The shifts blurred together, first into days, then weeks and finally into months. As I promised myself, even though I was itching to make the changes I knew would help, I resisted at first. Just after the first week, I had an extensive list of things, some minor and others far more extensive.
After that first week, I started to work out improvements, optimisations and corrections. I didn't make them just yet, only worked out what I could do. For the servitors, I compared mine to the other example I had or could find. Both from the previous servitors I had come across in the hive city, but also designs I found on the noosphere and any from the blueprints I found from the STCs.
The STCs were mostly a bust, unsurprisingly.
When I was sure my changes wouldn't be too noticeable or seen as heretical, I made them. In the end, I only changed about fourteen lines of code. A paltry amount compared to the thousands that were there. But those small changes saw a drastic increase in my servitor's effectiveness.
Firstly, it made their movements and actions more precise, which helped with their tasks and kept them out of each other's way and away from the machines.
I had lost sixty-seven to that alone in just the few weeks I'd been on shift.
It also economised their actions, making each movement or task more efficient, cutting out many of the unneeded steps.
These changes alone reduced my servitor loss by 17% and saw their effectiveness rise by 3%. It didn't do anything for their tombs, but the effect on the factory floor was noticeable and was therefore quickly noticed.
Unfortunately, the hardware was a dead end.
There wasn't much I could do; I repaired what I could and fixed the most egregious problems, but in the end, there were just too many to dedicate the attention they needed. I still did what I could, working even longer hours to get them fixed up.
Mostly out of professional pride, it irked me that I had machines that were so badly taken care of.
The flesh was a slightly different story. I found several genetors who could provide me with what I needed. All it took was flashing my identification code in my electoo tattoo, with the authority from Fabricator Locum Viel, and they were more than happy to help. I still owed them a favour, but that was mostly in the form of getting some expensive or harder to acquire resource, again using my connection to Viel.
I just needed to be careful not to cross a line where either he noticed or his rivals could use it against him or me.
Having no idea where that line was, I inched forward, testing each time.
The alchemical solution was perfect for my needs. It was basically an anti-bacterial cleaner on steroids. When I locked my servitors up at the end of my shift several times a week, I sprayed the liquid-based solution on them before shutting the doors.
The heat aerosolised it, so it covered almost all of the servitors, even those at the bottom of the heap. It didn't repair the damage already done, but it reduced infections and disease, as well as moisturising the skin. Only after a few sessions of this and the effect was noticeable, with them just looking healthier.
While several other priests working with my servitors gained the same benefits from my work, the machines were another story.
The maintenance on them was pretty good; there were things I would change, but nothing that needed to be done. The changes I wanted to make were more severe and therefore would require the machines to be off, not something I could do at the drop of a hat. So I had to wait for the scheduled stop for the assembly line in a year or two's time.
Unable to touch the hardware, I focused on what was rapidly becoming my speciality, the software or machine spirit, if you like.
This had the added advantage that I could keep the changes all to myself, reverting them each time I was finished for the day and then reloading them at the start of the next shift.
These changes were particularly noticeable, reducing waste material by 31% and improved accuracy by two nanometres. It didn't sound like a big difference, but with some of the tolerances further down the chain, it made a massive difference.
That, combined with the better timing for the machines, reduced the number of faulty products by 29%, increased the number of engines and drivetrains by several hundred at the end of each shift. After several days of this increased output, I'd had several tech priests, both more senior than me and those less so, scouring through everything to find what I was doing.
They tried to pressure me at first, with several of the senior ones wanting to claim credit, but all it took was a scan of my identification tattoo or a peek at my identity in the noosphere for them to back off.
It didn't stop them from searching for the upgrades. I could feel their eyes on me at the start of each shift. This close attention did allow them to learn some of what I was doing for the servitors, with many copying me and spraying them before shutting the doors.
It had a marginal improvement, but obviously nothing compared to what I had achieved.
When they couldn't outright pressure me, I had several try to sabotage me. Messing with the machines or servitors before it came to my shift. It had backfired so far, but I was working out a way to strike back at them. If there was anything I learned in this life, it was that a good offence makes for a great defence, and I would much rather be the one attacking.
A chime echoed around the great stone room. High above, arches intricately carved with cogs held the glass ceiling up. Through the ceiling, we could see the insides of a lost piece of technology from the Golden Age, I mean, the Dark Age of Technology.
I had to remember to refer to it like that, or I risked saying the former, which would not be good.
I had no idea what it would have done, but it was impressive craftsmanship. The entire circular room was part of it. Arcane machines lined the walls, with hundreds of robotic limbs surrounding the central core. It used to be a shiny black crystal, housed in a mesh of electronics. The black crystal reminded me of those found in the ruins of my hive. This had long since been damaged, the electronics fried and the crystal cracked. It still made for an impressive sight.
The arms looked to me as incredibly advanced fabricators. In fact, it was very similar to some of the STCs I had around manufacturing. Even if that was their true purpose, I doubted I would ever know.
If I walked to the edge of the circular room and looked down one of the drops, I would see that the room we were in was in fact, a great sphere and we were on just one floor of it. Whatever purpose it once served, it was now the central place of worship for the Adeptus Mechanicus of this forge world.
Tens of thousands of tech priests had come to see the great unveiling. Coming from all over the planet, these were the movers and shakers of the forge world. Each one was a Magos or Archmagos. There were several low-ranking adepts, but they were brought by someone else.
Each one seemingly trying to outdo the last in appearance. Bar a select few, who were too junior to have advanced bionics quite yet, none looked human. Augmetics of all shapes and sizes, from millipede-like legs, reminding me of a freakish creature, to one with dozens of tentacles like appendages surrounding him.
Standing on a raised platform in the centre of the room, just below the crystal core, was Archmagos Viel. It was the second time I had seen him since we had arrived five months ago. Enough time to get my next influx of sparks. As I had planned, I used them to complete the Mathematics fragment. It had used five, leaving me with only one left over. I hadn't decided where to use it quite yet, so I saved it for now. I had a year before I would need to use it. I could always throw it into the next foundation I wanted, biology.
As soon as I gained the maths fragment, I knew I should have got it first. The influx of knowledge was astronomical and complemented much of what the physics taught me. In fact it went further. The physics just gave me the equations I needed. The maths one taught me how and why they came about. Where they came from and how I could derive and use them.
Which was very useful because I was honestly lost on some of the mathematics in the physics fragment at first.
I had still been receiving tasks or lessons to learn from Viel in that time, mostly around machine spirits and the noosphere, but otherwise, I was more or less forgotten.
Which suited me just fine for now.
I needed time to settle in and secure myself.
Understand the lay of the land, so to speak.
Behind him were half a dozen other Magi. I recognised several as important members of his Collegex (effectively his faction), particularly Archmagos Dominus Ferrix-Omicron, who was the leader of his skatarii, the Locum's personnel bodyguards and security.
They weren't his only ones, not by any means, but they were a blunt instrument compared to the fine scalpel of some of his other tools.
Another was the Fabricator General, showing his support and finally, with a carefully blank face was the other Fabricator Locum. How much he wanted to be there, I didn't know; all I knew was he was the Archmagos who'd outmanoeuvred Viel, causing his exile all those years ago.
That wasn't how he explained it of course, but I could read between the lines.
A burst of static, at the very edge of what biological ears could pick up, cut through the room. A binary message and protocol inside.
All around me, the thousands of Magi murmured as one, in high Gothic or binary. "Glory to the Holy Trinity of the Machine."
It might have only been ten thousand magi in the room, but I knew across the world, millions more were tuning in via the noosphere. Dipping into it myself, I watched as the data world overlaid the real one. Viel shimmered and grew into a dozen metres tall humanoid figure, radiating a holy power with sparks of electricity dancing around him.
I could feel the approval and agreement from the priests around me and from across the planet through the noosphere.
That was one interpretation of the facts.
He threw off the sheet from the table and picked up a cut crystal, and lifted it up to catch the light. The light entered it, refracted and brightened when leaving it.
And what a flagship.
It was an amazing ship. I had only seen it from a distance, but it dwarfed anything near it. At 9.65 kilometres long with heavy armour and even heavier shields, it was a unit. It was also missing many of the flourishes you might find on capital ships, having been made during the Great Crusade.
It was an Apocalypse Class Battleship, so it was mainly fitted with Nova Cannons and Lance Batteries.
I wonder if the newly discovered crystals could improve its weaponry?
A hushed buzz rippled through the room. The excitement is palpable.
I had to fight back a snort at that.
That was a fancy way of saying it was utterly useless to them. The one other time I had met my mentor was in the noosphere within his sanctum. I don't think he expected me to see through his obscuration of the data he was working on or that I would be able to understand it.
The starship had two problems.
The first was a problem with the design. It was a prototype, made to test the technology, so the ship was small, less than 500m long, with minimal shielding, armour and no weapons. It was a civilian research vessel. Even with these major flaws, it might have still been used, as vulnerable as it would have been.
However, the second problem and the more significant one was that they had no way to produce it. The arrays to focus and control the field required a specific crystal lattice. Ironically enough, with their newly discovered knowledge, they might have all the information they needed to be able to rediscover the method of their production.
But with the heretical ban on scientific research and development that was never going to happen, so it would just sit on a shelf as wasted potential.
I needed to find a way to add it to my ones. That went for all the STCs the forge world had.
The assembly came to an abrupt ending. I got whiplash from the changes in etiquette. One minute he could spend minutes going into the sacred brilliance of the Machine God, then the ruthless efficiency the Adeptus Mechanicus was known for reared its ugly head and ended the interaction with barely a goodbye.
With the assembly done, the congregation splintered. Some headed for the door, eager to get back to work, likely inspired by discoveries today. While others hung about, hoping to form a connection with other magi.
I wanted to make some connection, as much as I hated networking, but I didn't have a clear enough picture of the political landscape to try. Not yet.
I also had a project I wanted to finish before the next shift started.
Following the crowd, I headed for the door, hemmed in from all sides. Several threw me disapproving looks until they scanned my identification and saw my connection to the Locum. Then they left a wide berth around me.
I was just leaving the Fabricartium when a burst of binary from behind me caught my attention.
I checked his identification and found he wasn't one of the priests that first bothered me; in fact, his factory was on the other side of the forge city. So I could give him a time of day.
I sent a burst of binary code back confirming that I was willing to listen.
Following the connection back, I turned and watched as a junior adept hurried over to me. He stood out in stark contrast to those around him. Not just because of his low rank, sitting a level below mine. He was still an adept, but at the very bottom of the totem pole.
No, it was his age; he was young, very young. Still in his mid to late teens, I would guess. To be made a tech-priest by then was an impressive feat. His records, which I could see more of thanks to my higher-than-normal access, were impressive.
A tech initiate for 10 years and then spotted by an Archmagos who took him as an apprentice, where he thrived. However, it wasn't all smooth waters. He had a few black marks on his record, like missed targets or greater servitor losses.
To the casual eye, it was just a tech priest struggling under the workload. But looking at his history as a whole, that seemed unlikely. One week, he was swimming along; the next, his deliverables were down.
Something had or was happening.
The final thing that set him apart was his looks. He was the most human-looking adept I had come across so far. At least those with a significant amount of augmetics.
What he had wasn't impressive, equal to or worse than what I had. But a clear effort had been made to keep his humanity, or at least the shape of it. Not the norm at all, most had whatever they could fit and get their hands on slotted on, regardless of the aesthetics. If it was an upgrade, it was worth getting. Case in point, as I watched a Magos move past, one of his arms supersized compared to the rest of him, reaching all the way to the floor, which forced him to walk in a hunched shape, like a chimp, awkward-looking but no less effective.
When he reached me, his mechandendrite twisted behind him, flashing into the sign language for greeting. "Rites of efficiency upon you."
I nodded, returning his ritualised greetings. "How can I assist you adept?"
Switching back to binary, he asked.
Once I confirmed, I got a request for a connection through the noosphere. Accepting it, I started to move away from the crowds, maintaining the connection with ease.
After a moment, Adept-Tyr-089 followed. I had to flex my mind a bit to ensure the connection was stable, as it flickered when Tyr-089 started moving. Clearly not as experienced in it. That, or he didn't have powerful bionics to handle some of the load.
Normally a sign of tech acolytes or very inexperienced tech-priest.
I didn't need to ask the why; that was pretty obvious.
His master didn't much interest me, not at this time. It might be a good connection to have though. The Biologis Puritans were more interesting and not a faction or sub-faction I recognised. I had been researching the big ones. I would look for it later; for now, I wanted to see how he explained it.
The most interesting was actually his information.
That was interesting. I wasn't sure how I felt about it. I would need to research and think on it, but if it could get me better and more human augmetics then I was all for it. That would allow me to kill two birds with one stone. Firstly, I could get better bionics, but more importantly, I would be able to look at some of the best the forge had to offer.
With that knowledge, I could start to make my own that wouldn't look out of place.
Agreeing to give him the stuff he needs and meet him at his assembly line in two days, we disconnected and went our separate ways. Once inside my private sanctum, otherwise known as my quarters, I locked the door behind me and was engulfed in a bear hug as Snuffles greeted me at the door.
Scratching his head, I walked to one of my workshops. Resting on the bench was a half-completed servo skull. Or that was what it looked like. I personally found them creepy. Why you would want a floating skull next to you, I didn't know.
Unfortunately, I needed the wetware of the brain for it to function, so I couldn't do without the skull and brain altogether. But rather than polished bone and some teeth still in the skull, this was made from an alloy. It looked similar to bone but was far harder and as a plus, not someone's skull.
Even if the people would have seen it as a great honour.
While servitors were treated as disposable tools, servo skulls were actually treated more respectfully. Normally made from people who had been of great service to the Machine God and could continue serving.
On the back of this skull, not yet fully connected and fused to the rest of the skull, was a band of metal plating. The bionic eyes were just ones I grabbed: cheap and replaceable. In time, I would make my own, both for any personnel servitor like the servo skull, but more importantly, for my use.
Mine was good for now, serving its purpose nicely. But I had so many ideas of how to improve it.
Picking up the metal band, I finished soldering the last of the circuitry to the machine interface that threaded into the brain and nerve system. I checked the unique command chip. It too was basic, with only the standard commands on it.
I had been pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to requisition supplies. Dare I say it, but it was easier than in the gang, where I had to either get my own or justify each item or buy them. Here, all I could use was my identification and Viel's name and demand the supplies I needed.
It had only been small things, but hopefully Tyr would be able to fill in the blanks so I could start to ask for more.
With the last connection linked and secured, I sealed the metal to the skull and fused them together; the metallic clunk of the magnetic lock secured it in place.
I reached through the connection to it, activating it. Much like I had with Snuffles, I had made a direct connection; it could be connected through wirelessly piggybacking off the noosphere, but it wasn't an open connection. This meant that only I would be able to control it, unlike basic servitors, which could all be controlled through the noosphere, if they had the connection, by anyone with the right commands.
Theoretically anyway.
Its bionic eyes lit up, a deep purple glowed from them, before dimming. It vibrated gently and then hummed as the anti-gravitation field flickered to life, lifting it off the desk. It came to a stop several feet above it.
From the band at the back, two mechadendrites popped out, extending to several metres in length, ending in a multitude of tools.
Its left bionic eye glowed red, extending well past the skull, allowing the eye to magnify its sight massively. The left looked biological, but the white of the eyes were blood red with just the black pupil in the middle.