Chapter 938: A New Type Of Automation
<span style="font-weight:400">The hardest part of her automation project, naturally, was getting started. If ra were ying the survival game that Dana had created ages ago, she would have needed to start from creating the most basic tools, and then using those to gradually improve her technology level. Thankfully, that wasn’t really required in this case as she made her way to the private world where their old factories were.
<span style="font-weight:400">The benefit of doing this in the real world is rather simple, and that is that she can use materials that she already has avable in order to get the basic framework started. Once she got to the old factory, she immediately ran to the maintenance warehouse. “I can’t take all the buildings, but I can at least grab a few drones to help me get started.” She muttered to herself, looking through what was avable.
<span style="font-weight:400">Naturally, after decades of disuse, the drones in the warehouse weren’t in peak condition, but she had the materials needed to repair them easily enough. From the warehouse, she was able to obtain five survey drones and six portable smelteries. <i><span style="font-weight:400">Not the best haul, but I can make it work!</i>
<span style="font-weight:400">Once she had what she needed to get started, she left this private world and went back to Deckan’s universe. The fact that the dimensium levels in this universe were so high would make it easier for ra’s owns to adjust. “First thing’s first, though…” She muttered, before closing her eyes and focusing on her connection with the familiar.
<i><span style="font-weight:400">We can’t have you destroying the factories and mines every time you shrink.</i><span style="font-weight:400"> Shemunicated, receiving a soft whine of response back from the star. Due to its nature, the celestial body familiar seemed to have a rather low intelligence. Or, maybe that had something to do with ra instead. Either way, she focused on creating a spell that would automatically trigger whenever the familiar changed size, altering the scale of anything linked to it to match.
<span style="font-weight:400">After finishing that spell, she moved out into the vast expanse of space, finding an open region where her familiar wouldn’t draw any unwanted attention. Only then did she allow it to expand to its full size. Seeing the star swelling up in front of her, ra was once again battered with the super-intense heat.
<span style="font-weight:400">If not for her status as an energy body, she would be directly evaporated by such close proximity to the sun. Thankfully, she was able to turn around and examine the threes that hade with her familiar’s evolutions. The first two were rather close, too close at least to produce nt life, with their surface temperature seeming to average around five hundred degrees. With it being so hot, there was naturally no water to be found.
<i><span style="font-weight:400">I’ll just use those two as resource farms when my first can’t keep up.</i><span style="font-weight:400"> She muttered inwardly, turning to the third. It seemed to be positioned perfectly within the habitable zone, judging by the vast oceans and greenery. <i><span style="font-weight:400">New base, acquired!</i>
<span style="font-weight:400">ra rushed forward with a wide grin, turning into a ck line that shot through space. In only a few seconds, she had arrived on the surface of the, looking around. “Okay, first order of business when starting a new resource management game. Identify a starting location. For that… fly, my pretties!” She cackled, holding her hands up and releasing the five survey drones from her inventory.
<span style="font-weight:400">The silver robots flew into the air, dense cones of light shooting out below them as they began to fly in different directions. “The Keeper said that he seeded these worlds with suitable resources, but these are respawning resources. I can’t assume that the quantity would be as high as a normal world. Unless he was just feeling <i><span style="font-weight:400">really</i><span style="font-weight:400"> generous. Though… the boss is typically pretty generous when someone asks a favor, so…”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra activated her terminal, which had been linked to the drones, and watched as the map was gradually filled in. “There’s a surface vein of copper five hundred meters to the south. Iron to the north, eight hundred meters and then thirty meters down. Coal… I can’t expect coal. I’ll need a logger to cut down trees for charcoal so that I can make steel.”
<span style="font-weight:400">As she thought about that, ra realized a rather critical error. “I couldn’t find any mining drones!” She gasped, gripping the sides of her head. “Am I going to have to dig it out by hand? No, that would take too long. I could just buy a mining robot? But I promised that I’d be self-sufficient… ah!”
<i><span style="font-weight:400">Sienna!</i><span style="font-weight:400"> ra mentally called through her World’s Shadow. When in doubt, delegate and outsource!
<i><span style="font-weight:400">Hmm?</i><span style="font-weight:400"> Sienna’s reply was soft, moments before ra’s shadow shifted and rose, the other familiar of Dana appearing.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Oh, good, you’re free!” ra eximed, jumping forward to hug the girl that was essentially her twin.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Not free.” Sienna corrected, allowing herself to be hugged. “What’s wrong?”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra blinked, but spoke even while continuing to hold onto the taciturn elf. “Well, I’m setting up this really big factory operation. I’ve got pretty much everything I need… other than manualbor. Do you have any monsters that can handle mining or logging? I’ll do the construction work myself until I can get a robot for it!”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna narrowed her eyes slightly, looking around. While ra’s primary job was patrolling the void, Sienna’s was to train the monster army within Dana’s shadow world. Logistics workers were naturally included in her army. “What are you making?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Uhm… everything!” ra chuckled at Sienna’s question. “The mineral nodes here respawn, so I want to use this as my primary research facility. I already arranged everything with the Keeper.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna’s eyes sharpened a bit when she heard that. “The Keeper agreed… okay.” She nodded, thinking for a moment. “How many?”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra pursed her lips in thought. “That depends on their efficiency. I currently have portable smelteries able to process one thousand kilograms of raw minerals every hour. My first job will be a home base with my first assembly line working towards better smelteries, and then I can make my own miners.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna shook her head at ra’s n. “Leave mining to me.” She said firmly, catching ra by surprise.
<span style="font-weight:400">“You want to be permanently in charge of my mining operations?” When she asked that, Sienna nodded her head quickly.
<span style="font-weight:400">“That’s right. Good training for monsters. What is the respawn duration?”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra had to think about that. “He said that it was the same as the others, so it should respawn every week. I’m still running a mineral survey, though.” When ra said that, Sienna narrowed her eyes at her. “...You want me to let you handle the surveys, as well?”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna nodded her head once again. “Good training. Do trees respawn? Have druids, if not.”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra blinked, before shaking her head. “No, I didn’t ask for nt life to respawn, only the minerals and crystals. This has all of the basic minerals, as well as Mage Heart and Blood Heart.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna’s eyes briefly widened, nodding her head quickly. “Good training. Have you found your home site?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Not yet.” ra shook her head before pausing, blinking. “Hey… you remember the Aurans?”
<span style="font-weight:400">When she asked that, she saw Sienna’s eyes going wide, practically sparkling in anticipation. ra gave a knowing grin. “Want to use the Fallen Goddess of Darkness powers to create bio-engineered shadow monster smelteries?”
<span style="font-weight:400">Again, a sharp nod met her question. ra simply let out a lightugh. “Alright, you make those. I’ll let you be in charge of mining, logging, smelting, and transportation. I’ll handle the production lines. For your new shadow monsters, make them only run on ki for sustenance. We can make a Blood Heart node our first mining project.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna thought about it for a moment, before nodding her head. With a biological temte to base a shadow monster on, it wouldn’t be too hard to create a monster with a simr ability. While the Aurans weren’t directly smelters, they were able to break down minerals that they ate, and perform a type of alchemy to change them into another form. This newly created form was pure enough that it could be used to smelt minerals, as long as the input and outputs were the same, removing the impurities.
<span style="font-weight:400">In fact, scientists had started working together with Aurans for years, trying to create an alchemical furnace that could replicate their effects in a machine. Unfortunately, the process had yet to bepleted, as certain mysterious traits from their own biology had yet to be solved. Thankfully, Sienna didn’t need to perfectly understand those traits. All she had to do was copy and paste.
<span style="font-weight:400">“Anything else?” Sienna asked, clearly eager to get back to the shadows so that she could make this new creature.
<span style="font-weight:400">ra thought about it for a few moments. “I can handleary defense myself. After all, this entire sr system is my familiar. From what I can tell, there’s not any natural animal life, so there shouldn’t be any local threats. Speaking of, have you gotten your familiar yet?”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna paused, shaking her head. “Not yet. Haven’t decided.”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra let out a long sigh. “Yeah, I suppose it’s a bit harder for you. The best in your case would be a familiar capable of ryingmands to arge group, but that’s basically what Dana set <i><span style="font-weight:400">you</i><span style="font-weight:400"> up for. If I know her, and she’s basically me, you were given a bunch of spells rted to armymands and monster development. Maybe you should go for a purebat familiar, something that can serve as your bodyguard? And preferably cute.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna hesitated for a moment. “Why cute?”
<span style="font-weight:400">“Just imagine!” ra chuckled. “You’re holding this cute little thing in your arms, and then an enemy shows up. Suddenly, your familiar jumps out, smacking the enemy to death before jumping back in your arms.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna blinked, slowly nodding at that idea. “Cute and powerful…” She seemed to be briefly lost in thought, before her eyes focused. The ground around her shattered and shifted, forming arge diagram. Above, clouds seemed to gather, the wind picking up.
<span style="font-weight:400">ra’s eyes went wide, jumping back as she saw Sienna immediately taking action. “Okay, you go fast!” As she said that, a ck portal appeared in front of Sienna, silver mist slowly pouring out.
<span style="font-weight:400">“I call upon you, who rests beyond the veil.” Sienna’s soft voice spoke, echoing as the wind began to spiral overhead. “The gentle breeze, the destructive storm. I call upon you, who resonates with my breath. May our path be as one, may the skies speak out names. You who knows the strength of my resolve, heed this summon and arrive like a gale.”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna held one hand out towards the portal as she chanted, seeming to guide the wind into it. As she finished, a burst of air pressure pushed away the clouds, clearing the sky and forcing ra to slide back. Her feet dug a long trench in the ground before she could stabilize herself, looking up at Sienna.
<span style="font-weight:400">The portal to the Underworld had vanished by this point. Now, in Sienna’s arms, was a small, white weasel. Its tail was curved sharp, like a fluffy de, and it nuzzled its head against her neck. Sienna’s entire body seemed to rx as she held her new familiar, causing ra to chuckle.
<span style="font-weight:400">“A sickle weasel? I suppose that would count as cute and dangerous at the same time.” ra nodded her head, resisting the urge to run over and pet the little creature. With how gently Sienna was holding it, she knew her ‘twin’ wouldn’t want the new familiar to be startled. “What are you going to name it?”
<span style="font-weight:400">Sienna blinked at that, furrowing her brows. She thought back to the stories that Aurivy had told them, before nodding her head. “Kama. His name is Kama.”
<span style="font-weight:400">ra rolled her eyes at the name, but Sienna was clearly satisfied. “Alright. You go get to work on supplying the monsters for the factory. I’ll find a location for the home base.”