Dust to Dust: Man 05

Aberrant

Pile was moping.

I really should figure out a way to “taste.” The humans seem to enjoy ingesting food and drink quite a bit. At least this alcohol is decent as fuel. It burns quite a bit quicker than the oil, but I think that a man drinking oil would draw unnecessary attention. Still, it comes at quite the premium, at least I could enjoy it...

The golem stared into the amber colored liquid in front of him, as if the solutions to his problems were at the bottom of the glass. An idle finger stirred the drink, making Pile exercise his control to expel alcohol from his top layer of sand skin. That is, until a shaky hand fumbled across the table to grab said glass and attempt to pull it across the table, spilling it everywhere.

“Itsh mine. I paid for it so itsh mine.” The ranger's blood could double as a disinfectant with its current alcohol levels. His judgment impaired beyond reason, Travis tried to lick up the rivulets of booze draining across the table.

Picked up a few bad habits from living with a wolf, I see.

The wolf in question seemed to laugh at her inebriated companion, a rash barking escaping her jowls in a wild mockery of human vocalization. After her chuckles died down, she slowly stood up and stretched her lithe body out, throwing off the inactivity of the past few hours. A wave of her head was enough of a signal for Pile to follow her, and she strode outside the pub. Taking one last look at the now unconscious Travis, Pile followed her lead.

She seems to be even more intelligent than her “handler.” Or maybe she can just handle her alcohol better.

After exiting the Steamer Hog, Pile spotted the ebony canine farther up the street, back towards the blacksmith's tent. Her intentions were obvious.

Back to business. Damn dog shows no respect for guests once her pal isn't around.

Brushing past the dismissive wolf, Pile walked through the canvas flaps and found the blacksmith furiously pushing a piece of armor onto a circular grinder. It was his armor!

How dare that bastard ruin what- oh. My armor is all still on the rack. A copy...?

Keeping his outrage contained, Pile tersely questioned the metalworker. “Mind telling me why you're copying my work.”

The man in question jumped at the surprise, losing his grip on the forearm piece. The grinder launched it across the room, tearing a hole in the canvas tent. After a long pause, a crash and screams were heard from far away.

“...”

“...”

A furtive glance between the man and the golem seemed to solidify their camaraderie and mutual silence on the matter.

The blacksmith, Rounic, took the initiative to restart their meeting. He heaved his large frame onto the nearby workbench and gave Pile a long, calculating look.

“You claim the armor is yours. You claim to have built it. Now I've seen many suits in my time in this corps, but yours is... unique. It is the single shittiest design I've ever laid eyes on. You have ports for air and the other pipes have what I swear is unrefined oil running through them. Pneumatic pistons move the monstrosity and on each forearm you have what I swear are rudimentary flamethrowers using oil as the fuel. There is no discernible powersource, despite obvious silver wire connections for electicity, and the entire assembly has to be used on top of what I assume to be a subsuit that makes the connections to the air and oil ports. Ignoring the fact that you must've moved this 70kg by sheer muscle power to get it here with no subsuit or power source, the fact remains that this is most simplistic, archaic, and downright idiotic suit I have ever laid eyes on.” Each point that the blacksmith states seemed to bore into Pile, the experienced man's words were extremely damaging to the golem's newborn sense of self and pride.

I just made it to disguise myself better as a human. My sand skin won't stand up to even cursory scrutiny, so the armor just seemed to be the safest bet. Connecting the armor directly to my inner workings were a mistake, it's far too obvious if someone suspects that I'm-

“However,-” Rounic's crisp tone interrupted Pile's self-depreciating train of thought. “It is also the single finest work of craftsman ship I've ever seen. What tools did you use to make this? I tried to replicate your work myself-” he gestured towards the grinder and the hole in the tent's side where the armor piece was sent earlier- “but failed to replicate the precise measurements of your suit. So again I ask you, where exactly did you put this together? The tools required to make something this precise...” He trailed off, staring at Pile's suit on the armor rack as if in a trance.

The tools required to make that are in my sled, but it seems that his interest in the matter is a bit fanatic. Better to draw his attention elsewhere.

“Well really,” the golem began “it was all my family's doing. My father is quite the accomplished mechanic. He wanted me to get practical experience without reading up on the subject beforehand, yet he still allowed me to use his high-end workshop. Therefore there is very little theory behind this suit, but the the craftsmanship is-”

“Yea yea.” The interest in the blacksmith's eyes faded as Pile described the mundane origins of his armor. “Damn noble's son. Take it to a shop nearby and get some decent equipment for it, before you find yourself in an actual fight and realize just how pathetic that thing is. Thing is, you'll only realize how pathetic is when you're on your back with a monster tearing out your ribcage. Steel doesn't mean anything to proper mana-infused beasts. Maybe if you had a bit more time in combat or in a mechanics college instead of lugging around a sled of trade wares, you wouldn't be wearing such a useless waste of good material.” Finished with his long-winded rant, Rounic seemed to lose interest in Pile, gesturing for the golem to pick up his armor. The blacksmith then went into the back of his shop, picking up the work he was doing when Pile walked in, and started from where he left off. Realizing that this is as far as he would get, Pile left the tent, fighting the feeling of dejection building in his core.

Rounic was pissed. Lost all his work hours on a wild goose chase, some damn noble's kid walking around in a polished turd. His hands, frantically busy in order to make up for all the wasted time, slowed. Realization dawned on him now that he looked back at the situation without being blinded by impeccably crafted armor. If the armor didn't function without an undersuit and the young noble wasn't wearing one, how the hell did he pull the sled full of oil? Especially while weaing 70kg of dead weight!?

Interest was once more kindled in the eyes of the blacksmith, but now it was tinged with mistrust and a bit of fear. If he had super strength he wouldn't be wearing a powersuit. Better notify the guards, just in case. Smells wrong.

In the dead of the night, the golem met with the knavish wolf and the unconscious ranger around the same alcohol-soaked wooden table, unaware of the rude surprise the morning would bring.

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ACTION! ADVENTURE! INTRIGUE! NAKED GOLEMS WITH METALLIC TESTES! ADVENTURE!

~one of these things is not like the other~

EDIT: Looks like I made the top 100 already! Weird that I could never break that back when I wrote the first 20ish chapters, but broke it with these 2 new ones. Anyways, I'm fleshing out my next few chapters now so I just have to do a bit of dialogue work and PRing before I submit chapters this week. Submitting a chapter a day is just a damn satisfying feeling.