Reborn as a Mechanist with a God-Tier System-Chapter 257: Year 2086

It was 13 days, but to Leon, it felt like a lifetime in the Trial.

All those sleepless nights of plotting, planning, and strategizing against impossible odds and C Rank Ascended led to this moment.

He finally choose his D Rank Class Specialization.

Leon froze as a barrage of detailed new concepts and knowledge concerning his Class Promotion drilled into his head, enriching his knowledge of mechanical, computer, and cyber engineering.

And then...

CRKSH!

Leon’s consciousness disappeared as once again, he entered an entirely white void but this time, it was different.

The white changed, turning into multi-colored specks of light surrounding his body as Leon’s consciousness was suddenly jerked forward by an invisible overpowering force.

He could not resist and the speed of the pull instantly made him dazed.

In his daze, Leon faintly saw colors of different hues surrounding him, rushing past him rapidly almost like he was traveling through time.

Leon didn’t know how long this lasted but before he could even begin to count, it suddenly stopped.

Then... silence.

...

Blink!

When Leon regained his bearing, he found himself in a familiar fugue state. ’It’s another lucid dream!’ He realized.

’Where am I?’

’Is it going to be another boxing and shooting lesson?’

The transition from the world of multi-colors ended not with thunder but with silence, the heavy, expectant quiet of a room waiting to be taught.

Looking around, the first thing Leon noticed was that he was inside what seemed like a classroom, or a research room?

Or a hall.

He found himself seated in front of a dark crescent desk, his fingers resting on its smooth surface that was worn by decades of restless hands.

Light poured into this hall from multiple tall windows.

Leon looked around, confused. ’This is not like the last time, where is this?’

The air in this hall smelled of ionized dust and machine oil, almost like he was back in the workshop of his shelter when he was doing construction work.

’Workshop?’ Leon blinked.

Before he could blink again, he saw swirls of light in his vision as more people like him appeared in this hall. Seated in chairs just like him, they wore either of dark blue, green, or yellow overalls.

Leon looked at himself and realized that he was wearing a blue overall.

He could already tell who these people where, every single person in this hall was an engineer.

Despite the fact that he literally just saw them materialize like a painting, looking at them now, Leon felt like every single one of them was as real as any person that he’d ever met in Neo-Tokara.

Each of them had notebooks, styluses, and eyes that were sharpened by intelligence, knowledge, and obsession.

He recognized that look. ’Every single one of them is just like me!’

Leon smiled instinctively as for the first time in a long time, he felt at home. ’Have I been to this place before?’

The engineers were not alone though.

At the front of the hall stood an instructor, a middle-aged man who seemed like he was in his late 50s.

He wore a neatly tucked white t-shirt on black corporate trousers.

Leon didn’t know why but staring at this middle-aged man, he felt a sense of nostalgia and it made his heart race. ’Is this from my past?’

’Wait, the time... what date is it?’

His eyes widened and he quickly picked up the smartphone that was in front of his desk. Looking at the screen, Leon’s eyes narrowed into slits.

It read- [November 18th, 2086]

"...!" Leon felt numb.

"Let’s begin," the middle-aged engineering instructor who already rolled up his sleeves said in a calm and resonant voice as he turned to face the wall, interrupting Leon from his daze.

There was no holograms, no A.I assistant whispering optimized phrasing. This was just a human being, an engineer teaching a group of younger engineers.

He continued. "You are here because humanity has reached the end of what incremental engineering can give us".

He wrote on the white board.

[PROJECT DAWNSTAR]

[OBJECTIVE: INTERSTELLAR TRANSIT WITHOUT EXTERNAL SUPPORT]

Seeing the topic on the board, an excited murmur instantly rippled through the class.

"This," the instructor continued, tapping the title on the board with his marker, "is not a ship. Not yet, it is a question".

He drew a long horizontal line beneath the words.

Professor Agbodo Olomu Robinson, one of the brightest minds in human history turned to face his students as he paced the podium with both his hands folded behind his back.

"Every civilization that reaches orbit believes the next step is simply more".

"More fuel, more thrust, more shielding, bigger engines," he gesticulated for emphasis with his hands, then he shook his head. "That thinking traps you in gravity wells forever".

Enraptured already, Leon forgot all the crazy questions that previously lingered in his head as he leaned forward with focused attention.

Already, he could tell that so many things were wrong.

’Did the ChronoSystem transport me back into a memory from the past?’

’Did humanity actually attempt interstellar travel all the way back then?’

’Wait... is this what resulted in Earth dying?’

Leon shelved all the crazy thoughts in his head as with a serious look on his face, he listened with sharp attention.

Professor Robinson turned towards the wall and began sketching a simple equation on the board.

["Δv = Iₛₚ · g₀ · ln(m₀ / m₁)"]

"The tyranny of the rocket equation," he said with a smile. "You all know it, you all hate it, and most of you think it’s something to be bypassed with clever fuels or exotic matter".

He underlined the algorithm. "That’s cowardice".

A few of the engineering students smiled nervously.

Professor Robinson tapped his marker on the equation on the board. "You don’t escape this equation," he said. "You design around it".

He erased half the board and replaced it with a diagram of flows depicting energy, mass, heat, and information.

"The first interstellar vessel will not be defined by its engines," he said. "It will be defined by what it refuses to carry".

He pointed at the diagram.

"No reaction mass for cruise, no onboard fuel for deceleration, no closed system life support pretending entropy doesn’t exist".

"Instead," Professor Robinson continued, "we externalize everything".

He drew a distant star on the white board.

"Acceleration happens here". He drew a mark near Earth.

"Deceleration happens here". He drew a mark near the star. "Everything in between is survival, not propulsion".

One of the engineering students raised a hand. "Sir, without onboard thrust, course correction becomes impossible beyond micro-adjustments".

The instructor smiled. "Correct. So we do not correct the ship".

He tapped the white board twice. "Instead, we correct space".

"The government is naïve, people in power are naïve. Interstellar flight is unlike anything humanity have ever seen before".

"Interstellar flight is not about motion," he said. "It’s about alignment, magnetic fields, photon pressure and gravitational gradients".

"Light speed travel is beyond mere motion".

"To reliably control it, you learn to read the medium between stars the way sailors once read wind and tide".

He pulled up a projection. It was not a virtual simulation, but raw observational data that was noise-heavy, incomplete and imperfect.

Compared to the holograms that Leon already got used to in Year 714 A.G, this looked primitive and ancient.

"This," Professor Robinson said, "is why we train engineers, not optimizers. You will be navigating with uncertainty, with instruments that lie, and with materials that age and fail. All you have to rely on is calculations and math".

"But that’s why you’re engineers".

He tapped the side of his head. "Engineers should always think outside the box and solve problems on their feet".

His eyes scanned through the class, sharp and intelligent.

"So instead of perfect systems like the government have been working towards unfruitfully for years, we’ll build systems that assume failure, systems that can be actively worked on and repaired even in the most turbulent of spatial storms and disturbances".

"Systems that are scalable and adaptable, systems that leave room for improvement with scaling and filing knowledge gaps".

"To create an interstellar system this robust, we need redundancy without symmetry, we need passive stability over active correction. If it needs constant input, it will die".

"We need repairability over efficiency. We don’t know what’s out there, so we need something that can survive with us even in the worst spatial conditions".

"This is the only way to realize the dream of interstellar travel".

"With a system like this," he smiled. "One day, in my lifetime, we’ll be able to travel outside our home star".

Professor Robinson exhaled. "Automation is a tool, not a god, and it is our duty as engineers to tame and master it".

Listening to this lecture, Leon felt like dominoes were exploding in his head and then impulsively, he suddenly raised his hand.

The Professor looked at him with a smile. "Yes, Leon, you have a question?"

Leon blinked. ’He knows my name?’

He ignored his discomfort and asked. "Professor, what if out there, we meet things that are beyond our imagination, things that can make us go extinct?"

Professor Robinson smiled, unfazed. "Danger is an essential part of exploration, you can’t not take risk and expect progress".

"Don’t worry my boy, if we find an external danger out there that can kill us, we’ll die but we won’t all die".

"One way or another, humanity always finds a way to survive".

Leon stared at the Professor in a daze.

Another engineer raised his hand. "But Professor, the government have been debating on your interstellar research for years without approving it, so isn’t this useless till the government approves?"

Professor Robinson smiled at the young engineer. "Well, Benjamin, last night, the world government had a meeting and passed the verdict".

"They’ve given up on Elon’s work," his smile blossomed. "I shall be the lead head of humanity’s first ever project to create a reliable and working spaceship, Project Dawnstar".

Leon stayed in a daze. ’Did the Professor succeed?’

’Did humanity succeed in creating a spaceship?’

His thoughts were interrupted as the world cracked.

CRKSH!

Leon’s consciousness felt an uncontrollable suction force that pulled him, dragging him into unconsciousness.

And then, it came to an end.

Silence.

END OF VOLUME 4.

[And another volume ends. Phew, thanks for sticking with me for so long. The first Chapters of Volume 5 will be released tomorrow.]

[Professor Agbodo Olomu Robinson is a tribute to my Dad. It’s been 8 years since he left, but he’ll forever live on through me and through my books.]

[Special Appreciation to D4rkV1II14n, Ginggy, and r03n for the Golden Tickets, thanks for the support throughout the month! Shadesworn too.]