Gears in the Iron Fortress's underground workshop suddenly reversed their rotation, and the steam conduits screamed as if on the verge of explosion. Chen Yuan watched the magic‑path cultivator's skeleton rise; the cloud‑and‑thunder runes between its ribs resonated with the power core. The entire frame emitted a metallic hum, as though performing a millennia‑lost mechanist war anthem.
[Detection: Patriarch's remnant soul awakened]
[Unlocked hidden function: Lineage Resonance (borrow 30% of Azure Bone's power for a short time)]
"Why reveal yourself so generously? I nearly got torn apart by those bone‑shatter beasts!" Chen Yuan thought, dragging his Bone‑Fang Blade across his chest. He watched the skeleton's hollow eye sockets filling with twin bursts of gear‑shaped flame.
"Young one, you react swiftly," the skeletal voice grated like gears turning in oil. "I am the last heir of Azure Bone's mechanist lineage—sadly mangled by that Hector fellow." The flames swept over Old Jin's joints. "Yet you've combined corpse‑refinement and mechanist arts admirably… though crudely."
Nika yanked Chen Yuan's sleeve as her own gears spun wildly. "The core's energy is flowing backwards! Every prosthetic in the fortress is going haywire!" She pointed to a monitoring gear on the workshop wall, showing guards attacking each other with their limbs in a nightmare of grinding metal and screams.
"It's Hector!" Chen Yuan realized. The half‑transparent core in Hector's chest was a corrupted magic‑path artifact. "He's perverted the mechanist way with cult runes. Now the remnant's awakening is triggering energy rejection!"
In an instant, the skeletal remnant streamed into Old Jin, whose joints clicked awake and whose dull eyes sparked gear‑shaped light. "Use this puppet as my vessel—and guard that girl well." Old Jin's voice morphed into Azure Bone's metallic timbre. With a swing, it cleaved through the overhead gear shaft. "To the power core's upper chamber—Hector begins the Abyssal Rite!"
Chen Yuan and Nika sprinted through the twisting gear tunnels, steam and embers spraying past. His system flashed:
[Alert: Massive chaos‑energy leak detected—natural corruption rise ×300%]
"Natural rise? So even standing still I'd turn into a monster?" He slapped his Silence Talisman, but corruption climbed at 1% per second. "System, I swear I'll need cheat codes to survive this!"
On the upper ritual plaza, Hector's mechanical tendrils thrust into the Old Ruler's skull‑altar. Hundreds of residents, each with a monster core in their chest, were locked onto gear tracks, forming a massive energy loop.
"With cogwork as lock, flesh as key!" Hector's amplified voice thundered. "Blessed by the Abyssal Maw, Iron Fortress will reign eternal as the mechanical kingdom!"
Tears and oil mingled on Nika's cheeks. "Father's… turned his people into ritual components!"
"He's long been corrupted by the Abyssal Temple." Chen Yuan saw Old Jin (now possessed by Azure Bone) dart among the chains, severing them. Freed residents shook off their prosthetics. "Behold true mechanist magic—"
He recalled the jade slip's "Myriad‑Bone Gear Array." Pressing his hand to the rune‑etched floor, skeletons throughout the fortress sprang to life, crawling up the gear tracks toward the plaza. Hector's tendrils lashed out—but meeting bone, they sizzled under cloud‑and‑thunder burn, black ichor hissing as it corroded stone.
[Lineage Resonance remaining: 12 min]
A clock's sword hung overhead. The half of Hector's jade token clicked open—revealing the matching half Chen Yuan carried. Hector's ritual hung on completing the token's circle.
"So that's his plan—using the full token to activate the Abyssal Rite!" Chen Yuan yanked at his chest. The jade token flared.
"System—channel all Bone‑Fang Blade energy into the token!"
[Warning: Artifact will downgrade to Mortal Grade–Low]
"Do it!" He roared. The blade's light dimmed; the token exploded in brilliant jade. "Hector, your cult runes are no more than rusted gears before true magic‑path power!"
Azure Bone's remnant laughed through Old Jin. The puppet's joints unfolded, and behind it a spectral gear‑and‑bone avatar coalesced—the Patriarch's mechanist form, each cog etched with storm runes, warping space as it turned.
"Impossible! Mechanist magic was lost…" Hector's tendrils trembled. The skull‑altar cracked. "Who are you?"
"I'm the one dismantling your gears." Chen Yuan charged the altar. The two jade halves clashed, jade light washing over every ritual chain. Freed citizens tore off their bindings as the runes on their limbs faded.
Nika seized spare gears, snapping the energy loop wide open. "Father—look at what you've done! You traded your people's lives with the Abyssal Temple!"
Hector's core shrieked, splitting in two—one half a pure storm‑rune gear, the other a tentacled chaos core. Gasping as his form fractured, he confessed: "Ten years ago… I found that half‑token in the rotwood, and the Maw's whispers never ceased…"
Chen Yuan caught the collapsing leader, peering at the storm‑rune half‑gear in his chest. "There's hope. Azure Bone's remnant can purge the chaos core." He looked to Old Jin—but the puppet stood motionless as the remnant flickered toward the token.
[Lineage Resonance ended]
[Unlocked Skill: Mechanist Soul‑Purge (cleanse corrupted prosthetics)]
"System's timing is unnervingly precise." Chen Yuan wiped sweat; his corruption soared to 47%, nearing the 50% threshold for mutation. "Another thirty seconds and I'd sprout tendrils for real."
With the crisis averted, Nika knelt beside her father, tapping his gears with her wrench. "I told you, the mechanist way shouldn't be bound to monster cores." She looked up, admiration shining in her blue eyes. "Can this ancient magic‑path truly restore the mechanist tradition?"
"At least we'll try." Chen Yuan assembled the two token halves; storm‑runes danced in his palm. "First, I need a place to refine these chaos cores—" He kicked a scattered core on the plaza. The system chirped a hefty XP gain. "And I need to re‑shell Old Jin in real mechanist bonework."
Night fell as the fortress's gears resumed their smooth rotation. Chen Yuan stood by the power core, watching Azure Bone's remnant drift back to rest, the token's glow sanctifying the city. Nika approached with a new prosthetic arm etched in improved storm runes.
"Try this." She fitted it onto Old Jin; gears whirred with a magic‑path lilt. "It can refine corpses and channel Mechanist's Way incantations—I call it the Bone‑Pivot Arm."
"Sounds like dark cuisine," Chen Yuan teased—but his eyes lit as Old Jin flexed its new limb. "But it's leaps ahead of the old bandage frame."
The system chimed:
[Iron Fortress residents' favor reached 60%—unlocked hidden shop: Mechanist's Workshop (trade for puppet parts)]
"About time." He browsed gears, bone frames, and steam cores, then remembered his astral‑eye from Mist‑Hidden City. "Nika, think the fortress telescope can glimpse the Shattered Star Plains' sky?"
"Sure—if you avoid the Starborn seers." Her mechanical arm absentmindedly stroked her goggles. "You aiming for the Shattered Star Plains? Their heavens can drive you mad."
"But that's where I need to go." Chen Yuan touched the token—its runes pulsed with a hidden signal. "The astral secrets there may free Azure Bone's remnant fully."
Distant wagon bells clattered—Old Mo's caravan had arrived. Chen Yuan felt a surge of confidence as Nika fine‑tuned gears on Old Jin's new frame.
"System, open realm panel." He whispered. Level 4 Qi‑Refinement was now over halfway, and his corruption had fallen to 32% after purifiers. "Next stop: the Shattered Star Plains. Hopefully their bone‑star astrolabe is less twisted than this fortress's gear arrays."
As the first kerosene lamp flickered on the fortress wall, he did not notice his shadow cast half‑skeletal, half‑mechanical on the plaza stones—a sign of their magic‑path–mechanist fusion, and a harbinger of the most heretical survival path yet to sweep the Cthulhu World. Meanwhile, deep within the altar's heart, the completed jade token pulsed faintly—sending its signal to some distant, awaiting presence: the gears of the magic‑path cultivator had begun to turn, promising to upend the very fabric of their world.