Dimensional Descent

After the path Complexity, there was the path of Simplicity. Leonel felt that it was less accurate to say that there were striations between these concepts… at least not totally. While Complexity was seen as the lesser form in this case, there were times that layers of Simplicity could be used in conjunction, ultimately returning to Simplicity. It could be said that they were interchangeable at a certain level.

The silver disk dictionary was a good example of Simplicity in action. It was a simple, smooth disk. And its internal components didn’t look much different from a watch’s internal construction.

“To a mortal, a watch might seem excessively complicated, especially when more complex movements were taken into account. However, on the scale of the Dimensional Verse, even watches that could track time, date and orbits couldn’t compare to the most complicated Craft even a mere Bronze Crafter could accomplish, let alone at Leonel’s current level.”

Considering the things the dictionary could do, the mere fact that it was made up of such a simple and straightforward setup with barely a few dozen components, could be considered the very pinnacle of Simplicity. And that was what Leonel was chasing after now. The trouble was that it wasn’t so simple at all.

“In order to grasp Complexity, Leonel was working on the level of atoms themselves. But what was odd here was that, technically speaking, weren’t the components of the silver dictionary also made up of countless atoms as well?”

“So what made the former Complexity and the latter Simplicity? This was where the lines blurred considerably.”

“Complexity didn’t necessarily have to deal with molecules and their structures, it was just that this was the hardest application of it. If one could succeed on that stage, then on larger scales, it wasn’t a problem to do the same.”

“In regard to Simplicity, the difference lay in the fact Complexity required Leonel to make active changes on the smallest of scales if he wanted to have a device with so few components. However, with Simplicity, the changes on the smallest scales could be triggered even without Leonel’s active participation.”

“The simplest analogy was boiling water.”

“There were two ways Leonel could create gaseous water vapor. He could go in and personally separate the water molecules, adding energy to them and allowing them to dissipate into the air.”

“Or… he could light a fire that evaporated them instantly.”

“This was the difference between his current application of Complexity and what it would take for him to reach Simplicity.”

“Essentially, his father’s dictionary was working on a molecular level, but the enclosure of the silver disk allowed those molecular changes to flow naturally from an influence of the atmosphere without needing manual input.”

“Just the explanation of this difference was enough for Leonel to spend quite some time just making sure he grasped the different nuances of everything…”

“But now he had to actually do it, and that was a whole other can of worms.”

“If he used the silver disk as a case study, there was something about the combination of materials used, the enclosures, and even the sentence Leonel and it could speak that triggered its very specific responses. Essentially, it was like a trained language model, except it was in physical form and there was no obvious ‘program’.”

“‘Simplicity my ass…’”

Leonel shook his head. This didn’t even seem like Simplicity at all. It felt like Complexity pushed to such an extreme they needed another name for it.

“‘To an extreme, huh…’”

That was how a lot of things worked.

“The Cobra Demon that he fought had been on the verge of reaching the Impetus State back then, and because of that, its frosty Force was being bolstered by a completely opposing comprehension, that being a superheated sort of energy.”

“It seemed that this was the natural progression of things, to push so far in one direction that you could suddenly see the light for the completely opposite.”

“Scarlet Star Force was exactly the same way. Except it was at such an extreme of Fire Force that it had been mistaken for a Force of pure Destruction when from the very beginning, it had been a Force of pure Creation…”

“It was just that much like its fire, its Creation abilities were so strong that it spilled over into Destruction.”

“‘But these are all just symbolic… syllogisms rather than real, tangible changes. Creation is still the root of Scarlet Star Force, even if it’s at such an extreme that it destroys instead, much like the Cobra Demon never actually used Fire Force either, it just wanted to use my Fire Force to bolster its cold Forces…”

“‘Then does that mean that Simplicity is still, at its core, just a higher form of Complexity…?’”

Leonel sat in thought, not immediately trying to brute force his way to an explanation. He felt that his thought process wasn’t quite right.

“Those things were Forces, but this was a discipline of sorts…”

“‘A discipline? Is that even the right way to think about it…? Hm, maybe it is. Dad’s lessons haven’t taught me exactly how to Craft since the very first lessons. Those techniques on exactly how to process materials, how to fuse ores, how to communicate with your Metal Spirit… I haven’t used them so strictly since I was 18, I deviated from them a long time ago. I can’t remember the last time I actually named one of the Crafting techniques I used.”

“‘Crafting feels more like a philosophy you follow… and now, even the strictness of which Force Art Language to use has been loosened to the point I have to create a new language every time I Craft…’”

The thoughts churned in Leonel’s head and he felt that he was close to something.

“Then it suddenly clicked.”

“‘This Simplicity… it’s the pinnacle of the Life Grade, that’s what it means. Evolution, the world… life itself is so endlessly complicated, but does it ever look complicated? It’s Complexity couched in Simplicity…’”