Alzolami grunted in frustration as her eyes flared for a moment. “There goes another one!” “You have to use your thumb and fingers, All-see.” “Cut me some slack kid! Sometimes I’m all thumbs, other times I’m all fingers, and occasionally I don’t have fingers or thumbs!” Rosey giggled. “You’re silly All-see!”

Alzolami and Rosey were eating a lunch of noodles with chopsticks in the manor’s dining room. They were sitting on the cushions that were standard in Ualiqula with their bowls and cups on simple shin-high tables in front of them. By the time Alzolami slurped up three noodles, Rosey was already halfway through her bowl.

They had already spent three weeks in Ualiqula and had easily adjusted to the naturalistic way of life. It was strange to Nick and Yohan that Rosey refused to leave Alzolami’s side and insisted on doing everything with her, but what truly astonished them was that Alzolami didn’t seem to mind Rosey’s company. “She has no shortage of complaints and doesn’t hesitate to let anyone, Rosey included, know about them.” stated Nick as he scoped the perimeter with Aura. Yohan peered into the distance with a handmade spyglass as he spoke. “Maybe, but she doesn’t try to shoo her away and she never says anything too harsh. In fact, the way she phrases her issues, it’s almost like she’s trying to entertain her, like silly nursery rhymes or something.”

Meanwhile, as they traversed the village during their stay, nearly everyone they spoke with appeared to hold them to a very high regard due to their direct affiliation with Lord Tomahk. The only ones that seemed to dislike or distrust them were the local Aura Guardians.

According to the ninth law of the Universal Mortal Constitution, every dimension has the right to appoint a group of PK Masters to enforce laws and ensure the wellbeing of residents, and in a dimension like Ualiqula, such a force is extremely essential. The Guardians of Ualiqula appear to have a great sense of chivalry, pride, and honor, and because of this they seem to have a low opinion of Lord Tohmak’s decision to use an outside source of manpower to aid himself.

For the most part, they expressed disapproval to the presence of Nick, Yohan, and Alzolami with mild passive-aggressive comments that came up in conversation. However, one guardian in particular had no such reservations. Most of the guardians were easily identifiable by their lamellar armor, heavy leather cloaks and clothing, and the presence of hand-crafted weaponry such as katana, spears, bows, slings, axes, and clubs, but one day a Guardian that stood out really tried to get in Nick’s face.

Nick was making his afternoon patrol route around the Tomahk estate when a Guardian rounded a corner to face him. He was clad in armor of gilded plate and scales, a helmet with horn-like protrusions in front, and had a maul twice Nick’s height with a head larger than Nick’s made up four rows of five metal spikes and a large spike on top. He had a face a head’s height higher than the top of Nick’s head covered in scars with thick black braided hair reaching down to his shoulder blades. He bent down to meet Nick’s eyes with his own grey ones and a leer.

“You should not be here! Leave, Mercenary!” Nick squinted in response to the blustering breath of the deep voice in his face. “Actually, I am supposed to be here. My friends and I have a schedule and traveling system in place to maximize our coverage of the estate and village that we can’t reveal due to the intelligence netw-” “Let them spy! They will only find all of the ways Morgou will break them!" “Well that’s hardly wise, if they know what your capabilities and vulnerabilities are, they’ll base their attack tactics around-” “Let them make plans! They will only realize the best plan is to pray that Morgou doesn’t break them!" “Okay, that’s not being very battle-conscious because you never know what kind of forces they’ll send, especially from such an industrial enemy. They might even send in troops armed with-” “Let them send the most heavily armed forces of all! They are only sending their armies for Morgou to break them, and break them, AND BREAK THEM!" Morgou’s thunderous shout served to scatter all the birds and animals from miles around and made fish in several ponds swim to the bottom.

Nick waited several moments for the ringing in his ears to subside and his vision to return to normal. “I take it you’re Morgou?” Morgou scoffed. “You take it right, mercenary. I am Morgou the Dragon Crusher. The Guardian that slew the indomitable planes emperor which ravaged the dimension for decades. The Guardian that tracked the elusive sleep breather, which claimed the lives of dozens of innocents every night, and killed it in its own lair. And as a Guardian, I swore an oath of undying loyalty to the great Lord Tomahk, and pledged my flesh, blood, and bone to ensuring the wellbeing of the citizens of Ualiqula. We have no need for honorless Masters, who hold no loyalty except to their own pitiful whims!” That last remark flipped Nick’s rarely used switch. Okay buster, you made it personal first!

“You know, it was your great Lord Tomahk that sent for our aid in the first place. Why must you doubt your Lord’s conviction by questioning his judgement? Does your own worthless pride take precedence over your loyalty and faith in your Lord? Do you really think he’d be as petty as to risk everything on someone careless enough to boast about their own capabilities for his enemies to hear? Some Guardian you are!”

Nick could feel unbridled hostility within the Aura emanating from Morgou. Nick responded by firing up his own Aura and seeding it with Intimidation. As their Auras collided, the air pressure dropped and sparks ignited between them.

The manor’s door to the side slid open and Alzolami’s head stretched out several feet towards them. “Cut it out you two! You might scare Rosey with all that nasty Aura!”

Realization dawned on Morgou’s face as he pulled back his Aura followed by Nick, who was still a little miffed. “He insulted Masters!” The light in Alzolami’s eyes spiraled in exasperation. She stretched her neck so that her face was right in front of Nick’s. “And I thought I was petty! Listen Nick, there’s no shortage of people in the universe who hold Masters in contempt for no good reason. Prove them wrong with your actions, not your insults!”

Alzolami then stretched her neck to stare right in Morgou’s face. “And you! We might have come here solely for our own personal gain, but we’re risking our lives just as much as you Guardians in this endeavor! If you start to think with your head rather than your fists, you’ll realize that if we work together, we’ll be able to solve our problems with maximum efficiency and minimal risk!”

Morgou kept his chin up. “Perhaps you are right, Female Mercenary. But know that even if Morgou must accept your aid, he will not be grateful for it.” Alzolami’s eyes flared. “Just do your job, and we’ll do ours. After a few more months, we’ll never have to see each other again.” Morgou huffed, and stormed off.

Nick, in mild awe, coughed to get Alzolami’s attention. “Didn’t expect that kind of speech from you. I thought insults were one of your favorite weapons?” “I don’t insult people for fun, it’s how I get in my enemy’s head. Make them go directly for me while I blindside them.”

***

The ringing of bronze bells thundered throughout the moonlit village as the villagers rushed to the heavily fortified shelters. Meanwhile, Nick and Yohan took perimeter on the north and south halves of Lord Tomahk's estate while Alzolami stayed in the center with Rosey.

Such events tended to happen several times a year in southern Ualiqula. They used the bells to prepare for monster attacks of either several hundred lower ranked monsters, a few dozen mid-ranked monsters, or one or two upper-ranked monsters. The common peoples retreated to their shelters while the Guardians made formation along the walls of the central village. Alzolami had suspected that Tomahk the Elder's forces may attempt to use such attacks to their advantage to infiltrate and kidnap Rosey. Rather than leave themselves vulnerable to such attempts amid the confusion of the gathered peoples, they had decided to remain within the manor along with several highly trusted servants.

Nick viewed the perimeter under his watch while scanning with his Aura as he listened to the commotion of the people and the shouts of officials trying to guide them. Things were never like this on Iaso. Even the fringe towns and solitary houses could turn back most monster attacks without much commotion. Maybe Tomahk the Elder has a point, but it's not my place to judge.

A couple of hours later, all of the people had finally reached the shelters and the only sounds he could hear were the shouts of the Aura Guardians and the inhuman cries of monsters. Suddenly, something big dropped from the sky and landed a way in front of Nick. With a series of mechanical grindings and metallic moaning, the object stood itself up for Nick to get a good look at it.

It stood twice as tall as Nick and had six spider-like legs with hydraulic joints, two large hydraulic arms with inward curving claw-like shears at the ends, a head shaped like a half-sphere studded with small rods Nick assumed were some kind of sensors, and a body with a long triple-jointed hydraulic abdomen that connected to the lower back half of a hexagonal torso which extended at full length would have made the construct three times as tall. I'm not sensing any Aura from this thing, so it's definitely not a synthman or monster. Must be some kind of automaton. Never really fought anything like this, but it shouldn't fight as unpredictably as another mortal.

The secret to manufacturing the cores/true bodies of synthmans died after the destruction and great exodus from the human origin dimension and frankly, that's how they liked it. They believed that the ability to freely reproduce instead of depending on artificial means helped to blur the line between themselves and the other tribes they shared the universe with, especially after the days of tribal supremacy and segregation from the previous ages. In their place, industrious mortals developed automatons with much simpler false intelligence that could retain and replicate instructions taught to them by their manufacturers. Of course, this ultimately led to the creation of automatons made exclusively for violence, mostly for monsters, but sometimes against mortals.

Those parts might have reinforcements to deflect attacks more powerful than I can make, but the joints should be vulnerable to a few good hits. Might need a lot to do it, so I should do something about my defense. First he covered his entire body in a layer armor-like shell similar to that of an iron pawn's metal, then he used its abilities to manifest a longsword that he gripped with both hands and swung at a joint in one of the automaton's legs while focusing a lot of Aura into the blade. He managed to sever its left front leg, but the automaton countered by smacking him aside with its right claw.

The automaton charged at him while raising and opening its right claw, aiming for his torso. Nick had managed to stay on his feet when he hit the ground and charged at the automaton to intercept. He released his left hand's grip from his longsword and made the shell around his left forearm grow into a solid hammer-like shape. As the automaton brought down its claw, he jammed his enlarged hand deep in-between the blades while digging his feet into the ground, stopping it. Then he reformed his longsword into a short but heavy-headed ax, focused a lot of Aura into it, and swung it at the blade's joints repeatedly. After several ear-splitting clangs, he managed to break off the blades of the claw.

The automaton walked backward a distance. It raised its remaining claw high into their air and craned its body up as high as it could. As it charged, Nick unmanifested the armor and ax and manifested the right arm of an iron rook. He took aim at the abdomen and fired off the fist into it. As the rocket-like fist made contact with the automaton's abdomen, the joints ripped apart by the tremendous force of the blow.

The automaton fell to pieces on the ground, desperately trying to reorient itself, only to fail each time. Nick willed the massive hand to come back to him. Once he reconnected it after it dragged back towards the end of his bicep, Nick dragged his metallic arm to the head of the automaton, focused and intensified his Aura all around his body, raised his fist into the air, and smashed it.

The automaton jerked, then all of its joints and went still. Nick stepped back and waited a few minutes to make sure he finished it. After removing all doubt, Nick unmanifested the arm, intensified his remaining Aura, and scanned the surrounding area. He saw that Yohan was still alone on his end, so he retracted his Aura to get a better look at the inside of the manor. To his shock, he found that in the room where Alzolami and Rosey were supposed to be was just one solitary body lying on the floor.

Nick rushed into the manor. He pushed back all the doors in his path until he reached his destination. On the floor, lying still, was Alzolami. Nick ran up to her and checked. Her Aura was still flowing, confirming she was alive. He gently shook her. "Alzolami! Alzolami! What happened?" Alzolami groaned and weakly tried sitting up on her own, only to fall back into Nick's arms. She opened her eyes. "It was... Laquil! He came in, saying he was checking if we were all right. When he got close, he jabbed me with something and I couldn't move! Then he took Rosey, ripped a hole in the wall to nowhere, and vanished as it closed behind him!"

Nick’s mind filled with anguish. That automaton was just a distraction! Nick cried out for help. Minutes later, the room was full of all the remaining residents of the manor. Lord Tomahk's eye was glowing intensely after Nick explained the situation to him. "Laquil specialized in teleportation Powers! I know for a fact that he has at least one remote-ranged Power, so he must be all the way to the northern half by now!"

Yohan howled in despair as the other servants bowed low to lord Tomahk, begging for forgiveness. The light completely vanished from Alzolami's eyes, showing that she was the most dispirited of them all.