*(mood song: "Pet Shop Boys - Opportunities")

Erik woke up now having digested everything and walked to the armoury.

Rose: [are you sure about this? isn't it too dangerous? what about your pregnancy?]

Erik was equipping the big power armor and adding it the alien tech core to fuse to its chest [...there's no other choice, I need to go inside the forge with this core and it's linked with this body... I need to be present, and the babies are still not too big anyway... did you get everything ready?]

Rose: [yeah, hope the sound waves work, but just in case I made sure it's completely airtight, with nanobot sealed joints] referring to a set of hundreds of small speakers and five subwoofers on the back, they would continuously reverberate creating a continuous sound wave.

Erik: [the power armor will protect me but the waves will reverberate and disorient anything alive down there... hopefully, we will also need the battlebots and drones too..., by the way, did Amanda finish her core and procedures?]

Rose: [her? not at all, at her current pace I estimate it will take her at least 6568 years to finish]

Erik paused a bit startled at the estimation [so long?]

Rose: [what did you expect? you told me to let her understand at her own pace, if I put myself to it then... a week maybe?, a month if I take it easy (´_ゝ`) ]

Erik: [but you would just replace whatever you wanted that way... it just doesn't feel right...]

Rose: [it is what it is, can't ask for pears from a poplar tree... and speaking of trees... you might wanna check the chestnut trees before you go]

Erik: [Oh? didn't I add plenty of fertilizer last week? I added some sweet algae exterior shells and some used up glow algae from the greenhouse along with all the kitchen waste if I remember correctly]

Rose: [you might have added too much lately? anyways... just see for yourself...]

Erik came down in the power armor to the third floor and became slack jawed by what he saw "they are... glowing?"

Rose: [yeah... seems like plants can mutate too, and your trees are pretty advanced lifeforms but these algae have lots of characteristics they lack, so they've been absorbing quite a lot, they still need air though... for now]

Erik got close to one of the trees and coming out of the power armor lightly caressed the trunk, now possessing cyan colored glowing nodes at some parts, its leaves now longer and having a touch of blue on its borders [this looks so cool, can't wait for it to give chestnuts... will need to keep an eye on what I give it or boil the things I give it first though... well, since I'm here...] he spotted one of the giant chickens then pecking something out of the ground, he got closer and saw a twenty centimeters long and 4 centimeters thick worm on its beak [...this... even the worms... sigh... you know... this mutation field gets annoying sometimes...].

Rose: [ well, I can't turn it off so... ¯\_(´_ゝ`)_/¯ ]

Erik sighed and went back upstairs, the power armor following after him.

Rose: [by the way, I connected to your pod and I'm controlling your avatar as you asked but... the rebel leader asked for a meeting, apparently he wants to ask you about the dozens of his soldiers that died during the last expedition]

Erik: [... hmm... tell him about Khroom and how his sacrifice saved us all, give a title or something to his sister and also ask the sister for a memento of him to bury in a ceremonial grave, make him into a hero, and as for the other's give a generous compensation to their families and talk about them as heroes, say this "my people! we are one step closer to ridding our home from the dangers of the past! some might think we failed, but we came back alive! now we know what we are dealing with! and we know how to kill it! there were lots of heroes that day, they fought bravely so that we could escape! my entire royal guard gave their lives for that purpose, and also others like Khroom" here then look at his sister and say "he was truly a hero, and will be remembered as such..." look back to the crowd, and finish with "we will build a statue with their names engraved so that they shall never be forgotten!" that will probably make them cheer you and work harder from that moment on]

Rose: [...you are good at this]

Erik shrugged [I've been trained for a lot of situations, and that involves my spaceship landing in an alien city too, so I'm trained in how to give speeches, a first impression is important after all, and since it could cause a galactic war with an even more advanced species... then it's even more important]

Rose: [that makes sense... but why do you keep those memories so protected? it's really hard to read those parts, not like I've tried or anything... ( ͡°^ ͡°)]

Erik: [sigh... I guess it should be 'cause of how we were trained, they used equipment to stimulate our brains so that those memories are considered essential by the brain and it doesn't delete them with time, we have lots of emotions and other stimuli attached to all those memories so they can be recalled almost like a VR movie ]

Rose: [hmm... that explains those, but there are some other deep memories that I can't seem to read...]

Erik: [... then don't, those... are private... we all have our demons...]

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Rose fell silent as Erik explained the situation to Inky that was waiting at the top of the stairs, Anhuka, Crabina, and the elders also waiting behind.

Inky: "didn't you go with the avatar? why are you in the power armor?"

Erik: "well, that door needs me to open it, it should be way safer now, but the water inside will be totally unbreathable for any marine creature, but don't worry... I will be back I promise"

Inky: "b-but... I can't avoid worrying!, can't I go with you on my own armor?"

Erik: "you and your avatar bodies both need oxygen my love, and extracting oxygen from the water constantly uses a lot of energy, while I have my suit ready with a big electrolysis generator I'm not so sure the powercore batteries in yours would last long enough, it's like constantly firing continuously"

Inky: "I don't care, I'm not letting you go there alone"

Erik: [...can you-]

Rose: [...yeah I can set her power armor too, why not... (´_ゝ`) ]

Erik: [thanks, by the way, did you finish the new hand cannon?]

Rose: [yeah, backpack of ammo and an autoloader, you should be able to deal quite the carnage if needed ლ(´ڡ`ლ)]

Erik: [thanks Rose]

Rose: [you are welcome (✿╹◡╹)]

Erik looked back at Inky and said "alright, but it will be dangerous, get ready"

Inky nodded seriously "alright"

He then turned to the others as the elders just nodded at him, they had heard his explanation to Inky after all, as for Anhuka she hugged him and said "please be safe"

Erik: "I will, take care of Crabina while I'm gone"

Anhuka nodded seriously "I will, whatever it takes"

Crabina hugged Erik too with worried eyes "daddy... be safe".

Causing Erik to pat her head with a comforting smile "I will sweety"

The other elders also wishing him a safe journey, except Timberly who said "let's celebrate once you are back, and you better make me another suit for next time too!" then remembering something added "oh, and I'm gonna drink all of your humanizer juice in your fridge"

Erik nodded and said "that's fine, the next time for sure"

--- two days later, dead area tunnel entrance ---

Inky, Erik, Rose, and Amanda were there, Inky was wearing her tailed sleek power armor, with a power sword on her waist, plenty of ammunition, and grenade pouches all over her chest and waist.

While Erik was wearing the hulking super power armor, a beast of metal with now a super sound system and drone hives on the back, all armed with plasma weapons, Rose constantly upgraded the suit so the movement was now smooth and fluid, as needles were stable into Erik's body, reading his nerve responses in real time, a helmet in his head for the more complex motions, the robot was almost two times the size of the power armors though, but if the tunnel didn't change then it wouldn't be a problem as the tunnel from last time was at least nine meters high in most parts, and the most important part, the two meter long automatic hand cannon with a rate of fire of one explosive bullet every second, it didn't sound like much, but accompanied by the 25 centimeters long explosive projectiles the result was devastatingly explosive, if even with that anything managed to get close enough though, it also had rotatory hands with extra sharp fingers, capable of using them like claws, drills or to chop and skewer through even stones.

Behind them were Erik's power armor with Amanda's battlebot inside and two dozens basic battlebots controlled by Rose that were little more than walking bombs carrying explosive harpoon launchers.

Erik examined the pumping devices and wondered outloud "maybe I should just pull them out? no..., first take it out of the lava river maybe? but what if they are still alive... Rose what do you think?.... Rose?" but there was no response, so he turned around, seeing all her battlebots standing in place.

Rose snapped out of her thoughts *sorry, the shadow claw tribe is a mess, the speech calmed things down, but obviously seeing a secret hulking metal armor and battle bots certainly made the people afraid, and you saying you were my boss didn't help much*

Erik: "oh that?, yeah the guards shot at me but it did no damage at all... that was fun, I just walked through the doors like nothing"

Amanda *but... isn't it in the colonization directives to integrate into local civilizations and learn their customs?*

Erik looked at Inky "indeed... and I did that already, in fact..." he touched his belly "I went above and beyond... see this beauty over here, she's the living proof, and we have even further proof inside"

Inky blushed inside her helmet as she punched up at the waist of his taller mech armor "oh stop it! but really... their faces were quite something when you walked into the plaza with the guards after us, they were readying for war when their queen just told them that shiny metallic being was their queen's boss they were so dumbfounded haha~"

Erik chuckled "yeah that was fun..."

--- flashback, a fort near the entrance of the shadow claw tribe ---

Erik and the others approached the guard post of the shadow claw tribe, loud exclamations coming from the walls, a shortly a loud horn was sounded, arrows being shot at them.

Erik clicked his tongue "sigh, these barbarians disrespecting their queen, not like they can stop me though~" [hey Rose, tell them something]

Rose: [I was still talking to Trebetuk after the discourse, it was a success by the way but... Trebetuk just doesn't shut up...]

Erik: [Rose, you are the queen, just say this "we will continue another day, something urgent came up" and just come, no need to give him any other explanation, an image is worth more than a thousand words after all, once I arrive everyone will see~]

Rose: [I take it you are enjoying the new power armor? (≖ᴗ≖✿)]

Erik ran through the fort's doors and sped right through the fort, Amanda, Inky, and the bots running after him [yeah jajaja, I see you fixed the mobility issue, taking it here was a pain, but having hands that can drill through stone really helped, we will probably need to patch that hole with a proper hatch at some point though]

Rose: [well, once the forge is back at work we..., well I will do much more, I didn't have enough metal for the submarine to explore the octopeople city ruins, but now I could even be extravagant]

Erik: [yeah, I'm sure we will find something cool there] he saw the shadow claw tribes walls as he ran out of a tunnel into an enormous cavern, archers and some cannoneers lining the walls [oh, I arrived, are you there yet? they are about to fire]

A bot behind him answering instead *I am*.

A loud shout was then heard "SOLDIERS OF THE SHADOW CLAW TRIBE! STAND DOWN! THAT'S AN ALLY OF OUR TRIBE!" the doors of the tribe were then opened as queen Erika (Rose) came out of the tribe's doors followed by her guards and walked right in front of Erik, Trebetuk and others walking warily behind her, but she then did something no one imagined she would, she kneeled her right knee to the ground and bowed to Erik "my lord, hope you had a pleasant travel!"

All the shadow claw tribe soldiers and citizens were left slack jawed, most soldiers dropping their weapons out of pure surprise.

But then, Erik nodded to Rose and talked in a majestic voice loudly amplified by the speakers "PEOPLE OF THE SHADOW CLAW TRIBE, I'VE COME TO FINISH WHAT YOU STARTED, I WILL END THE MONSTERS OF THE DEEP! AFTER THAT THIS TRIBE SHALL ENTER A NEW GOLDEN AGE!"

The silence lasted a couple of seconds as Erik just kept on running past the shadow claw tribe, cheers, and all kinds of speculation left behind.

--- Back to the present ---

Erik looked and the rubble and started pressurizing his cannon "anyways... let's crack this nut open!"