After Jacob finished his shower, it was Ethefelis's turn.
Jacob then noticed the sheep plushie in Alice's hands and asked about it.
For some reason, Alice suddenly got an idea and asked Jacob if he wanted a plushie too.
"Mr. Jacob, do you want one?"
"No. I'm a man—why would I want a plushie?"
"It's very cute."
Alice held the sheep plushie up toward him as if she were trying to sell its cuteness. Jacob, however, responded indifferently.
"It has nothing to do with being cute. I'm just not interested."
Jacob wasn't conquered by the charm of plushies!?
…Well, everyone has different tastes, can't force it on people.
After sitting down, Jacob looked at the year-measuring device and the magic cores on the low table.
"Karen, those things on the table look exactly the same as before I went to shower. Did you not touch them?"
I had been thinking about how to make magic cores connect with each other and had completely set aside the task of detecting the cores' years.
"I was thinking."
"About what?"
"I'm trying to make a tool that can be used for communication. That way we won't have to arrange specific meeting times anymore."
"So that's why you asked me earlier about how the year-measuring device is made? You want to use magic cores as the core of it?"
"Magic cores are pretty versatile."
"That's true."
After I finished my own shower, I took the clothes out of the washing machine after they were dried, folded them neatly, and placed them into each person's basket.
Then I threw the clothes I had just taken off into the washer.
After that, I returned to the living room and sat on the sofa, continuing to think.
Even after everyone else had gone back to their rooms to sleep, I was still stuck in the same place with no progress.
Then a thought suddenly crossed my mind.
Even though it's called Creation Magic, could altering or adding properties to a magic core also count as creation?
I took out a piece of paper and a pen and began writing down the functions and the manufacturing process in detail.
(First, the person who injects magic power into the magic core first will become the owner. Anyone who injects magic power afterward will be registered as a contact, and their identities will appear vertically on the glass screen.)
(Second, the glass screen will support touch and swipe controls, but only with human fingers.)
(Third, tapping a contact will call the contact's magic-core phone. On the contact's glass screen, the owner's identity will appear along with the buttons "Accept" and "Reject." Pressing "Accept" will connect the call and enter call mode. Pressing "Reject" will cut off the owner's call.)
(Fourth, while dialing, the owner's phone will display a "Cancel" button. Pressing it will cancel the call. Meanwhile, the contact's magic core will emit a faint white light repeatedly. After thirty seconds, it will stop and automatically reject the call.)
(Fifth, the magic core can pick up sounds within thirty centimeters and emit sound up to thirty centimeters away. The owner's voice will be transmitted to the contact, and the contact's voice will be transmitted to the owner.)
(Sixth, during a call, both phones will display the buttons "End" and "Speaker." Pressing "End" will terminate the call. Pressing "Speaker" will expand the sound range to one meter for both pick up and output. Pressing it again will revert the range.)
(Seventh, the phone can be activated by injecting magic power, but only by the owner.)
(Eighth, the method to create a magic core with the above functions is to silently say one's full name in the mind while injecting mana into the magic core.)
That was everything.
After thinking carefully, writing and revising again and again, I finally finished defining the functions the magic-core phone should have. I didn't think I had missed anything.
I took out a magic core, silently said my name in my mind, and injected magic power into it.
Still nothing happened.
I was starting to feel like giving up, but I decided to try one last desperate attempt.
I placed the magic core on the paper and spoke the magic's name aloud.
"Create"
The black light faded.
At first glance, nothing seemed to have changed.
I took out another magic core, silently said my name again, and injected magic power into it.
The next moment, excitement surged through me.
The corners of my mouth lifted unconsciously, and I kept slapping the sofa's armrest.
This time the result was different.
The magic core flashed briefly.
Did it work?!
It seemed I still hadn't fully understood the scope of Creation Magic. It wasn't limited to creating physical objects—adding properties could also count as creation.
Even so, I suppressed the urge to shout in excitement.
It was too early to relax. I still hadn't confirmed whether it truly worked. I needed to build the device first.
I took out another sheet of paper and began drawing the magic-core phone design I had in mind. In truth, it was based on the smartphones from my previous life.
After a while, I finished the drawing.
Then I took a tempered glass panel left over from when I built the house and placed it on top of the blueprint along with the first magic core.
Then I used create magic again.
After the black light faded, the phone from the blueprint had materialized.
I picked it up.
…Actually, calling it a magic core phone felt a bit long.
I might as well just call it a phone.
The phone fit in my hand, with a 16:9 shape and a thickness of only one centimeter. The entire body was made of glass, so transparent it felt like if I dropped it, I might never find it again.
However, the magic core was installed at the lower center of the phone, so if I looked carefully, I could still find it.
Since the phone was made of glass, I had designed the edges to be rounded so it wouldn't cut my hands.
The magic core inside had already been infused with my magic power, so I was the owner.
I injected magic power again to activate it.
Five black rectangular frames appeared on the glass screen, taking up about one-fifth of the entire display.
…And that was it.
Nothing else.
Then I realized something.
This test required two people.
I was the owner. I couldn't inject magic power again to become a contact, so I couldn't call myself using two phones to test it.
"So this is where phone numbers become important."
I sighed.
I hadn't come up with any inspiration for creating phone numbers, so this was the method I had devised instead. On the bright side, it meant the phone couldn't easily be stolen and used by someone else.
There were advantages and disadvantages.
"...Wait. How is calling myself even an advantage?"
I muttered, criticizing my own thought process.
My brain was clearly tired.
It was time to sleep.
Before returning to my room, I took out a new pure magic core and used another piece of the tempered glass panel I had only partially used earlier to create a second phone.
Tomorrow, I would ask Jacob to help me test it.