The Split

“Job’s done!”

The Mechanical Prophet hopped back a step, then withdrew his fist and struck a somewhat peculiar finishing pose—both hands held level in front of him, palms facing upward. Then he slowly let out a long breath and lowered his hands.

Though he was a robot, he really did seem to be sighing in relief. As he performed this strange, inexplicable sequence of movements, the structure of his body emitted a series of clicking sounds. Several fine cracks quietly split open across the surface of his silver-white armor, and then a dense blast of searing white steam shot out from within him. It condensed in the cold air into thick, milky-white vortices, causing the surrounding temperature to rise by several degrees.

“Hissssss—”

The continuous venting lasted for roughly seven or eight seconds before gradually subsiding.

“Whew—cooling down after finishing a job feels great.” The Mechanical Prophet stretched languidly, displaying an almost startlingly human touch.

His movements were so fluid that he hardly seemed like a mechanical construct at all. Every joint turned with a unique sense of beauty. When he had fully extended his body, faintly visible inside his breastplate were ghostly blue energy circuits that flickered on and off like breathing.

Another series of clear, pleasant hums rang out, and the vents in the Mechanical Prophet’s body slowly closed.

It was truly astonishing technology—a flawlessly integrated structure resembling a work of art.

Even with Xia Lun’s discerning eyes, he could not detect the slightest sign of assembly or splicing on the Mechanical Prophet’s body.

Comfortable? Wait, could this body actually feel sensations too?

Xia Lun stared at the ingenious mechanical body, amazement flickering in his eyes. As an adventurer who had seen countless rare wonders and treasures, he had never encountered such a perfect artificial creation.

The outside world truly exceeded his imagination.

“Ah, Mr. Xia Lun, the way you’re looking at me seems a little strange… Don’t tell me you have that sort of fetish? Surely not, right? Mechanical attraction is already an established preference on our planet, but you people probably haven’t encountered it yet. Besides, this body is male… Mechanical homosexuality?” The Mechanical Prophet’s train of thought seemed to have wandered somewhere strange.

Aina’s gaze turned cold. Her scarlet staff appeared in her hand and pointed toward the Mechanical Prophet as magical energy began to gather.

The Mechanical Prophet immediately felt a chill run through him.

“Just a joke! I was only joking!” he said hastily, raising both hands. “Mr. Xia Lun is your husband. How could he possibly be mechanically homosexual?”

Yet the energy gathering on Aina’s staff continued to intensify. The deep-red radiance grew denser and denser, resembling coagulated blood.

“I was wrong! Truly wrong!” The Mechanical Prophet’s voice trembled with the electronic quaver unique to machines. He looked as though he was only a step away from getting down on his knees and begging for mercy. “This body is very expensive! Please don’t destroy it! It took nearly one-tenth of our entire planet’s resources to develop, and just weaving the neural-link circuits took three months…”

A dazzling flash of red light swept past.

The Mechanical Prophet stood there in a daze, almost collapsing. A moment later, he hurriedly felt himself up and down, only to discover that he was completely unharmed.

Aina’s attack had passed straight by him and obliterated a several-meter-tall monster behind him.

“What are those?” Xia Lun immediately became wary.

“Looks like it’s not over yet.” Aina lightly withdrew her staff and spoke indifferently.

From the shattered ice fragments left behind by the frozen Chaos Demon God, one twisted crimson form after another began to crawl out.

Most of the monsters stood between three and five meters tall, their shapes bizarre and varied. Some barely retained a humanoid form, standing upright on two legs. Others crawled on four limbs like beasts. Still more had grotesque wings of flesh growing from their backs and flapped them desperately in an attempt to take flight.

Their entire bodies were made from indistinct masses of assembled flesh. They were uniformly crimson, with no discernible organs or features, like crude sculptures hastily molded from raw meat.

Most unsettling of all, they were constantly splitting apart.

Xia Lun watched with his own eyes as one monster split down the middle, becoming two smaller individuals. The two then expanded at a visible rate, returning to their original size in the blink of an eye.

“Thank you so much, Great Scarlet Goddess…” The Mechanical Prophet’s voice trembled with lingering fear. Naturally, the monsters were not what frightened him.

“Stop wasting time and get to work.” Aina snorted coldly, unwilling to continue entertaining him.

She then tapped the ground with her staff. A subtle red ripple spread outward, and the nearest group of monsters instantly turned into fragments scattered across the ground.

“Yes, Great Scarlet Goddess!” The Mechanical Prophet responded as though he had been granted a pardon. He immediately straightened and gave a military salute, placing his right hand across his chest.

“Signal transmitted. Summoning drone cannon group—Hive.”

A cold electronic voice rang out from within him.

A moment later, a light buzzing suddenly sounded through the air. Then countless fist-sized drone cannons descended from above, rapidly spreading across the entire battlefield.

The drone cannons resembled enormous eyes. Their bodies were made of crystalline, translucent material, and their method of attack was to unleash searing lasers that pierced straight through the monsters’ flesh in an instant.

For a time, lasers crisscrossed the battlefield. Every beam that swept past left behind a faint smell of charred flesh in the air.

The Mechanical Prophet waved his hands like a symphony conductor. Fine streams of data trailed from his fingertips as he precisely guided the movements of every drone cannon. At times the laser beams scattered into focused bursts; at others they converged into concentrated volleys, displaying astonishing tactical coordination.

“What an ingenious way to fight.” Xia Lun could not help but sigh in admiration, his eyes following the crystal devices as they darted nimbly through the sky.

At that, the Mechanical Prophet turned his head, apparently intending to continue his sales pitch… But when he caught sight of Aina’s still-frigid profile, he wisely closed his mouth.

Although the monsters were not especially large, the speed and strength they could unleash were truly astonishing. A crimson blur flashed past, and several drone cannons were swatted out of the air, smashing into the ground and creating deep craters.

Fortunately, the drone cannons were extraordinarily durable. Even after being knocked down, they would wobble back into the air moments later and rejoin the battle.

In truth, Xia Lun had already noticed that although the drone cannons were powerful, they still could not immediately turn the tide.

The monsters that had been sliced in two by the lasers temporarily lost their ability to fight, but continued writhing. It seemed that before long, they would recover completely.

“Damn it, are these things cancer cells? Why does it feel like they can multiply without limit?” the Mechanical Prophet complained. “If this keeps up, we’ll run out of energy…”

“If they were as simple as cancer cells, that would be a blessing.” The figure of the Arcane Sage appeared beside them at some point. “Find a way to gather these vermin together and wipe them out in one blow.”