Inside the coffin, a humanoid figure identical to Custodian’s original ten drones was laid on white cloth. The only difference was that it was painted red.
[Control on foreign automaton established. Automaton has no master confirmed. Setting master to CUSTODIAN.]
‘Activate.’
Instead of a red light, blue light leaked from the gaps of its body. It took a few minutes for it to start moving, raising its body out of the coffin.
“Oooh,” the red drone spoke with the same tone as Niner as it finally sat upright.
‘Greetings,’ Custodian greeted.
By habit or otherwise, the red drone bowed towards nothing then replied, “Hello.”
‘Can you join my hivespeak?’ Custodian asked.
“Ah! M-my bad,” the red drone whimpered.
‘H-hello?’ This time, the red drone finally spoke inside Custodian’s network of communication.
‘What is your name?’ Custodian asked.
‘My n-name?’ The red drone nervously looked up to the larger drones surrounding it.
‘You have no name?’ Custodian asked once more.
‘I… my databank… I can’t find it.’
‘So you forgot?’
‘Y-yes. My apologies.’ The red drone once again bowed at the air.
This drone was the most emotional drone Custodian had ever seen. It wasn’t sure if it was genuine or was simply acting it.
‘Drone 11 is designated for my next major prototype so I cannot give you that name. Would the name Red satisfy you?’ Custodian questioned.
‘Y-yes! Thank you… Master… Custodian?’
‘Yes. That is me.’
‘Thank you!’ Red bowed once again.
Slayer offered a hand to Red to get her off the coffin, to which she took. “Thank you.”
“Despite being… foreign. Without a doubt, we are still brethren,” Slayer observed.
“Yes! Please guide me well!” Red bowed at her new brothers.
‘First, I order all drones to finish up their search. Bring anything useful, including Red’s coffin. Next, I order all ten original drones and Red to my core room. It is time to discuss our next plan,’ Custodian ordered.
Every single drone accepted their tasks in unison, then began packing all their loot. The drones managed to find a set of extravagant old cloth which was still intact and gave it to Red.
“You would think the lich would wear this instead of its tattered bathing towel…” Apoth commented.
“Question. What is a ‘bath’?” Princeps asked.
“I think it’s like maintenance to the humans… or something,” Apoth replied doubtfully.
“B-bathing is to ensure their hygiene. With better hygiene, they would be less susceptible to diseases,” Red interjected as she put on the tunic, skirt, and half-cape.
“Disease?” Apoth asked.
“Cease wasting time. Hold this,” Slayer shoved a barrel of weapons to Apoth. “There. Task completed. Move out to the core room.”
At the courtyard, the humans were watching as the basket drones picked up the bones and monster cores lying about while the combat drones stabbed at the skeletons on the floor, thinking they were still actively hostile.
“Say… those… people over there. They keep making a noises which sort of sound like glass being broken. What do you think they mean?” Dyvona pointed at the combat drones and asked her group.
“I don’t know. Maybe ‘DIE!’?” Gerard guessed.
“Fool. Their language is much more complex than ours. They could be spouting war verses of a story passed down by their people for generations. You could hear the chaotic beauty in their war cries,” Aefelred argued.
“Right…” Dyvona rolled her eyes and noticed that the drones were finally coming out of the castle. She approached Slayer who had his hands full of books.
“Sir Slayer. What are those people saying?” Dyvona pointed at the same combat drones.
“Die. Begone. Trampled. Wrecked,” Slayer casually answered, then began shouting at the combat drones to stop being idiots.
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“Ah, that…” Aefelred coughed as Gerard tried to hold his laugh in.
Amidst his amusement, Gerard noticed something. He stopped laughing, pointed at Red, and asked, “Who is that person?”
Slayer was about to answer when Red approached them first. She slightly lifted the sides of her skirts, and did a curtsy.
“I am Red. A servant of Master Custodian. It is a pleasure to meet you, humans,” Red greeted.
“You can speak properly? Wait… humans? What are you?” Aefelred was taken aback.
“That…”
“Red. Cease wasting time. We must move,” Slayer interrupted Red, then pushed her forward.
The humans went back to their pool chamber, while the drones went to the core room. By the end of the siege, Custodian had reorganized the core room and its base surrounding it. The mini-Custodian was assigned its own room to process materials, freeing much space in the core room.
Eleven drones stood in front of their master, and in turn, the A.I. examined them all carefully.
“As you know, I was given one sole task.”
“Produce anti-mana.” Every single automaton including Custodian said in unison, even Red, who had only became Custodian’s drone just minutes ago.
“It seemed that this world is bigger, and much have yet to be learned. I believe that Red would be able to break the barrier inside the mountain on top of us. If the humans are correct, that is our path to the surface.”
The drones nodded.
“However…” Custodian used its arm to pick up a destroyed spider drone. It dropped the spider in front of the drones for them to see.
The drone was wet, and was obviously gnawed. Not only that, there were visible signs of it being attacked by magic.
“What is this?” Slayer asked as he held the spiderling up.
“Some time ago, we found an underground stream. We tossed a few scout drones in it and since they never responded, we assumed them to be lost. When you were gone sieging, Drone 4 found this,” Custodian explained. The drones all turned to the speed demon Drone 4.
“By chance, it swam ashore from another underground stream much, much deeper. With only one functioning leg, it crawled all the way to the spider hunting grounds where Drone 4 picked it up. Studying its findings…”
Custodian’s eyes disappeared, and a projection appear on its glassy body. It showed the scout being plunged deep into a ravine, then deeper underground. It was attacked by creatures of different sizes and shapes. Despite the damages it sustained to the point of its connection to Custodian being severed, it diligently took images and remembered the paths.
Once all that could be shown was shown, Custodian took out a chip.
“By a… what the humans would call… ‘miracle’, its processor survived. I will be using this as the beginning of my next prototype. This drone would become the honored Drone 11,” Custodian declared. “From now on, you twelve…no, thirteen drones would be designated as the Daedelus-type drones. The first among firsts. Be proud, you Daedeli.”
The drones saluted at their yet-made brother in unison and at Custodian’s declaration. An unimaginable form of pride was formed within the automatons themselves.
‘Is this because of Memory 2?’ Custodian wondered then shook the passing thought off. It had more pressing matters for now.
“Anyway, that is beside the point. The point is, we are not limited to solely on going up the surface. My plan is to expand upwards…” Custodian raised its eye up, then dropped it down, “and downwards!”
----------------------------------------
When the city was finally cleared of the undead, both the automatons and the humans went up the tower. At the passage entrance, the humans were distraught when they couldn’t find the corpse of their human companion.
Osvart, in particular, was crying while hugging the floor. “I’m so sorry, Liss. I’m so… very… sorry…”
The drones stood in silence, except for Red who would’ve cried a long time ago if she could.
“Our fallen companion, you see, was Osvart’s wife. They joined us in hopes that they could buy a house for themselves once we found treasure,” Aefelred explained while his group grieved over their loss.
“I… I must stay in the city. I must find her. Those damned undead took her somewhere!” Osvart resolved himself.
“Wait, in the first place, would they even allow you to…”
“Yes. We allow. Go,” Weaver interrupted Aefelred, then cocked his head. After thanking Weaver for a few dozens of times, he ran back down to the city.
“You?” Weaver asked the humans.
“We’ve been gone from our home for too long, I think. I’d rather leave sooner than later. Besides, with the undead gone and you guys here, Osvart would be fine,” Gerard replied.
With the humans making up their mind, the drones and humans continued their way out of the passage until they reached the barrier.
First, Princeps attacked the barrier with his ancient greatsword. After failing to break through, he stepped back.
‘Then it really is Red,’ Custodian thought.
Red stepped forward from the group, then placed her hand against the barrier.
[Password: ●●●●●●]
[Deciphering unique anti-mana pattern 1. Deciphering unique anti-mana pattern 2. Deciphering…]
‘A barrier made out of anti-mana?’ Custodian noted. As Red broke down the barrier, Custodian studied the patterns in the barriers in hopes that it could make its own barrier in the future. But studying the pattern, the A.I. realized it would take a lot of materials and advancement in anti-mana magic to make one.
Disregarding the issue of anti-mana barriers for now, Red finally managed to break the barrier.
“How did she…?” Aefelred was skeptical.
“A-ah… I… um… we found a special spell inside the castle and I was specifically taught it!” Red lied, her hands visibly shaking nervously.
‘They’re not going to believe that…’ Apoth retorted.
“That makes sense…” Aefelred and his group nodded.
‘I can’t believe they fell for it…’ Apoth retorted loudly.
Exarchi had his scouts move first, and after confirming that the path out was clear, the group moved up.
Custodian watched intently from Princeps’ perspective. Walking along the cavern passage, the A.I. noticed some unnatural light.
No.
For the first time of its existence, Custodian had finally seen sunlight.
The humans, being used to the darkness and unnatural light for some time, raised their arms to cover their eyes from the sunlight. Meanwhile, the drones immediately soaked the sunlight with their faces.
Custodian was taking in so much things. The air. The sounds. The light. This was truly like a newborn opening its eyes for the first time.
“You asked what this place was called before, right?” Gerard turned to the stunned Weaver.
“Yes?”
“Well, this place is quite far from Vyssium. It’s the neighbouring unclaimed region - Varangia,” Gerard answered.
“I see… then,” Weaver turned to his drone brethren who were still busy taking in everything,”my people… are called the Varangians.”