Chapter 19-1 Harvest

Chapter 19-1 Harvest

Lives.

Its all we really have to offer.The initial posting of this chapter occurred via Ñøv€l-B!n.

Were already less than useful for labor. Been that way for years. Wights obsoleted us before. The new mechs and drones coming out are just going to make the process faster. The Guilds offer all the public education we might need in public lobbies, but thats useless as well. They dont need the most of us to think or learn or become experts. They just skim the cream of the crop.

The rest of us arent worth shit from fuck.

Cheaper than vivianite priming and with our own memories. I suppose thats something of material value to us as well.

Sure, we can find other things to do. The ones with charisma might make it to Lights End by being entertainers, the ones who got the fire in them could become squires or Necros or ride the circuits to the top.

But the rest of us?

The most of us.

No. Were here for one thing and one thing alone.

All the free miracles and benefits and comfort promised by New Vultun is a rigged game. This isnt a death farm, but a self-resolving menageriea self-run slaughterhouse.

Our lives are like this by design. They cant get better. They shouldnt. Because once again, were just here for the dying.

Even with all the concessions the voiders forced our masters to make and the false front of public security presented by Exorcists and Paladins, were just duped into the nest to spend our years. Our childrens years.

Scratch your lottery ticket today! You might just be a lucky winner! Also, if you schedule a childbirth from your local paedia-tech and choose to bring home more than two children, you will be given a stipend of twenty-two thousand imps a month with a free lottery draw, along with a special chance to be gifted the new Ascender Dynamo Aerovan todayperfect for a family outing!

Were pathetic. We are. Because even if we all know, where else do we go? Where else offers anything better?

People say this is not the dream, this is not the dream. But this is material reality, and the reality is that beyond all the shit and misery, theres still a shadow of a life here.

Same cant be said for the world left behind outside the megas.

-Yun the Cynic, FATELESS

19-1

Harvest

The massacres were conducted as a subtle symphony, seemingly disconnected events strung together by an unseen hand behind the killings.

Across the over thirty-five thousand death-taxable sovereign territories spread over New Vultun, the bulk of expendable life was concentrated in the Warrens. Mostly Lights End and the Throat beneath it, with an estimated four hundred billion people occupying their space. Lower still, the Spine and the gutters suffered far less congestion, amounting to a hundred and five billion counted through thoughtstuff documentation compiled in annual Exorcist reports.

With such a bounty of life came opportunity and risk in equal measure. Eyes lingered in the light and darkness, dangers noticed and not. Hence, the city also proved to be something of a theater for those privileged enough to afford veils of privacy, watching and studying the ecosystem of the Warrens in detail, learning the habits of its inhabitants, and the pillars of power they built for themselves.

To this end, gangs and Syndicates were like micro-cosmic fiefdoms unto themselves, offering employment and resource distribution to the FATELESS that relied on them. Trade ran as favors and debts accrued, refugees and destitute signing over their lives, bodies, or whatever services they could provide.

Through these means was control truly established. A toxic providence offered by uncaring hounds that evolved beyond merely hunting, striking pacts with the most desperate of lambs.

Thus, the fall of a Syndicate was always a matter to note, the waves of their collapse rising to swallow entire communities, and signaling the encroach of lurking rivals.

It was when a Syndicate fell that deaths truly began to spike. Local gangs, inter and intra rivals, remnants and survivors, and newly established factions in an all-out throw down bid for power, seeking to claim the vacancy for themselves.

Such a time was also when diplomacy and force were wielded in equal measure to the benefit of the wildcard. The unnoticed. The unexpected. For when seats of power topple and the fragments of their pillars fall, even the unlikeliest people might be able to ride the chaos and assume control, rare though these instances were.

Because what was chance but the culmination of all variables and outcomes, and what was opportunity but moments transpiring at the behest of a hidden master?

Such were Avos thoughts as he stared through the looking glass, orchestrating another slaughter. Encased in haemokinetic plates infused with the Twice-Walkers miracles, he acted through Draus and Dice as they tore the megablocks hangars.

Railings screamed and crashed. Bodies burst and splattered. Husks of now-drained golems lit the backdrop of their blitzkrieg, the attack catching the Hawk-Daggers Syndicate completely unprepared.

+Nine fireteams. Eight nu-dogs. Four nu-bears. Three Necros. Two Heavies. Two leaders. Three levels above.+ Avo highlighted the targets using Draus Neurodeck as he continued to burn through the Sang Syndicates Nether lobbies, his Conflagration igniting another five hundred minds nested within the sequences. Over fifteen hundred combat-design bioforms were nulled with them, the egos of the beasts dissolving utterly in the same fire that smelted their masters into Avo.

Draus was right there with Dice, but also three hundred kilometers away, fighting a separate battle below the gutters themselves as she shattered a chamber filled with formerly living hostiles. Casually walking down a spiraling staircase overlooking a former drone bay now serving as a barge hanger, the Regular announced her arrival by firing shots through a shard of hovering glass. The shots snapped out from the reflective sheen cupping Dices form, counter-sniping the shooters blasting through their own walls to get at the girl.

Even as Dice turned, her momentum stayed constant, inertia lacking any hold on her. The dragon-curse pried at her blood, but Avo wrenched control back using his Heaven.

Twitching entities of chitin and fur roared at her from the walls and ceilings. Amalgams of bear, centipede, and cyborg, the incarnatesSang-modified bioformscarved through decorative scenery trying to cut her down, flak-canons once meant for anti-air now reduced to in-block urban combat.

They wouldnt be enough to stop her from getting to the final Knot.

The floor shattered beneath the hammering of her feet as Dice backhanded a four-ton repair drone aside with a casual swat. Wires and servos exploded. Fragments of industrial orange filled the air and eviscerated one of the centipede-bears stalking her. What few personnel remained fought to board the golems and aeros, desperate to flee, not knowing it was already too late.

Avo drew all of his Conflagration back into himself then, his halo roaring as ninety percent of his consciousness receded out from his Auto-Seance. Burning ghosts erupted out from his accretion like coronal ejections, jets of phantasmal flame spearing upward like spikes on a crown. Something wrong?

Yeah, she said. I didnt know I was getting into the world domination business. She pointed at the red arteries sprawling across fifteen districts and thousands of holographic structures. Overhead, a shining 2% hovered over the Sovereignty. Minimized markets dotted the overlapping rings upon which the districts were built. I go off and take a nap, and now I come back to this. I swear, half those icons werent there last time. And whys that flashing. She pointed to the Hawk-Dagger megablock they just hit.

Killed everyone. Then nuked it. Thanks for the warheads.

She waved him off. Yeah, dont sweat it. Got a few hundred more where those came from. She turned and gave him a shit-eating grin. Perks of raiding a Highflame battleship during the war.

Another triangular icon flashed as Chambers gave a whoop where he lounged on the throne. New cult member! Thank you for the sub!

Tavers blinked. What the hells does that mean?

Think the Skintaker just had another person pay to get into his most private streams. Chambers has been spoofing his way into them. Turning Syndicate personnel. Enforcers. Techs.

Huh, Tavers said, wiggling her noise. You kids get up to weird shit these days.

Avo stared down at the aged squire. You kids.

What? You think youre not a kid to me because youre a people-eating, mind-burning, Heaven-stealing monstrosity.

Yes.

Well, youd be wrong, juv.

The stare turned into a glare. Could burn you too.

Tavers yawned. Good. Im sure your other templates will agree with me when I get moved in.

A chorus of agreements sallied forth from his gestalt. Avo de-loaded all the traitorous templates and found himself left with less than ten minds. His frown deepened. He unbanished the turncoats and moved on.

Hows Essus, he asked. You took him down with you into the Maw earlier. Scouting detail. Tracking smuggling routes with you.

Well, all things considered yeah hes a fucking mess. Tavers shrugged. The bees spent most its time trying to keep him calm while we moved from point to point. Poor half-strand nearly had a breakdown when we found a mound of burned bodies. His Heavens useful though. You know he can connect anything that resembles a doorway with himself, yeah? That sped things up at least.

Find anything?

Not yet. The lines on her forehead wrinkled. We did encounter a big-ass Highflame patrol, though. Huge. Im talking thousands upon thousands of drones sweeping through the Maw. Cast a few consangs of mine, and theyve basically fighting Stormtree in there over Yuulden-Yang. Heavy drone warfare. Severe losses, but they dont seem to care. Or have orders not to.

She fixed him with a knowing look. Suppose we'd all do funny things when misplacing our shiny new Frame, huh, consang?

A pressure settled upon Avos shoulders, centering him. Highflame was moving away from playing subtle, it seemed. Dangerous. But potentially exploitable. A hundred thousand voices chittered in the back of his head, whispering how he could turn this threat to an advantage. The promise of his Frame was a lure. Perhaps he could direct them against Ori-Thaum or a rival power somehow if there was ever a need.

Suppose so, Avo replied.

A call flashed over his Neurodeck as Kaes ego-ID appeared. Answering it with a thought, the agnos avatar filled a corner of his feed. Though his DeepNav couldnt narrow in on her position, he knew that she was in her personal modulea new space the George Washington grew for her, mimicking the design of her old study in the Tiers using its smart matter. {Avo. I think I know how to install the barges canons into your Heavens without requiring the removal of Luminosity.}

{Good,} he replied. {Fortress would be hard to replace. Got a heavy spike of Heavens and thaums. Enough to make some improvements.}



Looking at the details he cast over, a small smirk spread across the smooth ebony of Kaes features. {Some improvements? You are due another education, oh, ghoul of mine, for I have earned for myself new knowledge that would make me the envy of any of my peers.} She giggled.

Avo titled his head, and for the first time, slotted pieces from Chambers template into his base ego.

Kae blinked. {Avo?}

{Ghoul of yours?}



Her expression went stiff and her cheeks reddened. {Iuh, it was a figure of speech. You understand! Dont tease me!}

He grunted in acknowledgment. {As you say my dearest Agnosi.}

She cried with indignation and cut the call, leaving only a frowning Tavers before him again.

Been staring at me for a bit, Tavers said. Saw your thoughstuff needling too. So, either you just got a call or theres something wrong with my face.

And with Chambers personality still slotted at the forefront, Avo bared his fangs in a smile and lightly patted the squire on the shoulder using the floating tip of an Echohead. Im sorry. You need a mirror.

It took a moment for her to understand what he was implying, but then she threw her head back and barked a laugh. Oh, you fucker.

So, did his gestalt continue to churn, and evermore a furnace of dynamic humanity did the Conflagration become.