After joining the Tori no Ichizoku clan, Dr. Machinist—Nikolai Mikhailov—descended further into depravity, expanding his horrific experiments under the protection of the clan’s influence. His thirst for violence, especially against children, became the focal point of his sadistic ambitions. Children, with their innocence and vulnerability, became his preferred subjects. In his cold, calculating mind, they were ideal candidates for his grotesque exploration into pain, suffering, and the fusion of man with machine.
Dr. Machinist subjected these children to unspeakable horrors. His experiments often involved pitting them against mechanical warriors—robots designed for no other purpose than to kill. These machines were towering constructs of metal and wire, weighing hundreds of pounds, and the children stood no chance. Each battle ended in death, but that was just the beginning. Once the children were slain, Dr. Machinist would take their lifeless bodies and implant their consciousness into the very machines that had destroyed them. This horrifying process fused man and machine, creating a twisted form of immortality, where the victim's mind was trapped in a cold, unfeeling machine—forever conscious but unable to escape the mechanical prison.
Under the Tori no Ichizoku banner, his body count grew with terrifying speed. By the time he fully integrated into their operations, Dr. Machinist had slaughtered over a hundred children. Their small, fragile bodies were perfect for his experiments, allowing him to test his cruel creations and refine his methods. His adult victims, often taken during the clan's violent raids on villages and towns, served a different purpose. These larger bodies provided him with a canvas for his more advanced machinery and chemical experimentation. These victims were just as disposable, and by the end of his reign, he had killed 125 adults. Their deaths were brutal, their bodies transformed into testing grounds for his insidious innovations.
His involvement in the clan's raids marked a new chapter in his reign of terror. The Tori no Ichizoku was notorious for its bloodthirsty campaigns of murder, pillaging, and rape, and Dr. Machinist was no passive participant. He was an active force in these atrocities, not only orchestrating the killings but also ensuring that his experiments continued amidst the chaos. He would often perform his grisly work in the aftermath of a raid, experimenting on both the living and the dead in unspeakable ways. The total number of his victims reached 225: 100 children and 125 adults. His involvement in the clan's other atrocities—the rapes, tortures, and senseless murders—further solidified his reputation as a monster.
Dr. Machinist’s true specialty, however, was in his ability to invent and implement grotesque devices that amplified the agony of his victims. His most infamous creations became his legacy of suffering. The Expansion Wall, a nightmarish contraption, was designed to tear the victim’s limbs apart slowly. Metal rods would gradually extend through their arms and legs, splitting the body apart, one agonizing inch at a time. The victim would remain alive, forced to endure an excruciating process that could take hours, even days. The sheer horror of it left survivors traumatized beyond belief, and the few who did manage to survive were left permanently disfigured.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
Then there was the Death Vice, a machine of unspeakable cruelty. Once strapped into this iron device, the victim's limbs were slowly crushed, the bones grinding together with relentless force. As the pressure mounted, the victim's eyes and ears would be mutilated, and the machine would tighten around their throat, cutting off their ability to speak or scream. The victim would remain conscious through the entire process, aware of their slow, painful death.
Perhaps his most twisted creation was the Disjawment mask. This steel mask would begin by crushing the victim's jaw, forcing their teeth to crack and their bones to splinter. The process was agonizingly slow, each moment dragging on like an eternity. The second phase of the mask's function was even more horrific. It would stretch the victim's jaw, tearing the flesh and bone from ear to ear, leaving a grotesque grin fixed permanently on their face. The victim would remain alive, enduring the agony until they finally succumbed to death.
What made Dr. Machinist so terrifying was not just the monstrosity of his inventions but his complete lack of empathy for his victims. His mind, a cold and calculating machine in itself, had long since lost any semblance of compassion. His detachment was absolute, and his pursuit of new methods of torture was driven by a twisted desire for perfection. The machines he created were no longer just instruments of death—they were tools for his own evolution, designed to push the boundaries of suffering and extend the limits of life itself.
The Tori no Ichizoku clan, in its desperation for power and control, had found a perfect weapon in Dr. Machinist. His physical transformation into a near-complete machine only solidified his role. With 80% of his body replaced with mechanical parts, he became something more than human. His arms and legs were now a collection of surgical instruments, knives, and torture devices, capable of dismembering and maiming at will. He could no longer be killed by conventional means. His new body was a vessel for destruction, capable of unimaginable violence. He no longer felt pain or emotion—the suffering of others became his only form of gratification.
His work was far from finished. Now that his body had been augmented, he could perform his experiments with greater efficiency. His operations expanded beyond simple torture. He began experimenting with chemicals designed to prolong life in a state of perpetual agony, keeping his victims alive long enough to undergo multiple rounds of suffering. He believed that by perfecting this technique, he could achieve immortality—a goal that consumed him entirely. His pursuit of this unholy form of eternal life became the driving force behind his twisted crusade.
The world would come to know Dr. Machinist as a symbol of pure terror—a being who fused man and machine in the most grotesque way imaginable. His legacy was one of pain and suffering, his name a whisper of dread that would haunt the nightmares of those who heard it. He was not just a doctor or a killer—he was a harbinger of death, a symbol of humanity's darkest potential. And in his hands, the machines he created would continue to spread terror for years to come.