After that whole situation, things finally cald down.
Benedict was finally allowed to stand up, though he was definitely on a tighter leash after he had the nerve to compare himself to .
The good thing about being in a district full of workers, though, is that most people are way too busy to care that one of the owners of the most dominant company on the continent had just been slapped by soone far younger than him.
"Do you have any factories here? Or anything with top-tier military units?"
"Y-Yes, I do, my lady. We even have the freshest batch of the G-32 series you ordered for your father."
"Good. I’ll be taking twenty percent of them."
"Of course, Lady D’Arclight. If you would please follow ."
Benedict started walking, and we fell in step behind him. Evelina let out a sigh, staring down at the hand she’d just used to slap him, her face twisted in disgust the entire ti.
"Pathetic. Did soone like him seriously think he could compare himself to you?"
"Don’t be too harsh. At least we’re getting what we want for free."
"That doesn’t sound like sothing you would say..."
"Oh, don’t worry, I haven’t gone soft. It’s just that if you want to punish a masochist like him, slapping him in the face and looking at him with disgust probably isn’t the best option."
"So you noticed... Well, noted, I guess."
*** Fvien chanical -Interior
The mont we stepped inside, the noise hit us again, louder this ti.
Not really louder, actually. Just... closer.
tal slamd into place. Gears ground in steady rhythm. Steam hissed in sharp bursts. All of it layered together into this constant backdrop of sound. It wasn’t chaos, though. Every noise lined up with sothing, so step in the process, repeating over and over like it had been done a thousand tis before.
Because that’s exactly what it was.
A factory.
An actual, working factory.
Long conveyor belts ran through the massive space, cutting straight lines through the building like tal arteries. Half-finished constructs rolled along them—bare fras at the start, fully armored units at the end.
Overhead, chanical arms hung from rail tracks, gliding back and forth with smooth, practiced motions.
CLANK!
One arm slamd a reinforced chest plate into place.
HISS!
Another sealed it shut with a burst of superheated steam.
CLICK-CLICK-CLICK.
A cluster of smaller, jointed tools dropped down all at once, tightening bolts and tracing glowing runic circuits into the tal, perfectly in sync.
No wasted movent. No pauses.
Every step on ti.
Every motion repeated, again and again.
"...Now this is more like it," I muttered.
Evelina didn’t answer right away. Her eyes were already moving, tracking the entire process, from the raw materials being fed in at one end to the finished units stepping off the line at the other.
Even the workers barely stopped.
They moved along the belts, cutting in only when they had to, realigning parts, swapping out components, checking readings on floating screens or etched panels. No one barked orders. No one ran around panicking.
They just... worked.
Efficiently.
"Of course it is," Benedict said quickly, walking just half a step ahead of Evelina. "This is one of our primary production facilities. Every unit here is inspected at least three tis before deploynt."
"Only three?" Evelina’s voice was flat.
Benedict froze mid-step.
"I—I an, we can increase it to five."
"Seven. But only for my family’s orders. Everyone else stays at three."
"...Of course, my lady."
We walked on, passing under a thick overhead rail where huge components wheeled by—entire torsos, weapon modules, even fully assembled limbs, all hanging from reinforced hooks as they moved toward their assigned lines.
On the right, a separate belt carried nothing but weapons—long, rifle-like constructs assembled in stages before being locked into waiting units further down.
On the left, sothing bigger caught my eye.
Much bigger.
A massive fra, easily twice the height of a normal unit, hung suspended while several arms worked on it at once, welding, carving, and layering reinforcent into its structure.
"...Custom orders?" I asked.
Benedict followed my gaze.
"Ah—yes. Specialized units. They’re not part of the standard lineup."
"Expensive?"
"Very."
"Figures."
We left it behind and headed deeper into the facility.
The farther we went, the fewer workers we saw, and the more the machines took over. The conveyor belts here moved slower, more carefully, like precision mattered more than speed.
Eventually, the noise faded into sothing softer, more controlled.
No shouting.
No heavy crashes.
Just a low, steady hum of power running through completed systems.
This section was different. No workers moved around here. Instead, a pair of fully assembled units stood at the entrance, perfectly still, their polished fras catching the faint glow of the nearby machinery.
Elite models.
Even standing idle, they didn’t feel like equipnt.
They felt like soldiers waiting for soone to speak.
"Here we are," Benedict said, gesturing ahead. "The G-32 series. Our finest models so far. And since this land is barely governed, it was easy to gather materials from various sources without any serious inspections."
Rows of identical units stood in the mist of steam and oil, tal fras gleaming faintly. They looked impressive—but looks didn’t an much without proof.
"Cael, test them."
"Got it."
I raised my hand and snapped my fingers.
[Requiem]
BOOM!
The shockwave slamd through the air, steam whipping around us. The unit’s head burst apart, tal and gears flying. It staggered once, servos whining, then collapsed to the floor, sparks hissing from the severed neck.
"...That’s disappointing." I snickered.
"Either that, or you aren’t exactly the best benchmark," Evelina said dryly. She glanced around, then pointed toward a rack of newly developed firearms.
"You. Grab whatever has the highest firepower and shoot one."
"Understood, my lady."
Benedict moved quickly, reaching for what looked like a sniper rifle. But compared to the usual steam rifles I had seen, even the Shadow Society’s, this one stood out. Runes ran along its fra, woven between advanced gearing and reinforced components.
If I had to guess, this thing hit hard.
"U-Um..."
Benedict took position and aid, but his hands trembled. He didn’t pull the trigger.
"What’s the delay?"
"M-My lady... I’ll be honest, I don’t think I’d survive the recoil. This thing was built for the G-32 units, not for soone like ..."
"Seriously?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
"Useless... Cael, if you would do the honors."
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