Chapter 8 - Unlucky
It took him about a 10-minute walk to arrive at a shop selling the cheapest artificial soul. Dodo had always connected to the internet since he realized he could use the internet to get many kinds of data and Dodo decided to use the internet to find the cheapest shop in the city center.
According to Dodo, the shop that they were heading to was the best, trusted and cheapest shop in the city center. Dodo also said that they sold the artificial eagle soul there too. He had also surveyed the price while on the bus and found out with their budget at the moment, they could buy another two or three other souls.
When Kyle heard that, he asked Dodo which soul he should buy other than the eagle soul and Dodo said to buy the most basic of the basic souls. "Why buy the basic one? People will love the advance one more than the basic one," said Kyle.
[That is because the basic soul is the origin of the other monster soul. With the data from the basic soul, we will be able to derive many other monster souls because they all originate from the basic soul] said Dodo.
"The machine you create can do something like that too?" Kyle asked as he thought that the soul machine was only used to perfect the imperfect soul. Something similar to charging an empty battery to full. He never thought that the soul machine could be used to alter the structure of the soul too.
[No, that machine can only be used to create or perfected an imperfect soul. As for altering the soul, I will need to create another machine but we cannot afford it at the moment] said Dodo and Kyle nodded. [Since the soul is rare, we need any data we can get about the soul and the best data for me will be the basic one]
"Okay then. You have checked the souls they are selling, so, other than the eagle, which one should I choose?" Kyle asked because Dodo was the pro here. His knowledge about souls was limited. He could ask Dodo for the knowledge but he decided against it because Dodo once told him that at his current strength, there was a limit to how much he could store in his brain.
Kyle had been gaining massive knowledge about what he learned at the college added with more supplement knowledge regarding what he had learned. He had reached the limit a long time ago and would ask for Dodo's solution if he could not do something.
Dodo assured him that he could increase his knowledge again once he became a magician because, at that time, his body would improve and make his brain stronger.
[Any basic soul is fine] said Dodo. He had no preference as long as they were basic souls. Kyle nodded and they arrived in front of the shop. 'Xuke AS Shop' was written on the signboard. From outside, Kyle could see that the shop was small but weirdly enough many people were coming in and out of the shop.
"I didn't know that an artificial soul shop can be this popular," said Kyle while he looked at all the people entering and exiting the shop. From what he knew, the artificial soul shop was not that popular because the souls were inferior. Even so, he saw many people go in and out of the shop.
[Kyle, I think this is because of that Crown holder news] said Dodo and Kyle clapped his hand as he finally realized what was going on. All these people were going in either to buy a soul to become a magician or survey what soul they wanted. Everyone realized that the war was coming and they wanted to be prepared.
Not only that, even before the war started, there would be a lot of incidents happening everywhere around the planet. That was the normal occurrence before the war because many magicians would come to the planet to gather news and information about the crown holder.
During the information gathering, it would not be surprising to have some of them fighting. There would also be some that tried their luck to fight the crown holder by themselves and many incidents and fighting would start everywhere on the planet.
Luckily for Kyle that the Crown holder did not live in or nearby his city. So, his city would be a bit peaceful compared to the city where the crown holder was living.
"Let's get inside," said Kyle and he walked inside the shop. Once he got inside, he was surprised to see the space got massive and instead of a shop, it was a massive hall. In the shop, many large tubes filled with water stood majestically. Inside the tube were many monster souls.
Kyle was shocked. He knew what was happening and that was not his first time too but he was still surprised and amazed. The shop used the dimensional room technology. It was a technology that could increase the space inside a building. It was the combination of human technology and space magic.
"Dodo, will our dojo use the dimensional room?" Kyle asked.
[That will be the big part of the upgrade I will do to the building once you become a magician] said Dodo and Kyle was happy. [The dimensional room is important if we want to receive many customers coming to our dojo. It is also important for further upgrades we will do to the dojo in the future. This is also the reason why I want to create the mana generator because the dimensional room uses massive energy and electricity or any other source of magic is not a good choice.]
"Will there be a limit on how big our dimensional room will be?" Kyle asked.
[Hehehe, our dimensional room is a bit special. The dimensional room in this shop used human technology but our dimensional room is using the system's power, so there will not be a limit to the space but our limit will be our energy. The more energy we have the more space we can use] said Dodo.
"So, the mana generator is our important asset and we need to upgrade it a lot or create a lot of them," said Kyle and Dodo agreed. "It will also be a problem if the mana generator broke," said Kyle with a worried face.
[There is no need to worry about the machine breaking because It will never break. I told you before that the machine will be part of my power once I created them, so they will not break. Other than that, you should know the basics of the system power from the novels, all these machines can be upgraded once the system level increases] Dodo assured Kyle and he was in a good mood again.
"Ok then, we better hurry and buy the soul," said Kyle and he walked around the shop and saw all the souls the shop displayed. There were many kinds of them and Kyle was amazed at the variety of the artificial monster soul present there.
He went to the shop attendant and asked for the list of the souls available. Kyle found the eagle soul he wanted and raised his eyebrow at the price. "I already expect this price but seeing it myself is still quite shocking," thought Kyle.
The price for a single eagle soul was 800 Sola. Sola was the universal currency used by humans after the start of the age of magic. There used to be dollar, yen, yuan, and so on but it was hard to keep track of the currency because there were too many planets occupied by humans and they decided to make it simple and used only one currency and that was sola.
800 sola was not that expensive for a soul but an inferior product, it was quite expensive. A natural soul would usually be in the range of 10 thousand sola to 100 thousand sola based on the strength of the monster the soul belonged to.
Kyle skimmed through the list of souls they sold and chose another two basic souls he wanted to buy. He decided to buy the cat and dog soul. He chose the two souls without much thought. He saw that both were 500 sola so he decided to take it. He also thought that cats and dogs were the go-to for pet lovers and many people might have compatibility with them.
All in all, he bought three artificial souls at the total price of 1800 sola. He had a lot more money than that but Dodo had used most of them to buy the materials for the machines. He had about 1000 sola more left in his account and he did not want to use it as he needed them to buy food.
Kyle received three small oval capsules containing the soul of the eagle, cat, and dog. The monster soul was as big as the real monster but the small capsule used the combination of technology and space magic just like the dimensional room to store the big soul.
Kyle put the capsules into his pocket and made his payment. Once he was done, he left the shop, took the bus and went home. While on the way to the bus stop, he saw the electronic billboard still showing the news about the crown holder and he could see that more and more people were getting worried and anxious.
Once he got in front of his shop, he saw that some of the material had arrived and the delivery people put it in front of the shop. Kyle moved all the materials inside the shop. He asked Dodo if he could move it by himself but it looked like Dodo's control was only limited to the inside of the shop. Dodo did say that it might be possible in the future once the system power was stronger.
Once he got inside, Kyle went to his room and sat on his bed. He took out the three capsules containing the souls and asked, "What do I do with this?" Dodo had yet to create the machine and thus, Kyle could not use the artificial soul yet.
[Put them on the floor and I will absorb them] said Dodo.
"Why do you need to absorb them? Also, I didn't know you can absorb things," said Kyle. He was surprised to hear that Dodo could absorb things. Dodo had never once absorbed things for the past two years.
[I need the data for the soul so, I need to absorb them] said Dodo, and Kyle was again surprised.
"Didn't you only need to look at it to get the data?" This was the first time Kyle heard that Dodo would need to absorb something to get the data.
[That only applies to the data that is already available like books. The soul data which was its composition and structure is not available in books. They are available in computer data but we cannot get it because they are highly secured by the shop or company. For me to use the machine, I will need the soul data. Since I cannot get the available data, I will need to absorb the soul to analyze it and get the data.] Dodo explained.
[Other than that, human's data might not be precise enough and I should analyze it myself because that is part of the hyper brain ability] , said Dodo. Kyle frowned when he heard that.
"So, you mean that human's data might be wrong? Then, doesn't that mean all the data we have collected is wrong?" Kyle was a bit worried if the effort they had done for the past two years was a waste.
[I told you that it might not be precise but it is not wrong. My hyper brain ability can store, analyze, and improve all the data I have. All the data we have collected for the past two years was not stored blindly. I will usually analyze the data and improve them from every data I have in my collection] said Dodo.
He continued, [If by chance I have a small amount of data, I will not be able to improve the data but once more and more data is added, I will use all of them to improve the data stored previously. With that, our efforts for the past two years are not a waste. If not, I will not be able to create the machine]
"Then, I can see one problem here," said Kyle with his hand on his chin. He was thinking of something. "How can you be sure the machine for perfecting the soul will work when you don't have the data of the natural soul?" Kyle asked. Since the machine could be used to perfect the artificial soul to be the same as the natural soul, without the data from the natural soul, how would Dodo be sure that it would work?
[Although I don't have the full data on the natural soul, I do have enough data for the machine to work. Though I don't have the specific data of the natural soul from the specific monsters but we have collected many general data about the natural soul] said Dodo and he continued, [Remember all the magician we saw killing the monsters, I got a lot of data about the natural soul from the fight]
"So, you mean that the perfecting process will be fine?" Kyle asked.
[… 50% it will work] said Dodo and Kyle frowned. 50% might seem a lot but it was not. Kyle was worried. Dodo could feel Kyle's feeling and he added, [Master, you don't need to worry. The machine might fail to create a perfect soul but it will be able to create a good enough soul for you to use]
Dodo continued, [Also, we can change the soul later with better soul]
"But changing souls means that I will need to start from zero again," Kyle knew how hard it was to advance as a magician and he was afraid to start from zero again after he spent a lot of time advancing as a magician.
[You don't need to worry about that. As the master of the dojo system, you will not face any big hardship] said Dodo, and Kyle remembered that the system was a cheat power. He had yet to activate the dojo system and thus, he had no idea what the dojo was capable of. Seeing that Dodo was quite laid back on this, he felt like there was no need for him to worry.
[No matter how imperfect the soul we will create this time, we need it for you to activate the dojo system. Once the dojo is activated, you will have a better time as a magician. My power is limited right now without the dojo system fully activated, so, we need to make do with what we have] said Dodo and Kyle nodded.
���Well then, how will you absorb the artificial souls?" Kyle asked. Since Dodo was connected to the building, he thought that Dodo would easily be able to absorb the soul.
[I know what you are thinking. The dojo system has yet to activate so I will still need your help to absorb the soul. All you need to do is hold the capsules in your hand and I will absorb it immediately] said Dodo and Kyle did as instructed. He took the three artificial soul capsules and held it in his palm. A second later, he felt like the capsules had disappeared. Kyle opened his hand and the capsules were gone.
"That will not be good for digestion…" thought Kyle but Dodo assured him that the capsules did not enter his stomach.
[I will need some time to analyze this, maybe four to five hours] said Dodo and he continued [We also got lucky as we get more data about the soul capsules. The data we get from books is not enough] said Dodo happily.
"Oh~ Then, will we be able to create the capsules soon too?" Kyle asked.
[Hehehe, this data is valuable, not only the capsules, but it can also be used in many other things. Whoa! Whoa!] Suddenly, Dodo was shocked and Kyle was worried.
"Is something wrong?" Kyle asked because he got worried.
[Ah no. You know, it is better if we use the analysis power more. The data from the books is insufficient. All those in the books are mostly theory. I get more data from analyzing the real things. Seriously, this data added with the data from the book, I can improve so many things] said Dodo excitedly. [I should have used this function more] said Dodo.
"So, all the data we get from books is useless?" Kyle asked.
[Hmm? No, the data from the books is useful. Like I said, it is not precise. With the real things, I will get more than the books perfecting the data from the books. So, Kyle, I think that starting today, other than data we can find from books or online, it is better if we can get the real things for me to analyze] said Dodo.
"… How about the skill? Will you need the real things too?" Kyle asked because all the skill data they got was from skill books.
[You don't need to worry about that. For now, those data are more than enough. Now that I know how useful the analysis function is, I will create a machine to test all the skills we have collected once we have more money and from that, I will be able to perfect the skill data] said Dodo and Kyle nodded.
"… This is so complicated," said Kyle and he got tired. If by chance they knew how useful the analysis function earlier, they would get more useful data. Kyle realized how much damage was done to Dodo because Dodo had no idea the analysis was more useful.
"I need to work hard to heal Dodo," thought Kyle. He was too tired from all the things that had happened that day, physically and mentally. His graduation day, facing the truth about the side effects, traveling to get the artificial soul, almost thought that the two-years effort was in vain and found out how severe the side effects were to Dodo.
"How can I be this unlucky? My parents passed away and when I got Dodo, I thought my life would turn for the better without knowing that the system I got was damaged and I was the one that unintentionally damaged it," Kyle sighed. Many things were running in his mind and a few minutes later, he fell asleep.