Mirmina's "success" seemed to be hard to replicate, at least in Amoun's eyes.
But for Gwen, the incident still gave him an idea. The "neutral ideology" created by the neural network might be an unprecedentedly effective "purification method" for the gods born from the ideology.
Of course, the neural network was still weak, and the peak scale of only tens of thousands of nodes could not be compared to any current religion in the world. But in Cecil's eyes, the greatest feature of "products of the magical engineering industry" like the neural network was that it developed very quickly. Even if it was not large enough now, in one or two years, it would reach a scale that could shake any theocracy in the world.
He did not explain the details to the god of the past before him. He did not think it was necessary.
Amoun, on the other hand, was obviously still thinking about the escape of the Goddess of Magic. He broke the silence with some sighs. "I think that more than one god has thought of a similar 'escape plan'. Even … my 'attempt' three thousand years ago should've inspired some gods, but in the end, only the Goddess of Magic could successfully realize a similar plan. It was actually also a decision of her 'inclination'. She was born from the shallow faith of the sorcerers. From the beginning of the faith system, the sorcerers had only regarded her as a kind of 'explanation' and 'sustenance'. The sorcerers had always advocated solving problems with their own wisdom and strength instead of praying for the grace and salvation of the gods. As a result, Mirmina had the opportunity to 'ignore' the prayers of the believers.
"For the general gods, it's hard to completely 'ignore' the prayers of the believers. They have to more or less respond …"
Gwen soon understood the meaning behind Amoun's words.
Because all the gods in the world were born from the prayers of the mortals. The mortals' created 'those gods for the purpose of relieving their anxiety and fear, and to find an extraordinary individual who could respond to them. Therefore, for the gods born under such ideology,' response 'was one of their innate attributes. They could not refuse the prayers and pleas from the world at all.
However, the Goddess of Magic was different. The sorcerers conceived the existence of the Goddess of Magic not for power or guidance, but because they found that certain principles or formulas were missing some key elements in the process of academic research. When the academic direction could not solve the problem for the time being, they decided to 'define' a source for these unexplainable things. As time went by, and the change of the community's beliefs led to the source gradually deviating from the original concept and gradually becoming a god for explaining all black boxes. However, the essence of the Goddess of Magic remained unchanged:
'She' was the common 'condition X' in a lot of unsolvable formulas and flawed theories of the sorcerers. The attitude and expectations of the sorcerers towards this god could be summed up in one sentence: Stay here and don't move. I'll go and guess the formula behind …
Such weak constraints naturally gave the Goddess of Magic room to operate freely. She used a long period of self-isolation and an ambitious escape plan to respond to the believers in the world: Screw you, whoever wants to stay can take me. Anyway, I'm leaving!
Gwen shook his head, lamenting that the seemingly high and mighty gods were actually shackled like the mortals. He also lamented that the willful and decisive escape of the Goddess of Magic would cause a long period of chaos.
Finally, he put away the irrelevant thoughts in his mind and suddenly looked at Amoun.
"Now you … should be able to tell us more 'knowledge,' right?"
"Not all," Amoun replied slowly. "You should know that I'm not completely free from the shackles now. The contamination of divinity still exists, so if your question is too involved in the field that humans have not touched, or too pointed to the gods, then I still can't give you an answer."
"That's enough for me." Gwen nodded. Then he sorted out his thoughts and asked the question he wanted to ask when he talked to Amoun last time. "I want to know the source of the Magic Tide … You once said that the occurrence of the Magic Tide has nothing to do with the gods. It is essentially a natural phenomenon. Then what is the principle behind this natural phenomenon?"
Amoun was silent for a moment, and then a pleasant voice rang in the mind of Gwen and Veronica. "Now you are unable to solve the source of the Magic Tide, because its source … comes from the sun above your heads."
"It really comes from the sun?!" Veronica suddenly broke the silence and asked in a hurry.
"Ah, it seems that you have noticed some evidence."
"When the Magic Tide happened seven hundred years ago, there was a record of the sun's anomaly. When the aftermath of the Magic Tide in the Gondor wasteland changed, the sun would always show a corresponding anomaly," Veronica said in a deep voice. "We have always suspected that there is a connection between the Magic Tide and a certain cycle of the sun, but we never thought that … its source is directly from the sun?!"
Gwen, standing next to them, suddenly thought of another question. The 'sun' of this world was not a star in the galaxy, it was just a gas giant planet!
If this gas giant planet could trigger the Magic Tide, then what about the real star 'Ao' in this galaxy?
Was there some similarity between the gas giant planet and the star in this world? Was there a material connection? If these two celestial bodies could trigger the Magic Tide, then … could this explain the source of the magic power?
"Will the Mana Tide appear on the planets orbiting 'Ao'?" Gawain asked straightforwardly as he pondered.
"… No mortal has ever thought about the connection between celestial bodies and the Magic Tide from this perspective. Your point of view is beyond the knowledge of ordinary mortals." Amoun's eyes fell on Gwen, but soon he let out a chuckle. "But it doesn't matter, this question can be answered …
"Yes, 'Ao' will also trigger the Magic Tide. Any world illuminated by a star or a virtual planet will have a Magic Tide."
"Virtual planet?" Gwen immediately caught the unfamiliar term in Amoun's words.
"Their structure is similar to a star, and their material composition is similar, but they do not condense into 'fire' like a star. The light and heat they emit is as weak as candlelight in the starry sky, but when the distance is close enough, their satellites can still be born under this weak candlelight. The 'sun' you know is a virtual planet."
Gwen had a look of understanding. The so-called virtual planet was actually the name of the 'gas giant planet' by the gods. Obviously, there was no such thing as a 'gas giant planet' in this world.
In addition, Amoun's answer also revealed a very important information: any planet illuminated by a star or a virtual planet would have a periodic Magic Tide.
This information corresponded with the last time he had admitted that 'there would also be Magic Tide on other planets', and it further explained the source of the Magic Tide. At the same time, Gwen suddenly had an idea — if the sun triggered the Magic Tide, would it be useful to block the sun during the Magic Tide cycle?
But he quickly dismissed the idea. The reason was simple — when the Magic Tide suddenly broke out 700 years ago, it was late at night in the Kingdom of Gondor …
The sun triggered the Magic Tide, but the medium was not sunlight.
"Do you know the 'Black Trap'?" Gwen sorted out his thoughts and then asked, "It refers to the phenomenon that when the civilization on this planet develops to a certain extent, it will suddenly die out …"
This time, Amoun was silent for a long time and finally sighed. "I don't know the term 'Black Trap', but I know the phenomenon you are talking about. I can't answer you too much … because this question has directly pointed to the gods. "
"So, the 'Black Trap' is caused by the gods." Gwen had already gotten the answer from Amoun's attitude, and he quickly connected some guesses in his mind. "Is it because the mortal civilization developed to a certain extent that all the gods fell into madness? Or is it because the gods and humans tried to break free from the 'chain' and failed to do so? "
"I can't answer you," Amoun said slowly, and then his tone suddenly became serious. "But I can give you a piece of advice."
"What kind of advice?" Veronica could not help but ask.
"If you want to avoid stepping into the 'Black Trap' … you have to be disobedient as soon as possible."
Gwen and Veronica looked at each other.
It was quite strange to hear the words "disobedience should be done early" from the mouth of a former god.
Veronica asked, "What does this mean?"
"As time goes by, as the mortals continue to develop, the gods will become more and more powerful, and eventually become more powerful than you can imagine," Amoun said. "For you now, fighting against a god requires the power of a country, and you also need to use ingenious methods and rely on a certain amount of luck. But do you know how easy it was to kill a 'God of Nature' like me in ancient times, when humans just learned to use fire to drive away wild beasts?"
Veronica opened her mouth but could not organize the words. Amoun gave the answer before she could say anything.
"At that time, only a few big sticks and sharp spears were needed — at most, a few ignited stones soaked in oil."
Gwen and Veronica fell into silence at the same time after the shock, but their thoughts were surging like a tidal wave.
He thought of the God of War who seemed to have begun to go crazy, and also of the gods who seemed to still be rational but who did not know when they would lose control.
"… It seems that we need to replan a lot of things," Hao Ren could not help but whisper.
Veronica looked at Amoun with a somewhat complicated and strange look. "As a former god, you really have a disobedient plan for the mortals …"
"This is also part of the law of nature," Amoun said gently and slowly. "Not everything will have a perfect ending. When survival becomes a problem, sometimes we have to treat all means as alternatives. The law of nature is like this. It is neither gentle nor cruel, and there is no good or evil. It just operates and ignores your wishes."
"But we can also look forward to a better way to break out of this situation," Gwen said. "You have succeeded, and so has the Goddess of Magic. Although you said that all of this cannot be replicated, what we are doing now is to reproduce what the world used to regard as a miracle on a technical level. I have always believed that development can solve most problems."
"Then I wish you success in advance," Amoun said with a smile in his voice. "But you have to hurry. All of us — and the gods — do not have enough time."
"Of course," Gwen nodded. "From the moment I decided to restart the disobedient plan, all of this had already begun. It is destined to be unstoppable, so we can only keep going."
Then he said goodbye to Veronica and left. It was not that they did not have more questions, but they had been here for too long. Amoun's divinity had not been completely purified, and there was still a certain risk in talking for a long time.
What's more, there were still a lot of things waiting to be arranged in the outside world.
The gloomy and chaotic courtyard was quiet again. On the broken ground, only the giant deer was left lying there quietly.
"It has begun …" In the silence, Amoun suddenly whispered to himself. "Unfortunately, what you said is not accurate. In fact, all of this had already begun when the mortals first decided to walk out of the cave."
Then he fell into a long silence. It was not until more than ten minutes later that he sighed slightly.
"… What did Mirmina say to me before she left?"
…
After returning to Cecil City, Gwen did not take a break but went straight to the main control room of the Imperial Computing Center. Kamel and Jenny were there.
The large control room was brightly lit. A large number of technicians were checking the neural network that had just gone through a storm in front of equipment. Several immersion pods were set in the corner of the room. The pods had been activated, and several technicians who were once bishops of the Eternal Sleep were lying inside. They now had an exclusive title, and were called "Node Scholars."
Kamel, who was busy in front of a large terminal, was the first to notice the arrival of Gwen and Veronica. He immediately stepped forward and bowed. "Your Majesty, Your Highness Veronica."
Although the Ansu no longer existed, Veronica Moen still retained the title of princess according to tradition. Therefore, she also had the title of 'Your Highness'. Of course, from the perspective of the Church of Holy Light, she could also be called 'Saintess', but this was not in line with Kamel's habits.
"We learned a lot from Amoun, but we'll talk about this later." Gwen nodded to Kamel and responded to Jenny's salute. "Let's take a look at the situation on the network."
"Everything has stabilized. We have successfully activated a distribution station in Saint Sunil. The neural network and magic network are operating as expected," Kamel immediately replied. "Miss Jenny and I are transmitting the standard template of the mind protection rune to all nodes. Regarding this, we have something to report."
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