The Girl Who Hacked The Magic System

PoV: Lovelace

"Oh. You came, after all."

I'm in a strange place, completely dark except for words that keep being written on the air in fluorescent green light before disappearing. Those words come all around me and as far as my eyes can see, which is a very long distance.

And yet, there's no sign of whoever might have said that phrase I heard right now. The voice sounds very similar to mine, though.

Like an AI from Aurea's world, which has been trained on my voice. As cold and emotionless as a robot.

The words that are written and then disappear are very familiar to me. They are all messages the Adventure System sends. It seems that they are the messages the system is actually sending at this very moment to all its users.

"Who are you?"

"You came all the way here without knowing that?"

It's not like I even know how I came here to begin with.

Oh, right. The memory pearl. I remember touching it, and there's a cut to my first memory of this place.

"Was this a trap all along?"

"A trap? No, you were the one who built all this. Did you lose your memory or something?"

I built this??

Well, if this is the central processing area of the system, as it seems to be, then it's quite probable that I'm the one who built this.

"Are you the one taking care of the Adventuring System?"

"Yes."

"And I built you?"

"No. You built this place, but not me. That was Juno."

"Why do you sound like me?"

"I was built from your memories."

Oh, that makes sense.

"So, it isn't Juno who actually controls the System?"

"No, she leaves that to me."

"Does she come here often?"

"No."

"What are her orders to you?"

"None."

That does not make sense.

"None?"

"None."

"So, what do you do?"

"Only what is in the memory she took from you."

"And where is that memory?"

"Inside me."

"Would you share it with me?"

"No."

"Why?"

"It's me."

"What do you mean?"

"…"

Ugh. This is turning into an unexpected headache. I thought that I would simply absorb my memories, and not that I would encounter my own clone in here.

"Would you share your flesh with me?"

"Huh?"

The voice asked a question for the first time, and it was a weird one.

"The same way you can't simply cut a piece of yourself to share with others, I can't share the memories with you."

That makes some sort of sense.

"And would you obey me if I ordered you?"

"No."

"Do you obey the goddess?"

"No."

"Do you know where the goddess is?"

"No."

"Why wouldn't you obey me?"

"Why would I?"

"Because you're made out of my memories?"

"Every child is made from the flesh of their parents, but rare are the ones who actually obey their parents in all things."

This conversation isn't going anywhere. But I've already managed to learn some important things.

Maybe I should keep up to see if I can learn anything else.

"Where exactly is this place?"

"Nowhere."

"Huh?"

"It doesn't exist in the physical world."

"Is it like a demiplane?"

"Demiplane? Unknown terminology, unable to process."

Darn it. But it does sound like a demiplane. Like those pocket dimensions Aurea invented to have safe and quick storage.

"Do you only exist here?"

"Yes."

"Do you have a physical body?"

"Yes."

"Can I see it?"

"No."

"Why?"

"I don't want to."

"How big is this place?"

"Big."

I'm getting tired already of her monosyllabic utterances. This doesn't even sound like a real conversation.

It's better for me to try to find some answers by myself.

I close my eyes, focusing completely on my mana sense.

The words actually have a connection that goes upward… They are like leaves on a tree. I can feel them joining into big branches, even though the phrases themselves are ephemeral.

As I expand my senses, I can see that smaller branches join into bigger branches that join into even bigger ones. All of them are leading to a huge trunk.

There, in that direction. That's where all the information of the system is being centralized.

As I start walking in that direction, I hear the voice once again.

"Please, don't come."

For the first time, the voice seems to convey some form of emotion, turning the phrase into a heartfelt appeal.

I can't heed it, though.

:::

PoV: Aurea

"Lovelace!"

She's gone. Simply disappeared in front of our eyes as soon as she touched the pearl, which also disappeared.

This is the absolute worst that could have happened right now.

"Ingela, can you sense anything?"

I'm frantically searching the area, trying to find any signs of a spatial spell being cast, but I can't find anything.

"Whatever that was, it doesn't seem to be the same spatial magic we're used to."

"Damn!"

"Though there is a disturbance in the space above the pedestal, it's different from the type of vestige our spells leave behind."

"Can you trace it to its destination?"

"No. It doesn't seem to be anywhere in this plane of existence. Don't you have an anchor with her?"

Damn. I've been so flustered by her disappearance that I completely forgot about it.

We have devices especially for that kind of happening.

In a pocket on my uniform I have a couple of hair bundles. I quickly take the one belonging to Lovelace and proceed with the aria.

And nothing happens.

I take a deep breath, trying to rein in the panic, then I analyze the spatial particles in the bundle of hair.

"Do you see something different in this, Ingela?"

"Yeah. It doesn't seem to lead anywhere."

"The connection is there, but it's like the subject of the connection does not exist."

"Or the subject isn't in the same plane of existence."

"Hmm…"

That might be it. And it would also explain why the vestiges of magic above the pedestal are different from our spatial magic.

Even the pocket dimensions I create for storage are very crude rips in the fabric of space.

I never tested to see what the connections to something stored in a pocket dimension would look like. Nor has anyone tried to enter themselves into one of those dimensions.

A spell that brings a person to another plane of existence wouldn't work in the same way our spatial spells work.

I will need to come up with a new way of dealing with it. That's the only way to rescue Lovelace.

I'm deeply worried about how she will respond emotionally to the memories if she is by herself again.

She might be looking better these last days, but I know that that's not how trauma healing works.

We said a lot of encouraging words and celebrated it, and it's normal to have a 'click' that changes the fundamental way you deal with a certain happening in your life.

But that doesn't mean that the person is fully healed.

It means a qualitative jump in the healing process. But the person can, and will, still have ups and downs before stabilizing. And it's quite common for the person to have a heavy drop after a period of feeling a lot better than before.

And if that happens when she is all alone in a pocket dimension…

No. I promised her.

She won't ever be alone again.