The next day, Rigel went out alone, much to Elizabeth's displeasure and Will's delight.
He didn't even take Jack and Salazar this time.
His objective was the active volcano in the center of the island, Calypso said it was Triton's forge, and he wanted to see if anything was still there.
It all started in the morning, picking up the compass. He wanted to know where the most precious treasure on this island was. The compass began to spin its needle rapidly, leaving him extremely curious. After all, the compass had only failed to point to Triton's Sapphires so far, but since the compass couldn't point to anything, he didn't know where to go to find the said 'treasure'.
However, he thought of another idea. He separated the two most important places on the island: the city of Atlantis and the volcano. At the first, the compass managed to point in one direction, so it wasn't there. At the second, the compass needle began to spin wildly, so he knew that the treasure was there.
Of course, just because the compass pointed to the city of Atlantis didn't mean he thought there was a great treasure there, he only wanted the city's best treasure, the most valuable thing according to Rigel's interests. As far as he knew, it could be just a random pearl on the ground or even something the mermaids had brought, after all, they were already in the city.
Even so, he would go back there later to look for this so-called treasure, the snakes he sent last time found nothing in the palace.
In any case, he climbed straight up the volcano, his compass managed to point to the 'entrance', though not to the treasure, but that was good enough.
Keeping Diabolus active and the crown always ready in case he needed more power.
The journey was much smoother this time with his improved physique, the climb took almost an hour, but the greatest danger he encountered was a 3-meter centipede that nearly bit him before Diabolus swallowed it.
When he came across an opening that appeared to have been excavated, it was a huge opening twenty meters wide, the same white stones from Atlantis appeared in his vision, although the ground here was quite damaged.
He entered using lights to illuminate his path.
Looking around cautiously, he advanced slowly, the path didn't seem to be inclined, but simply straight for a long time.
When he finally arrived at a gate with two statues of Merpeople with crossed tridents above it.
Rigel passed beneath them, arriving at a large hall.
What greeted him was magma, several cascades of magma falling from various openings in the walls of a circular hall. In the center, a small forge was present, of course, when he says small, he is speaking in comparison to the large hall around him.
A pool of magma lay at the center of the forge, and floating above it, a white pearl the size of a basketball spun slowly, its movement particularly sluggish.
Rigel felt strange about the place, there was magma everywhere, but he didn't feel heat, but rather a cold dampness that smelled of saltwater, perfect for a Merman, if he had to say so.
Rigel immediately fixed his eyes on the pearl, picked up the compass, looked at it, and seeing that the compass began to spin wildly again, he knew he had found it.
As soon as he approached, the adventure book opened with a snap.
//-//
Congratulations, writer, on finding Triton's forge and its greatest treasure, the Central Pearl.
[The Central Pearl is an artifact that constantly gathers the power of the sea, being the main source of energy for Atlantis. Unfortunately, although the pearl is powerful, its runes still use divine power to function, this being the main mechanism for attracting the sea's energy. This pearl can only last for about another 500 years before it fails.]
[However, I must say that you are fortunate, writer, to have discovered the core achievement of Atlantis and received the achievement "The Power of Atlantis".]
[Congratulations on receiving: "Central Pearl (Platinum)"]
[Central Pearl (Platinum)]
[Type: Project - Enchantment]
[Effect: Can draw energy from the sea to fill the pearl with energy, this energy can be used for a wide range of purposes. (The quantity and quality of energy generated depends on the pearl used as the core and the divine power engraved in the runes.)]
[Runic Knowledge:...]
[Engraving Method:...]
//-//
Rigel felt a great deal of knowledge passing through his mind again, how to choose a pearl, the runes he needed to engrave and their meanings, how to engrave them, and how to inject divine power...
Everything was there.
Although this was a Platinum project, it actually needed divine power to function. If it were before, Rigel couldn't do anything with it, but now? He had a way to attract divine power while wearing the crown.
He blinked thoughtfully, looking at Pearl with a frown.
In reality, this thing is either very useful or completely useless.
An "infinite" energy source, it only needs to keep the runes energized, but the problem is that it needs to be in the sea to function, or the energy generated will be much weaker, plus Rigel couldn't think of a current use for this pearl, he didn't have anything that truly needed energy.
However, what was truly surprising to Rigel was that he learned the difference between divine energy and magical energy.
At first he thought they were just different forms of energy, like the difference between electricity and gasoline, but he discovered he was wrong from the start.
Divine power is based on order, while magical power is based on chaos.
That was the best comparison he could make.
Divine power comes from nature itself, it is like the source power of all that exists. That is why, even without the faith of men, the gods can still draw power from their symbols, they are simply taking the energy from the concept itself.
Magical power, on the other hand, is the opposite, distorting the natural world, transforming one thing into another, disregarding the laws of the world, bending reality to the point where imagination itself becomes the limit.
The knowledge he received emphasized the reason why the central pearl only works in the sea.
Rigel also discovered the truth about magic and divine power, they can coexist, but are rarely balanced. This is based on their very concept, the more chaos, the less order, and the more order, the less chaos.
They are not mutually exclusive, but it is very rare for them to be balanced, furthermore, it is possible for them to change over time due to various factors.
This world has a much higher order than chaos, which is why several gods were born here. Rigel didn't feel his magic was limited in this world, but that's probably because he hadn't reached the limit, in other words, he's simply weak.
In any case, the pearl uses order to attract chaos, it was truly clever, because since the chaos in this world is weak, Triton, or whoever created this Central Pearl, managed to attract the power of chaos in the sea through divine power.
Rigel didn't see Triton using the Pearl to distort reality, it was the same old thing, control of the winds, water, and lightning. It seemed very basic, he probably wasn't focused on magic, which was a shame considering the power of the Pearl.
It wasn't until Rigel's eyes widened, he thought of something, the animals of this island. Finally he understood what was happening, why did the big animals become small and the small ones become big? Why did the land animals suddenly become sea animals when Atlantis sank?
It was all magic based on the power of that pearl! Rigel didn't know what to say for a moment, he couldn't understand Triton's mindset to do that. In the end, he gave up, it wasn't his problem.