Birth Of The Crafts-God

The rhyman retreated from the assassin, not willing to engage in combat until he had enough distance and was secure.

However, how could the assailant let go of such a perfect opportunity?

At the same time, the princess lunged forward with her spear.

The rhyman split his active limbs into three. The four on his left hand went for the princess. The four on his right hand attacked the assassin. The remaining three on his left acted as cover against the sniper in the dark. This was the most suitable move he could think of at the moment and it proved to be so.

The assassin was held back by the four limbs, parrying two and retreating backwards to escape the reach of the other two. A gunshot was heard as another bullet was fired, but the rhyman was prepared as he grouped the three remaining limbs in his head to form a shield. This blocked the bullet and also reduced the damage that each individual limb received.

Nonetheless, how could the rhyman's actions be entirely successful?

The princess was able to face off against twelve limbs and stand her ground; how could she be held back by only four?

*Clang*

With one sweep, the princess parried all the limbs and left the rhyman exposed.

A blue beam greeted her, but she was already prepared for that. However, contrary to the rhyman's thoughts, the princess didn't retreat but blocked the beam with her left hand as she advanced forward.

"Die."

The spear thrust forward, and pierced the rhyman without any suspense.

"You-" The rhuman grimaced as he felt the pain of his organs being pierced.

The princess ignored him, channeling her stellar energy into the weapon.

The princess' stellar energy flowed through the spear's shaft and into its head that was stuck inside of the rhyman.

Upon reaching the spear head, the energy exploded within the rhyman and began wreaking havoc.

"Ahh!"

The rhyman cried out loud as he could feel his remaining organs being targeted by the overbearing stellar energy. The stellar energy entered his body and shredded his organs, resulting in blood spilling from the gill-like openings on the rhyman's neck.

In the end, the rhyman was forced to his knees with his head tilted downwards.

"What about the viceroy?" The princess stared at the two individuals who now stood before her.

Number 1, who held a sniper rifle, responded.

"He ordered us to follow after you. When we arrived, we decided to stay in the dark and find the perfect opportunity."

From the point they departed until the princess' fight with the rhyman, not much time had actually gone by. Number 1 and 2 were slowed down by the Imoogi for the most part. Their speed was also considerably slower than the princess and the rhyman, so they caught up to the duo at a later point in time.

"Let's return." The princess said.

Then she stared at the corpse of the rhyman in thought.

"Bring it along."

. . .

Baylands city-state's map could be described as quite unique. The usual geography and distribution of districts or cities within a city-state was designed in such a way that the capital was located either at the centre or close to it. However in Baylands city-state, due to the fact that the original city was built as a wall between civilization and the Wastelands, it expanded outwards in the other three directions except the west. Due to this, its capital was basically at the border.

Much of Baylands city-state's population resided towards the east as going eastwards, one could avoid desolate beast domains and reduced the risks of encountering one.

Outside of Baylands City was a region known as the desolate territories. It was known as such because one could still spot some desolate beast domains within this region, albeit ones with weak desolate beasts.

After the desolate territories was the grey line where the grey zone, Alleva district, was located. Past the grey line and one would reach another region known as the safe zone. It was termed as such because there were no desolate beast domains or desolate beasts in the wild here.

Due to this unique distribution, the grey line —the region where Alleva district was located— became known as the dividing line, apart from its alias as the grey line.

One of the districts in the desolate territories is Maldoso district nicknamed as the production hub of Baylands city-state. Located southeast of Baylands City's South Mountains district, Maldoso district was home to many companies and factories, one of which is the Silverine Factory.

"Welcome. I'm glad you could make it." Maessen rushed to greet Lucas as soon as he spotted the latter.

"I got your mail yesterday but it was a bit late for me to respond." Lucas explained.

The previous day, Melissa had informed him that a message from the Silverine Factory's CEO —Maessen Ross— had dropped in his mailbox. According to the message, the Silverine Factory was having a difficult time reproducing the Qin stellar processor even with the complete blueprint Lucas had handed them.

If the Qin processors couldn't be mass-produced, it would make things difficult for Lucas. His time was limited and he was already preoccupied with the store and his progress. If Lucas also had to begin producing stellar processors, he would basically have no free time again and would be unable to satisfy the market demand. As such, it was vital to Lucas' future plans and success that the Silverine Factory was capable of mass-producing the Qin.

"No worries, no worries." Maessen smiled.

Lucas was the Silverine Factory's lucky charm and heavenly guide; there was no way Maessen would want to offend him or irritate him. Even if Lucas requested the CEO position, the board would seriously consider it. Hence, Maessen couldn't be dissatisfied nor order Lucas around.

"Shall we have a short break or do you want to go to the factory right away?"

"I'm short on time so let's head straight to the factory." Lucas nodded.

The Silverine Factory's production factory was located just behind the unique eight storey corporate headquarters known as the Blue Needle. It occupied a large plot of land that could basically be called a small town. Within this region, there was the assembly plant for the chips as well as the manufacturing factories for the equipment. The Silverine Factory didn't just make regular processors and stellar processors, but they also produced machines required for them.

Unfortunately, their capabilities were slightly lacking. They could only fulfill in-house orders when it came to stellar processor manufacturing equipment. As for the equipment required for fabricating regular processors, they managed to sell some of their stock to Novanio Tech.

On the other hand, the Versailles Group didn't have any manufacturing company so there was no need to sell to them. The equipment from Paros city-state was naturally superior. This was also why Novanio Tech didn't purchase stellar processor manufacturing equipment from the Silverine Factory.

Under the lead of Maessen, Lucas was brought into the back area of the Blue Needle, the region known as the Silverine Village.

The Silverine Village was simply the name given to the territory of the Silverine Factory where all their companies and structures were located. It was also where most of their staff lived in. For instance, Maessen's home was actually in the Silverine Village and not the Ross family's grounds in the Central Prefecture district.

"Professor Cayman. Please this way." Maessen called out to a man in a white lab coat who was waiting at the entrance of the Silverine Village.

The man looked quite old, looking to be in his sixties. However, due to the quality of hyumans looking a decade younger, it was more likely for the man to actually be in his seventies.

The old man had a black and white goatee with his hair neatly shaved. He gave off the vibe of a scholar especially with the small glasses he had hanging on the bridge of his nose.

Glasses weren't so common in the upper hierarchy of modern society. Although many people still used them thanks to the improved features and added functionality available with the hardware, few relied on glasses to aid with visual impairments. The more common option for others was to have their vision corrected surgically. For those who still wanted a pair of lenses on their eyes, they either used advanced contacts or projected lenses.

The old man was one of the few people with a visual impairment that still relied on glasses.

"I told you to wait for us at the factory. Why the rush?" Maessen was confused.

The old man shook his head. He glanced around and seeing that there was only Lucas present, he frowned slightly before answering Maessen.

"This is an important matter and we've already wasted quite a bit of time on this despite having access to the complete blueprint. I simply want to get this over with."

Maessen sighed. Although the old man put it like that, having worked with him for years, he could understand what was going through the man's head.

The old man was the Chief Innovation Officer (CINO) and the Chief Technical Officer (CTO) of the Silverine Factory. He usually spent his time in the lab, researching different techniques and thinking up of improvements and modifications for the Silverine Factory's technology. However, innovation was a progressive action that was determined by the depths of one's foundations.

Until now, the Silverine Factory wasn't able to improve by a significant margin and this became a turmoil for the old man. However, the appearance of the Qin stellar processor changed that.

While to Lucas, it might just be a processor, but to the old man and the other skilled technicians, they were able to see a new path in the stellar processor production processor. If they could comprehend the theory and logic behind it, they could improve the Silverine Factory's products by at least two generations. Naturally, this attracted their attention and focus with even the old man taking the role of team lead for the project.

However, despite having access to a complete blueprint, a team of specialists with the old man in charge still failed to complete mass-production of the Qin chip, much less understanding the technology behind it.

It could be understood why the old man was grumpy. He was a high Tier 1 Master yet couldn't understand a technology even with a complete blueprint. That was quite shameful to be honest.

"So, where's the creator?"