Sera paused at the words.

Administrator? It was talking to me, right? Sera shook her head at the thought, after all, who else was there?

“Alright thanks drone, now can I ask you a qui-”

But it was already walking off back towards the cave.

It seems like the drone’s other senses… had trouble as well. Iva seemed to agree, staring at the drone angrily as it marched off, or maybe she was angry at it nearly killing her?

Sera didn’t have long to ponder as her PID flashed a new screen at her.

PID Interface

Database entry ‘Drone’ updated:

Drones were sent far and window across large forms of land, mainly through the surface of the water, due to ease of transport. This mistake was fully realised only after the drones had been deployed, and our attempts to call them back were either unsuccessful or too-late due to damaged sustained.

‘The Ancients’ used these drones to reach land, however communications have been lost since the original objective.

More information about the drones, and this time history as well! Sera soaked up the information and realised she had been ignoring an obvious part of The Temple.

Where the people inhabiting it had gone. I may have assumed they all died a bit too quickly, wait, does this mean some of the ancients are still alive? Why aren’t they helping The Temple, then?

But rather than the information clearing up questions, it added more, and even worse, Sera realised she had to get moving. “My scanner and Scythe, oh wait.”

Looking at the ground near the entrance, Sera quickly found the discoloured Scythe, but the scanner… “Ah. Well, at least I can leave my pack out here. Come on Iva.”

The swim back to the cavern was different than her swims normally were, normally she got tired the longer she swam, but whatever the drone had injected inside her had sped up her healing and recovery time by quite a bit.

So much so Sera had caught up to the drone and saw it push back a fake wall and grab what must’ve been 10 or more massive ore outcrops half-dissassembled into a rectangular crate, with weird binding material holding the mass together.

Iva was staring transfixed, so she went on ahead.

Sera found her scanner shining its blue light at the wall, picked it up where she had ‘dropped’ it. I’m surprised it still works after that impact. Sera did notice a small dent in the metal, hopefully it won’t cause many problems in the future.

On the way back, Sera saw a glimpse of the drone fastening the crate to it’s back, with its arm supporting it and a bunch of broken barnacles and algae lying at its legs.

It could’ve gotten the barnacles off whenever it wanted to, but it just wasn’t bothered. The drone is definitely not made for self-maintenance. Sera thought to herself as she swam out of the cavern with Iva catching up, the way out being easier to find with a light guiding the way.

Before she knew it, Sera was halfway back to the base, assessing what supplies were needed.

PID Interface

Solar energy or ‘Solar panels’ *:

Materials:

Copper 2KG Lead 1KG Quartz 500G

PID Mount or ‘Mount’ *:

Materials:

Lead 500G Copper 500G Gold 500G Fossilised Coral 100G

I have enough to build the solar panels, the copper is still in surplus and the lead is fineish. It’s at least enough for the panels and the mount, but afterwards I’ll be running on fumes.

Which only leaves… “Gold. The coins I collected must be pure or an amalgam of metals, it’s heavy enough to sink to the bottom of my pack.”

Materials sorted, Sera focused on speeding back to the Dwelling, then got to work.

Sort of.

Each time she had gathered a small pile of lead or copper for the buildings, her mind wandered back to the drone.

Will it tell me when it was finished? Or if it even succeeds? I wonder what next part of The Temple I should fix.

Pondering about the drone that looked more like a relic the more she thought about it, Sera had gotten the materials ready. The Dwelling was finally going to have power.

Swiftly swimming to the top of the circular Dwelling, Sera fetched the builder tool out of the same pile of ‘junk’ she had gotten her materials from.

Starting with the solar panels, Sera instantly realised she may have made a small error. “How much sunlight actually is down here?”

Noticing a few blades of sunlight scattered around higher near the cliffs, Sera chewed her lip as she found a spot glittering with sunlight and with no cliffs close enough to pull shadows over it.

The only problem was the distance.

It was over 10 meters away.

Normally not a problem, hell, Sera could glide there with a few simple bends of the knee. The real problem was moving the Dwelling there, having to redo the materials and then finally being able to actually bui-

“Yeah, no.” She may have extended her ‘time-limit’ with the prison cell holding the princess having its life systems fixed… hopefully. But her time was still important. “I remember there were three recipes for getting power.”

PID Interface

Water Turbine *:

Materials:

Seagrass 1KG Lead 1KG Quartz 500G Copper 1KG

Solar Panel *:

Materials:

Copper 2KG Lead 1KG Quartz 500G

Solar Turbine *:

Materials:

Copper 2KG Lead 2KG Quartz 1KG Seagrass 1KG

Solar panels were out. Which left the two turbines. I could go for the Solar Turbine but… The amount of materials needed mean I would have to go back out to either the seagrass cave, the dungeon or the caves. Sera stopped as she realised that travelling to the caves and collecting materials would take too long, but not the seagrass.

“Iva, can you go get som-Actually let’s go get some seagrass. It’ll be faster if we both go.” Dropping the builder tool in the bundle of materials she left on the floor, Sera pushed off the seafloor and was off.

It turns out that using a Scythe for cutting plants was extremely effective, which surprised Sera more than it should, considering that it was used to harvest wheat back on earth.

Thankful that she didn’t have to use the knife like a saw, Sera left carrying most of the seagrass, with Iva only carrying a few strands herself.

With a small meep Iva let the seagrass fall over on top of her supplies. “Thanks Iva.” Sera was really starting to appreciate her new fins as she picked up her building tool and began the process.

Sera dropped the PID and let it begin to refine materials as she but the builder tool sleeve over the output area.

Builder Tool

Water Turbine *:

Materials:

Seagrass 1KG Lead 1KG Quartz 500G

[Build Water Turbine]

Clicking the button, Sera watched as the tool expanded into different lasers and machinations and began siphoning the materials into a buildable object.

First, Sera noticed it began digging into the hull of the Dwelling, almost half a meter down. Then before her, the turbine’s foundations began taking place, with the wires and what seemed to be once seagrass insulating the wiring that seemed to wrap around a thicker part of the turbine.

Noticing what seemed to be the power converter, the fins began taking place, with lead acting as bone and the seagrass fibres acting as flesh for the new turbine.

In a few minutes it was completed, despite being less than half her size she knew that the piece of technology was expertly crafted.

Gathering the other pile of materials, Sera opened the hatched, let Iva in first and then entered the Dwelling.

Despite having an energy source, the Dwelling seemed more or less the same. She began to hear a very soft whirr just outside, and she knew the turbine began to spin.

Laying out the materials, Sera got to work at double the speed, everything was prepared in a few seconds, which attributed not only to the amount of times she’s crafted but also because of her fins acting as gravity shoes within the Dwelling.

Builder Tool

PID Mount *:

Materials:

Lead 500G Copper 500G Gold 500G Fossilised Coral 100G

[Build PID Mount]

Accepting the prompt, Sera let her body go on autopilot as she realised something from her fight with the drone, something that had alluded her until she used it again.

Why did my fins stick to the floor of the cavern so easily? Could they always do that, or was there something in the floor of the cave that had helped with gravity fins?

Sera’s ponderings however, came up short as she realised that the Mount was about to finish.

As the last materials were transferred onto the mount, Sera couldn’t help but lower her shoulders and feel some of the stress that was holding onto her rib cage release.

“That was the last piece, wasn’t it? Before I build the Foodocculator and the Assimilation buildings.” Looking at the empty mount, Sera couldn’t help but have her hands wonder to her PID on the ground.

Picking it up, Sera curiously looked on as the mount opened itself up horizontally like a suitcase, waiting for the PID to be inserted.

Plopping it in, she didn’t notice any immediate change as the panel closed back up and the PID was secured in the mount.

Moments passed with Iva and Sera both staring at the wall for different reasons. “Huh. I don’t know why, but I guessed there was something more-”

Sera’s ears both felt like they were about to burst as the top of the Dwelling began a small whirr and then the sound of water moving began to flood the small space.

Looking around desperately for the problem, Sera saw small hatches open up along the walls of the Dwelling, along with a heavy clonk as if something were closing.

“What is-wait, the water!”

Sera noticed it as Iva’s fins began to flip in the air-

The Dwelling was draining the water.

Sera instantly went for the hatch, neither of them could breathe.

They would suffocate in minutes, but the hatch should be an easy way-

Sera’s mouth opened in horror as she pulled on the hatch, but it didn’t budge. “Oh shi-” she didn’t finish her thought as she pulled up from the hatch, her body was suddenly meeting the warm air of the cavern.

Her gills precariously began expanding as Sera saw Iva quickly sink below her waist level, she saw the red blur swim beneath her feet and wanted to hold Iva in a puddle.

But she needed to get to the PID.

Quickly.

Pulling her feet off the floor, Sera felt like she was stomping through water as she got to the PID mount and began pulling and pushing-

Only to find no response, and worse, she could feel the onset of the light headache.

The water hit left her thighs as Sera began quickly trying to find buttons to press or at least something to get her PID out!

If she wasn’t fast enough, the Dwelling would be their grave.

It would take minutes, and she didn’t have minutes, for the Dwelling to empty enough to then repressurize, and breaking out would be as effective as fighting the drone!

Sera heard a small thud below her and quickly went to grab Iva as her head pounded-

Was this it? Am I seriously going to get killed by a design flaw after surviving for this long?

Hearing a squeak, Sera looked down as the long flaps weakly flapped against her body-

“God dammit!”

Turning to the PID Mount, Sera couldn’t hold herself back anymore. “STOP. CANCEL. LET US OUT! OPEN THE HATCH-J-JUST-”

Her vision began to swim.

It turned out that pushing air in and out of her wasn’t a good idea when she was trying to hold onto that moisture.

Falling to her knee’s, Sera could feel Iva’s weak protests stop as the world went black.