System Programmer

While a good part of him was still feeling uneasy, his mood was gradually improving. Part of it was forced, but he did his best to fill his mind with positive thoughts. In the end, the best way to move forward was to act like he always did, it was time to bring forth Joshua Lockman, crazy inventor. An entire laboratory left behind by a lost civilization full of unknown technology? Who wouldn't get excited about that? Joshua changed his outfit to look like a scientist you see in movies, wearing a large white lab coat. His legs were trembling, he had the sudden envy to start running all over the place and seeing all the wonderful things this place was guarding. He remained calm though, even with Delila gone, there might be some danger. It wasn't out of question there was some bizarre high tech laser system hidden somewhere. Well, even if there was he could most likely avoid it by discarding his body but he had caused enough trouble lately. He was, therefore, just calmly marching along the hallway after exiting the lab. The room was lighted by occasional lanterns, powered by a simple rune creating light. Their mere presence was motivating, if runes were used for an elementary task like lighting a room, it could only mean much more advanced ones were waiting to be discovered.

Before he forgot, he sent a message to Catherine.

"Sweetie, can you dump that woman's body in one of the vats?"

"... Why do you want to do that?" she asked somewhat confused.

"Well, obviously I'm going to preserve her as a trophy! She'll be the symbol of 'Mess with Joshua Lockman and this is how you'll end up!' " he answered although it wasn't as cheerful as usual.

"Drop the act with me, ok? You don't have to force yourself." Catherine told him with a hint of worry in her voice.

"Very well. Truth is, I think this woman might have runes in her body and I'd like to examine them. If we let her body out there, her body might start to rot and the runes might get damaged."

"I see. You don't have to do it alone though. I'll be by your side when you do it." she replied.

Catherine understood what he was talking about and while it made sense, considering the state she had put Joshua in, he would probably be uncomfortable examining her body.

"Our first autopsy together! Now that's an event to look forward to! I didn't know you were such a romantic!"

Catherine just laughed in reply and asked Boris to take care of Delila's body.

The map of the area had partially been revealed thanks to Catherine. Every floor beside this basement was in ruins so he didn't expect much from most of the building apart from archeological findings. He would still examine it all, of course, but the priority lied on the current floor. Catherine had spotted a few machines along the way, he soon reached the first one.

The machine was hanging on the upper part of the wall. It was some sort of tube with a glass lens at the end. Furthermore, as soon as Joshua got into its view, it started to move and point in his direction. Seeing this, he stopped moving. He carefully waved at it, no reaction. He then slowly moved around a bit, the machine slowly turned to keep an eye on him.

'It may look different than what I'm used to, but this is clearly some sort of camera,' he thought, 'It doesn't look like it's going to shoot at me, I guess it's not equipped with weapons, so it's a mere surveillance tool.'

He proceeded to scan the apparatus which revealed some runic patterns as well as a circuit heading into the wall. From what he could tell, the rune was responsible for keeping track of him now he had been spotted as well as recording what passed through the lens and sending the result through the current. Unfortunately, he couldn't enter the wall to follow the circuit and see where it would lead him. He supposed there was sort of guard post somewhere, where all the different camera would display what they saw. Well, the building was empty so he didn't worry about it and moved on.

He finally reached the staircase Catherine had descended. Apart from the way up, there were 4 directions one could take from here, including the one he just came from. Deciding to go clockwise, he entered the next hallway.

He spotted a few other cameras along the way and concluded this place must have been quite well guarded in the past. Apart from those, there was nothing of interest in the hallway apart the ruins of a few bizarre looking paintings. There were stripes in every direction and some random dots. At first, he wondered if they could be some secret code thing, but after careful inspection, they appeared to be mere art pieces. Must be Easan style… he wasn't a fan.

Like the entrance to the laboratory, this hallway also ended with a pair of double doors. Full of anticipation, he pushed them open. Unlike before, he didn't end up in a massive room, instead, he appeared to be in some sort of lobby. He saw the ruins of an office behind a counter, unlike the one in the lab this one had been completely abandoned. The lobby ended after about 10 meters, leading to a set of three doors. Sticking to basic logic, Joshua opened the one on the left and entered.

The room appeared to be some sort of atelier. Several wooden desks were spread all over the place. Some of them had large sheets of paper lying on them. Scanning the whole room, Joshua found spotted a reserve of drawing tools in a corner. The walls in the room weren't visible, hidden behind massive bookshelves. They were all filled with books of all sizes, including some incredible large tomes. Unconsciously, Joshua was already smiling. He approached one of the desks and picked up a random sheet of paper.

'An rune design? No, this is not complete... '

He quickly glanced through the other papers. They appeared to be half completed runes. He could tell the writing wasn't too old.

'Could Delila have been trying to make runes here?' he thought.

If she was doing that here, it could only mean one thing… He rushed over to a bookshelf and picked a random tome. His hands trembled as he saw the content: Rune designs! All much more advanced than the ones he already knew! He bit his lip, resisting the urge to start devouring the content of this entire place. There were two other rooms in this area…

Taking the book he was holding with him, he ran over to the next door.

This room was also a workshop but of a very different kind. There was a forge on the opposite side of the room. Some machine he didn't recognize was standing next to it. To the right, there was a stand containing various metal objects. A few of them were weapons, but there were also more mundane items. He picked up a sword and scanned it. As he expected there was a rune engraved on the hilt. He activated it and the blade caught fire. He ran over to the unknown device and examined it for a few minutes. Even with Luna's help, he wasn't entirely sure how it worked but he got the basic idea. This device was used to inscribe a rune on an object. This place was a runeforge!

Judging by how the rooms were divided, could it be that…? He barged into the last room, at this point he was going nearly insane of excitement. The smell of the place gave it away. It smelled like a freaking hospital. An operation table was located in the middle. There were several medical charts hanging on the wall. Like in the forge, he saw a few devices he didn't recognize, but this time he could directly tell what they were used for. Inscribing runes on a human body.