Release that Witch

Amazed by the result, Roland was lost in thoughts.

This central carrier can figure out a nine-digit multiplication! No matter the method she used, whether it be using summation or column multiplication, she managed to find the correct answer instantly. This must mean that her calculating skills far surpass those of the common people. Even if she’s only able to answer yes or no, she’ll still be of great assistance to the Arithmetic Academy. At the very least, she can check the calculation results of the academy members which can help minimize the mistakes of large and complex calculation projects.

He squatted down excitedly and with a child-like grin, patted a main tentacle of the central carrier, ”You’re brilliant.”

The red light went out.

Pasha reminded him, ”Your Majesty, she can’t communicate with you directly.”

”She can understand my words and even give me yes or no answers. This already counts as a kind of communication.” Roland believed that communication, in essence, is just the receiving and sending of information. The central carrier can at worst be described as having troubles expressing her thoughts and thus couldn’t ”communicate” as a normal person could. He was not discouraged by this in the slightest and intended to continue finding out whether the central carrier was really limited to just giving out yes or no responses.

After pondering for a while, he said, ”Now let’s suppose lighting one main tentacle means one and lighting two tentacles means two. Can you give me a three with your red light?”

The question seemed to be much simpler than the five-digit multiplication, but it served an entirely different purpose. If the central carrier could display a correct answer to this question, it would mean that she was able to give more elaborate feedback to questions. Moreover, she might also be able to display calculation results directly in some way.

However, the central carrier did not instantly answer like before. After a few seconds, one of her tentacles started to glow, another one only glimmered, while the last one remained dark.

According to Celine, the central carrier meant that what Roland said was 30 percent correct.

However, this signal did not last for long.

The light of the glimmering tentacle went out very quickly and was soon followed by the glowing one.

”So the answer is a no?” He wondered.

”This is...”

Celine slightly sighed and explained, ”This is beyond her capacity. She had to express her agreement in a more complicated way to your question and thus got confused.” She paused before continuing, ”We’ve tried to ask her to express simple ideas and even some short sentences. However, once she found out that she could not answer a question simply with a yes or no, she would respond much slower and also easily get confused like how she just did.”

Roland said, frowning, ”Does this mean I have caused some sort of a logical barrier in her brain? Is she... alright?”

Celine waved her tentacles, answering, ”she’ll be alright after a moment of rest. I once tried asking her some contradictory questions. As a result, she ignored the rest of our questions for several weeks.”

Now Roland was certain that this bio-computer was going to be difficult to handle, but he still did not want to give up his plan of creating a new communication system to help the central carrier express more complicated ideas by answering yes or no. As she could check the calculation result, he thought that she must have known the correct answer and just did not know how to display it with her tentacles.

However, formulating this system was well beyond his area of expertise. As engineers and programmers tend to not get along very well, he knew very little about computer programming. After a bit of thought, he decided to give up on the idea of studying this central carrier all by himself.

”By the way, I remember that you said the carriers needed mud and heat to continue functioning. Is there any magma here?”

Pasha replied, ”Fran hasn’t drilled that deep yet, but we’ve found a boiling underground river here. So we should be able to find lava flow nearby soon. Also, I often smell sulfur from this underground river. It’s good for us to take a bath in it, too. As for the central carrier, we pump water from the river to shower her every few days, so you don’t need to worry about this.”

Hearing that magma was not a must for the carrier and that hot water could be used as a replacement, Roland was excited to think that he would only need a boiler to heat some water for this central carrier if he wanted to move her to the Arithmetic Academy one day.

He knew it was still not the time to make this request, as it would feel like he was overstepping his boundaries with the Taquila witches who had just moved here and had not yet joined the united front with Neverwinter. Besides, he was worried that those astrologers from the academy wouldn’t be able to keep their composure once they saw this gigantic tentacle monster.

He would first have to build trust with the witches during the exploration of the snow mountain before he could make this sensitive request.

After Roland left the secret chamber and ended his tour of the Third Border City, he began to contemplate about the plans for this place. At present, only a rough frame of this underground city had been constructed, and it could only serve as a temporary underground residence for the witches for now. Only after tunnels connected the numerous peaks of the Impassable Mountain Range could they consider this a real hidden stronghold. With the artillery installments and military fortifications above ground, it would then be incorporated into part of Neverwinter’s outermost defense line.

As soon as he returned to the castle, he summoned all the department leaders of City Hall to his reception hall. A purple curtain of light slowly materialized in front of them before eventually enveloping the whole room.

Despite the fact that Roland informed them in advance about what they were going to see, the officials’ faces still drastically changed when they saw this incredible scene. The young Minister of Agriculture, Sirius Daly, even accidentally knocked over his teacup on the table in shock; Barov kept on wiping the sweat from his forehead; Kyle Sichi and Astrologer of Dispersion Star stared at the light curtain in fearful disbelief. If it had not been for the king who was still sitting calmly in his chair, they probably would have already run away with their tails between their legs.

Roland glanced around and found that the only person who remained relatively calm was the noble lady from the Northern Region, Edith, who only jumped a little from the scene but at the same time her eyes seemed to be filled with excitement and curiosity. He also noticed that she was now looking at him with more respect in her eyes.

He had to admit that trying to figure out women was quite the difficult task.

Aside from Edith, all the other City Hall officials’ reactions were within his expectations.

As he was determined to form a united front with the Taquila survivors to fight against the demons, he knew that he could not hide them from the officials forever. Given this, he thought he had better introduce the witches to the officials before anyone in the City Hall noticed something strange in the mountains to the north of Neverwinter.

He also believed that two years of working in the City Hall should have broadened their outlooks and made them more open-minded toward new things.

However, after he explained to them who these tentacle blobs were, why they came here, and how he planned to explore the snow mountain together with them, most officials did not seem to be much supportive at all. If they had not been familiar with the witches in the Witch Union, they would have already treated those ancient witches as alien creatures like the demons.

Barov, the City Hall Director, said that it was too late to come up with new budget plans for this exploration since it was already the time for the Finance Department to work on the final accounts of the year. He also expressed his worries about Border Area’s possible vulnerability if they were to dispatch additional troops for this expedition, given how a force was recently just sent to the Southernmost Region.

With an obvious distrust in the Taquila survivors, Chief Knight Carter doubted the safety of this joint action and even argued that dangers might arise due to internal conflicts of the expedition team.

Sirius, Minister of Agriculture, stuttered about how the grains in stock could hardly support this plan alongside the ongoing military expedition and this news about the shortage of food might cause panic among the residents of the city.

Karl, the Minister of Construction, expressed his concerns about the instability of the mining area above the place hollowed out by the ancient witches in the mountain range.

Hearing them giving various reasons for canceling this exploration, Roland was clear that all they were doing was persuading him to think twice before cooperating with those tentacle monsters.

The discussion had become bogged down over this contentious issue.

If this had happened in a place such as a democratic parliament, he would not have been able to carry out his plan.

However, he did not forget that he was the lord of Neverwinter, the king of Graycastle and the one who had the final say in this matter.

He knew that it was now time for him to take over the meeting and forcibly carry out the plan.

Just like he did when he decided to protect the witches in his domain.