from the northeast."
But even the slightest mistake could lead to a massive disaster under the Blood Moon.
Victor's face darkened, and he turned to order, "Slow down the echo! Only one pass through the Inner Fortress relay; no more rushing!"
The apprentices quickly readjusted, and the Rune began to flash again, this time with a slower rhythm and significantly less of the previous erratic jumping.
A few seconds later.
"When-!
A deep, muffled bell rang out from the south side of Blackpine Fief.
This is the reporting code struck by the garrison on the south side as scheduled. The sound of the bell indicates that the series of beats sent from the North has passed through the stone walls and fortifications of the Inner Fortress and has been clearly received by them.
The apprentice standing to the side was stunned at first, then his face turned red and he almost shouted it out, but seeing that everyone was serious, he swallowed it back.
Victor's single eye remained fixed on the scorching Prototype, but his breathing became heavier.
"I'm sorry, my lord, this first Prototype is still far from practical use. It was clear when it was sent from the North, but it started to go astray when it reached the Inner Fortress. Then the south took over, Rune became a complete mess."
Upon hearing this, Shien walked to the Black Stone Platform: "The problem isn't that the message can't be relayed; it's that with each jump, the relay deviates from the initial rhythm, like a messenger shouting out military orders layer by layer. The more people shout, the more distorted it becomes."
Victor immediately took the blueprints out of his pocket.
"The next step is mainly to add calibration. We need to add an additional calibration ring to the repeater to bring the received beats back to their original state before sending them out."
Shien had already taken the charcoal pencil and drawn a new line on the drawing.
"Furthermore, don't rush to transmit long orders. First, create a fixed contingency plan booklet. Encode all commonly used military orders into Short Code, and the receiving end can simply check the booklet."
As Victor listened, he rearranged several chip positions and Rune slots.
By the time the discussion ended, the entire drawing had been completely altered beyond recognition.
Victor stared at the newly added calibration rings and said in a hoarse voice, "Give me some time, and I'll build the second-generation Prototype."
Shien looked up at the gray sky that was gradually turning red. "That's enough for today. The follow-up improvements are yours. Now, everyone go and rest."
Shien turned and walked toward the heavy Pig Iron, pausing slightly as he reached the entrance. "Tomorrow morning, move the other completed piece to the outer wall firing range."
"This will also allow the newly arrived Special Envoy Priest Emon, to see what Blackpine Fief is really up to."