After watching the Bloody Hand march past, the street gradually began to return to normal. Dorian was able to quickly find me the enchantments that I needed, and even suggested a few defensive ones. Given how I had been willing to pay such a large fee for the concealment charms, as well as my level, she gave me quite powerful defenses.
Most importantly, the use of these charms was rather simple, since they had been designed with the inventory system in mind. As long as the charm was placed in one of the inventory slots, it would remain active, attaching itself to your soul. When I heard that, I was quite impressed. “You said that this combination is the most popular for inventories?” I asked, able to see the black film appearing over my inventory.
“That’s right.” Dorian responded with a confident nod. “Unless you are either carrying nothing of value, or a large number of valuables, this is the most common combination.”
“Why those distinctions?” I asked, raising my brow curiously.
“It’s really quite simple. If you have nothing worth stealing, then there is no need to spend money to hide anything. On the other hand, if your inventory is filled with treasures, then even a random robbery will have a high chance of getting something valuable. For those cases, given the inherent wealth of those that this option applies to, it is more common to disguise the individual treasures. If people think that you have nothing to steal, they are less likely to try.”
“Meanwhile, if they see a black screen, they know that it’s a gamble. Rogues have a naturally high luck, but those who often use these powers to steal have that luck offset by their karma. In that case, they’ll judge how many pages of inventory space you have to approximate your level. If you’re strong enough to scare them, they won’t take that gamble. If not, they will typically try their luck before attempting a quick escape.”
I gave a small nod when I heard that. There was never anything like a perfect method to protect ones’ belongings. Even the Sky Citadel had been invaded in the past, so I naturally couldn’t expect this inventory to be perfectly secure. It was nice that there were some level of defenses in place, at least.
After paying for the rest of my defensive charms, I once more moved out and into the streets of Gandor. After the passing of Aurivy’s armed troops, the mood of the festival seemed decidedly less festive than it was before. Thankfully, there were those who were trying to restore the atmosphere, laughing and cheering as they shopped happily along the street.
Honestly, there were a few other souvenirs that I was interested in while I was out. The first was a figurine set of all of the Greater Pantheon, as well as the Keeper’s servants. Next was a scale model of the Sky Citadel, which was… honestly pretty accurate. The real scary thing I found was the scale model of Olympus, which was already in several street stalls.
They must have worked hard to grasp the external layout of Olympus so well in such a short time. I was just glad that there wasn’t a model of the interior. That would be far harder to obtain, unless I somehow decided to do a grand tour of our new home. Which was not going to happen.
With the festive atmosphere returning, I allowed myself to once again immerse in it. Whether it was the clattering bones of silly, dancing skeletons, or the lighthearted music that filled the air. Now was the time to relax.
“Haahh…” A long sigh echoed out in the workshop, a redheaded dwarf looking down at the item on the table before him. “Where in the blazes did ye even find somethin’ like this, lass?”
The item that he was inspecting was no larger than his own hand, with four metallic legs and a thin frame. Its density was no more than a centimeter, its width only three or four, depending on the extent of the damaged areas.
Nearby, a human woman with golden hair stood, smiling softly. “I was roaming around on my own when I found this on an asteroid. Do you think you can restore it?”
“Aye, aye.” Tubrock said with a rumbling chuckle. “I can restore it, alright. Now that I’ve seen the thing with me own eyes, shouldn’t be a problem to fill in the blanks. What do you want its function to be for the codin’?”
Elisae blinked in response, tilting her head slightly. “Wouldn’t you just be restoring its original function?”
“Its circuits were wiped, so I can’t do that. But this little guy can scout, manufacture, mine, or even serve as a communication device! If ye get enough of ‘em, they can connect together to form larger structures.”
Elisae thought about it for a moment. “In that case, would it be helpful to set this first one to the task of reproduction? Though, would that mean that the ones it create automatically have that task?”
Tubrock shook his head, a black hammer appearing in his hand. “It’ll handle the physical components. I’ll be needing to make another one to program them into different types. Otherwise, they’ll be blank slates.” As he said that, he lifted his hammer, bringing it down as if to smash the drone to pieces.
Elisae’s eyes widened, but his hammer came down before she could say anything. Rather than destroying the drone, there was a blast of golden sparks. His brows were tightly knit, and Elisae could see golden strands of light filling in the gaps of the broken machine.
The third occupant of the room, Clara, watched all of this with a happy smile. Once this is fixed up, and the various drone types are set, I can ask for a couple to use on my mining planet. Sienna can do the basic smelting and resource harvesting, and these little guys can do the more complex crafting.
As these thoughts flashed by, Tubrock’s hammer slammed down again and again, each strike filling in a bit more of the drone’s frame. After roughly one hundred strikes of the pitch black hammer, Tubrock set it over his shoulder, wiping his brow. “Aye, it’s done.” He said, a golden spark traveling from his finger to the drone. “As long as it’s supplied with enough iron, copper, titanium, and tungsten, it’ll be able to continuously reproduce. I limited its range of activities to just this table, to prevent it from getting out of control.”
After saying that, he extended his hand, and four large ingots printed themselves on the table in bursts of white light. The body of the drone clicked, standing up on its four legs and quickly running over to the ingots. Tiny lasers emerged from its ‘mouth’, consuming the various ingots.
While the ingots were being consumed, a stream of silver liquid fell from its midsection, running across the table to form three different lines. Each of these three lines began to bubble, rising up into an entirely new drone sitting in standby mode.
“Nanomachines!” Clara shouted happily, seeing the construction method of the drone. Obviously, it couldn’t produce drones the size of itself with its own body, so it had to make the parts internally, first. She was just happy that those parts took the form of nanomachines, opening up a wide range of different possibilities. “But wait… if they’re made of interconnected nanomachines, why did the one Elisae found not dissolve into silver fluid when it was broken?”
“That’s an easy one, lass.” Tubrock said with a shake of his head. “After the initial production period, the nanomachines become inert, unable to move independently. To do so again, they need to receive a special signal with an encrypted command. Otherwise, they can be blasted to bits and won’t dissolve. It’d be mighty inconvenient if an entire section of spaceship hull were to be liquified after a single blast, aye?”
Clara blinked, nodding her head in agreement. “Alright! So, what next? I’ve already picked out a starting point for the new empire, and these little guys can help us with the basic infrastructure in no time!”
“Ye’ll need to help us get there, then.” Tubrock said with a nod. “Let’s not be botherin’ the little lass about this right now.”
“Not asking for Aurivy transport?” Clara blinked again, before simply nodding. “Sun should be able to move us there, as well. Navigation via star maps should fall under her domain.”
While her Virtual self was laying the groundwork for her machine empire, Clara’s real self was welcoming Sienna back to her mining world. The taciturn elf’s eyes scanned the area, seeing the simple foundation that Clara had erected in a wide clearing. “This the base?” She asked curiously, to which Clara nodded her head.
“Were you able to already make the logistics monsters?” There was an eager tone in her voice as she asked that, seeing Sienna hugging her sickle weasel against her chest.
“Mhm. It was easy once I had a template.” After saying that, Sienna’s shadow erupted out across the ground behind her, covering over a kilometer. Six different types of beasts emerged, one after another. The first was a swarm of small, bat-like creatures without eyes, flying off in all directions. “Scouters. Can scan underground for ore deposits, and recognize different types.”
The second was a hulking monstrosity with a massive stomach, looking like a cross between a toad, a bull, and a boulder. “Transporters. Internal storage space in their stomachs, and can spit out anything they eat.”
Next came an entire pack of creatures that looked like wolves with sharp claws and thick legs, growling as they sat next to the transporters. “Miners. Powerful legs can dig up ores, and even crystal veins.”
The fourth was another massive beast, this one with four powerful legs and an almost cube-like body. When these appeared, they began lumbering forward, planting themselves on the foundation Clara had erected. “Smelter. Ingests ores and provides refined materials.”
The fifth was a group of chittering ants with saw-like mandibles, each ant standing nearly a meter tall at the shoulder. “Loggers. Can harvest and process wood.”
Finally, the last type of monster to appear was a single, slowly-moving… brain? There was a thin, almost transparent layer of flesh covering the brain, and six small legs beneath it. “Commander.” Sienna nodded her head. “Can communicate and deliver orders to the others, and recognize speech for commands.”
After she said that, she turned to the commander. “Locate iron and wood, smelt ingots and produce even planks. If you find Blood Heart, mark it and set it as secondary priority.” The commander creature let out a soft humm at that, the other monsters all moving out to scatter through the surroundings, with the exception of the smelters who would become a permanent addition to the factory.
Clara’s eyes widened as she saw the monster split off. The giant ants began sawing at nearby trees, carefully lowering them onto the bodies of other ants before stripping the bark and cutting along the grain. “Okay, Sienna… I admit it, you did great.” Sienna puffed out her chest proudly at the praise.
“If you need more, let me know. I can produce as many as needed from shadow.” She said, before thinking and adding on. “If the supply of this planet isn’t enough, I’ll make teleporting ones to go to your other planets, and variants for different atmospheres.”
“No, no, that’s fine!” Clara rapidly shook her head. “I won’t need to start mining the other planets for a long time. Besides, I’d need about eight billion of those wolves to be able to mine this planet dry before its regular refresh.”
Sienna blinked, nodding her head. “Eight billion… I’ll need a few years… and the others to keep up… They have weak reproduction ability, so need to manually create.”
Clara’s brow twitched, and she leaned forward to flick Sienna’s forehead. “Okay, you did that one on purpose.”
Sienna brought one hand up to her forehead, pouting before showing just the tiniest smile. “Maybe.”
