A Robotic Overmind for a Dungeon

It took a couple hours for the subway train to arrive at the station I was waiting at. Enough time to allow me to assist one of the feral incursions which consisted of a pair of hounds, an ant, and a spider. But eventually the train did come and I got up from my seat just to go sit back down, along with Paisleigh, her guards, and my lead hound who decided that looking around at the mole colony would be fun.

Once the train stopped back at the first station, my lead hound spent a few moments whipping the garrison back into shape as they had become lax in their duties. To be fair, I doubt that anything would happen here but since I was wrong about the mining outpost I guessed it could not hurt to have the guards be extra vigilant just in case.

After my lead hound finished with the poor guard hound, I began making my way around the subway train and down into the tunnel with Paisleigh, her guards, and my lead hound close behind. Eventually, I then reached the smaller tunnel which had a couple of my scout rats waiting nearby to help guide us down through the winding tunnels.

Thankfully, I had thought ahead and ordered my scout rats to ask the mole colony to widen the tunnel leading to their colony which allowed me to crouch my way down the tunnels. Soon enough, my entourage and I turn around the last corner and finally exit the very cramped tunnels and into the bustling mole colony.

With my much larger size, I could now see that the cavern is smaller than I had originally estimated while I was still using my scout rat's vision but not by much. All around the cavern were floodlights which illuminated the vast majority of the ground area of the cavern.

One of the caverns' support beams have already been set upon by my spiders who have begun doing what they do best. Saddling up to one of them, I asked for an estimate on how long it would take to repair these support beams, to which they pointed at the floating tag on the beam which stated that it would take around half a day to finish this support beam.

After I had finished my rather one sided conversation with the spider drone, the elder mole decided that now was a good time to approach me.

"Hello there, I suppose you are the leader of these fine drones here" The elder mole says in a chipper tone.

"Indeed I am. Is there something you wish to discuss or are you just here for idle chit chat?"

"Actually, I am here to offer you a tour of the cavern. Seeing that your drones are going to be spending much of their time here, you might as well take a look around." The elder mole gives out a chuckle before gesturing to me to follow which I did, although Paisleigh and my lead hound decided to wander off.

As it turned out, the majority of the buildings in the cavern looked to just be housing despite this being a mining hub. Although I do suppose I could see the reasoning for having a workforce on site since I was almost one of them. The bureaucrats who rolled over the factory that I worked at decided that workers could rent small apartment-like rooms which were rather cheap compared to the skyrocketing prices of the housing market.

Thankfully, I was already living out of a decent hab-block in the lower districts and thus did not have to accept the company's offer, but more than a couple co-workers did and they always had a feeling of being watched while living there. I shudder as I remember the depressing halls of the company apartments which were barely kept from disrepair.

Focusing back on the tour, I find solace in the fact that the rooms looked to be rather homey. It seems that the rooms had been retrofitted to house the moles. After a dozen or so minutes of walking around more of the same buildings, we eventually reach two interesting structures.

The first was a large sideways cylindrical structure which had large glass windows that displayed what looked to be some kind of generator. The second building was a small room filled with rusted and broken down servers, some of which looked to have been scrapped for parts.

I make a mental note to check if I can access data banks after the tour before following my guide down to the last section of the colony.

"And here is the cargo elevator which connects to a building at the surface, unfortunately, due to the lack of power available the elevator is non functional." The elder mole says with a sigh.

"Is the generator not enough?" I ask in a slightly confused tone. Why would there be an elevator if the generator does not produce enough power to run it.

"Well, I suppose it would have, but due to the patchwork repairs the generator is working at less than optimal efficiency and thus it can only sustain me and my kin's energy requirements."

I nod and make another mental note to have the spiders repair the generator since either would definitely help to have all the ore which they offer up as tithe get hauled up to the surface rather than dragging it out of the tight tunnels. With the last of the tour finished, the elder mole decides to bid me farewell and walks off towards a few other moles who were conversing.

Deciding that I might as well look around for Paisleigh, I began walking up and down the various paths around the colony before eventually finding the four hounds. Paisleigh and my lead hound were chatting with each other while the two guard hounds fought over a thin metal pipe which they must have found somewhere.

I decided to leave them to their chat but as I began walking back to my spider repair team, I began to feel tremors. I disregarded the tremors for a mole coming back from a mining trip or something but soon the tremor got louder and louder before turning into a thunderous rumble.

Then, a monstrous screech echoed across the cavern which seemed to originate from the wall farthest from the tunnels which I emerged from. Not long after, a large noodle-like mass of metal busted out of the cavern wall.

All of the moles around me began panicking as I signaled my lead hound to get ready. Pulling out my javelin, I begin advancing towards the incoming threat.