SlaughterBot

185: Back to Jail

Nicolai returned to the prison. He found it to be a scene of chaos.

The undead he encountered were few in number, and seemed especially listless, standing in random spots and doing nothing unless bothered.

There were bug corpses everywhere, and not only corpses. In small groups and singularly, bugs and strange creatures ranged through the area.

When he entered into the main area, the great pit in the centre, he found that it was entirely taken over by the bugs. They roved in...

184: Lotus Blossom Symbiote

With his gains from the Tree, even after spending what he had to on necessities such as more ammo, Nicolai was very near to 70,000 points. He had 63,000, and had also gained back many of the weapons he’d sold them previously. One more trade should be enough for him to get the required funds for the anti-material rifle and slay the Angel, something he had to do as soon as possible.

After that, he would likely have to venture into the jungle even without the skin suit, as he badly neede...

183: Shooter

Within the AA-12’s reaction chamber the firing pin impacted the back of the loaded 12-gauge round, penetrating the plastic covering and igniting the powder within. The explosion, contained and trapped in the barrel, had nowhere to go but forwards. The hot gasses of the explosion expanded rapidly, imparting almost all of their energy into the pellets that were between them and the exit, sending them out the front of the barrel at 1,300 feet-per-second.

They zipped through the air, spre...

182: Come to the Tree

‘How have you all been?’ he asked, opting to begin prying into the man before he made any serious moves. Jo and Beth were making questioning faces at him, Jo mouthed: What’s up?

He shrugged, because he wasn’t sure, and made a face and gesture that said something’s off. The drones circled around the walled area, and he saw people down below peering up. They looked much as they had last time, though he noted they seemed to have given up on the attempts...

181: Odd Tree People

[Author note: Merry Christmas my dudes ^_^.

Also thanks for the feedback the other day, mostly people seem fine with events as they were except that it was a little abrupt. I don't wanna make any huge changes but I figured something small to setup Jo's motivations going into chapter 180 should do the trick. If you check 179 at the end, there is a little Jo POV newly added. Also a Jo POV here to help explain/flesh out. Lemme know what you think.]

‘He’s such an asshole!â€...

180: Soul Rot

Nicolai left the others discussing the formation of the Coalition, taking Kleos and Maric into his room. He had questions and he needed answers.

‘My whole Soul is covered in Soul rot. Everything. The entire surface. What can I do?’ he asked the heads, looking into himself. He could see it, everywhere around his Soul. A hungry, busy infection, always pressing and seeking to dig deeper.

Currently it wasn’t having too much effect. Aware of it and fighting back, Nicolai was able...

179: Seeds of Blood

The Mask and Jo found the others interrogating the two heads.

‘If this place is falling down, then what can we do? Is anywhere safe?’ Old Ben was asking.

‘The jungle,’ said Kleos, ‘that’s where I’d be heading, if I were you lot. But, although the jungle isn’t going to collapse, I imagine in other ways it’s far more dangerous than this castle. This castle—in such a poor state—has a greatly weakened garrison. The undead here have been rotting away for a long ti...

178: The Mask

Paxolnaz was seething. It tore at the Interior around it as it travelled, spikes of it launching out and impaling weaker entities, shredding them and sending them fleeing before it. How much had the Denizen told the human? It would have liked to go and interrogate the creature, but knew there was no point. The Denizen would never speak a word to it.

Perhaps it should simply have the Denizen killed, grant its wish, but it was loathe to do so. The Denizen’s suffering was a potent source...

177: The Signal

Nicolai felt the Demon’s surprise, its fury, as his Soul Sense penetrated into the midst of its effort and reached the Symbiote. Then the Demon’s Soul Sense tightened around the Symbiote, blocking him.

You… hissed Paxolnaz, and Nicolai felt a pulse of power, felt and saw its Soul Sense rising and writhing, preparing to crush him.

But then the Demon’s Soul Sense froze. For around the room, dull red panes of light were materialising, and an unseen pressure was settl...

176: Demon's Gambit

The route back to the safe-place was difficult. The latest earthquake had been the worse yet, and it had had significant effect on the castle.

Hallways were blocked by collapses. Bridges had crumbled and fallen. Some areas were entirely missing, towers and walkways having slipped off and fallen to the jungle far below, only ragged holes and tears of stone remaining where they had stood.

The first major issue was that the stairway they would normally use to gain entrance to the int...

175: Closing the Cage

Nicolai streaked over the ground, and he was Nicolai again. The Zero-Twelve state had faded from its peak as he escaped their field of fire, and he’d been unable to cling onto it. However, he was still merged with the others, almost one mind, but not quite on the same perfect level.

He hungered to regain that state of ultimate combat ability, and grasped greedily at what remained of it, seeking to grow it and return to the peak.

He knew that he was pursued, but he judge...

174: Zero-Twelve

Move the arm, the shield!

Within Nicolai’s unconscious form, where even the thrill and the dark and the mask were all put to sleep, two remained functional.

In an odd reversal of the moment the long ago EMP had hit Zero-Twelve, and shut everything except Nicolai down, now, Threat Analysis and Cyberwarfare remained functional. The concussive force that had rolled through the organs, so disruptive to biological matter, had posed little problem to the hardware they ran on....

173: Come and Kill Me

Nicolai stood atop the Radio Tower. The wind whispered around him, picking at his poncho and flaring it, a black banner. He stood alone, ready and waiting.

In the clear space around the towers below, he saw bugs and undead tearing at one another. Even below the trees he saw them.

But Nicolai wasn’t interested in the bugs and undead. Where the treeline began, he saw what he was looking for.

Movement. Light flickered on metal. A single appeared and settled, standing on a bra...

172: Maxine

‘Go keep an eye on things from up there,’ Nicolai told Jo.

‘Trouble?’ she asked him over Local.

‘Most likely.’

She nodded and headed up the stairs, and he turned to his next target.

‘Greetings,’ he said to Maxine, who was talking with Perro and Azure. She looked over at him, eyes bright.

‘Ah, the illustrious leader. Your friends have told me about you,’ she said.

‘Good things, I hope,’ he said, smiling, his eyes on ...

171: Honourable Men

At the bottom of the tower, Nicolai moved to the entrance of the room where the others hid. He contacted them over Link before showing himself, wary of being shot by an overly primed finger-on-a-trigger, then he entered.

The room was small and mostly choked with vines. There was a stairway behind the vines, but it was collapsed. The others were packed within. He gave the vines a careful look, running his Soul Sense along them. Where those above where excessively barbed and black in colo...

170: The Angel

Nicolai kept firing, but as he fired he retreated backwards.

In its fury, the bird’s eyes were fixed only on him.

He was floating above the tower when the bird came within range of his Soul Sense. It struck at him immediately, but Nicolai had prepared for this. His Soul Sense was as firm and perfect as possible, and it was just enough for him to resist that first strike. The second came right on its heels, and he knew his Soul Sense would be broken. But he’d bought enough time...

169: Brother and Sister

The Centipedes gazed at him with many eyes, exuding hunger and curiosity. A vine crept out and touched on the ground before him, where a small amount of his blood formed a pool. After soaking in his blood the vine rose high into the air between the Centipedes, and two long, black, forked tongues emerged from their mouths and crawled through the air. They wormed over the vine, licking at his blood.

‘A little mouse, Sister,’ breathed one of them, as its tongue slithered back inside, a...

168: The Tower

Jo looked aside from the horde of bugs as she reloaded her rifle, looking over now she finally had time, to see what had become of Nicolai.

Her eyes widened. He was floating in the air, suspended there half a metre off from the ground, limned in yellow. He was a distant figure that seemed tinier still as the bird rose above him, raising its wings and screaming, a cry that spiked at her ears even from this distance.

It landed with a crash that shook the earth and sent up a plume of...

167: Assault

The shakes ended quickly, everyone letting out faint sounds of relief.

‘Another one,’ murmured Daksh.

‘They happen so often, nowadays,’ muttered Beth, which received an unhappy murmur of agreement from the rest of them.

As the others spoke, Nicolai’s ears were perked and his eyes moving, as always, while Threat Analysis had the drones out. It was his ears that warned him, something catching his attention. An odd rattling noise. Another shake? But there was...

166: Radio Woman

‘Who’s that?’ came a recognisable voice, with a long-dead accent of the American deep south.

‘Hey! Maxine? It’s me, Perro!’ said Perro, faster than any of them.

‘Perro? Hey! Good to hear from you. Where are you? Have you come to get me?’

‘Lock the connection,’ Nicolai reminded Daksh. Daksh nodded, and Nicolai sensed the connection they were using shift to a private state, so that others in the surrounding area could...

165: The Bird

After returning from the Library with his gains, Nicolai had been accosted by Perro, who once more demanded they go to rescue Maxine.

Since healing the laser burn, he was in good health and there was plenty of time left in the day. Desiring to keep the momentum going and see what else could be accomplished, he agreed to Perro’s request.

Now, Nicolai and the others filtered through the rooftop jungle. He was accompanied by Jo, Beth, Perro, Azure, Daksh, and Elena. This time, no o...

164: Late to the Party

We arrived too late, said Cornwall as Vikrum dashed through the hallways. He spotted another destroyed drone and knew he was going in the right direction.

I want him dead, he told the AI simply.

He is gone and he leaves no signs. The odds of finding him are negligible. Even if you do find him, victory is not certain. You did not bring any hunter-killer drones, only recon, and the Smart Gun is of limited effectiveness in the corridors of this area, You should ...