Chapter 928 — Spirit Song

"For humans, it isn't singing—it's a complex act of spellcasting. There is a special caste of spellcasters among humans... who command techniques akin to the Song of the Deep Sea," Kamael said gravely. "Of course, before we made contact with the sirens, this caste knew nothing of the Song's specific melody; they used a different melody. But testing has shown that they can indeed imitate the sirens' 'singing.'"

Gao Qi frowned, as though something had occurred to him, and said musingly: "This caste of spellcasters is..."

"It has since been disbanded, but I can find a way to rebuild it," a voice suddenly came from the chamber entrance, speaking before Kamael or Jenny could answer. "It is the 'psionic choir' of the Dream Church and the Long Slumber Order."

Gao Yang turned toward the sound and saw a beautiful lady in a form-fitting white gown, graceful in bearing, stepping inside. He recognized her at once—one of the former Evernight Deities, "Spirit Song" Wendy.

"The psionic choir?" He raised an eyebrow, then quickly recalled the relevant intelligence. "Ah, I know of this group..."

"Its predecessor was the Dream Church's choir of hymns, whose duty was to soothe and unify the spirits of the faithful through special 'psionic song' at important ceremonies. After the Long Slumber Order came into being, the psionic choir became one of the Order's important defensive forces, used to help core priests resist mental erosion from the gods, or to heal brethren whose minds had been wounded," Wendy said, a gentle, serene smile on her face. Her speaking voice was as lovely as song—well worthy of the name "Spirit Song." "When we withdrew from Typhon, the psionic choir was disbanded. Fewer than one-fifth of its members came to Cecil."

"You can imitate the sirens' Song of the Deep Sea?" Gao Yang regarded this former Nether Pontiff with some surprise. "Can your ears hear those special fluctuations hidden in the melody?"

"...We cannot hear them," Wendy said. "But we can perceive them by means other than the ears. In essence it is a spellcasting process, and psionic singers, specially trained, are no strangers to such a process."

Then this Miss "Spirit Song" paused, and with a hint of feeling sighed: "The 'singing techniques' we and the sirens use are indeed vastly different. Frankly speaking... humanity's gift in this regard falls far short of theirs. But if it is merely a matter of imitation, we can still accomplish it through diligent training and a certain degree of natural talent."

"It is worth our while to train a corps of psionic singers," Kamael said from the side. "When it comes to resisting divine erosion, one can never have too many cards up one's sleeve."

"Is it difficult to train a psionic singer?" Gao Yang mused briefly, then looked at "Spirit Song" Wendy. "And how long would it take to rebuild the entire psionic choir?"

"...Honestly, very difficult," Wendy thought for a moment, then answered frankly. "A psionic singer is not truly a 'singer'—it is not simply a matter of teaching someone with a good voice to sing. It is essentially a spellcasting profession, requiring keen magical perception, special techniques of mana control, and long, tedious study and training. And even when all of that is done, one must then learn from the sirens a whole body of knowledge utterly alien to human understanding... In fact, even I have yet to grasp what Miss Tier means when she repeatedly stresses 'perceiving the deep sea.' For an ordinary person, achieving that would surely be harder still.

"On that basis, even I can scarcely say how long it would take to rebuild a psionic choir... It could take many years."

Gao Qi frowned. "That means it would be extremely difficult to produce them in quantity, and success would be highly random and a matter of chance..."

But soon he noticed several key points Wendy had just mentioned. "You say that becoming a psionic singer requires keen magical perception and special mana control techniques?"

"Yes. Those two are also the greatest natural limits on becoming a psionic singer—beyond them, most limitations can be overcome through acquired training and study."

Gao Shao immediately looked at Kamael beside him. Before he could speak, the latter had already caught on.

"Your Majesty, we might try the neural thorns," Kamael nodded slightly, his voice a low hum. "The practical-model neural thorns are ready for mass production. Our next step is to use them to mass-produce basic mages. We can set aside a portion of the test quota for training psionic singers—if more trained psionic singers are added to our 'anti-divine defense system,' our future will no doubt be safer."

"Workable," Gao Shao nodded. "I'll grant you an expedited permit afterward."

As he spoke, a few bizarre fancies could not help but take shape in his mind—what would such a thing even look like, this hybrid of arcane technology, dream-divine arts, traditional sorcery, and siren craft? A soldier clad in a special combat suit, synthetic nerve cords flickering where they plugged into the back of his skull, humming unspeakable psionic melodies to his comrades on the battlefield, and in his idle hours going off to commune with "the power of the deep"...

And mass-produced, at that.

Gao Yang shook his head, shoving these premature associations out of his mind for the moment, his attention returning to the earlier topic. He looked at the holographic projection a short distance away, turning over those runes and the "song of the deep" in his thoughts, and said pensively, "We have made no small amount of progress, but the crucial question is... what is the deeper principle behind all this? Why is it that these things, which point toward the sirens, can put up such a high resistance to the corruption of the gods?"

Kamael considered for a moment, then broke the silence. "On that point... Jennie and I discussed it, and we have some conjectures."

Gao Yang raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"We suspect... it has to do with 'Eva,' the spirit of that race standing behind the sirens."

"To do with 'Eva'?" Gao Yang repeated curiously. "I remember Tyrell describing it to me..."

"Yes, she described it to us as well while assisting with the research," Kamael nodded. "And after analyzing the nature of that 'Eva' as she spoke of it, I suspect that this race-spirit may in essence be a... 'foreign god' whose mode of operation is utterly different from that of all the gods we know.

"Of course, that is only a figurative way of putting it, for by our definition of the gods, the 'Eva' the sirens speak of is not a god at all—it should be a far vaster, more conceptualized siren..."