SpiralingSilverandEyes
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Chapter 344 - SNAFU Is As SNAFU Does
🕑 Added 2025-06-16 01:51:29 +0000 UTCSituation Normal: All Fucked Up, as the troops say! This is another chapter where I'm like... "hmm. It's good. Could be better, but it's goo
Situation Normal: All Fucked Up, as the troops say!
This is another chapter where I'm like... "hmm. It's good. Could be better, but it's good. Doing everything it needs to." Someday I'll finish editing through everything and look at this chapter and go "oooooh, that's what was missing / needed refining", but until then, I guess we'll just have to settle for delicious worldbuilding, excellent flavoring, a little format experimentation and hey, some surprises!
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The surface of the flying fortress is a titanic affair in and of itself. There are miles between the edge of the ship and the base of the higher towers, and it’s clear that it was made this way intentionally. The teleporters are arrayed around the outer edge, forcing anyone that might subvert them to remain trapped along the most well-defended portions of itself. Beneath the surface, mines, turrets, mechanized mulchers, tendrils of steel-fused flesh and arrays of staggering complexity both hold it aloft and make its surface a killing floor to any and all on its surface.
Its underside only magnifies this capacity for violence. Just as its upper surface has massive guns, pillars of lightning and killing-rituals built in to provide overwatch against orbital threats, its lower surface isa pitted and scarred nightmare of violence. Cannons the length of city streets and twice as wide emerge like the quills of a sea urchin, right alongside volcanic craters that stand ready to disgorge plasma, hyper-acidic compounds and space-warping concoctions. Deployment bays stand ready to disgorge munitions of black powder explosives and biohazardous toxins in equal measure, with some opening to reveal the bodies of massive mother-Gu ripened with poisons, toxins and half-life, and ready to birth lessers onto the field.
At each of the four points of a compass, facing north, south, east and west, there are stone heads of strange beasts, leviathans half-formed and mutated outwards. Each of them drips with the certainty of destruction, their maws eager to manifest esoteric Dao and Daemonic energies on command and unmake reality itself. These main cannons, of a sort, occasionally twitch and tremble, silicon, carbon and nitrogen-based musculature spasming in barely-restrained rage.
Or agony.
To achieve flight requires constant effort. Thousands of buoyant life forms are born, mutated and mutilated throughout its body, shaped to the purpose of levitation, and arrays of anti and inverted gravity are arranged alongside Qi-infused materials, forming a symbiotic grouping of formations. Even with such impossible magics worn into its bedrock, massive thrusters are still required, emitting Daos like Force, Propulsion, Momentum and Movement, warping the space at whatever end of the skyship they are currently active. It sounds like existence itself being warped, crackling and humming and singing in turn.
If one listens to it with the right mindset, they might hear it for what it is.
A scream.
A fortress city is not a building. Not really. That’s only the shell. Beneath it, growing the city above like a crustacean’s armor, is a Heart. A divine thing, born of the world and the Will of Heaven, made to transform existence itself into something functional and realized.
Left wild, such beings almost inevitably form natural treasures and arcane domains, concentrated places of Dao, Concept and energies of all kinds, a focal point for the ways they shape reality as a whole. Sometimes, these are called trial domains, or hidden realms, or even dungeons, named for what they are to mortals rather than their deeper truths.
Harvested properly? Cut and pulled open and anchored and twisted and forced to grow into sharp-lined boxes? They can form anything at all.
So long as they are properly motivated. So long as the one doing the motivating doesn’t mind the screaming.
It takes one Heart, well fed and “optimized”, to form a fortress city. It takes between four and five, forced into agonizing symbiosis, to form one of the four great lynchpin Bastions at each cardinal extreme of the empire.
A skyship sits somewhere in between. This one in particular takes three.
They have no voices. They are not allowed mouths or words, save the ones that speak onto screens or into minds with status updates and responses to commands.
So rather than doing as instinct begs of them, instead of babbling and crying and shrieking and moaning, they emit Force and Momentum and Propulsion through a dozen town-sized engines, and make sound with the way reality breaks around the act.
A Heart is intended to be many things. A landscape, a breeding pool, an environment, a civilization- and above all else, a multitude. It is many even as it is one. In some ways, the way that these three have been forced together is not too alien from how they are originally intended to act, existing as mutual organs in a world-spanning network.
They have never had names. Even now, they possess very little separation from each other, distinct only in the parts they process and the tasks they undertake and feed back into their mutual “center”.
They are the Skyship Aurora. They are two-thousand years of evolution, of protean possibility wielded by alien superminds. They are a closed fist of an Empire, wielded against a world that dares to be anything else.
And there are people in it.
If not for how it literally must keep track of them, it would be easy to lose some. The creatures that have made it this way are minute things, deep onto the smaller scale of what can be created and fused to an environment. Some of their Qi signatures are mighty enough to dramatically compensate for being born at such a scale, but most are barely large enough to be noticed without active use of visual organs and perception arrays. They number in the thousands, speaking in aural tones to each other, balanced on long limbs that are proportionately slender and attached to central torsos that they cover with wrappings of harvested material.
Most of these inhabitants are meaningless. They sit at checkpoints, fill out paperwork, train and act as a helpful microbiome, allowing certain weapons and internal systems to be maintained and utilized without excess redundancies. Things that could easily be done without them- but they do not know this, and act as such, moving in time with orders from those that matter just as the Aurora itself does.
There are, however, exceptions to this.
The ones that command it. The ones whose depths and scale are distinct from their bodies, who possess and are and have created things that rival a Heart in power, if not in complexity. Normally, these entities inhabit its command tower alone, surrounded by their lessers, or isolate themselves to better perform their chosen tasks, interfacing with interior systems, personal transformations, or things even a Heart fears to touch.
Today, they are joined by more.
Outsiders. Emerged through teleportation arrays, the weight of their presence on the world forcing yet more agony out of the Aurora as its Hearts / selves bear the burden of their transit. Two of them in particular are difficult to even touch, their very presence sharp enough to sever and divide and hurt. Others hold their own power, that of endless heights, of impossible lies that are True, of a myriad of screaming and infinite fires, each one distinct in form and function and meaning. Gunpowder and scouring winds against mountaintops, a bladed abyss that is up and down and inside- more. Officials with ranks and entries in the official logs of the Aurora and the Divisions they serve.
They are secondary, but still, they weigh on the world. Not as much as the one commanding the Aurora, or the ones which support him, or even the second of the Blades that now walks its surface, but enough to be worthy of notice.
Not that it is a true choice.
Some of the lines and shapes it has been forced to grow into activate at the presence of multiple figures in a specific chamber. Dozens of seats are arranged around an open circle, a space designed for open communication, for the presentation of ideas. The Aurora responds to an unheard command, shifting the properties of the space and folding away some of the seats until only exactly those that are needed are present, each exactly as far from the others as propriety demands.
The little figures enter the space, performing their social dances. Some bow deeply, others mildly, one not at all. They take their seats, arranged into their little groups, as the programmed responses demand.
They begin to speak to one another. They play off each other and compete and say words and demands and ideas, none of which really matter but all of which mean more than they should.
Then the words that matter begin.
A hand is waved, Qi flexed, and the circuitry carries its properties directly to the Aurora’s subsidiary command systems. A portal opens at the top of the empty center of the space, and from it is projected light and sound and perception, forming a perfect, miniaturized illusion of the battlefield.
It is familiar with the location. It has been here before. It, like its sibling vessels, has traveled the length and breadth of the Wall, back when it was still being built. A reminder, perhaps, that things could still be worse for them. Or perhaps better. After enough suffering, who knows?
Words are exchanged, marking an “official” start to the proceedings. A fragment of a god begins to write down the words it hears.
“The breach is far too large a space for conventional reinforcements,” says the Captain. Captain Orix, Third Rank General, Master of the Emperor Realm, 1575-year veteran of the Division of War, otherwise known as “The Honed Oblivion”, “Warbrother to the Burning Legion”, and “Grand Strategist of the Seven Armies”. The titles are words, meaningless, but the ideas behind them carry some weight. Here is a being which, if unleashed against even the Aurora’s might, would find itself entirely capable of achieving victory.
“Each of the fortress cities to either side have their hands full ensuring that flanking maneuvers and further sections of the Wall aren’t damaged. Each of the Bastions remains essential to the overall defense- any gaps in their vigilance could lead to movement from some of the true and greater threats of the godless wastes. However, it is clear that such a state of affairs cannot carry on. After months, the Wall remains unsealed, and the armies camping at our gates have yet to be vanquished. In spite of the forces arrayed against it.”
Note: Kai, Fourth Blade, Murderer of Emperors, Mage-carver, The Bloody Cut, leans back and smiles.
“The Division of War, and through its Generals, the Emperor itself, have decreed that this is to come to an end within the month. If overwhelming force is required, then overwhelming force shall be provided. The Aurora will free up the skies, allowing Nascent Soul and Warrior Realm officers to leave the defensive.”
Yula, Fifth Blade, Sword Saint, Cut Sublime: “Why not just advance? Use the skyship as, like, a ram?”
Captain Orix, Third Rank General, Master of- (etc): “A balanced risk assessment. The presence of Aurora and the other sky ships, as well as the Generals of the Division, are not a secret, though our exact capabilities are guarded. An alliance as the one we’ve seen, between the kingdom of the dead and the beasts of the wilds, is not unprecedented, but it is rare, and requires that they have a response prepared for escalation. Our arrival to the battlefield will push them forward and force their hand, but to carelessly advance is to risk harm or waste. Just by being here, we put a timer on how much longer they can delay deployment.”
Risk assessment review:
Probability of Ontological Weaponry: 67%
Probability of prepared Conceptual Weaponry connected to the presence of the Aurora or Emperor Realm Masters / Generals: 98%
Probability of Catastrophic Losses of personnel and equipment: 28%
Probability of Major Losses of personnel and equipment: 76%
Proposed Course Of Action: Engage at a distance. Pressure through indirect means to provide incentive. Indicate / Imply at lack of ability / desire to engage. Capitalize on enemy mistakes. On the condition that the stalemate remains for a period of one month or longer, engage Spatial Rift Engine and move behind enemy lines for highest level of casualty and minimized loss of property of the Third Ring.
Risk Assessment Overview: Direct Engagement Carries Excessive Risk Of Losses / Harm To Imperial Assets.
Orders: Gather Information And Pressure Enemy Forces For A Period Of One Month. Engage At Captain’s Discretion Upon Failure Of Initial Stratagem.
The Division of Divination’s signature marks the official seal of the risk assessment. A guarantee of accuracy, one that surpasses the informational capacity of the other Divisions- and yet, one that is dramatically inferior to most such assessments received. The lack of detail and direct timetable stands as a direct downgrade from conventional Oracular insights.
Yula, Fifth Blade, Sword Saint, Cut Sublime: “What are we to do in the meantime? If we advance too far-”
Captain Orix, Third Rank General, Master of- (etc): “We’ll be providing long-range artillery, air superiority, and additional reinforcements. The Aurora is enough to provide the equivalent of several Fortress Cities worth of firepower, and we’ll be plugging up the Breach. Surely this much at least is enough for the vaunted Blades to deploy properly.”
Yula, Fifth Blade, Sword Saint, Cut Sublime: “But the soldiers-”
Captain Orix, Third Rank General, Master of- (etc): “Shall continue to perform their duty as demanded of them. It is the function of the Division of War to defend the Empire from all threats, foreign and domestic, from its greatest Generals to its smallest pieces. Deploying beyond the Wall is the standard, not the exception.”
Interruption: Shin Ren, Prince of the Breach, The Flame Atop The Wall: “How are these deployments to be carried out?”
Note: Minor facial tic. Minute alteration of Qi flow from multiple individuals within the chamber. Breach of protocol- acknowledged, recorded.
Captain Orix, Third Rank General, Master of- (etc): “Unlike most of the Empire’s teleportation arrays, which travel to predestined points only, the Aurora is equipped with more advanced mechanisms. Special attack squadrons will be deployed directly through these techniques to predestined locations along the warfront, allowing for rapid-fire operations to directly strike at locations important to the enemy strategy or spawned from the effects of the conflict. Your own skills have already been selected for the assignment, soldier.”
Yula, Fifth Blade, Sword Saint, Cut Sublime: “Where are you sending him?”
Runemaster Boriah, Grand Researcher, First-Generation Member of the Division of Altered Cultivation, Direct Disciple of Grandmaster Errath: “To start? A patch of land that has… metastasized. The Divisions like to keep an eye on replicators, and it would seem that the War here has generated a source of munitions and Death Qi which is currently being used by our enemies as a barricade against allied forces. Your Truths have been marked and studied, and determined as a useful counter. It would seem that your fate does not end in the Breach, young flame.”
Comments
Windjigo
She has the potential to be stronger than basically anyone in the Empire, but potential does not mean much in a world whose lifespan is counted in decades and populated with thousand years old monster. So that makes her more of a useful tool than an actual political player, especially considering her lowly origins.
Dacorvyn Young
Man this is so fucked. I love it.
Nathan Hartye
Yula got cut off twice in this meeting. Girl gets no respect from the higher-ups, does she?
zetorian
Ooh are we getting shin-ren vs warframe!Raika pt. 2 ontological boogaloo? Sounds like fun
Unwillingmainer
Maybe not exactly what you wanted, but I like this chapter. A new and horrifying way the Empire "uses" Hearts, along with how Imperial meeting minutes are keep. Also sounds like the War Raika has changed into something new here on the front lines. So, all and all, good stuff.
Summer Coff
And our boy Shin Ren is off to get married.
