System Programmer Chapter 27: Rage

Being the party's main line of defense, Boris moved in front of the others, shield in hand. The entrance to the building was a large set of double doors, he pushed them open quite easily. The hinges made a terrible noise as it happened. Clearly, the doors were not opened often.

With the entrance open, they all made their way inside. Unlike the laboratory Joshua had seen, this area was clearly not being maintained. There were cracks in the floor and on the wall everywhere and plants were even growing inside. This appeared to be an old entrance hall. There were broken chairs against the wall and the ruins of a counter in the middle of the room. A clerk had probably been stationed here long ago, welcoming visitors.

It didn't take long for Joshua's prediction to become true, an annoying noise started to beep in the whole place. Adding to the chant that was resonating through the whole building, there was now a whole cacophony of annoying noise causing everyone to have a cringe looking expression. Thanks to Joshua's explanations about machines, Catherine was familiar with the concept of an alarm system going off and making a lot of noise to warn people. No matter who was in here, they were clearly aware of their presence.

Ignoring the sound, Catherine scanned the room, there were several doors on the end of the room, each going in a different direction. Of course, she was hoping for a staircase going down, but due to the lack thereof, she picked the door that seemed to be the closest to Joshua's position.

As they were heading toward that door, another one suddenly opened. A large creature slowly stepped out of it. It vaguely looked humanoid, having two arms and two legs, but its body appeared to be made entirely out of stone. It had what appeared to be a face, except there were no facial features on it, no eyes, no nose, no mouth, nothing. It was roughly 3 meters in height and silently made its way toward the party, with clear hostile intentions.

Eric saw the thing walking towards them and prepared to strike. Considering the creature's body was made of stone, he doubted his fire attacks would harm it much so he tried a mental spell. He was quickly disappointed.

"This thing isn't sentient," he told the rest.

Catherine wasn't surprised, based on the creature's movement she had guessed as much. It reminded her too much of Joshua's bots, machines with a predefined objective who could only do what they were programmed for. Luna's quick scan revealed as much, this was a rune-powered construct.

"Destroy its head, that's where it's power source lies!" she told the rest.

Joshua's teachings didn't go to waste, she was able to recognize a power source and circuits. The creature's core was located within its head, with circuits powering the rest of its body. Therefore, as long as they got rid of its head, the thing should stop moving.

Boris didn't waste time and smashed the creature's head. Unfortunately, the electricity Joshua had added to his weapon wasn't of much help against a rocky creature. While part of the rock fissured, it wasn't enough. Lydia saw this and started to unleash a rain of explosive arrows. Those delivered a better result, fragments of rocks flew everywhere. Soon, a glowing rune became visible. Cynthia didn't waste time and smashed it with her staff. The rune was damaged and the creature started to zig-zag for a few seconds before falling over.

Everyone was relieved as they managed to dispatch the enemy pretty easily, but before they could rejoice, several other similar constructs made their entrance. Catherine bit her lip, while she was certain they could get rid of those things within a few minutes, she was worried about Joshua's well-being. He still wasn't replying to her, although the weapons were still functioning so she knew he was still fine. However, the chant was still going strong and she didn't have any time to waste.

"I'm going to go ahead, can you guys take care of those things?" she asked the team.

"Piece of cake!" Cynthia replied.

Considering the team's skill, she wasn't worried about them. She wished them luck and ran through the door she had pinpointed earlier. A construct tried to stand in her way, but Boris grabbed it with his chain and pulled it towards him. She kicked the door open and ran in the hallway that presented itself in front of her.

Using Luna, she quickly moved through several rooms, slowly building a map of the area. It seemed that the constructs were only going toward the main entrance, she didn't run into any more trouble along the way. The floor she was on was clearly in ruins, whatever was of interest here lied elsewhere. After a minute or two she finally found a staircase, going both up and down. Naturally, she went downstairs.

As she was going downwards, the chant suddenly stopped. Not knowing whether that was good news or bad news, she tried to contact Joshua again but was still met with silence. Finally reaching the lowest floor, she was on the same height as him and entered a corridor leading in his direction.

Unlike the ground floor, the underground level was clearly being kept clean. Catherine noticed several strange apparatus along the way. She deduced they were rune-powered machines, something that would make Joshua jump like crazy under normal circumstances, but she didn't have time to look at them for the moment.

She finally arrived at the laboratory. She pushed the double door open and entered the place. She had stopped running, there was probably danger ahead. She saw the vats Joshua had described to her, some of those beasts made her feel uncomfortable. The scan of the area indicated 2 figures in a corner of the room, she carefully made her way towards them.

As she got near, she heard the familiar voice of Joshua. While relieved, she was also feeling uneasy, as he was repeating one sentence over and over again. Not only that, she was hearing a vicious noise at a regular interval. While not running, her movement speed increased.

"How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! …"

As she got to the end of the room, she saw two figures lying on top of each other. When Catherine saw the scene, she was horrified. One of the figures was Joshua. He was lying on top of what appeared to be a woman, his torso standing up. They were both covered in a blue liquid, which Catherine assumed to be blood. The female figure wasn't moving, and how could she. Half her face was missing, no need to be an expert to determine she was dead. As for Joshua, his facial expression was showing pure anger. Tears were streaming down his face as he was repeatedly punching the woman's head, armed with a pair of brass knuckles. Each blow made a vicious sound as he continued to punch the cadaver in front of him, showing no sign of stopping. He was endlessly repeating that same phrase.

"How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! How dare you?! …"

Catherine had no idea what had happened here, but she couldn't leave Joshua in this state.

"JOSHUA!" she tried to call out for him.

No response, he just kept hitting the corpse, clearly in a deranged state. Catherine wondered why the system he had implemented to have Luna shocking wasn't active, but then she realized that every time he hit the body, a shock was being released over his entire being. The function was still operational, it just wasn't enough.

She considered getting closer and slapping him, but she wasn't sure how he would react to that. Worst case scenario, he might even attack her. Still, she had to do something. She summoned some ice cold water and had it float above Joshua. He didn't pay any attention to it. She snapped her finger and the water fell on him. He let out a 'Waah!' before stopping what he was doing.

Joshua stood still for a few seconds, his left fist still in a punching position. He was looking at the corpse in front of him.

"What the…" he said, almost whispering.

Catherine slowly walked towards him and kneeled. He slowly looked upwards in her direction. She saw his eyes were still full of tears. His angry expression had vanished, leaving room for an extremely confused look.

"Catherine…I…" he barely managed to say.

She didn't say anything and slowly embraced him. He didn't reject her and slowly pulled his arms around her too. She heard him crying for a while. She still didn't know what had happened but she slowly waited for him to calm down. After a few minutes, he started to repeat a single phrase.

"I'm sorry… I'm sorry..."

Chapter end