Chapter 358 - Command and Control

Note : Chapters 18 and 19 of Manaforged Robotics have been written and added to the queue !

Don't mind me, I'll just be cackling in the corner.

Rest assured I will have chapter 359 moved to the top of the queue when it is written. A courtesy if you will ;p

Also, an update on Cassissa, as many had asked !

Chapter 358

Eris Empire, Capital City of Starcore

Imperial Palace, Empress Sylvis Wing

Cassissa hummed as she set down her spatial pouch, and extracted a handful of tomes, setting them down on the desk before her.

She had a library, an extensive one with plenty of space for extra books, within hand's reach in her private study. But she was no one's fool. Not anymore.

She knew the Black Hand was keeping an eye on her, no doubt rifling through anything they could. Which was why she now had one of her adventuring spatial pouches to store any books she needed, keeping it on her person at all times, just like the talisman.

She had even filled the pouch with extra books, and her pockets with other enchanted pendants. Decoys, just in case. Though, some of those extra books did make good reading when she tired of her research. The First Empress' biography, the journals of Empress Sylvis, Emperor Marloven's 'Thoughts on Matters of State'...the words of her ancestors reassured her. Sometimes she could just stare at the cover of the biography, the timeless eyes of the woman who had founded the Empire staring back at her, and she felt...not at peace, but calmer.

The First Empress had taken a world in complete collapse, in much worse shape than it was now, and turned it around into a new Golden Age.

Someone knocked on the door, and Cassissa shoved a couple of tomes, the ones dealing with enchantment and teleportation, back into the bag, leaving the decoys on the table.

"Come in!" She called out, and almost scrambled out of her seat as her sister walked in, and closed the door behind her.

"You can stay seated sis." Said Oris Lumière, Empress of the Eris Empire...and Cassissa's jailor. "You're a princess, you don't have to pay your respects to me in private. Besides, I tire of all the scraping and bowing."

"And I tire of being locked inside my home." Spat back Cassissa, and something briefly passed within the Empress' eyes.

For a split second, there was something colder than a glacier, and a chill went down Cassissa's spine as she was reminded that the stern, big sister she'd grown up with was also the ruler of half of the world, and responsible for an incalculable amounts of deaths, many on her direct order. She may have more latitude than others, but there were limits.

"Apologies..." She muttered, and Oris sighed.

"It's alright, I think...I think I deserved that." She gestured at the second chair before her desk, the one she had installed for her enchanting (ah) suitor. "May I?"

"It's your palace."

The Empress chuckled.

"I suppose it is." She drew the chair back, and sat down, as Cassissa suddenly realized that there was...no one else.

Her sister was followed by a small army of soldiers and servants at all times. If she was here alone, it was to make a point, or ask for a favor. Knowing her, probably both.

"So. What is it that you wish?" Asked Cassissa, and Oris' eyebrows rose.

"What, no 'Hi sis, how are you?'"

"I mean no offense, but you're running the Empire. You don't have time for courtesy visits, much less ones not attended by half a billion flunkies."

The Empress smiled, but Cassissa knew her well enough to realize how hollow it was.

"Well, my little sister is growing up, and seeing right through me. I wanted to say...that I'm sorry. I'm sorry for locking you up. I was...worried about you."

"And reasons of state."

The Empress nodded.

"And reasons of state, yes. It is a time where we can't afford to show weakness."

"But?" Said Cassissa. There was only one carrot she wanted, and they both knew it.

"But the situation has changed." The Empress sighed. "Do you remember Allya?"

Cassissa had no idea what she looked like when she stared at her sister, but the Empress recoiled slightly, a staggering feat in its own regard.

"Of course you do. My apologies. I am going to assume Erik updated you on her."

"He brought news." Not of Allya, but Oris didn't need to know that. Of course, it wasn't a complete lie, the Empress would sniff it out in a second. But a partial one...

She saw the Empress' eyes light up. She'd caught it. But she wasn't willing to challenge her on it.

Besides which, there was almost...uneasiness there.

"Quite." Oris sighed. "I wish for your...input, on Allya. I will partially lift the lockdown, and have intelligence officers brief you."

"Input?"

"Quite frankly, you're the only one that truly knows her that I can rely on. And now...she's become a major player."

"And one with bigger alliances than you thought."

The Empress' gaze sharpened.

"Indeed?"

Cassissa laughed.

"We both know there's no way someone didn't do this without aiming square at Sunrise." She didn't need to precise what 'this' was. It was the only thing anyone had talked about in the last few days. "And that has you worried."

Oris nodded.

"Of course it has. Something this powerful, this fundamental..."

"They freed all the slaves, and broke our prisons and the contracts. That's not fundamental, it's clearing the board."

The Empress paused.

"I take it...no one has told you yet?"

"Told me what?"

"They weren't broken. They're no longer possible."

Cassissa froze.

"...What?"

"Slave brands, magical contracts...from the deeds that bind the World Mage Court together to the brands that kept our convicts in line, and yes, Sunrise's slave brands, it's gone. It's all gone. The magic underlying them...has been rewritten."

The princess leaned back into her seat, her thoughts reeling.

"That's...that's not possible. It can't be possible."

"Yet it is. We have the very proof of that before our eyes."

"...and now you're worried that someone who can change magic is allied with Allya."

"Or using her." The Empress grimaced. "There's something...wrong with what's happening to Rebirth. It's too convenient. Too...focused. But that's not for you to figure out. What I need from you is your assessment of Allya. She's just presided over the Asarian Assembly and more or less dictated the course of the Kingdom. I also have reliable intelligence that representatives of the Far Reach, the New Republic and the Tark Hegemony are on their way to Rebirth for some kind of peace summit."

"I can't tell you what she's planning." Warned Cassissa, and Oris laughed.

"No. But you can predict which way she'll jump. You can tell me what drives her, what makes her tick. You...you can give me and my strategists an idea of who is the person that is going to build an Empire to rival our own."

Cassissa slowly nodded.

"You're not planning on trying to break it up?"

"No. That would be suicidal. But I may be able to slow it down."

"That wouldn't be wise."

"Perhaps. Perhaps not. Just think on what I said, alright?"

Cassissa watched as her sister got up and moved to depart.

"I'll do it." Said the princess, and Oris stopped.

"I know. You may be...impulsive, but you're a loyal servant of the Empire." The Empress turned around, smiling with what felt like genuine warmth at her sister. "Just make sure to be thorough. I'll be seeing you soon."

Cassissa stared at the door for a long time after her sister left, processing what was said.

An Empire to rival their own...it almost made sense, didn't it? Everything she'd heard. That she knew the Order was involved...

Of course, that was only the smallest of the bombshells.

Cassissa turned back towards the desk and dropped her head into her hands as she looked at the scattering of books upon it.

Who...what in all the hells and heavens could just change magic like that? Not even just the sheer power, but even just the knowledge to-

She straightened suddenly.

And slowly took out the talisman from her pocket, hanging it before her eyes.

A talisman with never seen before arcana. Arcana that achieved things which should have been utterly impossible.

Fuck.

*****

"Status report." Said Alexandra as her hologram appeared on the bridge of the Flickerlight. It might not be technically as secure as their simulations, but she was wary of using them too often, far too aware of the risk of an AI completely disconnecting from reality inside their own personal paradise. She had no doubt Emilia would drag her out but she'd rather not have her girlfriend dig around or have reason to investigate her digital realms.

Ghost sighed as she flopped into one of the seats, still waiting near each console, waiting for someone to man them. She was very much here 'in the flesh', thanks to her abilities, and she took shameless advantage of that as the form fitting furniture sculpted itself to her body.

"Well, I have good news and bad news. Good news, we have a lot of information pouring in from...well, everybody."

"What do you mean?"

"If it affects us, it also affects other dungeons. That means the adventurers guild, our allies in the UDC...everyone is asking questions and providing data."

Alexandra's eyebrows rose.

"The guild is sending us stuff?"

The apparition laughed.

"Sweet stars no! But they're still talking to some of our allies, and it's being relayed to us. Plus, individual members are relaying data to the government of their dungeon town, since dungeon monsters and their behavior are so important economically, and several of those dungeon towns happen to be under Allya's control."

"Alright. Bad news?"

Ghost licked her lips.

"I'm not...entirely certain, how much of it affects us, and it has highlighted some...problems inside our organization. We always took our subordinates' loyalty as a matter of course."

"There was no external control link."

"There wasn't. But we've never truly looked into their loyalty protocols. I don't mean for Seraph or the AIs, I mean for the golems. They were...well, they were beneath our notice. We focused on the officers instead of the grunts. As in completely ignored them. That could have been a deadly mistake."

"Could?"

Ghost nodded.

"I did some code diving."

"We coded the golems."

"Wrong. They all come with a package from the dungeon systems. It's what allow them to move, sense and do fundamental threat recognition. Not to mention served as the basis for most of our code until we recovered their source code from Seraph's databanks and began working off of that. We've never done a deep dive into it. After this, I did. I had to. And I found...a lot of interesting things." Ghost took in a deep breath. "So, from what I've been able to discover so far, the loyalty systems between dungeon monsters and a dungeon core are two stage. The first one is software. Dungeon monsters have a control program, similar to the one we used to have, just completely autonomous. It doesn't call home or report anything, since it wouldn't have anything but us to report to."

"Or the control program in us."

"Yes. But they seemed reluctant to have something other than their command connect to them. Besides which, they'd be out of communication as soon as they were out of our influence." Ghost shook her head. "That first layer ensures loyalty. It's why our golems could never turn against us on a fundamental level. It might even explain why CQ...well, why she sided with us against Emilia sometimes."

Alexandra raised her hand.

"Allow me to make something extremely clear. If there is a mind control system, any mind control system, beneficial to us or not, in place on my daughter, you will remove it."

"Of course." Ghost's tone made it clear she considered it the only course of action as well. "But the second layer is what is more interesting here. Every dungeon monster also had a kind of...geas? Compulsion?" She gestured, and holograms pulled up, showing a complex web of runes. "It's not so much for loyalty as obedience. It overrides, say, a beast's self preservation instinct. Its what makes dungeon monsters impossible to break, effectively without morale, and obey without question."

"And that, Rook broke?"

"Exactly. We're getting reports across the world of dungeon monsters retreating or running away from their assigned areas. Even a couple of engagement reports from our allies with the UDC, that both sides more or less broke within minutes of the battle starting."

Alexandra straightened as she processed that.

"They didn't have...anything to enforce morale."

"Not when it was never a factor, no." Ghost sighed. "The issue is that...I genuinely cannot tell how much of an impact that's going to have on our forces. Normally it shouldn't, but..."

"With those behavior packages, and the anomalous behavior, there's clearly more than we've coded in inside our golems." Finished Alexandra, as she remembered all the times her golems had followed unscripted behavior. Saluting her, taking the initiative...She shivered. "We've kicked that can down the road long enough it seems. We're going to have to get to the bottom of those...anomalies."

"Agreed. There's also something else I came upon. Something that, well..." She shook her head. "You have to see it for yourself."

The apparition made a series of complex gestures, and the hologram of a complex tattoo appeared.

No, not a tattoo, a brand.

Sunrise's new slave brand.

Alexandra looked in horror as the brand's runes were deconstructed, and put side by side with the dungeon monster loyalty ones.

They matched.

"Holy fuck." Let out Alexandra.

"My thoughts exactly. And we know dungeon cores wouldn't be able to look into their own code, and those kind of protocols can only be accessed from the inside. There's only two factions we know can mess with dungeon code like that...the Church, and the Order."

Alexandra nodded, and froze.

"Wait. Inside access...Oh. Oh FUCK! Fuck fuck fuck FUCK! How could we be this FUCKING STUPID! We were planning to do the same damn thing and we didn't get it! We didn't even consider the freaking possibility!"

"What?" Ghost recoiled as Alexandra tried to grab her by the shoulders and shake her, though of course her hologram phased harmlessly through her.

"Don't you get it? The advisors, the vampires! They're not political officers! That's why Emilia sided with us! They're TROJAN HORSES! Direct access inside the network in case someone finds the protocols in the dungeon core and cut them off!" Alexandra's eyes were filled with fear. "Emilia is the one carrying the last kill switch you insisted had to be there, somewhere! She's...the advisors, they are the failsafes!"