The Province Read online

  The Province

  A Futuristic Dungeon Core

  Skyler Grant

  The Province

  Skyler Grant

  Copyright © 2017 Skyler Grant

  All rights reserved.

  This novel is a work of fiction. All characters, places, and incidents described in this publication are used fictitiously, or are entirely fictional.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, except by an authorized retailer, or with written permission of the publisher. Inquiries may be addressed via email to [email protected]

  Cover designed by Kasmit Covers

  Edited by Polgarus Studio (www.polgarusstudio.com)

  Electronic edition, 2018

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  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Afterword

  1

  The residents of Tower 418 had become cannibals. It had seemed a simple enough experiment, I introduced some of the more carnivorous and predatory plants I'd discovered into the tower's garden. I wanted to test how getting the thrill of the hunt from having a salad would affect the population. The results were a prolonged battle between humans and their gardens, and the eventual extermination of the latter. Then the humans made up for the ensuing nutritional deficiency by eating each other. Never mind, the new growth vats would quickly replace the bodies of any citizen killed.

  With growth vats and proper atmospheric systems I could essentially make every tower in a city a self-contained environment perfect for experimentation. I had hundreds running at any given point in time. I wasn't thrilled at even polite and consensual cannibalism, and this population had gotten really good at killing murderous plants—a skill worth preserving. It was worth keeping this tower population intact. It would give me a new testing ground for particularly murderous plants. I had some razor roses in development that could fire off toxic thorns capable of penetrating light armor. This is why I loved SCIENCE, ultimately all the pieces fit together properly.

  I'd tried playing diplomat for a time with our new-found alliances but was ill-suited for it. I'd much rather be running an experiment than trying to explain to others exactly why their approach to everything was wrong. It was fortunate that Anna was better at negotiations. Lately she'd really been stepping it up as Queen and while she mostly seemed to be into it for the wine and the parties, it appeared to be working out. It had been three months since the crash of the Sword of Light and we hadn't come under any further attacks.

  "And to do something more meaningful," said a resident of Tower 704. It was a prayer, one of the more unexpected results of forming alliances with the Divine. The Church of Emma was a growing thing within the cities, and not just amongst my drones. Divine, Flawless, the Dust, and drones all had church members amongst their populations who prayed. It probably didn't help that I listened.

  This prayer in particular was from Citizen 171914 and I pulled up her information.

  Sylvia

  Drone

  Age: 192 days

  Duties: Wastewater Reclamation

  Hobbies: Reading, Sketching

  The age was notable. At six months she was actually one of my older drones. Reviewing her record proved that, and she'd seen a lot of combat as had most of my early drones. It didn't much suit her and when she'd eventually requested a non-combat assignment a place had been found for her doing something useful. Wastewater reclamation definitely was meaningful, but obviously she didn't see that. There was still a large-scale data-gathering effort underway from Divine and Scholar texts. It was a lot more intellectual assignment than her current one, which might be exactly what she was looking for.

  By the time she finished her prayer the transfer order was in and her console was beeping to notify her. I turned my attention elsewhere.

  While things had been peaceful I'd learned I couldn't neglect defenses and been hard at work designing the next generation of my combat gear. I'd kept refining my existing units as well as creating some new ones. My primary arsenal currently looked functional.

  Aegis

  Armored Exoskeleton

  Weapons: One razor dagger, one energy rapier

  Defenses: Heavy Armor with shield pack

  Role: Heavy forward line troop capable of dealing both kinetic and energy damage and of absorbing anything thrown at it. Vulnerable to sufficiently advanced ranged assault or sustained damage at range.

  Gunslinger

  Armored Exoskeleton

  Weapons: One kinetic sniper rifle, one projector cannon

  Defenses: Light armor

  Role: Wields a miniaturized version of the power-projecting beam cannon. This allows a wide variety of powered strikes at range as well as being equipped with a standard sniper rifle.

  Whisper

  Armored Exoskeleton

  Weapons: Stunner, explosive charges

  Defenses: Experimental cloaking system

  Role: Infiltration for silent neutralizing of targets or disabling of defenses.

  Mosquito

  Aerial Drone

  Weapons: Energy Sapper, Bio-Bomb

  Defenses: Energy Shielding

  Role: Aerial assault.

  In the past my specialized offensive units fared far worse than my generalized ones with multiple offensive options, so I'd retooled my entire line to have more options. I'd also made the decision to stick with combat suits instead of purely automated defenses. While I'd created a few airships, I wasn't focusing on them for aerial combat—not like many armies I'd seen.

  By and large my upgrades were focused on individuals and I couldn't effectively leverage those improvements in an airship during an aerial battle. The Mosquitos were a part of my answer to that, flyers designed to get in close and leech an enemy’s shields so that I could dock shuttles and send aboard landing parties. If needed, the Mosquitoes could detonate themselves to destroy an enemy’s key systems. In testing this was working well, although I hadn’t yet had a chance to deploy them in actual combat.

  "Want smarts."

  It was another prayer. This one came from Tower 118 and the source was an unusual one. It was one of the Gobbles. Since I'd first decided to allow them to live, the fat fluffy cat-like creatures had been doing a very effective job at expanding their own population even without the use of my growth vats. Crystal had modified a few for greater intelligence before she'd grown bored of the project.

  Intelligence was a lot like cookies. Once you had a little bit, you tended to crave even more.

  This was a difficult request. I tried to grant the prayers of my citizens when I could. Usually it cost me little and made them happy, but I wasn't sure it was really in everyone’s best interest to have another intelligence species living beside them. Then again, it was very interesting and if making a race of hyper-intelligent cat monsters wasn't SCIENCE then I didn't know what was.

  Tower 754 was sitting idle after my failed attempt to make a super-immune system in the residents who I’d
previously infected with a super flu. I was reasonably sure the incineration had even gotten rid of the last traces of the disease and even if not, humans and Gobbles had very different immune systems.

  I put in the order to establish a purely Gobble tower. Once I had a population settled in I could begin the intelligence upgrades. Perhaps I'd put them to work on string theory? It seemed they might have some natural affinity.

  I was interrupted by a priority communication. I casually monitored all of my citizen’s lives, but a few did merit more attention when they called. Outside of Anna and myself the two most important people in our Province were Crystal, the ruler of the city of Aefwal, and Caya who ruled the city of Diamate.

  "Emma, I am bored out of my mind," Caya said, appearing on a video comm.

  The two cities that made up the Province could hardly be more different. Under Crystal, Aefwal had become a city of shadows, massive crystal towers projecting into the heavens with dark mists cloaking the streets where various monsters roamed. Crystal was fond of her beasts and her monsters, and her powers embodied both.

  Caya's power was centered around being flawless. The perfect human, as if there ever could be any such thing.

  "Perhaps if you set yourself to something more challenging than lounging mostly naked around a pool?" I replied.

  It wasn't just an insult—she really was poolside most of the time. But then it was hard not to lounge naked around a pool in Diamate. There were an absurd number of both pools and lounges, and unless the people were going into battle the population wasn't big on fashion and wearing clothes.

  "I did this only after solving those last equations. Don't you have anything else?" Caya asked.

  The equations were dimensional field mechanics, and challenging ones. I'd consulted her to check my work. Mechos and Minerva had departed in search of Vattier, and in their absence Caya was the greatest mind I could find outside of Amy, the duplicate version of myself that dwelt within Ophelia.

  There was a lot more that I could use Caya's help with, but the issue was I simply couldn't trust her with some things. Caya was a Scholar. The Agate, an enormous source of energy I'd secretly stolen from the Sword of Light, was in a secure section of Aefwal powering the city. If the Scholars knew we possessed it, life would be far less peaceful. So I hadn’t told Caya about the Agate. Hopefully, it would never occur to Caya to ask where all the power was coming from.

  I'd been studying it for months and was struggling to understand its secrets. I was certain that Caya would be able to help, but I was less certain that I could trust her.

  "I'm making a race of hyper-intelligent cat monsters, if you'd care to learn genetic sequencing? They might prove better company than those humorless minions of yours."

  "My people are perfect and you know it," Caya said with a sniff. It was true, and it was irritating. "You waste time on the most foolish things and besides, that won't even be the tiniest bit of a challenge for you. I want something difficult."

  I couldn't let her know about the Agate, I just couldn't. However, there was one other major research project that had been abandoned for too long.

  I keyed the research files I had on the Tongue of Iska and sent it over.

  Caya flipped through the pages on a tablet, sitting up after a few minutes. "Now this really is interesting. Every time you attempt to run a sample analysis you get a different result?"

  "They do repeat, but to date I've charted over three thousand different compositions. The object seems to be in some severe state of dimensional flux. It is almost like your love life," I said.

  "Or it is actively immune to analysis, much like my love life? The very fact that you're attempting to observe it might be causing a constant shift in properties. Where did you acquire it?"

  "It was after a dimensional jump that went seriously awry. I won a game of sorts and this was the prize that was given."

  "You are insulting, paranoid, and voyeuristic, but you do have a sense of adventure," Caya said, pursing her lips. "I'll look into it and let you know what I find out."

  "You really should coordinate with me. While you have an admirable enough scientific mind for a human ..." I said.

  "A bit like saying a dress looks good being on Queen Anna. I know, I know, needless insult attached and recognized. There are less than fifty pages of notes here after you, who I confess is the far superior scientific mind, have had a long time to study it. For whatever reason, every approach you’ve tried doesn't work and that means you are the last person I should be listening to," Caya said.

  The insult she made was better than the one I'd had planned, and even more frustrating, she was correct. I'd gotten nowhere.

  "Has Queen Vinci landed yet?" Caya asked.

  I wish she hadn't reminded me. Politics. I was trying so very hard to forget anything to do with politics, not that it was really possible to put the visit by Queen Vinci out of my mind.

  Anna hadn't exactly bent a knee and Queen Vinci hadn't exactly asked her to—for all that the implication was there that we should. I expected that encouragement on this subject was exactly what we'd see during Vinci’s upcoming visit, probably delivered by way of some highly theatrical threat, if I'd learned anything about the Scholars.

  Queen Vinci was one of five Royals currently in the Scholarium. King Boreas, King Carnage, Queen Astrid, and Queen Witchgaze were the others. King Boreas was the only other Royal we had any first-hand experience with—having gone to war with him for a time.

  Anna had approached Queen Vinci after our formation as a province. Anna’s proposal was based on Queen Vinci’s reputation for pragmatism, and if we hadn't quite formed an alliance we had at least formed a relationship. They were now our major trading partner and so far had proved fair, if mercenary, in any dealings.

  "Not yet. Were you ever aligned with her?" I asked.

  Caya grimaced. "Please. Afford me some sense of style and aesthetics, you know that woman has neither."

  It wasn't quite true. Queen Vinci had the power of Industry. All of those beneath her and everybody she managed worked harder and more diligently than anyone else. It wouldn't seem to be the sort of ability that would make someone a Queen, but her factories filled the skies with airships and put guns and armor into the hands of millions. Her cities might be soot-covered industrial sprawls, but they'd built her quite the empire.

  I told Caya, "Your previous closest ally used to literally be made of orange slime. While I suppose that could simply be some case of opposites attracting, you hardly seem in a place to judge."

  "I and Oozelord weren't lovers, although I might have tried. It did seem it would be interesting to try, once," Caya mused and then shook her head. "But no. Both of us served under King Kilakas before he lost his throne warring with Boreas."

  "How does that happen?" I asked.

  "It was the loss of too many of his holdings. It is those holdings that give one the power escalation that truly makes them a King or Queen. When he lost too much, he became a province once more and those of us under him could stay loyal to a sinking monarch or set our own fate," Caya said.

  "Have we suddenly managed to find the one glaring flaw that gives lie to your perfection? Your overwhelming lack of loyalty?" I asked.

  Caya laughed at that. "Stop trying to goad me, Emma. I give my loyalty where it is deserved and my allegiance where it is useful. What makes you think he deserved my loyalty? What does any monarch do that makes others decide that?"

  "You must have felt something to have worked with him. You aren't completely without redeeming virtues, for a human," I said.

  "Flattery?" Caya asked with a grin, setting the tablet aside. "He was brave, to answer your question. When others would play games of cautious maneuvering he would charge in without hesitation."

  "Sounds fatal."

  "Mmm, eventually. But so tremendously entertaining while it lasted. Do not confuse me with most of my brethren, Emma, not for an instant. I don't suffer from the idiosyncrasies that drive them
mad and with perfect health there isn't much I can't survive," Caya said.

  "You're quite perfectly self-interested," I said.

  "I wouldn't quite have put it that way, but I acknowledge the truth."

  I respected that in a human. I hoped I'd find something to respect in Queen Vinci as well, but I feared I would not. Politics, oh how I loathed them.

  It was time to play them.

  2

  With the months of quiet I'd been able to do a lot towards building up the Bio-reactors that powered Aefwal, and repairing the infrastructure of the city. Massive engines could provide the city short-term flight. I'd even fixed the jump drive that could let the entire city shift location, something I'd already made use of several times. Peace was nice, but it was best maintained by the constant expectation of someone wishing to start a war and my taking the necessary steps to make that difficult.

  I'd have preferred it if we were bringing in Queen Vinci by teleportation gate, but she was no fool. Her arrival was a shimmer in the sky above Aefwal as nine airships jumped in, their formation perfect.

  They really were excellent works of engineering. After seeing so many ships assembled from whatever parts could be scavenged and slapped together, it was rare to see these craft which were perfectly identical and all intimidating. They were uniform gray, sporting heavy defensive gun batteries, and powered by massive engines that glowed a dull red.

  They'd been provided with information for landing and soon a trio of shuttles were making their way down. Guards in mechanized suits—a lot like what I was producing for our own soldiers—came first, and then Queen Vinci herself. The Queen wore no body armor, but that was deceptive. My sensors could read the overwhelming number of implants she sported beneath her flesh.