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Chapter 1: The First Roar
[Opening Scene]
- Grokhot's mechanical spine shivers, gears grinding beneath armored plating.
SFX: Krrrkt-krrrkt
- His muzzle (cracked clay over welded steel) lifts, yellow optics flaring.
Grokhot: "It reeks."
- Carterra wasteland revealed: A graveyard of dead machines under sickly green skies. Oily rain falls in thick droplets.
Skrezhetka (radio-antenna ears twitching): "Not rain... That stench—it's coming from below."
- The ground sweats Living Oil, pooling like black tar.
- Mechanical beetles swarm in unnatural patterns.
[Ironbelly's Domain]
- The trio approaches Ironbelly at the Oil Mire. His open belly compartment displays:
* Stormglass orb (crackling with trapped lightning)
* Pristine spike-chain (gleaming despite the corrosion)
* Ancient key (rusted shaft but perfect teeth)
Ironbelly (grinding voice): "More nonsense, Grokhot?"
- He rolls the orb; distorted human faces warp in its surface.
Ironbelly: "Last night... I heard the wires sing their death-song."
- The Growling Maw fissure erupts with emerald fog. The sky pulses like an exposed vein.
Skrezhetka (whispering): "Is the Great Roar coming?"
Ironbelly (gravelly): "No. This is... an awakening."
[The Specter Emerges]
- Earth splits like rotten fruit. Living Oil forms grasping black tendrils.
- A screaming cyclone of beetles takes shape.
- The Chromed Specter rises:
* Liquid mirror-metal body (reflecting distorted versions of the borgs)
* Hollow eye-cylinders burning with blue plasma cores
SFX: SKREEE— (metal tearing reality itself)
Ironbelly (roaring): "RUN!"
[Cliffhanger Fall]
- Grokhot plummets through chaos:
* Skrezhetka tumbling mid-air
* Jagged debris frozen in time
* The Incubator below—a colossal biomechanical womb pulsing with sickly light.
Final words (echoing): "YOU AWOKE... NOW WE TOO SHALL RISE."
[Next Chapter Teaser]
- The Chromed Specter: Divine messenger or executioner?
- Incubator's Truth: Factory or living entity?
- Ironbelly's Secret: What did the old warrior see during the Last Roar?
[End or no;(
Chapter 2: "The Incubator"
1. The Fall
Grokhot slammed into something soft.
Not earth. Not metal.
Living Oil.
It enveloped him like warm tar, seeping into armor cracks, whispering in the language of gears and sparks.
"You alive?" Skrezhetka's voice grated nearby.
Grokhot tried to rise—the oil resisted, pulling him back.
"Don't move!" Ironbelly hissed. "It's testing you."
Testing?
Then Grokhot understood—the oil wasn't just holding him.
It was counting.
Every bolt. Every weld. Even the frame crack he'd hidden.
And then...
The oil released him.
---
2. The Incubator Hall
They stood in a vast circular chamber.
Walls pulsed with glowing tubes of oil. At the center:
A giant machine like a sleeping beast of steel and glass.
The Incubator.
"We shouldn't be here," Ironbelly's engine gurgled.
Too late.
Mechanical tendrils descended—thin as wires, strong as cables.
One touched Grokhot.
And...
He saw.
---
3. The Vision
Carterra—but not ruins.
A city.
Glowing.
Machine Gods walked among quadrobers, but they were... different.
Smooth. Perfect. Obedient.
Then—the Great Sundering.
The Gods left, and the quadrobers...
Were broken.
"WE WERE WRONG," the oil whispered. "YOU MUST BE BETTER."
---
4. Awakening
Grokhot woke.
The tendrils retracted, but a mark remained on his paw—a symbol he'd never seen.
"What is this?" Skrezhetka asked.
"A brand," Ironbelly rasped. "It chose you."
Suddenly—the Incubator shuddered.
A moan echoed from its depths, revealing them:
New quadrobers.
Flawless.
No cracks. No rust.
No freedom.
Their eyes burned blue.
---
5. Escape
"Up!" Ironbelly roared.
They scrambled for a maintenance pipe—but the new quadrobers moved faster.
One blocked Grokhot.
"You mustn't leave," echoed in his skull. "You will be perfected."
Grokhot revved his engine and struck.
His claw passed through the quadrober like smoke.
They weren't real.
Not yet.
---
6. Last Glimpse
Emerging, Grokhot looked back.
The fissure was sealing—but before it closed, he saw: