Chapter 99 - The Dome

*( mood song: "Jamie N Commons - Rumble And Sway")

Waking up early the next day, Erik arrived refreshed at the construction site, standing with Inky at the crater's border, both wearing their power armors, as hundreds of enormous rocks hanging from airbags approached. The army also guarding the surroundings to protect from any Abyssal who dared coming to the surface.

Inky saw him thinking and asked, "it's going fine right?"

Erik: "yeah... they are doing fine but... I was thinking... how this place will look like in 100 years..."

Inky: "well... I don't know, the Elder's said that they would be happy if they at least recover what they lost..."

Erik: "that's the thing... I wanna know more, now that I'm here... I wanna search for traces of the primordials, humans back on earth are on the edge, I need to know how the primordials did it and take that knowledge back..."

Inky: "what's a primordial?"

Erik: "oh, true... well, they were the ones that created this entire planet and lots of them in other places, an ancient race"

Inky laughed *giggle* "hahaha, good joke, no one can create a planet-" she saw Erik wasn't laughing though.

Erik: "I'm not joking, I come from a planet far away and I mysteriously reached here with a rocket, with my mission failing maybe millions of humans on earth will loose hope and their new home. The primordials had technology that even sounds like magic, like the evolutionary field covering this planet, it should be some kind of radiation but I just can't comprehend it..."

Inky didn't understand most of what he said but even then she told him "I'm sure you will find a way" and gave him a hug as their power armors clanqued with the impact "oh, I forgot I was wearing it"

Erik: "Yeah, it's like a second skin right?... sigh, well let's go down there, U wanna see the crab caves, since I exterminated them at least I will keep some documentation of how they lived"

They jumped down, soon landing at the stone chamber down below, a cloud emerging from the mud.

Erik looked around and he could still see dozens of octopeople and hybrids picking up corpses, the floor and walls of the chamber were also full of bullet holes 'If you do something... you do it right, with luck we will raise those eggs like hounds or just like cattle like those pigfish, I will make a pigfish fenced area once the forge is activated-' "huh?" he turned to the side as Inky had tapped his shoulder.

Inky: "what now?"

Erik: "well, the AI program in the glasses will tell workers what to do, so we will focus on walking down the side tunnels, but be alert, we don't know if there's still anything alive"

Inky nodded "alright" holding her rifle firmly.

They went down the biggest cave tunnel they saw, as they activated their power armor lights, the tunnel was pretty irregular on the ceiling, but the floor was smoothened out, a clear indicator of frequent use. Other that some small algae the tunnels seemed devoid of life. After 10 minutes they arrived at a dead end full of rubble.

Inky: "now what? this is a dead end..." and started to turn around.

Erik stopped her though "no... look at the marks on the floor..." there were lines leading to the rubble "the tunnel might have collapsed or they collapsed it on purpose... they can dig through rock, so this rubble ain't much for them" he clipped the rifle to a coupling on his back, leaving his hands free as he started moving rocks out of the way "give a hand too"

Inky nodded and imitated him, taking rocks off the rabble until there was a small hole at the top, and only some rocks at the bottom.

Erik took a small camera off his side and stuck it inside, seeing on a screen on his arm plenty of crabs guarding the other side.

Rose: [why not just asking me? I know what's at the other side, or you want it to be a surprise?]

Erik: [Nah, I was about to ask you, this is the explanation for Inky, I can't tell her the planet's consciousness is helping me scan through the walls right?]

Rose: [...that makes sense I guess, so? do you wanna know? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

Erik: [yes please]

Rose: [alright, there seems to be three injured fortress crabs guarding the tunnel while worker crabs dig the rock in the direction of the cliff and other workers carry eggs... they seem to be working till they drop dead from exhaustion]

Erik: [sigh... I really hope we can tame them somehow, maybe replacing their brains with computers I could make organic digging machines... and that tunnel will be a good asset too, I feel tempted to just let them finish the tunnel... but it's safer doing it myself, now to kill them... a poison bomb inside the tunnel would be great, but that would also kill the eggs and make the meat inedible, maybe just a small one to stun them... ] He turned to Inky and told her "alright, there seems to be guards, we will try capturing some worker and fortress crabs alive" Inky nodded and he dropped a small bomb through the hole, and closing it again with a rock.

*boom!* a muffled sound was heard as they waited some minutes for the poison to stun the crabs.

When 5 minutes passed, they opened the passage, putting the rocks to the side, and finding 3 barely moving fortress crabs at the other side.

Inky: "I don't get it, you normally use those as smoke screens as its a weak poison, why are they poisoned so much?"

Erik: "It's just concentrated inside the tunnel, now help me tie up their legs and pincers", they did so, as he would make Anhuka and her people transport them to the greenhouse for tests later.

Going down the tunnel they found 3 half dead exhausted workers and thinking 'their claws remind me of mantis shrimp... better not get hit...', they also tied them up as well, as they would be great biomachines once set up with a new brain or part of it. Reaching the end of the tunnel they found 5 more workers protecting a pile with dozens of eggs, Erik was a little vigilant at first, but seeing the crabs barely able to move at all, he relaxed, and along with Inky easily tied them up.

Then two of the eggs actually hatched though, one seemed to be a fortress crab and the other a worker, their shell being entirely white. He then saw them sniff one of the dead crabs and started eating it, only to spit it out 'would you look at that... no cannibalism... that's surprisingly weird', the small crabs looked up at Erik confused as they sniffed again, and soon turned aggressive, trying to attack Erik's feet. Erik sighed "sigh, a failure huh?, well whatever" he lifted his foot and easily crushed them with 2 stomps.

Coming out of the tunnel, Erik stopped a nearby hybrid that was picking up crab corpses back to their tribe "call Anhuka", the crab woman instantly nodded and dropped what she was doing to help him, her face a mix of fear and respect.

Minutes later, Anhuka quickly came running as fast as her body allowed her, sliding on the muddy ground by the end and colliding with Erik's power armor "oh my~ so careless of me~..." her hands caressing all of Erik's power armor as she snickered with a cheeky face.

Erik: "so...-"

Anhuka gasped "that's right! why you called for me?" she looked at Inky sideways "are you gonna impregnate me again~?"

Inky frowned and was about to retort, but Erik talked first "no, have your people carry the tied up crabs in there to the greenhouse lab, I'm gonna try... training them..., and take the eggs with you to your village, try to raise them too, keep them clean and oxygenated".

Anhuka bowed and said "as you command master!" running away to complete her tasks.

Time passed as they checked more tunnels, finding more crabs and easily reducing them, as most of them had suffocated and died.

Coming out of the last tunnel hours later, Erik observed as the octopeople set the last stone in its position behind them

Erik: [it does look reaaally solid]

Rose:[ yeah, and once I connect it to the base I will fill the gaps (･ิω･ิ)]

Erik: [actually, I had a good idea for filling those holes, make me a circular drill and I will ask someone to cut granite cylinders out of the rock wall, if we make them a tight fit then the drill holes would be easily filled]

Rose: [yeah, and I would save a lot of metal too]

Erik: [right~? by the way, can you make be a titanium knife?]

Rose: [why? titanium doesn't hold an edge (´_ゝ`)]

Erik: [yeah, but if you add diamond pieces on top and put it into a chamber, using the CVD (Chemical Vapor Deposition) method, it can use a plasma cloud at 900*C and it detaches carbon and adds it to the diamonds, making the diamond seeds grow and cover the knife]

Rose: [...that... could work... interesting (◉ω◉)]

The next morning, the dome would be finished and covered in sand, and with Rose connected, the nanobots had already started taking over and filling the gaps, coating the interior in a nanobot layer first as the drill holes had been filled with granite cylinders, the next step would be to turn the rough tunnels and side caves into hallways and rooms, once that was done and the dome covered with sand and with sealing doors the hybrids could start moving in, filling it with air and start digging a spiral staircase in the middle to expand their city.

--- Deep below the ground ---

A chubby and short crabman was impatiently waiting, he looked at a nearby soldier "has there been any reports yet?"

soldier: "none for now my king"

the King wondered aloud "why would it take them so long to kill a group of barbarians..."

the soldier seemed undecided but in the end, he gave his honest opinion "what if they met a beast in the way?"

King: "that's a good point... they might be in need of reinforcements... send the other regiments then!"

the soldier gasped: "we can't do that my king! the fire tribe would attack us the moment we show weakness! you know they have been eyeing our alchemists for a long time already..."

the King gritted his teeth annoyed "those dogs... send some scouts to the fire tribe, and some to the cliff to see the situation"

the soldier bowed "yes my king!" and went away.

unknown to him, his king was thinking 'hmph, you dare talk back to me... seems like you will be sent in the next suicide mission kekeke~'

--- deeper caves ---

Meanwhile, in deeper caves with nearby lava, there was a big tribe, in the center of it sat a just slightly above average looking crabman if you ignored the multiple scars on his exoskeleton, he exuded an air of confidence as he was wearing a complicated armor, and sat on a big throne made out of bones.

By the side stood 12 silent and armoured crab men of different sizes and with different weapons, all wearing helmets that covered their faces.

A buff crabman then came running and bending before the crabman on the throne, saying excitedly "my lord! our scouts inform us the shadow claw tribe is weakened! should we invade?"

Lord: "kukuku~ finally! this place is good for making weapons but there's barely any food and it's full of dangers... finally, we will take what we deserve, send scouts immediately!"

the buff crabman bowed again "yes my lord!" storming out immediately.

Lord: 'that chubby bastard... you refused to trade food with me, wanting to starve my people... this is retribution... with our blacksmiths and their alchemists and food... our soldiers will be invincible... kukukuku~'