Julian had already mapped out exactly what he wanted from the master genius.
"Madame Herta, I want to use the underlying framework of your Simulated Universe to provide technical support for my game."
Julian made his request directly, without a single ounce of hesitation. He knew it was an incredibly bold demand, but he didn't see the point in holding back.
Herta raised an eyebrow, her porcelain lips curving into a dry smile. "Oh? You certainly don't lack an appetite."
She smoothed down her dress, her voice dripping with cool authority. "However, just because you saved my face doesn't mean you can simply walk away with the keys to the Simulated Universe. That is a collective masterpiece built by multiple members of the Genius Society."
Julian wasn't surprised by her initial refusal. In fact, he had planned for it. His strategy was old-fashioned but practical: set a massive threshold from the start, and after she naturally shot it down, negotiate down to the lesser technologies he and Stephen had already quietly discussed.
But before he could even vocalize his fallback request, Herta continued smoothly:
"Of course, handing the framework over to your studio isn't completely out of the question. But you will have to agree to a few of my personal conditions first."
Julian's eyes widened slightly. Wait, she's actually considering it? He glanced over at Stephen, who looked just as surprised by her sudden flexibility, clearly wondering what kind of scheme the master of the house was brewing.
No matter the catch, the Simulated Universe framework was the absolute holy grail for his game's future. Even if her conditions turned out to be incredibly demanding or borderline impossible, he had to hear them out first.
"I am all ears," Julian said, leaning forward.
"It's quite simple," Herta explained, counting the points on her small fingers. "First, you must let me study your Pokémon up close. Second, I need to use your game world as a testing ground for a few of my own experiments. Finally, I will grant you the structural code, but your studio will have to shoulder the physical resource and manufacturing costs for the hardware yourself."
Julian's expression instantly brightened. Those didn't sound like difficult terms at all. To ensure there weren't any hidden traps in the fine print, he pushed for clarification. "Madame Herta, could you please break down the secondary condition for me?"
"Of course. My patience is remarkably resilient when dealing with a fascinating subject," she murmured.
"Letting me analyze the Pokémon you manifest through your Pathstrider traits is straightforward. I give you my word as a genius that my instruments won't cause them a single drop of physical harm, so you can leave your anxiety at the door. As for the grand experiment I want to run inside your software, the mechanics are slightly more complex. To put it simply: I intend to introduce our simulated Aeons directly into your game world to observe whether these digital gods will cast their gaze upon your active player base."
"Once a gaze is successfully recorded inside the software, I want to see if that divine power can be mirrored back into the user's real-world body. The detailed data models are a bit dry, so I will pass the complete files to Stephen later and let him explain the mathematics to you. You only need to know that this integration will not disrupt the standard gameplay loop for your consumers."
Julian nodded slowly as the logic clicked. Herta likely assumed he was completely blind to the deeper mechanics of her project, which was why she kept her summary so brief.
However, drawing upon his extensive meta-knowledge from his past life, he could easily map out her true goal. The master genius wanted to transform his massive media franchise into a universe-scale testing ground.
True, having trailblazers like Stelle, Dan Heng, and Welt running through her virtual worlds had vastly accelerated her early research data. But that style of testing suffered from a massive structural flaw: the sample size was simply far too narrow. Furthermore, the pioneers were already established Pathstriders, making it incredibly difficult for her instruments to isolate and run clean comparisons on how a regular civilian handles a god's gaze.
But if billions of active Pokémon players across the galaxy suddenly joined the network, the sheer volume of raw data flooding her servers would be astronomical. Because the incoming metrics would stem from vastly different individuals across thousands of worlds, her teams wouldn't have to worry about running out of diverse variables. It would provide an unbelievable push for her research.
And if a simulated Aeon actually chose to manifest its gaze before a regular player inside the game? That would be a historic scientific discovery.
Julian harbored zero objections to the scheme. If anything, letting her run those background loops would only make his game world feel infinitely more mysterious and immersive for the players. And as long as his companions weren't being mistreated under her microscopes, her first condition was perfectly acceptable too.
"I can agree to all of your parameters," Julian stated firmly. "However, the secondary condition carries a technical prerequisite that my current build cannot support."
"It's fine. You're referring to the fact that you need to transition the software into a massive, unified online multiplayer environment to handle the data load, right? Stephen already flagged that architecture in the brief he handed me," Herta dismissed with a wave of her hand.
The moment her curiosity had been piqued by the franchise, she had ordered Stephen to supply her with their core development files. At this point, it was safe to say she understood the internal logic of the game better than anyone else alive, save for the original creators.
To achieve her experimental vision, a massive online infrastructure was mandatory. Otherwise, with their current standalone model where every player ran around in their own isolated world save file, it wouldn't provide a healthy environment for her simulated Aeons to roam. After all, a god doesn't materialize simply to stare at a single isolated person in a closed room.
"The one commodity I possess in absolute limitlessness is time," Herta noted indifferently. "It won't be too late to initialize the divine tracking arrays after your studio officially launches the multiplayer expansion. Besides, mapping out a massive online universe was always part of your long-term studio roadmap anyway, wasn't it?"
Julian smiled and extended his right hand across the table. "Then I must thank you for your immense corporate generosity, Madame Herta. May our partnership run smoothly."
"A smooth partnership indeed," Herta replied, giving his hand a brief, professional shake. "You can harvest the structural code blocks directly from Stephen's terminal. Now, clear the floor so I can begin my evaluation of your Pokémon!"
"Wait, not yet—I still have a Stellaron research request waiting on my desk. What a blissful mountain of work! I'll ping your terminal when I require your presence later," she murmured, already pivoting on her heel to exit the room. But Julian quickly stepped into her path to stop her.
"What is it now? Do you have an additional condition to log?" she huffed, her porcelain brow furrowing.
"There is a delicate matter I wanted to ask your office about," Julian explained, his tone turning serious. "It regards the Lord Ravager from our encounter on the platform."
He carefully walked her through the strange sequence of events: how Nanook's gaze had suddenly locked onto both him and Stelle, the sudden ambush by Phantylia's parasitic aura, and the bizarre phenomenon where the raw energy of Destruction had flowed straight into his own spiritual reservoir after her clone dissolved.
Herta's eyes flashed with a sudden, intense light. "Oh? A reaction of that nature actually compiled? This is the first time my database has encountered a sequence like that. Come along to my laboratory immediately; I am running a comprehensive diagnostic on your body first."
The Blueprint of Destruction
Without a single second of delay, Herta marched Julian straight into her private sanctuary. Her office was a far cry from the sparse, compact room he remembered from his flat gaming monitors. The true layout was divided into dozens of separate research wings, and several structures that looked like seamless metallic walls were actually hidden hydraulic doors.
She tapped a hidden console, guiding Julian through a sliding partition into a high-spec clean room. At her gesture, he lay down inside a sleek, glowing pod that closely mirrored an advanced medical chamber.
The moment the hatch sealed and the scanning rays initialized, Julian felt the energy deep within his core begin to thrum violently. Both his familiar Elation current and the newly acquired Destruction energy flared up in sharp, resonant waves. Even without looking at the external monitors, the sheer frequency of the vibrations made the difference between the two paths perfectly clear to his senses.
"Fascinating," Herta's voice echoed over the chamber's audio line. "The instruments are registering a flawless, high-density energy response from the Path of Destruction. The raw volume sitting inside your reservoir is hovering a mere hair's breadth away from matching an authentic Emanator baseline... How incredibly interesting."
The automated hatch slid open with a soft hiss, and Julian stepped out of the pod, adjusting his collar. "What's the official diagnosis?"
"I have a highly viable theory," Herta said, leaning against her console as she reviewed the scrolling data streams. "Nanook turned his gaze toward your little companion on the platform, but because the Lord Ravager Phantylia had previously anchored a hidden tracking script onto your soul, your profile was caught in the exact same field of vision."
"Your media empire has been systematically slowing down the pace of her campaign across the stars, so the moment she realized you were exposed, she actively funneled Nanook's attention to manifest a weapon, intending to delete your existence from the server entirely."
"But her calculations suffered a major variable flaw: she failed to realize your personal combat capacity was exceptional enough to maintain a stalemate until my starskiff docked. The moment her clone was broken and forced to log off, that massive reservoir of destructive energy was left without a proper vessel to hold it. It likely recognized the unique traits of your Destruction Pokémon as the perfect alternative container—or perhaps Nanook himself found the design of your monster highly amusing and chose to bestow the current directly upon it."
Herta turned her head to look at him, a sharp smile touching her face. "However, that creature was fundamentally born from your own Pathstrider energy. The moment the dragon's physical form dissolved into light, that anchored power had nowhere left to go, so it naturally flowed straight back into your own soul."
"Of course, at this stage, the theory remains a working hypothesis that requires rigid experimentation to verify. Therefore," she cheered, her eyes sparkling with scientific hunger, "your top priority is to call down that magnificent, shadow-milled dragon of ruin so I can tear into its data fields!"
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