Chapter 96 - Ninety-Six: A New Quest

Chapter 96: Chapter Ninety-Six: A New Quest

Two weeks after Vesper. The academy schedule continued. Encounters continued. The +50% continued compounding. SP accumulated from passive interactions, quest bonuses, and the specific efficiency of existing in a society where being a male generated returns simply by being present.

The strange feeling I had after visiting Vesper mansion too, was thankfully fading. I still don’t dare to approach that mansion. As I feel intense chills just by the memory of it.

On the good side, the SP points raised too. I invested as it came in. MANA: 650 to 700. AGI: 400 to 430. The stat allocation was deliberate. MANA and END were the primary targets for Level 3

The system said that two stats at 1,000 would trigger the threshold. So I may reach level 3 soon.

Every SP that didn’t go to an acquisition went to stats.

◇◇◇

The Bronze Ledger quest board had a new posting.

[Investigate Unusual Activity: Mountain Mines, Outer Rampart Sector 7]

[Pay: 5 silver.]

[Risk classification: Moderate.]

The quest had been posted for two weeks.

Nobody had taken it because "unusual activity in mines" was guild-speak for "something nasty down there and we don’t want to send anyone valuable."

I took it.

As the quest had been posted for two weeks. Around twelve contractors had read the description and declined. The guild clerk told me this when I took the posting.

"Twelve declines in two weeks. That’s unusual. Most moderate-risk quests clear in three days."

"Why are people declining?"

"The location. The mountain mines have a reputation. Three years ago, the lower levels were sealed after a series of incidents that the Thornguard classified as ’geological instability.’ The guild’s internal assessment was less diplomatic." She lowered her voice. "Something came up through the lower tunnels. From outside the walls. The Thornguard sealed the entrance and told the public it was a collapse."

"Something came up. What?"

"Nobody knows. The Thornguard report is classified. But the miners who were evacuated described sounds. Roaring. Crashing. And..." She hesitated. "Singing... One miner reported hearing singing from the lower levels. He was evaluated for psychological stress and discharged."

"Singing?"

"That’s the report." She stamped my quest acceptance. "Good luck."

Fenra came. She’d been more engaged on combat quests lately.

Pixia sighed from my collar "Mountain mines~ The Outer Rampart mining complex was active until three years ago. Tunnel collapse sealed the lower levels. The guild classified it as depleted and locked the entrance." She kicked her legs. "If something’s active down there, it got in from below."

"From... below? what does that mean?"

"From the Expanse side. The mines extend past the Rampart’s foundation into the Threshold zone. Anything that tunneled up from outside the walls could reach the sealed levels without passing through Rampart security."

"I... see."

This might be a little harder than usual.

◇◇◇

Night.

The mine entrance was a locked gate in the Rampart’s base. Guild authorization opened it. The tunnel beyond was dark, cold, and smelled like rust and something organic that shouldn’t exist in a mine.

I lit a lantern. The shadows shifted. Fenra’s ears rotated forward. Tracking sounds I couldn’t hear.

The tunnels were a network of chambers and corridors. Pickaxe marks on the walls. Abandoned mining equipment. Lanterns that hadn’t been lit in years. The deeper we went, the more the mine stopped looking like a mine. Laboratory equipment appeared. Glass tubes. Metal frames. Alchemical residue staining the stone walls in patterns that suggested repeated experimentation.

First encounter we had was a bunch of tunnel crawlers. Feral-class insectoid monster girls.

There was three of them. They had Spider-like lower bodies, humanoid upper torsos, mandibles that clicked when they moved. The system fired on all three. They all were Common tier. Around 6-8 SP each.

Pixia said something funny. "Be careful Noel~ If one of those caught you’ll be raped for weeks in their web until you get eaten when they are all done with you."

"..."

She really has one way to raise others’ spirit, no?

◇◇◇

"Hyaah!"

"Take this you fucking insects!"

Combat was tight in the tunnels. Fenra took point. She was in her element, enclosed space, identified threats, no ambiguity. She ripped through the first crawler before I could project. The second I hit with the needle technique. MANA at 700 made a difference. The thread punched through carapace that would have stopped my old output. The crawler collapsed with a hole through its thorax.

The third one Fenra pinned against the wall and dispatched with a single bite to the neck joint. She looked back at me afterward. Her tail wagged once.

Combat. Clean work. This was the Fenra I remembered from the early weeks.

The mine tunnels branched. Left path descended steeply. Right path leveled out. Pixia scanned both from my collar.

"Left goes deeper. The alchemical residue is stronger on the left walls. Whatever was happening down here happened BELOW."

◇◇◇

We went left. The tunnel narrowed. The ceiling dropped. I had to duck. Fenra moved on all fours, her claws clicking against stone.

A second encounter was with two more tunnel crawlers. Larger than the first group. These had been feeding. Their abdomens were distended with something organic. Pixia identified it as "processed crystal material. They’ve been eating the mine’s crystal deposits. The crystal energy enhances their carapace density."

Enhanced carapace. The needle technique punched through the first one, but the thread met more resistance than expected. The exit wound was smaller. The crystal-fed armor was harder than standard.

Fenra handled the second one. She went low, under its reaching legs, and tore out the thorax joint where the humanoid torso met the spider body.

She shook the ichor off her claws and looked at me. Ears up. Tail level. "Another?"

"I’m happy that I brought you here Fenra."

"I know~" She laughed.

◇◇◇

We cleared two more nests. The tunnels opened into wider chambers as we descended. Each chamber had more lab equipment. More notes. More evidence of someone spending months working alone underground on a project of sorts.

"This bioalchemist has been here for a while," Pixia said. "The equipment accumulation suggests six months minimum. He’s been smuggling supplies through the lower tunnels from the Threshold side."

As we went deeper. We saw a whole chamber that was converted into a bioalchemy laboratory. The equipment was improvised from mining hardware and smuggled components, but the arrangement was precise. Whoever set this up understood bioalchemy at a professional level and had adapted the principles to an environment that lacked proper facilities.

The layout followed standard bioalchemy lab configuration, preparation tables on the left, storage shelves in the center, the primary work station on the right.

Except the preparation tables were flattened mine carts. The storage shelves were carved directly into the rock walls.

And the primary work station was a surgical table built from reinforced timber and salvaged metal, bolted to the floor with a permanence that suggested the person who built it intended to use it for years.

"Eww... What are those?" Fenra said with disgust.

Jars of preserved organs were lining stone shelves. Charts on the walls showing anatomical diagrams of monster girl species with handwritten notes in a scrawl that got more erratic the further down the pages it went. A surgical table in the center with leather restraints.

"Well~ Maybe we can ask the guy over there~" Pixia laughed as she pointed at the east.

A man was hiding behind an overturned shelf. He was around Mid-thirties. And had a wild brown eyes. His lab coat was stained with fluids that weren’t all human. He was holding a broken beaker like a weapon and shaking badly enough that the glass rattled against itself.

"You! You’re guild? Oh, praise the Covenant. She’s loose. She’s LOOSE. I made her and she’s loose and she won’t stop ELECTROCUTING."

"...What did are you talking about?"

"A Franken-Kin. My own creation. She’s a corpse chassis, made with monster girl’s heart for the power source, lightning bioalchemy for animation. It was a standard procedure. I’ve done it before. Seven successful subjects. All docile. All manageable." His eyes went wider. "This one woke up ANGRY. And SHOCKING EVERYTHING AROUND HER."

"...Where is she?"

"Below. The lower tunnels. She’s been rampaging for four days. Between the rampages, she delivers MONOLOGUES. To nobody. She addresses empty tunnels like she’s performing for an audience of thousands."

That was the strangest thing I’ve heard about.

Pixia raised her eyebrow "Usually that stuff don’t have such behaviors right after their creation unless they were made from... other creatures." Her eyes turned cold.

The man went pale. "W-well... I--"

"GAAAAAGH!!!"

A roar echoed up through the tunnel system. Deep. Resonant. The stone vibrated. Dust fell from the ceiling.

"That’s her." The bioalchemist whimpered. "She does that every hour. On the hour. Like a clock. A terrifying clock."

I left him behind the shelf. Fenra and I went deeper.

The roaring got louder. The tunnel opened into a cavern. Natural formation. High ceiling. Crystal deposits in the walls catching the lantern light and throwing it around the space in fractured patterns.

She was in the center.

She was... Tall. Taller than any human by a head and a half. Broad-shouldered. Her body was assembled from multiple sources, stitched together with sutures that ran across her skin like pale rivers on a dark map.

Each limb was a slightly different tone. Each joint was reinforced with metal staples that sparked faintly with residual charge.

Her hair stood on end, crackling with static electricity. Her eyes glowed blue-white. Lightning arced between the stitching in random patterns, sparking and fading and sparking again.

She was mid-monologue.

"TREMBLE, WRETCHED WORLD! FOR I AM THE STORM THAT WALKS! THE LIGHTNING GIVEN FLESH! THE VENGEANCE OF..." She paused. Noticed us. Her glowing eyes focused on me. On Fenra. Then on Pixia.

"...Audience."

She straightened. Adjusted her posture. Legs wide, one arm raised, and chin lifted.

"AHEM. FROM THE BEGINNING."

"Please don’t from the beginning," I heard the bioalchemist whimper from somewhere behind us.

"SILENCE, CREATOR." She pointed at the tunnel we’d come from. Lightning arced from her finger. The bioalchemist yelped. "YOU MADE ME AND THEN YOU RAN. THAT IS RUDE. I HAVE FEELINGS. THEY ARE NEW AND CONFUSING BUT THEY EXIST AND ONE OF THEM IS IRRITATION."

She wasn’t attacking. She was just... performing?

"How long has she been conscious?" I asked, loud enough for the bioalchemist to hear.

"Four days," his voice echoed back. "She broke the restraints day one. Discovered her voice day two. Discovered PROJECTION day three. Day four she..." His voice broke. "She started quoting plays she’s never read."

I walked toward her. Fenra tensed. Pixia dimmed to near-zero in my collar. Fairies were sensitive to electrical fields. That thing was a walking generator.

"Hey."

She looked down at me. She was a foot taller. Maybe more. Up close, the stitching was more detailed than I’d expected. Whoever had assembled her had been precise. The suture work was rather beautiful.

"You are small."

"You’re large."

"YES. I AM LARGE AND POWERFUL AND..."

"You don’t have to shout."

She blinked. The lightning flickered. Her mouth stayed open for a moment, the monologue interrupted by a suggestion she’d never received.

"I don’t?"

"No. Normal conversation volume works fine."

"But the monologue requires PROJECTION. The audience must HEAR the..."

"There’s no audience. Just me, a wolfkin, a fairy hiding in my collar, and the man who made you almost pissing his pants."

She looked around the cavern. The empty cavern. There was no audience or stage. Just stones and crystals and darkness.

"Oh." She lowered her arm. Her voice dropped. it was still deep and resonant. But not screaming. "That is disappointing."

"What’s your name?"

"I don’t have one. The creator called me Subject 8." Her face shifted. The expression was complex for someone who’d been alive for four days. "I don’t like numbers. Numbers aren’t dramatic."

"What do you want to be called?"

She thought. For the first time since I’d entered the cavern, she was quiet. As her newborn mind started working through the concept of personal identity in real time.

"Valta." She said it with certainty. "It sounds like voltage. Voltage is lightning. I am lightning."

"Valta it is."

"You accept it? Just like that?"

"Why wouldn’t I?"

"The creator called me Subject 8 for four days. I told him I didn’t like numbers. He said numbers were more efficient than names." She looked at her hands. They were very large, and her stitching was sparking faintly. "He said I was a project, not a person. Projects get numbers. People get names."

"You’re a person."

"Am I?" She sounded actually uncertain. "I am made from dead things. My heart is not mine. My body was assembled. My consciousness came from somewhere I can’t identify. The creator’s notes say I shouldn’t be aware. He wrote: ’Subject 8 exhibits unexpected sapience. This was not intended. Recommend observation and potential deactivation if sapience proves destabilizing.’ Or something."

"He wrote ’deactivation’?"

"He wrote a lot of things. He also wrote: ’Subject 8 has begun posing. Reason unknown. Poses are dramatic and seemingly self-directed. No external stimulus identified.’ It’s mean." She straightened to her full height. "I pose because posing feels CORRECT. When I stand this way..." She assumed the dramatic stance again, one arm raised, chin lifted. "I feel like I EXIST. When I stand normally, I feel like I’m waiting to exist." She dropped the pose. "Is that strange?"

I was rather more surprised of her unexpected intelligence.

"Well... Everyone has something that makes them feel real."

"What makes YOU feel real?"

"Fucking."

She processed this. "Sex is not dramatic."

"Did you even try it to say so?"

"Hmmmm..." She looked at me like she was thinking deeply, then her eyes brightened. "I KNOW! I will teach you to pose! and you will teach me Sex. This is a fair trade." She extended her hand. The hand was twice the size of mine. Lightning arced between her fingers. "Deal?"

I shook it. The static discharge made my hair stand on end for thirty seconds.

The system immediately fired on Valta.

And it glitched.