Legacy of the Dark Sage

"WE HAVE TO ESCAPE TO THE SURFACE! WHAT IS THE POINT IN ESCAPING UNDERGROUND!"

When Kyran jumped down the dark passage, the female spirit slipped out of his breast pocket and grabbed onto his hair once more. After Kyran covered himself with the silver armor, she grabbed onto his neck for her dear life.

To be honest, the female spirit had a choice of escaping by herself. But for reasons only known to her, she had stayed and kept Kyran company in spite of her complaints.

The female spirit's rambling had gone to deaf ears as Kyran confronted the automatons.

'Strange...' he thought with a slight frown. 'These guys... why are they acting like puppets rather than automatons?'

Kyran aimed at the energy core of another automaton he landed on before using it as a foothold; he propelled himself in another direction and aimed his swords at two incoming automatons.

Kyran's doubts were not without basis. Frankly, there were three ways to differentiate an automaton and a puppet. One was their energy core, which was connected to the second way, which was their programming.

An automaton's energy core could store a large amount of magic energy, while a puppet's energy core was limited. Their programming would also rely on how much magic energy was stored in their energy core. Automatons had far more complex programming. Thus, their magic energy consumption was quite huge. However, since their energy core could store a large amount of magic energy, they did not have any problem sustaining their activities. Puppets, on the other hand, had simpler programming. Because of this, they required less magic energy to move around. In fact, the stored magic energy in their energy core was normally reserved for when they performed a magic attack. Still, with their limited magic energy, the number of times they could perform a magic attack was definite.

Finally, the last way to differentiate the two is having their own sentient.

Automatons have their own sentient. For this reason, it is hard for others to differentiate them from real people or beasts— in case their body is that of a beast— from the way they move and react. This is also why automatons no longer require energy to move around; thus, all the magic energy stored in their energy core is used to perform magic-imbued attacks or spells. As for their appearance, they already undergo a lot of configuration, which is why unless one is naked, no one will notice they do not possess genuine flesh and blood.

Comparing these automatons to the first few Kyran acquired, he could not deny that their energy cores were the same. Although he did not have the time to check their programming, the fact that they did not rely on their internal magic energy to move around was proof that they were indeed automatons. However, because of their simple attack patterns, they were more like puppets.

Kyran was then reminded of his conversation with the great sword-wielding automaton before parting ways earlier. It was about Aran being their interim owner only. The automaton also told Kyran that Aran, as an interim, could activate them using minimum requirements.

From this, Kyran guessed that since Aran was only an interim, he could not fully activate the automatons' program.

The more Kyran fought the automatons, the more he was convinced of this.

In any case, he was glad that he only aimed to destroy their energy cores and not their whole body. An automaton's sentient was stored within its programming rather than its energy core, after all. If he had aimed at their programming, which was likely located near their energy core or their forehead, then it was similar to Kyran murdering these automatons.

Alas, it appeared Kyran had not truly given up on acquiring the automatons. As for his agreement with Dusk, he no longer cared about it the moment the latter chose to escape by himself.

While Kyran dealt with the automatons coming out of the dark passage, the female spirit did not stop complaining. In the end, sensing that Kyran was not listening, and with her throat growing sore from all her screaming, she finally stopped and resigned to her fate.

Just as the female spirit thought this, she saw the giant automaton's movement from the corner of her eye and shouted once more, "Lord Master! Watch out!"

"TRAITORS HAD TO BE VANQUISHED!"

The gigantic automaton's metallic-sounding roar reverberated throughout the passage as it jumped after Kyran. Because of its huge frame, not to mention its weight, its descent was much faster than Kyran's.

In the blink of an eye, the gigantic automaton had already closed the gap between it and Kyran.

"LORD MASTER!"

The female spirit shouted in fright as she stared at the growing soles of the giant automaton above them.

Compared to the female spirit, Kyran was calm. The automatons that saw the gigantic automaton's descent also appeared calm as they stopped and moved out of the way.

Seeing the automatons hovering in midair, Kyran felt aggrieved. These automatons could actually levitate! Talk about hitting him in his sore spot.

Without an item to use to help him stay afloat, Kyran continued to drop down the dark passage.

"THE GIANT'S FEET IS ALREADY RIGHT ABOVE US!"

Just as the female spirit shouted a warning, Kyran used the Dragon Steps and continued his descent. After a few seconds, he saw a huge opening that led to a spacious area.

Looking at the area from above, Kyran could liken it to a spacious underground cave rather than a hull of some sort that stored the automatons.

Using his enhanced senses, Kyran noticed another huge hole a distance from the right and guessed that was where the gigantic automaton had crawled up in pursuit of the traitors.

Close to that hole, a single spotlight could be seen, filling some light in the somewhat dimmed space.

WENG!

Several gold and red lights lit up as Kyran neared the ground.

Kyran could not help but smile at the multitude of automatons awaiting his descent.

On the contrary, the female spirit paled and almost fainted in fright.

"VANQUISH ALL TRAITORS!"

The situation above the castle had also taken a bad turn. With Kyran entering a range where his Void Domain had weakened, the knights trapped inside had already started their counter-attack.

If not for Filren's overwhelming advantage in terms of strength, he could not win against them. But at the end of the day, his mission was not to kill but to ensure they left the castle as soon as possible.

Ultimately, all the knights stopped attacking and listened to Filren the moment they realized he truly wanted to keep them away from harm. Although Filren appeared to have already fallen under the control of the intruder, they noticed his actions did not have any ill intentions. Rather, he only acted in goodwill.

The tremor under the castle was also felt in other locations. The one location that the tremor actually affected the most was the Military District.

Noir and the others were shocked when cracks on the ground started to appear. What was more, cracks also appeared on the surface of the array formation that sealed all knights inside the Military District.

Seeing those cracks, Noir did their best to fix them while Sigma and the fort leaders with them kept the knights outside the seal at bay.

With the help of Kyran's Servants, Noir's group barely kept the situation under control. However, with the knights inside the seal aiming at those cracks, there was no telling how long Noir and the others could keep their advantage.

Unbeknownst to them, the real cause of the cracks that had appeared on the seal was not only due to the tremor underground. Kyran was the one who placed that seal. And with him getting further away, his connection with it had decreased. It was similar to his Void Domain.

Of course, Kyran knew his connection with the seal and his domain would ease if he went too far. But at the moment, he could only put his trust in Noir and the others to keep everything under control until he finished what he set out to do in the castle.

Back to where Malek and the others were, Flos continued to summon his plant creations and waged a battle of attrition against Malek and the others.

At first, Malek's side seemed to have the situation under control with Cyneah's support. But as time went by, Malek noticed Cyneah's complexion started to pale. Apart from that, the miniature array formation, which allowed him to replenish his magic energy without any problem, started to dim.

This did not bode well for them.

Malek avoided burdening Cyneah with replenishing his own magic energy because, in their group, his consumption was enormous. For this reason, he relied on the miniature array formation. But if the array formation was gone, and he also relied on Cyneah's blessing, what would happen to her?

How would she replenish her own magic energy and continue to support them?

But that was only secondary. Malek's main worry was why the miniature array formation started to dim.

Did something happen to Kyran?