Death… And Me

Chapter 3478: Too Close

”Can you do something about this?” Celis pointed at Qwerty, who seemed to be trying to get free nonstop. Not only that, Celis also pointed upwards, where the lightning was starting to accumulate once again. From the looks of it, trying to bring Qwerty away from the city would cause them to be hit by lightning bots once more.

”Oh, that...” CAU’s eyes changed, and several lights reflected on Qwerty for a moment. ”As I thought, he still had his original programming. Well, that makes sense. HAF100s are so old that I’m impressed to see that they still exist. CAU3461, come here. Give me one of the interceptors.”

Another robot similar to CAU431 approached, passing a collar over. It had many intricate patterns, and above all, it gave the same feeling as the robots, probably made of the same materials and technology. ”Put this on his neck. It should block the Zoshia Enterprise Programming.”

Celis held Qwerty, and Rean put the collar on. They couldn’t really trust CAU431, but they didn’t have much of a choice. As soon as the collar was placed, it tightened around Qwerty’s neck, and its intricate patterns glowed. Fortunately, the lightning up in the skies instantly stopped accumulating. Not only that, but Qwerty also regained control over his body.

”Masters, I’m sorry,” Qwerty spoke to Rean and Roan.

Rean just patted him while Roan shook his head. ”It had nothing to do with you. Instead, check this collar you just got. Is there anything wrong with it? Could they use it to control you instead?” Sure enough, Roan was as cautious as ever.

Qwerty’s body seemed to interact with the collar for a moment before he shook his head. ”There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with the collar. It is basically generating a field that interferes with my programming. To be more specific, it interferes with the part of my programming that takes control of my body.”

Roan looked back at CAU431. ”It works; you have our thanks.”

Celis let Qwerty go, looking around. Just like before, Qwerty saw everything that happened. He just couldn’t control himself. ”So many like me...”

CAU431 corrected him, though. ”You aren’t like us. Each model has its own characteristics, and you... you are the only all-purpose model to have ever existed. That doesn’t really make you ’better’ than us in our fields, but you can adapt to all situations, which other models can’t. You could call yourself a jack of all trades.”

”Would that make him a master of none?” Rean asked out of curiosity. Since Qwerty could do everything other models could, then perhaps he couldn’t do them as perfectly. The entire saying was exactly that: jack of all trades, master of none.

”That’s not his case,” CAU431 explained. ”His abilities are just as good as any other model, but he can do them all, so it would be better to say he is a jack of all trades and master of all. Maybe ’master of all trades’ would fit better.”

Roan wasn’t that interested in that topic, only in their current situation. ”Alright, can you explain what is happening here? I understood you intervened because we seemed to be fighting against those other robots back there, but that doesn’t mean we are actually friends. We are just passing by, trying to reach the other side of the Evernight World.”

”Evernight World? Oh, I see, that’s what those from outside call this place, uh? We just call it the Zoshia world. Well, to be more specific, that was the name the Zoshia Enterprise always used, and we don’t quite like it. It’s just that we are already used to it,” CAU explained.

”Anyway,” and he continued, ”I did indeed intervene because you seemed to be at odds with the SANS idiots. Now that I see you have a HAF100, I am even happier that I did. If they had got their hands in the HAF100, we would be done for.”

Qwerty couldn’t help but ask. ”What do you intend to do with me?”

That was also the question in the twins’ group’s minds.

”That is a tricky question,” CAU could see what they were worried about. ”You see, the reason a HAF100 is so imporant is exactly its capability to achieve peak performance in all fields. In battle, it is great at attacking, defending, and supporting. In production, it is great at building, crafting, researching, etc... It simply doesn’t have a blind spot. From the records, that is also why all HAF100s were terminated shortly after their creation. There wasn’t supposed to be one intact, especially after so long.”

It goes without saying that an army of robots made of units similar to Qwerty would hold the absolute advantage if both sides had the same numbers. In fact, they would still have the advantage even if the numbers were somewhat not in their favor. Such was the difference.

Roan narrowed his eyes. ”That doesn’t explain much. Even if Qwerty... or HAF100 is that good, he is only a single unit. How could it make such a difference?”

”Do you know why there aren’t any HAF100s even though so many millions of years have passed? Because their blueprints and designs were lost after the creators disappeared. Nowadays, we can only produce the common units, like us, the CAU units, or the SANS units back in the SANS city. Well, the city name is actually Zoshia as well, but since the SANS robots control it, we use their nomenclature instead to avoid confusion.”

”However,” CAU431 spoke more, ”they still have the manufacturing facilities. As long as the designs are provided, they could make new HAF100s! That would spell the end of our Reprogrammation Army.”

Rean and Roan found it quite weird: a bunch of robots having the same problems as many human countries back on Earth... maybe in a more ’robotic’ way... It was to the point they even felt it a little bit boring. Of course, they didn’t say that out loud.

”Oh, we are almost there!” CAU431 then got their attention, pointing forward. Far in the distance, the darkness was replaced by a load of blue lights and buildings. Seems like they got to the CAU units’ base.