Magus ex Machina [Cyberpunk-Fantasy LitRPG] (Book 1 complete!)

Thunder split the sky as an earthquake split the ground. The epicenter of the giant beetle fight sank slightly, as the tarmac sucked in and suddenly blew outwards. A crack of lightning behind the scene framed a silhouette snapshot: Giant beetles and hunks of tarmac tumbling in every direction, thrown sky-high by a massive trunk rising from underground. No fine details remained of the image burned into their retinas, but the shape was unmistakable.

How was Tapper supposed to know that the metro network existed this far out from the mall dungeon?

A foghorn blared through the storm, deafening the swarm for a moment. The subway curled downwards on long metal segments connected by pulsing flesh, and slammed a train car down on the injured giant beetle. It tried to buck against the assault, but the train car warped and bent to grasp around the kicking beetle.

Tapper couldn't tear his eyes away. The first time he saw a subway beast was horrifying and alien in equal measure, but the metal's screeching as it morphed was just unnatural. "What illogical thing is that metro monster doing?"

"What do you think?" Salazar shouted back. "It's feeding!"

The insects, the entire countless swarm, flew into an even greater fury in response. Tapper was unsure whether they were responding to the assault or a new source of food, but the result was the same for them. Everything closed in, the vague gray wall of flying bugs and their buzzing intensifying into an overbearing pressure. More lightning danced across the tarmac, more bodies slammed into all sides of the jitney, and several dark spheres crashed through the widening gap.

One lucky shot cracked the projector right off its spindle, and the layers of holographic map blinked off the windshield. "Fuck, I'm driving blind!" Salazar shouted. "Get the maps back up in my goggles! ...Hello?" No response, and in the sudden silence Salazar's hands started to shake on the steering wheel. He was alone.

The others weren't faring much better. Tapper and Phanya ducked for cover, but another cannonball threaded the narrow opening and cracked Ricky on the back. His grip slipped with a pained groan, and the other two scrambled to pull Ricky aside before he fell through the crack. Any cannonballs that landed inside the vehicle unfolded into pillbugs, just as large as the locust but wingless. Instead bands of thick chitin armored the pillbugs, protecting their soft underside and sharp little mandibles made for grappling.

"Mister Salazar!" Tapper shouted, cranking his voice to full volume. He had to ensure that he could be heard over the sound of his drill hand shattering a pillbug's shell. "I believe we are straining to hold the line!"

"Get us out of here, Sal!!" Phanya chimed in. She was struggling to play bug dodgeball, while also tap dancing around a carpet of the little bastards. One lucky bug latched onto her ankle at just the wrong time to throw her off-balance, and another bug traveling at terminal velocity rang Phanya's bell. Her head snapped forward and her vision swam until the only thing she could see was a system message, but right now Phanya could not comprehend what the words meant. Someone shouted her name, maybe?

Salazar was also in his own little world. All the background screaming and thundering faded to white noise as he desperately tracked all the minefields surrounding them. Dodging bugs, dodging lightning, dodging craters, and now dodging a demon from hell. The subway train thrashed against its tight opening in the tarmac, throwing more hunks aside as it flexed and reeled back. Small manic sounds escaped from Salazar's snout as desperation spun the wheel. This was madness, what is he doing, everyone was shouting —

The metal tentacle slammed its captive beetle downwards, aiming for the jitney. But Salazar had turned the car directly towards the subway at the last moment, so the bug cracked down onto the pavement with full force instead. And, just like Salazar hoped, it shattered the weakened tarmac beneath them.

Darkness swallowed them, and silence followed.

[Injury healed: Concussion]

Phanya groaned. Everything hurt, so she was allowed to groan. Everything hurt, she couldn't see from something covering her face, and it smelled awful. One prodding hand sank into rags soaked through with a vile goop, and she groaned louder.

"Phanya! Ricky, Phanya's waking up!" The joy behind that tinny voice grated on Phanya's nerves, and guaranteed that she couldn't mope in peace. She heard another figure run up, and Phanya held up a hand before they started poking her.

"I'm fine, I'm fine," she murmured. She didn't move to take off the slimy bandages just yet, so she could stay in the blissful darkness for a moment longer. Instead Phanya pointed to her elbow and said, "Stupid Safety Pads don't protect against concussions, but I'm fine. And I bet there's a dumb, phase-cursed helmet out there that would do just that, too."

"Well, should such an object exist then I hope it matches your Safety Pads for a full set!"

Tapper's genuine enthusiasm tore down the walls of sarcasm once again, and Phanya sighed. "I bet it would, Taps." She very slowly sat up and removed the bandages, trying to manipulate them with only the tips of her fingers. Not that it mattered when her head was covered with the goop, but eventually she uncovered her eyes to the open world.

Or rather, to the darkened cave. She was lying in the cot and could easily see outside, as the two vehicle halves were now only linked by a few lengths of chain, but outside was only darkness. Darkness and a small campfire, over which sat an improvised grill and a roasting pillbug. Smoke drew the eye upward, and the fire glowed with just enough light to show the underside of the tarmac far above their heads.

Phanya blinked slowly up at the tarmac, over to the absolute mess of dead bugs in and around the jitney, down to the slimy bandages in her hand, and thought very slowly. There was a lot she needed to know, and she could only hear it from two very excitable boys. Plus, everything still hurt.

"So," Phanya eventually said, and pointed to the bandages. "Healing potion, right? It's, uh, different."

Tapper nodded enthusiastically and said, "That's right! By a stroke of serendipity, the pillbug monsters also count as Darkling Crawlers, just like the mealworms back home. So they can be used as healing potions! Admittedly the pillbugs have proven difficult to dry out, but what we lack in quality we surpass in quantity. And we ran out of the Cat's Tongue Nettle from Wiessa's greenhouse, but we found a substitution! More serendipity! I like that word."

Ricky was very familiar with the look Phanya gave when she stopped following a conversation, so he patted Tapper on the shoulder to quiet him down. Ricky just said, "It's octolusk jelly," and then he swept his other hand over to the campfire. Phanya squinted against the light and noticed Kakisi laying down at the edge of the fire's warmth, on his side and completely still. He actually looked dead to Phanya, but the others certainly weren't acting like it.

"After we finished fighting off the bugs Kakisi came out of hiding for a snack," Ricky continued. "And I mean the lil' guy absolutely gorged himself on bug guts, it was so much worse than this. Eventually he ate so much that he, uh… burst, with jelly. And then fell asleep next to the fire."

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"Baron's Jam!" Tapper cut back in. "I forgot that I had identified that during our first fight with an octolusk. Remember, Phanya? It was an egg clutch, but Kakisi just excreted the jelly! It's an excellent neutral base for potions!"

"And I think it is very convenient that Tapper's familiar just so happens to be a wiggling potion reagent dispenser," Ricky nodded.

Phanya quietly watched the two talk back and forth. She did hear everything, and comprehended most of it, but she could not bring up the willpower for an adequate reaction. "Well, then. Thank you for healing me, Tapper. Where is Salazar?"

"Mister Salazar is also resting, because I believe he broke at least one rib." A groan rattled from below, and Phanya craned over the cot to see Salazar laying on the floor. "Mister Salazar, you're awake! How are your ribs feeling?"

Salazar slowly sat up, pulling at the wet bandages wound around his chest. "What the hell am I wearing?"

"A minor regeneration potion! By a stroke of serendipity, the pillbug monsters also count as —"

"Tapper, Tapper," Phanya begged, "Please not again, he doesn't care. Salazar, you were knocked out, Tapper applied some medicine, you're fine. Now, can someone please explain why I'm under the goddamn tarmac again?"

All eyes turned to Salazar, but he didn't lash out. He just shook his head and said, "Lost my maps, all guidance. No way out of the storm, and subway demons usually emerge through pockets. So I hoped we could hide in one, and…" Salazar's voice trailed off as he winced and hugged his chest. He took a slow, shaking breath just fine, but he definitely remembered something in his chest breaking against the steering wheel. "And then I passed out."

"Well, you guessed right," Ricky said. "A whole bunch of those pillbugs fell in with us, but without them raining like freaking artillery they aren't all that bad. They mostly try to drag you down, so the whole 'fight' was just ten straight minutes of stomping on pillbugs… I swear, first chance I get I'm blacksmithing a sword, no more waiting around to find good tech. And now we're, uh… camping?"

"Yes! Speaking of, I must check on the soup." Tapper extracted himself and walked in his own strange way over to the fire, and Phanya realized it was roasting more than a pillbug. The curled shell was actually serving as a makeshift pot with something thick bubbling and steaming away inside.

Phanya gingerly stood up and stepped out of the jitney, moving slowly to test her balance. Everything hurt, but true to the system messages she wasn't injured and Phanya walked a circle around the campfire to stretch her legs. She watched Tapper stirring the pot, "smelling" it, and adding spices pilfered from Salazar's tiny kitchen. And were his joints whirring more than usual, or was the robot humming? So many questions, and she couldn't just ask them as if she were talking to a normal human.

"Tapper, I don't want to downplay how thankful I am for not having a concussion right now, but we still almost died in that storm. Now we're trapped underground and the jitney is probably trashed for good. Things are not great, so why are you so… chipper?"

"That's precisely why, Phanya!" Tapper answered, without looking up from the soup. It was almost done and he didn't want it to burn. "We survived a harrowing ordeal with life and limb intact, which is cause to celebrate. And now we are camping, which is somehow simultaneously both relaxing and adventurous! This is a time for us to take stock, reorganize, and reflect on our growth. And everything is more cozy!

"Even this soup, for instance. It is not a potion, and yet something about this setup of a large pot over an open fire is deceptively satisfying. Almost as if my witchly instincts are giving me a strong nod of approval that I never felt while cooking in a kitchen."

All the talking roused Kakisi from his nap and stirred fitfully. After only a moment of hesitation, Tapper bent down and tentatively scratched his familiar on the tip of his misshapen shell. The little octolusk stretched, flipped over, and went back to sleep with a gentle trilling purr. Tapper straightened, looked Phanya in the eye, and said, "The overall situation may be dire, but this moment here and now is good."

Once the soup finished, chairs were pulled from the car or improvised from the surroundings, and Tapper served each humanoid a heaping bowl. Phanya and Ricky accepted theirs with only a bit of caution, but Salazar reeled back. "Thanks, but I think I'll pass."

"It's actually not that bad," Ricky mumbled through a mouthful. He was the first one to try it, and once the first steaming spoonful hit his stomach Ricky realized how absolutely famished all the fighting left him.

"Thank you, Ricky! Balancing flavor profiles is an important part of bartending, but it's still mostly pillbug and jelly by volume. I believe I might call it PB&J soup for that reason!"

"Yeah that's great, I'm still going to just reconstitute some real food instead." Salazar stepped back into the vehicle, and after a moment his voice echoed back out with a bit more edge. "Where the hell is my food fixer!?"

Ricky stopped his wolfing and nervously gulped down his mouthful. "Uhh, you mean that slim black box? I kinda, uh, needed it for something." Salazar poked his head back into view and glared daggers at Ricky, who huffed in response. "Hey, we'll need everything we've got to get out of here. You were passed out for —" Ricky cut himself off and thrust a finger at Tapper.

"Approximately six hours," Tapper instantly chimed.

"Six hours! I haven't been sleeping for six hours, I've been working on a way to get us out of here, and I'm this close to figuring it out. Just eat the dang bars, it's fine."

"Or you can join us," Tapper interjected, stepping in between them and holding up a steaming container, "for a nice bowl of soup. There is plenty to go around! And we lack the means to preserve any leftovers."

While the others talked and argued, Phanya quietly worked through her stew and organized her thoughts. Phanya was used to Tapper's cooking, so long as she didn't dwell on the chewy bits, and with every bite the warmth radiating through her body made her feel a bit more awake. A bit more alive, with the strain of the insane past few days loosening its hold on her just a little bit. Despite everything, Tapper was right — this campfire was almost downright cozy.

Except for the one thing still nagging on her mind. "Hey guys," she eventually said, and the other three voices instantly quieted. "What about the giant subway monster?"

Tapper nodded with his usual enthusiasm. "Ah yes, the wyrm. It departed without incident when a great flash of fire scorched the earth above. There was a great roaring sound, and we could feel the heat radiating through the tarmac. I attempted to extrapolate the air temperature topside, and my calculations just returned an, uh, overflow error." Tapper's usual enthusiasm tapered off into mild embarrassment, but Ricky's picked right back up.

"Orbital. Laser. I'm telling ya." Ricky swung his spoon around to punctuate each point. "It got hot as hell in here for a few seconds, and everything above ground was gone. It was so bad that when the subway pulled away, it left a chunk of its slagged remains behind to plug the hole!"

Tapper pantomimed a wistful sigh. "We did not gain any experience for encountering the monster, unfortunately."

"Oh! But after everything I still dinged," Ricky said. He wiggled his eyebrows in Salazar's direction, who couldn't even bother pretending not to notice. "You know, ding?"

"Oh ding, riiiight," Phanya nodded back, her tone swinging from obviously sarcastic to subtly menacing. "Right sure yeah, I'll ding you alright. Why didn't either of you say anything about a freaking orbital laser almost melting us!?"

Ricky shrugged. "Like Tapper said, didn't get any experience."

Phanya snapped her soup spoon through the air and over the campfire, using her supernatural maneuvers to help her aim. True to her word, it dinged right off his forehead and Ricky fell off his chair. The tumble shook Kakisi awake, and the stuffed familiar dragged himself over to an upturned bowl to lazily lap up the spilled contents.

Through the various resulting jeers, Salazar huffed a quiet laugh and shook his head. "Told you, stayed in one place too long and the Glass Eye looked at us." The soup really wasn't that bad, and he sat a little closer to the campfire. Purely for the comfort of his reptilian genes, of course.