Chapter 6 - Bridging the gap

"Since they won't open until the end of this month.. No point dwelling over it. I might as well focus on my classes" Sylzone said.

"Good idea!" Jaff nodded in response.

"So we'll meet again in electrical engineering?" he continued.

"Yeah" Sylzone replied.

"Alright, sounds good" Jaff replied.

With that, they got up but before they did, a panel opened up in front of Sylzone with a prompt that said

Tip?

Please choose an amount or enter a custom one

Sylzone smiled inwardly. Of course, since there was customer service, there would be a customer service fee. Sylzone tapped $1 since the original body was not that rich to begin with.

The panel disappeared and reappeared with a message.

Thank you! Have a wonderful day

With that, Sylzone left the break room with Jaff before heading off in separate directions.

"Hey you know.. that club seems like a good start!" Carmen suddenly said.

Sylzone barely walked 5 steps outside the break room before he paused and turned around. He made a shush gesture with his fingers and then signaled for her to follow him.

Carmen understood what the gesture meant and followed behind Sylzone before they got back to his room.

Sylzone sat on his bed and rotated his arms, seemingly addicted to that after massage feeling. Carmen noticed this but didn't say anything.

"Yeah" Sylzone replied.

"How are you going to create a bio-mechanical chip after being familiar with the topic for only a week? That seems like a daunting task!" Carmen said.

"I'm not entirely sure. I will have to see how difficult the content of the class will be first" Sylzone replied.

"If I could help you .. I would. But, I have strict orders not to help you cheat" Carmen said dejectedly.

"Aren't you already helping me cheat to a degree?" Sylzone asked amusedly.

"That.. the stuff I've done is a natural role I play.. I can only cheat in helping you correct this timeline. For your personal growth.. you can only depend on yourself.." Carmen explained.

Sylzone thought it through and nodded. Indeed. Helping locate this mysterious man was related to the timeline. Explaining some basic things about this world seemed like a common thing for a system as well. Since he was unrelated to the system or the timeline originally, what she said made sense.

A day and a night had passed by. Sylzone was now in his first class of the semester. Jaff was sitting right next to him.

"Hello class, as some of you may have already found out, the school welcomes all, but some may not have the financial resources to afford everything. Therefore, the school has decided to give out free 1st year textbooks to all new students. The hope is by the next year, students will find a job and be able to afford stuff on their own. We understand that there is a certain intangible stigma associated with being poor that we don't want to burden students with. Thankfully, the government was able to implement a fully digital learning experience. No one will ever know who could afford a textbook or not afford one" the professor explained. "To answer your other doubt. We still have physical classes because the products we make are still very physical in nature."

Everyone nodded in understanding.

In front of Sylzone on a panel was a book titled 'Electrical Engineering for Beginners.'

'How simple sounding" he thought.

After opening up the book, he looked at the table of contents. They were topics he was familiar with, so he didn't feel too nervous. Then he turned to the first chapter and his breathing suddenly became a little slower

The topic was a lot more advanced but he could still understand a little of it.

Instead of circuits, voltages, and amps, there were concepts like quantum circuits, infinitely alternating circuits, yes-no logic, and triple route routing.

"Everyone, to get a better understanding of your knowledge of the topic, we will go around the class and ask everyone to explain a thing or two about what they know. Please don't repeat stuff. I will use this information to judge the pace of this class" the professor continued explaining.

Sylzone started to panic a little.

"Dude, are you ok? You seem really nervous. Did you forget everything already?" Jaff asked amusingly.

Sylzone was still in a daze until Jaff flicked his ears, then he snapped back to reality.

"Huh?" Sylzone responded.

"I said you seem really nervous" Jaff said.

"Oh.. just first day bugs" Sylzone replied.

He then turned back to the book.

'What the heck can this watch do to help me?

He started thinking about memorization, photographic memory, instant answers, and anything related to retaining memory.

Around him, he could hear students reciting facts. Because he was still in an excited state, time seemed to move a little faster. Then, the first student on his row was called.

"The original circuits have evolved to become quantum funneling circuits. Smart circuits were the successor to the original circuits but they lacked the ability to handle multiple actions at once. Quantum funneling circuits were the solution to this. One quantum funneling circuit could perform the action of millions of smart circuits millions of times at once.." a voice rumbled off in his head.

As Sylzone continued to process the information, trying to bridge the knowledge gap he was experiencing, the watch suddenly stirred. The vortex had reappeared.

Carmen noticed this and paid attention to both the watch and Sylzones' internal state.

Finally, the person on Sylzones' right was called and after he gave his explanation, the professor gazed at Sylzone.

"Ne"

However, at this very moment, time seemed to have slowed down to a stop. The vortex on his watch began to spin rapidly. Sylzone wasn't paying attention to anything else but the page in front of him. He was now in a peak mental state and his brain started operating at his max capacity. Eventually, symbols started appearing in his eyes, but he didn't see it, almost as though it was invisible. He was actually thinking of the original equations he was familiar with. All of a sudden, he started moving his lips. Carmen noticed this and realized he was mouthing off the explanation of how the original formula was created. Then, he started to explain more profound concepts related to how the formula evolved over time.

Eventually, the formula looked like the exact same one he found in the book and he stopped muttering.

"Xt!" the professor said.

He blinked his eyes once, wondering what had just happened.

'I can't believe the field evolved in such a way' he muttered.

The professor raised his eyebrow.

"Student over there. I understand you could be nervous. It's ok, take a deep breath and then try again" the professor said.

Sylzone snapped out of his daze and heard the second half of what the professor said. It took him a second to realize something strange happened. However, he coughed and cleared his state of mind before speaking.

"When you triple stack a quantum circuit, you increase the efficiency of it by 27X. The first stack triples the efficiency and the second stack triples the resulting efficiency, resulting in a staggering increase. A triple stack quantum circuit can be used to power various gadgets for a full day, up from the previous hour with a single quantum circuit" Sylzone stated.

"Very good!" the professor nodded. "Next!"

After Sylzone gave his explanation, he let out a sigh.

'Wow!' Carmen exclaimed in a cheerful voice.

'What happened earlier?' Sylzone asked. "I felt like I was speaking, but wasn't speaking."

'Well, you were concentrating really hard at first, so when the watch finally activated and the vortex appeared, I paid attention to both. When your mental state hit peak capacity, an equation from your old life appeared in your eyes, but you didn't seem to notice it. That was when your mouth started moving. I can read lips so I knew you were repeating how the equations you were familiar with were developed. Then, as you started explaining how the field evolved, the equation started changing shape. When you finally finished with an explanation of the current state of the technology, the equation suddenly looked exactly the same as the one in the book" Carmen explained.

Sylzone started to think through what Carmen had said.

'Explain? Shape changed? Spoke about how the field evolved? If I'm not wrong.. it sounds like the watch seemed to.. bridge the gap between my old knowledge and the current standards? Interesting'

'I just realized.. my previous conjecture about the watch seems to have been proven wrong' Carmen said suddenly.

'Which one' Sylzone asked.

'Remember earlier when you were in danger and the watch absorbed that piece of electronic?'

'Yeah' Sylzone replied.

'If you don't have to be in danger for the watch to activate, that means it wasn't saving your life. It was doing something else' Carmen continued.

Sylzone was lost in thought.

Finally, he spoke again, but with a slight fear in his heart.

'Doesn't that mean I am at risk of death then?' Sylzone said.

Carmen saw through his thoughts.

'I understand why you think that way, but you seem to have forgotten about what I can do! Since you're here to correct the guideline, and I'm here to assist you, I naturally can't let you just die like that!' Carmen replied unhappily.

Sylzone scratched his head in embarrassment but didn't respond. However, he felt that Carmen was a little happier.

He would have to experiment a lot more later, but for now, he was still in class.

In the second half of the class, he learned that the first half of the class was about theory, and the second half was about practical applications. Since this was the first day and it was also a beginners class, the professor showed some simple applications, such as a toaster with the ability to cool down toast immediately after it was cooked.

He still had difficulty with the theory portion of the explanation because what happened earlier only overloaded his head with information about circuits. He was unable to produce the same sensation again. He felt the pressure he experienced at the time had something to do with it, but the professor didn't do anything that triggered that same level of pressure again. He managed to barely understand the gist of the cooling mechanic. Essentially, circuits could be embedded directly into the application, and relay instructions from a microchip embedded with sensors to quantum technology surrounding the application. The quantum technology in the toaster was the true magic behind everything. All of this was controlled by a program in the microchip.

In relation to the cup of coffee he had before, the moment his fingers were a millimeter away from the handle, the sensors told the microchip to cool down. The microchip then ran a program that extracted more data from the sensor, including sensitivity of the surface to high temperatures. It then calculated the initial value to send the heat down to as well as additional commands to lower the heat at intervals that would be noticed. The microchip then sends commands through a circuit to the quantum technology. The quantum technology receives the command and instantly manipulates the heat on the handle, cooling it down before his fingers touched the handle.

As a result, he wasn't burned and even felt the decreasing temperature.

He then looked over at Jaff, recounting his experience with the coffee and asked if he could program a cup like that.

Jaff stared at him with a frown.

"At best, I can program the heat value and the delayed decrease, and also optimize the circuit to relay that information quickly, but I haven't got a clue on how to manipulate the quantum technology. Currently, I can recreate the coffee machine, but not the teacup!" Jaff explained.

Sylzone was slightly shocked. The simple teacup was more complex compared to the intimidating looking machine!

His only theory was that quantum technology was somehow related to the human as machines didn't care how hot or cold something was.

He recalled his schedule and saw that he indeed had a class related to quantum mechanics.

As he focused back on the professor, he began reminiscing about how primitive his previous life was compared to the wonders he saw in this world.

With that, he could only chuckle. This world was definitely very interesting and technology has come a long way!