16

It was not the presence, but rather the absence of any indication of movement that bothered Charles. The dark space was lit up by the few little motes of light that followed both him and Eereen, casting long shadows that danced and moved around almost unpredictably.

There were no more ramps, and the narrow corridor that connected their ramp to the other one was completely empty. The loopholes in the walls of the guard rooms looked upon the narrow space and the party of two that dared invade the underground complex. Small rectangles of light entered through the narrow slits and illuminated random pieces of metal and equipment, but their size was so small that it was impossible to make out what was inside the armored walls.

The air was silent. There was no hissing or turning of mechanical parts, and the absence of sound was deafening and ominous. The immaculate, narrow corridor was just in front of Charles who was barely two meters away from the closest loophole in front of him. He pictured that there would be a small pillar of light inside of it, tracing the path of the photons through the dusty air until they finally hit the mangle of metal in the background.

But there was no pillar, no path of light being traced inside the room. There was no dust in the air, just like on the ground and everywhere else.

Charles sighed and cursed himself for his hesitation. He had already concluded that if they had not been shot already, then there was no way the defenses would be active inside the two sealed rooms, so why was he hesitating? This was not a question of courage, but of logic. It was sound logic that allowed him to come to that conclusion, so there was no reason for his survival instincts to take over and make him freeze in his tracks like a scared schoolgirl.

And yet. The irrational part of his brain was acting up. There was almost a visceral fear of the dark at play, something he never had before because he knew that in space there was only darkness. And he lived there all his life, in the vast darkness punctuated by little dots of light and life here and there. It was his home, the dark, the place where he belonged and where his very soul was born. This, this was not even close to the real deep dark between the stars.

He called upon his rationality, but saw that it was not helping. It was this dichotomy that he hated about the human condition. The fallibility of reason when faced with the deep abyss of emotion, fear and instinct. As a way to get out of this impasse, he called upon his anger and irritation and finally saw that he was beginning to overcome this annoying irrational fear. If he had to fight fear with a stronger emotion, then so be it. He had a vast repository of them and he was not scared of using them. He would not let himself be held back by nonsensical reasoning, not when what he wanted so badly was just ahead of him. He knew which way he had to go, and it was forward.

And since he knew what he wanted and where to go, there would be nothing that could stop him. Ever. That was his way of living.

He took a step forward, then another and another. Each with more confidence than the last as he saw that indeed he was right and nothing bad was happening to him. He hated himself for doubting the logic that so far had served him so well. He turned around and saw Eereen still waiting behind the illusory cover of the wall which, even without considering the bullets ricocheting on the metal walls, would only provide cover from half the incoming fire at best.

It had been this consideration that allowed him to go ahead, even with the knowledge that he had been careless when descending the ramps in the first place. But he had the LAI to cover for these oversights, even though the artificial intelligence was acting strange as of late. An investigation was needed, as soon as he was out of here.

He reached the mid-point of the horizontal corridor, where there was another one leading deeper inside the compound. The guard rooms were now on the sides, and more slits and loopholes gave view to whoever was inside to what was happening where he now stood.  

He tried to get closer, warily, but motivated by a great curiosity about what kind of security systems could hide in there. It was with great disappointment that he learned that he could not control the wisps of light that were illuminating the area, either because of his lack of comprehension over the nature of the spell or because the original skill he copied did not support such a function at all. He made a mental note to better dissect the spell and, in case, to upgrade it as soon as he was out of here.

He huffed angrily and let go of his attempt at taking a peek inside. He resumed walking with purpose, knowing that whatever he was about to find would certainly live up to his expectations. After what he saw upstairs, this room was bound to contain true marvels of technology. He was very interested in seeing what another otherworlder, who could have come from any point in time and not necessarily from his own time, would be able do in this world. The design and the technology hinted at a traveler from the early industrial revolutions, but that still had to be seen for certain.

The fortified rooms were two squares with sides only four meters long. The space inside had to be fairly small, and was probably filled with automated turrets and defenses like the ones upstairs. After walking the narrow corridor between the rooms, what he saw ahead was the opening of a much bigger space that was filled with tools and unknown machinery. The shadows were moving because the light only briefly illuminated the shapes around the room, making their appearance ethereal and fantastical. It was like standing in a mystical realm of metal, steel and brass. A hallway leading into the lair of the Metalmancer, where statues of metal and gears adorned the tall iron pillars and shunned the marble and stone.

Leaving the slitted rooms behind him for now, since he could not see inside, he signaled the elf girl that it was clear to come in. He wanted to have a better view of this room because what he saw so far had only made his craving much worse, and the LAI assured him that there were no visible threats. Thinking about this last thing, he was still a bit shaken by the sudden change his AI showed earlier, but he was sure that at least it wanted to survive just as badly as him. Even in the case that it had reached sentience by ways unknown, it wouldn't be a problem yet. In the worst-case scenario, it would prioritize its survival and therefore not put Charles in danger, since the two of them were one and the same because of the nature of the implant themselves. It was not speaking anymore, and even when queried it was answering like it always had. He shook his head. One problem at a time, and right now he had bigger fish to fry.

The shadows moved and danced as the three wisps that followed Charles were joined by the last one that followed Eereen. She was looking around intently, occasionally looking up at Charles as if to check that he was still there with her. The room was dimly bathed in light blue light, but now the two of them could make out what was inside. There were pipes running along the ceiling and the outer walls of the room, at times burrowing into the metal and disappearing outside of reach. Others appeared as if growing from walls, different only in color and material, and ended inside several machines and strange tools after many twists and turns. Running all along the room there was an overhead crane mechanism that could move on suspended rails.

It was so big, so huge that it could easily lift a huge boulder by itself. It was simple looking, but what it lacked in complexity it made up in size. In the end, Charles thought after the initial disappointment at the lack of particularly interesting parts passed, a crane did not have to be a complex mechanism. It used the pressure inside the shrinking pipes to move unimaginable weights, and then it deposited the items where they were needed. It was the rest of the tools that he could see that would do the precision work.

The elf was looking at all this with wide eyes, and her mouth was slightly open. She was at a loss of words, evidently, and a little bit overwhelmed by the sights. She had never seen machines or real tools, Charles knew, so she had all the rights to be surprised. He too was surprised and in awe, even more so as he could already make out a few things he recognized. It was clear by now that there were no electric machines, but rather they were all either steam powered or moved by compressed and heated air. There was no rubber, stone or wood in their making. It was all metal.

There was a low steel table with robotic arms jutting out from underneath it on the sides of the room, next to the guard rooms in the back, while a long table that reminded Charles of an assembly line covered almost the entirety of the left-hand wall. The robotic arms came out of the floor and were fitted with pipes and pressure valves jutting out from next to their bases, which coiled around their length and then wormed their way inside the machines themselves becoming smaller and more complex like little fractals. They were only easily visible because their color was a bright gold against the polished silver of the machines they moved. The table was silvery as well, four meters wide and long, with a depression and an assortment of various tools attached at the edges. 

The table, together with the arms and everything that was attached to it, was huge; a gigantic and complex machine that could produce items at an industrial level. It could easily rival something he had seen in the Imperial hangars, where spaceships were built. He had never thought that he’d find such a thing in this world, and yet here it was. It was odd how all the machines were steam powered and not electric, but still what he saw was without a doubt something made by someone who had a modern understanding of engineering.

The assembly line was easily longer than ten meters, and had one hulking and almost intimidating robotic arm per side every meter. They looked much less precise than the others, but at the same time capable of moving much faster and with greater weights. They were thicker and the pipes larger, and the materials they processed were directly fed by the overhead crane, which was positioned right above. He supposed that this was where they would assemble the pieces coming from the other table into their final design.

The LAI analyzed the schematics, and projected a diagram with all the possible movements the arms could cover. Even if they seemed big and dumb, the reality was very different. The diagrams showed complex movements and graceful combinations of lift and pull that could allow for almost any kind of motion. Charles looked in awe at the unseen complexity behind the seemingly primitive design, and could not help but mentally praise the Metalmancer for thinking such an elegant machine.

On the opposite side of the table and the assembly line there was another structure: a cage made of girders and metal railing suspended on chains that converged into a pulley on the ceiling. It was a lift, a primitive design but still a genius idea powered by the very same thing that powered everything else inside this Factory. Steam and heat, coming from the depths of the plane of this reality itself.

Next to the lift there was a pile of coal almost as high as himself, overflowing from a metal container, and then a forge. An anvil and a casting mold were on the ground while tools were hanging from the wall as if suspended in the air. There was a power hammer as well, which used the pressure of the steam in the pipes to deliver powerful blows to the incandescent metal below. An open door led to another room opposite to where he entered this workshop, going deeper inside the underground complex. A small tube, different from all the other pipes ran from a square box behind the forge and into the floor, probably to something that was inside the room ahead. There was a hatch as well, close to the coal pile. Charles pondered for just a moment whether to go deeper or not, but seeing that there was no danger here he decided to take his time.

He approached the small, at least compared to the other one, table with the robotic arms that he saw next to the entrance, and with his hand he touched the brass of the pressure pipes almost reverently. They were cold, and empty, but the power he could feel radiating from them hinted at a glorious past. A past when the heat and steam moved the hulking pieces of machinery. When the energy they contained contributed in making awesome tools and gears with a precision that should be impossible and yet was very real before Charles’ eyes. A time when sweat and fire reigned supreme inside these walls, and the mind and ingenuity of a man from his own world were able to tame this wilderness and pave the way for the rise of machines.

[Level up! New level: 146]

Charles jumped backwards; a look of fear painted on his face. His body was completely activated in a state of fight of flight, his every cell at the ready to explode with energy.

It was when the silence that descended in the room did not change for a few moments that he decided to actually register what happened to him.

“Eh? What the hell?” He said angrily.

You gained a level though automatic mana cultivation. I notified you of the change. 

Came the emotionless voice of the LAI. He imagined a laughing little girl behind the robotic facade, laughing her heart out at the stupid joke it just pulled on him. He sighed and returned to look at the assortment of machines in front of him. There was no need to get all angry about this, there would be time for it later. 

The brass of the pipes was still slightly warm from his touch. The heat had not traveled one inch away from where his finger had rested on the metal, though, hinting at a thermal insulation capability that was just astounding.

“This is awesome!” He said, as the LAI was populating his vision with bright colored lines that overlapped the real placement of the things he saw.

Eereen looked at him quizzically for a moment, but then said nothing.

“Thank you for showing me this.” He said.

The elf was very surprised at the offhand comment, as she never expected him to thank her for this.

“You’re welcome.” She said in reply, but he was not listening anymore.

His vision was flooded with heat gradients, thermal radiation and equations of gases and pressure. He was studying everything in great detail, from the way energy traveled through the pipes to the way it was used to move the devices. Possible designs came to his mind, possible ways to adapt this tech to work following more modern principles. Even he, a man who came from the age of atoms and beyond, had something to learn from this Metalmancer from the 1800s Earth.

Charles moved away from the robotic arms table which by all means, now that he knew how it worked thanks to his LAI, was a CNC line in its function and capability. It diminished the probability of the Metalmancer being from the 1800s, now that he thought about it, but he discarded the thought at the moment.

He approached the assembly table. The overhead crane was resting above the table at an angle, immobile like everything else in this room. The assembly line was badly damaged by something, and heaps of molten metal cooled down and clogged the pathways and pipes. The most damage could be seen where the precision tools should have been placed at the ends of the mechanical mechanisms. Other parts were just ripped off or twisted and broken. The pipes were torn and misshapen, unable to even give him a hint of their function anymore. The crane too was out of commission and dangled dangerously off its bearings, with one side resting onto the long slab of metal underneath it.

“Barbarians. Those who do not appreciate the marvels of technology do not deserve to know of its beauty.” He hissed, looking at the damage that was inflicted to the precious mechanisms.

He could see that there were pieces missing, extracted from their original places for their preciousness and value. They had been stolen, not because of their exquisite design and impossibly delicate and precise features, but for their worth as raw materials.

And, because of this, lost to him forever. He would never know of their function; he would never be able to appreciate their design and their beauty. Those who did this had sullied the memory of the Metalmancer, and they had to pay for this.

And then, right when he thought he could not get any angrier, he saw it. There were three boxes resting on the wall next to the assembly line and the CNC, three almost unassuming things that were just there and nothing more. They were all torn and damaged so badly it was almost impossible to know what they were used for, but that very damage revealed what was inside of them and made Charles’ anger flare to unimaginable levels.

Little, almost invisible gears connected to each other. Their size and precision were uncanny, perfect and impossible. They rested on small bearings or moved even smaller mechanisms, each and every one of them connected to a myriad of others. Whatever damaged the boxed had torn literal holes in them, and punched through the delicate mechanisms and into the floor below. Here, Charles could see that there were lines going into the floor and towards the various machines, and in the end, he understood what those boxes were. 

They were computers. Big, slow and primitive, but computers nonetheless. And working with gears and steam, rather than with electrons and logic gates. They were the discovery that would have made his day, and yet they just laid there. Broken. Dead.

That he would not forgive. That he would not forget. The real agent that was responsible for all this, he knew, was the system. And the system would have to pay.

Hours passed without him even realizing. After a while, though, his curiosity had the best over his desire to meticulously catalogue everything in this room. He would have time to come back later and finish the job, but now he wanted to see what laid beyond the door.

He got up, and his legs cramped a little but he paid it no mind. He called out to the elf, who had gotten bored after the first hour of poking around and getting yelled at by Charles, and was now resting on the floor next to the door.

“Let’s go.”

She got up immediately, and assumed her usual position slightly behind him. He approached the open door and went through it, and what he saw on the other side made his jaw drop once again.