World Keeper-Chapter 1024: Slow Recovery

The recovery efforts were… by no means simple. The easiest part was, by far, ending the quarantine of Fyor, and allowing everyone that had been evacuated to return to their homes. Those that had homes to return to, at least. In most worlds, the property damage was actually fairly minimal, with the apocalypse beasts targeting the people rather than the planets themselves.

In truth, only Deckan and Sher Dien suffered a true cataclysm. Both of them needed the work of multiple gods to put their planets in a state where the citizens would be able to gradually recover. They needed to redevelop their foliage to a state where monsters would be able to spawn in.

In doing so, Tryval and Udona worked together to create ‘zones’ within their respective worlds. They separated the plant life that they were creating by its level range, encouraging the natural spawns to remain within this range. Although it was not guaranteed to work, the results were largely positive. With a few exceptions that had to be quickly managed, the monsters being spawned were within the levels of the zones that they appeared in.

Construction crews from the Metong swept through, providing temporary shelters to those that needed it while working to repair their damaged homes. With the vast majority of Deckan’s technology destroyed, many people were left without basic needs for weeks.

It took nearly two full months for some small semblance of normalcy to return to these months. By this point, most worlds had managed to recover most of their physical damages, with the loss of life being the most concerning issue.

There was simply no better way to say it, other than that this incident had once again reminded the world the horrors of the void. For too long they had grown numb to the beasts that lurked beyond the world. Ever since the first defensive measures were put in place, void monsters were becoming less and less of a threat. Some even considered them jokes, able to only randomize numbers or change a person’s perception of food.

Now… the world had seen the full extent of what a void monster could do, and it horrified them. Even with all of their defenses in place, they had suffered to such a degree that their daily lives had been ruined. According to reports taken from deep scans, there were entire planets that had simply disappeared from Deckan’s space, theorists speculating that it was the result of the stars starting to go out. These theories could no longer be proven, and nobody dared to try.

Granted, there was criticism cast towards the Greater Pantheon, saying that they had downplayed the threat that the people would face. The people were stressed, and needed an outlet for their frustrations. Towards this, the Greater Pantheon silently allowed their criticism, knowing that confrontation would only spark more infighting.

Amidst the post-invasion chaos, however, was a new revelation. The Fallen Goddess, Lyra, had ascended to join the Keeper in his paradise. While it was said that she was not a member of the Greater Pantheon, the fact that she had survived her ‘death’ had been confirmed, with several churches reporting that others may receive similar treatment only if they perform similarly meritorious deeds. It was the grace of Terra to allow one to ascend in such a way, but she would show no favoritism to any party. Only those who were truly worthy would find their place.

Chelsea let out a sigh as she shut off the news, massaging her forehead. As one might expect, the destruction of the world’s technology had caused the Ashtanu Research Foundation to quite literally collapse. Because of this, they had taken the step that they had previously only considered in passing, and created a unique world for themselves to do their research.

It had taken two full months to develop a research facility in this new world, but they already had a mountain of work on their plates, waiting to be completed. “Okay… I’ll be busy with helping out Ashley with the new code for a while. James, you good to rebuild the mana plant?”

James nodded his head, tapping his forehead. “Got all of the plans memorized up here. I’ll get it up and running again in no time.”

She nodded, turning to look at Treisha. “In that case, I’ll leave public relations to you. The research institute left Deckan, but we’re still in business. We need to make sure that everyone knows that.”

Treisha gave an emphatic nod, before hesitating. “What are we going to call ourselves now? Our old name doesn’t really work… and was never really that official anyways. We weren’t the only research team in the city, but the name still managed to stick.”

Chelsea thought about it briefly, before shaking her head. “I’ll leave that to you as your first job, dealing with the public. Whatever you come up with, we’ll let you handle it. Also, while we’re not directly hiring more members, we will accept collaborations in research. This isn’t a time for anyone to be picky, so if there’s a good project that can help everyone, we need to make sure it goes through.”

Treisha nodded her head, Chelsea looking at the final member of the team. Seeing her currently white eyes, she nodded. “Nora. You and Thea should try to reach out to the ninjas. A lot of their businesses are still around, but they lost their major world. Tell them that we have a proposition for them.”

Nora blinked, tilting her head slightly. “What proposition would that be?”

“We’ll allow the ninjas to make their base on a secondary planet within this system.” She said simply, surprising the others nearby. “Like I said, we’re not hiring. However, the ninjas have been almost constantly conducting their own research. If there’s anyone worth collaborating with, it would be them. Additionally, if we keep them close, we will be able to get their help in the future if we need more manpower for anything. Tell them that if they agree, their first job is to help build the void shield around this world.”

Nora nodded her head, her eyes switching to black for a moment as Thea took over. “Depending on how many of them are left, there shouldn’t be a problem getting their help. Though, I doubt that many from the command structure survived. They might even be in their own internal chaos now, trying to sort out who should lead them.”

“Even better.” Chelsea grinned. “If that’s the case, then our help will let them be indebted to us. Either way, you’ll be the liaison with that group for the near future. Once we’ve got the mana plant back up and running, James will help everyone come up with more projects to study.”

“Right.” Thea nodded her head, before pausing. “What code is it that you are planning to work on this time?”

“An expansion of the previous. I made three more worlds to cover the other base energy types. When I was setting up this world, I didn’t include any special materials or functions, all because I plan to expand our admin privileges in Digital Conversion. Once that’s done, we’ll have no need to worry about material costs.”

“The last code took me years to get through, but it should be a lot easier this time, now that I’ve started to get a grasp of the code’s structure. Still, it will probably take a few months to get all four working together in the testing environment. Until I’m done, I can’t have anyone disturbing me, since this project is… rather sensitive, and could be volatile if I’m in the middle of a test.”

The others nodded their heads, understanding the importance of what Chelsea wanted to do. Once she was finished with this update, it wouldn’t be a stretch to call the facility completely self-sufficient. Rather than saying that they were off the grid, they were the ones creating the grid in the first place.

I closed my eyes as I sat back on the couch, waiting for the notification from the system. There were too many damages to be dealt with for me to stay in Olympus and wait for them to pass naturally. After we had the proper damage report, I began setting up alarms to prepare to fast forward.

Although I was guaranteed a pass for one month after being attacked, that didn’t mean that I was willing to let things progress slowly while my world was in such a dire strait. If I did, and found out that our next invasion would be just as harsh, or worse, might even be with the same guy? That wasn’t something that I was willing to gamble with.

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The fact that we had defeated his invasion would let him know that we were strong enough to deal with a void god. If he managed to get us as his opponent again, it’s likely that he might send an entire team of them. If that was the case, there wouldn’t be a second victory. Quite simply, we would have to hide in Fyor, unable to come out for fear of the impending doom.

Though, that plan itself wasn’t really feasible. While the lower levels of Fyor were protected from a void attack, that did not mean that the entirety of Fyor was safe. The world barrier could still be broken, which would cause the inevitable collapse of the world. So yeah… another invasion from RagnaRocker was definitely not something that I could deal with in the short term.

Right now, my priority was for my worlds to get back on their feet and put this mess behind them. There would surely be a lot more focus on the void in the future, but that was fine. If it got them to take this more seriously next time, even better.

Chelsea had informed me when I was setting my alarms that she planned to expand the admin privileges of Digital Conversion to include all four energies, which I approved of. While it wasn’t something that I planned to open to the masses, having the ability to use the system at-will like that would surely become a powerful tool in the future.

As for why I wouldn’t put something so convenient in the hands of everyone, even when it could relieve the current housing or food crises? Quite simple… that also would mean that I would be giving potential villains an unlimited supply of energy with which to do even more damage.

That said, maybe there would be a way to tie karma in to the system. Those with higher positive karma would be able to enjoy a discount on the system, which would increase the better their karma. This would allow good samaritan citizens to take care of their communities, while similarly preventing those with unsavory habits from making use of the system to do harm.

Though… would it be possible to increase the cost of items through that system based on negative karma? I couldn’t help but think of that at the same time. If that was the case, it could be seen as a penalty for criminal conduct carried out through the system.

I focused, posing the idea to Ashley, who was rather prompt to respond. Sadly, there was no current way for them to accurately gauge karma within and independent system, as that was handled almost entirely by the Underworld. The only benchmarks that existed were the right to enter the golden palace, as well as the punishment of being imprisoned beneath it.

Additionally, they did not have a way to increase the mana cost of items based on the user’s data. According to Ashley, the system is very strict on its requirements for Digital Conversion. An exact amount of energy is needed for any product, with no more or less being accepted. With the new plug-in that Chelsea helped develop, the cost was being passed directly to the void, but the cost itself was still there, and was something that we could not circumvent.

Regardless, I kept the idea in mind for later, as it was at least one way to build a lesser punishment into the system for those that had brought negative karma to themselves. I also suggested the possibility that anyone who qualified for the golden palace deserved to have an eighty percent discount on the system, once Chelsea had finished creating the plug-ins for the other energy types. Ashley seemed rather open to this idea, though she said that it would take a while longer to get it implemented.