Chapter 19 - Refining

I carefully watched around, trying to see if anything changed after I touched the golem, while sending Otty the question of whether this is what he warned me about.

To my surprise, he answered that he did not know what I meant. I sent him the picture of the statues in the room and asked if these were the dangerous things he warned me about, but his answer was simple "No". All my other questions did not give me more information, as all he said was a repetition of the warning: Not take "joint" here.

It was confusing, but when I thought about it for a bit, I realized something. The maintenance unit was resonating with the systems and functions inside the walls, basically activating service functions hidden within them. However, this works only for a short distance, spreading only as far as the walls light up.

But if this room is the core of the entire sector. Could it be that I may be able to activate the whole sector from here?

I understand that this might also activate these golems, yet it's not the golems Otty warned me about. So could it be that once I activate the sector, someone will notice it?

But who? This dead space station… Is it really dead? Can someone still be here?

Maybe in another sector? Maybe only this sector is abandoned and there are still sectors where demons live? There were too many questions and too little information.

I pressed at my temples, rubbing them slightly and took a deep breath. 

There was no use worrying about it right now. As long as I do not activate the sector I will be fine, apparently. I'll try to get more information from Otty later.

On the other hand, if this sector is deactivated, and would not work until I activate this core room, does it mean, these Golems are also deactivated. In that case, is it safe to steal Cry from them?

My eyes lit up at this idea. How much Cry do these things have? Even if there is just the slightest bit inside each of them, there are hundreds of them. I looked around the room once more, only this time with the expression of a guy who had won the jackpot. 

Gulping nervously I stretched my hand toward the golem once again and felt the Cry inside it. 

There was so much. In my whole life I did not hold so much at once. Just taking Cry from one of them would solve all my financial problems. Taking Cry from all of them, though…

"It looks like I am not dying any time soon, Otty." I said in my head, but I'm not sure if Otty understood it. After all, this guy possibly lived for eons and may be the most immortal creature in the galaxy. The concept of age may not even be understandable for him. Otty did not answer anything, only looking at me with one of its tentacle-like sprouts.

Normally, you would need a special device to steal Cry from another person. Taking it from a sentient being who owns them is not simple if he does not wish to let them go. But it's a problem a device called Crypick can solve. Just like a pickaxe, it hacks away owned Cry bit by bit. 

Then there is also the problem of irreconcilability. Basically, Cry that was taken without permission would be harmful to anyone who tries to possess it. For that, it has to be refined. A step which turns it into a small, shiny white crystal.

I had neither picker nor refiner at the moment. These things can easily be made in the forger, if I find their schematics. It's not something rare or overly hard to find. Of course having a picker on you when you are stopped by the guards would get you in all kinds of problems, but owning one wasn't really illegal as long as you had it at home and did not carry it around. 

The problem is, to make them I would have to travel back five days. Spend a few days making them, then return here for another five days. Half a month just to begin extraction.

But if I return with at least enough to start up my hoverbike, then I'll save on returning time. For that, however, I'd need to take it with "bare hands," so to say. I have a feeling that stealing cry isn't very hard as they are mindless creatures. It's no different than stealing from animals or insects. What bothers me is the irreconcilability of 4GM.

Without refining it will harm me, but my horns have a bit of filtering capability. Just that they are not made to filter this much. It is one thing that this method will be incredibly wasteful, only reclaiming about half of all Cry I take. The bigger problem is that basic horns, such as mine, can only safely filter the amount I need to communicate with 4GM. Which is almost negligible compared to how much I'd need to take to use a hoverbike. This will burn my horns quite a lot.

I did receive schematics for some battle horns from Keith, but I have not made them yet, so before harming these ones I'd better have new ones in stock.

What should I do? Do I risk it to save time or not? First, I should see just how good my horns would cope with filtering, I guess.

I placed my hand on the golem once again, sensing where its Cry accumulator was, and ordered my 4GM particles to pull at the particles within it. After half a minute I finally managed to chip away a bit of the golem's Cry and absorbed it, observing how well my horns were coping.

It was not looking good. Every time I tried to sip more than an absolutely minuscule amount, my horns heated up and shone like flashlights, burning some Solid State cells within them in the process. 

If only I had battle horns. With them, I could have absorbed freely, as they are made with the intention to absorb from dead enemies in great amounts before the particles disperse in the world around, so they can filter a lot more. With my current ones, though this looked not feasible.

Guess I have to waste an additional five days after all.

At that moment I felt a cold touch of Otty's sprout on my cheek and was shaken by what I can only describe as a mental slap.

"No. Wrong." Said Otty.

"Wrong what? Wrong to take it? But I need it." I sent him as I shook away confusion after his slap.

Without answer, Otty slithered over my shoulder to my hand that touched the golem and then over it toward the golem. He stopped at my wrist, entwining one of his sprouts over it and then made another sprout with which he touched the golem.

Light shone throughout his whole body like a rivulet of shiny water streaming from the golem to my wrist.

"Take. This way." Said Otty's voice in my head.

I stared at him with an open mouth in surprise. After a moment I recollected my thoughts and nodded at him, before closing my eyes and concentrating on the Cry he was sending my way.

It was refined. He was refining it for me, allowing me to absorb it in its purest state from him, as if I were simply taking it from crystals. Without any harm to my horns.

However, a second later he slapped me once again, stopping the process.

"No. Wrong." Said Otty once again.

"Wrong what? You said to take it." I answered in confusion.

"Yes. Take this way." He answered.

I looked at him in confusion. Which is it? Take or not take. What was he trying to say?

I closed my eyes and tried to repeat the process once more, but Otty snapped at me again.

"No. Do wrong." Was the thought he sent me this time.

"Do wrong? I absorbed it incorrectly? I know that. My horns are the cheapest. I can only sip it in a small amount to not harm my horns too much." I said in my head, hoping he would understand such a complicated sentence.

"Do this way." Answered Otty.

But just as I absorbed another trace of it, Otty once again stopped me.

"What? I don't get it." I snapped at him.

"Yes. Like talk. Do talk." Answered Otty.

I looked at him, bewildered.

Do talk? Talk to him? What does he mean? Or does he mean…

We repeated the process again, but this time instead of letting my horns do all the work with me as a mere observer, I made a mental effort, concentrating my thoughts on the process the same way I concentrated them when I tried to talk with Otty. 

It was not easy. It felt as if I was trying to move some limb that I did not have, but this time Otty did not stop me. 

"Yes. Do that." Said Otty gently.

My concentration was constantly slipping away, as my thoughts tended to wander, but I forced myself to return my mind to full attention again and again. 

Unlike talking with Otty, when I just had to concentrate my thoughts for a split moment to send the message, the process of absorbing that Otty demanded from me needed constant application of my mental power. I am not sure if this is the correct way to describe this. But it felt as if I was wasting some strength, but not my body strength. It was something else. Something mental.

At some point I felt weary and could not continue any more, so I pulled away.

I opened my eyes, finding myself still standing the same way. But what was I pulling away then? My mind? This was such a strange feeling. And very novel. I had never felt something like that before.

Otty stopped refining Cry as soon as he felt me pulling my mind away and slithered back to my shoulder, where he placed his sprout on my cheek once again.

"Good. Did right." He said simply before once again going silent.

I needed rest. I was so weary, I could barely stand straight, but I was damned if I was going to sleep here in this eerie room, surrounded by all these golems.

So I pulled myself together and walked back to the bridge. As I walked through the tunnel in the wall, I checked on my Cry amount and was shocked to see how much of it I now had. I absorbed at least half of what the golem had. I tried to remember how much the golem had when I stopped absorbing to understand what Otty's refinement rate was. Even the best refiner would have some waste. It could never be 100%. Eighty-five was the best I've ever heard.

But what I saw here was shocking. If Otty's rate was not one hundred, then it was very close to it. He refined 4GM better than any refiner in existence. Otty was simply amazing. How lucky was I to find him?

With these thoughts, I reached my backpack, picked it up, and went over the bridge. I wasn't feeling comfortable sleeping in the open even though I was alone in this whole sector. When I mapped the floors, I found a few rooms that I marked as places to camp in, so I went there.

When I reached the place, I barely unrolled my sleeping mat before falling on it and passing out.