Gank: A LitRPG Adventure (The Crucible Shard Book 4)

by Skyler Grant

Around us there was an immense space that was very nearly a museum of virtual horrors. Beneath the Vainglory was an army of mechanical beasts in all shapes and sizes, deadly spikes and saws adorning their flesh. The walls were filled with docked fliers, clockwork dragons and eagles, and griffons with an astonishing variety of killing tools. Age had taken its toll however, most were corroded and partly collapsed.

  "How long has this chick been planning to destroy the world?" Cobalt said, after an appreciative whistle. "And how have I never run into her before this?"

  "You want to fight it, don't you?" Ashley asked.

  Cobalt said, "People always think that robot apocalypses are commonplace—and hey, visitors from a dystopian world ruled by benevolent computer gods, you have good reason to think that. But they are damned rare. I've only fought my way through three such wars in my life."

  Maria looked thoughtful. "Would a mechanical nation be a good one to rule? It seems they would be very orderly."

  "Depends on the machines," Cobalt said, with a jerk of her head in my direction. "You get some that are orderly, but some take their cue from organics and love a little chaos."

  The Vainglory settled towards an open dock and berthed with a metallic click.

  "Well, I guess we should figure out what is going on," I said.

  "Vainglory crew is staying here," Cobalt said.

  I was surprised. I was sure this place would have some kind of fight she'd been looking for.

  "Not spoiling to see if she has started something new?" I asked.

  Cobalt said, "We haven't really had a chance to look things over and get everything up to speed since coming into this world. Besides, my ship is trapped and surrounded by murder-bots. We'll be here with our foot near the gas and the guns loaded in case you need an exit plan, but this is Goddess business—you can handle it yourselves."

  I glanced at Riggs, who gave me a shrug. That was one God who wasn't going to get involved and was going to do as his Captain said.

  "Maria?" I asked.

  "I'll come," Maria said. "She is my Goddess too, after all."

  "That is unbecoming, by the way," Cobalt said. "We really do have to discuss your religious choices one of these days."

  "Perhaps, if my mother had been around to raise me better?" Maria said, sweetly.

  "Witness my two friends and allies not murdering each other," I said, as brightly as I could manage.

  We split up to get into our adventuring gear. Soon I had on my armor and met the others on the deck. It was time to find Yvera and discover just what Mela had been up to.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The gangplank leading to the Vainglory was as corroded as everything else. Time really had taken its toll on this place.

  "What do you think happened to everything in here?" I asked. "You'd think Mela would have used better components."

  "She likely felt no need to bother," Walt said as he followed me, waving his hand to conjure a few brightly glowing fireflies for light. "These were meant to be shock soldiers. Quick and deadly, but ultimately if they fell in combat they would be consumed by others and new ones created. There was no need to design everything to stand the test of time."

  "Still, she could have at least put some water seals on her mountain," Ashley said. "I'm going to scout ahead." In an instant she had faded from view. Right. Hopefully not too far ahead. The sun flares overhead still provided some light, but as we descended deeper into the complex we'd be dependent on Walt's conjuring.

  "She likely did," Walt said. "But those did fail with time. The damage is also in many ways worse than it appears."

  "You'll have to explain that one to me. Everything in here is clearly ruined," I said.

  "Think of it like Leosi and his undead army. The main limiting factor to being a necromancer is the raw material of corpses. Mela too is limited by the raw materials at her disposal."

  That did make a distressing sort of sense. This place was a machine graveyard, but that could change in a hurry, if she put her mind to it.

  Mela was technically on our side, but as this entire episode demonstrated, that was a loose arrangement to rely upon. Her true loyalties were to herself and to her plans.

  We passed into a tunnel. Corroded and ancient pipes lined the walls. We kept descending deeper into darkness.

  Ashley rejoined us. "I didn't get very far without light. I can stick with you invisible, if you want."

  "Do that. Just in case anything decides to surprise us, you can surprise it right back," I said.

  Ashley vanished again, but I knew she must be close.

  "What would all these pipes carry?" I asked Walt.

  "Steam. This isn't a world where electricity really exists, or would work, although something can be said for magical circuits," Walt said. "Steam power does though. Most of the killing machines are powered by wound springs or magical batteries, but for her manufacturing it is almost all with steam."

  We got to see that first hand. The hallway ended in a second cavern, this one filled with large presses and mechanical arms.

  They also appeared to be dead, but in the distance could be heard the steady thrumming and pulsing of heavy machinery at work, and we could see just the hint of illumination.

  We moved closer to get a better look.

  Well, here were our missing Goddesses. Three different assembly lines converged in a gigantic glass dome adorned with intricate rune work. Yvera was inside and engaged in combat with an endless barrage of machines. They appeared to be some sort of giant bugs, with clear sacs on their back filled with water, which they utilized in their attacks.

  Yvera's flames made slower work of the metal machines than usual, because whenever she would destroy one, the resulting explosive burst of water would cause steam to billow. A pipe above the dome was collecting this steam, powering the line and probably a bit more besides.

  Mela had trapped Yvera and was utilizing her as a power supply to fuel the facility and to bring it back to life.

  Mela herself was bent over a table, a large lens magnifying a component she was examining it. She hadn't noticed our approach, lost in her work.

  "It is really quiet an ingenious design," Walt said.

  "Capturing Yvera like this and making use of her?" I asked. "She'll win in the end."

  "Perhaps, but perhaps not. Despite water having an advantage over fire, Atlantia was bound into Yvera's service."

  Atlantia had agreed to Yvera's demands in order to save her own life—she was badly injured at the time. Yvera wasn't that far gone yet, but I had to wonder, if this kept up, whether that might eventually happen. Each burst of one of those bugs must be sapping a little of her power. Leave her a little more drained. Over time this place could reduce her to almost nothing. I wasn't going to allow that to happen.

  "We need a plan," I said.

  "We could simply accept this as inevitable. Mela has proved to be both resilient and resourceful. Yvera has been a less than reliable leader of the pantheon," Walt said.

  Yvera might not always be reliable. Lake had convinced me that she was evil, in a relative sense, but she was my kind of evil. Given a chance, she'd kick our home out of paradise and remake it into something far more dangerous, but she would do so out of love for what we might achieve when free.

  I didn't know what Mela wanted, but at best it was some sort of amalgamation of man and machine, and at worst the extermination of man.

  The first wouldn't be so bad, I was a bit of that now with nanites filling my blood and a computer in my head. The second, I'd not allow.

  "Not happening," I said. "Maria? Ashley?"

  "Covering the dome in a swarm of spiders is unlikely to help. I also see nothing that punches might prove effective against," Maria said.

  "Atlantia might be able to help," Ashley said, peering towards the dome. "The steam powering things is water, but the same runes that are dampening Yvera's power and keeping her contained are working against Atlantia as well."

  That was a problem
—so was Mela, of course. The Goddess of machines might be distracted in her work now, but if we raised a fuss she'd be on us. That wasn't a fight we could win without Yvera to assist.

  "How exactly are the runes working?" I asked.

  "They are keeping power that's in the system, in the system. Yvera can't struggle without inadvertently feeding more power to the machines. Atlantia can't simply pull the water from the system."

  "Can she make the water stronger?"

  "Yeah, but that will hurt Yvera. What are you thinking?" Ashley asked.

  "If we can't take the power out, we can put power in. Mela might have put enough safeguards in place to ward against even an enraged Goddess, but what about two of them?" I asked.

  "The machinery does have limits. If overcharged, you could cause it to break down," Walt said, frowning at the pipes. "But I warn you that I believe the main engine of this place has been brought online. It can absorb a lot of power, and its break down would be a rather spectacular catastrophe."

  Right. I didn't have a better idea.

  I said, "Lea, I figure you must be watching us, because you're just that damned good. We're going to blow this place to hell. When we get back to the Vainglory we'll need a quick transition."

  "I am that damned good. We'll be ready," Lea's voice said from nowhere.

  I next thought of Yvera and focused my thoughts. "I'm here. I don't know if you can hear me, but I think you can. We need to supercharge the engine powering this place to get you out. Water and fire makes steam. Atlantia is on board, this is probably going to hurt."

  Yvera, locked in her endless conflict in the dome, might have glanced in my direction. It was hard to tell. Inside my head there was only silence, I had to hope she got the message.

  "Do it," I said.

  Ashley nodded and her eyes shimmered colors from the depths of the sea.

  Within the dome, the water filling the bug's sacs seemed to intensify. It became more water, more filled with natural power.

  When Yvera destroyed the next one and was splashed, she screamed in agony, collapsing to one knee. Her flesh darkened as if she had been burned, that perfect pale flesh charring and cracking.

  The fiery aura around her pulsed and became brighter and brighter. Her red clothes, normally proof against her own flames, began to smolder and sear as the heat built up. Scraps of burned fabric fluttered to the ground as she was left naked, surrounded by flames flickering in mad fury. The next bug out of the chute had its metal fragments melt away almost at once, another splash of supercharged water catching Yvera, bringing another howl of pain.

  The interior of the dome grew hazy, obscured by steam that was too thick and heavy for the system to draw away. The air crackled with power, divine energy causing the mountain to shake violently.

  That finally got Mela's attention, her eyes flicking towards the dome in alarm and then shifting to find us.

  I didn't even see her move, the Goddess merely a flash of color as she closed the distance and one of her metallic arms transformed into a giant blade which she drove through Ashley's stomach and twisted.

  I heard ribs shatter and flesh tear, Ashley making a sound that was more strangled whimper than screech of pain. I reached out at once for her shoulder and let loose a healing spell. The flesh knitted together around Mela's arm. Mela didn't care, she just twisted more, tearing apart Ashley's insides again. It was brutal. I released another heal spell.

  "Oh Liam, we do have our fun don't we," Mela said calmly. "But if our time together has shown me one thing it's this. I can last longer than you can."

  Again she twisted and once more Ashley was torn apart. Unfortunately, Mela wasn't wrong. I had just the one heal left. We hadn't expected her to respond with such violence.

  Neither of us was paying attention to the dome. It exploded in a spray of magically charged glass.

  Just as Mela moved too fast to see, so I barely registered Yvera's as anything but a flash of flames out of the corner of my eyes, and there she was grabbing onto the knife arm and wrenching it out of Ashley.

  Blood and viscera sprayed, hissing and puffing away into smoke where it met Yvera's aura, and leaving Mela a mess.

  I expended another heal into Ashley and once more her body convulsed violently as flesh brutally torn apart came together.

  "Enough," Yvera said in a tone that brooked no argument. The flames around her were painfully hot, like standing too close to a forge.

  Mela tried to struggle free, but Yvera was having none of it, the knife arm beginning to glow red and then yellow in her grasp.

  "Please," Mela said. "I'd not have held you forever. I couldn't. I just needed you long enough to bring this facility back online."

  Yvera continued to hold on and the arm began to glow white, droplets of divine metal dripping to the floor as Mela began to howl and sob in agony.

  "The engine powering this place will explode soon. Take the others and go, she is no further threat to you," Yvera said.

  "You can't kill her," I said.

  "Not yet. Don't worry, Liam. I'm going to take my time and see she repents properly," Yvera said. Her tone was scary, biting and furious.

  "You took her in because you needed her. You still need her," I said.

  Yvera wrenched Mela's knife-arm upwards to raise it above her head. Droplets of her metal found flesh and began to sizzle. Even feeling she kind of deserved it, it was a horrifying.

  "You know I'm right. Promise me," I said.

  "He is right," Maria said, in her cold and regal voice that she used when making imperious demands. "A traitor you need, you still need. But make sure they understand the consequences for their deeds."

  Yvera's perfect features formed into a scowl as she stared at me. "Get to your ship, Liam. I won't kill her, but she loses her arms for this."

  I didn't think I was going to get a better deal than that. Besides, these were arms already replacing her original limbs and I was sure Mela would eventually be able to craft herself new ones. It would take her time and reduce her power a bit in the meantime. Right now, that seemed worth doing.

  Ashley was none too stable on her feet after having been pretty much gutted several times in a row. I had to support her as we returned through the passages.

  Walt never cracked an expression through the entire thing. Not a bit of that brutality seemed to have fazed him in the slightest or elicited even a note of concern. No, he still wasn't right. At least he hadn't stopped us.

  "You going to be okay?" I asked him.

  "I can hear her sobbing in my mind. Those arms are not unfeeling prosthesis to her, she cares for them as much as for her real limbs," Walt said.

  I hated that. I didn't like seeing her hurt. Mela remained the only Goddess I had slept with while in the form of a Goddess. I didn't particularly want to care for her even a little bit, but I did. Another entanglement easily made that endures long past it being comfortable. Keeping her alive had to be enough for me to sleep easy tonight. I hoped it would be.

  By the time we reached the Vainglory the mountain was shaking so violently beneath our feet it was difficult to stay upright.

  In a series of lurches we stumbled over the gangplank and on board. Behind us the halls were filling with strange, frightening steam. Everything it touched began to glow brilliantly with heat, before becoming steam too. The mountain was being transformed into fire and water, two opposing powers joining forces to create something far more destructive than either managed alone.

  Cobalt was waiting for us and helped me to get Ashley aboard. Once everyone was on deck she shouted a command and the world around us vanished into rainbow distortions as the dimensional drive engaged. For the second time we left this world behind bound for parts unknown. This time the crew should have at least had time to program a destination. I had to hope that we were headed somewhere friendly.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Reality rippled around the Vainglory just as the all-consuming steam nearly reached the ship.

/>   Wherever we had arrived, it was night time, and we were docked at the tallest building of a massive city. Far below us drifted airships similar to the Vainglory.

  "Where are we?" I asked. Things below were well-lit, illuminating buildings of intricately carved stone, and glasswork done in brilliant colors.

  Most of us aboard the ship were still dressed the same. However, the crew of the Vainglory was clothed in flowing garments of blue.

  "Skoros," Cobalt said. "We needed a safe harbor to settle and this is a reliable set of coordinates."

  "We use it to escape all the time," Lea said brightly. "Cobalt is kind of a big deal here."

  "I thought you hated being a Queen? What gives?" I asked.

  "I'm not a Queen. I'm a seven-time Grand Champion of the arena and the richest woman alive. There's a difference," Cobalt said.

  "Who'd really want to follow little Cobalt around after all?" said a voice I didn't recognize. It was a sharp-featured blonde dressed in silks of copper and green. She had something overpoweringly majestic about her presence and I felt the strangest compulsion to throw myself at her feet.

  Cobalt's gaze narrowed. She was startled and unhappy to see this woman.

  "Malachite, however did someone manage to pry you away from that mountain of yours, and what the hell are you doing in my city?" Cobalt asked.

  Malachite ran her eyes over us one at a time. I got checked out, but just a little. Maria held her attention. Malachite leapt with ease onto the ship and grasped Maria's chin in her palm, tilting her face to study it.

  "The spiders will bite," Maria said.

  "Good, I'd hope they weren't purely decorative. You've your mother's eyes," Malachite said.

  "Maria, this is your aunt Malachite. She's awful," Cobalt said sweetly.

  "Cobalt grew tired of her boyfriends groveling at my feet," Malachite said, and tossed me a loaded look. I wanted to—fuck, I wanted to. There was just something about her.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly before saying, "I'll pass. Thank you."

  "Intriguing," Malachite said, giving me a second perusal. It was more sincerely interested this time around, but I was only a distraction before she turned back to Maria, releasing her chin.