The Judge looks at me after giving his decision.

I have to pay an 800 thousand Mithril fine. Assuming a copper coin was worth only a dollar that is … nearly a trillion dollars. I didn’t have a single mithril coin to my name just yet, how…?

With an intent look, he lets me absorb the information as triumph wafts off the standing, Human looking being in the opposing table that had done all the talking. The judge waits for almost a minute before continuing:

“Given your unique circumstances and protections afforded as a currently integrating being in the system’s hierarch that was neither aware of the rules, nor has the conditions to pay this exorbitant amount at the moment, that value will be amortized at a compatible pace with your circumstances and no interest will be charged.”

Seeing a glimmer of hope in his words I tentatively let that seed sprout in my heart.

“After consideration, I come to the conclusion that you should be liable for an ascending monetary value based on your level. Every hundred levels you reach you will pay the required amount comparable to the expected earnings for someone at that level. I hope you take this seriously and don’t try to get away from it.”

I feel the system prompt calling my attention and a quick peek shows a table with the ‘payment plan’. I close it and pay attention to his next words without even reading it.

“All that said, you really not buying the ‘full license’, nor will I compel you to agree to the contract all book buyers are subject to for any works they acquire. That puts you in somewhat of a unique situation. You will pay ‘reparations’ while forfeiting all possible rights to sales, resales, rent and any other monetary reward from your entire race but seeing as you are technically paying for the information and it already spread this far I will stipulate that you can continue to share it.”

They continue to stand tall in their chairs for a moment until his words really sink in.

“Wait, that is more freedom than we give then with the full license, he won’t even be bound by the contract…”

“Why does it matter?” The judges ask.

“But…” He clearly tries to take a hold of himself before continuing. “We will be appealing this decision, the council…”

“The council can stuff it. This is a system court; it doesn’t matter what they think or the rules they enforce in their jurisdiction. This court supersedes all others. I won’t let anything outside of the proper rules influence my decision. Do you have any idea the consequences of becoming partial to one side… or the other?”

“But the deal is clearly in his favor.” He says a little more reservedly given who he is dealing with.

“That is your opinion, but you do not have all the facts or apparently much familiarity with this court's laws. If he hadn’t been brought here things would be different. You might have been able to get him in one of your courts for not following your rules and the council’s, but here we all follow the system’s rules, and my decision is final… unless you want to appeal to a higher system court.”

He stares at them and the leeway he gave them after his decision is clearly gone. So they just silently nod and he speaks to all of us.

“This is the end of this trial. This is my decision, everyone will abide by the ruling I have provided in the system’s stead. I will accompany the progression as needed throughout the process.

“After the standard restrictions run their course, nobody but Nash may by any means, not even through inference inform anything you learned during the course of this procedure to anyone except for the items I have explicitly allowed. You have a list in your system prompts.”

Turning back to the Antagonist of this proceeding the judge emphasizes.

“And don’t even think about trying to give even a hint more than what I have allowed. I’m very familiar with how your group likes to cheat on things like this, and my previous threat is not an exaggeration. You know what happens when someone like me gets pissed.”

Turning back to me, he says:

“If you wish to appeal the decision after due consideration, just open your system prompt and state your wish. Though my advice is for you to not do that. I don’t believe any of the other possible decisions would be to your preference. Do you have anything to say?”

I open my mouth before hesitating. Though in the end, conflicted as I’m, I decide to speak my heart.

“I know it probably means little coming from me, but I’m thankful that a judge such as yourself is part of the system’s courts. That considers matters thoroughly and acts in accordance with the tenants of law, even if sometimes that very law may be distorted by others’ interests.”

He lets a smirk out and with a wave of his hand, we are thrown out hurtling away from something akin to the outside of a courtroom simply floating in the void. Though as soon as I get my bearings and try to get a better look, it just blinks away in a blur of speed.

The automaton swims through the void and with his control of space starts dragging me away.

I try to talk, but without air, no sound comes out.

He puts a hand on my head as he slowly begins to build up speed. A communication mode similar to what I regularly establish with the rabbits pops into my mind.

“Damn kid, you know how to shake things up, don’t you? Who the hell would have expected things to turn out this way?”

“Still, that is an expensive…mistake.”

“Pthhh, look at your prompt. I don’t know the schedule you are paying in, for that matter neither does the Info Bureau’s people, but I saw the way things were going in there and I know how good you are at earning money.”

I open the prompt and look at it closely.

Level

Payment (Mithril)

Remaining (Mithril)

50

0

802109

150

0.01

802108.99

250

0.1

802108.89

350

1

802107.89

450

10

802097.89

550

100

801997.89

650

1000

800997.89

750

10,000

790997.89

850

100,000

690997.89

950

690,997.89

0

A simple all encompassing desire to laugh overwhelms me.

Even the lack of air doesn’t stop me as I imitate a gutted fish dry heaving. Trying to scream and let out all the tension accumulated over the last hour and a half including the shockingly short summary judgment I finally let reality sink in.

“This is like, nothing… One gold when I reach level 150 and 10 gold at 250. I have until level 350 by the time I need a single mithril coin.”

“Damn, it must be good to have the integration protections in place. Still, not all places are as good as the instance to make money, but this is nothing for someone like you. I mean, you don’t even have time limits or anything of the sort…”

I look at him as something catches up with me. The huge number on the first column.

“Wait, level 950, what level do people usually achieve? Information about that is unusually scarce.”

“Can’t tell you that, but if it is beyond what people ever reach, you simply won’t have to pay the higher brackets, isn’t that nice?”

His face even with the unnatural wrinkling of seemingly solid metal just lights up with a naughty smile.

“Yeah, very nice, very nice.” While speaking I realize we have stopped in a different sort of space, still the void, but there is something just beyond the horizon. I kick myself for having wasted the time in the void, but I think about experimenting a bit now.

I’m near a different sort of place instead of the perfectly smooth and nigh-infinite void.

Instead of waiting or letting him end the trip without any action from myself, I reach out to grab… something.

Even exerting my will I don’t move an inch. He widens his eyes at my actions, but I let out a smirk being I’m braced and ready. Using my entire willpower I pull and reality distorts.

I can perceive nothing but my will and body and even that is fuzzy. Still, I instinctively know that if I let go after having taken the plunge I will die. Maybe there are safeguards in place, maybe the automaton could save me, maybe a cosmic event would blunt the damage from whatever my gut is warning me about, but anything beyond myself is unknowable and I would not take any chances.

Holding on and pulling for dear life, I exert the entirety of my being in the single-minded actions trying to survive.

Stretching my will, I manage to find a few faint signs of the inner wolrd and Aspen. The bottom of my pool of willpower is approaching without anything to show for it, but I just redouble the effort as I connect with him and let Aspen ground me.

With our combined will, seconds stretch into eternity in this frantic fight for my life.

Attempting to pull myself forward seems to be harder than doing one armed pull ups with noodle arms, but somehow I inch my body forward without taking a single breath, and then finally at the end, an explosion.

An intense overwhelming screeching that cut off every single sense I possess, even the perception field is useless with so much information around, and I just shut it off to avoid a headache as I drift into unconsciousness.

==================

Automaton’s POV

Damn, I was taking my time returning him, just to see if he could learn a little more about the void, but he really grabbed the bull by the horns. And he actually made it on his own. Lucky kid, if he had screwed this up, he would be mincemeat… at best.

Hi, hi, minced meat, such a wonderful and stupid invention of these humans. Who would let go of the feeling of a steak when they had amazing taste budies like this.

As the laugh fades, I go back to watching Nash. Even amongst Aether users with early integration, this level of understanding and finesse with spatial work is rare. But after he managed to so quickly unlock the first of his soul lights and it being an inner world, I can’t exactly expect anything less of him now.

He may be lacking other advantages that most progenitors have, but if he keeps this up he has an actual shot. And teaching The other kid Aether was simply a stroke of genius.

=====================

“Hi, are you ok?” A new voice calls to me. Female, soft, yet intent and purposeful.

I slowly crack my eyes open and see a leather clad warrior half kneeling a few feet away. No boob armor.

“Argrhhh.” I try to speak, but only an incoherent groan comes out.

My muscles twitch as I try to get feeling back in them, or rather to get them feeling right instead of pulsing with the remnants of pain and lack of blood from a long night of cut off circulation.

It takes me a moment but I manage to sit up. Taking a deep breath and clearing my throat I say:

“Thanks, I…’m OK. I did something stupid.” Fighting off the dizziness I continue: “Do you know where Charlie’s village is?”

“Charlie’s village? I don’t think so. Where is it near?”

I look at her for a moment before reality catches up and the system takes notice of where I’m. A drag in reality, an infinitely strong and inexorable pull. Rushed for time, I do the only thing I can think of: open my inner world and throw thousands of seeds around which surprises her, but she just takes a couple of steps back to avoid the possible attack and keeps on guard.

A torrent of mana takes hold for just a brief instant before the orange system screen fades and I’m pulled to my own instance again… I think.

The surroundings are exactly the same. All the trees are in the same place relative to where I was, the ground is the same color, the same temperature, the only difference is the absence of anyone else nearby.

Damn, if I had a way of going into the void I could randomly pop into other instances without fixing the problems or finding addresses and maybe even bypassing the mana requirements altogether. Pulling the little speeder from the inner world, I fly high in the sky and search for a nearby village.

I have a few instruments to help locate myself, but no perfectly detailed map given the lack of variety and good reference points in the instance. Knowing where North points to is only as useful as your references even the near gyroscopic/ magical enhanced navigation system is much better without a starting point.

Still, I chose a direction and start flying looking closely for any signs of my root network. I should find the way back relatively closely with this strategy.

--------------

It takes me almost 8 hours to make my way back after an uneventful trip. Luckily I didn’t land on the other side of the instance or something.

The travel gave me a little time to mentally reorganize and go through with even more detail on what I got from the bookshop along with the additions to my book. This time great in both volume and quality.

There is so much new information from both sources that I just don’t know where to start, every five minutes I spend on something is enough to improve it a little, and if I spend a day or so, I’m sure to come up with something to revolutionize any single field compared to our current runic designs, but while all that is undoubtedly something to explore and I do stop when an idea is just too good to resist, I mostly keep on track with the last day or two preparing for my class trial.

One of the things that I can’t let go of however are bags of holding. And that will take me a little longer. There isn’t a lot more information or new runes even in the very last book I read which treated spatial phenomena, but it helped provide a little context to what I had already learned, and if I could help just a couple of people have access to something better than the very basic version that the Merchant sold it would be the icing on the cake.

The main reason was actually that this would be another avenue for me to learn about the myriad of aspects to help me in pushing for a greater size with the inner world.

I hadn’t given up on the steady and slow improvements as I tried to reach for the maximum size I could reach. Each of the new runic designs surrounding the entire space adds complexity to a system I was already in over my head messing with, but if I managed to learn to manipulate and create or just modify a similar space, it might just help me to understand my own inner world.