Industrial Cthulhu: Starting as an Island Lord

The Sirens stepped back a little, making space for her. The female Siren stood there somewhat timidly.

”Lord, I am Una.”

Hughes frowned as he tried to recall. He had some impression of her, from when the first cognitive interference occurred a few days ago.

This Siren seemed to have particularly bad luck. The spontaneously appearing pollution had materialized right above her head, burying her entirely. It was her teammates who had dug her out.

What had she discovered?

Under Hughes’ encouraging gaze, Una recalled the events and spoke softly:

”When I was in the Abyssal Trench, I was attacked by a monster inside. I struggled for a long time before Lord Ash came to my aid. I nearly died, so I have a deep impression of that pollution.”

”Later, when Monica was corrupted by the pollution, I also remembered that pollution clearly. It was exactly the same as the one in the deep sea.”

”But later...”

She frowned.”During the cognitive interference, I was struck by the pollution. I struggled inside it for a long time before I managed to escape. At that time, I felt something was off about this pollution.”

”Something off?”

”Yes, it felt somewhat different from the pollution in the deep sea. It looked very similar, but it wasn’t exactly the same thing.”

”It’s like... salt and sugar. Both are seasonings, but they are completely different.”

Hughes took a deep breath. ”Why didn’t you report this?”

Una shook her head. ”I wasn’t entirely sure. They looked way too similar, both were Dark worms and had the same reaction to the outside world. I thought the difference was simply because one appeared in the sea and the other on land.”

Hughes understood her meaning. Subjectively, Una felt a significant difference, but no matter how one observed them, the two types of pollution appeared identical.

Like salt and sugar, the difference couldn’t be easily spotted by the eye. One had to taste them to tell them apart.

”Uh... did you try interacting with it again?”

”Being wrapped inside pollution... doesn’t feel good...”

Una’s face visibly darkened. Her mouth twitched, and she spoke in a small voice.

Hughes recalled the writhing Dark pollution, which moved as if composed of thousands of squirming worms, and shuddered.

Thankfully, he had purified it quickly enough. The moment the pollution appeared, it was cleansed. Otherwise, if that stuff had kept appearing inside him...

Hughes’ face darkened as well.

”Alright, I understand. Did anyone else notice anything?”

The Sirens exchanged glances and shook their heads.

”In other words, we might have triggered the pollution’s descent for a different reason. We don’t know what that reason is yet. What we do know is that, unlike cognitive interference, it does not cause a random downpour of pollution. Instead, it continuously generates new pollution within the body in massive quantities, lasting for a long time.”

The pollution downpour from cognitive interference was also overwhelming in volume, but it usually only happened in a single wave. As long as one wasn’t as unlucky as Una, who had been buried alive, there was still a chance of survival.

But today’s pollution descent had directly generated pollution inside his body, in massive amounts, and lasted for several hours.

If Hughes hadn’t had purification abilities, he would have been as good as dead.

The candies he had obtained from Nora could suppress pollution to some extent, but against such prolonged, high-dose pollution infusion, they would have been useless.

Hughes sighed, his expression growing heavy.

These past days, he had devised several ways to deal with cognitive interference.

He could indeed drive scientific and industrial progress, but the advancement of an entire civilization couldn’t rely on him alone.

In the future, ordinary people would need to participate in research.

He wanted to create a system that could sustain itself healthily.

Cognitive interference was dangerous, but with proper precautions, it might still be manageable.

But how could he avoid this kind of inside-out pollution?

Today, he built a steam engine, and the pollution descent was purified instantly.

But what if Gaia improved the steam engine tomorrow, and pollution descended again?

What if she turned into a corrupted monster like Monica had? What then?

Even if they managed to handle it, Gaia couldn’t sign a Symbiotic Contract with him.

If she became a monster, she would have to be killed, and she would be lost.

How was civilization supposed to develop like this? Treat scientists as disposable resources?

Impossible. Even if scientists willingly sacrificed themselves one after another, such a system would be unsustainable, leading to inevitable gaps in research.

Hughes forced a bitter smile. If this world was truly this strange, then it was no wonder the major powers had all become extremely conservative.

”It really feels like this world is punishing civilization’s progress severely...”

He couldn’t help but mutter.

It was like those cultivation novels where the protagonist secluded themselves for tens of thousands of years, only to emerge and find that farmers were still plowing their fields with oxen.

Or fantasy worlds where elves, with lifespans of thousands of years, spent millennia learning knowledge, only to become slightly better at fighting.

It was as if the world forcibly maintained its internal logic, seemingly reasonable and normal at a glance, but upon closer thought, it evoked an inexplicable sense of dread.

Could it be that scientific research here also relied on archaeology? That would be far too ironic.

This theory wasn’t difficult to grasp, and the surrounding Sirens had also realized it.

Their expressions darkened as well.

When it came to devotion to science, these Sirens were absolute fanatics.

Their first exposure to scientific thinking had been Hughes’ water pressure theory, it had solved a problem that had troubled them for thousands of years.

No one among their kind had ever thought of approaching their curse from that perspective. Saying it had reshaped their worldview wouldn’t be an exaggeration.

Later, Hughes proposed signing Symbiotic Contracts with everyone, linking them together. They were direct beneficiaries of this.

Previously, they had to worry about their contract partners being too weak or about one party’s fatal injuries dragging the other down. Now, with a shared life pool, they had almost limitless tolerance for mistakes.

This extended to the various applications of Mind Link, the industrial systems of the territory, and even the manufacturing of the steam engine; they had been the closest witnesses to it all.

The Sirens hadn’t noticed, but they had gradually adapted to Hughes’ way of thinking, observe, analyze, deduce patterns, experiment, and apply findings.

Hughes simply found it easy to communicate with the Sirens. Using the Mind Link to talk even felt a bit like messaging on WhatsApp. He hadn’t thought too much about it.

But in reality, it meant their worldviews were aligning.

They were becoming more like Hughes.

Thus, the pain Hughes felt in his heart at this moment was also felt by the Sirens.

The atmosphere grew heavy.

Monica pushed through the nearby Sirens and squeezed in front of Hughes.

The Sirens looked down at her.

Hughes also raised his head, somewhat surprised by the little Siren before him.

Monica wasn’t very old and was about the same height as Hughes. She looked straight into the eyes of her lord.

”Humans fear pollution, but I don’t. Humans love science, and so do I. If humans can’t do it, then I will.”