Chapter 13: Royal Arrival
With the fifth evolution chamber fully formed after yesterdays battle, the task to accumulate enough resources to create this 'evolution master' would take a great amount of time. Much of yesterday was spent spawning the zerg that was lost in the battle at the encampment, but after the roaches and the zerglings were restored to their previous numbers, Virid and Kay decided to be patient and allowed their resources build up, which eventually enabled them to generate their own bio-engineered bio-engineer with bio-engineering abilities.
With the constantly expanding creep fields and two barely active extractors producing little resources, Virid estimated that they will achieve enough a sufficient amount of bio-matter and accelerant in two days. If the manifestation altars can supply the zerg with the hydrocarbons they needed, then their deadline would be cut even shorter, and thankfully, Kragnon was helpful enough to supply one manifestation altar to supply them with usable hydrocarbons. With a new stream of hydrocarbons being supplied to the zerg swarm, Virid re-estimated that the new evolution master could begin spawning as soon as the next day.
Yesterday was a very different experience for a different person, however. Kragnon's worry was weighing down his shoulders. Kragnon the Lovechief was currently searching though a type of information sharing database called the 'information network', which happened to be a glorified alien internet application. H was looking through the current events after his eighty year long was a lot of historical events he missed that he felt needed to brush upon.
Elsewhere, a few hours after the battle, and waiting if the gilanian reinforcements would come, Kay finally decided to join Kragnon once he felt comfortable knowing that his surface hive cluster would be safe, leaving it alone for the moment. Once Kay made his way up the tower and into the council room once again, he knocked on the entrance's door and made his way inside. "Kragnon! Hey! I'm back! ... What are you doing?" Kay asked, watching several words in computerized gilaish and several pictures move up the wall-screen.
Kragnon turned around and glared at Kay. "There you are!" He turned back to the wall of text. "Maiden. Put 'zerg' into the search engine."
[Command detected. Loading results based on search parameters. Loading results in: Most recent; Most popular; Trending; And recommended.]
Kragnon turned back around. "Kay, tell me what you did out there."
Kay stared blankly at Kragnon. "I uh... Killed a bunch of gilanians that belonged to the empire."
Kragnon hissed lowly and turned toward the large wall-screen again and pointed to an image. "Tell me, Kay. What does that look like?"
Kay looked up at the image and saw himself. "... Is that me? Huh. I think I gained some weight."
"Your weight is not important, Kay." Kragnon said, turning around. "You have made a statement toward the emperor and warned him not to bother you again, and you threatened that you would kill him if he did so. Kay! You don't go and say that to someone very powerful, and not expect their ego to make things worse! Since the bandit lord has kept the status of emperor and immortal for many years, I'm willing to guess that he's going to test your power with a show of force. If he manages to defeat you, he'll discover my hiding place. All these years I spent in hibernation and my plan to force Gollog to see the error of his ways would be for nothing! But that is nothing compared to the forces he will be sending after you. I am willing to bet that he will be using all of his immortal powers to take you down!"
Kay raised an eyebrow to Kragnon's exclamation. "Immortal powers? Can he raise the dead to fight me, or something?"
Kragnon took a breath and shook his head. "Well... No. But I have been researching his capabilities and how his domain had grown over the years. Apparently, he can summon the power of our orbiting sun to smite the foes that dared angered him. He can summon the light of the moon to make people and objects vanish and reappear by his will. They say that he makes his home in an avatar body in Empire City, in a palace said to be made of ethereal metal and thoughts made physical."
"Avatar body? Hmm! Kinda sounds cool in a sort of weird way." Kay said.
Kragnon went up to Kay and flicked his forehead. "I'm being serious here! Since I have been asleep for eighty years, I don't know what had transpired during my slumber! I happen to be VERY unprepared in this age I just woke up in, so I need to research on how Gollog and his empire grew in power over the years."
Kay rubbed his forehead and felt annoyed. "Okay, mister 'Lovechief'. Why are you getting so serious about this anyway?"
Kragnon took a deep breath as he stared at Kay, but then sighed before looking down. "I have a talent, you see. My ability to calm others and to convince them to see reason is something that many politicians and leaders would kill to have. In fact, my ability was very much renowned over several cities. That was when the bandit lord heard of my skills and wanted me to join him. In fact, I used to be called 'Golden-tongue Kragnon' back in the day. Heh."
Kay nodded. "Sounds like you could have been a great diplomat."
"Yes, I could have. However, it was also during a time when I joined with a resistance group that wanted Gollog's 'empire' to fall off its perch. The plan was to put me into a cold-pod and wait for thirty years, allow my reputation to die down as the years pass, come to Empire City, gain an advisory role, and convince Gollog that his rule is incredibly tyrannical over his people. Long ago, rumor had spread around that Gollog was a being that somehow achieved immortality. If my persuasion couldn't stop him, then I would have to resort to assassinating him. I'm still certain that his claim of immortality is farcical." Kragnon turned back to the wall of text and images. "... But I find myself in doubt. Looking at the eighty years of history that has passed, it seems as though this Gollog guy is somehow still around?"
"How old is he?"
"Well... Last time I checked he was around two hundred, so... three hundred years now? The gilanian lifespan is normally one hundred and twenty if they eat healthy, exercise, and have a great health plan. Some live longer if they're lucky." Kragnon answered with a sigh.
"Well, consider me a bit skeptical." Kay said, walking past Kragnon and inspecting the information network that had all the details regarding 'zerg' in the search engine. There was surprisingly little info, but there was several entries that was labeled 'military document'. "... But I'm kind of curious on what kind of fan-fiction these guys wrote about me."
Kragnon followed Kay's gaze. "Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa no! Don't access any of the military documents!" Kragnon shouted, rushing in front of Kay and shielding the document from his eyes.
Kay backed away from Kragnon. "Uh... Why?"
"Because if you made a requisition of information from military networks, the ones that made that document will accept our request on the grounds that we give our permission to share our transfer handle to them. If we did that, they can track the handle to our physical location, and I would be fucked." Kragnon explained.
Kay stared at Kragnon, but then shrugged. "Alright. I'll leave the military documents alone."
Kragnon shook his head. "Not good enough. I want you to NEVER request info from any document, video file, audio recording, recreational network games, or ANYTHING that requires permission to share our transfer handle. The network connection here is strictly for data mining."
Kay stared at Kragnon for a long time before sighing. "Alright, fine. It's your house. Just one thing though." Kay said, reaching his hand toward Kragnon.
"What is i-OW!" Kay flicked a clawed finger at Kragnon's head, making his head jerk backwards violently. Kragnon pawed his head and discovered drops of blood that was coming from his new injury. "What was that for?!"
"That was to remind you to not be a rude host when you have guests in your house." Kay grunted.
"Didn't you walk right into my home?" Kragnon said, agitated and pressing his hand onto his forehead.
"I knocked, didn't I?" Kay retorted.
Kragnon stared at Kay accusingly before turning to the wall-screen. "If you need me, I'll be healing and reviewing what had happened during my eighty years of hibernation here. I'll be using the network for a while."
Kay nodded. "I'll be managing my swarm with Virid. If you need me, step outside and start yelling at a zergling. Talk as though I am it, if you can."
Kragnon turned around to look at Kay with a puzzled expression. "... So when you said that you ARE the swarm..."
Kay poked at his own head and smiled. "Psionic link. Every zerg organism and their thoughts and my own are shared. Like your information network, except more... intimate. It's very useful, but you kinda have to watch your own thoughts sometimes. Think of a dirty thought, for example, and the zerglings might get sexually excited or something."
Kragnon blinked two times. "... But I thought you said that many of the zerg castes were asexual?"
"I don't see nothing wrong with a little bump and grind." Kay said as he waved goodbye to Kragnon and leaving.
Kragnon blinked a few more times before sighing and shrugging, only to return to his task of finding more information of the year he was in, and learning of the events that had occured over the past eighty years.
A day later, Kay was watching over the zerglings that were running around and chasing each other. He had given a small group of zerglings free will as a test, but regretted his decision when those zerglings attacked each other and the other zerg strains. After that, Kay had given a different group of zerglings conditional free will in another test, meaning that they were allowed to do anything they want, provided that they don't harm one another or a friendly organism, refrain from venturing off the creep or too far from zerg controlled territory unless specified, and sound a warning through the hivemind connection when something unusual was detected.
Overall, Kay quite enjoyed this new kind of control over the zerg, so he opted to have nearly all of the zerg have this level of free will. The only zerg that were not allowed to have this kind of free will was the bio-structures and many of the queens and drones. Sure, a queen or three, sometimes Virid, would change shifts and take turns reveling in these moments of metaphorical nakedness, feeling quite free from the command and will of the swarm's collective telepathy. Or something close to nakedness, since it was free will with a condition. It was likened to wearing invisible brain underwear, but stripping oneself of their mental clothes and armor. However, if a fight was going to start, the zerg would shift gears in an instant and await the command of their masters, eager for the battle.
But even so, Kay could tell that much of the zerg organisms enjoyed this level of freedom.
The zerglings played their games of chase and tag, did flanking practice on friendly zerg and each other, and sometimes danced to their own form of music, using animalistic roars and howls, stomps, and their own carapace as musical washboards. The only zerglings that didn't follow this command, as expected, were the zergling twins that hounded Kay's perceptual awareness.
The roaches kept to their own, traveling in packs of six or more, either walking above ground or burrowing through it. They seemed to prefer circling the outer territory of the creep fields, and never straying off of the creep. It kind of made them seem more like guard dogs that patrolled a yard.
The overlords did little, but they were content with just witnessing the antics of the zerglings, and letting the roaches know if any areas seemed like it needed a much needed patrol. Sometimes they even provided shade for the ground-bound zerg, or for each other when it grew too hot during the day.
The overseers didn't seem to enjoy having free will or having free time to themselves. Once Kay had given the overseers conditional free will, the overseers simply darted around the entire hive cluster and moved outward. They appeared semi-content with just flying around in their random patrols. Since they were content with zipping around within the established territory, he left them alone to their own form of idle activities. Despite being creatures that used to be overlords, their mentality was largely different. They were still able to relay psionic control like the overlords they evolved from, but their brains had to be reconfigured to compensate for their ocular organs.
The infestor, although slow as it bumbled around from one place to another, felt included when it chased the zerglings around or burrowed with the roaches. It would sometimes vomit up an infested gilanian for the zerglings to try and play with, but stopped doing so after the first few times. The infested gilanians would commit suicide when they wrested enough free will from the zerg hivemind. Apparently, any time an infested gilanian wrested enough willpower from psionic control, they would kill themselves by ripping their own heads off. Even when they were clones that were grown inside of the infestors' bellies, they were still too genetically unstable, incompatible, and weak minded, and were driven into insanity when allowed some control of their mental faculties.
The few remaining banelings joined with the zerglings as much as they could, but they never got themselves into any form of roughhousing. After all, one errant claw could blow them up! But they were content enough to just roll around in circles or burrow into the ground.
The elder hydralisk seemed more than content to just languidly swim in the freshwater spring. Kay would have wanted it to have more hydralisk friends to play with, but he knew that a deadline had to be met. At least it enjoyed chasing the zerglings away from its freshwater pool.
The drones were very busy, having little time to divulge in this new freedom called 'conditional free will'. Besides, with the creep constantly expanding, more drones were being made to encompass more creep collecting duties. They seemed more content with performing manual labor instead of going off on their own adventures.
The queens were a surprise. Like the elder hydralisk staying in the spring, the queens opted to stay near the central part of the hive cluster. They mainly preoccupied their time with grooming themselves, the other queens, the bio-structures, and any zerg creature that felt like it wanted the attention. One would be surprised how often a zergling tried to bite at a random object and get something stuck in its teeth, only to have a queen assist in getting it out of their mouth.
Before Kay could get comfortable, Virid interrupted his current hobby of zerg-watching. 'Kay. We have acquired enough bio-matter and accelerant to create an evolution master.'
"Kay!" Kay said, getting up from the rock formation that he was using to overlook his swarm from. The rock formation also happened to be atop the cave entrance that lead into the underground tunnels and the hidden tribe village. "Where do you think we should make him?"
'Someplace safe. I recommend we should conceive and gestate the evolution master at one of the underground hatcheries. The hidden village appears to be our best option.' Virid suggested.
"He'll be mighty far from the five evolution chambers." Kay stated.
'Once we gain more resources, it can grow more evolution chambers. So long as we have five evolution chambers, or any bio-structure, it will unlock the appropriate strain tied to it.'
"... Fair point." Kay said, walking to the nydus network. Taking the long way to the underground village would be pointless when one had a living subway at your beck and call. This time around, he was careful when entering the beast, allowing the guts to not only support him, but also direct his movement. In a transit that lasted seconds, Kay was already in the underground village in no time flat. He turned and made a short trek to the hatchery. There, he saw three queens tending and protecting the hatchery with the larvae it produced. "Need me to choose which lucky larva will spawn into our evolution master?"
'The swarm does not believe in luck.' Virid hissed. 'We adapt as evolution dictates. There are no mutations that affect luck, so luck is useless to us.'
Kay nodded as he listened to Virid. She did have a point. Luck was kind of pointless, unless you had a lot of good luck, or a lot of bad luck. Karma, on the other hand, was something that Kay would easily find himself believing in. He reached his hand forward and picked the closest larva in front of him. "You. I pick you. Become our evolution master and help me, Virid, and the zerg swarm in ways that only an evolution master could."
The larva shrieked in glee before turning into a cocoon. A flood of nutrients spilled from the nearby hatchery, nearly drowning the newly christened evolution master. The cocoon absorbed the nutritional fluid, growing in size quickly as veins were threatening to burst from the insane pressure building within them. Kay felt a resounding amount of pride, since a new evolution master would quickly provide them many new kinds of strains in quick fashion. There were many adaptable mutations that the zerg would be unable to achieve on their own without the help of this evolution master.
PANIC!
'There is a gilanian standing near the nydus worm. Judging from its appearance, it would appear to be the wide gilanian with the blue cape you had talked with yesterday.' Virid reported.
Kay paused. "... The Crescent Arms commander, Kralluf?"
'How do you terrans say this expression? 'Bingo?' Is that the right thing to say?'
Kay chuckled. "It's a good expression, but you might want to work on the delivery. Anyway, I'm going to talk to him and see what he wants." Kay said, turning around and sprinting to the nydus worm.
After yet another transfer through the guts of the underground intestines, Kay was now in the presence of Kralluf yet again, this time in person. Kay noted that the commander wasn't accompanied by any soldiers, or had driven here in a vehicle. Instead, he brought a copper and green suitcase with him, for whatever reason. After looking the commander up and down, Kay noted that he was two heads taller than the gilanian before him. However, that bladed hammer looked deceptively heavy. Kralluf took his turn to inspect the infested zerg command organism. "... The video channel made you look smaller than I thought." Kralluf grunted.
"And uh... you're pretty short." Kay traded.
Kralluf sighed and lowered his bladed hammer. "I'm afraid I have came with ill news. After hearing how your zerg beasts managed to slay my Crescent Arms encampment, my holy emperor has decided to give you an audience."
Kay was surprised. He crossed his arms and loosened his stance. "Does uh... Does this mean I need to go to his golden city and make an appointment, or whatever?"
Kralluf placed the suitcase down and opened it. "He will be here soon." The suitcase extended into a broad circular plate, while several antennas extended out and became angled. He tapped several buttons on a control pad, and then grabbed a mobile communication device from his person. "Oh holy liege, the dreaming immortal, the incarnate of divine will, I call upon you. Emperor Gollog, I answer your request to give audience to the person of your choosing, now standing before me. Sending coordinates for the MEM shift."
After a few more button presses, the machine came to life as blue and white static hovered over the metal plates. The sound it made was similar to a tuning fork resonating next to several metal wind chimes. The blue/white static faded away to reveal yet another gilanian. He was an albino, and he wore a long white robe with opalescent trimmings. He also wore extremely ornate metal gauntlets, boots, and a tall crown that was impressively opalescent. He stepped off of the platform and smiled at Kay, spreading his arms wide as though greeting him. "You are the one I wanted to see today. Kay, was it? Is that the name you chose for yourself?" The gilanian said in a deep, yet baritone voice. "I am Emperor Gollog, and it is a pleasure to finally meet you." He spoke with an air of regal authority, but his voice was quite deep. He talked with a sultry softness, but Kay could tell that there was a darker side to him.
Kay kept quiet.
"Nothing to say? I shall move to my next topic then." Gollog said, folding his arms behind himself. "You see, Kay, I wanted to meet you because I have heard about your little battle with the scout forces of the Crescent Arms Division here. I have seen your brutality, and I have grown impressed with your feats and triumph. You are well deserving of the respect and fear among the mortals. But I have grown interested in other matters in regards to your prowess. And believe me, I am greatly impressed by your beasts, and you."
Kay remained silent.
"As you might have heard, I am an immortal with simple desires. Even though I have ascended, I did not feel the need to throw away my flights of fancy, or my baser wants, just yet. In fact, as an immortal with an entire empire at my disposal, I have the power to grant any wish within my power. I can even grant immortality to others, and let them bask in the glow that is my divinity. I can even grant one of your wishes, if you have any! But it is at a small cost, I'm afraid. The price is allegiance." Gollog took a breath before he spoke again. "So what say you, bug-man beast-master of Red Mountain? Will you join my rule and allow me to fulfill your wish within my power?"
Kay was mute in his reply.
An awkward pause passed before Gollog turned around to Kralluf. "Kralluf? Were you able to hear me as I talked?"
Kralluf straightened up and stiffened. "Yes, my liege. Every word."
Gollog turned back to Kay, and Kay could see his face emoting an annoyed expression. "Please answer me, Kay. It is rude to leave an emperor's question unanswered."
Kay frowned. "You're not real."
Gollog's scaly brows furrowed, confusion wrinkling his scaly face. "... Excuse me?"
"Yeah, you're not even here right now. That, or brain dead. I'm going to assume that you didn't hear me the first time, seeing that you had sent to me a very fancy answering machine. Now then. Allow me to make myself perfectly clear." Kay said, almost growling. "We are the zerg. We evolve by fighting. We have taken resources from many lands. We survived monsters that you couldn't even imagine. We even survived the wrath of a god. We are not to be bartered with. We are not to be trifled with. We are not to be crossed." Kay took a deep breath before speaking again. "Now get out of here, and leave us the fuck alone." He said, turning around and heading for the nydus worm.
Gollog clenched his fists. "YOU DARE TURN YOUR BACK TO AN IMMORTAL EMPEROR?" Kay spun around and shielded one of his ears with a hand. Gollog's voice became incredibly loud in that instant. "YOU DARE RESCIND THE DIVINE GIFT OF WISH FULFILLMENT? YOU DARE ANGER ME WITH YOUR ALOOF BEHAVIOR? THEN LET IT BE KNOWN THAT IF YOU DO NOT ALIGN YOUR ALLEGIANCE WITH ME, YOU WILL BE AN ENEMY TO THE GOLDEN STAR EMPIRE! I MAY NOT BE A GOD, OR BE ABLE TO GIVE YOU THE SAME WRATH THAT YOU SOMEHOW SURVIVED, BUT MY DOMAIN IS ALL OF THE LANDS AND THE WATERS OF KILN! YOU ARE A PRISONER TO THIS WORLD, JUST AS A COLLARED SLAVE IS PRISONER TO HER SLAVE-MASTER! IF YOU DO NOT ACCEPT MY GRATITUDE, THEN THIS TIME TOMORROW, I SHALL SEND FORTH AN ARMY THAT WILL SQUASH YOU AND YOUR MONSTERS LIKE THE INSECTS THEY ARE!" Gollog took a deep breath before speaking again. "I will give you one more chance to reconsider. What say you, bug-man beast-master of Red Mountain?"
Kay uncovered his ear before speaking. "Can you get me off of Kiln?" Gollog's expression furrowed further, telling Kay that he either didn't want him to leave, or he didn't know how to. Kay turned around once more. "Then we're done here. If you really want to start a war with the zerg, just know that you have been warned. See you tomorrow. Or not. You are free to choose what will happen next." Kay said, entering the nydus worm once he was done.
He could tell from the nydus worm's point of view that Gollog was fuming. The, supposedly immortal, emperor stormed back to the metal plates that Kralluf had used to summon his emperor with. Kay figured out that the device Kralluf used to summon Gollog was a MEM device, and that both Gollog and Kralluf used it again to make their leave. Ten seconds later, it detonated and prevented anyone from using it further. Kay thought about retrieving the device, before it had unexpectedly exploded after the blue and white static vanished. Perhaps a counter-measure to prevent the device from being reverse-engineered? Virid had questions, however. 'Why did you say that he was not real?'
"Because I couldn't read his thoughts." Kay said, emerging from the nydus worm in the underground village again. He walked to the hatchery that was supplying a cocoon with more nutrient rich fluid, which was still slowly growing.
'Would this mean that your psionic abilities as a spectre are recovering?'
Kay nodded, carefully rubbing the back of his head. "It's possible, even if it's slow. If I had to rate my mental state on its psionic potential as it is now, I guess I'd rate it about a... five, or maybe five and a half, out of ten on the psionic scale. I was able to read some surface thoughts from that Kralluf guy, but I got completely nothing from Gollog. Hell, I'm pretty sure Gollog was never in front of me to begin with!" Kay said, nearing the still enlarging cocoon that had the evolution master swimming inside it. "How long until the evolution master emerges?"
'I estimate that the gestation will complete at sundown.'
Kay groaned. "Let's get as many combat strains good and ready for tomorrow."
'Our economy of bio-matter is slowly dropping. We may need to expand the creep fields and move our drones to new areas.'
"Ah shit. ... Well, we can extend our nydus network coverage to expand our territory farther. Have seven more nydus worms emerge ten kilometers from our hive cluster, and space them out evenly. We already have a nydus worm that is southwest from our position, so all we need to do is to finish expanding the creep to other areas. Once the nydus worms are in place, we can then quickly cover the land with more creep and give the drones more ground to harvest nutrient rich creep from. The queens will have to be hard at work laying lots of creep tumors, so have the overlords help them. And Virid?" Kay said, pacing back and forth.
'Yes, Kay?'
"We need to surprise them with something they won't expect. We're living on borrowed time, and I want to make good use of it!"
A/N: I could have finished this yesterday, but my internet connection became a derp and I forgot to ctrl + C my document before pressing the save button. :c