Mage Adam-Chapter 404

Adam did not bother to hide his killing from the protesting mortals. They all clearly witnessed the horrifying sight of the resisters inside the magic formation—bodies evaporating into nothing, souls scattered into oblivion. 𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

Sometimes, violence was the most effective means of achieving one’s goals. The threat of death was far more persuasive than any words. To implement a new system that touched upon class interests and challenged habits ingrained for tens of millions of years, an iron fist was indispensable.

One had to break the old, to build the new.

When an ordinary person died, nothing remained—not even the corpse. But when a mage perished, their personal space shattered, scattering all sorts of possessions into the air. Adam waved his hand and swept them all up in one go, then smiled benignly at the remaining protesters:

“Now, do you still have any questions?”

No one dared make a sound. They didn’t even dare to nod. They only stared wide-eyed in horror at the “young man” before them—this figure who had killed thousands as if it were nothing. They feared that even the smallest movement might bring death upon them, and wished more than anything that they were not here at all.

Adam swept his gaze across them. Seeing no one speak, he nodded in satisfaction.

“Since there are no further objections, you may leave. The law-enforcement robots and teaching robots will arrive in your cities shortly.

Remember this—do not attempt anything unnecessary. Your lives, your wills, are not as important as you imagine.”

After the first clash ended, both sides waited for the next opportunity to move. Small-scale resistance never ceased, but collective actions like before were no longer organized.

Adam’s uncompromising methods had finally achieved the intended effect. The liberal faction now understood that any hand they extended would only be severed, achieving nothing.

Thus, on the surface, the Academy Continent returned to peace—an unprecedented peace.

But both factions’ leadership knew this calm was only a façade. Each maneuvered in secret, consolidating strength, while Adam used the time to accelerate development, striving to make his plans reality.

The City of the Academy looked dazzling on the surface, yet it was still barren in truth. The only residents were the council-dispatched personnel, the administrative mages Adam had brought, and a handful of factories he had established.

Some mortal factions not deeply tied to the great conglomerates had tentatively proposed stationing representatives in the Academy City—people to report daily affairs and to listen to and carry out the mages’ instructions, supposedly for better governance of the common folk.

But Adam refused them outright. Their intent was obvious: to approach authority by softer means, to become its mouthpieces, and to secure treatment not much worse than before. But Adam had no need for their tongues. To him, mortals only needed to obey passively. They had no qualification to negotiate or cooperate with him.

Setting aside such trivial matters, Adam poured all his attention during this month-long calm into the factories.

One was a plant producing ordinary communicators—the highest in daily output, but not the largest in scale. That honor belonged to the robot factory and the construct factory.

Robots differed from the alchemical puppets currently common across the Mage World. Their function and power could not compare to puppets equipped with artificial souls and advanced elemental-reactive metals—or even bio-metals. But they possessed a crucial advantage: they were simple to make, and cheap.

The personal chip’s core was the Fire of Origin—a higher form of true chip. It was alive, capable of upgrading and evolving. By contrast, the chips Adam installed in robot bodies were dead: programmed, standardized.

Thanks to the establishment and spread of quantum mechanics, and Adam’s promotion of electrical science, semiconductor and integrated-circuit technologies were born almost overnight. With Adam’s involvement, equipment necessary for manufacturing was rapidly created through repeated trials of alchemical magic. In the Personal Chip Research Institute, mages familiar with quantum theory quickly produced the simplest silicon-based integrated circuits.

But that was as far as it went. Mages saw little future in the technology. Dead chips were leagues behind the Fire of Origin and nearly useless to them. Having succeeded once, they set the circuits aside without another glance.

For Adam, however, this technology was vital to his Academy Continent plans. Using integrated circuits as the core, and electromagnetic robots as the template, simplified robots were quickly built. ℞Ａ₦𝙤βĚȿ

They came in two models: instructional and law-enforcement. The teaching robots, as the name suggested, were for instruction. The law-enforcement robots, with simple constructs added to their bodies, could exert the strength of a First-Rank Mage.

Teaching models would be permanent residents, updated over time only to improve their ability to handle foundational education. The enforcement models, meanwhile, would gradually fade once the Academy Continent matured, leaving only the constructs behind. These would be distributed to apprentice mages with no hope of advancement and to elite mortals.

Adam had no intention of monopolizing power over the Academy Continent forever. For mortals, this was a vast world—one they might not traverse in a lifetime. But for him, and for other mages who aspired to master the entire Void, it was merely a corner of existence, as small as dust.

Combat testing was held on an island occupied by enemy mages.

The law-enforcement robots executed their tasks flawlessly. With construct power fully unleashed, they matched a First-Rank enemy mage in combat. Enemy apprentices could not withstand even a single exchange.

“Their combat ability is acceptable. Enough to manage mage apprentices,” Adam concluded after watching the test with his assistants.

The Guardians and the Watchers agreed. They were the incarnations of good and evil, of light and shadow. Though their roles differed, both represented and maintained the order of the Mage World. What mattered most to them was precisely this.

When the Academy Continent was fully on track, the number of apprentices would inevitably multiply geometrically. Managing the relations between apprentices and mortals would be a major problem. The enforcement robots offered a fine solution, buying precious time to find a balance.

Garfield glanced at the stiff robots, then at his own nanorobot body, and felt satisfied. Though all were robots, Lord Garfield was clearly far superior to these “kin.” Most of all, he was pleased with his new post: Law-Enforcement Officer. Though low in rank and serving more as a control hub, he considered himself already a great figure.

It reminded him of his “glorious years” on the Dragon Plane.

“You’ve written the Academy’s foundational teaching materials,” Adam said after flipping through several printed textbooks. “I believe there are some problems with them.”