Getting a Technology System in Modern Day

827  The Contemplative Seraphina.

For the next five months of VR time, Aron dedicated himself to an intensive cycle of designing, building, and testing the tower. Each iteration was subjected to rigorous scrutiny, with problems identified and resolved as they arose. He continually adjusted the testing environments, introduced unforeseen challenges, and attempted to breach the system from various angles to ensure its resilience. Aron left no stone unturned, determined to account for every possible scenario.

{We can now say that it has passed level one security and is ready for rollout,} Nova finally announced, bringing the final test instance to a close.

“Good,” Aron replied, exhaling a sigh of relief. “Send the data to Lab City and have them work on refining it further.” While he was relieved to have completed this critical phase of his plan, the lingering knowledge of the existence of beings far more dangerous than he had previously imagined tempered his satisfaction. The safety of the empire and its citizens had remained as a lingering thought on his mind.

{I suggest you take some time to rest and recharge, and allow me to focus on decrypting any of the encrypted files we have,} Nova advised. She had noticed the toll that months of unbroken focus, even within the accelerated timeline of VR, had taken on Aron.

“Yeah, I’ll take a break for a while,” Aron agreed, initiating the logout process. His voice carried a rare note of exhaustion, though his resolve remained unshaken.

After Aron logged out, Nova promptly wrapped up her tasks, finalized the data collection, and terminated the VR instance.

…………..

“What’s on your mind, Princess?” asked the Xor’Vak, his voice calm yet curious. His scheduled shift had brought him here, pulling him away from the intense closed-door training session he had been fully immersed in just moments ago.

Seraphina, seated near the edge of the hovering city within the universal simulation, allowed herself a rare moment of reflection. Her gaze wandered over the bustling world below, where people appeared as tiny dots, moving about their lives far beneath the city’s towering height. The sight, both humbling and overwhelming, framed her response.

“I’m trying to understand the empire,” she admitted, her tone laced with frustration and wonder. “Even with the assimilation of cultural and contextual knowledge about its workings, about humans... it’s proving to be more challenging than I anticipated.”

Her eyes lingered on the streets below, where individuals of countless backgrounds carried on with their routines, seemingly oblivious to the larger mechanisms governing their lives. The vastness of it all, coupled with the complexity of human behavior, seemed to weigh on her thoughts.

“Please enlighten me,” the Xor’Vak assistant said, his tone respectful yet tinged with confusion. He couldn’t quite grasp what Seraphina was trying to convey—a pattern that had become almost routine for those tasked with watching over her since her assimilation with human culture and contextual knowledge.

“It’s the disconnection,” Seraphina began, her gaze still fixed on the bustling ground below. “The mismatch between the relatively small size of the empire and the sheer power it wields. And then there’s the speed—how rapidly they reached this level of dominance. It feels like an anomaly,” she explained, her thoughts drifting back to the imperial history she had studied. At first, she suspected the humans of fabricating their records, but the evidence presented had been too overwhelming to dismiss.

“Perhaps they haven’t expanded further because the current empire has no immediate need,” her loyal aide offered thoughtfully. “They might only choose to expand when their existing resources no longer suffice. And considering they reside in a star system brimming with mana stones—more than enough to fuel their advancements—any other system might seem barren and unattractive by comparison.”

“Although that might be how it appears, I believe the opposite,” Seraphina replied, her tone steady but with an air of finality that hinted she wouldn’t elaborate further. Her thoughts drifted to her private meetings with Aron, where he had revealed a vision so profound she wouldn’t dare speak of it—not even to her most trusted subordinates who had accompanied her.

Those meetings, coupled with her assimilation of human knowledge and her observations over time, had led her to an unsettling yet intriguing conclusion. Humans were, almost universally, driven by greed. But their greed wasn’t singular; it took on countless forms. Some craved wealth, others pursued happiness, longevity, beauty, or power. Yet, in her eyes, the emperor stood apart. His greed was the most extraordinary of all—his desire was for peace. And he was willing to walk any path, no matter how treacherous, to make it a reality.

To Seraphina, this made him the most fascinating being she had ever encountered. His greed was not only vast but backed by a power and determination that made its realization seem achievable. It was this combination that, paradoxically, made him even more alluring in her eyes.

“You think the emperor is willingly halting the empire’s expansion?” her aide asked, his voice filled with surprise as he tried to piece together her cryptic response. He could only guess at the deeper meaning behind her words, hindered by her deliberate restraint in sharing her thoughts.

“Yes, I think so,” Seraphina responded, her tone calm but firm. “He seems to be deliberately slowing down the pace of the empire's expansion, trying to mitigate the potential negative effects of their rapid technological progress. In contrast, it took the civilizations in the Astral Conclave thousands of years to reach their current level of technological sophistication—progress that has taken the empire barely a decade. During those millennia, the Conclave's numbers grew alongside their advancements, allowing them to colonize different star systems without spreading themselves too thin. But the empire, due to its unprecedented acceleration, doesn’t have that same luxury. This super-rapid development raises questions, and I still don’t have answers about how it all happened.”

She paused for a moment, her gaze distant as she reflected on Aron’s broader aspirations. That’s also why I’m so curious about how he plans to achieve his dream of peace—of the calm he desires, she thought to herself, the weight of his ambitions and the complexities they entailed lingering in her mind.

The aide nodded thoughtfully, finally piecing together the reasoning behind the empire’s apparent restraint. “It’s a smart move on his part,” he admitted. “If what you’re saying is true, it makes sense why the empire is focusing more on fortifying its foundation rather than pushing for expansion beyond the solar system and Proxima Centauri. Stability always comes before growth, especially when the stakes are this high.” n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Seraphina gave him a faint smile, appreciating his understanding but still keeping many of her deeper thoughts to herself. “Indeed. It’s a delicate balance he’s trying to maintain, one that will define the future of the empire.”