"Can you scan my body?" Xylos said
"Cannot scan the spirit body," PS000 responded
Xylos expected the result. Unless he entered the book physically like last time, there wouldn't be a way for him to identify what kind of life form he is. However, he felt odd that it can determine how much time he has left.
Connecting the dots, it seemed that his astral and spiritual state determines how long he can live instead of his physical body. Thinking deeper it makes sense, the most likely cause of ARTHs dissipating is the lack of a self.
Consolidating his memories, when he first arrived at the breakfast area, ARTHs other than the female and Marc, everyone mechanically ate their food. While touring the various faculties, unless an instructor was leading the class none of the ARTHs would be out and about doing self-directed activities. They lived liked drones waiting for the next order or task. How did Marc and the female maintain a sense of self was a mystery.
Xylos played around with the system for a bit and noticed that it was much more limited than he expected. For example, if he asked it to create a cube, it would generate a generic white cube with no discernable features.
After thinking for a bit Xylos needed some way to define an object. He would need tangible variables, that he can adjust, control, and observe as he went about his experiments.
"Create a new variable called height," Xylos said.
"Please define <Variable>" PS000 responded.
"A <Variable> is a symbolic representation of feature of an object"
"Variable module created. Scanning repository for <Variables>"
After several minutes it said, "Variable repository created. 1 000 000 000 entries. Possible variables for 'Length' toe, finger, nail, league, step, small, hand,..."
A cluttered list of measuring methods appeared, looking at the possibilities gave him a headache.
"Reduce all possible variables for 'length' to a numeric value greater than 0. A length of 5 is equal to the 1 toe"
"Removing redundant entries...optimizing...done!" PS000 said
"Create a cube with a length of 100 on each side," Xylos said, and soon after a 100 cm cube appeared in the air. The easiest metric was done.
"Search for <Variable> color" Xylos continued,
"Possible variables for 'color,' red, blue, green, white, black..." All possible color names appeared.
"Reduce all possible variables for 'color' to 6 hex. Hex values from 0 to F. FFFFFF is black, 000000 is white, FF0000 is red, 00FF00 is green, and 0000FF is blue. All other color is a mix of those ." It was slightly more complicated, but Xylos hoped it could derive the mixing method.
"Error, unable to optimize based on the given information. Added reference to Black as FFFFF; added reference to White as 000000..."
As expected, PS000 wasn't a true AI, it was something like a calculator that can store, identify, and modify information. Thus, if he connected all the color names with the hex values, he would be able to get the desired result but it wasn't worth the effort.
Using the same approach. he created and optimized several variables and object modifiers. It took a very long time but at the end of it all, he could finally describe the key features of an object.
"Create an object with the <Shape> = <Dagger>, <Dagger.Blade.Hardness = 10>, <Dagger.Blade.Length = 50>, <Dagger.Grip.Length = 10> made with <Dagger.Grip.Material = Soft Leather>" Xylos said. An illusion of a 50 cm dagger with soft leather grip appeared in the air.
He then wrote a rune scroll with the same parameters and compiled it. The same dagger appeared in thin air, but this time a spell information dialog appeared:
Lethality: 0~10
Mana cost: 1000
Life cost: 1 hour
Modifiers: none
Description: A spell that will conjure a really hard dagger
He had no way to gauge what it meant by Lethality since he didn't have a physical body as a point of reference. The only way he can obtain a point of reference is if he had PS000 copy his body and simulated what a Lethality of 1 or 10 was.
He smiled for a moment since he now had a way to simulate various "Programs" in a realistic virtual environment. Once he creates a copy of himself in this "System" he can safely simulate programs and experiments that might be able to resolve his current predicament and future obstacles.
The moment he relaxed a wave of exhaustion washed over him and he felt his spirit body being sucked back into the physical world where he instantly fell into a deep sleep.
The next day, Xylos had a quick breakfast, grabbed a bag of baked bread, 100 stacks of rune paper, and 5 bottles of rune ink. Then, he performed some random action before the legendary book and mentally pressed the red button on the key. A moment later he appeared before PS000.
"Welcome, Master Xylos," The stage said as Xylos jumped onto the stage.
"PS000, scan my body and create a duplicate. Show me all the relevant information." Xylos said
"Scanning..."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Location: Observation Area
"There it happened again," Tyler said as he called his boss over, "I think he found a way to access the book."
"Interesting, get someone to bring the book into Room B01. When he comes out, we can finally find out why the previous owner of the book is dead set on getting the book back." The Supervisor said.
"I thought the book was donated?" Tyler said
"I wouldn't say it was donated." The Supervisor smiled, "We received it as collateral when we bailed him out of a debt. If someone can enter and exit out of a book it has to be at least a mystical or legendary item. ARTH 737 managed to find a way to enter and leave at will. If we can find out from him how before he disappears, this facility would have made a significant contribution to our corporation."
"What if he resists?" Tyler asked
"We'll restrain him but as one of the few conscious ARTHs, we can probably offer him a deal. A living being should have an opportunity to live comfortably no matter how short it might be." The Supervisor replied, "Keep up the good work recruit."
Tyler looked at the Supervisor with a surprised expression. When he was hired as an intern at the facility and saw that the experimental subjects were humanoids, he thought that the members of the facility would be hardened, and apathetic to living beings but the way the Supervisor approached ARTH 737, was very human. This made Tyler feel better, but it also made him wonder what is the true purpose of the research facility.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Location: Somewhere in an underground facility
"We detected a signal from one of the Legendary fragments," A worker in a black, red and blue military uniform said.
"Great, where did it come from?" The Coordinator said
"It appeared at a research facility in LaPlace. Managed by..." The worker hesitated and said, "Life Plus Corporation."
The Coordinator cursed and said, "Contact the CO, we need to gather our elites to retrieve that fragment as quietly as possible. Try to keep the casualties to a minimum, we don't want such a big corporation after us. Life Plus Corporation huh, I don't think they'll care much about losing a book, maybe they don't know its true identity yet."