The Hundred Reigns 255: The Workshop of Horrors (14) (Patreon)

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The elevator took them down into the Mechanical Tower’s depths. 

The descent seemed to go on forever. One of Simon’s Titles allowed him to map out any place he had been to, so any area he explored would provide valuable intel in the future, but the sheer length of the trip made him wonder if this place wasn’t somehow bigger than the Church’s Lighthouse in Valendre. Its partial invisibility always masked its true size, so it might very well be the biggest man-made structure on Brimir. 

“I would have expected you to use teleportation or a more advanced form of transportation than elevators,” Simon commented. “How… primitive.”

“We had to take steps to prevent any unwelcome teleportation or summoning inside the premises,” one of the two Carlos said. It didn’t surprise Simon that the maniac would create more than one copy of himself, and he would also bet neither of these two was the real one. “Safety trumps expediency.”

“Do not expect to escape the premises,” the other duplicate added. “You will be under constant surveillance during your indeterminate stay here.”

Simon guessed they had sensory and recording spells similar to the ones his father used in his doomsday bunkers. Two iron golems also escorted them down for good measure, and their other magical defenses were formidable. Simon had tried to telepathically contact Agrat and Shabram, to no avail. The Mechanical Tower’s barrier blocked telepathy the same way the Sanctuary’s and Illusea’s did. 

He thankfully had a plan to get around it based on his experience with the kish people; a loophole that should allow him to besiege this place from the inside. Simon was bidding his time until he could locate Jym and Magda, after which all hell would break loose. 

The elevator finally slowed down and opened into a metal room that likely served as a security checkpoint. Two automatons kept watch over two dozen crystal balls connected to strange cables wired into the floor. Their surfaces showed images of various areas.

The barrier should interfere with divination, so how can they transmit sensory information? Simon wondered as he allowed his captors to guide him to a corridor heading east. The metal doors opened and closed on their own without human intervention, just like in the Goetia Research Facility. Do they transmit it through manalith cables to avoid interference? 

The corridor slithered between a set of empty cells protected from the outside world by magical forcefields. Accommodations were simple, and there were no other prisoners held within these walls. 

“Will this be my new home?” Simon wondered. “Do you keep Coil and Magda in one of these cells?”

“You will see them after the surgery,” one of the fake Carlos replied. “Not before.”

“What surgery?” Simon inquired once they crossed the next set of metal doors. The room beyond it was clearly some kind of advanced medical ward crammed with operation tables and advanced equipment lined up in perfectly ordered fashion. Metal tubes similar to the Goetia Research Facility’s crystals produced light above the tables.

The most ominous part about this room was the machine in its center. The pristine white golem resembled a preying mantis with a single manalith eye and far too many arms, all of them fitted with scalpels, saws, syringes, and other surgical tools. Everything in this place was fully automated, even medicine. 

“Considering your political affiliation, you will be fitted with implants to ensure your cooperation,” one of the two Carlos explained. “They will include INT-increasing cranial boosters, mechanical organs to ensure your survival in more dangerous areas, and a bomb placed in your frontal lobe set to detonate should you leave the premises or disobey a direct order from a floor overseer.”

In short, they intended to put him under a mechanical equivalent of the Brand of Pride. How shameful for a Crafter to use an Overlord’s tactics against him. 

“Interesting proposition, but unfortunately for you, to use your own terms…” Simon clenched his fist in anticipation. “That outcome is highly improbable.”

The puppets underestimated him. “I recall telling you that your consent is purely optional.”

A notification showed up on Simon’s System screen to confirm his words. 

Sleep negated by Unyielding Essence. 

“Odorless gas?” Simon guessed, looking up and spotting vents in the ceiling. “You know, I actually used that on a traitor a long time ago.”

“Sleep protection?” One of the two Carlos appeared vaguely curious. “But you were checked for any magical items or crestones. Implants per–”

Simon backhanded that puppet and tore its head off its shoulders. 

An alarm sounded out in the medical ward before the wooden skull even hit the floor. The two iron golems sprang to action to intercept him, as did the surgical machine, but Simon simply waved his hand at them. 

“Chaos Wind.”

A ghostly gust of howling, screaming wind erupted from his palm with the force of a storm. It flowed out in the form of a purple smog that pushed back the sleeping gas in the air, snapped the metal doors off of their frames, and blasted back all the constructs against the nearest walls. Most shattered to pieces, with the remaining fake Carlo’s back breaking on impact with a sickening crack. He wasn’t human enough for the Madness effect to take over his mind, but it put him down for now.

“Foolish puppet man,” Simon said as he put on his Nightveil-cloaked Overlord armor. Silk and Velvet both emerged from his shadow, while he dropped Bert from his Inventory. “I expected you to bring me to this place, sooner or later.”

The puppet Carlo immediately recognized Bert’s puppet form, his eyebrows furrowing slightly without any fear. “Project 731.”

“Hello, Father,” Bert said as he sharpened his knife-fingers in anticipation. “Did you miss me?”

“No,” the puppet Crafter replied flatly. “You have been discarded.”

“Tell me… are you real enough to feel pain?” Bert lunged at him with fury and impaled him through the chest. “Let’s find out!”

“Do not destroy him too quickly,” Simon ordered as he brought out two teleportation gems from his Inventory and activated the inert one. The device spatially imprinted on their current location, which would allow anyone using it to return here so long as they managed to bypass the barrier. 

How lucky they were to have a person capable of doing just that.

“This is so messed up,” Velvet commented upon glancing at the fake Crafter with a look of disgust. “These powerful men are all the same.”

“We can still turn a profit from all of this,” her sister replied.  

“You know what to do,” Simon telepathically informed Silk as he tossed her the two gems. He couldn’t risk the enemy overhearing them through any form of sensors, so he insisted on using mental communication. “Use the left one to go to my base, then the right one to return with the reinforcements. Do not delay. Velvet, deal with the guards to the west.”

While Velvet reluctantly obeyed, an anti-artificial sword appearing in her hand, Bert began to disembowel the fake Carlo. Unfortunately for him, his puppet-creator didn’t have any organs beneath his skin, nor any sense of pain based on his bored expression.

“Argh, this is so unsatisfying!” Bert cursed. “Where is the real one?!”

“I will tell you nothing,” the puppet replied. His heart began to heat up and his wax-skin melted due to his self-destruct mechanism. 

“Your consent is optional,” Simon said as he cast Heart’s Desire on him before he could fully disintegrate. He had held off on doing so earlier in case his enemies could somehow detect his magic, but this should hopefully reveal valuable intel.

The puppet’s mental landscape was as flat as any of its other artificial kindred, but the picture it showed was truly abnormal; a sea of pipes and cables spiraling into a machine of incalculable proportions. In its heart pulsed a manalith core glowing like a star caught in a metal coffin, pumping out power and life. 

A Noble Crestone.

Has he incorporated the Crafter’s Crestone into a machine? Simon wondered as he returned to reality to find Bert cursing over a pile of molten wax and burned wood. Was that what he meant when he hoped to modify his Class? 

“I’m starting to see why you dislike your creator,” Simon telepathically informed Bert while he heard a ruckus from the corridor. Velvet had probably ambushed the golem sentries from earlier. “Any idea where we are?” 

“This must be the Medical Bay,” Bert hypothesized. “It’s usually placed on the lower levels. Sector 2, maybe 1.”

“So we’re much closer to the bottom than the top.” Simon sensed a powerful source of mana coming from deep below. “The Earth Megalith must be a few floors beneath us.”

“We can cut the power everywhere once we claim it,” Bert happily suggested. “The old fool will have no choice but to come down from his ivory throne and personally negotiate with us.”

It was a solid plan, and Silk soon teleported back with the troops required to make it a reality. Agrat appeared alongside her, holding the Lotan-bound pictobox with one hand and a stack of picture sheets with the other.

“Your Majesty, I unfortunately confirmed that our pictures may only hold a single soul at any given time, even when used on multiple subjects or a possessed vessel,” Agrat informed him telepathically. “Though I do think you’ll be pleased with this particular collection.”

“I’m sure I will.” Simon raised his hand at the stack. “Hellfire.”

He blasted the manalith sheets and an army of the Abyss escaped in triumph. Bound demons and noncorporeal undead of various forms and sizes filled the Medical Bay, from imps armed with pumpkin bombs to larger watchers. Agrat followed that up by using the pictobox to summon a weakened avatar of Lotan as well. All these months of research and preparing for the worst would now pay off.

“Agrat, take the troops and block the elevator shafts to ensure they cannot send reinforcements down here,” Simon ordered through telepathy. “Use Lotan to plug the path to the upper levels, then tear this place apart until you bring me Jym and Magda Coil. I want them alive and unharmed. Eliminate anyone else offering resistance.” 

His demonic troops roared and spread out to unleash hell as the alarm continued to ring out. Only Bert and the Rogue twins remained at his side. 

“There’s something wrong with the masked golems,” Velvet warned him upon returning to his side. Her sword was drenched in glistening oil. “They triggered my Assassin Perks.”

“So?” Simon inquired. 

“So they should only work on humanoids.”

The implications deeply disturbed Simon, who was now determined to get to the bottom of things; in more ways than one. 

“What are you?” the inhuman voice from earlier rang out from the walls, nearly startling Simon. “The others match the files of Elsa Nightingale, Project 731, and the archfiend Agrat Bat Mahlat, but you… my divination sensors keep coming with incorrect results when analyzing you. Who are you?” 

“This is new…” Bert muttered to himself, searching the area and locating trumpet-like speakers in a corner of the room. “Can they listen as well?”

“They can see us at least,” Silk noted warily upon putting on her Rogue outfit. 

“Are you another machine?” Simon asked dismissively. “Inform your creator that he has half an hour to deliver Jym and Magda Coil to my forces, alive and well, or I will have no choice but to severely damage this facility.”

He would have already cast an Edict and caused this whole place to collapse in on itself if it didn’t threaten his friends’ lives and the Crafter Crestone, which he would obtain too in time. He would not allow its power to remain in the hands of someone like Carlo. 

“What you want does not concern me,” the voice replied. “When security forces bring you to a thought-extractor, this information will be properly filed and your corpse repurposed for immediate assignment.” 

“Violence it is then.” Simon telepathically ordered his allies to spread out before calling upon his strongest Perk. “Darkbound.”

The power of darkness flowed through him, and the Medical Bay soon became too small to hold him. His back smashed through the metal ceiling, and his sudden increase in weight caused the floor to crack under his feet. He punched through the latter and triggered its collapse, causing Silk, Velvet and Bert to leap out of the way. 

Simon fell into a hole of his own making through many feet of bolts and metal before hitting an acrid-smelling chamber filled with bubbling pools of multicolored fluids. Their contents splashed Simon when he fell through them, some healing him on contact, others leaving small burns on his armor. 

Minor Corrosion damage. Polymorphy negated by Unyielding Essence. 

Mutagens? It didn’t surprise Simon all that much that the Crafter could reverse-engineer a few of the Alchemist’s inventions considering their resources, but he wondered what those were doing beneath a medical area. 

Either way, his immense bulk caused the pools to spill onto the floor, which he broke through too. His allies had leaped onto his shoulders like bugs carried along for the ride. 

Their descent ended at the third level, where Simon landed in a hangar with a floor sturdy enough to withstand his increased weight. It was huge and massive, so much that Simon's crown couldn’t reach the ceiling, with walls that appeared composed of dark green metal scraps merged with machinery and magenta cables. Energy coursed through the latter and caused the metal to pulse as if alive. The size of the room suggested it had been used to hold something enormous. 

The sheer amount of mana radiating from the depths arose in yellowish fumes seeping from magically-reinforced steel panels. The level holding the Earth Megalith had to be a mere few floors beneath them. 

Simon punched it with all of his might, but it proved solid enough that even his monstrous strength hardly left a dent on the surface. A shimmering field of energy softened his blows. 

Simon summoned his mace and smashed the floor with Magic Eraser. The barrier fizzled out for a second due to the blow, only for the manalith cables to light up and immediately restore it. 

“A lingering effect,” Bert recognized, his razor-finger pointing at the cables. “Those manalith cables must feed it.”

“Go cut them th—” A surge of pain in Simon’s back interrupted his thoughts. 

Supereffective medium Light damage! Mythic damage!

Simon glared over his shoulder and immediately spotted a set of hidden cannons in a recess of the room firing beams at him. He immediately blasted them with Hellfire Gaze and melted them to piles of scrap.  

Unfortunately, the walls soon split open like metal lips and revealed artificial tunnels in the structure. Six humanoid iron golems and two enormous machines that resembled metal scorpions crawled out of them, with the latter having a single glowing red eye, cannons in place of pincers, and a stinger thrumming with magical energy. Whereas the lesser golems looked like rats compared to Simon, these arachnoids reached up to his waist. 

Their design… Simon tensed up upon recognizing these machines. It resembles the machine in the miasma pictobox picture, but less complex and elaborate…

“Disable the barrier while I break those toys,” Simon ordered his minions as he summoned a sheathed sword. Silk, Bert, and Velvet leaped off his back and engaged the smaller golems on the ground. “Quickdraw.”

He closed the gap between him and one of the scorpions in the blink of an eye, slashing his blade upon its back. Its metal hide proved solid enough to survive the first strike, his sword only reaching halfway through its body. Its cannons and stinger opened fire all at once, blasting Simon with lasers and plasma. Although supereffective due to being pure light, the creature’s firepower couldn’t be higher than a level 60 creature and only inflicted minor wounds. 

While Simon switched his sword for a mace and prepared to smite the construct into the ground, the other machine leaped into the air with surprising agility for its size. Manalith engines on its belly propelled it forward until it landed on Simon’s chest and dug into his armor 

Annihibot’s Antimagic Field suppressed your buffs and magical items’ effects!

This stripped him of his Nightveil, but not of Darkbound. Simon responded by immediately ripping the scorpion off his chest and flinging it against the wall, then smashed its sibling with Underworld Hammer. His Technique reduced it to scrap, with lava surging from the ground and causing the forcefield to fizzle out. 

Such was his current power that he didn’t feel any experience coming from destroying these machines. None at all. 

“File found… Overlord…” the voice in the walls commented, a hint of fear breaking through its mechanical detachment. “Reassessing conclusions… This was all a plot to infiltrate my premises. You are after my Crestone.”

Simon frowned behind his helmet as he lunged at the other scorpion before it could recover. “Your Crestone?”

The voice ignored him and began to bark orders across the speakers. “All personnel: Overlord presence confirmed in Sector 1. Emergency level raised from 1 to 7—”

The alarm rang out far louder than before until it became almost deafening. The light coming out of the manalith cables switched to red, and the rising yellow fumes grew in intensity. The entire structure appeared to be drawing more power. 

“That is not my creator,” Bert commented telepathically as Simon pulverized the remaining mechanical scorpion in one swift stroke. The puppeteer had taken control of two of the golems with strings and had them engage the remaining automatons, while Velvet and Silk cut the manalith cables. “He doesn’t speak that way.”

“Lethal force authorized; experimental weapons deployment authorized; all available security forces mobilized; collateral damage threshold raised.” The voice in the walls grew menacing. “Sanitize my premises of this demonic infection. Improved Process.”

A tremor shook the whole structure, and the ceiling began to shrink down on them. The scraps composing the room moved towards the group like contracting bowels.  

“The walls are closing in!” Velvet pointed out the obvious.

“I cut the power,” Silk replied more calmly, many of the manalith leylines going dark after she jammed her sword into a nexus of them. 

“Your Majesty, hundreds of golems and automatons are crawling down the blocked elevator shaft,” Agrat warned him through telepathy. “Some of them bleed.”

The voice said my corpse would be repurposed for immediate assignment… Simon grunted in disgust as he raised his mace and channeled Magic Eraser. The Crafter apparently shared Duchar’s beliefs about not letting the dead go to waste. “Can you hold them off?”

“We will do our best.”

Simon contented himself with that as he smashed the floor with Magic Eraser and dispelled the barrier for good, then pulverized the floor with Underworld Hammer. It gave way to his might and collapsed into a shaft. 

Simon quickly gathered his allies in the palm of his hand, then fell into the hole he had created. The Mechanical Tower’s panels shifted in an attempt to close the gap, but he melted them with Hellfire Gaze.

He fell into an underground vault wide enough to hold an entire castle within its walls. It took the shape of a massive dome topped with manalith cables transporting mana across the entire structure. Simon immediately spotted a large number of masked, humanoid automatons toiling around in spite of the searing heat and pressure in the air to keep everything operational. They were so occupied by their tasks that they didn’t even bother to look at the giant landing among them. 

At the center of it all stood an enormous pillar of steel thicker than Frightwall’s towers, protected by multiple layers of magical barriers. Yellow fumes exuded from its base, and it appeared like a coffin holding a glowing star to Simon’s Dark Visionary senses; with a black spot infecting its heart. 

The Earth Megalith. This immense device likely syphoned its power to fuel the entire tower. Once I breach it, this whole place will be bereft of energy. 

“You will go no further,” the voice in the walls said, its words now brimming with hostility. “Instant Crafting.”

Light gathered at the foot of the pillar and then swiftly rose in the form of pure mana, which swiftly coalesced into steel. Gears, pistons, and plates materialized from nothing into a colossal humanoid form overshadowing even the Darkbound Simon himself. 

“That… that is a Crafter Perk,” Bert said out loud in utter disbelief. 

But it comes from the tower itself… The picture Simon had seen in the false Carlo’s mind flared in his thoughts, the unbelievable truth now clear in its insane implications. A better solution than a human wielder…

“This place…” Simon gripped his mace as the Mechanical Tower summoned its newest defender. “This place is alive.”

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