Chapter 290

Red Sands Desert, Principality of Rebirth

Dungeon Factory, Workshop

Alexandra frowned as she looked at the prototypes.

Okay, so an autocannon wasn't that easy to make for a tank. Actually, an autocannon wasn't easy to make period. There were a lot of problems once you started upping the rate of fire. Fortunately, there were solutions, but those meant choices and...

And Alexandra couldn't refuse her daughter, which meant that instead of staying on course for a single weapon, they'd branched out.

Which was why she now had three final prototypes. One was a simple autocannon, twenty millimeters, just like the ones the Old World armored personnel carriers had used during their attack on the town. It was simple, effective, and a ton of ammo, giving it great utility for a sustained engagement. It, however, lacked massively in shock power. As sustainable as it was, a steady stream of fire from a single twenty millimeter didn't compare to two field guns in shock and awe, not to mention it would have a lot of problems against more heavily armored targets. Which would have been insane to say on Earth, after all she was fighting knights and trebuchets, but this was Alcheryos, where the knights had armor plating that could shrug off bullets and the trebuchets had energy shields.

The second prototype was more worrying. They couldn't bring the rate of fire of the autocannon up because it started to seriously overheat and have some breech and ammunition loading issues.

So they'd reached for the simplest solution: add more barrels. They'd run into problems almost immediately. Namely, the tank was a walker, and that meant a lot more issues than what a, say, thread powered vehicle would encounter. Namely, there were complex mechanisms at weird places within the body to allow the damned thing to walk, which you couldn't really move without having to redesign the entire thing, and that meant a large turret with multiple ammo feeds going back into the body was a no go. So, no opium dream like Traveller's 'urban pacification robot' and it's giant array of autocannons.

Instead they'd put all the barrels on the same ammunition feed, and eventually on a single gun mount. They'd, eventually, built a twenty millimeter gatling gun.

They'd solved the fire rate problem quite handily.

Problem was, they'd solved it too harshly. As in 'that thing will shoot out its ammo supply in fifteen seconds flat'. That was a problem with all high speed gatling weapons to be fair, but still. Plus that wasn't even mentioning the vibrations or recoil. Mythril covered a multitude of sins but there were limits.

So they'd toned it down. Now the gun would 'only' put thirty rounds down range every second, or about eighteen hundred a minute, at maximum fire rate, and unless in absolute emergencies the tank was locked to a more reasonable ten rounds per second, allowing it to fire for an amazing three minutes at that rate. Which, to be fair, wasn't bad at all, given the obscene amount of space the ammo feed for that monstrosity took, especially since they were still limited to their 'low tech'.

The third prototype was when CQ had declared she'd had an idea, gone into the deeper reaches of the workshop, and brought back the Praetorian Guard's grenade launchers, and asked if they could do the same but with that.

The answer was no. Not with low technology.

But they'd built a high tech variant, based on the Omega-class spidertank chassis...

They had created a monster. Twenty millimeter rounds were terrifying, but no one should have to contemplate what thirty, forty millimeter grenades per second did to anything. They'd even made an ammo mix, with a pulse grenade to shred armor followed up by a variety of high explosive rounds to widen the breach, and finally airburst shrapnel to finish off whatever the hell had been exposed.

CQ called it the can opener special, and Alexandra couldn't agree more. Its only weakness was how horribly long and expensive it was to make the ammunition for it. For that matter, that was also one of the problems for the twenty millimeter Gatling. Alexandra had gotten the ammo costs way down from where they used to be, but it was simply to wasteful to use in most combat settings. Not just in terms of raw costs either, but now that her army was operating on the end of a supply line, such an ammo hog was a huge liability when she had to ship the ammo via airships.

"I got it!"

Alexandra screamed as she threw herself away from the workbench and whirled around in a fighting stance, before blinking as she found herself face to face with Ghost, her other self with her hands raised.

"Holy shit, are you alright?"

"Don't sneak up on me like that! What the fuck?!?"

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Ghost held her hands further apart in a conciliatory gesture.

"Sorry, sorry! Just...I didn't think I was being that quiet."

"You can knock you know!"

"I got excited."

Alexandra sighed.

"So can I. Alright, spit it out. What have you found?"

"I got it! The killswitch in the dungeon core!"

Alexandra froze.

"Show me."

*****

"Damn." Said Alexandra as they stood in the simulated house, the code hovering over the table. Despite both of them having physical forms now, it was still easier to handle coding matters here. Especially sensitive stuff that should be kept away from Emilia and her maids. "So, this is it?"

"This is it." Confirmed Ghost, as she gestured at the floating code, zooming on certain sections. "See this? Most of these are base functions. Written like the rest of the normal code, not modifications by the God of Fire."

"That seems more like an abort sequence than a self destruct."

"That's because it is! One part lead me to the other, but effectively there are two killswitches. One is a simple forced shutdown, the other one is more...violent."

"Violent how?"

"Boom."

"Ah. Large boom?"

"That's...hard to tell. I don't quite understand what it does. But from what I can tell it rapidly disperses the essence, the mana, like some kind of fuel jettison system, and then blows the core up."

"So a failsafe, not a deliberate suicide detonation."

"Yeah, but the dispersal is so rapid it should have the equivalent effect of, well, exactly what happened when you annihilated the Republic's army, combined with someone blowing up a pile of mana crystals."

"So, like scramming a fusion reactor? Hot plasma everywhere?"

"Pretty much the magical equivalent of that."

Alexandra tapped her chin as she looked at the code.

"Interesting. So pretty much civilian failsafes."

"Yep."

"I assume our Divine friend tapped into those functions?"

"Yeah." Ghost grimaced, rubbing her neck. "And that's the weird part."

"Why?"

"Because they have activation sequences and communication systems. But instead the God of Fire just...built his own."

"So, either he didn't have the codes..."

"Or he didn't trust the ones who made the cores."

"That...might explain a lot."

"Yeeeep."

Alexandra put her hand on her other self's shoulder.

"Good work, I mean it."

"Thanks." Ghost couldn't meet her other self's gaze, and Alexandra sighed.

"You did it, didn't you? You and Emilia."

"Yes?" Said Ghost, and Alexandra's ears prickled.

Her other self was lying. Why would she lie about that? She wouldn't unless...

Unless she did something she considered worse.

"What did you do?"

"Nothing!"

Alexandra's eyes narrowed. She knew that tone. She knew that face.

"Allow me to rephrase then, what are you two planning?"

Ghost stayed silent.

"You remember our deal, correct? Our truce?" Said Alexandra, and Ghost nodded.

"Of course!"

The dungeon core eyed her other self suspiciously, but finally let go.

"Alright then. I'll find whatever you're planning, and turn it against you."

"Of course you will. Now, didn't you have a little diplomacy scheduled?"

It was a blatant attempt at deflecting and changing the subject, but Alexandra sighed as she checked the time. Her other self was right.

"Yep, it is. Time to see if those little moles will finally talk to us."

"Tired of digging tunnels, are they?"

Alexandra smiled.

"More of having them collapse on top of their sappers' heads."

The troops Sunrise had trapped within the fortresses had tried a whole panoply of tricks to get out or at least annoy her, and a couple had taken her by surprise, but, well, she had a lot of explosives, including seismic charges. Part of one of the fortresses' cellar collapsing thanks to a particularly potent charge was probably the deciding factor in them ceasing their constant attempts to dig new tunnels and entrances to launch a surface counter attack.

They were starting to get desperate too. Not because they were surrounded, but because they'd heard the main body of the army moving out. They had to be panicking that they weren't buying time, and would just be sieged down by a reserve force.

That...wasn't actually the case however. Her main force had simply moved out to greet some friends.

"Then I suppose it's high time to give them a way out."

"Yep."

*****

The golem that came carrying the white flag was not just another disposable pawn. This time it was an ambassador, sheathed in holographic finery and holding a full, white flag.

It simply put itself in front of one of the few remaining entrances, and waited.

After only a dozen minutes waiting, a knight, grimy and battered, but still standing proud, exited the fortress, holding a similar flag.

"Hail, dungeon core Crystal!" Said the knight. "I recognize your flag of truce, and speak in the name of Count Malikan, ruler of the Elden Forest and colonel of the Southern Army of Restoration, commanding officer of the Alesian fortress line!"

"Hail, knight and herald." Answered the dungeon core, and she smiled as she saw the knight shiver at her voice, who was so cold it almost reached absolute zero. "I am here to discuss terms."

The knight nodded.

"My lord had surmised as such. Under what conditions shall they be hammered out?"

Alexandra extended her hand, and a golem walked out of the endless ranks of her army, presenting a box with a little satin pillow and a scroll placed upon it. The Earth-born grabbed the scroll, and raised it.

"The terms are thus. Both leaders shall meet on the surface today at sunset under flags of truce, with an entourage of no more than ten soldiers each. This meeting shall last for no longer than eight hours, and the safety of all will be guaranteed by the World Mage Court, the Merchants guild and the Syndicate of the dark elves." She placed the scroll back onto its pillow, and the golem slowly made its way to the knight, offering it to him.

The knight hesitated for a second, before deciding that honor or no, politeness cost him nothing, and when in doubt it was probably wise to assume the dungeon's creatures where an extension of her. He bowed as he took the scroll, before bowing again to the ambassador.

"Thank you, wise dungeon core. I will take this to my commander at once."

Alexandra nodded, and watched him disappear back into the entrance, before making her ambassador retreat, and changing the hologram back to its old configuration.

"Do you believe they will accept?" Said the Count as she entered the field command center, which was pretty much a bunker they're appropriated. She'd tried to dissuade the noble to get down on the ground, but he'd steadfastly refused, wanting to see the death and destruction with his own eyes. She'd eventually caved in, mainly thanks to CQ promising she'd keep an eye on him.

"They think their leverage is quickly vanishing. They're terrified that I'll just bypass them and leave them to rot. So yes, I think they'll bite. Now, if they'll take my proposal is another matter entirely."

"It is poetic justice of the highest order."

"I know. But those are prideful bastards. Especially their higher ups."

"Prideful or not, every noble has to have a pragmatic streak, or they would never last for very long." The Count shrugged as she looked at him. "I am speaking from experience. Either one learns to the realities of the world, or either your domain will collapse or you will be removed by a fellow noble or one's overlord."

"True, I suppose. Alright then, let's wait and see which way they jump. Game of cards? We have some time before the suns sets."

"Will CQ be joining us?"

"Do you want to get your ass kicked that badly?"

The Count grimaced.

"No, I suppose not. Let's lay them out."