Molting the Mortal Coil

Chapter 877: Essence Seal

It was far from an impossible technique, but it definitely required a lot of practice to master the method of holding so much information in total focus. For a moment Sage lamented that he wasnt younger, as this sort of technique would probably be much easier to learn at a young age when the brain was very malleable. A Cultivators mind would constantly be improved as their strength continued to grow. A normal humans period of fastest learning might be as a child, but that was because it started to slow down as they matured. By cultivating a person would be inciting more growth and at a supernatural level at that. With the right Cultivation Technique, they could easily learn faster than a normal child would. That said, Sage felt it would be very beneficial to have his mind wired differently from the get go. As he advanced through the ranks his understanding of the Essence Seal would deepen and sooner or later hed master it quite easily. Instead of trying to cram it into his mind in a single year, it would be better to slowly train such a skill.

That must be what the Essence Sculptors test is about then. If you are talented enough as a genius to master this strange way of thinking within a year, then youre qualified to join him. I suppose theres nothing wrong with wanting only the most talented. Especially if youre doing this sort of recruiting drive out in the middle of nowhere.

Sage wondered if the Essence Sculptor would be upset to find out that he wasnt going to pass this test because of his talent, but because of his other unusual methods. Probably not, since the Essence Sculptor didnt bother to test talent directly. Instead he created this roundabout test. If he wanted to make a way for those with high talent and also those with special talents or abilities, then giving an open ended test like this was definitely a much better choice. While he couldnt be sure, this idea at least gave him some hope that he didnt need to worry about getting reprimanded in the future. It would be very annoying if he got bullied for lacking natural talent. He made a note to approach the Essence Sculptor or his allies with caution.

As it was now, Sages terrible talent showed its ugly head. When he attempted to learn the technique without any cheating he made such small progress that he realized it would likely take him a full century to perfect it. Mastering the completely detailed body of the Essence Seal was only the most simple part of the technique, like learning how to write letters on a page. Deciphering and predicting what shape it would take and how it was going to move was far more difficult. He couldnt help but feel somewhat jealous of those geniuses right now, if they could truly do this task in only a year. Sage felt he was much smarter than he had been on Earth, but that was mostly just the detail of his memory and the speed of his mind. It had to be much faster to keep up with his far faster body.

Sage realized that the improvement of cultivation on the mind must act like a sort of multiplier which improved with every stage. A better cultivation technique might increase this multiplier or it might improve the base value. Either way, it became very obvious that this body of his had a base intelligence value much much lower than those geniuses. Especially since he believed this sort of fellow wouldnt only wish to recruit Nascent Souls. Either that or he only wished for those who used special mind improving techniques.

Perhaps this also counts as a mind improving technique, in a way?

The method that Sage was using to cheat was right in front of him. A thin man dressed in a sharp black suit, completely with a sharp wing collared shirt and white gloves was standing across from him. These distinctive details as well as the single horizontal arm and bow made this man distinctly look the part as a butler. Sage had hand tailored a few of these suits for himself on the Inner World a long time ago. He gave the pattern to the Lang Clan and it slowly spread through the world from there. It was only fitting that he used the altered collar that he so associated with a classical butler for this fellow across from him.

Thats because this thin man was not just a butler, he was an Adjutor. Just like the Dragoons and the Hoplites before them, this was not a human but an Insect with a Human Seal. Yet, that was only the most basic observation. Unlike the Hoplite and Dragoon that seemed like Demi-human insects because of their carapace covered hands, feet, bits of their faces, the Adjutors only distinguishing characteristic was the slightly larger than normal multifaceted eyes. They had the compound eyes of an insect shoved into the skull of a humans head, but otherwise appeared very human.

Contrary to the first two Human Sealed insects, the Adjutor was not meant for combat. Instead, the Adjutor was the most powerful iteration of the biocomputer. The Adjutor was an insect created as an interface for a biocomputer. In its true form, an Adjutor was quite large and they were also taught the Hive Body technique of the Insect Immortal Index. Inside the Adjutors body they carried a huge assortment of insects that were the living components of the biocomputer. In order to make the biocomputer mobile, the inside of Adjutors huge body was used as a surface to carve all the Formation Arrays that were required to act as its logic engine. The true version of the Hive Body technique created a sort of extradimensional space in a Cultivators dantian which added to the tunnels that the standard version of the Hive Body technique created. With this technique it could use the large space of its Hive Body to store the insects that acted as data, while the rest of the pathways in their body were covered with arrays.

The Adjutor also used a simplified version of the holographic display technique that could only be used by Nascent Souls. There was an altered version of Qi Nozzles on their palms and illusionary Formation Arrays inside their wrists. The Nascent Soul technique was a way to use Laws and brute power to form an Illusionary Formation Array without actually carving an array anywhere. An Adjutor wasnt a Nascent Soul, but it had Formation Arrays inside its body as well as the Qi Nozzle to make it very efficient. This way the Adjutor could create large three dimensional projections to act as a screen.

Yet, the screen was now the primary method of access and control, instead it was just a way to share information with others. Thats because each Adjutor was meant to be the Linked Insect of a single Lang Clan member. As their linked insect, the Lang Clan member would have a direct link to their mind. There was no need for any input device, since it took only thoughts for the two to communicate. It also wasnt the first generation of Adjutor. They had been improved over and over again, especially since the Human Seal had one more quality that wasnt outwardly obvious. It made sure that the emotions and wisdom of the Adjutor were not equivalent to a human. These bug-men were already autonomous enough, and they were made to be tools. The less independent they could be, the better. Especially since they had so much processing power available, it would be better if they needed the Lang Clans input for things.

There was no danger from them now, but he was definitely not in a hurry to make a living version of Skynet.