Reincarnated as an Apocalyptic Catalyst-Chapter 105: Algorithms VS Arcanum

"The world I came from was full of things you wouldn’t believe," I began. "There were no enchanted weapons, no ancient spells, no divine blessings, but we had our own kind of wonders. As far as weapons go, imagine a bow that fires arrows, but the arrows are condensed down to a size smaller than your finger and move with such terrifying speed that you’d be dead before you even finished hearing the explosion of power that came from the weapon. If that wasn’t enough, we had ways of destroying entire cities. The capital you know of here? It would be gone in a matter of hours, wiped from existence with a single attack capable of obliterating every living soul. Of course, we tried not to use these weapons, due to the reasonable controversy behind them."

Nythera’s eyes widened in horror, her drink nearly slipping from her grasp. "You’re joking," she murmured. "Weapons that could erase an entire city? And you just... had them?"

Vance let out a low whistle, shaking his head. "Damn. And I thought our wars were bad."

Ronan, ever unreadable, merely blinked. "Efficient. I would like to learn this ability."

I sighed, rubbing my temple. "Oh sweet Ronan, I might have to have you step out of the room if this is your response," I muttered under my breath.

Nythera turned to me, looking almost betrayed. "And you didn’t have gods watching over you?"

I smirked, raising my cup. "Nope. Just men playing gods... and hoping no one called their bluff."

I leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees. "Technology. Instead of bending reality to our will like you do with mana, we used science—an understanding of the natural world—to make things work. We had metal carriages that could outrun the fastest horse, ships that flew through the sky, and little boxes that let people talk across vast distances instantly."

Vance let out a low whistle. "Sounds like you all were gods in your own right."

I barked out a short laugh. "Not even close. We had no gods—at least, none that actually did anything. If someone prayed, nothing happened. If someone begged for power, they had to earn it the hard way. And if they wanted to grow stronger, well... that’s where things got tricky."

I stretched my legs out, staring into the fire. "In your world, people level up. You fight, train, or find some ancient relic, and suddenly you’re stronger, faster, better. For us? Strength was a lifetime commitment." I gestured vaguely to my arms. "Want to be physically strong? You had to dedicate years to training, eating the right food, and pushing your body past its limits, with no promise that it would ever amount to anything."

Vance scoffed. "I never thought that what we had would be considered shortcuts, but what you dealt with sounds like a real pain in the ass. So you had no shortcuts at all?"

I shook my head. "Nope, not without injecting or ingesting various illegal drugs. If you wanted to be a warrior, you bled for it every day. No magic armor to protect you, no potions to heal your wounds. Just discipline, exhaustion, and pain."

Nythera tilted her head. "And what about the mind? Magic? Anything similar?"

I smirked. "Magic didn’t exist, but knowledge was its own kind of power. We had books, libraries filled with information, and even devices that could store entire collections of human knowledge. But just like with strength, intelligence wasn’t something you just gained. It took years of study, practice, and experience. And even then? Most people never did anything great with it."

She frowned. "That sounds... unfair."

I chuckled. "It was. Imagine spending your entire life working toward something—only to realize you’ll never be good enough because someone else was born richer, smarter, or just plain luckier."

Vance took a long drink and processed the information. "So let me get this straight—you had no levels, no magic, no divine intervention, and the only way to get stronger or smarter was to waste decades hoping you were lucky enough to be born into the right circumstances?"

I grinned wryly. "Pretty much. Some people got to the top, but the rest of us? We fought for scraps. Mind you, there were prodigies that existed who would boost civilization ahead a hundred or so years with their discoveries. All of that being said, technology had its benefits beyond what this world held. The vast scope of our military might was a great deterrent to life-snuffing wars over trivial things. You wouldn’t pick a fight with someone if it turned out they could kill you and everyone you loved while they could do the same to you."

I stretched my legs out again, feeling the resistance in my joints, the desire to curl up and drift off into sleep, and I continued to stare into the fire. "And yet, despite all those struggles, all that effort, most people never truly became anything. They spent their entire lives just... existing. Working, eating, sleeping, and repeating the cycle until they died."

Nythera wrapped her arms around her knees, her expression contemplative. "That sounds... empty."

I sighed. "It was. But we didn’t have anything else. No grand quests, no chosen heroes, just people trying to get by."

The group fell silent for a moment, the weight of my words settling over them. The flickering firelight danced in the dim cellar, casting long shadows across their faces.

Vance broke the silence with a small chuckle. "Well, that explains why you’re handling all of this so well. You were already stuck in a nightmare before you got here."

I laughed. "Yeah... But I do miss a lot of the luxuries provided. Despite actually mattering in this world to some degree, there was a lot of shit my world had that yours doesnt, even just the simple things we took from granted."

Nythera tilted her head, still trying to process everything I had told her, and desperately eager to hear more. "Like what?"

I let out a dry chuckle. "Where do I even begin? Comfort, for one. You know how after a long day of travel, your body aches, your feet hurt, and all you want to do is rest? In my world, we had beds that molded to your body, blankets made from materials so soft they felt like clouds, and pillows that supported your neck just right. We had entire rooms built around the idea of making you as comfortable as possible, with warmth or cool air at the push of a button."

Vance grunted, clearly unimpressed. "Sounds excessive. A bed’s a bed."

I smirked, shaking my head. "You say that now, but if I could drop you into a proper heated bath, let you soak in hot water for an hour, then toss you into a mattress that hugged your every contour, you’d change your mind real quick."

Nythera blinked. "Hot water, whenever you wanted it?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Turn a handle, and it flows instantly. Cold water, too, if you needed it. We didn’t have to boil anything, didn’t have to collect from a river or well. Just... there. Always available. We also had small chambers in the kitchen that could turn water to ice cubes that you could use to make the water even colder."

She seemed almost offended by the idea. "That sounds unfair."

I let out a laugh. "Tell me about it. You don’t realize how much you miss simple things like that until they’re gone like food. We had ways to keep it fresh for weeks, even months. We could take meat, vegetables, dairy—things that would spoil within days here—and store them in boxes that kept them at just the right temperature. Those same containers that made ice. No magic, just science."

Vance furrowed his brow. "So you never had to worry about spoiled rations?"

"Not really. And even when we did, food was... different. We had entire industries dedicated to making meals convenient. Fast food, pre-packaged meals, drinks that gave you all the nutrients you needed without having to hunt or cook. You just throw them into another container that heats it almost perfectly. I mean sometimes the middle would still be cold, but you just heated it a bit longer and you could have a full blown dinner ready to go in 5 minutes."

Nythera scrunched her nose. "There’s no way that’s true. I feel like you would just be eating charred meat. How in the world could you do any of that?"

I shrugged. "Science, Nythera, just education taken from. It took a very long time, but the more we learned, the more we advanced, and life just got better. To quote Ronan–

"It was efficient," he interrupted.

I nodded in response as I continued. "We had entire shops dedicated just to sweets. Chocolate, pastries, things so rich and flavorful they’d make your head spin. We had drinks colder than ice, available anytime we wanted, flavored with anything you could imagine. If you wanted fresh fruit from across the world, you could get it—without ever seeing the place it came from."

Nythera’s lips parted slightly, her expression shifting between awe and disbelief. "That... that doesn’t seem real."

"Oh, it was. And that’s just the surface of it." I leaned back against the wall, rubbing my temple. "Clothing, for example. Have you ever gotten stuck in wet armor or rough wool that just won’t sit right? We had clothes so soft and fitted that you barely felt them on your skin. If it was wet, you threw it into another box, waited 30 minutes, and it was perfectly toasty and warm. Shoes designed for comfort, for running, for different types of weather. Not just for necessity, but for luxury."

Vance raised a brow. "Think we can find a way back to that world? I wouldn’t mind spending even a couple days there." He laughed, a hopeless laugh, but held onto the thought like a precious dream.

I laughed. "Oh, don’t get me wrong. It had its problems, but there were a lot of things we took for granted. Medicine, for example. You get sick here, you grab a healer, maybe toss a few coins out and you are better in an hour or two. In my world, we had doctors, medicines that cured diseases, surgeries that could fix internal injuries without magic. People lived longer, healthier lives because of it. That being said, a broken bone could take weeks, and if you lost a limb, you would need it replaced with artificial materials or just go without that limb."

Ronan decided to speak up, "So magic was superior in this instance."

I hesitated before answering. "Yeah, in that instance magic is superior. We could get a common cold and be sniffling and complaining for a week before it went away. The benefit being that once it was over, our bodies were better suited to handle that. So, say you get that same cold a year later, it might only take a day or two before you beat it. The next year, you might not even get sick."

The others shrugged, seeming to see what I was saying, but still not convinced that science could beat magic in every way.

"But all of that... all the comfort, the advancements, the luxuries... they weren’t free. People still suffered. People still died. Not because they lacked these things, but because those in power controlled them. You’d think a world where hunger and sickness could be solved would be fairer, but greed was just as much a curse there as it is here."

Vance grunted. "Figures. The more things change, the more they stay the same."

"Exactly." I sighed, rubbing the bridge of my nose. "I had everything I needed, but at the same time, I had nothing. I could go anywhere, eat anything, buy whatever small luxury I wanted, but I was just another person in a sea of billions. Nothing I did mattered, and all of the greatest pleasures were far out of my reach."

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