Youre right, Aron said with a smile. Both in that it isnt complete, and that theres still two parts missing.

[Whatre the other two parts? I cant find anything that looks like it would fit this segment in my knowledgebase,] Nova asked. For the first time in a long time, she was unable to comprehend Arons thought processes. She had a few theories, but she wasnt confident in any of them; they were all equally likely, or equally unlikely as the case may be.

Aron went still for a moment, then, with a grunt, rose from his chair. He paced around the room with his hands behind his back, as if he was a wise old sage about to give advice or perhaps an anecdote about his earlier life. It was a fair comparison, too, as his mental age was far, far beyond his physical age due to spending so much time in the time-dilated environment that was the universal simulation.

After the initialization of Project Loki, I, and everyone else in my inner circle, came to the conclusion that everything weve been doing are preventive measures. And since none of us can be sure whether our incoming visitors will be friendly or hostile, we cant fully commit to a single course of action, either.

So this, he gestured to the screen, where the compiler was still running, is the solution. Its a seed that can either cause a civilization to flourish, or infect them with a plague that will destroy them, given time. Whether it sprouts or spreads will depend on whether or not the visitors are friendly. And it doesnt matter if theyre carbon based, mana based, or otherwise, this is the core of a weapon that can target any of them.

I call it Project Protagonist.

Aron was speaking in a calm tone, as if he was talking about the preponderance of cats on the internet, not civilization-ending weapons.

Project Protagonist isnt a weapon thatll wreak havoc on its own, like a bomb or something. Like I said, it can either help a civilization, or destroy one. I came up with the idea a few months ago, and only recently figured out how to bring it to fruition.

The code is just the easiest part of the project. I dont even know if I can successfully write the remaining two parts, either, and just figuring out if its viable or not will cost quite a few billion SP. Even then, thatll only make it slightly more in the realm of possibility rather than a sure thing.

And even if I do create it successfully, Ill only need to make a few of them. That, in and of itself, is actually a good thing. If there are billions of them, they wont be worth anything, and might even backfire on humanity. Especially since, with its capabilities, the weapon itself will possibly spiral out of control if I need to use more than a few dozen of them.

Thats all I can say for now. Its too early to know if itll succeed or not, so Ill withhold commenting further. But I look forward to your guesses as the project progresses, he finished with an arrogant smirk.

He walked back to his desk chair and sat down, then minimized the compiler that was still cascading a visual reference of his code on the screen. Then he pulled up the Lab City research database and entered something in the search field and hit enter.

The screen changed to look like the format of a scientific journal, which contained an internally published research paper about the latest generation of nanites that Lab City was working with. In the time theyd had to work on it after he downloaded the nanotechnology knowledge into them, the researchers had already reached the 2846th generation of nanites.

Aron frowned for a moment, then closed the window with a sigh and said, Looks like itll take a few centuries for the nanotechnology research to catch up to my needs.

Nova noted that down and created an action plan to increase the speed at which she built new quantum superclusters, increasing the time dilation that Lab City was under. Since its residents were completely digital and had no physical limitations, there was also no limit to the time dilation they could operate under without being detrimental to their continued existence. The only limiting factor was her server capacity.

She also set a reminder to herself to remind Aron after each century that passed in Lab City as well, or after every hundred new iterations of nanotechnology. At each of those milestones, he could take another look to see if the technology had reached the necessary level of advancement.

That was the level of convenience Aron had grown used to since Novas birth a few years before. She was the backbone that allowed him to focus on the big picture as she dealt with the million complicated, or even simply mind-numbingly boring, tasks that were required to reach his goals.

[So from what you said, the remaining two parts have to do with carbon- and mana-based life forms in some fashion, right?] Nova asked. She had already devoted a small block of her processing power to figure out what Aron had planned. So when she saw him lean back and relax in his chair, it was the perfect time, in her mind, to ask.

After all, he wasnt doing anything right then but spinning in his chair as he waited for the compiler to finish its task.

Yep. Ill need a few things from the system to accomplish that. Plus, I bet the things I need will also give us quite the insight into alien life forms, he said as he stopped spinning in his chair.

He opened his systems shop and granted Nova live access to his vision so she could read over his shoulder, so to speak. And there it was, listed in easily readable text floating in Arons vision, courtesy of his systems shop.