In this world everything was more difficult. He had no one to rely upon except Arya and the Stark family. How could he demand charcoal, iron ore, and lime stone from them?
That was only the basics of what he needed. It was times like this that Mycah wished he had learned wizard craft. The craft didn't seem so important when he could improve his skill with powered armor. That was proving untrue.
There were spells for basic things like finding ore, mining, and carpentry. If magic could do it there was a spell for it. He never needed it and he'd specialized in armored warfare. Simple resistant spells would have made any stone viable.
He wasn't trying to make a Excalibur series blade, only metal that could case his capacitor. The problem was his only source of electricity was his own. Lightning considered to be the gods wrath wasn't gentle. Something robust was needed to hold the power.
"Your filthy, mother says you need to go get a bath." Arya said.
Mycah nodded and didn't say anything. He was busily putting the smithy together with his tentacles. One brick wasn't cut right and no matter how he fit it, the thing didn't belong.
"If you asked we'll help you with whatever this is." Arya said. "What is a printing press?" She asked again.
"It's a tool used to copy books quickly and easily. With it knowledge and ideas can be spread far and wide. With greater availability of books more people will learn to read." Mycah said. She looked at him confused. Had he been wrong in his understanding? How could she know if he didn't? Perhaps, he had gotten it backwards. Maybe with more people being able to read the demand for more books arose.
"I thought it was a weapon." Arya said. Mycah blinked, oh that made a little more sense. Then he blinked. Well no need to throw the baby out with the bath water. Was his whole aim right or wrong? Had he even tested this theory out? What if he wasted all his time with building a printing press and the people were no more literate?
He placed the brick that didn't fit aside and decided it was best to talk with the Maester. This might have been against his former thoughts but suddenly something seemed off. Had he misplaced cause and effect?
"Alright, I'll take a bath and then we'll talk to maester Luwin about my idea." Arya smiled and they took off for the small bathhouse.
After emerging from the tub he evaporated the water clinging to him with some fire manipulation. "How are you so unbothered by the heat? The water's boiling." Arya questioned.
"You'll be able to do that too when your like me." Mycah said. She smiled and took off again.
They made their way to Luwin's chambers. The man looked at them with questioning eyes. "Are you finally ready to unveil what you were building?" Luwin asked. The old man looked outside his widow to see the towering smelter.
"Change of plans. As I was building it, I had a thought. Was I building something that I thought would increase literacy or was a I building the result of an increase in literacy? The more I think about it the more I've come to realize supply doesn't increase demand." Mycah finished.
"You speak as a learned man instead of a butcher's boy. Despite your healing of Bran's back, I thought it magic. From your words you want to establish a change in society. I assure you the demand for copies of books is very high in old town. If you sent the idea to them, they may recreate it." Luwin said.
"What are you going to do with the thing then?" Arya asked.
"I'll make a few weapons. Its basically built." It didn't feel right walking around without a sword.
"I'll leave a few steel weapons for house Stark. Maester Luwin would you like to see a new type of steel.
If he was going to continue on he needed a weapon designed to grow in power. Time was his friend now. He'd have thousands of years on this rock. This time he needed a weapon to test time. No he needed something that surpassed it. He made a few molds from soapstone. Before he forged his sword he needed to get the hang of forging broad heads.
The smelter was lit with the demonic flames he'd stolen when he slew a fox yokai. Aura functioned on a quantum level transmitting information across universes. Even so there were differences between verses.
He pumped aura into the flame bringing it to life to melt the stubborn ore. Mycah poured the fire on blasting through the ore's defenses and melting it. The glittering silver metal the remained was bathed in aura and powdered limestone. Something was happening to it on a molecular scale. Carbon structures were formed guided by the strengthening presence of aura. The iron was partway steel now and down for the count. If he let it cool then it would become pig iron. Worthless for what he needed.
Mycah had another card to play that the iron didn't anticipate. His smithing hammer lit with gods wrath. After the iron was poured into the mold, he smacked it with divine lightning. After a few hits he let the arrow head cool. The broad head glowed slightly golden before reverting to the silver of steel. It had been laid low and made obedient by Mycah's power. He'd do it hundreds more times.
"So what's different about these broadheads. Their shiny but what makes them better. Are you going to blind the enemy with them?" Theon asked.
"It will slip through plate. Unfortunately, the shaft will stop it before it goes too far. So don't expect to multiple kills." Mycah said.
"Could you make me an axe?" Theon asked. Mycah gave him a thumbs up. His tentacles were getting sore working with so many molds and hammers at once.
"Will I be able to do this too?" Arya asked.
"Yea," Mycah said as he moved on to pike molds.
"When will you start teaching me more?" Arya asked.
Mycah sighed and stepped away from his forging. He closed his eyes for a second and gathered a vast amount off raw essence. Lightning crackled around his hands as he gathered ever vaster amounts until a tiny ball of essence appeared on his palm. It was at least enough to get her to the third stage.
"Meditate imagine your body is the forge and this is raw iron ore. What you want is the steel. The rest is waste. Take only what will help you and nothing else. You have six hours begin." Arya closed her eyes and returned to meditation.
By the second hour he was making axe heads. Hundreds of pike heads laid in a pile. "What's the difference between these weapons and Valerian steel." Maester Luwin asked.
"Mechanically, Valerian steel is lighter, magically more powerful, and it holds the fire element." Mycah said.
"My weapons are sharper, sturdier, and elementally blank. They are also cheaper to make. I wasn't joking when I said the Valerians spent lives like coppers."
"There is a letter from the night's watch and a package. I think you should take a look at it." Maester Luwin said.
Mycah nodded and made his way to the lord's study. Rob was waiting there with a package. Within it was a mechanical hand of all things. Well on the outside it looked like a rotting hand.
"In the letter it says the white walkers are back. You aren't normal, so I was wondering do you know anything about this." Rob asked.
Mycah stared at the hand looking deeper by focusing aura to his eyes. His eyes quickly moved to the microscopic level. There he saw nano machines moving about keeping the dead flesh together. They struggled to release the smell of a decomposing corpse but it was all for show. He could sense the inner workings of the machine. Worse the nano machines were climbing up the rising heat from the hand to spread. This was more a disease than mere nano bots.
He extended multiple tentacles with nano hairs to catch the nano bots. Then he dug into the hands. Metallic servos replaces joints and muscles. Revealing what was hidden underneath. He dug into the nanomachines to find tiny tesla coils transmitting power and information.
After extending tiny fibrous tentacles from nano tentacles, he struggled to subvert to exchange of information. Even when he stole a spark, the information was nonsensical. The language was alien to even coding from his world. There was nothing he could get directly from the nanomachines. Indirectly, he quickly gained an understanding what they did.
The nano machines converted flesh into machinery. It was interesting. He pushed his own information into the nanobots and watched many of them explode on the spot. Those that didn't quickly began to turn gold before self destructing.
Mycah let out a sigh, he couldn't catch a break. He'd need to try again.
"Well if these aren't white walkers then I don't know what are." Mycah said.
"This isn't good father left Winterfell to me and now we have a threat unseen in thousands of years knocking at our door." Rob said.
"Stay calm Rob we still have a wall between us. There is time to warn the rest of the seven kingdoms." Luwin counseled.
"Nope, we'd need thousands of years to prepare for this." Mycah countered. Then he let out a sigh. "I'm going to have to depose the monarchy and establish a republic now."
"Wait why would have you to do that?" Rob asked. "Isn't that the last thing we need to do before an invasion?" He laughed at Rob's words.
"Nope these things are the worst. We are fucked. They infect the body and the mind. The night's watch might already be compromised. You'll get your brother out of there, if you want to save him." Mycah said.
"In the stories only the dead became one of them." Rob argued.
"Rob that was what 8,000 years ago. They've evolved since then." Mycah said.
"Why the Republic?" Luwin asked.
"Our leaders are going to get taken over in this war. We need the ability to change them out quickly. Having a civil war or blood line dispute every time isn't going to cut it."
"How does it spread?" Rob asked.
"Microscopic machines too small to see. You'd need some serious magnification to see them." Mycah said.
"No one will believe that. They'll think us mad. If I didn't know you I'd think you a liar. I saw the metal inside. Jon wrote me and said it moved. He said fire hurt it but only Long claw finished it off. Valerian Steel can hurt them then." Rob said.
"That many screaming burning souls cutting into such a delicate information chain must have overcharged them and they self destructed. I did something similar, when I tried to take control of them." Rob looked at him expectantly. "They committed suicide rather than be captured."
"These tiny machines can think. Is it some sort of sentient disease?" Luwin asked.
"That is accurate, very good. Yes that isn't a bad assumption. Or something is controlling them from afar. Even when the main body ceases to function the nanites don't. They continued to turn flesh into metal underneath. Not only that, I suspect they would normally hide the evidence. Parts of the hand were already being cannibalized. They were escaping the box to infect other hosts. You aren't infected. Rob your body seems to kill them naturally. Maybe it's a trait passed down from the Starks of old." Mycah said. Then smiled. "Maybe we aren't completely dead."
"Can these things infect you?" Rob asked.
"This weak type not a chance in the seven hells. If the mind behind them gets busy creating a counter to me. I don't know. We have to act fast and dirty. Summer will end soon and this war won't be an easy one. I guess its back to the forge with me. I'll finish up here. Then write a letter for me and I'll go to the wall and pick up your brother."
With the letter in hand, Mycah stepped out to check on Arya. She was still meditating. Her body was covered in a thin layer of filth and the orb of essence had shrunk considerably.
Theon was busily shooting a target he made over and over. The arrows were stuck in the wall of Winterfell. "Are you seriously wasting my arrows?" Mycah yelled.
Theon jumped and fired another one. It flew right into the wall buried up to the fletching. "Warn a guy next time you sneak up on them. I could have shot you and wouldn't that have been a shame." Theon said. "Are you fucking Arya?" Theon asked.
For a second, he thought of just raising his hand and blasting Theon with lightning until he felt better. Sparks danced across his fingers as he itched to just blast Theon a little. "Oh, relax I won't tell anyone. After all you made us such wonderful weapons." The lightning around Mycah's fingers lit up again.
"Another word and I'll inform Rob you volunteered to join the night's watch, as much trouble as we're about to have from beyond the wall, he might think nothing of it." Theon froze at that. All joking was gone from his eyes.
"How bad is it? Another king beyond the wall?" Mycah shook his head.
"I could handle that in an hour Theon. No we have white walkers. The stories left a lot of the good stuff out." Mycah said.
"Your jesting, they are just stories." Theon said.
"Then someone made some very convincing fakes. Jon sent us a hand. At a glance its just a rotting hand. It was underneath the skin. Metal, wires, and tiny machines that slowly rebuilt the body into something else. We have a working theory. Built off what I saw from the tiny machines." Mycah said.
"This is madness, you had to have made it up. Machines can't do anything on their own. What can a windmill do?" Theon asked.
"They're more like spiders made of metal and too small to see easily. Even if you were looking at one you couldn't see it. Only with millions of them together could your eyes see them. Think about it Theon they could be in your body right now and you wouldn't know. They could whisper things in your ears and change you slowly. Now think, what if they were in the ear of the lord of the night's watch, Lord Stark, or the King." Theon didn't take long to think about it.
"We are fucked." Theon said. Then he looked at his quiver of arrows. "We need everyone then." Mycah nodded.
"Don't let anyone disturb Arya while she cultivates it could kill her." Mycah said.
"That doesn't change the fact you two are doing things. She's like my sister. If you hurt her, then I'll find a way to hurt you back worse." Theon said. Mycah nodded.