Kaijin Fighter: So I Have to Make Monsters, So What?

'Huh…this is going a lot smoother than I anticipated.' Zhen Liu mused as he watched the ingots in the crucible melt, all while absorbing [Chaos] and whatever cursed energy radiated off of the [Ghost Flames]. 'I wonder if I actually would've gotten along with Dante in another lifetime…nah.'

The time Zhen Liu had spent pretending to be Dante's ally proved to be rather…enlightening.

Sure, the man disgusted Zhen Liu on a moral and spiritual level, but the way he approached [Chaos] was a refreshing change of perspective.

Zhen Liu would usually infuse [Chaos] into either completed products that had a strong enough identity on their own or at least material components that also had strong identities.

To give an example, prior to meeting with Dante, if Zhen Liu was tasked with making a clock into a kaijin, he would normally just infuse the entire clock with [Chaos] and be done with it. At that particular point in time, if he attempted to break down the clock into components and infuse [Chaos] that way, he would overclock it and accidentally create gear-based zakos, spring-based zakos, and probably chime-based zakos.

Now, after meeting Dante, Zhen Liu was fairly certain that he could infuse the aforementioned clock components with [Chaos] and end up creating a clock-based kaijin with significantly more power than what would happen if he just attempted to suffuse the whole structure with [Chaos]...probably.

Zhen Liu had yet to actually test this idea since he already had a lot of kaijin to keep track of for the time being, but he was fairly certain that this new trick of his would end up creating significantly stronger bodies for those slumbering divine fragments.

'Hmmm.'

Tossing a glance to his side, Zhen Liu expected that the sudden surge of energy would've stirred the slumbering figures. Evidently, this wasn't the case.

Chalking it up to groginess, Zhen Liu brought his attention back to the crucible that was now filled with molten metal.

'I feel like, I'm missing something…ah, right.'

Molten metal, especially magic metals full of unstable energies, couldn't be crafted by hand.

As much as Zhen Liu was probably immune to such burn damage, he couldn't simply sculpt it like clay or blow it like glass; he needed to pour the metal into a specialized cast where it could cool into a particular shape.

In this case, he needed shapes that could be joined together into the form of a fully articulated body.

Thankfully, Zhen Liu didn't need to do all of that work, because Logos and Pathos had already done so.

Granted, he wasn't aware of that fact until the aforementioned spirits of logic and emotion personally told him.

'Alright, I'm pretty sure I can just leave the crucible burning while I go and get an appropriate cast. Hmm, I wonder if I could just use one of the many—

<Sit your pretty ass down, milord!> Pathos suddenly called out in Zhen Liu's brain just as he was about to go and find a suitable piece of stone that probably still had his imprint somewhere. <Because Logos and I had already done so ahead of time.>

'Eh?'

As soon as Zhen Liu questioned how that was even possible, the floor behind him suddenly opened up, and three rectangular pedestals rose one after the other. Using the light of the forge, Zhen Liu could make out several indents that could be brought together to make a vaguely humanoid figure.

Although, due to the aura of the flames or possibly the sickly green shade, the aforementioned indentations had a horror movie feel to them.

Zhen Liu could practically imagine some poor schmuck being dismantled and then used to make the molds, like some kind of cheap slasher film that ended with either cannibalism or some stitched-together human doll that was made from harvested body parts.

…Meanwhile…

[Achoo!]

[Hmmm? What's up, CD? Are you sick? Wait, can we even get sick?]

[Nothing, PD,] Corpse Doll answered her worrying twin sister. [Let's just get back to playing this… what did they call it? Fideogaem?]

[Videogame.]

[Yeah, that.]

…Now back to the forge…

'Alright, partially loaded question: when and how did you get these oddly appropriate molds? Did you make them or are they a leftover inheritance from one of my predecessors?' Zhen Liu asked as he studied the casts.

All three of them were incredibly detailed and were even labelled with the names of the fragments that they were going to make bodies for.

However, the stone that these molds were made from felt…ancient.

=A little of column A and a little of column B, milord,= Logos answered. =These stones were a favorite of the Mad Tinkerer. A Kaijin Lord who specialized in turning handmade aether puppets into kaijin.=

<A bit like that Pinocchio story you fed your family not too long ago,> Pathos teased. <That said, you should probably know that we did use blank slates to make these moldings, and that we customized each one so that the tezcatlipocas would feel comfortable in their new bodies.>

=Thankfully, I still remember how their original hosts felt whenever I touched their skins.=

'That...you two really need to tell me your ancient backstory one of these days.'

<=Some day milord. Some day.=>

Now that he had the molds ready, all Zhen Liu had to do now was to pour in the molten mixture and go from there.

'Wait...should I have made a unique mix of metals per mold, or do you guys think I could get away with just using a universal one?' Zhen Liu realized just as he was about to pour what he knew to be predominantly molten [Malevolent Gold] with only a smattering of other cursed metals mixed in, into the body dedicated to Xipe Totec.

A part of him figured that the Flayed One would very much prefer his body to be made of silver or copper, metals known for their antimicrobial properties.

Incidentally, he was right.

<Hmmm. From what I recall, the tezcatlipocas took great pride in how strange and unique their bodies were from one another. And I don't just mean in terms of overall body shape.>

=Your current mixture would probably work best for Quetzalcoatl's body. Since out of everyone present, that guy has always been more closely related to the sun than anyone we've known.=

'Makes sense.'

Following this idea, Zhen Liu carefully poured in the first of three molten metal mixtures into the mold dedicated to Quetzalcoatl's body.

Following that, Zhen Liu prepared two more crucibles with different metals being the main focus.

For Xipe Totec, Zhen Liu made sure to add more [Sinful Copper], due to fact that copper had always been famous for its antimicrobial properties. Well, that,the fact that it's a nutrient for the body, and because whenever Zhen Liu had seen objects made of copper they usually had a mottled pattern that was very similar to how the Flayed One's body looked when statues were made in his honor.

As for Huitzilopochtli, Zhen Liu mostly used [Diabolic Silver] and [Azure Lead], due to the fact that those exposed to excessive amounts of silver and lead have been known to turn blue. Of course, there's also the historical aspect of silver often being used to make weapons designed to fight the forces of evil, or in the case of a particular game that focused on dwarves building a home in the middle of nowhere, incredibly effective warhammers and maces.

Regardless, once all of the crucibles were filled with their dedicated mixtures, and poured into their respective molds, Zhen Liu's work was done...for the time being.

He could've technically attempted to try and use his abilities to cool down the newly minted bodies at a faster rate, but he didn't want to risk going gung-ho about it and accidentally ruining everything in the process.

He may have had access to a whole mine of these cursed metals, but he didn't want to overburden the people with his creative endeavours.

Especially since many of them would be living in the mines full time and planned to...wait a minute.

'Ah, fuck, I just realized something important.'

=Hmmm? What's the matter, milord?=

'Dante had been one of the greatest suppliers of cursed metals and purchasers of discarded slaves for the underworld markets, right?,' Zhen Liu rhetorically asked. 'At least, that's the impression I got when the Kaijin and I parsed through his paperwork.'

<=That's correct.=>

'And we just violently couped his ass without anyone but the immediate locals in the area knowing. Meaning that if any of those underworld-related caravans show up, those people are kind of fucked due to their lack of hard power and my lack of being able to provide protective soft power,' Zhen Liu elaborated once he received the answer he was expecting. 'Alright, I got to have the Kaijin Lord persona make an even grander entrance in the future. Hopefully somewhere with a high populace.'

=To be fair milord, you do technically have one reputation barrier.=

'I do?"

<Don't you remember how those enslaved warriors reacted when they learned the identities of your cousins?>

'...ah.'