Chapter 103: Chapter 103: Protection

Orion stared at the fusion reactor blueprint on his screen. The design was perfect. Revolutionary. Worth billions—maybe trillions—if someone stole it.

“Rene,” he said. “We need to protect this. I want you to file patents for everything. The reactor design, the thermoelectric material composition, the superconductor structure, the magnetic control systems, the laser ignition configuration, the fluid dynamics optimization—everything that can be patented.”

“Understood. Shall I prepare comprehensive patent applications?”

“Yeah. And don’t just file one patent per invention. Create variations. Different material ratios, alternate configurations, modified designs. I want a patent wall so thick that nobody can copy our work without running into our intellectual property.”

“Acknowledged. How many variations per technology?”

“As many as make sense. If there are ten viable ways to build the superconductor with similar performance, patent all ten. Same for everything else.”

“This will result in approximately 200-300 individual patents.”

“Good. That’s what I want. Make it impossible for competitors to work around our IP.”

“Understood. I will draft all patent applications with full technical specifications, claims, and supporting documentation. Shall I file with the United Federation Patent Office?”

“Yeah. And pay for expedited processing. Fast-track everything. I don’t want to wait years for approval.”

“Expedited filing fees for 200-300 patents will be approximately 15 million credits.”

Orion didn’t hesitate. “Do it. Fifteen million is nothing compared to protecting technology worth trillions.”

“Filing now.”

Orion watched progress bars appear on his screen. Patent applications streaming to the Federation Patent Office. Fees transferring automatically.

Each application was comprehensive. Detailed technical specifications. Material compositions down to atomic ratios. Manufacturing processes with precise parameters. Performance characteristics with simulation data as supporting evidence.

Rene had done it all in seconds. What would take a team of patent lawyers months to prepare, she’d accomplished instantly.

“All patents filed,” Rene reported. “Expedited processing initiated. Expected approval timeline: 3-6 weeks for initial review, 8-12 weeks for final approval.”

“Perfect.”

Orion stood up. Stretched. His muscles responded smoothly—enhanced by weeks of cultivation practice.

He checked the time. 10:47 AM. Still had a few hours before the Helix meeting.

Time to cultivate.

He sat cross-legged on his bed. Closed his eyes. Began the breathing technique.

Inhale. The air pulled into his lungs. His enhanced perception could feel the oxygen molecules, and mixed within them, tiny particles of exotic energy. The breathing technique separated them out, drew them into his bloodstream.

Hold. The exotic energy circulated through his body. Flowing through blood vessels, seeping into cells, making molecular bonds stronger. His muscles absorbed the energy. His bones became denser. His organs worked better.

Exhale. Dark impurities came out through his pores. The waste his cells had shed—toxins, damaged proteins, built-up cellular garbage.

He continued for an hour. Each cycle made him a tiny bit stronger. The improvements were small—maybe 0.1% per session. But they added up. Day after day, week after week.

His body had already improved by 30% since the system enhancement. Another few months of this and he’d be twice as strong as a normal human. A year? Three times stronger.

And that was just basic cultivation. The library had information on higher levels. The next level would make him ten times stronger. The level after that, a hundred times.

Eventually, he’d be strong enough to punch through steel. Fast enough to dodge bullets. Tough enough to walk through fire.

But that was future Orion’s problem. Present Orion needed a shower.

12:30 PM – KITCHEN

Orion came downstairs to find Cassia making lunch. Something with vegetables and rice.

“Good timing,” she said. “I was about to call you.”

He sat at the table. “What’s up?”

“I’ve been thinking about the company. Innovatia is going to need staff. A lot of staff. I can’t run everything alone, especially at the beginning.”

“Makes sense. What are you thinking?”

“I want to bring in some people I trust from my old workplace. Former colleagues who are talented and reliable. Build the executive team with people I know can handle it.”

Orion nodded. “That’s smart. How many people?”

“Maybe five or six to start. VP of Engineering, VP of Marketing, Head of HR, Chief Financial Officer, Head of Operations, Legal Counsel. Between all of us, we can manage the early stages.”

“Do it. Hire whoever you think we need.”

Cassia slid a plate in front of him. Stir-fried vegetables with rice and some kind of protein substitute. “I also need to finish the paperwork for the new office building you bought. Start actual recruitment for the development teams. Set up benefits packages—health insurance, retirement plans, stock options.”

“Make the benefits really good. I want Innovatia to be the kind of place where the best talent wants to work.”

“That’ll be expensive.”

“We have thirty-one billion credits. We can afford it.” Orion paused, thinking. “Actually, while you’re setting things up, you should also look into getting us a proper house. And some decent cars.”

Cassia looked up from her plate. “What?”

“We’re going to be running a major tech company. Living in a mid-tier apartment doesn’t really fit that image anymore. We should get a mansion. Something with space, good security, home offices. And autocars that don’t look like we’re struggling students.”

“Orion, that’s a huge expense—”

“Mom, you keep forgetting we have thirty-one billion credits. A mansion and some cars is what, thirty or forty million? That’s barely one percent of what we have. It’s nothing.”

Cassia set down her fork. “You’re serious.”

“Yeah. You’re going to be CEO of a major corporation. I’m the founder and chief technology officer. We need to look the part. Plus, it’ll be more comfortable. Better security. Space to work from home when needed.”

She was quiet for a moment. Then smiled. “You know what? You’re right. We can afford it. I’ll look into properties this afternoon.”

“Good. Get something nice. And I’ll give you access to my account so you can handle the purchases.”

Orion pulled up his phone. Transferred account access permissions to her.

“There. Buy whatever you think we need. Just don’t go too crazy.”

Cassia laughed. “Thirty-five million credits for a house and cars is already crazy by normal standards for me.”

“Good thing we’re not normal anymore.”

They ate lunch together. Cassia talked about office layouts and recruitment strategies. Benefits packages that would attract top talent. Stock option plans.

Orion listened with half his attention. The other half was already thinking about the next problem.

The BCI.

It worked great—he could think commands and they’d execute. He could control his computer, type code, navigate systems all with just his thoughts.

But yesterday while running those long simulations, he’d noticed some issues. Small bugs in how the BCI interpreted certain thought patterns. Moments where the signal got slightly fuzzy. Minor delays that shouldn’t be there.

Nothing major. The system worked at 99.1% accuracy. But he could make it better.

“I’m heading back up,” Orion said after finishing his food. “Got some work to do before the meeting.”

“Alright. I’m going out this afternoon to look at properties. I’ll send you listings if I find anything good.”

“Sounds good.”

ORION’S ROOM – 1:15 PM

Orion put on the earbuds.

“Rene, I want to spend some time fixing bugs in the BCI. Yesterday during the simulations, I noticed a few issues with signal interpretation. Nothing major, but we can do better than 99.1% accuracy.”

“Understood. What specific issues did you observe?”

“Sometimes when I’m thinking complex nested concepts, the translation gets slightly fuzzy. Like if I’m imagining a function with multiple layers of logic, occasionally the BCI misses one of the conditions or gets the order slightly wrong.”

“I have logged several instances of minor interpretation errors during our extended simulation sessions. The issues appear to correlate with high cognitive load—when you are processing multiple complex concepts simultaneously.”

“Exactly. So let’s fix it. We need to refine the brain wave pattern recognition algorithms. Make them better at handling complex nested thoughts.”

“I can simulate various algorithm refinements and test them against your recorded neural patterns. This will allow optimization without requiring extensive retraining.”

“How long will that take?”

“Approximately two hours to simulate thousands of algorithm variations and identify optimal parameters.”

“Do it. I want the BCI working as close to perfect as possible.”

“Beginning optimization now.”

While Rene worked on that, Orion decided to prepare for the Helix meeting.

“Rene, also prepare a USB drive with the experimental procedures for manufacturing the superconductor and thermoelectric materials. Complete step-by-step instructions that the Helix research team can follow.”

“Already prepared. USB contains comprehensive manufacturing procedures with precise parameters, equipment specifications, safety protocols, and quality control checkpoints.”

“When did you do that?”

“This morning during patent filing. The task required minimal processing capacity.”

Orion shook his head. Having an AI that could multitask thousands of operations at once was still surreal.

He spent the next hour reviewing the materials he’d present to the Helix team. Made sure everything was clear and understandable. These were professional researchers, but they didn’t have knowledge from the library like he did. He needed to explain things simply.

“BCI optimization complete,” Rene announced. “New algorithms achieve 99.87% accuracy—a significant improvement in handling complex nested cognitive structures. The refinements primarily focus on better temporal pattern recognition and improved filtering of cognitive background noise.”

“Good. Upload the new algorithms.”

“Uploading now.”

Orion felt a brief tingling sensation behind his ears as the BCI firmware updated. The new algorithms loaded into the smartwatch processor.

“Update complete. Please test the improvements.”

Orion thought through a complex code structure—a multi-layered function with nested loops, conditional statements, error handling, and recursive calls. The kind of thing that had sometimes gotten slightly garbled before.

The code appeared on his screen perfectly. Every condition in the right place. Every loop properly nested. Every recursive call correctly structured.

“Much better,” Orion said. “That’s exactly what I needed.”

He tested a few more complex thought patterns. Everything translated perfectly.

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