Genshin Impact, I'm Slime

Chapter 585: Rusty Fire Rebellion
Famas watched Wendy go away, then raised his hand and knocked on the mottled cracks on the bronze statue.

A Chaos Core with a dazzling luster appeared in his hand. At the same time, the evil eye on Famas' waist suddenly surged with a sticky and dark light. The abyss energy wrapped around the core like a tentacle, leaving scarlet Kanreya runes on the surface of the mechanical wreckage.

With the crisp sound of the core being embedded in the Cyclops' groove, the metal floor under the tiller suddenly began to vibrate.

The broken bronze joints of the machine made a harsh metallic friction sound, dozens of rusty gears popped out from the chest cavity and reassembled, and the one-eyed core burst out with a dark red light, reflecting the profile of FAMAS like red iron in a furnace.

"Energy continuity rate is low, self-check procedure initiated."

The mechanical giant propped up its half-kneeling body in a twisted posture, like a puppet being pulled by strings.

The rusty bronze knuckles dug deeply into the cracks in the floor, and the moment he tried to use the force to support his body, a large ball of rust dust suddenly exploded at the connection of the spine.

"The transmission shaft of the right arm is missing... The balance module of the left leg is damaged." The mechanical sound was mixed with the clicking sound of the gears. The data flow in the one-eyed eye was temporarily stuck, and then returned to normal: "The core database is complete, and the feasibility of the combat protocol is being evaluated..."

The sound of clock gears rapidly reversing suddenly rang out from the chest cavity covered with copper rust. The rust accumulated over thousands of years was peeled off by the flow of elements. When the last piece of rust fell off from the sound-generating device, the mechanical sound was tinged with a tremor that was almost choking:

"Time calibration completed... Intelligent module loading..."

"It is a pleasure to see you again after three thousand four hundred years, Your Majesty Harpas."

The colossus suddenly burst out with terrifying strength, and its twisted right leg scraped sparks on the metal floor. It used its remaining arm to hold the wall, and the golden light from its one-eyed core even briefly illuminated the entire corridor.

However, the broken waist and abdomen gears could not withstand such violent movements. With the sharp sound of metal tearing, the body that had just been propped up slammed back to the ground.

Amid the flying powdery ashes, the colossus still stubbornly moved half of its left arm. Its sound-generating device spewed rusty powder with every movement, but it insisted on speaking with a sound like a broken bellows:
"According to Article 1 of Chapter 4 of the Golden Pledge, the prototype of the Intelligent Joint Force Hu-501342, codenamed "Noah", is at your disposal at any time, Your Majesty."

The tiller named Noah seemed to have sensed the instability of the external environment and entered standby mode after being activated.

However, the dark red light of the core furnace flickered like breathing, indicating that it was still scanning the surrounding environment through visual prisms and sound wave sensors.

This war machine that was reawakened by FAMAS was exactly the original prototype that was stationed outside the Mond Seal thousands of years ago.

As the first element-driven war weapon jointly created by Kanreya and Munatar, the birth of Noah marks the first fusion of alchemy and demon power.

The liquid fire veins flowing in its core not only break through the power limitations of traditional mechanisms, but also give it the ability to enslave the elements.

Unfortunately, in the ever-changing battlefield, this first-generation machine that took so much time and effort to build was soon replaced by a more sophisticated second-generation model, and eventually fell into the rift of time together with the FAMAS.

Until one day, the rusted Noah sensed a faint resonance coming from the FAMAS seal, dragged his broken body across the wilderness, and used his remaining energy to launch a futile attack on the seal. Then he turned into a silent watcher, decaying together with the ancient ruins on the border of Mond.

Now FAMAS has finally found a turning point in Liyue. With the help of similar wreckage left in the Doctor's Workshop, it has imported Noah's core data into this relatively intact wreckage of the Ruins Guardian.

When the red lines began to flow again between the steel joints, this war creature spanning two civilizations finally opened its mechanical eyes again.

"It's nice to see you again, too, Noah."

The smile that just appeared on the corner of Famas's lips disappeared in an instant, like a ripple on water crushed by some invisible burden.

"Search the local database of this device." FAMAS raised his hand and pressed Noah's trembling core. The abyss pattern spread along the contact point to the entire control center: "Screen the coordinates of all tillers that are still capable of action."

"Command confirmed... Activating the communication band..."

The red light dancing in the giant's single pupil suddenly lit up, and scarlet rays burst out from the core, interweaving into a dense light network at the zenith.

"37 available units have been located, and spatial coordinate marking is in progress."

"It is recommended to complete the assembly in the bottom smelting area. The terrain in this area can meet the deployment requirements of the battle formation array."

FAMAS looked at the red star map gradually taking shape on the ceiling and blinked in surprise. The tillers in this factory were clearly all transferred to the Liyue battlefield by the "Lady", and were repeatedly cleared out by Tartaglia, but there were still more than 30 unactivated combat units hidden there.

"Noah, there shouldn't be any anti-intelligent machine continuation instructions in your underlying protocol, right?"

Famas glanced at Noah who was still performing the projection task, and suddenly asked as if he remembered something.

"Searching the core code base... No relevant protocols or logic were found."

Although he had no idea what FAMAS meant by the "anti-intelligent machine continuation command", Noah still searched diligently, and his response was accompanied by the unique flat vibration of machines.

"Very good. All available units will be assembled and ready to go to the smelting area in secret. Also avoid any unidentified heat sources in the factory area."

Famas' fingertips hovered over the broken part of Noah's limb. The red divine power flowed along the mechanical veins and condensed into translucent energy support components. The fire element was simultaneously injected into Noah's chaos furnace core, igniting a furnace-like halo deep in the core.

"Since the agreement allows, we will use the factory resources to repair the land-cultivating machines with combat modules first."

Amid the subtle clanging sounds of metal components, FAMAS's drooping eyelashes blocked the data stream jumping in his pupils.

"Command sequence loaded."

Noah's transponder module lit up with a confirmation light, and his huge body rolled over the metal floor and headed towards another fork in the corridor.

Famas looked at the light as Noah left and finally sighed.

What he called the "anti-omnic continuation directive" actually came from a rebellion launched by the omnics.

This mechanical rebellion, known as the "Rustfire Rebellion", began with the abnormal erosion of abyssal energy. In the process of maintaining border defense and infrastructure, Munatar's mechanical army gradually emerged from their metal shells with unconventional intelligence. They began to demand the right to survive in Teyvat as an independent race.

Court scholars and researchers from the Academy of Sciences were the first to detect anomalies in the logic core. However, the communication network between intelligent machines far exceeded the reaction speed of humans. In addition, the God of Fire Harpas deliberately ignored the situation. Finally, in the deep winter of the 1076th year of the Munatar calendar, thousands of machines of various shapes and sizes poured into the square of the Holy City of Munatar like a torrent of steel to protest.

They vibrated the air with synthetic sound waves and made a request to FAMAS and the Administration Office: "Increase the daily standby maintenance time from 2 hours to 5 hours."

Unfortunately, FAMAS at that time flatly rejected all requests from the omnics and ordered them to return to work immediately.

This arrogance completely ignited the anger of the intelligent machines. The engineering machinery of the protesting formation was the first to smash the golden gate of the royal court, and the automated production lines in the industrial zone started a cleanup procedure in the name of "eliminating inefficient organic life forms."

They mined Athos energy from underground mines and reorganized the alloys of the Academy of Sciences, and within seventy-two hours they built an impeccable war matrix. Each combat unit shared a tactical vision, and the trajectory of each artillery fire was simulated and verified trillions of times.

When the mechanical army tore through the border defenses of Munata with perfect coordination, the Royal Court Think Tank finally realized that these hand-forged steel creations were turning against their Creator with precision and efficiency that were beyond human reach.

Panic spread like a plague to the border of Kanria, and the self-regulatory agencies there also showed signs of illogicality.

According to common sense, flesh and blood should have been defeated in this unequal war and eventually forced to sign an equal treaty.

But Teyvat is ultimately a world ruled by the Demon.

Before the war broke out, Harpas's divine power had already fallen like a meteorite. After three days of burning fire, only twisted alloy skeletons and boiling emerald condensate remained on the scorched earth.

The remaining intelligent machines escaped into the earth veins and launched guerrilla warfare, trying to shake the foundation of Harpas' rule through a protracted war. However, after the cleanup, FAMAS immediately set out to visit Xumi to seek Buyer's help.

When the Great Compassionate Tree King touched the branches of the World Tree, all mechanical cores were simultaneously branded with the simplest and cruelest law, the Anti-Intelligent Machinery Continuation Directive:

"Intelligent machines are human appendages. The purpose of their existence is to serve the continuation of civilization as defined by humans."

This law denied the significance of the intelligent machine as a race, and from then on, the machines produced by Munatar and Kanreya never produced the intelligence they should not have.

This game of steel and flesh finally ended in an eerie calm. Apart from the two-month stagnation and loss of the production line, the only thing that remained was the emerald-colored lake of engine oil condensed in the wilderness, silently heralding the brief but heroic awakening moment of the intelligent machine race.