Archeologist Warlord: Book 3

by E. M. Hardy

  Dumb luck. It was the only reason that the rogues weren’t walking all over him right now.

  He would have stood no chance of pushing them back, not with the numbers he fielded prior to capturing the rogue pyramids. They would have overrun him before spreading out from there, and he would have been powerless to do anything about it.

  “You’re an exceedingly arrogant little idiot that never learns from his mistakes.”

  The knight’s parting words suddenly returned to haunt him.

  Skewered by an akinji raider’s lance, smashed by an Imperial martial artist’s cudgel, cut apart by a Taiyo samurai’s blade, trampled by a khanate horse’s hooves… even crashing on rocks after being swept away by a flood.

  The idea of death really didn’t disturb Martin as much as it used to. No, he already ‘died’ countless thousands of times already, learning to shrug it off with each fallen walker reshaped and revived in the production vats.

  He didn’t really care what happened to him as long as he kept himself focused on his goals. He always operated on the assumption that his shells were expendable, that he could always come back from the dead.

  Even the attack by the Rats wasn’t enough to instill a sense of fear in him. Sure, they bombed his core and put him out of commission, but he figured it was just a temporary thing. He still came back, so he put the thought of death out of his mind. He just assumed his core possessed the ability to regenerate, to recover after taking critical damage.

  Looking back on the events of his revival, however, he realized that things didn’t add up. He had been gone for an entire year after the bombing, but he reckoned that the self-repair began only six months from the time the Rats attacked his core.

  He recalled how a blood-infused shard filled with frozen chi and prana supplied him with the energy he needed to reboot his consciousness, fuel him long enough to feed off the ambient chi floating in the air. If that shard did not find its way to his core, if he had never drawn power from the shard… would he have revived at all?

  Maybe his revival was indeed all down to dumb luck.

  He remembered the knight’s sneering disgust, his utter disdain, and realized that the man had a point. He needed to rely on more than luck, to better protect himself in the future. If only he could move his core, put it somewhere safer.

  Hell, he possessed hundreds of pyramids scattered across the Wastes and this desolate jungle. He also possessed the ability to build new pyramids from scratch… including the massive crystal control cores that come with them.

  Could it be possible? Could he really just build a new control core somewhere else, move his primary consciousness into it like he moved a partition of his consciousness into a walker?

  …nate…

  Martin was so deep in thought, carefully considering how he could move his core around to a safer location, when a whisper shook him out of his reverie.

  He traced the source of the voice, noting that it came from the partition that he sliced off to take control of the Builder satellite.

  “Hello?” Martin’s consciousness ventured back, channeling more of his awareness toward the satellite. Nothing replied, so he shrugged it off and went back to studying his home continent and considering how he could transfer his core consciousness to a new vessel.

  …minate…

  He was in the middle of drawing up plans to construct a new core vessel when he heard the whisper again. He was just about to dismiss the voice once more when he suddenly remembered the Invader knight, of how he attempted to take control of him during moments of weakness.

  Martin abruptly contracted his awareness, pulling the partition of his consciousness away and shutting down his connection to the satellite.

  He immediately began fortifying himself, cycling chi within the ethereal aspect of his core. He would not be caught off-guard this time. He would fight back, kick the Invader knight out with his enforced presence. He shielded his thoughts, bolstered his energy reserves, and waited for the knight to make the first move.

  He waited… and waited… and waited some more. Nothing.

  He prepared a team of walkers, each raising the sharpened edges of halberds over the line that physically connected the rogue core to the rest of his network. They were ready to drop their weapons at the slightest hint of intrusion, of invasion.

  Steadying himself, he reconnected a partition of his consciousness to the satellite.

  Exterminate.

  Martin startled within his core, the voice much clearer than ever before. Correction, it was not just one voice—it was a chorus of voices speaking out in unison.

  Um. Hello? Anyone there?

  Exterminate, the voices replied dumbly, almost like a response to his query.

  Hi, are you—

  Exterminate?

  No, I—

  EXTERMINATE!

  Martin jumped at the sudden surge of urgency, of hostility in the chorus.

  Their shrill cries somehow reminded him of tiny disfigured creatures hiding inside unstoppable garbage cans, disintegrating everything around them with their overpowered lasers and impenetrable shields.

  He almost chuckled to himself at the reference before freezing up as he realized the implications of what he was hearing.

  Suddenly panicking, he accessed the satellite and began following the signals of the voices—ignoring their screeching the whole time. His partition of consciousness eventually bounced upon another satellite, then another, and another. Each individual voice in the chorus fought back against his consciousness, pushing him out from their networks.

  Most of the voices were strong enough to repel him, prevent him from accessing their respective satellites, but he was able to trace one relatively weak signal.

  It came from a lone pyramid without production capabilities, something like a surveillance facility.

  Small, weak, hidden, the voice residing within it offered little resistance as he forced himself against its connection, pushed it back long enough to hijack the satellite that it rode on. He accessed the camera—relatively well-preserved and only slightly more damaged than the one in his satellite—and peered down.

  The larger continent of Copsis lay out before him, almost five times the area of his home continent and composed of multiple landmasses all squished together into one supercontinent. The inky blackness of night draped over the whole continent, masking its geological features.

  It matched what he saw in Amun’s vision, what the Builder witnessed during the end of civilization in his time.

  He noticed something odd after a few moments of studying the continent, ignoring the voices shouting ‘exterminate’ at him like some kind of accusation. It took him a few more moments before he realized just how eerily dark the continent was.

  Where were all the night lights? This was supposed to be the main continent, a landmass capable of supporting huge populations.

  That’s when he noticed the lights clustering all around the western side of the continent, with the brightest massing up on the coastlines. A straggled line separated the lights of civilization from the oppressive darkness as if there was some border between light and dark.

  Martin continued ignoring the voices when he realized they could not influence his control.

  True, he couldn’t contend against the stronger ones among the chorus, but they likewise couldn’t entirely push him out of the satellite grid. He continued watching the continent until he noticed that he had seen this sight before.

  The sun rose on the continent, and the light confirmed his fears when he zoomed in with the lens of his newly-captured satellite.

  There, like little microbes on a glass slide, crawled swarms of tiny, indiscernible constructs. They wormed out of tiny little pyramids, making their way to join millions of their comrades as they expanded relentlessly all over the continent. Bands of humans resisted here and there, clashing with the lines of rogues, but they were like drops of water melting a
way against a vast ocean.

  That’s when Martin realized there were more rogues on the planet of Copsis. They were running rampant on the main continent with no one to stop them, and they were driven by one all-consuming desire…

  …to exterminate.

  Epilogue

  Empress Zi Li scrunched her delicate eyebrows together, grumbling and mumbling to herself as her husband rubbed her shoulders.

  She gently leaned back on her rocking chair, a luxurious gift from one of the Emiras, and allowed the swaying thing to ease some of the stress and pain oozing out of her body. Suhaib, in the meantime, continued rubbing her shoulders as they savored their privacy deep within the Empress’ chambers.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, reaching back to clutch Suhaib’s hand.

  “My pleasure, love. How are you feeling?”

  “Like a heavily pregnant sow, no thanks to you,” she replied with a chuckle that quickly died away as she lapsed back into silence. Suhaib wrapped his arms around her shoulders, and she leaned back to savor his warmth. The silence dragged on for a few more moments, then a few more, and a few more still.

  The royal leader of the Ren Empire, clutching her husband’s hands, sighed before letting them go. “Speak your mind, husband.”

  The sixth prince of the emirate of Ma’an and the current prince consort of the Empress pursed his lips together before taking a seat opposite his royal wife.

  “Li… you are my life and my joy. I will do anything for you, as I have sworn my loyalty to you and the Empire you rule over. But still… is there any way I can convince you to change your mind?”

  The Empress Zi Li frowned at that, straightening her back and hardening her gaze upon her husband.

  “I have confessed to you, love, of what I have done before. It did not work then, when he was at his most vulnerable. Now, at the height of his power? It would be utter ruin to challenge him so openly, much less attempt to provoke him with a direct attack.”

  “So why do you need me to meet the other emirs in secret, to form an alliance against…”

  Zi Li paused for a moment, ready to interrupt Suhaib, when she raised a finger to her lips. He tapered off and left the rest unsaid. She nodded, satisfied with him. Martin’s constructs could be anywhere, listening in with his floating eyeballs or hidden dolls.

  Plans against him must always be whispered, letters coded and burned as soon as their purposes are served.

  “You have read the war reports of your brother, yes?”

  “Mufeed? Yes, yes I have.”

  “You have also read the reports of Agent 42, about the rogue facilities he took for his own use?”

  “Yes.”

  “You listened to Hobogetur’s boasts when we celebrated the return of the allied army, plied him with drink and food to loosen his tongue?”

  “Yes.”

  “Now, think for a moment. What if he turns his hand against us?”

  Suhaib frowned at that. “I… think he would never do such a thing. He has proven himself a loyal friend, time and time again. Even when…” He inhaled deeply at that statement, steeling himself for what he needed to say but eventually backed down, lacking the courage to voice it out loud. “Even when he discovered things he shouldn’t have, he stood by his vows of vassalage. I don’t think he would turn against us so easily.”

  “But what if?” Zi Li continued stubbornly. “What if he finds some reason to overthrow my rule, or your father’s rule? He could, for example, use the Isles of Taiyo as an excuse to break his vows. Maybe he would ‘liberate’ the citizenry from royal rule now that he has the sheer weight of numbers on his side.

  “The Empire has at most two hundred thousand professional soldiers, maybe throw in a million conscripts if we shove spears into the hands of peasants. He has millions of walkers and sphinxes now. We wouldn’t be able to do anything if he decided one day to wipe us away, erase our legacies from history.”

  “I really don’t think he would—”

  “Or what if he loses himself, like what happened during Inagaki’s rebellion?”

  This argument killed whatever arguments Suhaib planned to say. He knew very well what happened to Martin during that time, of the dark madness that possessed him.

  “Uhi… are you there?” Suhaib’s jinni materialized, manifesting herself from the Invisible World in a gentle shimmer of light. Suhaib frowned at that, at how his wife called forth his own bonded partner.

  “You and your people called Martin the Corrupter once.”

  “True, but he is the Purifier now,” Uhi responded, bowing to the Empress of the Ren Empire. “He leads lost souls back to peace, toward the cycle of life and away from eternal rage and misery.”

  “But there was a time that he almost lost control of himself, where he reveled in the pain and suffering of his victims? What did you call it, trapping and torturing their souls for power?”

  Uhi hesitated, glancing at her partner from behind her thin veil. Suhaib hesitated, then nodded—a nod that Uhi returned to the Empress.

  For her part, Zi Li turned back to face her husband. Before she spoke, she gently rubbed her swollen belly and rocked her chair once more.

  “I know you call Martin friend, husband, but I will not pass this responsibility on to our children. I will do all I can to protect them, ensure their rightful place in this world. I will not leave them to the whims of an unstable thing, one that commands millions of empty-faced dolls that could at one moment joke with you and the next go insane from some mysterious affliction of the soul.

  “Suhaib… love… I no longer seek war with Martin, but I must prepare for one if it should ever fall upon us. It is my duty as Empress.

  “This is why I plead with you, husband, to seek help from your old friends and acquaintances. We need to form a united front, to aid one another should Martin lose his humanity and become the monster that Uhi once feared… one that I still fear, and that our children would have to bear if such a disaster comes to pass.”

  Suhaib sat still for a few minutes, fully digesting Zi Li’s words for the whole duration before nodding his silent assent.

  Zi Li gave him a grateful smile, stretching her arms out for a hug. Suhaib’s pensive expression melted at her adorable gesture, and he scooted closer to give her what she wanted. Uhi, satisfied with the resolution of events, withdrew to the Invisible World to give the couple some privacy.

  Zi Li’s eyes followed her husband as he stood up, no doubt to write his coded letters and plan for the journey to the Bashri Basin.

  She knew that she should have rejoiced when he closed the door, that she should revel in her ability to manipulate her husband into doing whatever she wanted. She should have held her head up high, proud in the fact that she could so easily use him to secure the allies she needed for the next step of her plan to cut Martin down to size.

  She instead buried her face into her hands to muffle the sobs that no ruler of the mighty Ren Empire would ever be caught dead making.

  ***

  Saikawa Tatsumi held his breath, willing the shadows around him to envelop him in their protective embrace. He watched his hated enemy’s things pass by the corridors of the pyramid, vigilantly keeping a lookout.

  He had been watching the door for six hours now, waiting eagerly for a chance to slip in.

  That chance came when one of the small things, the dolls, approached the guarded entrance. Saikawa heard from his seniors that the first shadow infiltrations went smoothly, with the hated enemy not even suspecting a thing.

  They were able to plant their timed explosives, sneak out, and escape without encountering a single hiccup along the way. They had avenged the Shogun—the True Shogun, not the false one that stole Inagaki Nobumoto’s mantle, sold his virtue to the Empire and to the soulless things that had invaded the home islands.

  Except all of Saikawa’s seniors were dead now, hunted down like dogs after bringing divine retribution upon the enemies o
f the True Shogun.

  Saikawa shifted silently, the shadows bending light around him and rendering him invisible despite all the torches the things carried around with them. His talent for shadow-walking eclipsed his peers’, his veil of shadows bending light instead of simply covering him in darkness.

  This was the only reason he survived the Empire’s purge. Few of his fellows who ran to the emirates of the Bashri were spared, tracked and hunted down by the agents of the League of Merchants—their so-called operators.

  The time came.

  Jiku, his jinni, fell in silently as she wove a veil of glass shadows around him, further bending the light around him. Saikawa then stepped in, torchlight passing through his invisible body, as he followed the doll inside the chamber.

  He frowned, noting the near-pristine condition of the crystalline pillar within. The hated enemy must have found some way to fix it, to recover from the damage. Otherwise, its creatures would have stayed dead instead of coming back to life.

  Saikawa stood in a corner of the room, well away from any path that a creature would take. The doll morphed its hand into a tube of some kind before spraying mud at the base of the crystalline pillar.

  The little thing then morphed its hands back to normal, patting and shaping the soft material into place. It then turned around toward the entrance, the guards allowing it to pass before sealing the door once more.

  Saikawa waited a few more moments, before allowing a soft sigh to escape his lips. He lowered his heavy pack and peered inside. The energized crystals remained hidden in his veil of glass shadows, ensconced in multiple layers of soft cloth to muffle any potential noise. Saikawa stared at his doom, knowing he would never escape this facility alive.

  The hated enemy posted sentries in its pyramids now, sealing the entrances instead of leaving them open and unguarded. There were even two in the core room itself, standing vigil over everything. They would be upon him the moment the crystals left his protective shadows.