Wandering Tech-Priest in Multiverse chapter 24 : looking for materials and passing out from exha

The crimson church stood silent beneath the afternoon sun, its jagged crimson-tal towers gleaming faintly. From the outside, the building rely looked strange—eccentric, almost—but inside, sothing far more dangerous was taking shape.

On the uppermost floor, Luthar stood at its heart, surrounded by a skeletal fra of reinforced alloy scaffolding. The walls glinted with polished, circuit-etched panels, and the ceiling above had been retrofitted with a segnted, retractable plate.

Steel clinked softly as a servo-skull hovered low, clamping another stabilizer into place with surgical precision. Luthar watched the readouts flicker on his floating dataslate:

Mounting, Secured

Shock Lattice: Stable

It was not yet a reactor. Not truly. But the bones were there.

The compact reactor core he'd acquired the schematic for would eventually rest here—suspended in a cradle of magnetic fields. When complete, it would power the church, the chanica shop, the lab below, and perhaps even more one day.

"Vertical launch ejection enabled," he muttered, brushing gloved fingers across the embedded control runeplate. A cylindrical column embedded in the floor responded with a low chanical chi.

In the event of a ltdown, the system would jettison the core straight through the retractable ceiling and into the sky—violent salvation.

Luthar turned his gaze downward, inspecting the wiring conduits stretching through the floor—snaking their way into the heart of the church. Each was labeled and logged with ticulous precision: power distribution, shielding, and diagnostic relays. A web of purpose. Slowly, the church itself was becoming a circuit.

After a final glance at the vacant containnt ring, Luthar turned and descended.

The central hall shimred with filtered sunlight cast through gold-edged panes. Dust drifted lazily in the beams, catching like mories in the still air. Below, the hamring of construction gave way to quiet—cool and serene.

Hestia stood near the threshold, straightening the hem of her tunic with ritual care. She wore her usual white-and-blue garb, but her hair had been tied more neatly than usual, the iconic ribbon clasped with a silver pin.

She was preparing to leave.

Her eyes t his. "The Denatus is today," she said without preamble. "Formalities. The Guild requires every god to attend."

Luthar gave a curt nod, arms folded. "Divine politics wrapped in ritual. What could be more sacred?"

She smirked faintly, though it didn't reach her eyes. "Better than a divine tantrum. I'll be gone a few days. Depends on how loud the egos get."

She adjusted her ribbon's clasp again, then hesitated. Sothing lingered behind her silence—an unsaid worry or thought—but she let it pass. With a final glance back, she stepped toward the entrance, her sandals echoing softly across the polished crimson floor.

Luthar watched until the doors closed behind her.

Later, back in the reactor chamber, he stood before the half-assembled fra, now reinforced with a higher grade of tal he'd salvaged from his private reserve. The tempered alloy glead beneath the artificial light.

But the calculations had made one thing clear—he'd already used most of the high-end materials in his possession. What remained were common ions and base tals easily acquired from the market—if one had the coin.

True alloys—mithril, adamantite, or divine-forged composites—were another matter entirely.

Even if he had the funds, acquiring more than a few kilograms of such materials was nearly impossible. There was no such thing as buying a ton of adamantite.

Looking at the formulas for Plasteel and Adamantium, only one thought echoed through his mind: replication. Plasteel—still feasible. The composition could be altered slightly, impurities tolerated, and the structure reinforced by more advanced thods. It wouldn't be perfect, but it could match the quality. But Adamantium... Adamantium was another matter entirely.

It wasn't just a dal. It was a relic of dead stars and forgotten forges, alloyed in conditions that bordered on the mythical. Even the chanicus treated its production as sacred—ritualized, barely understood.

Was there truly no way to synthesize Adamantium? He can use variants of plasteel, but without adamantium, everything he built would fall short.

Just thinking about how many materials and technologies he had to research was giving him a headache.

He lifted his hand, fingers twitching slightly as he reached to call up the schematics.

Then everything went black.

No alarms. No dramatic collapse. Just silence.

As the world returned slowly. Fuzzy lights The weight of exhaustion pressing down like gravity.

Luthar blinked.

The ceiling was familiar. It was his lab ceiling, softly illuminated by maintenance strips and diagnostic runes. He tried to move and felt sothing tug at his arm—cables, disconnected IV lines, and a sensor harness peeled aside and left hanging.

He wasn't alone.

He turned his head slightly. Liliruca stood nearby, arms crossed, her small form backlit by the soft blue glow of a terminal screen. Her cloak was off, and her hands were still gloved, dusty from bags of supplies piled by the door.

Luthar exhaled slowly and asked. "How long?"

"A day."

Her voice was clipped. Tired.

She moved closer, boots making the faintest scuff against the tal floor. A folded blanket was tucked beneath one arm, but her hands paused as she looked at him properly—really looked.

There was a tremble in her brows, a tightness at the corners of her eyes. Frustration, yes—but sothing raw behind it.

"I got everything you asked for," she said, placing the supplies on the edge of the bench with practiced care. "Everything on the list."

Her tone dipped. Cracked slightly at the end.

Then she turned, finally eting his gaze. Her mouth pressed into a thin line, jaw clenched tight. "Next ti you feel like dying," she muttered, "maybe you can tell in advance."

For a heartbeat, she said nothing more.

Then her brows drew together, and she glared at him—really glared. "Don't you always claim you're the smart one, the calculating one?" What was the plan, huh? Just drop dead next to your fancy ejection system?"

She bit her tongue, eyes glassy now. Angry. Relieved. Furious with herself for feeling either.

"Idiot," she whispered, barely audible. "You absolute idiot."

Luthar's breath rasped as he gave a silent ntal pulse through the neural link. The nearby servo-skull beeped in acknowledgnt, drifting off with a low whir of its grav-thrusters.

Monts later, it returned with a small injector. The capsule clicked into the armature, and without ceremony, it pressed against his neck.

A hiss. A sharp sting. Then fire.

The stimulant surged through his veins like molten wire. Painful clarity followed. His muscles twitched—then he moved.

He sat up slowly, joints aching, breath catching in his throat. Muscles scread in protest, but they obeyed under the effect of electroos and his will.

Only then did he glance toward Liliruca. She was still watching him, arms crossed tightly across her chest, the mix of fury and worry still carved.

Liliruca didn't speak right away. She just stared, arms still crossed, eyes scanning his face like she was waiting for him to crack in half again.

Finally, her voice ca—low but steady.

"What happened?"

Luthar inhaled, chanically and slow. "Overexertion. Neural overclock, tabolic suppression—I pushed past the safe threshold."

She blinked, processing. "That's... not an answer. You passed out cold."

"I use a drug to keep myself awake for 7 days," he said, glancing at the disconnected sensors hanging from his arm. "After 7 days I was too busy, so I suppressed the alerts and continued to work, which started neural degradation and irregular synapse cycling."

Her eyes widened. "Can't you just simply sleep?"

"I do not have ti for that."

Liliruca looked sowhere between horrified and furious. "So you kept working. For a week and a half. While your body—what, decayed?"

"My external system kept mobile. So augntations can bypass a lot of normal physical fatigue, but the brain... the brain is different It reached its limit."

She rubbed at her temple, paced a few steps, and then turned sharply. "Luthar... why? Why push that hard? You could've died alone on that floor. Is this really worth it?"

He glanced toward schematics still floating faintly in his vision, then back to her. "Yes."

That single word landed heavy.

She stared at him, silent.

She sighed, long and exhausted, and began unpacking the supplies with slightly more care this ti. "You're getting real sleep."

Luthar leaned back, eyes half-lidded. "Don't worry, I am not that stupid."

She gave him a sharp look.

He lifted a hand in mild surrender.

"Fine, just rember to check out the shop. As for the dungeon, I don't think you need to go for a while; we already have data for the first 15 floors."

She sighed again, quieter this ti. Her posture shifted—shoulders slumping, the tension leaking out of her fra like steam from a cracked pipe.

"Fine," she muttered. "I'll go check on the shop."

She paused at the door, looking back just once.

"And You I don't want to see you working when I co back."

Luthar raised an eyebrow but said nothing. The servo-skull gave a soft chirp, perhaps in solidarity.

Liliruca didn't smile. But she nodded—just once—and slipped out, the door hissing shut behind her.

Silence returned. Just the hum of reactors and the faint glow of dormant schematics lingering like ghosts above his vision.