Chapter 9: Lab In Use
Another month passed with not much change. The only real change was that all of the Lanes was united now and the tension between Undercity and Piltover had increased. It was like a powder keg ready to blow. Enforcers and the people had now started fighter in the streets. Whenever the Enforcer's came down to start crap, others would quickly gather and help out. Many times the Enforcers didn't have enough people and were beaten quite badly before being thrown out of Undercity. Sometimes they were even thrown off the bridge between the two cities. Depending on what they were trying to do. It hadn't become a revolt yet, but they were definitely sending the message that Piltover's people weren't welcome here any longer. With the way things are right now, it makes me wonder what the fuse that set things off was. There had to be something, otherwise the Uprising would've already happened. The lanes are already united and geared up for a fight, so there's nothing stopping them from doing it now. I'll worry about that as the day becomes closer.
As for what I got for this month's reward, I chose to get an item. This hasn't happened since the super soldier serum I got for Mother after I was born. The Item I chose was an Artificer's Tool Set. It was pretty much a satchel full of tools used to make machines and gadgets. It even had tools for engraving and polishing. There were 2 kinds of each tool. The first kind, was the regular ones that was used for the more mundane machines, but was sturdy and didn't seem like it was going to break even if used for generations. The second kind, was, of course, a magic imbued version. It was supposed to be used to make magic artifacts and to inscribe the magic runes necessary to make the stronger kinds of artifacts. I needed tools and it was the perfect time and I currently have no knowledge I need at the moment. Though, with this, I'll probably need to get magic knowledge later. Maybe when Hextech becomes more available.
Since my last birthday, Vander and Silco had their people search for small machinery, gears and parts for me. Some same from junk heaps, people that were throwing them away and abandoned or vacated shacks around Undercity. Others, the nicer ones, came from 'jobs' people did in Piltover. The bridge was still blockaded, but some experienced people knew ways around it. They did this as it was more profitable to smuggle stuff in and out of Piltover and of course there were a few corrupt people in Piltover that could help them out.
I got some pieces myself through trades. I would offer medicine or fruits from my plants in exchange for, what others would call, junk. I even made another plant that would help out mothers and orphanages that had infants, but not enough food. I called it a Nurture Plant. It was a bush that grew large bell shaped flowers with a large stamen. These flowers would produce a nectar that high in nutrients necessary for an infants growth. All I had to do was pluck it from the bush, place in on an infants mouth and have it suck the stamen like it would a bottle or pacifier. A lot like the flower from Maleficent when Aurora was a baby.
All people needed to do was give me 'junk' and they could receive food and medicine, This was Undercity after all, one thing we never ran out of was junk. Thanks to this, I hand stockpiled a large stash of junk and trinkets. The ones given from Undercity was of course in bad condition. I had to polish and bend them back into working order, or at least as close to it as I could get. The broken ones were repaired by fixing it with pieces from another broken object or tossed into a scrap piled. The scraps were melted down and used to weld stuff together, making it easier to fix the less broken stuff. The stuff gained from Piltover were in great condition and were of great quality, but I needed them for their parts, not as a whole. I took them apart and organized the separate parts I needed.
With all that done, I started putting together a small puppet machine that I had designed previously. It was going to be something small and easy to move. I figured out a way to allow people to control multiple puppets during this month. They wouldn't be able to control more than one human sized, complex puppet, but if I were to make them smaller and get all the gears right, then all I had to do was include left hidden weapon and they'll be simple enough to work with one hand.
I'll make a pair for now and see how many weapons and patterns I can add while maintaining the one hand requirement. My knowledge of puppets and machinery really helped me out here. The project was going smoothly, but I still had to test all kinds of combinations and occasionally found more ways I could improve it. I also ran into the problem of needing more material and had to go exchange more stuff for junk and then prep the junk in order to make them useful. Then, I went right back to creating my first puppets. I even added some pipes and tubes in order to allow it to have a power source. These were outfitted to be powered by Chemtech. Luckily for me I hand the necessary requirements for making the required power source.
I took a whole month to finish the metal forms of the puppets and to create a strong metal wire and then to wire them throughout the puppets' systems, so that each movement would get the right reaction. During this time, since I knew I would need a few chemicals to power my puppets and a few more to use as weapons, I grew a few new plants.
I had hoarded a lot of those poison fruits from the Doctor plant and finally decided to put it to good use. I first got a few pots full of soil and then buried one fruit in each. I then created a fungus that could absorb the poison from the fruit as nutrients and then give said nutrients, with the mutagenic properties from the pollution still intact, to another plant. I then created one plant that I needed in each pot. As the plants grew, the plants mutated slightly and became more potent. I kept these plants on the roof of The Last Drop, so that no one would mess with as these plants could be quite dangerous. Everyday, I would go up to the roof and place another fruit into the soil so that the fungus could do it's job. The plants were normal, besides the potency increase due to the fungus, but they already had names in this world. The only one I could name, was the fungus, so I named it a Nurse Spore. As it works in tandem with the Doctor Plant's fruit and feeds other plants like an IV drip would.
Once I was done with the puppets' bodies I started working on the chemicals. I of course wore protective gear and made sure the lab had ventilation to make sure that there wasn't a build up of noxious fumes. I then went to pluck the components I needed from the plants on the roof of the building. From there, it was just a matter of prepping the ingredients and mixing them in the right way using the provided lab equipment. I was thankful for my knowledge on the subject and to the people who provided the lab and equipment. By the time I was done, there were a few vials of different chemicals. I quickly, yet carefully poured them into the right containing vials that could use them to power Chemtech. Then. I installed them into their respective puppets.
After Everything was inserted into the right place, I closed the torso compartment of the puppets and turned them one. Once activated, The chemical in the puppets churned, bubbled and then moved through the puppets' bodies by using the installed pipes and tubes. The two puppets were of different designs and as the Chemtech activated, they both glowed a slight green color.
I was glad it worked as normally shimmer was used as a power source, but I didn't have access to it. Luckily, Shimmer was made from the things affected by the pollution in Undercity. With the fruits of the Doctor plant and the Nurse spore working together, I was able to give the plants used a similar property and therefore the finished product had the same property, but better since it was a mix of the different plants.
I quickly put the rings connected to the puppets' strings on my fingers and began to move them around. As they stood and move, I could see the finished product in their full glory. The one of the left was a dark dirt like color with a face that looked like a ghoul's with stitches across the mouth and eyes. It carried two sickles, one in each hand and they were connected to a small chain that attach to the puppet and could extend out if the sickle was ever thrown. I also knew that if I did a different motion, it would spray out and improved version of Scarecrow's fear toxin that had now also been impowered by shimmer...kinda. This Puppet was named Scarecrow, for obvious reasons.
The other was designed a small jester. It had the hat, the shoes and the puffy shirt and trouser, but it was monochrome, only black and white. Its face had a larger than life smile and big eyes, but something about them seemed off to say the least. It also carried a small box on its back that had a face on each side with a different expression. This puppet carried no main weapons like the other, but had more hidden features. It could release poison needles from it finger tips like bullets. It could release Joker gas from its mouth. It's palms has a button that would send a powerful charge of electricity through the body of whoever got touched by it. It took awhile to recreate Joker's joy buzzer. It could also spray out acid from the second button from the top of it's shirt.
The box on it's back was a special Item I had asked for when it passed a month. It was a storage cube. Not a magic one, the lid would have to be opened and an item pulled out. It was from some high tech world and it used some advanced future technology to create a space larger on the inside than the outside and items would shrink when put inside and grown when taken out. It was quite comical to see that sometimes, so I felt sort of compelled to add it onto this puppet. I had to designs machines that could fit along the inner walls of the box that would store items and push said items toward the top. This allowed me to invent a lot of gadgets and tools that the puppet could use and then I redesigns the exterior to fight the whole jester motif. I could make the puppet open the box and pull out an Item that would be thrown as a projectile or placed as a trap.
In the box, there were the iconic jumping dentures, replacement parts for the needles and gas, smoke bombs filled with joker gas or fear toxin and tiny wrapped gift boxes that contained a trapped item. There were cupcakes, cigars, candy and other stuff, but they were all traps. Some boxes were bigger than others and contained other more things, larger things, or deadlier things. There were also a few replacement parts and my artificer tool set in there in case I need to make repairs while out. I named this puppet Joker.
For the next month, I did nothing but practice using these puppets. First it was one at a time, then it was both at the same time. I had to perform maintenance a few times and even got some new parts that I used to upgrade or replace some parts. I even had a safety mode for them. It locked all the hidden arsenal and prevented the release of the gases. I was able to show it off to Vander and Mother while it was in safe mode, but I told Silco a little bit about what they could 'possibly' do. I made sure to keep it quite 'hypothetical'.
After all that was done, I chose my reward for the month. I chose to get a Junker's Storage Chest. That's what it was called. It worked well with my situation, as it was essentially another storage item that held a lot of stuff inside it, but more than that, it was made to hold junk and machinery. Any junk or machinery placed inside would get repaired and maintained so that there would be no more damaged items. I would still need to polish some items, but the prep work time was shortened and the amount of scrap produced was less. It just made it easier for future puppet making and saves space. Other items can be stored in the chest, but they won't receive the same effect if they are not metals or machinery.
(A/N: I made it so he could do small projects at the moment. Nothing large, but still useful.)
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