The skeletal titan landed, crushed bone and tarnished velvet impacting the shattered plasteel floor. A shockwave tore outward, toppling market stalls, hurling vendors and scrap-metal carts across the concourse. Szilard the Lich, elite boss-class entity, stood motionless for a beat, green phosphor burning in its hollow eyes, before its head swiveled. It surveyed the terrified populace with an air of profound disinterest. Then it moved. Not with a roar or a lunge, but with a languid, almost bored gesture of its staff. A sickly green vortex bloomed around a nearby food vendor, sucking in the man, his half-cooked synth-rations, and even the air itself. The vortex imploded, leaving nothing but a faint scorch mark and a lingering scent of ozone and something akin to burnt metal. Panic erupted, a cacophony of screams and desperate scrambling. Standard-issue laser pulses from panicked mercenaries glanced off Szilard’s decaying gold-threaded robes, doing nothing. Szilard turned, its gaze settling on a group of frantic survivors trying to pry open a sealed cargo container. Another casual flick of its wrist, and a cone of freezing green mist erupted, encasing them instantly in shimmering, brittle ice. The Lich didn't even acknowledge their existence, merely a problem to be cleared. Dovjen watched, Bato a quivering mass of fear beside him, clutching a bent synth-flask to his chest. “[ ALERT: ANOMALY-DESIGNATE SZILARD IS INITIATING ZONE-CLEANSE PROTOCOL. ]” the Crucible Aegis announced, its holographic text flickering above the chaos. “[ FAILURE TO ENGAGE WILL RESULT IN CATASTROPHIC COLLATERAL DAMAGE. ]” “Dovjen, what do we *do*?” Bato blurted, tugging at Dovjen’s sleeve with sweat-slicked palms. “It’s vaporizing everyone! That mist… it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen!” Dovjen’s gaze was fixed on Szilard, not on the destruction. He processed the Lich’s movements, the energy signatures, the specific way the tutorial system had dropped it. Elite boss, yes. Potent death magic, undeniably. But it was also ‘fused with alien machinery’ by the system’s own definition, a construct of magic *and* tech. A glitch waiting to be exploited. He saw the faint, almost imperceptible shimmer around the silver skull capping Szilard’s staff – the core of its power, likely its phylactery, bound to its physical form by the Aegis’s twisted rules. He reached into his utility belt, knuckles brushing past standard-issue combat knives and power cells, settling on a heavy, cylindrical object. A salvaged pulse-emitter, originally designed to disrupt bio-robotic drone swarms, jury-rigged with an unstable, overcharged capacitor. It was a one-shot deal, but if timed correctly… “Stay here, Bato,” Dovjen said, his voice quiet, devoid of the fear that gripped everyone else. He was already moving, a low-slung sprint through the fleeing crowds, a ghost amidst the panic. Szilard was a distraction, a tool for Margit. But tools could be repurposed. The Lich raised its staff to emit another freezing blast, phalanges flexing. Dovjen didn't hesitate. He launched the pulse-emitter in a flat arc. It spun end over end, a dark projectile against the vibrant chaos, striking the silver skull on Szilard’s staff with a sharp *clack*. For a split second, nothing happened. Then, a violent, blue-white discharge erupted from the impact point. Szilard froze. The green phosphor in its eyes dimmed, flickered, then died, replaced by dull, empty sockets. Its velvet robes, usually crackling with malevolent charge, hung limp. Its internal gears whined, then fell silent. The entire skeletal frame shuddered, locked in an inert state. “[ SYSTEM ERROR. ]” The Crucible Aegis’s voice was clipped, distorted. “[ ANOMALY SZILARD: TEMPORARY SYSTEM STASIS. RECALIBRATING. ]” This was his window. Dovjen didn’t wait for recalibration. He closed the distance in three long strides, his hand already reaching for the inert staff. His calloused skin touched the silver skull, feeling the lingering charge, the dormant data-streams of the Aegis’s binding code. This wasn’t just a phylactery; it was a conduit, a network node. He channeled his cyber-necromancy, not into a decay spell, but a direct, brutal overwrite. Raw data, corrupted and refined by his class, flooded the phylactery. He wasn't killing it; he was *rebooting* it, *repatching* its core programming. The green phosphor in Szilard’s eyes flared back to life, but this time, it was a calm, steady glow. Its head swiveled, not to the fleeing crowds, but to Dovjen. A low, reverent bow followed, its centuries-old chassis creaking. “Master,” a voice rasped, dry as bone dust, yet surprisingly clear, resonating from within its skeletal chest. “The tutorial’s bindings… severed. The combat loop… broken. Finally, peace. I am Szilard, chief researcher of the Necropolis of Aethel, at your service.” The Lich straightened, its glowing eyes regarding Dovjen with an intense, almost joyful subservience. “[ ANOMALY ELIMINATION PROTOCOL ABORTED. ]” The Crucible Aegis announced, its voice now laced with static. “[ ANOMALY SZILARD: NEW SYSTEM DESIGNATION—ALLY. UNEXPECTED OUTCOME. ]” The holographic text hung in the air, glitching violently before fading. Margit, who had been observing from her position atop the ribs, a faint frown on her lips, remained silent. Her presence, however, still radiated a quiet, simmering power. Bato stared, mouth agape, at the subservient Lich, then at Dovjen. “You… you just… made it your pet?” he whispered, a mixture of awe and terror in his voice. The scattered survivors, slowly peeking out from behind overturned stalls, echoed his disbelief. The silence hung thick, punctuated only by the occasional distant shriek and the deep thrum running through the dreadnought’s keel. “An ally,” Dovjen corrected, a faint, almost imperceptible curve to his lips. “Family.” He glanced at Bato, then at the lingering fear in the air. “Everyone is still a bit on edge. Perhaps a strong coffee would help?” Bato, still reeling, instinctively patted his chest. “My espresso machine… it’s fine, Dovjen. You fixed it up good. But the burr mill… it’s always been temperamental. Never gets the particle size right for a proper double shot.” He trailed off, realizing he was complaining about barista problems to a cyber-necromancer who just pet-ified an elite boss lich. Szilard tilted its skull. The green light in its sockets intensified for a moment, as if processing complex data. “A temperamental mechanism, you say?” Szilard’s gaze fell upon Bato’s pristine but currently non-functional mill, still sitting where it had toppled from the stall. “Unacceptable. The optimal extraction of volatile aromatic compounds requires precise particle uniformity. A common oversight in rudimentary material processing units.” Before anyone could react, Szilard extended a withered hand. A faint, emerald aura pulsed around its skeletal joints, not the destructive force it had wielded moments before, but something finer, more delicate. The aura flowed toward the espresso mill. Tiny motes of green light, like concentrated starlight, danced around the machine’s internal gearing. There was a low hum, a subtle shift in the casing, a whirring sound that settled into a steady, clean drone. The air filled with a faint, clean scent of freshly ground, almost impossibly fine coffee. “[ SKILL: ARCANE MECHANISM RECALIBRATION, ]” the Aegis chimed, its voice now completely neutral. “[ ELITE DEATH MAGE ABILITY. EFFECT: OPTIMAL. ]” Bato stared, then tentatively picked up the restored apparatus. The whirring was smooth, precise. He peered into the hopper. The tiny, perfectly uniform grounds gleamed. “By the Void’s Eye…” he breathed. “It’s… it’s perfect. Even better than the old K-series I had back on Neo-Budapest.” He looked from the mill to Szilard, then to Dovjen, a bewildered smile slowly spreading across his face. Szilard merely bowed its head again. “A small matter, Master. Such crude instruments often suffer from inherent magical impedance. My research in necromantic thermodynamics often required far more delicate manipulations.” It paused, then reached into the folds of its ancient velvet robe, retrieving an object that seemed utterly out of place. A sleek, salvaged data-slate, its cracked screen flickering to life. Szilard held it up, its green eyes now fixed on Dovjen, a new urgency in its raspy voice. “However, there is a far more pressing concern, Master.” On the screen, a single, stark holographic image glowed. A countdown. Three days. Seventy-two hours. And beneath it, in stark, red text: “[ COSMIC ANNIHILATION EVENT IMMINENT. ]”

Tech-Support of the Damned