As I walked into the Laboratory of my Star farm crystal bearer predecessor I felt a sense of familiarity, like I was come home. That feeling quickly disappeared however as I made my way over to the desk of Lulu'Zurkai. She had a mountain of scrolls neatly stacked on top of her desk, more than a few looking frayed and warn from having been unrolled and rerolled repeatedly.
I grabbed the first scroll I saw and unrolled it. Of course it was written in Torapos. It was a report about the recent concerns about the Nephilguize to a section leader. Lulu'Zurkai dismissed the report and the concerns, foolishly considering what happened.
I rolled the scroll back up then looked over at a nearby tablet, the script was also written in Torapos. This was just a description of a previous iteration of the Nephilguize, very poorly worded to.
"Star shaper, the control thingy!" Jiggles exclaimed from the doorway. I looked back around him and saw he was pointing at the crystal pedestal. I nodded in acknowledgement then turned to look at the pedestal in question.
I quickly walked over to it and waved a hand above it, sigils and words flashing info to view inches above the top of the pedestal while the screen flashed to life. I scanned the runes that floated above the pedestal then pressed the ones that spelled out SYSTEMS.
"WARNING! SYSTEM SETTINGS LOCKED BY ADMINISTRATOR." A voice called out from the pedestal. I frowned then pressed a couple new runes only for a new screen to pop up. The screen said genius researcher's log in bold runes. A long list of logs then stretched across the screen, more than a hundred logs.
"How the fuck is this related to systems!" I snapped. As if to spite me the screen scrolled down to a random entry and started playing it. The image of a west African woman dressed in traditional Tolapo dress with ornate jewelry appeared on the screen.
"Legendary researchers log, Report 222A-DES. The situation in the lab is impossible! How is a genius like myself supposed to design the ultimate evo when the mainland is considering cutting back funding for my lab! Do those ingrates not understand that I am trying to make history! A evo that could use mana and cast spells! Imagine the possibilities! But these ungrateful bastards aren't seeing anything other than the expense reports that my chief researcher keeps sending! I'll have to order him to fudge those numbers. Regardless! I discovered something major in my recent splicing attempts, the mana capacity of the splicer ingredient used to splice the Nephilguize greatly determines how powerful the resulting evo will be. So naturally the next course of action is to find splicer ingredient with larger mana capabilities before the military does. End of report."
I gritted my teeth as I listened to my predecessor blab on about her research and casually calling splicers ingredients. In my anger, my conversations with Alberto over the last month flashed in my mind. I recalled what he admitted about using his brother to splice that evo that Bone-lasher killed. That his father had said that he learned of a ancient splicing technique that used corpses and perfected it.
'Did Loki learn that technique from my predecessor?!' I thought.
"Legendary researchers log. Report 333A-SSE. Yet another report from a section head reporting possible problems with continuing to produce Nephilguize. Nonsense! Nothing more than superstition and closed-mindedness! We even had a couple researchers desert in the middle of the project! To prevent this I'm placing the laboratory on a spacial lock down. Any attempt to leave will result on the offender being atomized in the fold between space time. As I constantly forget things like passwords or code phrases I'm leaving myself a reminder to access the system setting for the space-time system. Astrea! Now onto the latest success of my experiments! I created a talking Nephilguize! Naturally this new evo would be amazing considering I used that useless experiment from years ago to splice it. Honestly I don't understand why I decided that researching the differences between pregnancy and splicing, the resulting data was not worth the nine months of morning sickness or the talentless daughter I produced. A mana capacity that nearly rivaled my own but no talent…I digress! This new Nephilguize will be my stepping stone into true perfection! End of report."
I could hear my blood boiling in my ears as I listened to my predecessor's newest report. I was nearly hyperventilating with rage. Jiggles tentatively touched my back in an attempt to soothe me but quickly pulled his hand away when a spark of lightning jumped off my and struck Jiggles finger. I was not in control of myself or my mana.
I finally managed to calm myself and control my mana. When I looked up I saw that the screen was back to the first windows when I first activated it. I growled under my breath and typed in the runes that spelled out SYSTEM. Another windows popped up that prompted a password, it hadn't done that before. I quickly typed in the runes that spelled the password Lulu'Zurkai said in her log.
"Astrea…" I said aloud as I typed. The screen went blank for several seconds then a new screen popped up, showing a list of commands. I looked them over then tapped on the runes that spelled SPACE-TIME CONTROLS.
"WARNING! SPACIAL SEALING LOCK IN PLACE! WOULD YOU LIKE TO UNDO LOCK?" The system asked then a screen popped up and prompted with two options.
"Yes…" I said as I typed the corresponding runes.
"WARNING! SPACIAL SEALING SYSTEM LOCK IS UNLOCKING….SUCCESSFUL! WARNING, LABORATORY UNIQUE SPACE-TIME BUBBLE NO LONGER FOLLOWING SPACIAL CONSTRAINTS! EMERGENCY EVACUTATION OF ALL HUMAN'S WITHIN THE LABORATORY!"
Following that announcement from the console loud warning alarms started going off throughout the Laboratory. The lights dimmed and turned a dark red. I started to groan when I saw Jiggles forcibly recalled back to my farm crystal. Before I could question why or how, a swirling rainbow mass swirled around my feet. I was suddenly enveloped by rainbow lights that blinded me. I felt my stomach drop like I was falling.
"EMERGENCY EVACUTATION OF ALL HUMAN'S COMPLETE! NOW DECOMMISSIONING LABORATORY'S SPACE-TIME BUBBLE!...." The system announced as it's voice was slowly drowned out.
There was another rainbow flash and suddenly found myself several hundred feet in the air and falling. I blinked several times before the reality of my situation hit.
'I'm falling…I'm outside…SHIT I'M FALLING!' I thought in a panic.
"HOLY SHIIIIIIIIIT!" Anders voice screamed. I looked towards the sound of the voice and saw Anders, Reagan, and Turak'Kahn all falling about thirty feet from me. Sylvester Arsine and Grandpa Seamus were falling about five feet away from them.
Thinking quickly, I looked down and saw that we were directly over the area where we dived into that sea cave to get to where the Phagialy was. Directly below us was not only the King's Glaive but also Grimm-Guard.
"GRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIM!" I bellowed after taking a deep breath. The massive evo looked up and saw me and everyone falling, letting out a panicked screech it quickly flew up to catch me. "I can fly! Catch them!"
I pointed and motioned at Grandpa Seamus and everyone else. Grimm-Guard immediately obeyed my order and turned to fly after my Grandpa and the others. He dipped slightly and before rising up and scooping up everyone. Letting them roll down his back to diffuse the inertia they'd gained from falling. I channeled float attribute mana throughout my body and slowed my descent until I was floating.
"GET MEH OFF THIS BLOODY THING!" Grandpa Seamus bellowed. I turned and saw Grandpa Seamus clinging to Grimm-Guard while also standing on pins and needles like a cat that had been scared.
'Oh…yeah, Grandpa's afraid of centipedes…' I thought as I face-palmed myself.
I quickly flew over to Grimm-Guard and grabbed Grandpa Seamus and lifted him off the massive evo's back. Grandpa Seamus clung to me like a leech with two arms and a leg while also kicking at the air towards Grimm-Guard as if he was trying to distance us from him.
"Grimm take everyone down to King's Glaive." I ordered. The massive evo nodded then headed down towards the mana train. Once Grimm-Guard's head and upper body were heading down to the train, only the trailing segments of his long body were in view as the flew.
"He's leaving Grandpa." I said while patting his back. Grandpa looked down at Grimm-Guard then shivered and groaned.
"Disgusting things…" Grandpa Seamus grumbled under his breath. I frowned and shook my head.
"He's not disgusting Grandpa. He's my evo." I defended. Grandpa grumbled under his breath while I slowly floated back down to the King's Glaive.
***
"WHAAAAAAAAT?!" Nate bellowed as he looked at the fused form of his son and Gadget. I rubbed the bridge of my nose as I fought off a headache.
I was standing in the control car of King's Glaive with everyone from the expedition into the ancient splicer laboratory along with Nate, Sin, Viola, and Jane. Since I had arrived later than everyone else due to carrying Grandpa Seamus down, Turak'Kahn had already explained what had happened. Of course to everyone in the King's Glaive it had only been a few minutes since we'd left instead of the many hours that we'd been trapped inside. Nate naturally was worried about Bo and asked where he was, it wasn't until I got there and explained his situation to a more understandable standard that he calmed down only to get excited again when it all dawned on him.
"He should be fine…we just need him to de-fuse." I said then looked at the aforementioned fusion.
"Sorry everyone, unfortunately I cannot manually choose to separate into my bases. The time limit needs to be exhausted." Sylvester Arsaine said.
"How long until this time limit is over?" Nate asked with a sigh. Sylvester Arsaine cocked his head to the side and scratched his chin for a few moments sighed.
"Another half hour. Or rather a half hour in total." Sylvester Arsaine said. I perked up a bit at that and the fusion noticed it. "It seems that while we were inside that Laboratory the time limit was frozen, probably because we were inside a different Space-time."
I nodded then looked over at Viola. She had been quiet since I walked in with Grandpa, shortly after Turak'Kahn had finished his explanation. She looked defeated or rather disappointed. Knowing her, the information that the lab was experimenting with human sacrificial splicing instead of spell casting or crafting was probably disappointing.
"The lad and his evo aside, did ya destroy the lab Starlight?" Grandpa Seamus asked me. I nodded and leaned against a nearby wall.
"The system said it was decommissioning the space-time bubbles." I replied. Grandpa Seamus nodded slowly then glanced off into the distance for a few brief seconds then looked back at me and nodded.
"Good, hopefully all ta other labs were get the same treatment bein' linked an' all." Grandpa Seamus said. I nodded in agreement then almost immediately had my ear grabbed and yanked to the side.
"Ow, ow, ow, ow!" I exclaimed and looked at the offender that was yanking my ear, Jane.
"That is the least of your problems! Do you have any idea how serious that way! You lead the Pharaoh into a literal time trap filled with blood thirsty, mana hungry, monsters!" Jane exclaimed.
"It's not like I dragged your dad along! He volunteered to come along!" I griped. Jane popped me on the back of the head then started dragging me towards the door.
"That doesn't matter! You're the boss of this company so any problems that occur during company time in your fault!" Jane exclaimed.
"Wait where are you taking me…? Ow…! Fuck that hurts!" I exclaimed.
"To work! We have a lot of shit to prepare for tomorrow and not a lot of time to do it!"