Genius Engineer in the Labyrinth - Chapter 26



Only Noblemtl

Eyes (1)

Even as Breaker’s paramedics treated his wounds, Alan’s body was in shock and required deep rest.

There was a reason why they said, ‘Rest is an extension of treatment. Or, it is part of training.’ The body needs to replenish itself as much as it has consumed in order to function properly. If you just use it recklessly, the growth points could wear out and disappear.

If you were a warrior or a warrior who was good at strengthening your body, you might not know, but wasn’t Allen weak to begin with?

As a result, after collapsing as soon as I lay down on the bed, I spent two days sleeping and waking up repeatedly. Even this was thanks to the measures taken by the paramedics. If I had to handle it alone, it might have taken several days.

The moment I opened my eyes, I saw a narrow bed. The ceiling was low, and the walls were so narrow that I could touch them with just a little bit of stretching. It was a capsule hotel where the daily rate was 10,000 coins.

‘I can’t come and go here forever. I can’t afford a house, so I have to find a studio or an officetel…’

It was possible because I had an Explorer ID made by Breaker. However, I had to consider that it was cheaper the further out you went from the city, and more expensive the closer you got to the Explorer Guild or Labyrinth.

Alan put his worries aside for a moment, opened his eyes, and accessed Samramansang to search for the events of that day.

[Orderly labyrinth explorers, all under the strong watch of the city defense force!]

[Dungeon Explorer ○○○, is the claim that he discovered a new path actually a fraud?!]

It’s surprising that there was no news about people dying and being arrested like that.

‘It was either an everyday thing that wasn’t newsworthy, or someone who didn’t want to make a fuss quietly dealt with it.’

Even the headlines in other news outlets right now are praising the defense forces, so it would be difficult to pour cold water on that.

Alan closed the page he was looking at and started searching for the content he was most curious about.

‘Breaker, black clothes, direct explorer···.’

This time again there was no useful information or news.

However, when I combined several search terms, short articles or comments appeared. Most of them were community-based news, so their reliability was low, but I clicked on them because I was curious.

[Title: What are those guys wearing Breaker badges and black cloaks?]

Handsome Oak: That’s…

┖Seagull: Speak quickly.

┖Handsome Oak: You are the truth that cannot be handled.

┖Badagool: You said you didn’t know. It’s always the idiots who don’t know who pretend to know. Get out.

Shan Hai Jing: Curious?

┖Seagull: If you’re going to tease me, then get out.

┖Shan Hae Kyung: He must be an agent of Breaker.

┖Sea Ghoul: Agent? Why is an explorer an agent, let alone a national intelligence agency?

┖Shan Hai Jing: It’s just a name. No one knows what it’s called or what it does. Sometimes, when I hear news of them helping explorers in danger, regardless of their affiliation, they seem like good friends…

┖ Sea Ghoul: You don’t have to shield it.

┖ Sanhae -kyung: No matter how good it is, it’s a dog.

┖Handsome Oak: Mr. Jake, you can’t do that here.

‘Jake Marshall?’

This time, I found it right away. The moment I searched for ‘Jay’, the auto-complete function completed the name.

He was the president of the Breakers. The Breakers were registered as an Explorers’ Guild, so it would be proper to call him the president, but since the Breakers were so big, everyone just called him the president.

‘President Jake Marshall establishes a practical course for new dungeon explorers. He visits the families of dungeon explorers in person to offer compensation and words of consolation.’

Although he was rumored to be a kind person, Alan decided to reserve judgment until he saw it for himself.

Are there a few people who are different on the outside and inside? If that is not the case and if it is true, Chairman Jake Marshall is a respectable person.

Alan blinked and exited the capsule, ending all the activities. Rather than clearing up his doubts, they only grew bigger.

After getting ready to go out, Alan packed his few bags and left the capsule hotel, heading to the bank.

It was located next to the 5-story building where the new registration was made, next to the road. It was used to store money and items for explorers belonging to Breaker.

After waiting for his turn and sitting in front of the teller, Alan handed his ID to the dwarf bank teller.

“Identity verification complete. What brings you here?”

“I came here to check my balance and pick up something that was stored in my name.”

“The item stored in the safe under the name of the explorer is a soul stone. Is this the item you are looking for?”

“yes.”

“Please wait a moment. I will put the balance on the front.”

I asked them to keep the leopard’s soul stone if it was still intact, and fortunately, it seemed to be intact.

And the account balance was printed on the transparent wall that separated Alan and the banker.

10 million coins.

The balance, which was close to 0, jumped significantly. The automaton that had been defeated at that time must have been swallowed by the maze, which meant that the knight alone had brought in that amount of money.

I was half thinking it was a waste and half thinking it sold well.

‘I wanted to investigate the article too, but it was a shame. But since there are more things I can do, let’s focus on that.’

It was already out of his hands. Alan was wondering what to do with the money. In the meantime, the leopard soul stone was placed in front of Alan.

“thank you.”

“good bye.”

The completely broken leopard needed a new body. After leaving the bank, Alan ordered an automaton skeleton in the shape of a feline beast from a second-floor store in the building next door.

The clerk said they had it in stock and asked me to wait a moment.

“Is there anything else you need?”

“Is there a place nearby where I can rent a workshop?”

It would be best to prepare and train your own equipment, but I don’t have the funds to do that. So for now, it would be best to borrow equipment that someone else has already set up.

The employee nodded in response to Alan’s question.

“There is a basic magic engineering workshop in the basement of this building, but not many people come there.”

“Are there any defects?”

“It was designed for magic engineers who mainly travel through the labyrinthine lower floors···.”

The clerk hesitated for a moment, but when Alan continued to look at him, he continued speaking.

“For those who go there, it’s better to buy ready-made products than handmade ones because the price and performance are better. For those who are not from the lower classes, they can rent or own better-equipped workshops.”

“It doesn’t matter if you only have basic facilities.”

Tools are important, but if you don’t have them, you have to proceed as if you didn’t have them. The automaton in the labyrinth doesn’t take such circumstances into account.

“Then, please show me your ID for a moment to check if you are eligible.”

“Here it is.”

The employee’s artificial eye glowed blue as it scanned the ID.

“Mr. Alan, you have recently met the requirements and can rent it. You can enter by showing your ID at the front of the studio, but please check your account balance first as a daily rental fee is charged.”

“thank you.”

It was within the expected range. In fact, I didn’t even expect it to be free. The idea of ​​gold as the omnipotence of money is prevalent everywhere, and Maze City is the city at the forefront of that trend.

As I was looking around the store for a while, the employee’s eyes turned blue. It meant that he was communicating with someone.

“The automaton you requested has been delivered to the front of the underground workshop.”

“thank you.”

“We always put our explorers’ convenience first.”

Alan quickly headed underground. The leopard was a leopard, and he wanted to see what knowledge the bird inside the knight’s body contained.

Beep!

As soon as he scanned his ID, the door to the one-man workshop opened. Alan placed the automaton in the center of the workshop and quickly sat down in front of the desk with the magnifying glass.

I took the tightly wrapped bird out of my backpack and carefully disassembled it with the tools in the workshop.

Inside the automaton, which had its chest open like a real dissected bird, the power source was visible.

‘The magic stone was broken, but fortunately the soul stone is intact. It seems that the unusual technique was not applied as expected···.’

Alan carefully removed the soul stone with his latex-gloved hands and held it under the light attached to his desk.

“oh.”

I couldn’t help but exclaim in admiration. Usually, soul stones are made of thin plastic pieces with white smoke floating around them, but this one sparkled like it was sprinkled with gold dust.

‘It’s like an Oparts.’

Not all Oparts were great. Even a fruit knife was called an Oparts, so it was forbidden to have high expectations.

Alan rubbed the soulstone with his magically charged fingers. He moved in the same pattern as the soulstone’s input window usually appears, and this also produced a response.

Another light source appeared in the workshop where there had been only the light of the lamp. The lights from this light source were very small and densely packed together.

Last time, when I touched the leopard’s soul stone, I thought it was the Milky Way, but I was wrong. Rather, this side was the Milky Way, and the leopard was just a cluster of stars.

Countless stars were floating in the air, evidence of why the knight had more actions than other automata.

‘If the human soul were structured, could it be expressed like this? Since artificial intelligence is made of soul stones, it would be structurally possible. If we were to make it like a real human, the complexity would be beyond imagination.’

Alan suddenly remembered a phrase he had read somewhere. ‘A person holds a microcosm in his heart.’ Perhaps it was the words of someone who was trying to express a person using the letters of a star.

I blinked and focused on the letters again. I put aside the letters I didn’t know and started reading the ones I did know.

‘Targeting. Of course it’s a bird, so it’s flying. I don’t know about the movement. Could this be a character referring to a manhole?’

There were still a lot of characters I didn’t know, as there was still a lot left to read.

Alan closed his eyes tightly, almost completely absorbed in the Milky Way, as he thought about stopping by the bookstore.

Brrrr.

At that moment, my left eye vibrated. Startled by the sudden reaction, my eyelids closed on their own.

‘What is this?’

The Milky Way emitted by the bird’s soul stone was gradually shrinking. To be exact, its left eye was devouring the star characters.

I was too lazy to explain the eyes that Nobak made, so I just told the orc doctor that they were Oparts.

‘I thought it was a real Oparts.’

Alan rubbed his eyelids with his magical fingers. His stimulated eyes vomited out the Milky Way.

A dazzling array of stars surrounded Alan. There were also some areas that looked like they were stained with black paint.

‘This is a bad sector. This must be a problem caused by forcibly wearing an item that hasn’t been stabilized yet.’

It was a part that was not easily erased even if one tried to erase it, but when the soul stone of the bird absorbed all the Milky Way that had erupted, the boundary became as clean as a thread.

‘By absorbing the soul stone? Or by devouring the Ooparts?’

I found a way to repair the eye, but it was uncertain until I obtained the other Oparts.

The eyes were also unfinished to begin with. The traces of the old man’s work that could be seen here and there were very crude. Since there were so many stencils, there were also basic mistakes such as overwriting.

A magic engineer classified in the order of artisan, master, and maestro. It was only natural that he had to be a maestro to handle Ooparts easily.

Their recruiting costs were beyond the means of the average person, and even if they could, they wouldn’t meet just anyone.

‘Nobak was at best a craftsman and a master craftsman, so there was nothing he could do.’

However, Alan was not too worried. If it was unfinished, he could finish it step by step. He had never considered it impossible. He could say it was the spirit of youth.

That good feeling was dampened when I saw the price of the beginner’s edition of the Byeolja in Samramansang.

‘5 million?’

It’s a whopping ten times the price of the introductory book.

From a wizard’s perspective, the Star Character Interpretation was like a book of vision magic, so it was natural to treat it this way, but Alan was the one who needed it, so he felt bad.

When I saw the intermediate price, I felt like my heart would break, so I ended the Samramansang and turned my gaze to the leopard placed in the center of the workshop.

‘If you want to get what you want, you have to go down the labyrinth.’

It was easy up to the 7th floor, so I planned to go down to the 10th floor for the next exploration.

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