“Can I have a turn?” asked Minus after Kragiel was finished getting better acquainted with her new God.

“Turn? What’d you mean?” inquired Fizzy while smashing up a Pawn with its own arm.

“I wanna try smashing these guys with my own hands!”

“I say we let her do it, boss,” chimed in Plus. “Lawrence knows she’s earned some stress relief after all the stuff she’s been through.”

“Yeah, I suppose that’s fair. I’ll take over on magnet duty, then!”

“Alright!”

The golem staggered for a moment as the two personalities traded places, but Minus was able to establish complete control without issue. Fizzy’s body then hunched over to the extreme, so much so that her hands hung down below her knees. This wasn’t due to Minus messing up or anything like that, though. She had already walked half of Fizzy along the bottom of that lake immediately after her ‘birth,’ so it wasn’t like she didn’t know what she was doing. Rather, it was the case that this was her natural stance.

Even though she was born of Fizzy’s subconscious, Minus was still her own person with her own tastes and preferences. This notion became readily apparent when she started running wild. Her original self had a very cold and calculating fighting style that dismantled her opponents with deadly efficiency and never using more effort than was deemed necessary. It was a ruthless mentality that Boxxy had thoroughly beaten into her in the past, and one that had served her well ever since then. Well, except when she had an audience and she wanted to show off. Or it was a painfully easy fight that she could have a bit of fun with. But other than that hers was a very controlled approach to combat, regardless of whether she was unarmed or not.

“RRAAARGH!” roared the golem as she barrelled her way through yet another automaton. “FUCKING DIE!”

Minus, on the other hand, was like a rabid dog that had been let off its leash. She ran around in that low, primal stance of hers, ripping out the Pawns’ legs and then smashing their heads and torsos between her hands before they hit the ground. She also pounced at them, toppling them over only to smash them into smithereens between her heels before zig-zagging towards her next target. Her movements were all over the place, but the sheer ferocity with which she assaulted her targets made her a lot more unpredictable and intimidating than the original.

Well, it wasn’t like mindless mechanical dolls could be intimidated, but that was besides the point.

“This is probably what I would be like if I were born a golem, huh?” mused Fizzy.

“Probably,” agreed Plus. “I catch glimpses of that side of yours every now and then, but - IS THAT THE BEST YOU GOT?! - Minus takes it to the extreme. It’s like she’s the embodiment to our baser, more monstrous instincts.”

“I suppose that makes sense given how she - WAHAHAHAHA! - came into being. Though I would personally never allow myself to act so undignified as to run on all fours. It’s - TOO SLOW! - unsightly.”

“I wouldn’t say that. Even if they’re a bit exaggerated, her movements are all very fluid and natural. I think that has a certain amount of - Catch this, chucklenuts! - beauty to it as well.”

“I suppose that’s true,” consented Fizzy. “At least her timing with electrifying her attacks is spot on, but would it kill her to use the cannon every now and then?”

“You guys know I can hear you, right?!”

“We - know,” answered the two in near-unison.

“Steell talking to yourself, I see?”

The trio’s internal dispute came to an abrupt end when Katya’s distorted voice echoed all around them. It may have taken some time since they had only one body to work with, but Fizzy and company had already all but decimated her security detail. It was honestly a shame those automata didn’t give out any XP upon their defeat, otherwise she’d probably be a Level 10 War Golem by now. Yet if Fizzy’s rage-filled face was as any indication, she obviously hadn’t had enough.

“Come out here so I can punch you in the cunt, you dick-munching fuck-ass!”

“Woah, easy there Minus,” cautioned Fizzy. “You’re getting a bit ahead of ourselves.”

“Yeah, we don’t even know where she is!”

“I don’t give a damn! I won’t be able to calm down until I crush her bitch face between my hands!”

“Quite,” responded the otherworlder. “However, vhat do you plan to do heer, Feezy? Zis depot is nearly depleted, eez of leetle value to me. Vhy did you zink it vhas so lightly defended?”

The golem had to admit, even though she had smashed her way through a few hundred automata, this was still ‘light’ by Katya’s standards. If this place truly meant a lot to the Original Artificer, she would've also had stationary gun emplacements, or rigged the area with traps. But even if taking the place offline wouldn’t be a major blow to Katya’s operations, it would still be enough to serve Fizzy’s needs.

The Paladin regained control of her body and calmly walked over to a specific point in the underground quarry while the remains of the security force retreated. She flexed her magnetic muscle and, after causing a minor seismic event, ripped about twenty insulated tubes out of the ground. She casually grabbed onto the now exposed wiring, causing a massive discharge of electricity to pass through her body and disperse throughout the area. The lights coming from the facility behind her suddenly shut off, only to flicker back to life a few moments later when its emergency generator kicked in.

“Lookie here!” taunted Fizzy while arcs of raw power screeched all around her. “I just found myself a way to your base!”

Katya had quite a few secondary installations that supported Novyy Dragunov. Mostly mining and processing facilities with the odd remote munitions factory or fuel depot. However, all of them were part of the same power grid. Therefore, the electric lifelines that Fizzy had in her grip would no doubt eventually lead her right to Katya’s doorstep. The otherworlder could, of course, get rid of the compromised power lines and facilities in an effort to ‘lose’ Fizzy, sort of like a lizard losing its tail to escape. However, her stubborn pride would never allow her to do something that would directly diminish her power.

“I am afraid you have zat ze ozer vhay around, Feezy,” calmly stated Katya.

“It’s Fizzy, Richard-damnit! FIZZY! EFF- AYE - ZEE - ZEE!”

“You missed the ‘y’ at the end there, boss,” pointed out Plus.

“Not now!”

“It matters now vhat you call yourself,” interjected the otherworlder. “If you continue to oppose me, all zat you vhill become eez scrap.”

“Hah! I’d like to see you try! Your machines may have given me pause before, but they’re no match for me now!”

“Yes, I vhill admit, you have become somezing very impressive since vhe last met. But! I have not sat idly by eizer!”

The roaring of multiple engines then entered Fizzy’s hearing. She discarded the severed power line and turned her attention towards the direction they were coming from - the large tunnel at the end of the cavern. It was the same direction that those power cables stretched out towards, so it was painfully obvious Katya’s reinforcements were on route. And indeed, much like she had assumed, a total of eight Knight-class transports sped out of the tunnel’s mouth. They came to a screeching halt some ninety meters away from the golem, forming a blockade of sorts directly in her line of sight.

Fizzy then realized something was very different about those vehicles. They had the same general shape of an armored box on wheels, but they had something new on top of their flat, rectangular roofs. Each steel platform now sported a strange spherical device somewhere between one and one-and-a-half meters wide. They spun around freely within their sockets, pointing all of their spike-like protrusions directly at the golem.

Fizzy didn’t need to be a Level 10 Champion of Chaos to recognize she was being targeted, but the split second warning the Skill gave her was still very much appreciated. It allowed her to throw up her shield just before Katya’s new weapons finished charging, at which point each of them released a ray of bright red light. The beams converged on the golem in an instant and would have hit her head were it not for her shield.

“Hahahaha!” laughed Katya in an arrogant manner. “How you like my latest prototype, suka? Stings, no?”

They didn’t have any weight or impact to them, but the sustained attack made sparks fly freely as they slowly but surely cut their way through the Artifact-grade item. Rather than stand still and face this unknown attack head on, Fizzy immediately discharged her built up heat through Heat Exchange. The result smoke, steam and dust cloud gave her a tiny bit of cover that allowed her to make a dash for it. Katya’s machines didn’t fall for such a crude tactic and kept their sights aimed squarely on their target. Three of them even moved to sweep across her exposed lower body. They left bright red half-molten trenches in her mithril thighs before she could duck behind a pile of loose stones, likely refuse from the mining operations.

Rather than continue trying to melt their way through the pile of rocks, the Knights stopped firing off their laser turrets and began to move. They split up in two groups and drove around the edges of the bowl-shaped cavern, likely trying to flank Fizzy and get a better shot at them. The golem wanted to return fire with her Magitech Cannon, but she had made the mistake of showing it off to the otherworlder. Although she didn’t know its exact capabilities and limitations, Katya was still able to gauge its effective range and would not allow her opponent’s attacks to reach her Knights.

Realizing she was about to be cornered, the Paladin abandoned her cover and made a run for it. The Knights opened fire on her immediately, but they had trouble hitting her since the shaking of the vehicle while it was in motion was disturbing their aim. Which was probably why a few of them slammed on the brakes so they can get a better bead on their target.

Fizzy couldn’t afford to get hit by those things. Her shield could withstand it thanks to its enchantments, but the rest of her was nowhere near as durable. She had never seen this sort of focused energy beam before, but she had already determined that being sliced neatly in half by it was a very real possibility.

“I got you, boss!”

Plus borrowed the use of Geomagnetic Grip to levitate the remains of Minus and Fizzy’s earlier rampage and form a shell around herself. Molten, shattered and heavily bent as they were, the ‘corpses’ of Katya’s Pawns were still forged out of steel. The debris was therefore quite useful in repelling her expanded arsenal. The only problem was that those beams were still cutting through the whirlwind of junk at an alarming rate.

“Minus!”

“W-what?”

“Don’t just sit there and stare! Help me out! You take the left, I’ll handle the right!”

“Right!”

It was a bit awkward sharing the same Skill, but the cohesion between the two Parallels could not be underestimated. Even if they were different minds with their own opinions and quirks, their common roots could not be denied. It took barely a few seconds for them to reach a level of cooperation whereby they were completely blocking out Katya’s lasers with their improvised defenses. Luckily they were standing in a field of scrap, so there was plenty of raw material to use as replacement whenever their respective shells took damage.

“Hey!” shouted Katya in an annoyed manner. “Those are not yours, suka blyat!”

Fizzy knew it couldn’t last, though. Entrusting her defense to her alternate selves allowed her to gauge the situation, and the larger picture was not good. It wasn’t like the steel fragments lying around were infinite, and she wouldn’t be allowed anywhere near those things even if she were to charge at them. She hated to do it, but the Paladin decided it was best to fall back for now and formulate a different attack strategy.

The question of where she could go was a difficult one, though. The sealed mining facility seemed like an obvious place, but it was a death trap. Katya’s Knights would just surround the place and keep her boxed in until she eventually succumbed to their beams. That was provided that the otherworlder didn’t outright detonate the place. Her penchant for self-destructive machinery was rather obnoxious, to say the least.

Therefore, the only option left to Fizzy was to retreat back into the hole she had arrived at, where those bulky vehicles could not give chase. However, there was a good fifty meters between there and the edge of the robotic debris. Plus and Minus were just barely keeping up with the onslaught, but their defenses would crumble quite quickly without spare parts to commandeer. Which would mean that the golem’s back would be exposed for the last part of the dash, but it was still her best bet.

She then spotted something out of the corner of her eye, something beyond the whirlwind of scrap and sparks surrounding her. It was a three-meter tall Rockfist Guardian that was in full sprint. It was headed right for a pair of Knights that were too busy shooting at the mithril golem to notice it in time. The stoneborn construct was thus able to plough right into the similarly-sized vehicles and used its freakishly long arms to flip both of them over, incapacitating them.

“Yobanyye pidorasy!”

Katya swore in her native language at full volume when she realized Fizzy was not as alone as she seemed, but the one that was surprised the most at this turn of events was the golem herself. She glanced back up at where she last left her guides and was shocked to see Kadam’s head poking out from behind cover. He threw her a wave, then turned his attention back to directing his rocky pet as it finished smashing up the two Knights. Kragiel then leapt out in front of him, placing a red kite shield with spikes sticking out of it between her brother’s head and the laser blast that was about to decapitate him.

A second Rockfist Guardian rose out of the ground immediately in front of the two siblings and ran down to meet Fizzy halfway. The disposable soldier then used its thick body as mobile cover, making up for the fact that the golem’s floating scrap barrier was all but destroyed. It soon succumbed to the converging heat beams, but the Paladin was already in range of Kadam’s magic by that point. The Stonesinger made walls of stone leap out of the ground behind her, further blocking Katya’s new weapons. The Paladin was thus able to safely retreat back through the hole she came from, putting her in a position where the lasers could no longer reach her.

The two stoneborn and the golem then retreated with all due haste, with Kadam collapsing the tunnel behind them as they went to make sure they weren’t being followed. It wasn’t until after a solid half hour of running that they allowed themselves to relax.

“That damned monster!”

Now that she was no longer in danger, Fizzy found herself with nothing better to do than to curse Katya’s name while punching the wall in frustration.

“Where did those blasted weapons even come from?! She didn’t have anything like those when I was still over there!”

“Huff! Huff! Don’t ask us,” said Kragiel while leaning on her knees and struggling to catch her breath. “That sort of thing was a first for us as well!”

“They might be the death of us if we don’t inform the higher ups right away,” pointed out Kadam. “None of our conventional defenses can stand up to that sort of attack.”

Bullets and bombs made primarily of metal were easy enough to repel with Stonesinger magic, but literal beams of scorching light? That would rip right through any sort of magical fortification that earth-attuned magic could create. Rock, stone and metal could not stand up to sustained heat of that degree. Even Kragiel’s Masterwork-quality fire-resistant shield had very nearly buckled under the strain. And that was just the prototype. The siblings shuddered to think the sort of destruction the finished, mass-produced version would inflict.

“Look… Fizzy,” spoke up Kragiel after that brief moment of silence. “I want to thank you, and to apologize to you.”

“Huh? What’s this about?”

“If it wasn’t for the Paladin Job you gave me… I don’t think Kaddie would be alive right now.”

The deadly forces unleashed by the Nemesis’s new weapon moved at the speed of light. The only way to intercept something like that was to already be in a position to block it before it had been fired. A feat that was only made possible through the Champion of Chaos Skill, which allowed the rookie Paladin to perceive the threat to her brother’s life moments before it happened. If not for that, then the chances of him still having a face were slim, to say the least.

“This moron always sticks his head out where he shouldn’t,” she continued, “so as the older sister that always has to look after him, I am honestly grateful for what you have given me. I am also sorry to have doubted your words and intentions.”

It was painfully obvious by this point that Fizzy and Katya were no longer allies, despite Kragiel believing otherwise pretty much the entire trip. It was a bittersweet pill for her to swallow, but she wasn’t above admitting her own faults.

“… If you want to throw something worthless like gratitude around, then direct it towards Herman,” declared Fizzy. “Besides, don’t think you’ll be as grateful if I were to tell you how Katya developed those weapons.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Kragiel with a puzzled look.

“You just said you knew nothing about them, didn’t you?” chimed in her brother.

“Well… how should I put this…”

After a bit of internal conference, Plus had reminded Fizzy that Katya did indeed have that sort of technology at her disposal. Although the golem had only caught a glimpse of them, the assembly lines in Novyy Dragunov used tiny lasers to cut and weld the various components that made up her steel battalions. However, those were much smaller and weaker than the artillery pieces the Original Artificer had shown off today. Meaning that she definitely had the ability to supersize those tools into energy weapons, but she hadn’t done so over the last twenty years.

So then, what was it that kept her from doing this sort of thing? The most obvious answer was power problems. Anything that could discharge that much heat and at such range would require massive amounts of energy, regardless of whether its origins were magical or scientific in nature. And easy access to energy was something that Katya always seemed to be short of. It was likely she was incapable of making a power source that was compact enough to move around, yet powerful enough to feed those beasts. It wasn’t all that far fetched an assumption when considering her specialization. She was an Automata Artificer first and foremost, so power management was, as the android herself had put it, outside her ‘field of eksperteez.’

However, power management was precisely the sort of thing that Arclight Artificers excelled at, something that the Fizzlesprocket clan had proven time and time again. Like, for example, when they developed a type of alchemical circuit to better facilitate the transfer and amplification of electrical energy. It was something that would’ve definitely helped solve Katya’s issues, but was invented more than half a century after her disappearance. She would therefore have had no idea that such a method even existed.

At least not until a certain visitor from the surface had demonstrated the revolutionary technique right in front of her.

“Long story short, it may or may not have been almost entirely my fault.”