Chapter 918 — The Day of Grid Connection

Documents that could be transmitted directly into this study were usually quite out of the ordinary, and it was rare for two reports to arrive in such quick succession.

By then Gao Yang had already scanned the main portion of the document; the brief lines were not long, but their content was a piece of tremendous news.

"The Northern primary hub is ready, a full day ahead of schedule!" he said with exceptional delight, even happier than when he had received the good news from Byron. "A report from Victoria—the hub has completed all acceptance procedures and the final stress test, and can now be connected to the trunk network at any time—awaiting only the word from the imperial capital."

Hedy's eyes went wide at once; she too had waited a long time for this news, and especially of late, as the expected acceptance date drew near, her anticipation had grown day by day. As one of those who had watched magical technology develop with her own eyes, she knew better than most what it meant for the Empire's magic net to be connected across all its lands—after less than a second of stunned silence, she wore an exceptionally happy expression: "Wonderful! We've finally waited for this day!"

"How are the preparations coming along?" Gao Yang asked swiftly.

"All departments finished their preparations the day before yesterday; most of the personnel are standing by at this moment, and we've been waiting all along for word from the north," Hedy said at once. "If we enter the grid-connection preparatory procedure from now, we can formally activate the first primary hub in about four hours—starting with the hub at Tenwoods City."

"Then go," Gao Yang said with a nod to Hedy. "The next few hours will be a great undertaking."

This was absolutely a great undertaking—of that he was utterly certain. Like the activation of the first magic-net prototype, like Ansu's civil war, like the founding of the Empire, what was about to happen in the next few hours would be enough to leave its mark upon an age; even now he could foresee that this event would indisputably be printed in the textbooks and exam papers of students in later days—the kind that had to be studied in history class, studied in politics class, and even studied in magical technology class.

Required memorization for the liberal arts, and a compulsory course for the sciences as well.

At that thought, Gao Yang could not help but twitch the corner of his mouth into a peculiar expression.

The Xuanmai Sect suddenly wore a strange smile, which rather puzzled the Empire's eldest princess—but Hedy soon tossed the little doubt from her mind. At such a joyous moment, the Xuanmai Sect must surely be stirred in his heart as well, and a somewhat complicated smile was only to be expected.

Having explained it to herself thus, she turned and left Gao Song's study. She came out into the corridor, looked at the rows of magic-crystal lamps lining both sides in neat order, and let out a soft breath; then she lowered her head, placed her hands over her chest, and offered a brief prayer she had not made in a long while: "Myrmidna, Goddess of Magic... would you be willing to bear witness to all of this..."

The prayer received no reply, yet she could sense a faint, indistinct attention and a response on some psychological level—within expectation, and entirely reasonable.

……

At the Imperial Academy, in a brand-new classroom, the upper-year students of the magical technology department sat in neat rows behind their desks, listening to the newly added course for this term: "Concepts of Neural Networks."

Irvine, dressed in the uniform of the magical technology department, was watching the lectern intently, while beside him a big boy with short brown hair and a few freckles on his face was bent over his desk, writing furiously.

"Storm," Irvine could not help but nudge his newly made classmate, reminding him in a low voice, "don't just focus on your notes—the teacher is explaining the key theoretical knowledge."

The big boy named Storm seemed to startle; the tip of his pen left a crooked smear of ink on the paper. He glanced up swiftly at Irvine, and a somewhat nervous and somewhat timid look came over his face: "I... all right, all right..."

Seeing the other's reaction, Irvine wanted to say something more, but the next second a voice like a thunderclap came suddenly from the direction of the lectern: "No talking in class! Mr. Irvine Franklin!"

That great voice swept through the classroom like a storm, and every student was jolted on the instant; Irvine Franklin broke out in a fine layer of sweat—even as a duke's son, he grew utterly tense when facing that great voice; in fact, throughout the entire Imperial Academy, there was no student who did not fear it.

He immediately straightened up, adopting the posture of one who had recognized his error, and stole a cautious glance at the figure on the lectern.

A short, middle-aged man stood there, his hair standing on end as though it had exploded; he floated in midair, and directly beneath his feet sat a set of magic-net projection crystals, emitting a very faint hum.

Having finished scolding the student, Magnum shook his head, turned to look at the diagram he had just sketched in the air, and prepared to carry on with the rest of the lesson: "Good. Now that everyone's awake, let's move on to the next part—how to ensure that multiple brainwave signals entering a single node at the same time don't interfere with one another. Listen carefully, all of you, because the pioneers who first compiled this knowledge spent ten years solving the problem, and you lucky wretches only need less than half a class to learn it! First..."

Magnum's voice had barely reached the midpoint when it stopped abruptly.

In the brief silence, the students could not help but stir a little; Eleven heard someone whispering behind him:

"Why has Mr. Magnum suddenly gone quiet?"

"Could Lady Selina have cut off his voice amplifier again..."

"Shh—Lady Selina might be watching us from somewhere in this classroom right now."

"Quiet!!" Suddenly Magnum's great voice erupted once more. He glared at the classroom, then waved a hand. "All right, it seems today's lesson will end early. There's a task on the neural network side, and I need to shift my attention to other work. The rest of this lesson's content will wait until next time."

Then he added in that same booming voice: "But don't think you can slack off—I've already prepared the test papers for the earlier part of the course! A teaching assistant will bring them here shortly. You'll spend the remaining half of this class and the next study period right here writing them!"

The words had scarcely left his mouth when Magnum's figure vanished from the lectern in an instant, leaving behind only a cluster of formulas and diagrams floating in midair, and in the classroom nothing but a group of students staring at one another.