“I have identified one individual that seemed to be unusual for this facility. His position is just before the final door, and he seems to be guarding it.”
Yo turned back as she heard that, throwing the door she was holding down to the floor. “And? What’s so strange about him?” It was likely unusual for her to kill so many people with the same face so quickly, so Yo might be eager to fight someone unique.
After her question, a blue hologram appeared in the center of the small room we were in, projected by my armor. The hologram showed a single man, with a tall, muscular build. However, I could not say that he was entirely human. Over a quarter of his head, as well as both arms and legs, had been replaced with sleek machinery. No doubt, this man was a cyborg, and the first I had seen from the New Human Empire.
“I don’t have enough of me in the area to make a scanning tool and find his level, but he is most likely the commander of the facility. At the very least, he is someone near the top. His power should be considerable, so I want you all to be careful, okay?” That last sentence held no small amount of worry, even though we were in clone bodies. Nobody knew the weaknesses of these bodies better than Celeste, after all.
“...Alright.” Sharon nodded. “Show us the way.” At this point, I became little more than a healing robot following them around. When it comes to commanding teams, Sharon undoubtedly has more experience, so I did not feel bad following her lead.
Celeste, however, seemed to take some pity on me. In the corner of my view, the map she had been creating of the facility expanded, the path we needed to take highlighted for me. Looks like I’ve become the official navigator.
Now that I didn’t have to concentrate on fighting, I saw that Thalia was once again trying to reach me. This time, I didn’t really have a reason to refuse to answer, because all I was doing was giving out directions. “Kind of busy at the moment. What’s up?” I asked as I answered the call.
“John, we have a problem!” Thalia’s panicked voice came through over the call.
Hearing her tone, I immediately took this seriously. “What’s wrong?”
“There’s been a rebellion! Maeve and I are trapped in her castle!” Thalia had even dropped the royal manner of speech, which would have let me know this was major, even if the contents themselves did not paint a clear enough picture. “The guards suddenly started attacking us, and we were forced to hide underground. I think… I think that they might be assassins from the Empire!”
I could hear her voice cracking up, as if she was only moments away from breaking down in tears. “It’s alright. I’ll call some people, they’ll be there soon.” Thankfully, some of our crew had decided to get off at Gerin originally, rather than joining us. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to offer any help at all. “But tell me, what exactly happened?”
As we continued to progress through the facility, Celeste made my helmet soundproof so that I could listen to Thalia’s explanation. I wasn’t sure if she was explaining things to the girls or not, but we continued moving at a faster pace. “Maeve called me a few hours ago to visit, saying that she was worried. That she thought her court wasn’t safe. I rushed over as fast as I could, but by the time I got here, she was already being attacked. By her own guard, even!”
“I wouldn’t have been able to save her, if it wasn’t for this dress. Oh Circle, I’ve never been so happy to be stuck in it. I grabbed her and ran, and we escaped into the tunnels beneath the castle. I can still hear them running around outside, looking for us. I don’t know if we’ll be able to last until help arrives…” I could hear broken sobs over the end of her explanation, and I knew that this timing couldn’t be a coincidence. Is that what this quest is about? To somehow save Maeve and Thalia? But, what could this base possibly have to do with that?
“It’ll be okay, Thalia. I might be able to help. Don’t ask how, I’m not sure myself. Just trust me, nothing bad is going to happen to you.” I tried to speak as confidently as I could, while in my mind I was wanting us to rush faster and faster. As if responding to my wish, the girls looked in my direction, faces displaying shock.
The three of them each gave a quick nod to whatever Celeste had told them, and we practically ran through the rooms. Rather than waiting for Sharon or Yo to bash down the doors, Yin would rip them out of their positions with her telekinesis before we even approached them, and Sharon would speed through to quickly kill whoever was inside the room before we moved on.
Doing this caused Yin quite a lot of mental strain, requiring me to cast recovery magic on her regularly, but it drastically increased the speed we progressed. In under a minute, we were approaching the room where Celeste had been unable to progress her scans. Just as before, Yin ripped the door off and threw it to the side, while Yo and Sharon charged in.
By now, Celeste had allowed me to hear what was going on outside, though I still hadn’t hung up from the call with Thalia. I thought, maybe keeping the call going would reassure her, even if we weren’t speaking. Just having a friendly voice ready to tell her everything would be alright.
“Hah! You finally made it here, time to-gah! Hey, let me finish!” The cyborg commander shouted out as Sharon appeared in front of him, stabbing out with her bladed glove. He hurriedly raised one hand to block, the blade unable to penetrate his metal limb.
“Maybe later.” I said, not wanting to waste time with this. I knew that I was probably going to suffer for this, but I stretched my psychic energy to cover him, while Celeste warned Sharon and Yo to back off.
“That’s better, where was I? Oh ye--” The cyborg suddenly vanished from his position. Sharon turned to look questioningly at me, but my head was currently being assaulted by a jackhammer. Or, that’s what it felt like after using Toy Prison on someone for the first time. And, going by the distinct coppery taste in my mouth, I should not do this again too soon.
I tried to focus on healing my own broken head, while the girls made quick work of the door that led to our prize. “Almost there, Thalia. Just a little bit more…” I groaned out, moving forward with the others into a dimly lit room.
In front of me, Sharon and Yo had frozen midstep, causing me to wonder what was going on. It wasn’t that they had entered a trap or anything, as their bodies were still shaking slightly. I didn’t quite understand until I saw past them, and into the darkness.
This room was much more expansive than any other that we had been in, at least a hundred meters from end to end. All along the wall, people were strung up by their wrists. Bruises and cuts were spread out over their bodies, and many lacked any semblance of clothing. Among them were humans, elves, dwarves, fairies, demons, halflings, kleptids, drakes. Every race of the alliance, aside from the Deus Ex, Qu’Lopti, and Ha’Vosh.
However, what caught my attention the most wasn’t the assortment, but rather one particular face in the crowd ahead of us. One of the elves with her head held down, silvery hair matted with blood obscuring half her face. “Thalia…” I couldn’t help but speak out as I looked at the figure.
“What…?” I heard her asking, her tone still one of worry.
“That’s not Maeve!” I called out as I rushed towards the familiar, albeit battered figure of High Queen Maeve chained to the far wall.
“What do you--” The call abruptly ended before she could finish her sentence, and I could only watch my friend’s list, hoping that Thalia’s name wasn’t removed from it.
Chapter 29: The Queen’s Story Laid Bare
There were only really two situations that would cause a call in the system to drop, from my understanding. First, if one of the recipients died. Now, that was obviously not the case, because Thalia’s name was still appearing on my friend’s list. As soon as someone died, their name would be removed. The other circumstance where the call would drop, is if the other party was rendered unconscious. That seemed to be the obvious case here, so I could only watch the list, and hope that the name did not disappear.
While I was watching, the power armor s
urrounding me seemingly shattered, forming millions of tiny particles that rapidly reformed into Celeste. Once she was done remaking herself, she ran over and checked on Maeve’s condition. “She’s still alive, thankfully. Her soul seems to be connected to something outside of her body, though. Should I try to sever the connection?”
I barely registered her words, but still shook my head. “Try one of the others first.” No offense to whatever unlucky person was chosen, but if I had to choose between risking a complete stranger and someone I actually knew, the choice is obvious. As Celeste nodded, and moved to inspect the person chained next to Maeve, a prompt appeared in front of me.
Incoming call from Thalia.
I felt like I could finally breathe after seeing that message, and quickly accepted it. “Thalia!? Are you okay?”
“I… We’re fine.” She said, her voice shaking. “The High Queen… no, her imposter, tried to kill me.”
“Well… did you get out safely?”
There was an awkward pause for a moment before Thalia responded. “Uhm… no. She was actually quite successful.” I felt like my mind went blank at that. If Thalia was dead, then how..? As if sensing the unspoken question, she continued. “After she stabbed us through my neck, the dress shattered. The dagger was taken out and our wound was healed. From there… well, we panicked slightly. We may have used the royal scepter.”
“...The one that’s been building up energy for nearly a decade?”
“Indeed. It was quite messy. Thankfully, that accursed dress is finally gone.” Her voice still sounded awkward, but I breathed out a sigh of relief. So that was the real purpose of it. I had never really understood why Aria would give out a dress like that, unless it was just to force a fashion statement.
A moment later, there were two sudden gasps from in front of me. Neither of them sounded like my party, so I looked up. Along the wall, two of the previously motionless chained figures were suddenly moving. One was the soldier that Celeste was working on, while the other was Maeve herself.
Maeve let out a groan of pain as she felt the wounds all over her body, but her eyes were watery as she looked at us. “Where… where am I? What have I done?” Although she was a queen who ruled over an entire planet, at the moment she seemed to be nothing more than a scared girl.
“What do you remember?” I asked, cautiously.
Maeve’s face lowered, her eyes closing. “Everything… did I really do all that?” I could see tears forming at the edge of her closed eyes. Looking over at the soldier sitting next to her, although his soul had been returned back to his body, he looked just barely alive.
Celeste looked up at me, and shook her head. “His soul was damaged when I tried to forcefully sever the connection.”
“What’s going on?” Thalia asked from the other end of the call.
“We’ve got Maeve here, the real one. And a bunch of other people, too.” But, why were they even kept alive like this in the first place. Surely, it would have been enough to take their memories to give to their doubles. Or is there some deeper meaning?
“The system.” Celeste said as she looked at the vegetative body in front of her. “They must have needed the original alive, so that the double could take their place in the system. If the real Maeve died… she would be removed from everyone’s friends list. It probably also let them intercept the messages sent to these people.”
Maeve nodded slightly at that, but Sharon looked around the room. “There are diplomats from every race here. How could they do all of this without anyone noticing?”
At that, the High Queen spoke. “I… I’m not entirely sure about the others. But, for me, they got me through my guard. One day, while I was on my way to meet the other High Queens, I had two guards protecting me. When we got to the ship, I saw another… another me. After that, I blacked out. When I woke up, it was like I couldn’t control my own body.”
“When did they capture you, Miss Maeve?” Yo asked, curiously.
“It was… a couple of days before you arrived at my world after the war declaration.” Finally, Maeve looked up at me, and smiled bitterly. “Sorry about the wedding, but that was her doing. Though, she thankfully followed the script I had been preparing ahead of time, likely to help keep her cover.”
Suddenly, I was reminded of the calls Thalia had sent me previously, about how the political relations had started to break down. If they had this many of the officials in their pocket, it’s no wonder. Any more, and they wouldn’t have even needed to fight the war. They could have just ordered the warp gates to be opened, and let the New Human Empire walk right in.
That’s why this planet was set to be destroyed in an attack, to cover their trails. They couldn’t afford this secret to be discovered, and would rather have it destroyed. As I thought that, a new window appeared in front of me.
Quest Complete!
Close Encounters
Rank ★★★★☆ Assault and Investigation
You have uncovered a secret plot to control the allied races through politics, and in doing so have saved the life of a friend!
Reward: Sometimes, success is the greatest reward.
While I somewhat felt that I was ripped off with the quest reward, the fact that I succeeded in itself was enough to count as a reward. Now I just have to figure out how to save these guys, before they can destroy their civilizations. As it stood now, the only way I knew for sure how to save them was to kill their double.
“Thalia, send a message to whoever you can. I’m going to give you a list of people who have been compromised like Maeve was. Until we figure out what’s going on, these figures should be taken into custody. If they resist, kill them. That is the only known way to properly return them to normal.” From there, I began listing the names of each individual lined up along the walls, after having Celeste check their souls. Of course, I needed her and Maeve to help me identify quite a few, and there were a couple that were lacking that strange connection.
When I went to investigate those without the soul connection, their chains suddenly loosened, and they launched themselves at me to attack. Thankfully, Yin was a step faster, and the two were literally torn to ribbons before they could reach me. Well, at least that is two less corrupt politicians..
In the end, I had sent Thalia at least fifty names, all of them either political representatives or guards. When I finished the list, Thalia let out a long breath. “That’s a lot of people, John. We’re not sure anyone will believe us without proof.”
I nodded my head at that. “I understand. It’s possible that they will try to discredit you. We’ll try to safely cut the links from our end in the meantime.”
With that taken care of, we began cutting the chains for all of the remaining captives, while I applied healing magic to cure their physical injuries. Maeve looked slightly uncomfortable as she received the healing, her face tinted red. “You do realize I’m still naked, don’t you?”
...I had actually forgotten in the seriousness of the situation. “Uhm… yes?” She let out a sigh, shaking her head with a wry grin.
“Two wives just not enough for you, huh?”
As Maeve said that, I felt a chill running down my back, two piercing stares behind me threatening to give me a very bad time if I answered wrongly. “No, no, I’m perfectly happy in my relationships, thank you.” I hurriedly answered.
Turning around, I looked at Sharon and Yo. “Can you two make sure that there is nobody left in this base to cause us trouble on our way out? We’re going to have to carry them all out by hand.” While I would love to just shove them in my grove, I couldn’t guarantee their safety. The number of planets in my grove was shrinking by the hour. And, Sharon had already completely lost her grove. Not to mention the fact that druid powers are still being blocked.
The two girls nodded their head, and sped out of the room. Sighing, I turned to Yin. “Mind helping me carry those we can?” While it would have been best to send Yin with the others, her telekinesis was more usefu
l here.
“Okay.” She nodded quickly, and waved a hand. Five people floated up gently into the air, and she began walking to the entrance with them.
Maeve stood up, using one arm to cover her chest while she smirked at me. “I’ll follow from the back. Eyes front, mister.” She laughed, picking up the vegetative guard while Celeste and I each grabbed another.
While we walked, Maeve was sending out calls as well, letting people know what had happened. From the tone of her voice, the whole event had deeply shaken her. She event sent a message to Thalia, nearly sobbing out an apology for what her double had done.
It’d definitely be too much to ask that this was their main plan, and we ruined all their dreams by discovering this place. I thought bitterly, looking up at the sky when I had finished the first trip ferrying people. If this had truly been their main plan, the base would have been better defended, and not set to be destroyed at the first attack. But, there was not even a single Orik, and almost everyone in the facility was purchased through the system.
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