Chapter 251: The First Stable Mindmark

Chapter 251: The First Stable Mindmark

Noah turned his attention to Eldrath again. Inside the central research institute, engineers had arranged Vrizzik’s diagrams across a wide display. The final recording from the destroyed laboratory played beside them. An older engineer stopped the footage when Vrizzik removed a component from the imprinting apparatus and held it close to the camera.

"There. That’s the part missing from his final drawing," the engineer said. "Can you enlarge it?"

His colleague brought up an earlier diagram. "The housing is the same, but he changed the transfer assembly. I’ll send both versions to the workshop. They can check what needs to be made."

The institutes had spent weeks sorting the archive Noah provided. Researchers examined Vrizzik’s notes while the engineers recreated the parts shown in his recordings. Several workshops supplied components, and the first reconstructed machine was assembled a few months later. Its initial tests produced incomplete patterns on prepared materials. The engineers adjusted the transfer assembly, tested it again, and continued until the machine could produce complete industrial rune patterns repeatedly.

One test left the pattern broken along its lower edge. The younger engineer held the sample beside the drawing and pointed out the missing section. A workshop specialist examined the assembly and found a fitting that had been manufactured using the dimensions of an earlier design. They replaced it, checked the alignment, and tested a fresh sample. The missing section appeared, although the next transfer still had an irregular line. The engineers spent another week checking individual components against the surviving recordings until they could obtain the same result across repeated trials.

The older engineer examined the fourth successful sample. "Run another test with the same settings. We need to make sure it wasn’t a one-time result."

A fifth sample emerged with the same pattern. The engineer checked the measurements before calling the research director. Their reconstructed apparatus now performed the function Vrizzik had intended. It had not reproduced the accidental imprint inside his mind.

At the palace, the director presented the results to Eldrath’s ruler. He brought the original footage, the reconstructed machine’s records, and a proposal for the next stage.

"You’ve rebuilt his equipment," the ruler said. "What remains?"

"We can transfer runes onto prepared materials. But we haven’t produced a mental imprint. To investigate that, we’ll need experiments involving living goblins."

The minister responsible for scientific research opened the proposal. "Vrizzik injured several subjects before his laboratory was destroyed. The institute is requesting a restricted facility and medical staff for every trial."

"Can the procedure be performed safely?" the ruler asked.

"We can’t guarantee that yet," the director admitted. "We can stop trials when the monitors show trouble, but there are risks we don’t understand."

Another official spoke. "News of the explosion has already caused concern. If people hear that the government is experimenting on goblins’ minds, the public may panic."

The ruler read through the medical provisions and the list of personnel. He authorized a confidential program under the central institute, with access limited to its researchers, medical teams, and designated government officials. He ordered the project kept out of public reports while its safety remained uncertain.

"The medical staff will decide when a procedure has to stop," he told the director. "I expect the institute to record every injury and death. Send those records directly to the oversight office."

The director accepted the authorization. Within months, a secured research wing housed two reconstructed imprinting machines and the equipment needed to examine their subjects. Initial participants were volunteers who had been informed that the procedure was experimental. The first trial ended without an imprint. The next two produced brief, irregular readings, but the subjects could not perceive a rune after the apparatus was disconnected.

In a later trial, a volunteer suddenly lost consciousness. The attending physician ordered the procedure stopped, but the goblin did not recover. The medical team recorded the death, and the institute suspended further trials while the engineers examined the machine.

"Was there a fault in the transfer assembly?" the research director asked at the review.

"We found no damage," the senior engineer replied. "The readings changed during the transfer. We’re comparing them with the earlier tests before we run it again."

"And the volunteer’s family?" the physician asked.

"The government office will notify them," the director answered. "The circumstances are still classified."

More experiments followed once the program resumed, but additional volunteers withdrew after hearing that a participant had died. The institute requested more subjects. Noah observed a meeting in which a security administrator informed the director that his office could supply them from outside the volunteer program.

"Will these goblins agree to take part?" the director asked.

"The government has authorized the project," the administrator replied. "We’ll handle the transfers. Your researchers should prepare the examination rooms."

Some of the new arrivals were brought under armed escort. A goblin who had been taken while traveling home demanded to know where he was, while another refused to enter the examination room until the guards pushed him inside. They had not volunteered. Their families were given no information about the restricted facility, and reports of their disappearance did not reach the public news services.

A physician objected when she saw the admission forms. The spaces reserved for the subjects’ agreement had been left blank.

"These people haven’t signed anything," she told the project director. "One of them says he was taken from his workplace."

The director called the security office. Its representative confirmed that the subjects had been assigned under the government’s confidential authorization. The physician demanded that the captives at least be examined before any transfer was attempted. The director agreed and postponed that day’s trial. The guards remained outside the examination rooms, and no subject was permitted to leave.

The research team continued its trials. Several transfers failed entirely; others left subjects with severe headaches or injuries. A second goblin died following an unstable procedure. His death, like the first, was recorded only in the classified medical files. The project director required another review of the equipment, but the government continued supplying subjects and funding the program.

The years passed on Eldrath. Engineers improved the transfer components while medical researchers compared the subjects’ responses. Tests on prepared materials became consistent, yet mental imprints remained elusive. On some occasions, subjects described fragments of a pattern before the impression disappeared. The scientists examined those recordings closely and adjusted the equipment between trials.

During one examination, several years after the project began, a goblin woman remained seated after the apparatus had been disconnected. She closed her eyes and gripped the arms of her chair.

"It’s still there," she said.

The researcher beside her leaned forward. "What can you see?"

"The rune. All of it. I can still see the lines even though you’ve removed the machine."

He opened a reference image but kept it turned away from her. "Describe the upper part. Start with the line on the left."

She described the pattern correctly. The researcher called his colleagues over, and they compared her account with the rune loaded into the apparatus. The first complete mental imprint had been reproduced.

The team moved her to an observation room. The rune remained perceptible for several hours, and the measuring instruments recorded an unusual mana response. That evening the readings began fluctuating. The woman complained of pain behind her eyes, and the medical staff treated her while the researchers watched the imprint deteriorate. By morning she could no longer perceive it.

"The transfer worked," the senior scientist said at the following meeting. "She described the complete pattern after the machine was removed."

"But the imprint lasted less than a day," the physician replied. "She was in considerable pain before it disappeared. We can’t call that stable."

"Then we’ll compare the readings from the first hour with the ones taken before it failed," the scientist said. "The next design will need to address that change."

Other trials eventually produced mental imprints as well. Some disappeared within minutes; others lasted for hours. A few subjects required prolonged treatment after the patterns became unstable. There were further fatalities, and the medical department kept a separate register of the deaths alongside its experiment records. The research remained confidential. Outside the facility, the goblin population still knew nothing about the program or the missing people being used in its trials.

During one review, a researcher asked whether the latest transfer settings could be used for the next group. The attending physician opened the medical reports from the previous week.

"Two subjects still have severe headaches, and one hasn’t been able to return to ordinary activity," she said. "Don’t bring them back for another procedure."

"We have other subjects scheduled," the researcher replied.

"Then examine them first. And tell the director that the second observation room is full. We can’t monitor additional patients properly until some of these people recover."

The director delayed the next trials and arranged additional medical staff. The researchers continued studying the data already collected.

Another several years passed. The institute added examination rooms and rebuilt the imprinting machines using results from the accumulated tests. Researchers who had joined as junior assistants became senior members of the program. The original recording of Vrizzik’s accident remained in the archive, although the team now worked primarily from its own measurements.

One afternoon, Noah observed a volunteer undergoing an examination several days after implantation. The machine had been disconnected after the procedure, and the goblin had returned each day for medical checks. He sat comfortably while a researcher reviewed his responses.

"Can you still see the rune?" she asked.

"Yes. It hasn’t changed since yesterday."

"Any pain or dizziness?"

"None. I slept normally, too."

She asked him to describe the pattern again. He did so without looking at the reference. The scientist checked the monitoring display, then called the research director into the room.

"The measurements are still consistent," she said. "He can describe the full rune, and we haven’t recorded the symptoms that appeared in the earlier trials."

The director examined the results. "Continue the observation period. We’ve had apparent successes before."

Days passed. The imprint remained intact. The subject was able to leave the examination facility and return for follow-up checks without any change in the pattern. The director authorized another controlled trial with the improved machine. It too produced an imprint that remained stable after the apparatus was removed. Several more subjects achieved the same result during the following months.

The institute asked a separate medical team to examine those subjects without showing them the original records. Each subject described the complete pattern, and the independent examinations agreed with the earlier measurements. An engineer from another laboratory then inspected the machine and supervised a repeat procedure using the approved settings. The new imprint remained present through the observation period. Only after those results were added did the director schedule a meeting to consider whether the method could be recorded as reproducible.

At the institute’s review meeting, the lead engineer displayed the confirmed trials.

"The latest machine has produced stable imprints in several subjects. The patterns remain unchanged, and the subjects can still perceive them after leaving the apparatus."

"What about the medical results?" the director asked.

"Those subjects have shown none of the complications we recorded during the unstable transfers," the physician replied. "We’ll continue the follow-up examinations."

The director examined the compiled reports before approving the finding. The institute had successfully developed a reproducible method of placing a stable mana rune within a goblin’s mind. What the implanted rune could do remained untested.

"We need a consistent name for it," a younger scientist said. "Half the files say ’mental imprint,’ and the others use the original industrial rune designation."

"Do you have one in mind?" the director asked.

"Mindmark Rune. We can use that for the stable pattern and keep the original design names for the machines."

The director looked around the table. Nobody objected.

"Mindmark Rune, then. Update the final report."

The classified report reached Eldrath’s ruler a few days later. He read the results, questioned the director about the subjects’ health, and congratulated the scientists on the successful implantation. He also reviewed the medical records, including the deaths accumulated during the years of trials.

"You’ve confirmed the imprint can remain stable," he said. "Can the subjects use it yet?"

"We haven’t established that, Your Majesty. They can perceive the pattern, but we haven’t demonstrated controlled activation. That’s the next subject the researchers are examining."

"Continue the program. Keep the records restricted, including the earlier failures."

No announcement was made. The institute’s public research remained separate from the confidential program, and the families of the goblins taken by the security administration still had no account of what had happened to them.

Noah turned his attention to one of the final examinations. A goblin sat in a quiet room, disconnected from the imprinting machine, and described the Mindmark Rune to an attending researcher. The instruments beside him recorded the stable pattern. Behind the observation window, several scientists checked the results and began discussing their next experiments. Noah watched them for a short time before withdrawing his attention from Eldrath.