Chapter 14: You Go Soothe the Machine Soul!

The machine soul is displeased!!!

Watching the excavator wildly swinging its mechanical arms, the hive workers and gang members were thrown into panic.

It swayed like a living thing, turning its tracks and sending debris flying across the ground.

“Is the excavator insane?!” the gang members cried, retreating in terror.

They hastily raised their automatic pistols and fired bullets at the small excavator.

Bullets struck the low-grade ceramic-steel shell, sparking violently.

Even low-grade ceramic-steel could not be pierced by the gang members’ automatic pistol rounds,

and all the gunfire achieved was to make the excavator even more frenzied.

Its mechanical arm swung violently, smashing into a nearby building; the force shook the structure, sending stones flying, and the gang members scrambled to dodge.

“What the hell do we do?!” the gang leader shouted at the hive workers.

The machinery had come alive—this was something they’d only heard in rumors and stories; their knowledge of “machine souls” extended only to the word itself.

The hive workers were equally bewildered; they understood machinery a little, but the mystical concept of “machine souls” was completely foreign to them.

“Should we soothe the machine soul?” one hive worker suddenly said.

“Yes, yes, I remember now—we’re supposed to soothe the machine soul!” another hive worker nodded frantically.

“I heard the same thing in the tavern—soothe the machine soul!” the hive workers chattered excitedly.

The gang leader nodded, grabbed a nearby gang member, and pointed at the frenzied excavator:

“You. Go soothe the machine soul.”

“Me?” the young gang member pointed at his own face, stunned: “Me? Soothe the machine soul?”

“Is this real?”

“Go now!” the gang leader barked.

The young gang member shuddered and stepped forward shakily.

He had no idea how to soothe a machine soul—he could only extend his hands and use the same gentle motions he used on his wife at night, stroking the excavator’s shell.

The motion was slow, tender, and grotesque.

“Will this actually work?” the gang leader frowned, watching.

As the young gang member rubbed the shell, the excavator actually stopped.

“It really worked?!” the gang leader’s eyes widened.

The hive workers nearby gasped in astonishment.

“I—I can soothe the machine soul!” the young gang member exclaimed, delighted.

He turned and gave a thumbs-up to the other gang members behind him.

The other gang members burst into applause.

Then, behind the young gang member, the excavator raised its mechanical arm high.

Thud!

The arm came crashing down—the young gang member’s eyes rolled back, and he fainted.

The excavator’s wheels spun wildly again, its mechanical arm swinging freely.

Zhou Yun wiped sweat from his forehead.

Controlling the excavator with telekinesis from this distance, pretending it was a machine soul gone berserk, was surprisingly draining.

Fortunately, the entire gang stronghold was in chaos; even the gang members guarding the water source had been drawn over, trying to subdue the mad excavator.

This was the perfect opportunity.

Zhou Yun glanced at Monge; Monge understood instantly.

He slashed his own arm with the rusted dagger, and bubbly blood welled up.

Monge picked up a stone from the ground, dripped his blood onto it, and the stone was immediately corroded into a network of tiny pits, filled with his blood.

“Just throw this stone into the water tank,” Monge said to Zhou Yun.

Zhou Yun nodded, picked up the stone, and vanished from his spot, reappearing beside the gang stronghold’s water tank a moment later, where he tossed the stone into the water.

Far away, beneath the pile of rubble, the excavator—no longer under Zhou Yun’s telekinesis—had stopped moving.

The gang members, exhausted and drenched in sweat, stared at the excavator.

“That should be enough,” Zhou Yun nodded slightly, his figure vanishing from beside the tank and reappearing beside Monge and Malkit.

“Added it,” Zhou Yun nodded to Monge and Malkit.

The three stood in the shadow of the building, watching the gang members and hive workers nearby panting from exhaustion.

Soon after, nearly all of them had drunk the water tainted with Monge’s blood.

Then… nothing happened.

Zhou Yun’s eyebrow twitched slightly.

A few gang members had started having diarrhea, and a few others complained of stomach discomfort,

but most seemed unaffected.

Monge noticed Zhou Yun’s twitching eyebrow and spoke weakly:

“People’s constitutions aren’t all the same.”

“Some who drink unfiltered water get diarrhea immediately.”

“Others might take half a day before feeling any discomfort.”

Hearing this, Zhou Yun’s eyebrow twitched harder.

“No, man,” Zhou Yun rubbed his forehead, staring at Monge: “Is your blood’s toxicity really on the same level as unfiltered water?”

Monge nodded guiltily.

“The toxic components in my blood are stored in glands—there’s only so much.”

“I used up a lot of it just to deal with you earlier; now the toxicity might be too low.”

“Wait a little longer. Just wait.”

Monge’s voice grew weaker with every word.

He couldn’t blame himself, Monge muttered inwardly.

He’d been startled by Lyen Rus’s terrifying face.

He’d panicked and squeezed most of the toxic substance from his glands into his blood—now his blood’s toxicity was far too low.

“Wait a little longer. Have patience,” Monge said to Malkit beside him: “Right, brother?”

Malkit, also embarrassed, turned his head away.

Looking at these two pathetic cultists before him, Zhou Yun felt his composure cracking.

Which genius from the Garden of Nurgle had corrupted these two pathetic cultists?

Other cultists are blessed by Nurgle, blessed by the Great Unclean One—what, are you two blessed by Nurgle’s spirit? So weak.

Zhou Yun shook his head and extended his hand to Monge: “Lend me your dagger.”

“Huh?” Monge blinked, handing Zhou Yun the dagger coated in crimson rust.

Zhou Yun weighed the dagger in his hand—he decided to solve this with a simpler, more direct method.

In Monge’s bewildered gaze, Zhou Yun vanished from his spot in an instant.

He suddenly appeared behind the gang leader, pressing Monge’s dagger across his throat.

The surrounding gang members jumped, raising their automatic pistols and aiming at Zhou Yun.

“Don’t move!”

“This dagger is coated with lethal corruption toxin. A single scratch will turn you into pus, rot your soul, and drag it into the realm of demons, where you’ll never return to the Golden Throne.”

I’ll revise this slightly for the next chapter—posting in ten minutes.





(End of Chapter)