FJTTS - Chapter 17 (Patreon)

"One, two, three, four,"

"Beep"

"Five, six, seven, eight,"

"Beep beep beeeeeeep!"

"Nine, te-"

"Beee-eee-eppp bip bip."

"Would you stop that obnoxious beeping already?" Arthur, being interrupted out of his jumping jack routine, yelled at the divibot which was cheerfully floating nearby. 

"What beeping?" Digibee asked in confusion. Its holographic eye going wide open in confusion.

"Your beeping! And in the first place, you aren’t one of those censoring AIs used by shady organizations. If you want to sing the song, just say out the lyrics. Why beep?”, Arthur said, wiping the sweat off his forehead.

“Biological supremacist!” the bot yelled out at the accusation. “I was singing every word of the lyrics. Do not discriminate just because you are unable to comprehend it.”

“No, I’m pretty sure you were just beeping.” Arthur said skeptically.

“Well, did you take into account the frequency, wavelength, waveshape, amplitude of the so called ‘beeps’? They were all DISTINCT! Each carrying more information than your outdated biological vocal cords will ever be able to transmit.”

‘Is that how it’s supposed to be. Obnoxious beeping is singing now?’ Arthur grimaced, but couldn’t find a way to refute Digibee.

The bot, realizing it had one-up’ed the sentinel, continued to beep its way around the yard with renewed vigor. All Arthur could do was sigh.

“That’s not right Arthur. You need to properly apologize after falsely accusing Digibee like that.” Zoe, who was doing yoga nearby, called out to him. Apparently, the flexible motions of the Indian yoga biyam kept her tentacles in shape.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m sorry.” Arthur reluctantly complied. He then cast another furtive glance at the floating bot and went back to start another repetition of jumping jacks. 

It’s been one week since he started adding exercise to his everyday life, and after hours and hours of tireless hardship, encouragement from Zoe, scientific methods and simulations by Digibee, pats from the cat, he had finally reached his peak…. Losing 4 kilograms.

Ok, he actually only lost 3.

But according to professionals (the bot), it was because he gained some muscles too.

It would be a lie to say he wasn’t disappointed at the small progress, but it was what it was. Even though he didn’t really make that much ‘amazing gainz’, he could physically feel how much stronger and ‘efficient’ his body had become. There were some changes still going on below his flab that totally justified his continuous intake of junk food and sugary drinks.

After all, bodily transformation, even the godly kind, needed glucose and fiber. 

On other hand, there had been little in the ways of updates regarding godly matters. He did urge Vileplume everyday if there was something to do, to which the loli usually replied vaguely. 

Fortunately, just this morning she sent them an instant message stating she had found some clues regarding ‘illegal space teleporting activities’ caused by something on or near Earth. And she’d need Arthur to investigate it.

“Beep?”

“???”

“BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP!”

“Oh for the love of-“ 

“Anomaly detected!” Before Arthur could yell out at the bot in frustration for the sudden jarring alarms, the bot’s eyes went into red alert mode and it started projecting a hologram of the area.

Realizing it wasn’t a ‘song’ anymore but something serious, Arthur asked, “What happened?”

“A large number of moderately high threat level combat practitioners just teleported all around the surrounding area. In a radius of 200 kilometers there are currently 58 energy signatures of moderately high threat level individuals, and the number is rising.” The bot reported, showing a real time map of the energy signatures.

“Arthur!” Zoe, stopping her yoga, also added, “I can also sense them. A huge number of Earth’s tier nine and ten personnel have appeared. This is bad.”

“Why?” he asked.

“The last time this many appeared at one point was during world war III.” Zoe answered grimly.

“Oh boy.” He frowned. Not liking what Zoe was indicating.

“They are converging.” The bot continued. “Heading towards… the large source signal right outside this town. The… fragment as the locals call it.”

“Could that be why they are here? Fighting for resources?”

“No! Impossible. Sources are rare but the one outside definitely does not warrant this much attention.”

“They have started fighting!” The bot hurriedly added. But before Arthur could ask more, 

“Phew.” it ‘sighed’ out in relief. “Luckily they were smart enough to set up a space lock around the combat zone. The battle should not affect reality.”

Zoe also visibly relaxed. She saw Arthur’s confused look, and explained, “They are fighting in a parallel dimension, so harm would be limited there. This means it isn’t all out war yet.”

But then she added, “It’s still strange though. I checked out the source outside a few days ago. It was one of the rarer, weirder ones. But not really… of use to many organizations. The niche kind. There must be something else going it.”

Arthur nodded, then asked the bot to immediately monitor all information in the area. While the mundane and supernatural were separated at first glance, in reality they were also deeply intertwined. Maybe they could find clues from the local government intranet to shed some light onto the situation.

He, on the other hand directly contacted the loli goddess asking for instructions. As an absolute newbie who had only read about 10 pages of the sentinel instruction manual, he wasn’t about to take independent action without supervision.

Ok, he just needed her to take the fall if he messed up.

“Who is this?! How did you get this number?! If you are non Xylnareon personnel who is just prank calling when the great mighty adult goddess is watching her favouri-“

“Farking answering machine!” Arthur threw his arms up in frustration at how unreliable the crazy loli could be.

But then he got a call back via the divine network. 

“Uh, hello? Sorry dude was at work.” The loli sheepishly said.

“Never mind that. There’s a situation on moon.”

“Hmm? Yeah, I see. From the looks of it, it got nothing to do with you lot. Lemme double check, hmm, ya. No, ya. Wait, it’s actually your fault.”

“What?”

“You heard what I said. Let me record this. Wait, this is a chance! This is your first mission. Figure out why you messed up, and solve it. This actually came at a good time. Like a little tutorial mission about Emblematic Dominance! Toodles!”  

“Whaaat? Wait do-“

“Beep!”

“Hello?” Arthur spoke a few more time into the network. But there was no reply. He sighed, and looked at the bot and Zoe, knowing they couldn’t hear his conversation with the goddess.

So, he repeated what the loli told him.

But they were left just as confused as he was, not knowing what the goddess meant. Arthur asked the bot if he could sue his boss for not giving information that was already available before starting the mission. But the bot said he could not since god said it was his fault.

‘How unreasonable.’ Arthur could only complain inwardly.

“By the way, can you confirm the status of the battlefield again?” He asked the bot. Unsure of what action to take without more information.

“Beep! It’s kind of hard without any sensors set up inside the space lock. All I can say is no one is using techniques of mass destructions… yet.”

“Well, that isn’t ominous at all.”

Zoe thought for a while, then suggested, “I can try sneaking it. I think I can get in without alerting anyone.”  The bot proposed its own idea, “Actually, if Zoe and I use our specialties together we could easily get some sensors in.”

“How?” Arthur asked.

The bot explained, “Well I got Minibees yes?”  “Mini-what?”

“Minibees! These!” It floated Infront of Arthur, and he could see that from both sides of its spherical body little hatches opened up. There were some tiny alerts in AI voices coming from somewhere about launching of the fighter squadron alpha and beta, and miniature versions of Digibees started flying out.

“I got sensor drones!” The bot said haughtily. “And they can fly at about 80 kmph. They can also turn invisible.”

And, to Arthur’s amazement, the ‘Minibees’ started to flicker and turn completely invisible before his very eyes. He could still sense they were there for some reason, but his physical senses could not register them.

The bot went on, “Now Zoe. Do your thing.”  The Eldritch magic caster nodded, and made some motions with her hand. A few mana circles lit up around the now invisible Minibees. And then even Arthur’s other ‘sense’ could no longer sense the tiny drones.

“Alright!” The bot cheered.

For once, Arthur was seriously impressed by the sapient gizmo globe. He thought it was a useless floating eyeball, when in reality it was a Quasar Fire-class bulk imperial divibot! It got its own fleet!

He gave them both a thumbs up and asked, “Can you livestream what the Minibees see?”

“Uhh, is a single strand of Spaghetti called Spaghetto?”

“Great! I’ll go make popcorn.” Zoe said as she ran off to the kitchen. 

“And don’t forget juice!” Arthur reminded her. He then asked Digibee to set up the TV while he quickly changed out of his sweaty gym wear. 

To be honest Arthur was a bit panicky when the loli goddess said the sudden influx of combatants on the moon was his fault. Too panicked to come up with any proper course of action other than to ‘confirm the situation’.

It was a blessing that he actually had some competent helpers, no matter how psychotic/bugged they seemed like normally.

His mouth curled up into a smile. 

Then he remembered, “By the way, where’s the cat?”