DKIE CH82: Spark

You foolish mortals. Luka shook his head. Why was he cursing people in the middle of the day? It was no wonder the Wisdom Tree insisted on a disclaimer. Although the main improvement was his strength, he felt a strange sense of annoyance towards everyone, too lazy to waste a single word. No wonder the Wisdom Tree had been a ‘mute’ for so long.

Luka composed himself, forcibly using the unrefined, mottled power of faith to dispel this feeling, and focused on his cultivation. “Finally…” An eleventh-rank grand magus, only a single step away from the twelfth rank. Seeing that his breakthrough surprisingly didn’t attract a lightning tribulation, the Wisdom Tree was also astonished. After a moment, it seemed to think of something and fell silent.

“The Tree Core existed even before the Wisdom Tree gained sentience.” The Elf King, who had been swept a thousand meters away earlier, elegantly walked back. “The Tree Core is where the Wisdom Tree has precipitated the most life force. With it, it’s equivalent to you having an extra lifeline.”

Quill also said, “A thousand-year tree has a ten-thousand-year core. In the future, when the Wisdom Tree becomes a god, it can even give back to you.”

Luka was suddenly a little embarrassed. He had come to discuss cooperation and ended up getting a Tree Core for free. This was a huge advantage to take. Seeing his sudden reserve, Quill shook his head. For some ancient life forms, they would rush at even a ten percent chance of becoming a god. What’s more, the chances of winning this battle were not small. For the elf race, this was practically a gift delivered to their doorstep.

“Um, could you provide me with a quiet place?” Luka urgently needed to consolidate his new realm. After the sudden promotion, various aspects were still unstable. The Elf King took him to Clear Spring Valley to rest. The natural elements there were rich, and he wouldn’t be disturbed.

Luka said, “It seems I can only appreciate your new composition later.” Not expecting him to remember this, the Elf King waved his hand, indicating there was no need for honorifics. Just as they arrived, he suddenly said, “Luka, do you know what the most magical thing is?”

Luka looked at him. “Whenever we meet, you always have a hidden meaning. But no matter at what point we meet, I would consider you a kindred spirit.” It wasn’t because of shared interests, but because after every negotiation of interests, the ideals the other party unintentionally revealed were something the Elf King highly valued.

Luka gave a dry laugh. “…You flatter me. Godhood isn’t a monopoly business.” It was all thanks to the contrast provided by his peers.

The Elf King didn’t stay long; he still had to see the Dwarf Clan Chief. Luka got goosebumps and said to Quill, “I can’t take it anymore. He’s praising me too much.” Praising his looks or his career would be fine. Praising his character just made him lose his confidence.

Quill reached out and gently brushed his wind-tousled hair, smiling faintly. “It’s praise you deserve.”

–

The area below Clear Spring Valley was buried with a large amount of moonstone ore. The energy overflowed into the water’s surface, and soaking in it was beneficial for one’s meridians. Luka entered the lake fully clothed. Under the operation of his faith power, his body remained scorching hot even in the cool lake water.

The water surface suddenly rippled, and a figure appeared next to Luka. He wondered, “You’re soaking too?” These special areas on the Elf Island contained dense life elements, which were not suitable for necromancers.

Quill said with a straight face, “To temper my will.”

Luka believed his nonsense and closed his eyes again, focusing on sorting out the magic power in his body. This cultivation session was no exception, resembling the poetic line “purple smoke rises from a censer in the sun.” His skin turned red from the rising heat. After his light clothes were soaked, a semi-nude layer of pink could be seen, and a falling flower happened to float by on the water.

Quill’s body tensed.

Cultivation knows no time. At some point, the moon rose from the other side of the valley. The aura leaking from Quill had thickened, and indirectly, his will had actually been strengthened.

Luka’s terminal suddenly began to vibrate incessantly on the shore. Again and again, almost without interruption, there must be something urgent. “So noisy.” Luka, focused on consolidating his power, frowned slightly.

Quill reached out a long arm, cast a soundproofing spell, and helped answer the terminal. There were more than a dozen unread messages on the screen.

[Lillian from Stone Magazine: Quick, look at the community forum! The movie is a huge success, and the limited edition 3D glasses are selling like crazy.]
[Lillian from Stone Magazine: Are there any more left? I didn’t even get one. If you have any, save one for me.]
[Lillian from Stone Magazine: [Anyone there?]]
[Lillian from Stone Magazine: My mother loves your movie! She said she felt healthier after watching it!]

A flood of messages, all from Lillian. Hearing a response, Lillian breathed a sigh of relief. “You finally picked up. Usually, you’re always…”

Quill interrupted her chatter. “Is something the matter?”

Lillian was stunned. “Luka…”

“He’s busy.”

Lillian was even more astonished. Terminals were usually carried on one’s person. If he was busy, he could just ignore it or not answer. Just then, she seemed to hear the sound of flowing water from the other side. The silence made Quill’s patience wear thin. “Is there anything else?”

Lillian finally came back to her senses. Connecting the recent rumors flying around, she seemed to have figured something out. The rumors, the sound of water, the inconvenience, and his tired tone! The more she thought, the more it made sense. Lillian’s mind was about to crash from her rapid thinking.

The person on the other end of the terminal had run out of patience. “Wait!” the female voice hurriedly shouted. Just before Quill could hang up, a flash of inspiration hit Lillian, and she asked rapidly, “I apologize for the intrusion! If you ever decide to announce your relationship, please go through our column, okay? We’ll use the best writers, the best layout, and special parchment for the material, so it can be collected for centuries to come.” After all, the news in the papers was just reporters’ speculation, which was a different matter from a personal admission.

The last sentence made Quill’s expression waver slightly. Just as Lillian’s heart was in her throat, she heard the reply— “Can be considered.”

With that, he hung up. Lillian was instantly ecstatic.

On the other side, before the screen even went dark, another private message popped up from the Saint: [The ferret has already set out to deliver something to you.]
Quill conveniently replied: [.] Using a quote and a period to indicate “read.”
The Saint: “…” He could tell at a glance it wasn’t the person himself. If it were Luka, it would have started with at least three sticker packs.

Quill was not at all surprised about the Saint sending a gift. For the sake of the Wisdom Tree, the elf race would inevitably go all-out in the war. This was nothing but beneficial for the Saint, so it was natural for him to show some gesture. The gift was certainly a treasure, and it would likely be of great benefit to Luka’s improvement.

Time flowed quietly with the moonlight in the mountains. It wasn’t until the sound of string music drifted from the distance that the faint mist around Luka disappeared, and he let out a long breath. “It’s gotten so late.” Seeing the full moon in the sky, he was a little surprised. The influx of faith power had skyrocketed recently, and he had to absorb it carefully to prevent his magic from becoming chaotic.

The second before the water evaporated completely, Quill happened to witness the scene of Luka coming ashore, soaking wet, his perfect waist-to-hip ratio like that of a merman. He reached out to help him ashore. A grand magus certainly didn’t need help, but both of them tacitly ignored this point.

Water dripped from his fingertips. Quill suddenly remembered Luka’s response written on the fogged window: Standard Answer. Recalling those two words now still brought a warmth to his heart.

Suppressing his lustful thoughts, he handed over the terminal and mentioned Lillian’s call. Luka immediately called her back via voice chat. After a brief conversation, Lillian cleared her throat and asked, “What were you doing just now?”
Luka: “Soaking in a hot spring.” The water in Clear Spring Valley was pretty much a hot spring.

Lillian asked knowingly, “Soaking by yourself?”

Luka: “And Yu… my friend, A-Cai.”

Lillian’s voice rose a few pitches in excitement, but she tried to get back to business. “You’ve done what you can, loved who you can. Take some time to look at the novel website. Everyone is writing the same genre now. I’ve held several writing contests and even promoted them on the community forum, but the results have been mediocre.”

Luka opened the novel website. He thought the idea of promoting was right, but pushing niche, unpopular genres on a platform like this certainly had its limitations. Different platforms have different audiences, and the active users on the community forum preferred a faster pace.

“I…” Luka suddenly paused. When dealing with matters, he was accustomed to locking onto important keywords first. Only now did he notice the first half of her sentence. “Done what you can, loved who you can?”

Lillian said meaningfully, “Anyway, your friend promised me. When you announce your relationship, I get the exclusive.”

Luka’s mind spun a few times, and he finally seemed to land on a certain possibility. His ears instantly burned. He spoke rapidly into the terminal, “I had to soak in the hot spring to consolidate my power because my strength increased. I’ll pay attention to the novel situation. Talk later.”

This time, it was Lillian’s turn to be silent. More heart-wrenching than a friend falling in love was a friend leveling up like a cannonball.

The awkwardness under the moonlight fell into Quill’s eyes. “The elves are holding a welcoming banquet. Let’s go get something to eat first.” Luka mumbled an indistinct reply. Lillian’s words still seemed to echo in his ears. Along the way, even when Quill mentioned the Saint, he wasn’t paying much attention.

As they approached the circular banquet hall, it was surrounded by vintage lamp posts, and even the cobblestone path in mid-air seemed to glow. The elves had held a banquet when the Saintess came last time, but this one was on a grander scale. Luka said this directly at the entrance. The Dwarf Clan Chief, sitting next to the Elf King, was very pleased to hear this. The dwarves’ attitude towards Luka was generally very conflicted; they couldn’t stand to see him do well, but they also couldn’t stand to hear others speak ill of him.

After three rounds of drinks, the Dwarf Clan Chief used his equipment to sense him and said, “You seem to have gotten stronger.”

Luka walked over and sat down. “A fortunate breakthrough.”

The wine in the Dwarf Clan Chief’s hand instantly lost its fragrance. It’s fine, he comforted himself. Even if he broke through, he’s still two ranks below me.

Luka raised his glass to him and the Elf King from across the table. “To a beautiful future.” The Elf King nodded.

The breakthrough had consumed a lot of energy, and Luka soon immersed himself in a battle with the food. The elves lived by the sea and had a lot of seafood. Quill sat with perfect posture, able to calmly pick the meat from crab legs for him even while wearing gloves, as precise as if performing surgery. The Elf King’s gaze lingered on the unique black glove for an extra second.

After the video conference ended earlier, he and the Saint had had a deep private discussion. Since they had decided to commit the entire clan to the war, it was natural for both sides to have a basic understanding of the members in their camp. The Saint hadn’t explicitly stated Quill’s identity, but during their conversation, the Elf King had already formed some guesses about his race. He determined that most of the other’s power was accumulated under that black glove and was curious why he didn’t disperse it to absorb it, which would bring a surge in strength.

The powerful have a strong sense of boundaries, so the Elf King didn’t take the initiative to ask. The welcoming banquet ended with all the guests enjoying themselves.

–

The weather at sea was changeable. On the second day of Luka’s arrival on the island, the Elf Island began broadcasting notices to halt ship traffic. The elves on the island, bored with nothing to do, often wandered in the forest. The Elf Island had no forbidden areas for its own kind, but for the past two days, they had been temporarily notified not to linger near the council hall.

Inside the council hall, Luka was discussing the innovation of the terminal with the Elf King and the Dwarf Clan Chief. Luka proposed various types of terminal models. “We can completely turn this into a sustainable industrial chain, releasing a new model every year.”

The Dwarf Clan Chief’s beard bristled at these words. “I don’t make low-quality things. If the old one isn’t broken, who will buy the new one?”

Luka: “Add features, do limited editions.” In short, firmly grasp the customer’s “love the new, tire of the old” mentality to make money.

Quill was not present to witness this heated discussion. Since morning, he had been standing by the coast. During the island’s closure period, the shore was devoid of the many foreign guests waiting for trade. In the disastrous weather, a snow-white figure came riding the wind and waves across space from ten thousand meters out at sea.

Quill reached out and caught nothing but air. The ferret had a super-strong sense of space. It couldn’t wear a storage ring on its paws, so it carried a small satchel. When it stood up, it looked like a hamster at first glance.

Tossing the bundle to Quill, before he could speak, the ferret had already left a line of paw prints: Before I left, the Saint asked if you had something for me to bring back?

Quill raised an eyebrow. Cooperating with smart people was indeed less trouble. He took off his glove and casually broke off a piece of bone and tossed it. The crisp sound made the ferret’s fur stand on end. The moment it caught it, it felt as if it were surrounded by negative emotions. This dissipated energy quickly sealed itself within the cracks of the bone fragment.

What a poisonous bone! The ferret had never thought it would be a bone courier and was curious what this thing could be used for.

Quill said lightly, “A medium. The pendulum for the Holy Court’s future death knell.”

Taking the bone, the ferret set out to sea again. By the time Quill returned to the forest, Luka’s meeting had already ended. The latter was meticulously inspecting a magical framework, not idle for a moment. Quill glanced at it briefly. It was similar to the community’s framework, but obviously much simpler. “A simplified version of the community?”

Luka nodded. “Yes. It’s mainly for scoring and commenting. Users can rate and write reviews for a specific work on it.” The community’s functions were vast and complex; specialization was sometimes very important. Just as a certain platform, X-ban, had achieved great success by borrowing many useful functional elements, the most successful of which were the five-star rating system and the careful maintenance of reader comments. It used this as a medium to eventually form a huge user network. Luka retained these two parts in the new software.

Quill helped him check the connection points. “The Saint sent you something. I’ve checked it; you can consume it directly.” Forcing growth didn’t apply to Luka. With faith paving the way, as long as he had enough experience, he could level up directly.

“For me?” Who doesn’t like a pie falling from the sky? Luka immediately opened it with a smile. Inside the box was a smooth, restrained bead, much heavier than it looked. Upon closer inspection, the bead seemed to contain four different phantoms: a bear, a crane, a leopard, and a tiger.

“The Four Symbols Star Orb,” Quill said. “Don’t absorb it. It’s best to embed it in the brow of the little figure inside you.”

Luka imagined the scene. Erlang Shen. Well, it wasn’t growing on his own face, so he decided to do it.

Quill reminded him, “You’ve consumed both Nether Milk and the Four Symbols Star Orb one after another. In the future, no amount of heavenly treasures will likely have any effect.”

Luka understood, similar to drug resistance. “It’s fine.” He would enjoy the benefits first. With a little more effort, becoming a legendary grand magus was just around the corner!

The magical framework had been tested. Before consuming the Four Symbols Star Orb, Luka prepared to upload it through the space station first. “Are you sure you want to release this?” Quill asked. No matter how he looked at it, this seemed to be the most insignificant of all the platforms Luka currently operated. A review would never have just one voice. Luka already had works with good reputations; a new platform wouldn’t provide much of a boost.

As if knowing what he was thinking, Luka explained, “It has limited benefits for me. It’s that some works on the novel website lack exposure. Niche works have a hard time breaking out on their own.” As the upload progress neared one hundred percent, he smiled. “A review-based platform can play a good role. And it has another great, wonderful use; you’ll know after using it for a while.”

He paid no more attention to the software. The urge to increase his strength was pressing. Luka tidied up his desk and ran to Clear Spring Valley to consume the Four Symbols Star Orb. With a flurry of fierce actions, he was gone. In the space station, a new downloadable software appeared silently.

Having connections wasn’t for nothing. Every time Luka uploaded a magical framework, the Wisdom Tree’s review was exceptionally fast, and it would also send out a unified recommendation notice. The name “Luka” was now the best brand. Most terminal users, upon seeing the developer’s great name, chose to download it almost without hesitation. He managed to create a sensation every time, and the public’s expectations for Luka were now very high.

“[Spark]?”

A million miles away in Boulder City, Lillian was attending a banquet hosted by the Boulder City Lord. Seeing that the developer was Luka, she installed and tried it without hesitation. Cullen, who was chatting with guests nearby, caught a glimpse from the corner of her eye and also walked over quickly. “Is it Luka? The icon is quite interesting.” All of his works had a faint silhouette of a feather in the bottom right corner, which you had to look very closely to see.

Lillian rubbed her hands together. “Let’s see what it is.” Her eyes, fixed on the download progress, were about to burn a hole through it. She said “too slow” three times in a row. She had just been talking about the obstacles in the development of online literature; this suddenly new software might be related to it.

Finally entering the main page, the two were simultaneously stunned by an interface that exuded a strong, primitive atmosphere. Lillian said hesitantly, “It seems a bit like… the community?” No, it was even more simplistic than the community they were currently using.

The four modules—[Movies][Music][Novels][Q&A Discussion]—were arranged neatly, giving a desolate, pioneering feel. Lillian blinked in disbelief a few times and finally clicked on the movie module at the top.

A pop-up box appeared:
[A paradise for movie lovers to communicate.]
[Here, you can rate and review movies.]
[Do not show this message again? Yes/No]

Even after entering, there was nothing outstanding. Within the section, there were currently only three movies: “God of Forging” and the two parts of “The Real and Fake Young Master.” And apart from the movie posters and trailers, the related materials were almost blank. The five stars in the middle were presumably for star ratings. Below the star ratings were simply the three words [Write a Review]. The page was so simple that she suspected he might have uploaded it by mistake.

Lillian, unconvinced, clicked through the other modules one by one. The novel and music sections had many works, but they too only had brief introductions. She and Cullen looked at each other. What was Luka up to?

Cullen said, “Try rating something.” The overall operation was very easy to get started with; even someone who had never used a terminal could use it after a glance or two. Other than that, there was nothing.

Cullen managed to come up with a reason. “The reviews online are all positive right now. Maybe Luka wants to hear more different opinions? So he made a rating system to collect them.”

Lillian stated honestly, “As far as I know, he doesn’t possess that quality.”

“…”

Luka’s Diary Excerpt:

In view of the recent numerous access traces in this diary, a special reading guide is hereby established:

1. If your mentality collapses after reading this diary, I am not responsible.
   
2. If you can’t stand the scenes of public displays of affection while reading this diary, I am not responsible.
   
3. All rights of interpretation belong to Luka.
   

Wisdom Tree: …Such a familiar feeling of a disclaimer.

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