Through the Living Heir

Seeing his confusion, SIMON explains. “Things expanding can be used for power. The steam expanding pushes the piston to power the sea ships, and the star-like material here-“ the fusion torch is circled “-pushes the spaceship forward.” Nick says “or does SIMON?” from over by Kaleb. “I think Nick needs something. Unless you have another question, you should probably give the glasses back.”

That’d make him a believer in old theories like time and space being mutable. Not like that’s true in real life or anything… There are some fundamental revelations to be made, though. All four elements are good for breaking things, but levity compressed in adamant makes the best actual explosive. And you’ve got bottled pholestegen (the spelling of which I apparently butchered. It’s supposed to be phlogiston…), which can set fire to stuff.

Nick nods along. He looks slightly alarmed at the sacrifices part, presumably because he has essentially three things with him. “Does your moon match the crystals, or is it stone? What does your theology say about the stars, considering that they are essentially suns that are far away? Or the fact that many of my people’s settlements are built on moons, because they are easier to leave from if needed? Or the fact that elk, pine, and moons don’t exist on many other planets? Your theology is solid, though. The sun will indeed expand and burn away most planets that are supported by it, and the universe itself will eventually be heated up evenly, and without a source of cold, nothing would be able to happen. The sacrifices, though- wait a second. Do I need to convert; or does SIMON?” SIMON shows a graphic of expanding steam pushing a piston, next to expanding glowing stuff (a fusion torch) pushing a rocket forward, likely correcting the misconception.

Certainly! Apprentice what’s-it-called. Uh. Demolitionist? There’s several examples of things that go boom so far. Levity explosives are fun… Neither of those things are known or even expected to be possible. Immortality is still a big quest, though. (Or Roy might believe everyone else is wrong about it.)

Pretty much any profession you can think of. You’ll see.

Apprentice for what? Other than that, looks good.

“Ever seen a steam engine or aeropile? They move like that, but bigger. There’s also some stuff that makes them go faster than they should, involving something that’s sorta gravity, but that’s not important.” As your conversation with Kaleb continues, SIMON speaks in your ear. “You know I can still hear you, right? There is the placebo effect. If people are given a medicine they think will work, even if it’s just sugar and coloring, they sometimes get better. So you’re kinda right, though it doesn’t work on things out of your control, you might be able to resist a ‘possession’ by not believing in it.” Nick shrugs, but his eyes are wide. “Those crystals are literal miracles. If they are powered by your religion, and can sense that someone believes, that’s proof for it. Can you tell me the basics of your beliefs so you can convert me?”

Hello! Welcome to the shard! I’m glad to have more people here. (Presumably, if you’ve been lurking, you know about the cookies, so I won’t contribute to that debate.) I’d very much recommend the non-Cosmere stuff, although the forums for then aren’t really active. What do you think you’ll do here? I’d be happy to give suggestions. Do you have any non-Sanderson hobbies?

Nick takes the crystal Kaleb presumably handed him. “Thank you. You have no idea how amazing it is.” He turns it over in his hand. “How do I turn this on?” @The Stormfather, Nick is gonna make a spaceship. Is that a thing he’s allowed to do?

"I think I could do that in a day or two, if I was in the IISC. But there's nobody here who could give me the money, and IISC currency is probably worthless to you anyway. What about if I build us a space ship using the crystal's energy and give it to you once we're out of here. A fusion reactor, which is what we use to power them, can produce pretty much any material you want from water. Ever heard of titanium? It's the strongest metal by weight we know of. And vanadium? That's another metal, which makes incredibly strong alloys. Gold takes some energy, but the crystals can collect infinite energy." Nick gestures to himself. "The only jobs people still have are creative. Anything menial can be done by machines. I can give you these machines when we find a way to get back. Even a copy of the teleporter we'll have to have reverse engineered. Combined with the crystals, your civilization will be a utopia that can literally last past what should have been the end of the universe." "We use flying ships. They move very fast, but it's highly unlikely that one could have scooped us up and moved us. They're rather large, and don't do well anywhere there's gravity."

"Ok, so. If you took a pot of water, you could pull the energy out. It would warm up again, then you could add the energy back, then take the total energy away again. If you did that a couple times, you've boiled water without burning anything. That's not possible for me- with that crystal you could power anything I possess forever."

"Wait, what? Can you do that to inanimate objects? Because if you can take the energy out, then put it back, you get literal infinite power to do anything. Those things reverse entropy!"

“I don’t actually need to eat. I can feed off of light from Nick’s suit, or the energy produced by a fusion reactor, which is essentially a small star that our ships are powered by.” SIMON displays a cutaway graphic of one of the reactors. “I do have a favorite color, though. It’s the greenish blue I’ve been using for graphics. We went to a world where the plants were that color, and I liked it so much I set it as the color palette.” The entire lens is covered in a picture of that planet. Ferns, grasses, and bushes in a shade of turquoise around the same brightness as earth leaves cover the ground. Vines and roots tether floating, disc shaped plants in place, while others hang in the sky. A scaly, squirrel-like creature with small wings jumps from one to another, the floating plant bobbing under its weight. Above you, one darting shape with huge wings chases another, winding through the sky. A flash of flame comes from the prey’s mouth, and a floating island plant explodes, showering the hunting dragon with plant, and distracting it enough for the smaller prey to escape. (These are western dragons, not eastern.) Then, off to the side, you see a shape step out from behind one of the almost-tree tethered plants. It’s a similar color to the plants, mottled with the brown color of the dirt, and has large, folded wings on its back. Unlike the other dragons you’ve seen, however, it walks on two legs rather than four, and in its forelimbs, or perhaps more accurately, arms, it holds a spear. Then the video cuts off. “Cool, right!” SIMON says. “That’s all the footage I have that isn’t half scrambled. Did you like it?” Nick puts a hand on his forehead. “I’ll grow myself some dead clothes so you don’t break my suit again. How exactly does your exorcism work?” He turns around, “Hey SIMON! Can you get me some dead clothes so Kaleb doesn’t break the suit?”

Can you make a character? It’s in the post, but I can see how you could have missed that request.

“The space shortcut and the disassembly-reassembly are physically possible, but we have no idea how they would be accomplished. The physical swap is, as far as we know, not possible. But something must have happened, unless the jungle morphed into the desert while you weren’t paying attention. That’s a thing we could do, but not quickly.” Nick is still rolling up the solar mat. “In order to find out how it works, I’d need a description of what happens. I’ve been either absent or unconscious for the teleportations. Also, the person with the tail who seemed like me may have some interesting implications.”

“Moving from one place to another without passing through places in between is generally called teleportation. Apparently you’ve been moving from place to place, and there was someone who was apparently similar to me disappeared. Can you tell me more about either what happens when you teleport, or about the person?” The right side of the glasses feels wood-like, while the left is smooth and hard. The right lens is also missing. SIMON speaks from the left glasses hinge. “Hello Aki. May I call you that? I’m Nick’s AI assistant, and my job is to help him by explaining, analyzing, managing, and implementing things he needs explained, analyzed, managed, or implemented. Normally, I’m connected to a network of similar thinking machines and information libraries, and I’ve lost much of my memory, so I’ve had to recreate things, such as my emotion recognition, from scratch.” As SIMON talks, related diagrams appear on the glasses lens. “Nick has upgraded me several times, giving me personality and enhanced capabilities. For instance, he personally designed a program that shows where to step and move depending on your goal. With practice following it, he can run across uneven surfaces, do acrobatics, and parry sword blows, despite not knowing how to do any of those things.” SIMON displays both lines in the air that show how to perform the actions, and a stick figure accomplishing them. “I’m guessing you have questions for me. I’m happy to answer them, although my lost memory may make this difficult.”

Eastern time, if I recall correctly.

“Here, you can talk to SIMON if you want. He’s the one who asked you for help when I was in a coma.” Nick points at the corner of his glasses. “Here’s where his brain is.” Then he hands over the glasses.

“AI stands for artificial intelligence. They’re machines built to think like humans. SIMON is one. He is run by my glasses, and his job is to give me advice and organize things. But occasionally AI will ‘level up’ becoming smarter and more human. The first AI to do this asked for a planet in exchange for leaving everyone alone, and every new ‘true AI’ that develops goes there as well. Nobody knows what they actually do there. They might have highly advanced technology, because they think so much faster than humans.”

According to Wikipedia, four (or five) elements theory seems to have developed independently in Asia, Europe, and Asia. (Or maybe I misinterpreted something) Alternatively, we could pick a real-life city that was famous for science during the Second Industrial Revolution.

“I literally just told you that we didn’t. The IISC, Interstellar Intelligent Species Council, is the government that’s supposed to have jurisdiction everywhere humans or the other twelve species live. I don’t know of any technology we have that’s even close. We travel between the stars, but it takes months. The only place I’d think could hide that sort of advantage is the True AI System. That being said, we’ve developed guesses for what a teleporter could look like, mostly for fun. They either tell you the exact makeup of what is being teleported, then assemble it at the destination, which we can’t do, or they create a tunnel through space that connects two different places, which we can’t do. Or they somehow swap things directly. We don’t even know how that would be possible.” “Somehow, nobody told me we were teleporting around. What happens before and after the teleportation?” Nick is still rolling up his solar mat, trying to make it be absorbed faster.

“I’m training to become a xenoengineer, which means I know how to figure out how things work. The IISC” - he pronounces it like Isaac - “doesn’t have the technology to teleport like this. That being said, there’s two ways it could work. Moving us physically, or disintegrating and then reassembling us.”

“I likely told you this already, but I am Nick Bryer.” He imitates the bow exactly. Aki can see blue lights flash on his glasses as he does so.

Nick raises one eyebrow. “Maybe what’s-his-name knows.” @Ancient Elantrian