Reached Top 5 already!! This is the bonus chapter for reaching 600 Powerstones btw ;)
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Zeke followed the recipe and made a few more. The only pity was that there weren't enough varieties of Apricorns, so he couldn't craft things like Master Balls.
According to Pokémon rules, the lower the target's health, the higher the catch rate. Beating them to near death before attempting a capture was a pretty solid strategy.
"It seems you have found what you were looking for." The Lion took an extra glance at the unremarkable Poké Ball in Zeke's hand. He really couldn't understand why a man capable of saving Sanguinius would be so interested in a simple fruit.
Packing the Poké Balls away, the group traversed through stretches of ash and scorched earth until they arrived before the Red Moon Keep.
The surroundings were littered with countless shattered armor plates and twisted bone fragments. Zeke didn't see any patrols, nor did he spot any surveillance machines.
"They have already slaughtered everything on this world that could threaten them, so they rest easy," Zabriel noted. "They haven't even set up basic defenses."
"A pack of fools," Lion El'Jonson scoffed.
Zeke originally wanted to pilot the Ender Dragon Titan and level this fortress to the ground, but realizing that doing so would rob him of the chance to use his new Poké Balls, he opted to dig a tunnel to sneak in.
Approaching the Red Moon Keep, Zeke pulled out his pickaxe, started mining, and squeezed his way inside.
"Follow me." Zeke's voice drifted back through the gap, and the rest of the squad filed in after him.
It took Zeke exactly twelve seconds to mine through six meters of solid fortress wall, arriving in a dimly lit room. The echoes bouncing off the surroundings indicated he was in a massive space.
The distinct scent of Promethium fuel, engine oil, and other similar mechanical odors wafted through the air.
It appeared to be a vehicle hangar. Zeke placed down a torch, illuminating a Leman Russ Battle Tank right in front of him.
There was a massive gaping hole in the front of the tank. Its treads were completely dismantled and scattered across the floor, the turret was crooked, and the main barrel drooped powerlessly toward the ground.
It was a corpse of steel, abandoned here and forgotten by all.
Staring at this pile of scrap iron, an absurd thought popped into Zeke's head: Can this thing be caught?
He looked at the Poké Ball in his hand, then back at the scrapped tank. Well, it doesn't cost anything to try. He raised his hand and hurled the Poké Ball.
The red-and-white sphere struck the armor of the Leman Russ. A transparent shadow was instantly sucked out of the tank and drawn into the ball.
The Poké Ball dropped to the floor, wobbled twice, clicked shut, and the indicator light in the center turned green.
Zeke looked at the physical tank that was still sitting right there, then at the glowing green Poké Ball in his hand, his brain temporarily short-circuiting.
What the hell did I just catch?
Trembling slightly, Zeke picked up the Poké Ball and checked JEI. The Pokédex entry materialized before his eyes:
[Machine Spirit of the Leman Russ]
[Ghost Type]
[Skill: Possess]
Zeke tossed the Poké Ball again, releasing the Machine Spirit.
The Machine Spirit looked exactly like the Leman Russ Tank, but entirely transparent. Zeke could sense an aura of ancient decay radiating from it.
Am I... not already dead? The Machine Spirit opened its "eyes." Its final memory was of holding the line against the foreign invaders alongside its driver on the battlefield. They ultimately failed to defend the Red Moon Keep.
Its chassis was destroyed, and its driver was devoured by those abhorrent Chaos creatures. It had fully expected its fate was to become scrap metal, its spirit dissipating into nothingness.
Looking at the young human standing before it, the Machine Spirit felt an inexplicable sense of affinity. Is this my new driver?
"Can you speak?" Zeke asked.
The cannon barrel on the Machine Spirit wiggled left and right. It could understand Zeke's words, but it possessed no voice to answer.
"I see..." Zeke nodded thoughtfully.
"Zeke, are you alright? From the moment we got in here, you've been playing with that spherical object and talking to thin air," Guilliman asked with genuine concern.
"Huh? You guys can't see it?" Zeke pointed at the Machine Spirit.
"See what?" Guilliman squinted at where Zeke was pointing, then shook his head.
Just as Zeke was about to explain, the noisy clatter of footsteps echoed from outside. The Lion immediately grew alert, crouching low to listen.
"They are 200 meters away, heading this direction. They will arrive in approximately 20 seconds. Hide for now; do not alert the enemy," the Lion ordered.
Zeke cast an Invisibility spell on himself, then issued a command to the Machine Spirit: "Use Possess."
The Machine Spirit dove right back into the physical body of the Leman Russ. The battered hatch of the tank twitched slightly.
Zeke watched as the Machine Spirit's skill list changed. 'Possess' was replaced by two new skills: Double-Edge and Explosion.
The group passing by was a squad of corrupted mortals.
The leader was of average height and unremarkable build, wearing a simple robe painted with various vile, profane symbols in dark red.
Zeke was still hesitating when the Lion—after pondering for a split second whether to silently assassinate or interrogate them—made a hand gesture toward Zeke.
Zeke looked where the Lion pointed, only to see that the bald back of the Cultist's head had sprouted a pair of eyes and a massive, gaping mouth, from which a long blue tongue slithered in and out.
A bunch of hopelessly corrupted Chaos Cultists. No need to waste any breath on them.
Zeke launched the first strike. "Leman Russ, use Double-Edge on them!"
The sudden roar of an engine shredded the silence of the hangar. The passing Cultists snapped their heads toward the source of the noise.
The road wheels of the battered Leman Russ spun frantically. Despite having no tracks, it forcefully ground against the floor, dragging its massive, bulky chassis forward in a violent charge straight at the Cultists.
"Isn't that tank out of fuel?!" someone screamed in terror.
"Out of fuel?! It's completely scrapped!"
"Then how is it—"
The sickening crunch of steel colliding with flesh swallowed everything else.
The Machine Spirit recognized these Cultists. It remembered their stench. It remembered their twisted faces. It remembered the despairing screams of its driver as they dragged him out of the hatch.
Harboring a thousandfold hatred, the Leman Russ plowed directly into the crowd.
Under such overwhelming kinetic force, the Cultists were torn limb from limb, their mangled corpses dropping to the ground.
A flurry of hurried footsteps immediately echoed from the direction the dead Cultists had just come from, rapidly swelling into a chaotic cacophony of disorganized marching.
More enemies were rushing over.
"Guard my back," the Lion told Zabriel, preparing to leap into the fray.
Zeke stopped the Lion.
The Leman Russ, having violently rampaged through the crowd using Double-Edge, was now shuddering worse than ever, its already ruined chassis pushed to the absolute brink of collapse.
A filthy, disgusting tide of enemies swarmed around the tank. Zeke saw horned skulls, purplish flesh, scales, long tails, cloven hooves, and countless other mutations.
In their frenzy, they jammed their own bodies into the tank's grinding gears to stop it.
The Machine Spirit looked toward Zeke. It was waiting for that command.
Zeke met that transparent gaze for a single second, then gave a firm nod.
"Use Explosion on them."
At first, a single beam of blinding light pierced through the cracks in the armor. Then came more. Countless beams of radiant energy tore through the steel, puncturing the outer shell and illuminating the entire hangar.
The shockwave of the detonation blew the roof clean off the hangar. The walls fractured, sending thousands of shrapnel fragments flying in every direction.
The Cultists swarming the tank were instantly vaporized in the blast. Pus, blood, and deformed flesh were entirely reduced to nothingness.
After that Zeke swiftly recalled the Machine Spirit back into the Poké Ball.
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Next Goal = 750 Powerstones (Only 65 more to go)
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