《Nanites in a fantasy》 Welp i think i died Sam jolted awake in a white Room. They were a They, as at the moment they could not remember what they were. They rubbed a hand over their face or at least they tried. They didn''t have hands wait where they supposed to have hands. Why were they having such a hard time thinking? ¡°Ahh you''re finally aware. Give it a moment and it should all come back to you.¡± A voice said seemingly coming from everywhere and nowhere at once. They tried to speak but they couldn''t or do anything really else. So, they just did it the voice said and just sat? Float? They waited and yeah after a few minutes their mind began to clear¡­. Wait they died! They remembered seeing the large truck coming at them, If they swerved to the left, they would have hit the kids that they were trying to avoid and to the right was a wall. He was going to hit something no matter what. Then, then he was just here. ¡°Good you should be aware enough to now make an informed decision. To explain you died and you didn''t have a preferred religion, so we aren''t exactly sure where to send you. You have a few options available though I will say your act of self sacrifice in your final moments opened up most of them. Before I present you with the list. Your options can be boiled down to two primary decisions reincarnation which due to your last act you have just enough to do a¡­ Oh what is it you mortals call it an isekai. Though I will warn you, you won''t have much to work with if you go that route without making sacrifices. The second option is to head to an afterlife of your choice. But in order to save myself from the typical questions you mortals tend to prattle upon. No, the afterlife is not eternal think of it a bit like a cleansing or warm bath. A pleasant time but the longer you spend there the less you will be you until one day you are nothing more than a blank slate and are reborn. The only reason why it''s a different classification from reincarnation is beyond obvious. The afterlife is a reward, but the cleansing is far more thorough. Reincarnations do not retain most of their memories and what little they do would be simple deja vu or strange dreams. The problem is they tend to keep whatever weird quirks they developed from their previous life. Sometimes this is a blessing, sometimes a curse. Some of the most famous prodigies or infamous beings from your world were reincarnates. And no, they did not know this, despite some information carrying over. Now unless you have any questions you may make your decision.¡± The voice said as a screen appeared in front of him along with a sort of body. It was transparent and lacked key details but at least it had limbs and working hands. Thankfully their didn''t seem to be any time limits and this body, if you could even call it that. Lacked any form of needs which gave him plenty of time to consider his option of which there weren''t a lot. Apparently, this whole system worked on some form of point values and Sam didn''t have a lot of points. He could buy the isekai ability, but he had no control over what or where he ended up as. As all those were too expensive. The only things he could afford were things like bacteria or simple single cell organisms. ¡®Wait.¡¯ The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. He flipped through the list of available worlds which he couldn''t afford. Fantasy, sci-fi, grimdark, the list went on. Curiously he goes back to the species panel. And he couldn''t find any non organic species. ¡°Hey quick question I only see organic species in this. Like plants, animals and even bacteria but if I''m not wrong even in my world we had already figured out stuff like silicon could sustain life. So, living crystals should be a possibility. And I know there are tons of things in fantasy and so on that are made of elements. And sci-fi has robots that are sentient as well. Am I limited to just these or can I opt in to others.¡± ¡°You could but it is a jarring difference compared to what you are used to from your previous life. That''s why they are not listed. That being said let me know what you were looking for and I will see if it is available.¡± The voice said clearly bored with the conversation. ¡°What about a nanobot swarm I mean you don''t even have to start me off with a large swarm if it¡¯s going to cost me more points. Well so long as they have the capability of reproducing.¡± ¡°Ah you have a mind in you after all. That''s quite an interesting proposal. Very few are brave enough to go that route¡­.. Maybe you won''t be such a disappointment after all.¡± As the voice said that the screen shifted, and Sam found himself staring at a new option menu. [Race: Grey Goo. Starting size: 0.05 ML. Total drones: 36995432. Skills: Replication.] [WARNING: current swarm size is too small to contain users consciousness.] [Penalties: Due to current swarm being too small to house even a limited version of swarm consciousness. In solution a fragile crystalline matrix has been granted as a boon. This small crystal orb is weaker than glass and is your mind and soul until such time as you can find a way to fully transition into the swarm host consciousness.] [Notice: The orb additionally contains basic blueprint structures for new nanobots as well as the required programming and a limited power source. Note this power source cannot maintain a large swarm of nanobots. An additional power source will need to be located.] A surprisingly useful penalty in Sam''s opinion and one that even granted him a few points. Not a lot of them mind you but enough he was able to pick up two skills. Printing and research and he could barely afford research, it being one the most expensive skills for the class but its description made it clear it was necessary. [Research: Research replaces the random and accomplishment set skill system with the time based intelligence system. While not allowing you to unlock new skills. This skill helps with the development of tools scientifical formula and general upgrades.] ¡°You¡¯re not as dumb as you look boy. I¡¯m surprised you caught that yes most mechanical creatures cannot integrate with the mechanics of higher worlds another reason why they aren¡¯t normally on the list. Your earth being one of the lower planes does not have access to the benefits and foes the higher planes enjoy. It¡¯s for that very reason planes like your world are not invaded by stronger worlds. Because despite physical resources there isn''t much there to offer. Yes, worlds like these tend to eventually develop rather interesting technology, they rarely develop anything that isn''t achievable elsewhere. Regardless mechanical type powers do not tend to meld well without an organic base on realms that lacks the suitable technology. At least with this you will be able to develop the technology needed on your own. Though until your swarm grows large enough to function fully independently it will be extremely slow going. Your core only has enough processing power to run your personality matrix on the lowest value Any additional processing power will have to be drawn from the swarm network which would take millions of drones to form even the most minute amount of processing power. Well at the beginning anyways but this has the beginnings for almost infinite growth and almost infinite power. But it will not be an easy road. You must understand you''re going to be starting off very, very weak and very, very small. That said this is one of the more interesting things I''ve seen in a while so I will allow it. Sam then felt a pop like sensation and was simply gone A squishy solution ¡°POP¡± That was the only sound that disturbed the serene forest that Sam now found himself in. Wait was he still a he? As far as he could tell he didn''t have any biological components and usually the leader of a swarm was a queen. Should he go back to using the, the they pronouns as he was technically a lot of things ohh this was gonna make his head hur-. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] The notification sounded off in his head or was it his core. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] OK OK he needed to stop overthinking things apparently. Now how did he look around. Oh, oh ok that was weird he could see sort of it was more like a vast field in front of him where he could see in every direction and a bit underneath him. Wait, that was him wasn''t it. Well at first glance his core looks like a giant glowing mountain of orange and green crystal. That his vision self identified as his core meaning the three hundred and sixty degrees view, he was getting was likely generated from all the viewpoints of his nanobots. Which would likely explain why everything looks so huge. He couldn''t see a lot, The grass here was tall blocking his view, and he was fairly well hidden underneath it, small blessings and all he guessed. However, just as he started to wonder about this. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] OK that was starting to get really annoying he had to stop and ponder his next step very carefully especially with the hole pondering part. He was surrounded by grass so he was likely on the ground the safest place in that case would likely be under the ground. [Warning processor limit exceeded. Force restart initiated.] ¡­¡­¡­ If Sam still had lungs, he''d be gasping right now he had apparently overdone it and had been force restarted. He didn''t feel any different, but he did notice the world was far darker? Was it nighttime? [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] Damn it he needed to hurry he tried to order his nanobots to begin digging down and using whatever material they could to reproduce [warning: tasks currently exceed processing capabilities] ¡®Crap wait is there some sort of task manager or some way I can prioritize certain things to free up processing power.¡¯ ¡­¡­ As soon as he had asked the question, he had been knocked out again when he came to it was bright once more but with a different notification. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] [Query??? Answer: Unfortunately, the task manager system requires more processing power than is available.] [Warning: In order to use the query function user interface and personality core had to be taken offline to use/answer query.] Strangely enough it had answered the wrong question and in return had somehow answered the right question. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] He didn''t have the time nor the patience to deal with this. ¡®OK take me offline however long you need to unless there''s an emergency and run whatever system or task manager is required to begin digging and bearing my core. Let''s say a foot underground using whatever usable material is available to multiply and produce more nanobots.¡¯ ¡­.. When he came to his mind was a bit clearer and he was in the dark? No, he was underground, probably a foot underground. With a small Ant hill like shaft above him being the only source of light. His field of vision had increased as the nanobots multiplied going from a drop sitting on top of him to being able to fully envelope his core in a thin layer of bluish silver. Along with the clarity of mind and a expanded field of view, he could now bring up the task manager. Though it was just the manager if he tried to push the start button it gave him another warning. [Warning: processor limit reached desired tasks exceeds current processor limits.] A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation. Sam just sighed and set to work, he ordered the nanobots to move his core a foot down and a foot to the right. While using the mound above as a dumping ground for any loose non usable material. That he could later use to harden and fortify the walls of his tunnel. Upon reaching the new core location they were to secure the core in an inch thick stone bunker then begin fortifying other tunnels to secure both flow of resources and structural stability. A storage room was to be set off to the right with an assembly room connected to it with another tunnel connecting back to the main tunnel on the surface. A fourth of his current nanobot supply would be devoted to replicating and growing. He was to be brought back online if there was an issue they couldn¡¯t handle or if the required processing power was established or once the task was complete. ¡­. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] Sam awoke to the same blasted message repeating itself more than fifty times over in his head. Apparently, the swarm had been pushing itself to his cores limits while he was unconscious. Since it hadn''t led to a full shutdown of progression the swarm would just continue with a different task until their numbers reached high enough that they could figure out the problem they were dealing with. According to his internal clock which was new. He had been out for close to three weeks. In that time is nanobot swarm had grown from a few ounces too little over two cups. Yeah, he guessed it wasn''t a lot, but it would do for now and at the very least he could think without that blasted pop up showing up every two seconds. He took this opportunity to actually stop to examine his nanobots and they honestly weren''t much. Instead of the terrifying all matter consuming grey goo from sci-fi they were about what you would expect from what IRL nanobots would look like. The things were limited to say the least while they could work together on massive scales to communicate, think, construct, and so on. But in order to do anything actually impressive he needed gallons of nanobots not a few cups. The fact he had managed to gather enough metal from what was essentially your average garden soil to make that much was downright impressive. Though he¡¯d have to continue to dig down and out to gather more usable material. His mine now extended five feet down eight feet wide. In a circular mine system set up in rings that expanded out and down as it went. They reused most of the material they dug to reinforce the tunnels with a manufactured stone the nanobots created for the walls. It wasn''t cement or concrete, it was just a solid slab of printed rock, it was impressive to say the least. Unfortunately, with him awake it had all shut down. The bots that were digging had simply dropped what they were doing and returned to him along with waste removal and construction. leaving tunnels unfinished and new nanobots in various states of incompleteness. Sam sighed he knew what he had to do but he didn''t like it. ¡°Alright continue mining and resource gathering as well as construction of this bunker complex until such time as it can run fully automatically with my personality matrix online or until research becomes available.¡± ¡­.. Two days he was only out two more days. The bots had devoted themselves fully to the mining and production of more nanobots to increase the swarms processing power. A shocking five new assembly rooms had sprung up around the supply room along with another two supply rooms. The mine tunnels had increased almost fifteen feet out and eight feet down the most shocking part was they had all but stopped expanding. The bots had found a rusted old chest or maybe a lock box it wasn''t very big but it was filled with coins of varying metals. It was currently being broken apart for the needed materials. He had them scan any of the still intact coins as they might need them later. But more importantly if there were coins here that meant they were sentients that made them. Interestingly enough he found he had a new map feature it wasn''t a lot, but it would do him some good. Thankfully the research function had finally been unlocked and he could pick from a few options. Along with an obvious warning that it would shut him down again. The options he had were limited to say the least, but it was a start. [Basic circuits: While you understand the basics of wiring electricity and circuit boards from your own nanobots. You lack the knowledge to apply this to anything more than just creating more nanobots. As this is more instinctual than it is conscious thought. Researching basic circuits will expand on this knowledge unlocking the capabilities to build simple machines. Examples: Solar panel copper wire basic circuit, circuit Breakers.] [batteries: Basic and crude batteries.] [Advanced mineral printing: a comprehensive survey of usable materials and what they can be broken down and formatted into.] [Basic improvements: By stress testing a small group of nanobots you can come to understand their limitations and find ways to improve them. Note: This does not guarantee improvement it just generates data that can later be used for more exact research down the line.] He picked basic circuits and ordered his bots to continue mining, multiplying and to start sending small expeditionary groups to the surface to look around. He didn''t know how far his transmission radius was so he needed them to figure that out for him and informed any bot to attempt to retrace its path and return to the source of his signal if it got disconnected. They were to wake him up if anything went wrong or the task was completed. He wasn''t out too long, just a few days this time but when he came to, he had three big problems. Apparently, it had rained, and he had lost the sum total of his entire Expeditionary force. This was not that bad. As In all honesty they were replaceable, but they had encountered another large bottleneck power. Apparently, the swarm couldn''t grow any larger without more power, so he added an additional task. To have them store any non usable drones created and continue his research and production and he was knocked out again. When he came to again it had almost been a week, but he had basic circuits researched. It was actually pretty useful he could even build rudimentary computer systems. Though it would be a ridiculously large resource sink for what would have been an extremely complex calculator. Plus, he didn''t have enough understanding to actually program a computer yet. Though with basic computers having been added to his research menu. He figured it would help him along that line and at the very least give him more advanced circuits. The problem was while he had the capability of continuing to do more research, he had honestly hit a rather nasty bottleneck. He had already worked his way through a fourth of the coins. And the bots mining operation had yet to provide much resources. His mapping wasn¡¯t doing much either, apparently twenty feet was his maximum broadcasting radius. Meaning while he had about twenty feet ish of map of the surface he could no longer expand in any direction. As for the large stash of inactive drones it was about to exceed a gallon worth of nanobots stored within the bunker complex. And after devoting a few days to researching various options to try and increase his research or power production capabilities. The solutions were well, he wasn''t really sure what he was expecting when he asked the question and was given the research option but they weren''t much. The first option was to simply stop and sit there and let the research go by. If his nanites were inactive but online he could focus solely on powering more of them. Since they would be using less power and thus would offer him more processing capabilities. It would offer a small boost in research. The second possibility and the one that was more interesting to him was to begin construction on a power generation facility. He could build basic Dynamos and alternators as well as solar panels from basic circuitry, but he needed a place to set them up though. The surface was covered in a dense undergrowth so he couldn¡¯t see much. So, he figured he was in some sort of field. Though with some shadows from nearby trees. He could cut them down and begin construction but that was risky if there was a lock box here that meant someone put it here. And if he started covering the ground in solar panels something was bound to notice. If the lock box had truly been forgotten about that wasn''t nearly as dangerous. But the simple fact that it was here meant it was close enough at some point to intelligent life and intelligent life would be able to notice any form of construction. He then sealed the entrance before he began digging through the side of the bunker where he had hit his core. The wall was cracked open, and the core was moved out and pushed to the surface and the tunnel was collapsed behind him. It wasn''t as secure as he''d liked but it would hopefully keep any curious critter from trying to figure out what was in there. What burst forth on the surface about a good two feet away from where his hidden bunker was located. Was what most people would mistake for a staple of the fantasy genre. Smaller than a basketball the mound of the amorphous bluish silver nanobots pushed forward into the forest beyond to endless growth war and advancement. But to the rest of the world, it was just another slime emerging from the ground. digging in If Sam still had lungs he would be sighing right now. He was aware that slimes were one of the more common monsters in fantasy, and while he was technically not a slime the form his swarm was currently taking was similar to one. He had armored his core with a simple metal box with small holes so he could still connect to the nanobots. He had been traveling in the same direction for close to a week at this point and he probably covered close to two miles according to his map. He had found another coin and even an old broken knife which he was currently dragging along as he slowly disassembled it adding its metal to his armored cube. Nothing he¡¯d found so far had been useful and judging by the rising humidity he didn''t have much longer before another rainstorm came through. He had climbed a tree a few days ago and spotted an old dead burned out, but massive husk of a tree. If the wood was still in decent enough shape, it would make the perfect place to start setting up a permanent base of operations. Its large limbs reached at least partially above most of the forest canopy making it the perfect spot for the installation of solar panels and signal antennas. It likely had a deep root structure which would be good for reaching deeper underground where he was likely to find more metallic compounds. And a large amount of just empty space inside of it that he could hollow out and make use of. This made it almost ideal for attempting to build larger units. While he had only been able to look at the research screen. He was very aware about the limitations of his nanobots, they were the ultimate multi tool. But they were slow, they had signal reach issues and required near constant recharging. In short, while they were incredibly useful and given enough numbers incredibly powerful it would take an ungodly amount of them to do anything on a particularly large scale. Simple robotics while far beyond his current research capabilities would need to be his next step. Basic drones could be used for everything from construction to resource gathering to exploration and mapping as well as extending his relay capabilities. A simple RC car like drone that could transport the equivalent of a water bottle''s worth of nanites to a position could begin construction on just about anything. As he could get basic materials out of the soil and surrounding flora if not fauna. But he currently didn''t need to actually start looking for proper locations for facilities such as resource production construction and so on just yet. As he could continue just expanding underground until he found it. True, it was an extremely slow process and not the best use of his resources. But even a simple solar powered aerial drone with a magnet could be extremely useful if he could find some form of civilization to just snatch materials from. [Warning processor limit reached please reduce stress load or a force restart will be attempted.] Well, that was a surprise he hadn''t seen one of those notifications since he woke up after his last shutdown. He must have really been deep in thought for that to happen, then again he was probably using a lot of his processing power to coordinate the swarm in such an active manner. It took another day for him to reach the tree, and he immediately set to work. While he would have liked to keep his armor it wasn''t doing him any good at the moment. Most of his nanobots were put to work freeing his core and digging it down. The thing''s roots really did run deep and navigating around them wasn''t easy. This was only complicated further by the fact he didn''t want to dig through the roots until he had a proper understanding of the current state of the tree. It may have looked rough from the outside but for all he knew it could have been recently struck by lightning and still be alive. He hadn''t been in the area long enough to know or not. Better to explore it and the surrounding area than make stupid assumptions that bite him in the butt later and boy did that hold true here. He just barely made it underground before it started raining. What little remained of his armored cube knife and the coin was left abandoned on the surface. As he continued to slowly work his way downward, he discovered something interesting. All the trees in this area of a certain type had interconnected roots. Meaning while the larger tree he had found was extremely badly damaged, it was still very much alive, being kept on life support by the other surrounding trees of the forest. It would probably still die eventually due to its inability to produce its own food. Though he may be able to help with that in time. He¡¯d have to look into doing some research on the subject. But it wasn''t uncommon in stories for nanobots to hybridize with organic creatures so why not hear? But that would have to wait till he managed to get somewhere a bit safer and more established. This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. Once he was underneath the tree, he started queuing up his research. Advanced circuits, Cabling, Power storage, Basic power generation, Basic transceivers, Basic engineering, Intro to beginner botany, and Floral research we''re all queued up. The next step was to begin planning out the basic structure of his new base. A tunnel was to be dug up through the tree. Though he wanted to do as little damage as possible to the tree, he still needed to reach the top. Next was the ever expanding ring like mining system a small area for an assembly bay. And an additional area for storing manufactured nanobots and resources. Since he couldn''t currently grow his swarm, he wouldn''t put a high priority on making more of them. The last idea to designate was a tunnel heading back towards where his original base had been. It wasn''t much more than a narrow pipeline but at the very least it would help him gain access to the cache of nanobots stored there as well as the remaining medals in the lockbox. With all this done, he began his research. Advanced circuits allowed him to manufacture real solar panels, unlike the crude things he could make previously. Along with it came just the tool he was looking for he could now run a hard line connection. While this did limit him on how far he could expand beyond his limited transmission radius any tunnels he dug could have a wire ran along it. It not only provided power but allowed him to communicate with his bots as well. Though it had to somewhat remain in a direct physical connection with it. Basically, as long as some part of the swarm was touching the line he''d be able to communicate with the rest of them, not perfect but at least it helped him expand underground. He gave his bot some new orders to start building solar panels in the limbs of the tree. He then added Basic computing, Solar panel enhancement, and Advanced circuits II, to the research list. With those in the queue, he allowed his swarm to start producing nanobots again. Though in a very limited capacity. As he was more interested in gathering building materials, as at this point while increasing his swarm size would be useful it would just lead him to another bottleneck down the road. Plus, with the new cables being installed in the pipeline tunnel it wouldn''t be long until he was reconnected with the stored nanobots back at the original base. He began the next research cycle and was again knocked out, but when he came to this time not even a full day had passed. He wasn''t quite sure what the cabling research was supposed to give him. But apparently, it only unlocked additional research as well as giving him the ability to shield his wires making them less likely to start fires or bleed EMF into the surroundings. But he had to admit the related research was very useful everything from high voltage wires to fiber optic cables. So, he''d have to research it all for the time being though he began working his way towards Ethernet cables. Not a lot happened beyond Sam continuing his research and construction. The only thing of true interest that happened over the next few weeks. Was when he accidentally punched his way into a borough of Rabbits with little horns on their heads. He had hoped to just leave them alone and change paths. Unfortunately, the moment the rabbit spotted the small stream of nanites retreating back towards the pipe they had been constructing. It had decided to dig them out. It had unearthed close to a foot of the pipe before Sam bit the bullet and attacked the thing. Attack might have been a bit of an exaggeration, he just let the nanites pour through the pipe like a fluid flooding the din and there were a lot more rabbits there than he had originally thought. After ceiling off the entryway to the surface he began to explore while consuming the corpse of the rabbit. Surprisingly the rabbit contained a lot of useful materials and for anything he couldn''t use, he had plans for. He pushed the remains of the corpse close to the entrance to use as bait as he slowly continued to disassemble the corpse. He hadn¡¯t originally wanted to harm the rabbits, but they had proven to be a valuable source of resources on top of that their tunnels expanded deep underground. Now that he set the trap, he just needed to wait. So, trusting his bots he wants more let himself be taken under only to be awakened a short while later. His research had been paused but not canceled like it would have if the bots ran into something they couldn''t handle. He got to watch as his bots latched on to the head of some weird wolf fox hybrid smothering it. Before the slime like form of his nanobots pulled it into the burrow. Where it would take the place of the rabbit¡¯s corpse. Quickly stripping it of its remaining material. What was left was a brownish mush that he didn''t know if anything would find appealing. With that done he fell back to sleep only coming to a while later when the nanites finally reached the old base and all the stored nanobots there came back online. With the first solar panels and the added nanobots, he could now stay awake during the day while researching. fighting back Eight years according to their internal clock they had been sitting here for eight years. Now they had not been idle quite the opposite they had been busy expanding, growing adapting, and studying everything they could get their hands on. To the point, their core had even begun to grow slightly. They now had a small swarm of remote controlled slime like nanobot swarms patrolling the forest. Both acting as caretakers and hunting any creature that entered their domain, well not entirely. About two years in they had discovered that most animals gave off one of two energy signatures a positive or a negative energy signature. The giant wolves, carnivorous rabbits, giant spiky bears, and all things goblins there never seemed to be an end to the goblins. Were all firmly in the negative category and the positively charged ones were closer to your average animals. With a few larger and more mystical variants. After dividing the forest in half and experimenting for a little over a year on hunting one type over the other they had discovered that the positively charged ones improve the environment. On top of that if the energy in the positive zones became high enough his nanobots could run off them without needing to be recharged. Though he was still trying to figure out how that worked the negative energy was similar but to a much lesser degree also it seemed to actively kill off the local vegetation. The strangest part was the two seemed to be drawn to each other actively warring over territory and did not attempt to cohabitate. Wherever positive energy would build up it attracted more positively charged creatures who would generate more of this energy. It would then slowly spread outwards boosting growth to continue to generate more energy. Passively purifying negative energy whereas negative energy would actively hunt positively charged zones to consume. But instead of trying to grow their area of influence, it seemed to be actively removing the positively charged creatures from the zones. Consuming them to grow or multiply, would in turn passively grow their area of influence. So, while the negatively charged ones had numbers on their side the positively charged ones were far more powerful, going for a more quality over quantity approach. Sam had their slimes actively hunting negative energy signatures. Allowing more positive creatures to take up residence in his forest thus causing a massive balloon in the biosphere. The most curious part was the strange crystals that began to grow not only in and above ground but on trees and inside plants. Even some of the creatures began to grow them though those were few and far between. But a massive deer with crystalline antlers and a spiky bear with crystal spikes and claws roamed their forest. The cash of coins had long since been eaten away and a massive subterranean complex spread underground throughout the entire forest carving itself ever deeper and further. Well, massive might have been a bit of an exaggeration as except for the main downward shaft of which the main cable ran not one of the tunnels was more than an inch in diameter. Better to be called pipes than anything else regardless they worked for Sam''s purpose. The nanobots had spread to almost a dozen trees. The once massive Dead tree was now vibrant and lively once again. Its bark was now marked with silver circuitry patterns it leaves replaced by crystalline solar panels. Among its many branches were several platforms for small aerial drone units to take off and land. These drones scouted for the largest negative energy sources in the surrounding area. Usually, the larger creatures held more resources within them. These drones with airdrop slime¡¯s on larger energy sources while the patrolling drones hunted down any smaller creatures. The forest itself was actually starting to expand new trees sprouting up and growing over what was once barren fields or in terms of the mountains a craggy wasteland. Sam had not yet ventured up the mountains as something powerful slumbered there, its energy was neither positive nor negative but so high it was undoubtedly a powerful life form. This had been attracting negative creatures just like his forest did but since this creature did not bother to defend its home the large swarms of negative creatures had left the mountain of barren bleak and blackened wasteland. Sam did not go further up the mountain than the forest spread just protecting its border. Not wanting to risk an encounter with the massive creatures, it would likely just ignore them as it did with the negative ones but best not to risk it. Down the valley and through the field there was a massive lake, something slumbered there as well but Sam had plans for that one. Flowing water was hard for his nanobots to function in, so they had to get creative. His bots dropped rocks into the river to build an improvised dam along with some pipes to redirect the water. And they had been able to dry out the riverbed enough he could begin construction on a proper dam. Which would allow him to redirect the water flow away from the lake as well as giving them a massive power source when he could open the flood gates back up. Currently, the water of the river is being dumped into the underground aquifer on the opposite side of the forest. The aquifer had been drained in the past few years for some unknown reason and was teetering on the edge of collapse. After reinforcing the aquifer, making use of it for future underground construction was tempting. Though for the time being they would just dump the water from the river into it so he could build his dam. Once he had let the lake dry up and they had ran that creature out of its home he would begin to set up shop there. Even though water wasn''t exactly the safest space for his nanobots. They had already begun researching aquatic adaptations. The lake while inconvenient was one of the ideal spots for larger scale construction. Currently any large scale construction either had to be done above ground by a group of nanobot slimes or done underground and then later excavated. Neither method was nearly as useful as they would have liked. They would have liked to have large scale surface based construction without having to clear large swaths of territory. In all honesty, it was more because they were afraid if they started building large structures in the middle of fields or whatever. That eventually something intelligent would find them. They had yet to run into whatever had buried the chest yet, but his drones had spotted from a distance caravans of humanoids and beasts of all shapes and descriptions. But none had bothered coming towards the forest, so Sam was happy enough to leave them be. Now in truth, they knew eventually they''d have to bite the bullet but whether they tried to keep hidden or try to interact with them had yet to be decided. However, it wasn''t long before that decision was made for them. What they had at first just assumed was three more of the humanoid creatures started to venture into the forest. However, they were quickly made aware that these were not the same as the ones they had seen previously. These strange creatures they would later come to know to be undead gave off a variant of the negative energy signature and were likewise attracted by the positive creatures. In order to protect the forest, they quickly joined Sam and their nanobot slimes. Though Sam slimes proved far more effective than the local fauna. When the undead died, they didn''t necessarily stay dead when one died two or three would begin to make their way over to their falling comrade only for it to seemingly feed off of their energy before getting back up. The process in truth could be done by one undead but it was far slower. The larger their numbers the faster they¡¯d get back up. The scary part was an entire squad could be taken out only for a random straggler to show up a few hours later and begin to revive the entire squad. Even if they didn¡¯t manage to revive but a few before the fauna showed up to fight them off again their energy didn''t fade so long as the body was intact. So whenever enough of them died in one place eventually the energy would coalesce in the most intact body, and it would get back up and start the process all over again. Thankfully the only reason Sam knew this would happen was because they had let a small section of the forest go unprotected and uncleansed by their slimes temporarily as an experiment. They could easily see how these creatures could snowball. Especially since they never stopped showing up, it was just a trickle, the largest group of which had only been five or six at a time, but if left unchecked they could multiply dramatically. There was no doubt in their mind that they would eventually kill the local fauna and inevitably add them to their ranks. Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Sam didn''t have to wait too long to be proven right, as less than a week later a pack of undead wolves found their way into their forest. These things had been a pack of negatively charged creatures that they had been hunting just outside Sam''s forest. Sam had stopped hunting them figuring it was better to have them as a buffer against the undead. They had been proven right as letting them recoup their numbers had slowed the tide but hadn''t stopped it. Eventually, they fell to the snowball effect of the undead and Sam had to deal with one of the largest groups they had faced yet. This was made problematic as Sam couldn''t invest the time and resources into hunting down the negatively charged creatures and the undead at the same time. Thankfully one took care of the other so that was useful, but they had to keep on top of them or they would snowball. The best solution Sam had found was to start creating slightly larger aerial drones capable of using a one shot harpoon pressure cannon. These were few and far between due to their price, but they were the best option. Sam would send them out to snatch up corpses and drag them back to the forest to be consumed by nanobots. The bodies lacked much in the way of usable material. There were some in there though the greatest source of materials came from whatever little bits they had on them. A few coins in a pocket, a belt buckle, or the occasional bit of armor or farming tool. The caravans they had been seeing were still coming though less often and when they did come, they were in larger groups and far more heavily guarded. They seemed to understand the same thing Sam did and burned the bodies after a few of these caravans passed through, ash pits started marking the road. They were tempted to send out a few slimes to dig through them for any usable resources but held off on that. Even with aerial surveillance Sam didn''t want to risk running into a scout or something unprepared. The days turned into weeks, the weeks turned to months and the caravans became less common as the undead became more so. Even with Sam¡¯s timely intervention sending out aerial drones to snatch up bodies whenever possible. The negatively charged creatures that had started to become more populous after Sam stopped hunting them began to die off again regardless, they were no longer applicable. Sam would send out hunting parties of slimes to try and keep the undead in check only occasionally hunting the surviving negatively charged creatures. After close to a year of the undead presence most of the creatures still left were either very intelligent packs like goblins or wolves or were particularly powerful. Like the creature that Sam could only describe as a cross between a giant crab and a troll that was living in what was left of the lake. Sam almost felt bad draining it leaving it open to the undead hordes, but it was keeping them busy and if they killed it Sam could then throw hordes of their slimes at them and consume the corpse before the undead could raise it and take over. The only reason why Sam didn''t take time to push the creature out on their own was simply because they needed it. As Sam''s slime like nanobot swarms we''re particularly good at tearing apart the undead before breaking them down to their base materials normal creatures were not as well suited. Some could eat them, but most didn¡¯t like rotting corpses, and even the most starving animals would try to avoid them. Except for the actual slimes in the area who we''re eating well. Though the undead destroyed them easily natural slime seemed to prefer hiding underground during the day emerging at night to eat up whatever waste biological material they could find. Dead plants fecal matter corpses whatever so it wasn''t too uncommon for one of the undead to revive while a group of slimes was feeding on it. Occasionally the slimes would get the kill and apparently slimes had some level of growth ability like with the positive and negatively charged fauna. Because of this, a few slimes had even taken to hunting and Sam had done what little they could to help them out. Strangely the undead seemed to ignore Sam they could see them, but they couldn''t detect them like they could everything else. The undead were seemingly drawn to the living no matter where it was hiding even if they couldn''t find the creature they knew where. Since they seemed to be blind to Sam''s presence, they also couldn''t detect Sam''s growing tunnel network underneath their feet as Sam spread down through the valley. In comparison, they weren¡¯t digging as deep as they normally would just sticking below the surface. This made the tunnels all the better as quick access points for attacks or defense when needed. Allowing for Sam to develop a unique death from above and below doctrine. The fighting went on for close to another year before anything happened. At this point, the caravans had all stopped, and the valley below was dying for lack of a better word. Where it once had been planes with a small river running through it. Now it was nothing but dead wasteland, the crab creature was still alive, so the river was still turned off. With only a few remaining defenders of the valley left Sam began to plan an offensive. When the remaining defenders inevitably fell Sam was planning on making a push to claim the valley as a buffer zone. There was a stark difference between Sams forest and the valley below. After about three yards of thin fields that went from the vibrant life of the forest to the bleak dried up wasteland that was the valley below. Of the few remaining defenders, there was a cavern of goblins that had dug in deep and used the rock they dug up to build a proper if not crude fort. They used crude tools and died in the dozens, but their stupidly fast reproduction rate made up for it. Unfortunately, that also meant Sam kept seeing hordes of undead goblins thrown at their forest. Sam was already tunneling into their back lines to clear them out. they were more of a pest than anything raiding Sams forests for food hunting down the weak and young of the forest fauna. This wouldn''t be as big of an issue if they didn''t use such destructive tactics as setting fires to smoke out pray. It would be a few more days before Sam punched into their caverns and started flooding it with slimes to flush them out to the undead. Next was a giant of a bear lumbering around the valley she had a small cave that provided somewhat of a defense from the undead hordes. She was somewhat of a neutral party and didn¡¯t harm the forest, so Sam left her alone. The last was the most annoying and one that Sam would probably have to get creative to take out. It was a massive hawk like thing it had been terrorizing the drones. Though it had mostly left them alone after it figured out that they weren¡¯t too particularly good to eat but it still occasionally attacked one. The best solution Sam currently had was to just wait for it to get close enough to one of the trees they controlled to ZAP the blasted thing. Sam had figured out how to use its nanobot swarms to generate a small directed electrical pulse into their prey. Sam had then figured out how to use that upgrade on their trees, turning them into improvised Tesla coils. They currently had sixteen trees in total, well technically fifteen counting the ones in progress. They would make a good makeshift fortress if the forest ever started to fall to the undead. Sam was really starting to get annoyed with the undead, they just kept throwing numbers at them and unfortunately Sam simply didn''t have the numbers to throw back. The main problem was while Sam could handle groups of them, they had to devote a large number of nanobots just to make a simple slime like swarm and They couldn''t just simply have them on their own. Sam had to have a transceiver to control them remotely, the slimes could only work remotely for so long before they''d have to recharge by either returning to the forest or returning to the pipelines underground. They had also figured out how to use the green crystals as improvised batteries. As the bots were able to drain them before breaking them down into basic silicon but even those were starting to get fewer and farther between. The valley was full of hundreds of undead abominations and while the slimes could take them out one at a time it took time to tear the bodies apart to make sure they couldn''t get back up. Part of Sam was starting to consider building larger robots to help try and fight these things. There was also another part of them that was concerned that giving them a more physical target would just invite the undead to break them. It was rare but occasionally the undead would get lucky and managed to smash a transceiver. Thankfully another transceiver could simply take control of the leaderless swarm and absorb them forming a larger slime. That could repair or even replace the broken transceiver by breaking down the destroyed receiver to its base components and rebuilding it. Though that wasn''t the problem, the problem was time. Every transceiver that needed to be fixed or replaced was another slime they didn''t have in the battle. Even if the larger slimes are more effective at taking on singular enemies, another annoying part was Sam couldn''t have them utilize the resources they were gaining. While yes, they could have them produce more nanobots, while they were mostly immobile consuming their dead opponents. A lot of the resources they were getting were just of no use for making more nanobots. If it couldn¡¯t be used it was turned into what I was calling print blocks. Basically, legos made of differing materials. They weren''t as strong as the blocks from Sam''s old world, but they were firm enough that they could be stacked together into a basic locking shape with other resources. When the slimes became too full or needed a recharge it would make its way back to a pipe handoff its receiver to another swarm and drop off any gathered materials. These materials Would be gathered together into a palette that would then be transported by aerial drone back to the assimilated trees to make use of. Though things finally came to a head when a small group of humanoids made their way into the valley. the cat on the doorstep Sam was of course worried at first. It was the very thing they had been afraid of encountering since their arrival in this world, people were just wild cards they couldn''t predict. The fact that these people still seem to have some form of command structure and organization in what Sam could only assume was a catastrophe at best and apocalypse at worst proved that they were right to be worried. Sam decided to watch them from afar not wanting to get too close, especially since more than a few were the typical fantasy style, Archer. Surprisingly though a few had muskets only two compared to the six Archers in the group but the muskets they were using were weird. They were both barrel and breach loaded but judging by what they saw using a variety of ammo types including both your typical balls but also bolts and darts. The design was unique as it used a breach loaded cartridge as an accelerant. The cartridge would be loaded into the breach and then sealed then the arrow or projectile would be loaded through the barrel and strangely enough, it seemed to work better than the depictions of muskets in Sam''s old world. Since the ammo and the propellant were two separate items it wasn''t limited to your standard bullet. While musket balls seemed to be the fastest to reload only having to be rolled down the barrel or when they wanted a shotgun like effect poured in a bunch of smaller ones. Small metal bolts and darts could be slid in and fired out. The bolts acted as specialty ammo types as they were typically filled with various volatile materials. Sam witnessed several of these bolts causing the undead to burst into flames dissolve or explode one just straight up released a slime inside of the undead that then ate its way out. Darts on the other hand worked a lot like penetrator rounds. While taking the longest to load as they actually had to use a ramrod to load them and judging by the gunner recoil required more powerful propellant. This sent the small metal darts flying fast enough to penetrate through armor. The Gunners for lack of a better word also seemed to carry three types of firearms. A rifle which seemed to be their primary, a pistol which seemed to be their secondary and of which they usually carried more than one kept preloaded and a for lack of a better word miniature Canon. The thing didn''t look much different than in an oversized single barrel shotgun the only major difference from it was the curved padded stock and a thickened reinforced metal barrel. Sam had only seen it fired once to kill an undead bear, where a golf ball size projectile was loaded into the barrel and was fired with enough explosive force that it nearly knocked the gunner over. It shattered the undead bear''s front left leg shoulder and spine. It didn''t kill the thing but completely stopped its momentum allowing for a far easier kill. The Archers, on the other hand, seem to be more like your modern Rifleman in the squad. Able to fire at almost inhuman speeds and while a few of their arrows had tricks similar to the bolts Sam had seen fired by the gunman they seemed to have abilities of their own. That amplified basic arrows which all but confirmed Sam''s theory that magic was a thing here the rest of the squad were various forms of soldiers your typical warrior and scout or was rogue the correct term here? Regardless, they seemed to be looking for something they had taken up camping in a cave in the valley wall and had started gathering what meager wood was available in the valley for fortifying defenses. One of the more fascinating things Sam observed was their supply lines. They used a fast moving wagon with a few people who would ride in avoiding the undead as much as possible. The wagon would be unhooked and while they kept the 1st and 2nd wagons after that they dismantled them for their lumber. They then used the lumber to improve their own defenses meanwhile those who had brought the supplies that weren''t acting as reinforcements would ride off on the beasts occasionally taking a passenger or two. Though on occasion if they had wounded, they would take the still intact wagon to transport the wounded back. There was a new supply transport every other day, but they weren''t hunting the undead like Sam had at first thought they would. They instead set out in squads and began investigating areas. Sam tried to keep their own squads of slimes away from them but there were already a few run ins and Sam had lost a few transceivers to the overly curious humanoids. Well, mostly humanoids as the last wagon didn''t have any beasts of burden and were instead pulled by two centaurs who apparently were sticking around. Most of the humanoids were well, actual humans from what Sam could tell but some were human adjacent. Like elves and if the naming from popular media back on earth was correct, beast kin and halflings and at least two dwarfs. Who were constantly shoring up defenses and a few other odds and ends? So far, they had all but avoided the forest as that was where Sam was fighting instead they were sticking to the valley that had Sam worried. They, however, weren''t given long to worry about it. As while they were continuing their activities to secure the valley and gather resources one of the scouts managed to get themselves cornered by a pack of undead wolves. Sam could have left them, they should have left them, but they wouldn''t have been here if it wasn''t for their need to protect others, to begin with.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. As the cat girl Archer slowly backed up against the valley wall with her snapped bow. Six of Sam''s aerial drones soared overhead each dropping a slime onto one of the wolves Sam didn''t have enough in the area to do a coordinated strike with more than that. There were fifteen wolves, but his slimes had their little electrical trick and electrocuted the first ones that attacked them. Since the slimes could not be detected by the undead naturally, they had to rely on their own visual acuity to hunt them. This gave the slimes a huge advantage and while electricity couldn''t kill the undead it could short out whatever it was that held them together. Giving them enough time to pour into the corpse and rip it apart from the inside out going for the joints first. It wasn''t pretty it wasn''t clean but simply removing the arms and legs was enough to render the undead to a none threat. Meanwhile, the Archer girl wasn''t being idle either once the slimes had zapped the undead. she got busy putting the undead down. While her bow may have been broken, she still had a knife, a few spells and her arrows. Molly panted as she leaned against the valley wall swearing at herself for her poor decisions. She had volunteered for this scouting mission to try and find out what was protecting these lands from the undead horde. They weren''t hostile with it had bought them some much needed time and breathing room for towns'' defenses and farms to be readied. While they weren''t quite ready to form a counterattack. If the source of whatever was defending the forest and valley could be located and if the gods were merciful and it could be bargained or negotiated with, they might, just might be able to set up some form of forward operation, or better yet a new supply line between cities. They had tried to use the nearby roads early on in the undead''s invasion. When it became clear whatever was stemming the tide by attracting in most of the undead in the area. Was further into the valley and would not protect the roads beyond they abandoned the route. Unfortunately, they hadn''t found much of anything, the valley just seemed to be overrun with undead. They had spotted a few strange flying creatures, but none got close enough to inspect, and a few strange slimes made of a strange silverish blue material. That instead of a traditional cores they had strange metal plates inside of them. The blacksmiths that had come with couldn''t make heads or tails of these plates and the alchemists were just confused as to why anyone would meld such elements together. Valuable metals like gold and copper were seemingly fused with a flat plate of well not glass but something close to it. The strangest part was just how alive the forest was, the valley was dead stripped of all life but a few monsters that still managed to make a living there but the further up the valley you went the more life seemed to flourish. The undead naturally leached life energy from the environment around them. It wasn''t dramatic enough to greatly affect a person unless they were exposed to it for long periods of time or we''re surrounded by a large number of them but plant life didn''t fare nearly as well. So, the lush green forest at the end of the valley made no sense. If that wasn''t enough according to the Centaur druids that had arrived recently the valley was healing. The forest seemingly being a wellspring of life energy so it wasn''t surprising that the undead would be attracted to it like a beacon similar to the way it was attracted to towns or cities, but no one had managed to get close to the forest. It was set at the end of the valley and wasn¡¯t wide enough to slip by the undead. Where the undead were thin enough simple disillusionment charms made it easy enough for you to pass around them. However, the further up the valley they went towards the forest the more the valley bottlenecked and the thicker the concentration of undead became. Though strangely, so did the concentration of the silver slimes and those strange flying creatures. The dispelling charms they use merely mask their life signatures so they weren''t lit up like a beacon for all undead in range but the undead still had their sight and hearing, heck some even still had a decent sense of smell. So, if one was spotted or made too much noise they would still come swarming after them. The only reason the undead weren''t a bigger threat yet was because they were an extremely well known property. Adventurers¡¯ armies and even the occasional hero had been dealing with them since time immemorial and while in large numbers they were still a great threat. Nonetheless so long as you knew how to deal with them, they could easily be dealt with, which was the only reason they had gone so long without losing a major city. They had lost a few villages in the opening days of the undead rising and had a few close calls with cities, but the local guilds and Garrisons had managed to prevent the worst. The peculiar part was they were all coming from the West. Every party that was sent West, well at least the ones that came back at least. Said it was the same scenario every wear. The neighboring Kingdoms had lost at least two major cities and almost a dozen villages had retreated to fortify the remaining cities and were in desperate need of supplies. Both the adventuring Guild and the army of the nation of Ringwood were currently holding the line against the undead hordes. Systematically eliminating the undead and destruction of their bodies. They were more or less able to stem the tide the annoying part though was the local wildlife. Monsters would always outnumber humans and the undead would inevitably outnumber the monsters and while powerful undead created from them were few and far between there are lesser counterparts were not so much. Their best hope was to try and continue to stem the tide further by resupplying the neighboring Kingdoms with whatever they could get their hands on. If all of this wasn''t already a big enough headache, she was now following one of the flying creatures that had somehow done a coordinated takedown of a pack of undead that had been hunting her. She begrudgingly admitted it saved her from said pack of undead and while it stayed out of her reach it seemed to know where all the undead were and was able to guide her with all things bird calls. To her surprise when she had finally stepped out from behind a patch of boulders to find a small field of grass in front of her. It had been to long since she had seen plant life this vibrant outside of some nobles garden as she took her first steps into the forest. Scared cat and goblins Molly was baffled by the sheer beauty of this forest. She had been in an elvan¡¯s holy Grove only once and that was for the marriage of her sister and the only reason she had been allowed in was for the ceremony. The elves all but worshipped nature and the nature goddess. This place was like an entire forest spanning holy Grove. No, it was even more than that, as unlike those carefully critiqued bastions of magic and mana. This place had magical beasts huge guardians of the forest lumbering around just casually. Though she could see several bared scars from the recent undead invasions. Though considering how she could feel the very potent life energy in the air mending her own wounds she wondered just how recent those wounds had to be. As one massive emerald stag covered in scratch marks laid down near a group. No an actual heard of emerald stags. The second largest got up and wandered back the way the first had just come. As Molly traveled deeper into the forest, she witnessed this seen repeated several times over with several different species. They were clearly defending the place but not desperately so from what she could tell. What shocked her was when a Terra Ursus or an earth bear, one of the mightiest of the common classification of forest guardians stopped letting a pack of the silverish blue slimes pass in front of it. Magical creatures tended to show difference to the master of their territory. So why the heck was the most powerful common class magical creature here showing any form of subservience to slimes and it didn''t even bat an eye at her flying guide. So maybe the two were connected? Maybe the slimes could be an earlier stage of this flying creature. She''d never heard of anything like that, but monsters were weird, and she was proven just how weird when she entered a Grove of massive old trees. The trees were covered in silver markings with crystal leaves and more of the flying creatures made their nests in its branches. As the slimes came in and out of their roots. This was the heart of the forest, not its literal heart as she doubted it was old enough for such a magical artifact to have formed but this, this was what was protecting it. This was what was making it so strong. She had seen the silver slimes attacking the undead, but she had thought them just regular beasts. Yeah, the slimes were weird, but this was just beyond anything she could have imagined. The air in the grove was charged with a faint presence like standing too close to a Thunder spell. But instead of it being wild and violent like she was used to it was a faint hum in the background. She¡¯d guess this was why all the animals and magical beasts avoided the unique trees. In the center of the small Grove of unique trees was a pit of bluish silver material that made-up the slimes. Sam wasn''t quite sure what to think of their guest, but they couldn''t let the chance to be a little dramatic pass them by. So as their guest passed the pit they had been using to fabricate larger units in they activated their newest prototype. This prototype was the test bed for new larger robotic units. Well larger being a bit of a big word considering they were used to working on a much smaller scale. After all their slimes weren''t much bigger than a basketball and his drones weren''t that large to begin with. They could easily scale them up for heavier loads or for specialty projects but never really had a need to. As for the newer unit well, a bipedal design was still a bit too far for them. But robots had been a bit of their interest back home. When they had been a kid their parents had got them a spot unit as both a house tender and the family pet spot units were basically just improved versions of Boston Dynamics old spot program. Robots had never really gotten to the point where they could fully replace people. However, when improved versions of stuff like the spots, store guides or Atlas bots found their way into the open market after a huge rise in automation had nearly caused a financial collapse. Eventually, the government had to bite the bullet and give tax breaks for using human employees but by the time they had. Almost all factory or industrial work was nearly done completely by robotics supervised by humans except on a few very special cases. So, they had plenty of ideas and basic information to pull from to design actual robotic units. Nothing to advance or even anything equivalent to military grade just yet though. The cat girl startled back as the dog like robot Sam had been working on rose out of the pool approaching her only for her to trip over a root. Sam chuckled at the scene before having the bot extend its gripper to offer to help her up. The catgirl just stared at it for a few seconds before grabbing the thing''s arm instead of its gripper. Ohh well, it did sort of look like a mouth. Once she was back upright the blue pool behind Sam''s bot began to rise to form a platform on which it printed a small speaker in a little wooden box. This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. Sam couldn''t help but find the poor girls baffled confusion amusing but they didn''t do this just to show off they had a task to do. Sam had honestly wished they had managed to get more audio recordings from the camp. Research was an amazing skill but it could only do so much with what it had on hand. The spot bot gently picked up the small speaker and once it was firmly latched into its small gripping appendage the platform of nanobots collapsed back into the pool. The bot then walked over to Sam''s original tree and pressed the small speaker against it . Small silver like appendages reached out from the bark fusing to the box and connected it to the circuitry network that spanned across the ancient tree that Sam now called home. The speaker popped and crackled as they took a second to adjust it just right before. ¡°Hello? Speak learn speak?¡± It wasn''t their most elegant of sentences, but they hoped they got the right phrasing across. ¡°Hello? Communicate study talk?¡± At least that''s what Molly thought the thing said. In all honesty, it was really rough. The strange voice was stunted and it did not know how to accent the words correctly and what little it did seemed to be a blend of multiple different accents. But it was trying to talk so she¡¯d try too. After all, that''s kind of what she was supposed to be here for anyways. Not that this wasn''t the most insane and downright almost creepy thing she''d ever done. But she was in the middle of the most vibrant forest she had ever seen during an undead crisis while most other lands were trying to stave off being blighted talking to a magic tree. At least she really hoped it was a magic tree maybe the druids or elves could handle this a bit better but at least they''d know what they would be dealing with. Its magic was so weird though it had created a creature right before her eyes and then made another weird tool that let it speak. So yeah, she had to at least try. Especially since who knew when they''d ever manage to get back into this forest again. A week later Molly was regretting so many of her decisions, one of which was not taking longer to train the blasted thing on how to speak their language at least somewhat decently. Because she was desperately wishing her comrades had found a way into the forest by now. Molly grit her teeth and grabbed onto the strange metal rope attached to the harness around her hips and back that was further attached to eight of the flying little drones? She believed that was the word the tree well the core or Sam it had been using the two interchangeably had referred to the little flying things as. She watched in blatant fear as their little spinney wings spun up into an absolute roar seconds before she felt her feet leave the ground. She gulped and looked down not liking this not liking this at all she watched the forest pass underneath her followed by swarms of undead. Witch was terrifying but thankfully it wasn''t a long flight before she spotted the small cave in the cliffside they had been using as their base. She watched as her comrades filed out to look up at her as she was set down in the middle of their camp. Her legs were shaky from the short flight and she was so thankful to be back on solid ground that she nearly fell over but she righted herself quickly enough and before the flying things had a chance to land she yanked the stupid harness off. Before stumbling to the nearest seat and plopping down on it. Much to the absolute bafflement of everyone there who was pretty sure they were going to find her body shambling around the valley somewhere. ¡°Someone anyone get me a drink or something I don''t care at this point.¡± She grunted when she found a flask of dwarven whiskey shoved into her hand. She poured a cap full and swallowed it down before another. The stuff nearly killed her going down, but she didn''t want to be shit faced for her report to the commander so she put the cap back on after the second shot. ¡°Gods damn it that stuff is rough. I needed something to settle my nerves not.¡± Cough. ¡°Not knock me out.¡± Cough. ¡°I got in. Mmmh. I got into that insane forest. Met the guy. Um, girl. Um, thing. I don''t know, in charge. Ohh fuck whatever you guys do the silver slimes the flying whirly thingies the metal dogs don''t attack them. They belong to whatever is in charge around here and we need to give back whatever we took from those. Cause yeah it''s not happy about that. It doesn''t like thieves it sort of understands we weren''t trying to steal from it but it does want its stuff back. Apparently, those little disc thingies aren''t easy to make I think. It doesn''t really fully understand our language just yet. It I did the best I could in the time I had but it can talk at least ohh ship I need to do this all to the. Ohh there you are commander uh we got a week to fortify this place it''s digging a tunnel or well a pipe. It thinks a week might be longer, but it thinks a week and till it reaches us. It just told me to make this place as safe as possible. Again, it''s not got a big vocabulary it''s still learning but it learns fast. sooo yeah uh I ohggah damn that''s drink was strong I''m not I''m not going back. It''s gonna try and make me fly and I''m not going back.¡± She grunts before slumping over onto the table. It took three days to punch a hole into the back lines of the goblin camp. Sam was beginning to think their estimate of a week to reach the nearby camp of the expedition was a bit overly enthusiastic. They just side and continued digging while the first slime poured out into the goblin nest. What followed was a really short fight if you could even call it that. They weren¡¯t sure what they were expecting really but they weren''t expecting a bloodbath. They were expecting a panic, they were not expecting to eat most of the goblin''s forces before they even realized what was going on. Followed by the survivors freaking out and fleeing out of their defended nests and into the waiting jaws of the undead. But well, regardless they now had a small cave system under their control. They would definitely need to fortify the small cave system before starting work on improvements but that was for later. Right now they had to get busy clearing out the goblin settlement along with one of the greatest and most disgusting caches of resources they had ever found. At the back of The Cave system was a deep deep pit deep enough that even just looking down Sam could see veins of iron and other materials along with a small. Ok, it was actually, quite big but in comparison to the cavern, it was small mound of goblin waste. Goblins could eat just about anything though that did not mean they could necessarily digest it. So obviously they would have to relieve themselves of anything they couldn¡¯t, including a lot of iron and other metals. While it wasn''t as useful for larger scale construction as the lake would likely be once they could gain access to it. This place would be ideal for setting up a small subterranean factory complex to produce more of the more complex units. Not to mention the mineral rich rock and the abundance of forgotten materials by the goblins. But for the time being, they began cleaning and working their way towards the meeting point which was Sam''s top priority. However, once they had a bit of room to work with they''d start setting up the first sections of their new assembly lines.