X52 awoke with a start as her body finally healed enough to support her soul’s functions once again. She sat up, wincing as a loose gear somewhere in her body had not finished resetting itself. Looking around, an uneasy feeling in the back of her head suddenly grew stronger. The featureless stone room she had found herself in reminded her far too much of a prison, especially the clocksteel door she had set her eyes on.

She suddenly remembered the most important thing she was carrying and felt panic grip her. Sensation in her left arm was numb, but she soon brought it up and sighed in relief. Her sister’s heart was still in her hand. That left a question, however, unanswered. 

“How did I get here?” she asked herself. The air smelled vaguely of death, which meant that she was either being held by Kel’rk’ath, or she was in a compound once held by Kel’rk’ath. The possibility that a normal necromancer had such odd death mana was low, if not impossible.

She did not waste time in needless pondering and instead focused her senses beyond the stone room, out into the world around her. What she found was not a fortress of the dead nor a raging battle, but instead a small cluster of buildings with living people fortifying what they could find as undead guarded and did menial labor. It was… bizarre. As if a small slice of Kel’rk’ath’s faith-worlds suddenly found itself in the midst of the two gods’ experiment grounds.

As she sensed her way through the small outpost, a haze of death almost annoyingly thick descended upon every street and building. X52 was almost certain that the living were about to die in droves from whatever the fog of death was, but nothing happened. Instead, she got the sense that the haze was watching. Watching everyone and everything. She knew better than to catch its attention, and waited for it to pass, noticing how it pointedly ignored her room specifically.

As she waited, a memory lost in the shuffle of resetting her body suddenly untwisted itself in her soul. She remembered the nine Headhunters, created by the Hive the final line of defense in case the heart of her sister was about to be stolen while her body was being reconstructed, and how she almost killed them all. All that still stood as she wobbled on her legs was the first of the headhunters created among its batch. She fought as well as she could with her soul wound and handicapped as she was, but she was beaten. Just as the headhunter was about to finish her off, she caught a whiff of death. The next thing she knew, the metallic titan of an undead stood in front of her, battling the weakened headhunter with a large sword and shield.

It fought well, maybe even better than she did, but it was still equally matched with the damaged headhunter and would have been annihilated were there more units. It eventually gained the upper hand, but X52 did not want to leave it up to chance. She clawed the headhunter’s eyes out and promptly collapsed.

The next thing she knew, she was waking up in a stone-slab bed, listening to the walls like a fugitive. Like the fugitive she technically was. She growled in frustration, hugging her knees close. She hated this. Running, fighting off units she directly oversaw the creation of, and keeping her sister’s heart in her hand at all times. It weighed on her so much she wanted to cry.

But she was trained better than that. Crying would not help her apart from clogging her head and dulling her senses. She remembered her mother telling her the only time she was allowed to cry was when she was confiding with a friend, confiding in herself, or showing the enemy surrender. She did not need to confide. She did not have a friend with her. And she most certainly was not going to surrender.

She clenched her fist and renewed her determination. The first step was to assess the situation. She extended her senses once again, counting every living and unliving thing in her range. There were over forty living people, all of which were mages, and several dozen undead walking around. Beyond simply wandering around, clusters of undead were hiding underground. The gods only knew how they got there, but she still noticed how there were about two dozen of them, all large enough to devour her whole. She sensed pangs of death coming from within the mountains as well, but she ignored those. Only after she dealt with the town of enemies could she start worrying about the other undead likely stationed around.

Once she was done looking at the undead around her, she tried to find what she had on her. Her ring of books was still there, which, while nice to have when bored, did not help her at that moment. Her dress was nothing but rags at that point, barely keeping her often-disregarded decency intact. X52 could have used her clothing to strangle someone, but she knew her eyes would be a problem if she wanted to blend it. Even then, the presence watching the little village would have seen her before she could have done anything anyway.

Other than her books, torn clothing, and the heart of her sister, she was empty-handed. She was crippled in both body and soul, she was isolated in the middle of hostile territory, and she was without options. She could only hope an idea came to her as she waited. 

She did not wait long, since there was an odd scent of death coming approaching her building at a fast walk. X52 could not tell what the thing was, but it was stronger. After a moment, she finally realized what it was that was approaching her room. It was a lich.

‘So Kel’rk’ath and Sa’ar’kik are taking this seriously… I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not,’ she thought to herself as she quickly moved to the side of the door. If the two gods knew about the Forgeheart, then they would be putting a lot of effort into dealing with the Hive. That was not great for her, mostly because she would have to find a way back to her mother’s territory, which was far from easy.

She put her musing aside. The clocksteel door opened with a single soft click, proving that it was not a prison cell after all. A figure stepped into the room and X52 wasted no time in slashing them with her claws. Instead of the rending of metal or flesh she had expected, an ear-splitting screech sounded out. Momentarily stunned, X52 caught sight of her opponent. It was an armored figure, obviously female, with nothing in her hands.

Her armor was also made of adamantite, which was not pleasant news for X52.

She recovered quickly, however, and threw a punch at the armored figure as she was turning around, stunned. The armored lich was sent flying into the opposite wall, falling into a heap on the floor. Ignoring a sharp pinch of pain, X52 returned to her stance as the lich quickly picked herself up and created a barrier on the doorframe. She was trapped, “Alright, what was that for?” the lich asked, turning her eye-flames to X52, more specifically her eyes, “I mean- Wait… You’re a Clockwork?” she asked, stunned.

Cornered, X52 did not dally, launching herself at her opponent and unleashing every attack she could throw with the one hand she had unoccupied. The lich, however, simply stood there, taking every hit without moving an inch. X52 stepped back, breathing in deeply and analyzing the lich. She was not harmed. In fact, the scratches on her armor were molding themselves back to perfect condition before her very eyes. She stepped a half a step back, eyeing the lich warrily, “What do you want with me?” she asked sharply, making sure her empty hand was in front of her.

The lich crossed her arms, looking extremely unimpressed, “Look, I don’t know why you’re getting so worked up, lady. Sure, you’re a Clockwork, but last I’ve checked, you’re not supposed to be… independent. Er- Point is, this is new territory. Why don’t we start over? My name is Mori Athantos, Lich Extraordinaire. You?” By the time the lich turned her attention back to X52, she was already jabbing her hand into the weak points of her armor in a bid to grab the lich’s soul. The lich barely dodged, slapping her hand away with surprising force, “Alright, that’s enough,” she said coldly. A sudden tug came from X52’s soul, sending pain ripping across her entire being and staggering her. She fell to the ground, barely able to stop herself from banging her head on the stone floor.

The lich, however, stepped back in surprise, “[Holy- What the hell happened!?]” The words came to her doubled, making her head and soul throb painfully, “Ah crap, sorry,” the lich said, “What happened?” she asked, kneeling beside X52.

X52 herself wanted to escape, but the pain she had been getting used to suddenly rushing back filled her mind entirely with pain. All she could do for a few long minutes was lie on the floor, breathing shallowly. She slowly came back to her senses after a short while. Above her, she saw the lich, Mori, kneeling beside her with her faceplate lowered and gauntlet gripping her hand. She looked… concerned. As much as the clay-like bone of her face could convey the emotion. 

“What happened?” Mori asked again, care in her voice as she held X52’s hand.

She stared up at the lich for a long moment, “Why should you care? Just kill me already and get it over with.”

Mori frowned, “Why should I care? Because there’s something more going on here,” she replied, cracking a smile at the end, “The Clockworks suddenly start using airships with enough firepower to hurt a dragon, a lot of normal Clockworks start being able to use mana and spells, and suddenly a fully independent, fully sapient Clockwork appears in the desert close to the main Hive? That sounds a bit like a coincidence to me, don’t you think?” she asked with a teasing smile on her face.

X52 knew that, if her body was able to sweat, she would have been sweating greatly, “What are you getting at?” she asked, still trying to maintain a sharp tone.

Mori chuckled, “See, that’s the thing. I don’t know what happened. So, do you want my guess? Let’s say that, hypothetically, the ‘Demon of the Clock,’ or #^_%#&_*!- Dammit, name censoring again. Hrm. Your mom, that is to say the ‘Demon of the Clock,’ doesn’t want to eliminate all life in this world, does she?” X52 tried as hard as she could to maintain her poker face, though she had no clue how effective she was, “She, for whatever reason, just wants there to be a constant state of war. Some ups and downs, maybe. Some heroic triumphs and tragic losses here and there, maybe. But the goal was never to eliminate everyone.” X52 could have sworn that she was sweating bullets, considering how tense she felt, “However, now the gloves are off. Something’s gotten into her… Or it’s not her in the first place. Someone replaced your goddess!” she shouted triumphantly, a smug smile on her face.

X52 paused for a moment, processing what the lich had just spouted, and began to laugh. She had been so close to figuring out the true nature of the 87%, but jumped to the entirely wrong conclusion. Even as the lich stared down at her, confused, and as the gears in her body pinched at her, she laughed. For once after a long, painful week, she could hear the rhythm of her body beat again.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock