Cain opened his eyes, plan in place. He packed up, leaving only what mattered.
He checked the surveillance feed and eased up, if only a bit.
"Let's get to work."
Leaving his gear on the mound, he started pulling at the native plant fibers.
They resisted at first but held firm in his grip — strong and flexible. Cain grinned with satisfaction.
'Just what he was looking for.'
With close to a hundred kilos gathered, Cain made his way back to the mound, hands already working the weave.
He dug through his tools and grabbed the rope-weaving device, built to twist raw fiber into tight, usable cord.
'Appliances like this weren't made to look pretty. They're built to make life easier.'
"I know old man. I know."
While the machine whirred behind him, Cain crept past the shardlings and dragged out the elephant's severed limbs.
'Let me put these where I need them to be.'
As he dragged the heavy sacks of meat, Cain stopped sharpening rocks on the go, slicing through nearby logs with quick, heavy cuts.
"I need to finish this before another group arrives."
Finished weaving the ropes, he started laying traps on the vicinity.
After a while, warm cast of the sun shone upon him as it rose above the extremely imposing Borderwall.
'I bet no one's cracking that wall fifty klicks tall. What time is it?'
[09:07 AM]
Thuds echoed in Cain's ears as shardlings gnawed on ore and stone — feeding like they knew what was coming.
Their sensing crystals flicked to him, but their minds were wired for noise and tremors. Silent and steady, Cain moved, and they let him pass, unaware.
He placed his devices sparingly, each drop light and deliberate.
Placing the last one device for his elaborate scheme, he squinted his eyes in the distance.
'I hope everyone is alright.'
Cain spotted it in the distance—the Roosevelt Fortress.
Even from hundreds of kilometers away, its towering form was unmistakable.
Taking a deep breath, he readied himself.
'Let me drink something caffeinated, just in case things get ugly.'
While having his beverage, he scrolled through his playlist.
[Beethoven – Symphony No. 5]
[Gioachino Rossini – The Barber of Seville]
[Schubert – Ave Maria]
"Hmm. Let's pick this one."
A single beat — an intro to something artful.
The speakers chirped to life, embedding harmonics in all eight cardinal points — playing the comedic prequel to Mozart's tune.
The shardlings stirred, heads cocked with silent curiosity. They broke formation, each drifting down a different path, as if chasing answers only they could sense.
'I just need to wait.'
Cain watched through multiple surveillance feeds, tracking each shardling's movement.
One stood out — drawn in by the sound, it approached a tree and began tapping it softly, almost tenderly, as if hoping it would respond.
As the comedic opera surged, Cain fired.
"Figaro... Figaro... Figaro... Figaro... Figaro!!!"
A noosed cluster of logs snapped forward, slicing the air in perfect tempo.
The shardling tipped over, limbs twitching as it tried to stand, still silent, still unaware.
It barely felt the hit — just a tickle.
Cain moved in for the kill, his gaze fixed on the shardling's backside where the core pulsed.
He drove his blade in, ripped it free without hesitation.
Steady and symphonically methodical.
The rest didn't even give the murder a glance.
With a quick shot from his device, Cain launched the rope.
Leaves cascaded from the canopy, settling over the corpse in a quiet, concealing veil.
'One down, Thirteen more to go.'
"Let's see what we got."
Cain pulled up the terminal, switching between surveillance, social, and shop—checking the appraisal fast.
He needed to be sure this wasn't a waste of time.
"There it is."
[Average Quality - Passable] [14 Gold]
[Visual Appraisal: Hairline cracks, small bumps with cuboidal shape, luminosity flickering every few minutes.]
"Oh, there's another one."
It pounded the cliff face with sharp, violent strike.
Each impact was echoing like angry piano chords slammed without rhythm, just raw emotion.
Fifty meters above, jagged rocks jutted out. With a bit of shaping,
He shaped seven jagged stones into brutal weapons.
Cain fired. The clay cradling the stones dried instantly, fissures spreading through its surface.
With sharp cracks, the earth gave way—massive stones, each over two meters, slid free and thundered down one after another.
"?"
A questioning tone, unable to comprehend what was happening.
The arms three-armed shardling lost all its limbs.
All three arms gone, the shardling writhed, its cries sharp and desperate.
"Fortunatissimo per verita!"
Sixty. Seventy. Eighty. With three presses, the volume drowned out its pleas for help.
It was a creature with thoughts.
'My legs didn't exist. I couldn't run, beg —nothing.'
Its body knew the truth of what was about to happen.
The man walking right in front of it. He was death itself.
The shardlings thought stops as extreme pain assaulted him.
Shard by shard, inch by inch — the core was torn out of his cavities before his very eyes.
'Respect the prey. The second you don't, you'll feel yourself being dragged six feet under.'
"Rest in peace shardling, your nightmare is over."
Cain soaked the brittle soil. Mud crept over the body like a second skin.
Its form blurred, buried beneath clay — its presence murky to the senses of nearby shardlings.
Cain stashed the core, saving the quality check for later.
Looking at the monitoring system, Cain was able to watch something firsthand.
The shardlings crept closer.
Slow, deliberate, like dancers before the final note.
Then they began to sing — discordant, metallic tones trying to imitate the voice of a man.
'I suppose this is going to happen? Curse those online courses.'
From their warped bodies, limbs bent and cracked inward, molding into a grotesque sphere.
The shardlings had become dolls crushed into a lump and re-baked with malice.
They weren't just fusing — they were becoming something new.
At its peak, light flickered — cores humming in sync, alive with something wrong.
Not one to be deterred by the mystery of this world, Cain acted.
Rotation. Vibration. Sharpen. Harden.
The thin sword spun with surgical accuracy, a literal high-speed mining drill.
As the blade made contact, cracks started forming on the amalgamation.
'I feel like those construction workers on grandpa's storybook.'
Every second bled into the next.
Water ran, hissing against the heat of the drill.
Its rhythm echoed — faint and eerie, woven into the music.
Crack!
The stone shell caved, but it held its stance — still, and unnervingly rhythmic with the beat.
The crescendo rose — another Figaro shrieked through the speakers.
'I can't tell the music from the mimicry anymore. I should. I should be careful.'
He started excavating what seems to be a merging core?
"Not flickering. Hmmm… I bet this is thirty gold."
The rock twitched.
Cain checked the live feed — nothing.
"Maybe just a falling stone."
He kept hammering at the most protruding crystal.
The shell flaked away like brittle pastry beneath his drill.
Cain had seen horrors too massive to fear a small fry like this.
'Right... just another small fry.'
The feeling of striking the motherlode brushed away his fears.
Click. Click. Click. Pop.
"Let us see what we have here."
Cain checked his terminal, comparing the core in his hand to listings online.
A smile crept up his face, success.
"Thirty gold in the bag. I just need to cash them out. Hopefully."
He dug deeper. The core emerged, its lumen burning into his eyes.
"Another one —"
The shardling formation suddenly shivered.