A huge room spread before them. A forge spat out hot ingots. Black machinery riddled with bright lines of magic churned away, stamping metal into shape. Water splashed and hissed as the metal dropped into it to cool. Bare puppets without any clothes or decorations snatched up the pieces and assembled them. The puppets burned and singed as they put the hot metal together, but they didn’t react. They felt no pain. One of them toppled over, overcome by the heat. Its fellows trampled it. In a few moments, it was no more than shards of porcelain.

In the corner, a meat grinder worked. Dark gears bit at each other, tens of them chewing together. Headless mages and dead beasts dropped through a hole in the ceiling and landed on the gears. The grinder sucked them in and tore them apart. In its heart, magical lights burned. Familiar black goo came out the bottom. Puppets held the suits of armor up to the goo, filling them up before pushing them away. The suits of armor slumped. The older ones, ‘alive’ for thirty seconds or so, abruptly straightened. They marched away, leaving the line of slumped armors to join a block of upright armors.

And what a block. It was a platoon. Larger than that. An army of the armors, lined up neatly in a square. It reminded Ike of the puppets from the Abyss, but somehow more primitive. Simpler.

But no less dangerous. Ike eyed the armor. Would the spider fang work on metal? Besides, the puppets he had worked with earlier were meant to appear human. They didn’t prioritize attack and defense. They also included human details. Human details that might have weakened their bodies. These, on the other hand, were walking weapons. Nothing more than killing machines.

The contents of the black goo weren’t entirely a surprise. The mana had to come from somewhere. What could convert lunam, or anything, to mana? Beasts, and by extension, humans. He didn’t know how it worked. If he mashed beasts and humans together, there was no chance he’d make mana-producing goo. But it did make sense, to him, in an abstract sort of way.

The real question is how it keeps regenerating. I kind-of understand how the goo is made, but I don’t understand how it perpetuates itself. Is it some kind of lifeform? An undead lifeform? He considered, then shrugged. It wasn’t that important. He had no desire to make the black goo himself. He would use it, but not make it.

It is tragic, but… they’re already dead. Might as well make use of them, Ike reasoned.

He sighed aloud. “We need to stop this, don’t we.”

“Yeah. We should,” Wisp agreed.

Ike stepped forward. He rolled up his sleeves. “Let’s get to work. Take a look around, and we’ll meet back here in ten.”

The two of them split up, each one leaping in the opposite direction. Ike took a lap of the space, cataloging all the machinery. The meat grinder, the forge, and the metal-shaper were the largest magical machines in the space. Smaller machines whirred away, working on things Ike couldn’t hope to understand, but they seemed largely irrelevant to the general process of the automated procedures.

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

Gotta smash the big three, he noted, moving along.

The assembly puppets all worked in a line at the end. They picked up the pieces and assembled them, tightening screws by hand and placing all the parts in the appropriate order. They were the easiest part to break, but also the easiest to replace. As he watched, a new assembly puppet stepped from a cabinet up against the wall and rejoined the assembly line. Dozens of cabinets lined the walls, doubtlessly equally full of puppets. Ike turned, eyeing the army as well. If he smashed all the assemblers, including the cabinets, what said an army puppet couldn’t step forward and join the lines?

Whatever action I take will doubtlessly draw the puppet army’s ire. They could be like the puppets in the Abyss, unresponsive to almost any stimuli, but I doubt it. That one was walking up the stairs earlier. And these… they just seem more threatening, I guess. Less likely to be in storage mode, or whatever was happening to those other puppets.

Since I’ll draw the army’s ire, I need to take the most direct action to disable the assembly line, not the easiest. Just smashing the assembly puppets isn’t enough. I need to somehow disable those giant machines. The same ones that are easily churning up mage and beast bodies and smelting who-knows-what-kind of magical metal. I know from experience that beasts’ bones and hides can be incredibly tough. This isn’t going to be easy.

He returned to his starting point. A moment later, a thump told him that Wisp had returned as well. “What do you think?”

Wisp hummed. “The grinder’s the obvious one, isn’t it? Lots of moving parts. Probably be pretty easy to knock around, compared to the other two. I mean, a forge is just a furnace, and the other’s kind of just a glorified hammer.”

“But you can use the black goo to make more black goo,” Ike pointed out.

“Enough for a whole army? Plus, do you think they know that?” she asked.

Ike thought for a moment. “I think we go after the grinder and the metal shaper. The forge is whatever. They can build a new one pretty easily. Those two are going to be the hardest to rebuild.”

“Right. And the rest of it, if we’ve got time?” Wisp asked.

“Yeah. I mean, burn it to the ground if you can, but…” Ike spread his hands.

“You got it. I’ll take the meat grinder. I’ve always wanted to try people sausage.”

Ike froze. He narrowed his eyes at Wisp.

She gave him an innocent look. “A joke! It was a joke.”

“I’m never sure, with you,” Ike said.

“But, you know, if there’s human sausage in there—”

Ike’s glare grew sharper.

She laughed. “Joking, joking. C’mon. Let’s go.” Without waiting for Ike to respond, she leaped toward the meat grinder.

Ike stared after her. He sighed, shaking his head. I am using the black goo myself, so I guess I can’t throw stones. He jumped toward the metal-shaper. Even as he jumped, he drew back his fist. He drew aether into it, circulating it in his fist. To the bursting point, then over. Green shockwaves built up around his fist. His fist shook from the effort. His bones trembled and his tendons ached. He was damaging his fist just to stock up energy, but right now, his healing could keep up.

When he unleashed it, though…

Ike dropped toward the hammer. He let his fist fly.