Committing to Zugzwang

Stepping onto the dried sands of the Dead Steppes, Daegna’ar, and his battalion started their march toward the northern complex, which was attacked by the celestials on the recordings. As the march went on, the search parties caught up with Daegna’ar with reports of their findings.

Dr. Holmes was nowhere to be found.

Even though Daegna’ar was no mere mortal, and at this point he was more a machine than a living creature, his chest felt like it was bound by chains, squeezing all remainder of hope out of his being. Nothing made any sense without her by his side. He must figure out how to find her and bring her back. Nevertheless, the eerie energy research will allow his army to be much more efficient. Maybe there will be something that can be done after they get situated in the complex and start harvesting the energy. The training simulations went quite well, and the morale of the troops was at an all-time high, some looked like they were going to an amusement park.

Meanwhile, Ultar Corp. got word from the spied inserted into Daegna’ar’s army. This prompted them to give the go-ahead to Ultec Robotics to deploy troops to tail Daegna’ar in Infernum. The group tailing Daegna’ar comprised of a few hundred Ultec soldiers and robotic units, and upwards of 500 Mercenary Cuties. They were mostly adventurers from the surrounding areas of Tron City.

On their march to the complex, the army encountered a river, which was dubbed “the river of tears'', because whenever personnel crossed it, they fell to the ground, weeping, unable to continue for no less than an hour. Pretty much everyone who crossed went through the same experience and snapped out of it. After crossing the river, the battalion was very close to the complex that was emanating a beam of light from its depths into the sky, seemingly never-ending. According to the scouts, the complex was still guarded by a significant count of demons and if Daegna’ar wants to settle in that complex, a battle is unavoidable.

Starting the siege, Daegna’ar gave orders to the attack groups to surround the point of interest and pressure the demons from all sides. The demons were lazy and out of practice, and underestimated the Cuties moving in on their territory, especially those who looked very much like a demon, but somehow from another Infernum.

The resident warlock started to conjure a message for Adamanthryx. Unlike the technologies of the overworld, messages in Infernum are sent by powerful beings in the form of sigils that take time to arrive to the recipient and can be seen by most creatures of Infernum. The warlock didn’t manage to send word to his masters in Adamanthryx, as he sent the first glyph he was found by the Daegna’ar’s forces and shot. The whole complex was taken within a few hours, all but a few demons were defeated, and those that survived were captured as prisoners.

The science teams were starting to settle in, while the army collapsed halls and fortified positions inside and outside of the complex. The practical research of the Infernum energies has finally started, a portal was opened to the Soranus-13 facility, and critical research personnel was finally able to start working. As they worked, a more stable portal was opened from Tron City, for supplies, equipment, and data transfer.

While exploring the complex, a secret entrance was discovered. These doors led deeper underground. In the deeper halls of the complex, Cuties found the knowledge keepers, who did not put up a fight and were taken as prisoners without any bloodshed.

At first, the science teams started to establish communications through their gathered knowledge of the Nimrod language in writing. From there, learning and self-evolving A.I. was added to expand and ease the communication between Cuties and the Keepers.

In the deeper chambers, Cuties found the source of the never-ending beam. Some unknown machinery was located. Through interrogation of the Keepers, it was gathered that these machines take apart the souls placed into them, and emit pure energy through that process. The soul is completely consumed during this process. No wonder the creatures from Above are trying to take this from the hands of the demons, likely afraid of their Lords creating a doomsday weapon, which will destroy the balance and send everything into chaos. The Keepers also threatened the Cuties, that the Lord of Adamanthryx will not let them have this place, and soon the demons of the second most powerful city of Infernum will be breaking down the barricades and skinning all of the interlopers alive for their invasion.

The scientist teams worked day and night, using Dr. Holmes’ serums to amplify the speed and endurance of the workforce. In just a few days, they have managed to make a breakthrough with the eerie energy utility. It could be stabilized and used as a power source for the portals, and other equipment, including weaponry. They have harvested as much energy as they could, and distributed it accordingly, requesting more resources for the conversion from Daegna’ar’s soldiers. They were to capture wandering souls nearby and bring them to the machines, to be used to gather more eerie energy.

Meanwhile, the Keepers were transferred to the Soranus-13 facility and placed under guard, while their biology and genomics were studied by the scientists. The main goal was to make a transportable prototype of eerie harvesters, and the Keepers were the surefire way to find out how. But they did not budge. As days marched on, the Keepers were also gathering information on the Cuties and their base of operations. Knowing that the portal is open at all times, they’ve studied their surroundings, waiting…

Shortly, the R&D teams made working tech for on-the-fly transcribers and translators from the Infernum tongue. All of this tech was shipped right away to the officers of Daegna’ar’s army, him included.

The eerie energy augmentations went ahead as well, to a point where even the mighty Darkir-Tungu was imbued with it. Now the sword was cutting through anything and everything like a hot knife through butter. This impressed Daegna’ar, yet, his mind was occupied by different perils, and he was not ready to move on further with the campaign.

As the portal was open, within days it became a common thing for everyone, and the portals were guarded only from the Soranus-13 side, to prevent invasion, just in case. Until sigils shot through the portal and flew off somewhere to the east. Daegna’ar saw this first-hand and knew right away that the Keepers sent word about everything to their master this time around. The time started working against them.

In a fit of rage, he stepped through the portal and snarled at the guards to open the cells. The Keepers tried to defend themselves using defensive sigils, yet Darkir-Tungu was not affected by the magic of the Keepers, it cut right through the shields, and slaughtered four out of six Keepers, as a warning to those left alive. The Keepers realized that this powerful being is no less than the lords of Dis and Adamanthryx, and offered their services to a worthy leader. Thanks to the new translator tech, the Keepers could talk to Daegna’ar and offer to be ambassadors for him and his army in Infernum, in return for their lives.

He accepted their offer and they taught him how to use sigils, and educated him on the recent history of Infernum, along with the power dynamics of minor and major demons and how their power materializes upon defeat. They also clued him in on what was the message sent by the other Keepers. The messages contained all the information about the portals and a way to finally get to the overworld. The messages urged the lord-regent Aelzebuub to gather forces to take back the complex and do all he can to keep the Soranus-13 portal open.

The Keepers advised Daegna’ar to continue his march towards Dis, recruiting every soul they found along the way for their army and reaping those opposed to the idea of walking under Daegna’ar’s banner for eerie energy. Daegna’ar agreed that it was time to resume the march.

The entrance to the harvesting machine was blown up and caved in, to make it nearly impossible to get to, and closed the portal to the Soranus facility. Right after, Daegna’ar and his army moved towards another temple such as this one west from there. It was said that it recently was attacked by celestials, and it would be an easy target to take over, even with it being a bit banged up from the recent battle it would serve as a good forward operating base positioned south-west from Dis. There also was the third temple of this kind South of the first temple. It was occupied by the Aelzebuub’s warriors and warlocks and heavily fortified.

As the Daegna’ar’s army marched further west, they started to encounter more and more Abyssals, along with wandering souls. The army tried to capture as many as possible, to use for harvesting later, at the same time, they started to convert more and more souls into the army. These conversions allowed the science teams to conduct more research and gather more information on this plane of existence, along with its artifacts, allowing for a better understanding of how to use the eerie energy and the geographical information of the surrounding areas of Infernum.

The Army marched on for several days growing their numbers by a third, before finally reaching the west harvest temple. It was guarded by winged creatures with the faces of dogs, armed with spears of pure light. The guards noticed Daegna’ar’s army approaching the complex, and stood their ground, preemptively sending out troops to ween off the possible attacks. Learning of this Daegna’ar ordered the army to attack head-on and fight the winged beasts. The guardians put up a masterful fight, forcing Daegna’ar to suffer severe losses within his ranks. The warriors with eerie equipment finally caught up to the fight and started to turn the tide, fighting the guardians on even ground. A few of these guardians fell, and every one of them was called back by a horn, sounding from Above. They instantly disengaged and flew away from the temple, as soon as the horn sounded off. The temple was taken, and the research can continue.

The army settled in and started to fortify its positions around the complex, meanwhile, teams were sent in to clear the path to the harvester, and remove the rubble from the temple to set up a forward operating base for good.

Within hours the army managed to set up the harvester and started reaping the souls of the captured. Teams were sent out to capture more souls for harvesting from the surrounding area. Through that the army found more minor demons to recruit as well. The science team was conjuring more and more eerie energy, storing it in powerful portable batteries.

A week went by, and no retaliation came from the Above, nor the East. Perhaps, word came of the might that the Daegna’ar’s army possesses, and the opposing leaders opted to stay their hand for now. This allowed Daegna’ar to get distracted again by the one whose actions made him reach this point in the first place. The one who saved his mortal vessel, giving him the ability to fight once more, even after becoming a much lesser version of himself. The one who saw him through all of it and made him the strong leader that he is now.

A choice was made to find Eireen using all the resources they possess. The Keepers advised Daegna’ar that the more demons he has under him, the better the odds of finding Eireen would be. As the network grew, so did his power and knowledge. It became clear that to find Eireen, they would need to visit Sahmael the Omniscient, he would be the only one who could know where she is in all of Infernum.

Within days his army built several bridges across Acheron and expanded their reach for lost souls. After fortifying for nearly two weeks, Deagna’ar and his battalion moved onwards, leaving behind the science team of Kenshi Corp. with a protective detail to continue their efforts with the Infernum technologies, and energy research.

The Keepers also told Daegna’ar of the legend of Abbadon, who was once thought to be the most powerful being of Infernum but was now bound by the chains of Judecca way below in the lake of Cocytus. The way to reach the lake was through Dis.

As they crossed Acheron and started to roll over the hill, the army encountered a demon outpost that was abruptly attacked. The demons managed to send sigils north, and by what Deagna’ar could make out of it, it was going straight to the lord of Dis – Sahmael.