Barda's initial collection of information had been quite comprehensive in a lot of areas, and that included Magic. Barda had processed the information but had not taken the time to understand it fully.
Magic is the power to be able to influence events by using mysterious or supernatural forces. There were several kinds of magic and Barda did not have a complete list of these magic powers, or where they stemmed from. He would have loved to know more, but he had incomplete knowledge.
At least with the documents scanned from Lady Arnea, What he did know was this. There were 4 main types of magical powers based on their sources. There was Elemental Magic, Necromancy, Witchcraft, and Proxy magic.
Necromancers got their power from death, while Proxy magic relied on the worship of superior beings that would grant to worshipper magical powers. These powers stemmed from the deity. Witchcraft was known as black magic. It involved all forbidden practices of magic, some taboos being too dangerous.
Elemental magic was the most basic and common. It involved having some influence over a natural element or natural phenomena. Some individuals were born with it, but the vast majority got their power from absorbing Magical beasts' essences.
There were, however, limitations to this kind. The first was that one could only command one kind of element. Barda was shocked by this. He wondered if this was a fluke but he had been able to absorb 2 essences from 2 seemingly unrelated magical beasts.
The wyverns were Fire Element beasts, that went without saying. However, the spider he had brought down looked more like a Rock ELement than Fire. Even being able to cause an earthquake spoke more to the Rock Element. That could only mean one of 2 things, either he could absorb essences from multiple elements or the 2 essences were related somehow. Barda was more inclined to the former.
All this went through Barda's mind as he made his way to the forging room. Once there he locked himself in and started working. All around him people were busy rebuilding the city and he wouldn't be very missed. He had a very important thing he needed to do.
Taking out the small piece, Barda analyzed it again. Despite it being the size of a chest, most of it was just structural, barely benefiting him. However, Barda recognized a small component that had been broken off. Most of it had been burned off, but some parts remained intact. It was this part that Barda was interested in.
Barda was analyzing the chip on the board to understand what part it came from. Without any to power the device, he could do nothing further than surface analysis. He couldn't figure out from which part the piece had fallen from, much less its function. All he could do was analyze the physical component and its structure. He was going to reverse-engineer it.
Once he had done all the analysis he could, Barda began the work. At this point, all Barda wanted to do was to be able to create a functional Integrated Circuit chip. With that, he can begin making smart devices.
There were several kinds of computing chips that had been developed over the years. The ones in his brain were bio-chips. Each of these chips had their advantages and disadvantages, for instance, his chips were extremely high functioning capable of multiple high-end modules, however, they were very costly to produce and quite plainly too far away from his reach at the moment.
Some chips could be considered easier to build than others, but it was still a herculean task. The chip he had in front of him was silicon-based. This was not a coincidence since Barda selected the silicon-based pods. They were the simplest to build and the least complicated. Other advancements such as Gallium Nitride chips that came after the silicon chips were less vulnerable to EMPs and more complex. Barda figured that he didn't have to worry about EMPs at the moment.
First things first, Barda had to get the right raw materials. Silicon was top of the list, but there were other components required as well such as capacitors and resistors. Barda also needed extensive wiring and proper insulation of the wires. In essence, every component he needed to add would be a new invention. He also needed to invent some tools as well to help him in handling these components.
With a heavy sigh, Barda made a list of materials he would need. He started collecting those that were easily accessible such as copper, iron, brass, wood, sulfur, coal, and crude oil. He would then go collect tree saps to make rubber at night.
Barda found that the process was going to be more extensive than he had previously thought estimated. For instance, to make a simple wire, he had to make 2 machines. The first machine would the copper material, stretching and lightening the material into a wire. the other machine winds the new wire into a large bobbin. Wires would be fused to form an electric conductor/cable. He still hadn't made the insulator yet.
To make rubber from nature, a critical component in his new invention, he had to go into the forest and extract a liquid sap called latex from certain types of trees. The best type of trees were the rubber trees, but since he couldn't find any, he went with dandelions. Not as good but readily available.
Next, Barda needed to come up with a way to extract hydrocarbon chains from crude oil. He then went ahead and polymerized the chemicals extracted to create various plastics. Then came the silicon-processing bit.
Barda acquired a lot of quartz from the mine he had found the magical spider. With that, he could extract the silicon from it and form the chip and parts of the motherboard. Now all that was missing was some bit of memory (RAM) and he would have a functional computer.
Being locked in all day and night was not a good idea, but luckily, he had Batoo and some other minions he could send for food. Not that he needed to eat, but he had to keep up appearances.
After 36 hours of intense work, Barda finally produced his first chip. Well, it was more of a circuit board than anything else but it worked. He passed electrical signals in it and was able to perform simple arithmetic and logic-based functions. It had a frequency rate of 2.3 kilohertz or 2300 cycles per second. Barely functional but it would do.
***
"Those treacherous b*st*rds!" the Queen exclaimed as she read the list of all the positive respondents. The prince of Gumina had invited all the nearby city-states for a delegation.
By now, it was well known that the port city of Reuze was in bed with the Gumina Kingdom, and since the puppet king of Tristan was also under Gumina, Gumina now controlled 2 city-states in the continent.
If anyone agreed to come, they were legitimizing the claim Gumina had over the continent, essentially siding with the enemy. In Lady Maara's eyes, that was no different from stabbing the continent in the back.
"They are not traitors my Queen," King Sahir sighed, "Just looking out for their kingdom's welfare." He understood where they came from. Had he been in their shoes, he would have done the same.
"Your Highness, we must act immediately?" General Morio said.
"Act how?" King Sahir.
"We need to also send an invitation to all these cities as well, and any other they did not send to," the general responded. "If they are organizing some sort of summit, we also need to be there and have our summit as well. Show them that we are not without support in the continent!"
"And do we have support?" Lady Maara asked in a sad tone.
"Your Highness, there is only one way to find out," Commander Greer said.
"Why would they support us?" King Sahir was bewildered.
"We managed to kill 4 of Gumina's dragons," the General answered.
"We also took down the hell legion," the Commander added. "And scared off whatever nightmarish monsters they throw at us."
"We also have a legitimate claim. This is our land, our continent!" A crane city general added. This was an invasion of some foreign power. If they couldn't curb it, they were all doomed.
"It is decided then. Lady Twila, draft the invites." Lady Maara said.