Apocalypse Redux

Chapter 130: Introspection

Even though the mess in Scotland had occurred over a week ago, it was still living rent free in Isaac’s head. That incident had been resolved fairly well, the local constabulary had dragged that teenage idiot all the way to the University of Edinburgh, where he’d given a full report on the additional information his manual contained to its anemic [System] research department in exchange for a marginally reduced sentence, and there was no way in hell he’d be trying something like that again.

But that, the memory of the Eldritch that would have birthed calamity, wasn’t what was bothering Isaac, no, that would have been too fucking easy.

No, it was the principle behind what had led to the formation of the dungeon in the first place. It had been a dark god giving a small hint to a random kid who might or might not follow through, creating a Dungeon that might or might not actually turn into a nuisance for humanity.

The theory behind it was simple, sadly. Taking a direct action was expensive in terms of how it shifted the balance. Having someone else take that action who would almost certainly be successful would be almost as expensive, with the cost decreasing as the intermediary grew less and less competent and therefore progressively more unlikely to succeed. Hence, long shots grew increasingly cheap to the point where even time travel was on the table.

And yet, as cheap as the exotic activation requirements of Isaac’s journey had been, that little trick had to have been more expensive than giving a little hint to a single person. So there had to be more.

He’d seen the fallout from one of the hints that had paid off in the darkest of ways and he’d stopped that from happening again. But how many more such attempts had been made, that hadn’t panned off? How many more people had been set on a path that might turn them into what effectively amounted to a terrorist?

Sure, those people, if they existed, had failed in the other timeline. But he wasn’t in that other timeline, was he? Chaos Theory, that asshole, also known as the Butterfly Effect could easily result in some of those other plots succeeding.

Of course, it was entirely possible that his efforts to change the public perception of summoning actually succeeded to such a degree that those people would stop listening to the ‘voices’ over their own common sense. Then again, it was highly unlikely that anyone would try to manipulate someone with enough common sense to outright ignore the manipulations. It wasn’t like there weren’t plenty of alternatives available. After all, sadly, common sense wasn’t common.

At the end of the day, those people wouldn’t look all that different from regular dumbasses. They were both just people who made the wrong choices in pursuit of power and ended up causing trouble for everyone else.

Regardless, all Isaac could do was continue on as he always had. Make sure common sense grew actually common, make sure defenders existed to clean up after those who lacked it, and personally slap down any idiots he encountered personally. Besides, worrying about what might be wasn’t getting him very far. This new realization wouldn’t change his overall strategy, and he already had a full plate of stuff to do before he returned to the university.