Mira paused for a moment and asked “Why do you get to name all the armor and weapons? Why can’t the users name them?”

Jade answered “I made the armor with my own material and ideas, it all my work so I get to decide the name while the users pay for the armor. It’s only fair”. Mira said “You said that you specialize in aura weapons. How come you barely made any aura weapons apart from the regular armor?”

Jade answered “It’s the magic you brought to me and the room you were training in. The room has devices that analyzed your body’s functions when you used your skills. I noticed that there were similarities between your body’s energy response and the energy response of monsters with non-aura type abilities. After researching it for about an hour, I came to the conclusion that what I considered as special abilities were the monsters using martial arts skills like you. With that knowledge and with magic’s capability to replicate the effects of various devices without materials, making non-aura weapons has become very easy for me.

The magic innovations don’t easily apply to aura since it comes from the cells of monsters and I can’t recreate the process with magic… yet. That’s why I believe this transaction is worth paying for with space technology devices, not knowledge, devices”

Mira nodded and thought ‘One hour of research and he was able to gain all that from my performance. I wonder how many years it will take Deji to do that’. She asked “Have you ever considered making missiles, nukes, robots and the like? If you had those you would be able to gain encode without having to lift a finger”. Jade sighed and said “I would love to do that but I didn’t specialize in those areas when I was in university and when I did my masters. I only learnt how to make plasma and other types of new gen weapon effects when I reverse engineered the weapons I had.

So I only know the general idea of how robots, missiles and nukes work. I can make a bit of artificial intelligence but it’s nothing compared to modern AIs. I can’t make modern AIs without long periods of experimentation and I’m not even sure I’ll succeed so it’s better for me to focus on what I can make now”.

Mira was surprised at the reveal and said “I really thought your high intelligence stat would be enough for the task” Jade said “A high intelligence stat isn’t a substitute for knowledge, experience and research that so many people have been doing for a century. Maybe if my intelligence stat was higher it might not be impossible for me to create working devices simply from knowing the general knowledge I already have. But knowledge is still not the same as intelligence since I would have no hope of creating such things if I had no general knowledge or idea about them regardless of how high my intelligence stat was”.

Mira nodded in agreement and said “It makes sense”. Jade said “Tell Jola that I’m willing to sell information on how Psychic technology works and even some magic knowledge if he gets me detailed data of different specialized branches of Physic, Chemistry, Biology and Engineering, as much as he can get. And if you get those types of information as long as I don’t have it, I’ll be willing to pay for it. Research data and the like is also much appreciated”

Mira nodded, thought for a moment and said “Why didn’t you ask for this before?” Jade’s eyes darted around, he didn’t want to answer this question, then he sighed in resignation and said “I wasn’t sure if you would come back alive or if you had the potential to grow strong in this apocalypse considering you were always whining about my training. I didn’t want to put too much hope on you”.

Mira was shocked at Jade’s blatant lack of faith in her but then she thought about it ‘It was Funmi’s improvement that spurred me to action. If not for that I would have continued relying on Jade’s armor and I would have never tried to surpass it. I would probably be at Rank 5 by now if those things didn’t happen’. She calmed down and nodded in understanding.

Jade said “It’s also because I didn’t know what to prioritize before. I was hoping that I would be able to learn some martial arts and stuff that could improve my combat strength but now I realize that since I’m not a masochist like you, I’ll probably have to wait until more research goes into martial arts to learn it”

Mira smiled and punched Jade’s side causing Jade to chuckle and say “For now I’m focusing on Magic and technology. I mean, I have space technology and I can go to other countries and continents if I really wanted to. And look at the amount of combat power I got simply from learning the sanctuary’s Magic, I could probably beat a Rank 12 after I upgrade my equipment. I’m sure there’s other magic out there, I just need to find the people who have them and trade for it. And with more knowledge of technology, my power will soar!”

Mira nodded and said “I’m glad you’ve found your calling. I would like to go to America after I complete the transaction with the sanctuary” Jade was surprised and said “But you made so many friends there already”.

Mira said “I know, it’ll be hard to part with them but my main goal is to explore. I’m sure the sanctuary still has more for me and can still amaze me but I want a different experience. America was always a place where I wanted to go to but now it’s probably filled with the strongest set of monsters in the world.

I’m sure I’ll be able to get my stats to the transcendental rank in such an environment. Lara’s culling of the monsters and the sanctuary’s safe style of combat isn’t very good for individual growth. Danger greatly helps stat growth from what I’ve experienced, call me a masochist if you want but it’s true. I need a dangerous environment”.

Jade was perturbed for a moment, then he sighed and said “If that’s what you want; I can’t decide for you. I’m going to start my search for knowledge at Japan and also to search for some mangas. It’s quite boring when I have nothing to do”.

Mira shook her head while chuckling at Jade’s skewed priorities and thought ‘Maybe after I evolve I’ll be able to think so whimsically’.

Mira wore her Bubble armor and got a feel for how it worked while Jade packed up the other weapon sets in boxes. Mira said “This is some good armor we should have a spar” Jade said “When you get back we can spar. I’m sure the boys and girls at the sanctuary would love to reverse engineer the weapons. We shouldn’t keep them waiting”.

Mira nodded and Jade finished packing up the weapon sets.