464 First Trace Of The Watchers

Back in Intersection, Waska and Rasa were getting ready to depart. The details of their departure were simple: find the boy and bring him back if possible. If capturing him was impossible, kill him. With the two Flames of Magma were three Elders who were all in the Pseudo Phenom Realm. And one of them was even a Peak Pseudo Phenom. Magma was really holding nothing back to capture Mane.

"The report reaching us is that he is in Amalgamation now," Rasa informed Magma as he polished his blade in his final preparations.

"Yes. Apparently he went to the Forest of the Gods first before making a beeline towards Amalgamation. We don't know how long he will stay there, but I reckon that it wouldn't be for long" Waska was loading a few supplies onto his mount as he spoke.

"Bring him back the first chance you get," Magma ordered simply and left, not bothering to see his men off all the way to the gates. He needed to tell the Primogenitor of the new developments. If the boy was out, Ashera may be joining soon.

"Let's go," Rasa was leading the mission this time. He jumped onto his tiger and urged it forwards, and the others quickly followed after him.

Back in Amalgamation, the one who had caused such a large movement in the camp of the Barbarians was deep in thought as he analysed the design of the city's overhead barrier. There were several sheets of paper before him, each with several texts and explanations on the barrier and its usefulness. The barrier's mechanism of action, its core, and supporting engines had all been included in the material Mane had been given. And as he perused, the wrinkle in this brows deepened.

"What is it?" Mane wasn't the only one in the room. Sunflower was here as well. She had already changed into her sleeping attire, and it seemed she had no designs of sleeping in the room she was allocated tonight. She noticed that Mane was thinking too deeply about the material he was holding on to. And hoped that there was no issue with it.

"The barrier. It's almost as if the one who designed it initially, designed it to have flaws." Mane frowned and said. Usually, when something was to be created, its design was always better than the final product. For the design was a mixture of fantasy and perfection, but reality was so often disappointing. The materials needed to create the level of masterpiece the creator had in mind, coupled with the skill of the technicians always determined just how close the object would get to the original design. Often times, creators had to tone down their expectations, with some having to redesign their works in an inferior setup to make things much simpler.

"Maybe these aren't the true original designs? The creator may have had to reduce the level of quality to make it feasible." Sunflower argued. Her thoughts were along the path of logic. For as mentioned earlier, creators at times had to tone down expectations and make something inferior to what they truly had in mind.

"This is different," But what Mane was looking at was different. There were many strategically placed flaws. These flaws showed both the genius of the maker and a bit of cryptic thinking.

"Whoever designed this wanted it to be flawed. A Nature Barrier isn't difficult to make. Nature Barriers are only complicated because of the amount of resources that go into it. Which is why most opt out of it. But once completed, a Nature Barrier is much better than a Defense Barrier or even a Cover Barrier." Mane went on to explain what he meant to Sunflower.

There were many kinds of barriers, and each of them had their own perks. However, when it came to complexity, the Nature Barrier was the least complex. And this was because, the Nature Barrier demanded a lot of resources. And in the world of barriers, the lesser the amount of resources needed, the greater the complexity of the barrier to be created.

The Nature Barrier encompassed the natural laws of several elements into itself to create a masterpiece that could last for eons. The issue was where one was going to find those resources. Luckily, Elementals were a race that were made for the Elements. So finding severally talented people in many different elements was no problem. Which meant that the most important resource of the Nature Barrier was no problem to the Elementals. For Barbarians however, a Nature Barrier was not possible for them to make. For they were a race dull in elemental affinity.

The next step was to get media for accommodating and transferring the energy of the Elementals into the barrier. For this to happen, a core had to be created. The core was to be the collection of the natural laws and serve as a constant fuel for the barrier. And herein lied the second issue. Cores were very difficult to create because of the sheer wealth required to make and maintain them. According to the design in front of Mane, the first ever core was made with a thousand Elemental Stones for each of the four basic elements – fire, water, earth and wind! That meant that a thousand Fire Stones, a thousand Ice Stones and a thousand of every other stone were forged into one. Elements like lightning and darkness however, were not used. After all, where was one going to find several Darkness and Lightning Elementals to fill the stones with their energy and solidify their laws?

The last step was the trickiest, yet easiest. The last step was all on the technicians. The last thing to be done was to perfectly position the core before a constant energy source and place it in such a way that it would be easy to reach for maintenance, yet inaccessible to the unwanted 'scrutiny' of enemies during invasions.

Herein lied the issue with the designs mane was looking at. A Nature Barrier was lacking in complexity. Yet the designer had left a flaw in each stage of its creation. In the first step where a thousand of each stone was required, the creator used 999 per element. It was a difference of just one, but it significantly reduced the efficiency of the barrier. The next step also had a gaping flaw. Although Elemental Stones of the same element contained the same energy, their energy signatures were different. And this would destabilize any barrier if they were used this way. So when filling Elemental Stones with energy, there was a need to completely empty the stones so that they could be molded by the energy of the donor. This was because surrounding atmospheric energy was always the same, no matter who commanded them. Then the creator would tweak each stone so that they shared one likeness and aura. Yet in this case, it wasn't done so. 2% of the Stones' energy was left within them before they were refilled, meaning that the stones weren't in perfect harmony with each other.

The last flaw was also striking. The core was usually placed almost central to the barrier's semi- sphere of influence. The core was meant to act as the heart of the Barrier, and so it was positioned exactly as one – in the middle of the barrier; about two-thirds to the left of the midline and one-third to the right of the midline. Once again, the creator had reversed this. The core was rather positioned in such a way that two-thirds of its structure was to the right of the midline, and one-third of it was rather to the left. It was a reversal that meant that the Barrier would have to be fixed every hundred years, instead of its proposed every thousand years.

"So you're saying they are too deliberate to be mistakes?" Sunflower asked after Mane was done with his lengthy explanation.

"Yes. That's exactly my point. These mistakes are too conspicuous to be accidents. And they are well planned, meaning that the creator was no fool. Mistress Ashera could have corrected them when she did maintenance for the barrier a hundred years ago, yet she didn't. And this makes me wonder why." Mane rubbed his chin and said.

"Which means you also have no intentions of correcting them either," Sunflower smiled and said.

"Exactly," Mane nodded his head.

"I'm going to bed. Don't stay up too late." Sunflower yawned and advised before placing a soft kiss on Mane's temple and plumping herself onto the large bed.

"Sure," Mane nodded and proceeded to look deeper into the designs. It took the young prodigy about two hours to finish going through everything, and once he was done his eyes were filled with slight excitement. Mane was hardly one to be moved by anything mediocre. Yet his eager eyes showed that whatever he had discovered was anything but average.

"So that's why it was made this way!" Mane slapped his knees and exclaimed. He quickly cast his eyes onto the figure lying on the bed upon realizing how loud he was. He only sighed in relief when he saw that she was still asleep. Once Mane had gone through the entire design, he understood why Ashera hadn't corrected the flaws. And why she who was cursed, who was so protective of him had allowed him to come out.

"I will see for myself when the time comes," Mane calmed himself and said. "My word it's late!" it was now that the young man realised how much time he had spent going through the designs. But there was still one more thing he had to do.

Mane pulled out a piece of paper and scribbled a few things onto it.

"Recreation: Origami Crane," Mane chanted, and the paper folded itself into a bird that flapped its wings and took flight. This was a skill he had unlocked when he became a High Level Scholar – Recreation. It was highly useful and allowed Mane to do so much. Mane fished through his pockets and retrieved a small stick. He broke one end of the stick and burnt it. Then he poured the ashes onto the living Origami Crane. The ashes melted into the crane like it was dust, and it shone with a dull light.

"Find him. Tell him that I need his help." Mane ordered, and the crane flew out of the room with blinding speed.

"I have to get to the twins," Mane mumbled before his figure slipped past the bedroom window and into the expansive darkness outside.