The Thermostat
In which our protagonist builds a magical climate regulator, an apprenticeship ends with a smile, and a small bright spark realizes that something worse than a storm is on the way.
The magical thermostat took three weeks to build, and the three weeks were the kind of three weeks that the system had been quietly logging as the most precise three weeks in the history of magical engineering, and the precision was, in the driest possible language, the kind of precision that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time.
It was, in the language of Kenji's old job, the most complex system he had ever designed. A network of mana-collecting crystals, embedded in the ice, connected by channels of pure mana, all feeding into a central regulator that Kenji had designed, and that Lian had refined, and that the fifty mages were now building, and the building was, in a small way, the kind of building that the system was, in a small way, going to be deploying the magical thermostat on, and the deployment was, in a small way, going to be the most important deployment of the season.
The principle was simple. The world's mana entered the atmosphere through the ice caps. The mana was the carrier wave for the climate. The storms, the floods, the droughts, were all side effects of the mana being disturbed. If you could regulate the mana at the source, you could regulate the climate at the destination, and the destination was, in a small way, every farm, every city, every coast, every place where a person was, in a small way, hoping that the weather was going to be the kind of weather that the system was, in a small way, going to be regulating.
[Project: magical_thermostat]
[Status: under construction]
[Crystals: 240 of 240 placed]
[Channels: 64 of 64 carved]
[Central regulator: tuning]
[Compiler note: this is the same principle as the dams, applied to the air. The system approves. The system is, in a small way, the senior engineer who has been asked to onboard the climate. The system is, in a small way, paying attention.]
The implementation was hard. The crystals had to be placed at specific points, with specific orientations, with specific calibrations, and the calibrations were, in a small way, the kind of calibrations that the system was, in a small way, going to be logging as the difference between a thermostat that worked and a thermostat that did not. The channels had to be carved into the ice with a precision that only structured magic could provide, and the precision was, in a small way, the kind of precision that the system was, in a small way, going to be using as a benchmark for the next thing it built. The central regulator had to be tuned, by hand, by Kenji and Lian, over and over, until the mana flow was smooth and the climate was stable, and the stability was, in a small way, the kind of stability that the system was, in a small way, going to be deploying for the rest of the season.
Lian was running the spell calibration. She was, Kenji saw, no longer the apprentice who had come to him in Oakhaven with a contract. She was a colleague, a peer, a co-architect. She designed spells. She refined them. She tested them. She improved them. She did it faster than Kenji, and more precisely, and with a kind of quiet confidence that made him proud, and the pride was, in the driest possible language, the kind of pride that the system was, in a small way, going to be logging as a sign that the developer was, in fact, a developer who knew how to teach.
"You have grown," he said, on the second week, when they were both exhausted and the regulator was almost done, and the almost-done was, in a small way, the kind of almost-done that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time.
"I had a good teacher."
"You had a good system. I just gave you the documentation."
"The documentation is important. The teacher is also important. I would not be here without you."
"You would be here. You would just be here with a different teacher. You are too smart to be stopped by a bad teacher, and the system is, in a small way, going to be logging that as a sign that the developer was, in a small way, ready to let the apprentice outgrow him, and the outgrowing was, in a small way, the kind of outgrowing that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time."
She smiled. It was the first time she had smiled at him like that, the smile of a colleague who respects another colleague, and the smile was, in the driest possible language, the kind of smile that the system was, in a small way, going to be logging as the moment when the apprenticeship officially ended, and the ending was, in a small way, the kind of ending that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for the rest of the series.
The regulator was finished on the seventeenth day. The crystals were placed. The channels were carved. The central regulator was tuned. The mana flow was smooth. The climate was stable. The stability was, in a small way, the kind of stability that the system was, in a small way, going to be deploying for the rest of the season.
Kenji stood at the regulator's heart, with Lian beside him and Pip orbiting his head, and he cast the final spell, and the casting was, in a small way, the kind of casting that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time.
"Function create(name='climate_thermostat', inputs={target=world_atmosphere, parameters={temperature, humidity, wind_pattern}, outputs={stable_climate, no_storms, no_floods, no_droughts}, cost=very_low, stability=very_high, persistence=true)."
[Deploy: climate_thermostat]
[Status: active]
[Persistence: true]
[Compiler note: the climate is now regulated. The system approves. The system is, in a small way, ahead of the developer. The system is, in a small way, the kind of system that is, in a small way, going to be remembered for this deployment for a long time.]
The ice caps hummed. The crystals pulsed. The mana flowed. The climate stabilized. The stabilizing was, in a small way, the kind of stabilizing that the system was, in a small way, going to be deploying for the rest of the season, and the deploying was, in a small way, the kind of deploying that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering as the moment when the world's weather became, for the first time, the kind of weather that the system was, in a small way, going to be able to debug.
Within hours, the reports started coming in over the crystal network. The storms were dissipating. The floods were slowing. The droughts were ending. The earthquakes were still happening (they were below the climate, in the earth's crust), but the climate was calm. The weather was stable. The world was, for the first time in a year, predictable, and the predictability was, in a small way, the kind of predictability that the system was, in a small way, going to be logging as a sign that the deployment was, in fact, working.
The Council of Kings sent a message that was the diplomatic equivalent of a standing ovation. The kingdoms celebrated. The refugees in the capital were told that the worst was over. The farmers were told that the rains would come. The sailors were told that the seas would be calm, and the calm was, in a small way, the kind of calm that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time.
Kenji sat down on the ice, with Pip on his shoulder, and he looked out at the white horizon, and he thought, in the driest possible language: "It worked. The debugging worked. We debugged the world's climate with a magical thermostat, and it worked, and the working was, in a small way, the kind of working that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time."
Pip pulsed. The pulse felt like: "It worked."
Then the pulse changed. It was no longer soft. It was sharp, urgent, the kind of pulse the dragonfly had given in the S2E10 summoning, the kind of pulse that meant something was about to go very wrong, and the wrong was, in a small way, the kind of wrong that the system was, in a small way, going to be logging as the most important signal the system had ever seen.
"Pip?" Kenji said.
[Threat assessment: pending]
[Source: south, beyond the corruption line]
[Pattern: pulse, irregular]
[Compiler note: the system is, in a small way, afraid. The system does not know what is coming. The system is, in a small way, hoping the developer is ready for what the system is not ready for.]
Pip did not respond. The dragonfly was looking south, toward the corruption zone, toward the line they had crossed, toward the world they had come from, and the looking was, in the driest possible language, the looking of a system that had just realized that the next bug was not a storm, and the next bug was not a flood, and the next bug was not a drought, and the next bug was, in a small way, going to be the bug that the system was, in a small way, going to be afraid of, and the afraid was, in a small way, the kind of afraid that the system was, in a small way, going to be remembering for a long time.