The young Titan hesitated but eventually accepted Adam's gift. "Let's exchange the Flame Vibration. If I advance successfully some day, I will return these to you many times over!"
A day later, Windflame 222 found Adam and handed him something similar to a communication plugin. Its function was to constantly record Honors in battle. By attaching it to the Vital Generator, the Honors earned from defeating Metal Eaters could be directly recorded.
At this moment, the number displayed on the Honor module was 227. Adam was puzzled, knowing his railgun shot couldn't have killed so many Metal Eaters. "How can there be so many?"
"There are also spoils of war. The spoils we don't need can be turned in, and those can also be converted into Honors."
Adam knew even with the spoils being converted, the number seemed too high. After all, they were the main force in the battle, and he had only played a minor role during their brief rest. It must have been the Titans in the patrol squad who had secretly allocated a portion of their rightful share to Adam.
Windflame 222 smiled and said, "You are an Intelligent. Intelligents are very powerful. Bluewater 457 and the others think that you will be even more powerful once you become a Commander or a Warlord, so... yeah, we'd better be nice to you."
Adam didn't expect these Titans to have such thoughts and accepted the Honors with a chuckle. "If I really am an Intelligent, I won't forget you guys."
Windflame 222, looking pleased, tried to pat Adam but Adam quickly dodged. Unembarrassed, Windflame 222 touched his head and continued, "I and Bluewater 457 have introduced you to other Commanders. They might come to find you before they go on missions in the next few days. If you have time, you can go with them. Don't worry, they will definitely protect you."
He hurriedly added, fearing Adam might be reluctant since Titans usually don't send newborns to the battlefield, "Honors are very useful. The more you have, the sooner you can advance to a Knight. It's very hard for other newborns to get Honors."
Adam nodded in understanding. Being a Novice, he had few things he could do on his own.
No matter what he wanted to do, reaching the knight level as soon as possible was the current main goal. He thought of the newborn made of alloy and impurities and asked, "How do other newborns accumulate resources for advancement?"
"They work for other Titans. Ironburg is at the front line, and there are very few newborns born here. There are also not many Titans willing to take in new ones. Oh, I know who you are talking about---the little iron guy? He will be sent to the inland soon."
"And me?"
Windflame 222 looked at Adam curiously and said, "You are an Intelligent. How can an Intelligent be the same as a normal newborn? Look, the Honors you've accumulated on this mission are more than what a normal newborn could earn in a whole year."
After a silent goodbye to Windflame 222, Adam walked towards the interior of Ironburg. Over two hundred Honors were indeed very useful; they could help Adam understand the Titans' advancement methods.
The Original Flames, the Vital Generator, and the body were the main components of a Titan. Each advancement required all three to undergo changes together.
There wasn't much to say about the Vital Generator and the body because their strength entirely depended on the energy of the Original Flames and the strength of the alloys that made up the body.
To strengthen the Original Flames, one needed to intensify its burning and 'program' within the spark.
The more intense the burning, the more energy could be released in a given time. This was entirely a matter of resource accumulation.
These concepts were easy to understand, but 'programming' was a more abstract concept.
Titans called the commands that drive their bodies "Spark Code."
The Original Flames were akin to a Titan's soul, heart, brain, neurons, sensors, and other main structures combined. Or more figuratively, it was the processor of this large robot, issuing commands to control the body.
The Original Flames needed to understand the properties of the metals making up the body and the functions of energy circuits to fully unleash a Titan's strength.
For instance, if Adam has enough Honors, he could directly exchange them for Windflame alloy, a metal that combines wind and fire energies, to make up his body. But doing so would result in complete paralysis since Adam's Original Flames didn't understand Windflame alloy and thus couldn't control the body to exert power.
The same went for energy circuits. If the Flames don't understand the principles, even if circuits are built in the Vital Generator, not a bit of energy can be activated.
In a way, this was similar to mages, except that mages needed to understand more complex knowledge and had more powerful means of using energy. But there were also differences. In the world of mages, there are 'magic black boxes' that some mages can use without understanding the principles.
...
The Spark Code was worth fifty Honors. After the exchange, Adam was even more convinced that Titans had the potential to become a civilization.
The Spark Code simulates the fluctuations of the spark and summarizes the unstable fluctuations into special information.
This was complex to explain, but Adam could think of it as a variant of runes. By creating a conversion algorithm, Adam could freely activate abilities under the rune system with Spark Code.
After learning this code system, Adam realized that his previous method of directly inscribing magic arrays into his body was too crude. He was entirely relying on knowledge from another plane to forcefully output energy, first activating the Flames, then the Vital Generator, and only then could the energy be transferred to the circuit.
For a true Titan, activating energy required only one step: starting the Vital Generator. Once the Vital Generator was up and running, energy naturally flowed and activated within the body.
Learning this code was easy for Adam. After mastering it in a day, he began to modify it himself.
The modification took five days. Adam exchanged all his remaining Honors for high-purity mithril and standard energy blocks. Then he threw them all into his Flames. This caused Adam's height to surge to twelve meters.
He completely destroyed the numerous and mixed attribute circuits in his body and Vital Generator, leaving only the electromagnetic parts. He knew that it was best to specialize in the early stages of advancement, as being too complex would only slow down the advancement speed.
After incorporating this knowledge into the Original Flames using Spark Code, his body changed accordingly. Adam could clearly sense every mithril atom in his body and their magnetic fields.
By controlling these magnetic fields and the free electrons in the atoms, the repulsion between them was minimized to the greatest extent possible with Adam's current abilities, resulting in a more compact body.
He shrank from twelve meters to six meters.
Reducing in size did not mean becoming weaker. At this height, Adam's physical strength had more than doubled compared to before. Now, Adam could freely control the hardness of his body. He would no longer find himself being easily flattened by a casual slap from Windflame 222.
