Alice in the Land of Steam

Like the buzzing noise, the mechanical agitation and the heart's wail were precipitated in the noise. When everyone was silent, only Alice's voice was particularly clear and hoarse, so much so that one wondered if her throat had been burned by fire, so that when she spoke, she was mixed with a kind of hard fatigue. If that was the case, the fire should be called the past, and the fuel that supported its burning should be called memory.

Maybe even Alice herself didn't notice that when she opened her mouth, the name she subconsciously uttered was not "goddess", but "mother". Perhaps this was the fire of the past burning with memory, leaving the deepest mark in the depths of her chaotic and ignorant mind. Usually, it was buried deep in her heart, but today it turned into an impulse and blurted out without thinking.

In fact, it might not be her. Even her companions had not noticed this detail yet, because their minds were attracted by Alice's words.

The essence of magic is the spirituality of the goddess.

What is spirituality? In Saint Tomi's theory, spirituality is a channel for all things in the world to communicate with each other, and it is a metaphysical concept that cannot be described in words. It determines the unity of subjective consciousness and objective cognition of living beings. All things have spirituality, and therefore constitute a complete world. If you lose your spirituality, you lose the qualification to exist, or you can think of it as being separated from the world.

For humans, spirituality is particularly important, because they are born unable to perceive magic power, and must stimulate their spirituality to gain the qualification to use magic. Because of this strong correlation, some magicians in the Middle Ages also believed that the relationship between spirit and magic is the relationship between spirit and body, and they are seamlessly integrated and inseparable.

But Alice's statement is likely to completely overturn this perception.

If the essence of magic power is the spirituality of the goddess, then the so-called extraordinary, magic and wizardry are not...

"That's right." Tiantis smiled coldly: "The essence of all mysticism in this world is actually that living beings communicate with the spirit of Mother through their own spirituality, and borrow the right to use various concepts and laws from Him at the beginning of creation. All things have spirits, it's nothing more than the sun and the moon need to rotate, so they borrowed the concepts of light and darkness, warmth and cold from Mother; animals and plants need to be nurtured and grow, so they borrowed the concepts of life and death, growth and reincarnation from Mother; and after the self-conscious intelligent life forms have broken away from the most basic survival needs, they began to pursue higher-level power, so they borrowed the most concepts from Mother, and then derived a variety of mystical systems. Alchemy? Astrology? A strong body? A majestic spirit? A tenacious will? Even a long and long life..."

"Without Mother's generosity, do you think that mere mortals could covet the power of the universe's beginning?" Tiantis's gaze swept coldly over Countess Nevill and the proprietress Shesta, because the blood magic or fairy magic they used undoubtedly had the same origin: "Mother's character is always too naive, thinking that mortals will restrain themselves and use the power given by Her with caution. She is also too kind and does not want the creatures she created to experience the era of eating raw meat and drinking blood, and slashing and burning crops, as in the history of the earth."

To put it more vividly, a mother who dotes on her children always wants to leave the best things for her children.

But the question is, will those children whom He favors really respond to His expectations?
When the goddess was still in this world and the Holy Temple was floating in the sky of Eden, overlooking the earth, perhaps they did not dare to show any strange thoughts; but when the goddess chose to leave in order to set them free, would everything remain the same?

Thinking of the last scene in the video, Lingge was thoughtful. He looked at Tiandis and asked, "It sounds like you don't agree with the goddess's approach."

Tiantis did not answer the question directly. Instead, he looked at the young man for a while before speaking: "Mother got inspiration from the game and created this fantasy world of swords, magic and alien races. She wanted to abandon common sense and explore those fantastic, magnificent and incredible things. There is nothing wrong with this. However, the reason why the game can run stably is that the NPCs in it have been set with codes and can only run according to stereotyped procedures. When Mother made the "game" of Eden, she gave her NPCs abundant emotions and even opened up some of the permissions at the beginning for them."

How will NPCs react when they find out they are just a piece of code in a game?
What thoughts will NPCs have when they know that they only need to continue to seize authority to have the opportunity to go one step further, transcend the boundaries of life, and become beings like "players" or "gods"?
However, the power they can obtain is limited, because magic power is not a kind of energy in essence, but a kind of authority granted to mortals by the goddess of creation. It will not be generated naturally, nor will it be lost without reason. Unless all the authority can be concentrated in oneself, perhaps one can realize his ambition and transcend the mundane world. Just like the protagonist in the game, he keeps defeating enemies and constantly improving his level until he exceeds the upper limit set by the underlying code. As for where the enemy comes from... Aren't they everywhere you look?
But before that, they still have a huge obstacle to overcome, that is the messenger left by the goddess, the guardian and arbitrator of the world, the administrator who maintains and manages the world's magic circulation system - the real girl, Tiantis.

What consequences will arise when limited power conflicts with unlimited desire?
Tiantis retracted his gaze, glanced at Celestial Themis, and said calmly: "As the administrator of the Heavenly Temple Control Center, I apply to play the X25 archive file."

Starlight flashed in the eyes of Celestial Themis, and she replied in a flat voice: "Judgment: reasonable. The application has been approved. Now start playing the X25 archive file, codenamed: Spear and Shield."

Spear and shield, that is, tit-for-tat positions.

However, before everyone had time to think about which side the spear and shield in the code name referred to, the screen that had been silent suddenly lit up again, and a new video recording began to play, accompanied by the cold statement of Themis from heaven.

……

[The Spear and Shield file records the following: This file was recorded in the 129,825,312th year after the origin of Eden, which is also the 2,793rd year after the goddess left Eden. On the issue of war against mortal civilization, the agent Alice and the guardian Tiantis put forward different views. In the end, the observer heaven made the final decision. Only this video record is retained as supporting material.]

In the control center of the Holy Temple of Heaven, a row of silver-white metal cabinets are connected by countless electronic optical cables that climb on the ground or hang in the air. On the giant machinery in the central area, countless virtual light screens are scrolling with dense data and text, cascading down like a waterfall. The silver-haired girl surrounded by these virtual light screens is using her authority to deeply connect with the control center, sorting and editing these data involving different times, different spaces and even different dimensions. The huge amount of information and operation volume is enough to burn the most advanced supercomputer on the earth into scrap metal in an instant, but for her it is just a daily routine.

The same was true for another person. Tiantis's eyes were fixed on the huge main screen floating in the air, not wanting to miss every set of data and every piece of information refreshed on it. His hands kept tapping back and forth on the operating table, making crisp and loud clicking sounds. Because the operation speed was too fast, his hands even left a blurry afterimage. The continuous tapping sound suddenly sounded like a hurried minor tune, making people hold their breath for fear of disrupting their rhythm.

"Heaven," sometimes, Tiantis would take the initiative to give the girl instructions, usually brief and concise, just like her personality: "In three minutes, report to me the battle situation between the Saint Mogdia Empire and the Feather Clan Blue Sky Royal Court in the Gonde-Gular Forest area. Remember to attach the specific casualties and whether there are extraordinary life forms above the level of demigods participating in the battle; in five minutes, re-test the magic concentration in the Gonde-Gular Forest area and list a specific curve chart; in ten minutes, warn the monarch of the Kingdom of Vaninlina in the name of the Holy Temple of Heaven that the scale of this war is under our control and will not endanger his territory. If he still attempts to send troops to intervene, I will determine that he is deliberately disrupting the situation and reduce the magic circulation index in the Kingdom of Idolina in the next hundred years. Of course, it is best to let Alice say it in person, so that it is more legitimate..."

"Tantis!"

A voice with a hint of anger suddenly came from behind, briefly interrupting the two people's work. Tiantis did not turn around, only Tianjie looked up and saw Alice walking towards them aggressively, looking like she was going to call them to task.

"You've come just in time, Alice." Tiantis still focused on the observation data, but he used a little of his mind to talk to Alice: "I estimate that the war between the Saint Mogdia Empire and the Feather Clan's Blue Sky Royal Court will stop within four to six months. During this period, I will not allow anyone to try to expand the scale of the war or fish in troubled waters. So I need you to warn the leaders of the Vaninlina Kingdom, the Yingergon Kingdom, the Castalia Tribal Alliance and the Emerald Royal Court. I think some of them can no longer restrain their ambitions..."

The blonde girl couldn't help but pause, and her momentum naturally weakened by three points, but after she realized it, she became even more angry and didn't give him face at all: "If you want to go, go by yourself, what does this have to do with me?"

Hearing this, Tianjie couldn't help but glance at her, wanting to say something but stopping. Tiantis was also shocked by this irresponsible statement, and her hands subconsciously slowed down a lot, and the rapid minor tune turned into a soothing music. She turned around and said to Alice unhappily: "This is a war between mortal civilizations. Do you think it has nothing to do with you, the leader and agent of this civilization? Don't say such irresponsible words to me, otherwise, even if the mother is gone, I will teach you a lesson on her behalf."

Alice snorted, not afraid at all: "I said, if you want to go, go by yourself, this matter has nothing to do with me?"

Tiantis didn't even turn his head, thinking that she was still being upset. Although there had been no conflicts between the two recently, Alice's personality had always been like this. She didn't need any reason to be upset. At this time, she only needed to coax her with a few words: "So, does it have anything to do with me?"

"Of course it has something to do with you!"

Alice gritted her teeth and stared at Tiandis's back angrily, her tone quite impatient and impulsive: "This war was originally instigated by you. Do you still dare to say that it has nothing to do with you, Tiandis!?"

The knocking stopped suddenly.

Even the data flows pouring out on the virtual light screens came to a strange stagnation at this moment, as if the heaven was also shocked by this sentence, but the girl never liked to show such emotions on her face.

Tiantis slowly turned his head, fixed his eyes on Alice's face, and asked word by word: "What did you say just now?"

Alice felt a little guilty when she saw her like that. She subconsciously took a half step back, and then she realized that she shouldn't show her weakness at this time, so she glared back fiercely: "Did I say something wrong? Not only the war between the Saint Mogdia Empire and the Feather Clan's Blue Sky Royal Court, but also the Blood Moon War between the Blood Clan and the Werewolves, the ten-year battle between Libein and Shadowgun, the joint war between the three major elves... Since the 158th year after my mother left, you have been secretly provoking conflicts between these races and countries, indirectly contributing to the outbreak of every war, right? Don't think I don't know these things. What exactly do you want to do, Tiantis?"

She clenched her fists and glared at the black-haired girl in front of her with her crimson eyes. In addition to anger and dissatisfaction, there was also a hint of grievance, as if she would never give up unless she gave a reasonable explanation.

Themis in the celestial world turned her head slightly, her eyes also falling on Tentis, waiting for her answer.

However, Tiandis was silent for a moment, then sneered nonchalantly, "You said you knew it a long time ago? But I'm afraid with your intelligence, you haven't noticed this problem so easily. Let me guess who leaked the news to you: Nigflaim, the virtual dragon god of the dragon clan? Isabel, the sage of truth among humans? Or the guy from the mirror elf clan who calls himself the king of the sea? Forget it, it doesn't matter who it is. I told you a long time ago not to get too involved with them, but you always refuse to listen to me, Alice."

She raised her chin. Although they were about the same height, she looked down upon her. In her dark eyes was a coldness that Alice had never seen before, as well as undisguised disappointment. "What if I told you that I did all this?"

"What do you want to do? What can you do?"

"Ms. Alice, who is so naive?" (End of this chapter)