CHAPTER 24
Pog had outlined a path Lucas could take to avoid the golem factory and the crazy AI. It was a longer trek, involving moving first to the east along one of the transit tunnels before turning west again at another junction. Lucas peered over Pog’s shoulder at the map on his interface panel. It looked like these tunnels honeycombed the entire area, linking a cluster of nearby locations. The Scouts were diligent as always, but the trip was uneventful. Back at the camp, Korah and the spiders proudly presented a small mountain of paralysed wildlife. Korah seemed a little better, or perhaps she was just getting used to ignoring the pain.
Lucas was happy to see her, and it must have shown in his Aura because Korah smiled warmly in response.
“You did not have your soul sucked out then? Me and the spiders were about to start tearing up the place looking for you.”
“You were right, it was dangerous down there. But, also very interesting. I think I've found a back door into Caleb’s camp, and maybe a way to shut down the defences, or even turn them against him.”
Korah’s eyes lit up
“Impressive, so what is the story?”
“I found some potential allies operating the Relic under the slaver camp, very strange ones. I struck a deal with them, but I'm still not exactly sure how to live up to my end. I’ll need to use a lot of these I think,” He said, gesturing to the pile of fur and scales and blood.
“If all goes to plan, then we won't need to worry about the Relic and can launch an open attack from the front, also maybe sneak in a flanking force from below. You can't go near Caleb with all that metal in your body, so I'll take him on while you take out his mercenaries, ok?”
Korah darkened a little at that.
“Caleb is a very dangerous man. If you take him on directly you will die.”
“I know. You are going to have to trust me.”
Korah obviously didn't like the idea, but she didn't object any further.
Like a line of worker ants, Lucas, Korah and the spiders began dragging a baggage train of paralysed creatures through the tunnels. Pog was so excited to see Lucas that he started bopping around, as if ready to break into a dance. When his eyes landed on the paralysed Elk Lucas was dragging into the chamber he laughed out loud.
“Is that Polly’s new body? Hahaha yes!”
“Not exactly.” Lucas replied, dropping the Elk and wiping his hands on his pants.
Korah was next, looking wide eyed and pale. She had refused Lucas’s suggestion that she stay in the camp and rest, despite being obviously terrified of entering the Relic tunnels. Now she was feeling the strain of having dragged a huge lizard for several miles. Lucas frowned when he noticed she had attached the Regeneration Bracer again. She dumped the lizard unceremoniously with the Elk, breathing shallow and quick breaths.
“Do you need more?” She asked, wiping sweat off her forehead.
“No, that's fine. The spiders will take care of the rest. But can you go hunting again early in the morning? and take a Brawler with you. One more round of reinforcements before the battle starts tomorrow would be good.”
Lucas tried to hide that he was only asking that because it meant she would likely go to sleep early instead of trying to help the spiders drag more creatures through the tunnels. He had no idea if it was successful, but she only nodded and turned to leave, not paying any attention to Pog or the Relic.
“Ok!” Lucas said, turning to Pog and rubbing his hands together. “What kind of bodies do you guys want?”
“Polly wants to be strong and fast with a lot of abilities.”
“Yea that should be fine. Polimathras lives in a crystal right?”
Pog nodded, reaching into his orange robe to withdraw a fist sized crystal that emitted a soft blue light.
“He’s in here now.” Pog was about to hand the crystal over, but hesitated when the light caught his eye.
“It will be quiet with him gone.” He took a deep breath, then handed the crystal to Lucas.
Lucas used Analyse. The Mana probe that entered the crystal to perform the Analysis immediately encountered Polimathras, who greeted him with a polite touching of Mana. A popup was generated, like usual.
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Lucas spoke to him, knowing that with their Mana connected the intentions behind his words would be readable.
“I’ve never done this before, but if you are data stored as a pattern I will be able to copy you exactly. Polimathras signalled affirmative, so Lucas took out an egg and the Brood Nexus.
With his Mana now forming a link between himself, the Brood interface, the Memory Crystal and the Egg he began a massive suite of alterations to the embryonic spider. He began by introducing patterns for his own body parts, which resulted in a truly monstrous human-spider hybrid. He then withdrew the spider data bit by bit until the figure in the design interface was mostly human. At least, it looked human. It was apparently quite impossible to completely remove a lingering ‘spidery’ quality that seemed inherent to everything the Brood Nexus did. If it was possible to remove it completely, it would be done at a level that was still too fine for his Mana to operate on. There wasn’t much he could do about it, so with a shrug he continued.
Next he copied over the patterns for the abilities Analyse, Natural Language, Map and Inventory. He then moved his attention to the Memory Crystal. As Lucas’s Mana moved into the patterns within, he began to feel awkward about the disturbingly absolute insight into Polimathras’s personality and memories that was part of the process.
He tried his best to politely pay no attention to what was very much not his business. Despite that, there were some peculiar details that he couldn't help but notice; like the fact that the man was apparently convinced that he was damned to suffer an eternity of torment at the hands of some unfathomable enemy from the future.
That was just the start, he appeared to be some kind of secret agent that was up to his eyeballs in political schemes, but the depth of complexity that came with trying to understand an entirely alien socio-political landscape all at once made Lucas’ mind baulk. He tried to focus on getting the job done.
He gave a kill command to the Combat Spider that waited at the pile of paralysed prey, and it began feeding him with Mana. The chamber was a mostly enclosed space that effectively trapped the released Mana, giving him decent efficiency on the conversion. The total cost for Polimathras’s new body was 47 Mana. Which totalled seven dead animals. Lucas didn't use any of his own Mana.
With the transfer complete, Lucas closed the design interface to see a huge egg laying on the ground. Under the bright Relic lights the skin of the egg was translucent, full of veins and pink jelly. Within was a humanoid shape curled into a foetal position. First it twitched, then reached out and pressed its palms against the thin film of egg skin. Goo flowed out when the skin of the egg ripped.
A naked hairless man fell out onto his hands, looking very much like a bald Lucas. He immediately started coughing up a shocking amount of slime, intermittently gasping for breath. Both Pog and Lucas grimaced as the retching and coughing continued, the only sound echoing around the chamber for several minutes.
When he had cleared his airways enough to speak, he went to one knee like a knight.
“M..My Lord.” he croaked out, before coughing again.
Lucas did not respond immediately, fixated on Polimathras’s eyes. They were black as slate, whites and iris both, and far too big. Now that Lucas was looking more closely that wasn't the only oddity; his finger and toenails were a matching black, and his skin was too grey to be natural for a human. The most shocking thing of all however, was a very familiar ‘spidery’ quality to his Aura.
“My Lord, please give me that crystal, the matter is urgent.” He continued, when the coughing subsided again.
Lucas looked at the Memory Crystal he was still holding. Feeling a little bewildered, but sensing no hostility or subterfuge from his Aura, Lucas decided to just hand it over and see what happens. Polimathras lifted it high, then brought it down with all his strength onto the stone floor, shattering it into countless shards. A little mushroom cloud of Mana puffed out into the air, then dissipated.
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“I apologise fo..” He paused to vomit up a pool of pink slime. “for not explaining first my Lord, but the mind in that crystal was a deadly threat. He.. and I know many powerful and dangerous secrets. My previous self would have immediately tried to kill us both if he realised your deception.”
“My.. deception?”
“Yes My Lord. It was truly cunning to have the body you created compel such devoted loyalty, you have gained a powerful asset and disarmed a deadly threat in one move.
“It was an accident! I swear, I didn't know that would happen! I was just making you a body!”
“As you say my Lord. But I have never been happier. Every fibre of my being sings in perfect harmony of purpose. A chorus of praise to the one beautiful goal. Oh my Lord, what a wonderful gift you have given me. My life, my talents, all the power and knowledge I possess, all of it is yours. Your will be done, my Lord. In all things, your will be done!” He got down to one knee again.
“Ah fuck,” Lucas said.
“What happened to him?” Asked Pog, who was looking on impassively.
“Um, well, I think because I made his body out of a spider egg, he kind of became part of my brood of spiders. Like these guys.” Lucas said, gesturing towards the Combat Spider that had just dragged a paralysed monkey of some kind into the chamber. Pog stared at the spider for a moment mouthing the word ‘spider’, before turning back to Polimathras.
“How do you feel, Polly?”
“Wonderful Pog, join us.”
“Well that's creepy. But, he seems happy. So, anyway, how about my body? Can you… not make mine out of a spider egg.”
“My Lord, please integrate Pog into the Brood, he will be a valuable asset.” Polimathras interjected.
“Not without his permission Polly,” Lucas replied. “Now, What kind of body do you want, Pog?”
“I want… you to build my body into this Relic.”
“What?”
“This Relic is something very special. It’s mostly broken down, but I can fix that with your help. I don’t ever want to be apart from it again. I want… I need to know what its true purpose is. I can sense secrets here, buried in this place that would send the Priests mad if they knew.”
“Pog, something like that would destroy your humanity altogether.” Said Polimathras.
“Don't give me that Polly! You’re some kind of spider-man-mutant now! You just spent fifteen minutes vomiting up pink slime only to tell me what a great time you are having!! Besides, you destroyed my humanity with that Tranquillity Ritual. You tore me away from my Relic, my home. You knew what would happen to me, so you don't get to judge now!
He gestured with a waving hand to Lucas and Polimathras.
“You two are the same, willing to do anything, to pay any cost to get what you want.” Pog continued.
“Well I'm not going to let you push me away from what makes me happy when I'm not useful anymore. This Relic, is the centre of everything, there is some secret purpose that makes it unique. I can feel it, and I am going to find out what it is. I will never be away from it again.” He looked back at Lucas.
“I’m the one who can turn this Relic against the Slavers, so it's me, not Polly, you need to please. And, this is what I want.”
“Alright, fine, but I don't really know how it's possible.” Lucas thought back to when he had used the Healing and Brood Nexus’ together to ‘heal’ a new leg onto one of his Combat Spiders.
“I can generate new body parts of basically any shape, if I can get hold of the Mana patterns that describe how you want them to be.”
“You can get that from the Relic, I can help.” Said Pog, gesturing for Lucas to come closer.
“Come over to the panel. When your Mana enters the machine it should be able to trace the structure of the Mana conduits that are still connected. I know this Relic very well, and can show you where the connections are broken. If you can extend my body into the Relic, along the Mana conduits, I will be able to use my flesh to bridge the gap where the connections are broken.”
“How did you even think this up,” Lucas asked.
“My Lord,” Polimathras chimed in. “Pog does not think like a normal human. Tranquils often form obsessive bonds to whatever task they are given, it is a by-product of the emptiness left in their soul. Pog operated a Relic for the church for his entire life, and separating from it was very hard on him.”
“Don't talk about me like I'm not here Polly. ”
“Ok ok,” Lucas said, placing his hands on the interface panel. Lucas looked up at the massive construct in front of him. It was a tangled mess of crumbling machine parts, some huge, some too small to make out. When he sent his Mana into the interface panel he realised what Pog meant by ‘Mana conduits’. They were the physical substance that his Mana flowed through in order to activate the various functions available at this site. His Mana awareness traced their structure in his mind's eye. As Pog had said, many broke off abruptly to leave incomplete functions or entire sections totally inaccessible.
”Stand up against the Relic, just here” Lucas said, indicating a spot where the conduits were close to the surface.
Pog took off his robe and laid his back flat against the construct. Lucas had the Combat Spider begin dragging paralysed creatures close to him.
With his Mana still circulating the Relic, Lucas pulled out the Brood Nexus and Korah’s Healing Nexus. He summoned a Fractal Mind and gave it the Healing Nexus, which floated up into his Aura and began orbiting along a Mana band. He then placed a hand on Pog’s chest.
Pog’s body appeared in the Brood Interface. Lucas fed in the pattern of the Relic’s Mana conduits, which the interface accepted as a separate layer. Lucas left the Nexus trance for a moment.
“This is probably going to hurt, a lot,” He said.
“And, will I start calling you Lord, like Polly?”
“I don't know… This is all new to me.”
“Ok, let's do it.”
Re-entering the Brood Nexus, Lucas began extending Pog’s body along the shape of the Mana Conduits within the interface, then fed the patterns of the design into the Healing Nexus. The Healing Nexus then regarded the un-transformed Pog as an injury it needed to heal, and the transformed version as what Pog should look like when fully healed. A kill command had the Combat Spider begin stabbing the creatures one by one with a Scythe, releasing the Mana that the Fractal then sucked into the Healing Nexus.
Pog screamed. The wailing gurgling scream of someone experiencing the pain of their body being reconstructed on a molecular level. The skin on his back split wide open. Flesh and nerves extended like red and white slugs, searching for gaps and holes in the machinery. Soon a web of biological tendrils were spreading over the face of the Relic like something growing in a petri dish. Pog has stopped screaming, and began murmuring.
“Yes I see now,” He was interrupted by a groan of either pain or ecstasy, and his eyes rolled back in his head.
“I found it. A broken link. I can reach for it, grow me some muscles here.” Not sure what he was talking about, Lucas looked back into the Nexus design interface. He saw that Pog’s body had traced along almost the entire network of the Mana conduits. The model of Pog in the interface was wiggling a little appendage deep inside the machine. Lucas built some longer muscle mass into the appendage, turning it into a fleshy tentacle of sorts.
“No, no, make it finer. I need to create networks.”
Lucas frowned but meticulously reworked the tentacle into a brush-like structure of fine biological fibres, each one capable of independent articulation.
“Yes, that's perfect!” Lucas watched though the interface, zoomed in closely, as Pog used this strange appendage to create his own network of Mana conduits. Some fibres linked to each other in a web of connections while others branched out into the machinery. Pog suddenly started yelling.
“I CAN MAKE MY OWN FUNCTIONS. HAHAHA.”
His maniacal laughter continued to echo through the chamber as Lucas made more and more of these fibered appendages. Pog's original body began to disperse into the machine as he was extended deeper. The space between all of his human features expanded and became filled with stone and metal. His eyes became black like Polimathras. To Lucas’s horror, more eyes began appearing, bubbling to the surface of the biological soup like an unwelcome cluster of bloated raisins. The laughter began to take on a chittering quality as mandibles sprouted out of his distorted mouth. It cut off altogether when the mouth parts dispersed into the machinery.
Suddenly realising that the last of their paralysed prey had been sacrificed, Lucas cut the connections.
“Ok, that’s all I can do. Maybe we can make some new connections later or something, but for now we have a job to do.”
A wet, metallic sound, like air moving through damp copper tubing rang out of the machine.
“Yes Master!”
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