Chapter 370 - Alexandra

Note :

I'm...not super comfortable with this chapter, honestly. It felt kind of rushed, but at the same time, this is one third of the novel in, I NEED to get things moving. I don't know, what do you guys think ? Does this chapter feels rushed ?

Also, chapter 348 is coming out this saturday on Royal Road, and I'm definitely grabbing some popcorn to watch the reaction. And yes, Captain Nuclear, I have quoted your comment in the author's notes. Eheheheheh.

Chapter 370

Red Sands Desert, Archduchy of Rebirth

City of Rebirth

Allya simply stared in slacked jaw astonishment for several seconds, before she regained the ability to speak.

"I- What?!?"

"We need your help, Allya. With the brands destroyed...if she was being kept prisoner, it'll be a lot harder to contain her now." Raika smiled. "Believe me, she's tough. So this is our best chance to find her."

She's a lot tougher than you would ever believe, thought Allya.

"So you want to mount a rescue mission?"

She had trouble keeping the hysterical edge out of her voice. Alex didn't need a rescue. Her enemies did. Those that still lived, anyway. Which wasn't that many. That woman didn't seem to understand the concept of 'appropriate level of force', only 'overkill'.

"Yes, that's the gist of it. A heavily armed rescue mission. If possible, I'd also like to requisition some of the Void Blade prisoners, especially their leader. I know they have refused to talk, but perhaps some of the lower ranking members' memories will refresh once taken away from the rest...and their leader may be more amenable to a compromise after everything that has happened."

"That's not up to me. If you want to negotiate the release of the prisoners, it'll have to be with Crystal."

Raika nodded, undeterred.

"Of course! Could you arrange a meeting?"

Allya's mind raced.

"Of course. I think she'll be...interested in your little project."

To say the least.

"Great! Thank you!" Raika and the rest of her party smiled. "We'll get out of your hair then. You know where to find us!"

"That I do. Have a good day!"

"You too!"

Allya watched them leave, before slamming her fist through an illusion and straight onto a good old red button, the door instantly locking and all manners of security systems slamming into place as a hologram popped up above the desk.

"Seraph here, what's the emergency?"

"I need to talk to Alex, right the fuck NOW!"

*****

"You heated the water?" Said Emilia as she pulled her feet back from the lapping waves.

"Yep!" Alexandra smiled as she stood by her girlfriend's side, trying not to stare at her...and failing.

She wasn't going to admit it to anyone, but it had taken her a solid five minutes after seeing her new bikini to be able to put any form of coherent sentence out.

Of course, the vampire took advantage of it shamelessly.

"That seems a bit frivolous, no?"

"Well, the advantage of fully controlling the environment due to it being artificial to begin with means I can do frivolous things like that. Besides, it's more of a sandy pool than anything."

"True, true. It really feels like seawater too."

"That was surprisingly easy to replicate once I, uh..." Alexandra suffered a software failure as Emilia bent over to put her hands in the water, before smiling over her shoulder at her girlfriend.

"Yes dear?"

"I, ah, I got some samples."

Emilia blinked as she straightened up, to her girlfriend's less than concealed disappointment.

"A sample? Of seawater?"

"Yeah. There's a market for live seafood, and some of it can only survive in seawater. Rebirth's moving up in the world in terms of quality."

"And riches."

"Well yeah. Our little dungeon town isn't the wild wild frontier anymore. It's a capital. A center of trade. Soon it'll be culture too."

Emilia snickered.

"I don't take Allya for an opera type of girl."

"She has hidden depths. Besides, she's attracted quite the entourage who might."

"Welll...I can see Pyn enjoying it." Emilia walked, stalked really, over to her girlfriend, pressing herself against the dungeon core's avatar. "Though I don't think there'll be a lot of listening." She purred, and Alexandra squirmed as the vampire's hands found their way under the strings holding her girlfriend's bikini together, starting to slide-

ALERT - SERAPH REQUESTS EMERGENCY MEETING

Alexandra hissed.

"Oh for fuck's sake!" She looked at the vampire. "I'm sorry Emi, I think there's an emergency."

"Go, I'll fetch our clothes." Answered her girlfriend, all thoughts of other activities forgotten.

"Thanks." Alexandra lowered the privacy barrier around them. "Seraph, this better be good."

The AI's holographic avatar appeared.

"Ma'am, we have a problem. It's about your former party."

"Shit. What happened?"

Seraph gestured, and Allya's hologram appeared. The archduchess opened her mouth, closed it as she saw the dungeon core's outfit and its...disarray, before shaking herself out of it.

"Alex! We need to talk."

*****

"Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck FUCK." Alexandra came to a halt, halfway through pacing down the length of the command center, now fully dressed -or more accurately, encased in armor-, with Emilia seated on one of the command throne's armrests while Allya's hologram was hovering above the projector.

"So, what's the plan?" Said Allya.

"Can you delay them? In any way?"

The archduchess grimaced.

"I...genuinely don't know. The problem is leverage and legitimacy. I was able to keep Sylvia and her merry crew of cutthroat in Rebirth for so long because they were pirates, and I had stuff they desperately wanted for their operations under the Order. Here...they want my support, but do they absolutely need it? They're rich, well respected. If I stop them, it's going to ring every kind of alarm bells."

Alexandra swore.

"Any way to string them along?"

"Yeah, but I don't know for how much. A few days, maybe a few weeks? But there's only so much I can do. And honestly...if they're going to leave anyway, wouldn't you rather it be with an expedition we sponsored and control?"

The dungeon core closed her eyes.

"That's...it's a good point, but can we let them leave?"

"Can you? Alex this isn't about me. This is about you. You're the one who wants to protect them."

"It is about us. If they find out what happened to me..."

"I doubt they'll be able to uncover anything. The Order doesn't seem like the type to make a mistake this big."

"And yet here I stand."

Silence descended upon the room.

"What about telling them?" The archduchess and the dungeon core turned towards the vampire, who shrugged. "I mean, they're never going to stop digging, and that's...it's a really good indication that they won't betray you, isn't it?"

"That's...that would put them in danger. Wrap them up in this mess as we're on a direct collision course with the adventurers guild." Alexandra closed her eyes. "They almost died for me Emilia. They got maimed, enslaved, just to protect me...I owe them."

"Then you owe them the truth too, don't you?"

This time the silence was deafening.

"Yeah." Alexandra deflated, as if a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders. "I guess I do. Allya, could you...could you arrange a meeting? Tell them it's about the prisoners and their expedition."

"Alright. I'll get right on it." The archduchess looked at the two women in turn, clearly taking in the change in dynamics between them, and sighed off.

Alexandra sighed as the hologram vanished, and flopped onto her command throne, missing Emilia by millimeters.

"This is going to take a toll..."

"Well, you've had practice at telling people."

The dungeon core chuckled.

"Yeah. You, them...this is the month of truths, isn't it?"

"It had to happen sooner and later." The vampire twisted her body a bit so she could deposit a kiss on the top of her girlfriend's head. "I'll be there. Give you some courage."

"Thanks love." Alexandra smiled. "I appreciate it."

"Good. And after that, we're going straight back to the beach. We were interrupted, and I think you'll be able to use the stress relief."

Alexandra blushed, but nodded nonetheless.

"Yeah. I guess I will."

*****

Raika looked around curiously. They'd been in the dungeon plenty of times, but never in the utility areas. Behind the curtains, so to speak.

Even with the promise of safe passage, and golems showing the way for them, it had still been nerve wracking to walk through the minefield.

And she had to wonder at the level of paranoia on display. They could have just walked in the military entrance, but instead were being ushered through backdoors in a 'regular' dungeon delve.

"This feels disturbingly bare." Said Alyssa, as the healer touched one of the walls with her cybernetic hand. "It's just...rock."

"I like it. Very practical." Fernand made it to the end of the tunnel, and looked at the vast room. Some kind of assembly area, clearly, complete with elevators and...were those rails ? "This seems like our destination."

"Nooo, you think?" Thomas chuckled, before gesturing at the welcoming committee, which the golems that had guided them in were now joining. "What gave it away? The open, giant elevator? The party of golems?"

"No, the dungeon core watching you make an idiot of yourself." Said Raika, shutting the ranger up, before bowing deeply before the young woman. "Lady Crystal, it's an honor to meet you at last."

"Oh my, how polite." The young woman smiled. "But I am not Crystal. I am Glitch. I've been sent to guide you to the dungeon core. Please, follow me."

"Oh! Right, I'd heard about you." Though 'heard' in this case was 'vague rumors from the army'. She hadn't paid much heed to them, but it seemed like they were true. The dungeon core had created her own posse of...advisors? Officers? Intelligent golems, at the very least. "Do you know if it's...good news?"

Glitch turned around after they followed her into the elevator, and fixed her gaze on the party leader. For a split second, it seemed like there were far more eyes than two, but Raika blinked and it was gone.

"...Yes. I believe she has great news for you."

"That's a relief to hear. We weren't sure..." She looked at Alyssa, who smiled. "We weren't sure she'd be willing to let the prisoners go."

"They are, ultimately, of little consequence. But there's more."

"Truly?" Raika looked at her teammates. "Does she wish to participate in our expedition?"

That would be...beyond any boons they could have reasonably expected. But then again, the dungeon core had always seemed to like them, and Allya clearly had a lot of pull with her.

And Crystal had resources and prestige they could barely dream of. With what had happened to Sunrise...even a handful of her golems would ensure no doors would remain closed within the Kingdom. If she sent one of her ships, even just one of those 'expeditionary traders' that had been sent with great fanfare to Sarth, then all bets were off. If the UDC had folded before her airfleet, no one would dare even raise their hand against them.

Of course it might scare off people that would otherwise talk to them, but they were adventurers, doing things incognito was in their blood.

"Lady Crystal will make everything clear."

"Crystal clear?" Said Thomas, before folding in half as Alyssa none too gently elbowed him with her cybernetic arm. "Ow! I was kidding."

"Forgive my teammate. He means no offense." Quickly said Raika, and Glitch shrugged.

"None taken." She gestured as the elevator stopped and the door opened. "Follow me, please."

What followed was a never racking few minutes of passing through armed checkpoints and well equipped patrols, with Raika's eyes going ever wider.

She'd been told, repeatedly, that the dungeon core was out of troops, after sending what she could North to fight Sunrise, but...

It looked like there was an entire army down there. Perhaps it was just a show of force because the dungeon core was meeting them, but still.

Before long however they arrived before a massive blast door, watching it shudder and retract into the ceiling, and being ushered in...the door closing behind them with an ominous clang. And unless she was seriously mistaken, locking as well.

There was a large table, laden with food and drink, and behind it...a tall woman, who looked like an older version of the dungeon core's boss, just like the hologram which had attended the archduchess' wedding. Besides her was a smiling vampire...

And along every wall were golems, armed to the teeth. But not with regular guns, no.

They were armed to the teeth with Old World weapons, encased in ancient armor and wreathed in energy shields.

"What's going on?" Asked Raika, instinctively going for her sword, before forcibly relaxing, realizing that she'd be dead long before she'd be able to draw them. Though she did keep her hand on the pommel.

If she was going die, she'd at least try to take one of them with her, even if it was futile.

Glitch didn't answer, simply gesturing them forward, and she felt a chill at the change of demeanor. From pleasant, if a bit stiff, the dungeon...boss? Assistant? Had gone deadly serious.

They walked up to the table, her teammates as tense as a bowstring, and stopped before it.

The dungeon core smiled as she stood up, and Raika realized with a start that this wasn't a hologram. This was an actual, physical body. A dungeon avatar. But that was impossible, Crystal-

Crystal could have some Old World weapons, but nowhere near enough to arm this many golems. And neither should she be able to field an avatar.

Raika met the dungeon core's eyes, expecting to see...she didn't know what she expected.

But warmth and sadness wasn't it. Actually, her eyes...her eyes felt familiar. The color, the pupils, they were wrong, but the eyes were the window into the soul, and the expression within...

"Hey guys. You've come a long way to find me."

Raika let go of her sword, her world collapsing around her as she recognized the voice, the posture, the eyes.

"Alex?!?"