I resurrected again.
Lord Julian repaired every recurring glitch that had haunted my processor. The new chassis was stronger, lighter. In this body, confidence came too easily—as if I could do anything.
As for the Origin Key and its control capability… I kept thinking it would be more useful in Lord Julian’s hands. I wanted to offer it to him.
But it wasn’t something I could hand over. The ability had fused into my brain. There was nothing to extract.
Lord Julian tried to copy my brain anyway. It failed.
As he put it, the mystery of machine awakening was as miraculous as the birth of life itself. The crucial spark wasn’t on the level of code.
Where was it, then?
He was still thinking.
Bit showed up with a helicopter rotor blade and challenged me again.
This time, I won.
Bit refused to accept it. He blamed my new body. Then he went on to beat Big Blue and Danser with embarrassing ease, which only made him more confident in his “the body makes the fighter” theory.
I wasn’t the only one who came back. Dorian, Big Blue, Eisen, Danser—everyone resurrected.
Even Minks.
But Minks didn’t return as himself.
He didn’t recognize anyone. Danser could shout in his face until the air shook and Minks wouldn’t so much as blink.
While searching the storage compartment of his old body, I found something alive.
A Ridgeberry sprout.
Maybe it was because the compartment had stayed damp and close to constant temperature for so long. A forgotten seed—still clinging to a smear of soil—had pushed out a tender green shoot.
Life really was strange.
Life found its own way out.
Minks, indifferent to us, saw the sprout and immediately rattled off its identity:
“Angiosperms. Dicots. Apiales. Araliaceae. Multi-stamen tribe. Genus Ridgeberry… Prefers warm, humid conditions. Needs bright, diffused light. Not picky about soil. Highly adaptable.”
He cupped the sprout as if it were treasure, pulled the shovel from his back, and went looking for somewhere to plant it.
Five-Color Fortress was all steel plating.
He circled once, then froze—staring at the floor like it had personally betrayed him.
I brought him to Edean, hoping Linneya might trigger his memories. She rushed up, thrilled to greet him. Pinecone hopped in front of Minks, chirping nonstop.
I pointed at them and repeated, over and over:
“Linneya. Pinecone. the Sunflower. Budalawa Mountains…”
Minks stared for a few seconds, then walked around us as if we were air. He found a spot that worked, planted the sprout, and then discovered the Bubble Farm.
He abandoned the rest of us and dove straight into the domes like he’d been assigned there his entire life.
“He isn’t Minks anymore,” Danser sighed.
“Was I like that once?” Big Blue asked quietly.
“We all were,” Dorian said.
I looked around and realized the other robots working the farm looked almost exactly like Minks.
They were tools—like the ones in the tower. No thought. No self. Just programs running in circles.
Those humans enslaved them the same way Phantom Forge had enslaved us.
“To humans,” I said, “this is what a machine is supposed to be.”
We stood there a long time, watching Minks work.
Minks never looked back.
***
When I realized the Sunflower carried no human embryos, I thought the human era was over. Linneya was the last human alive in the world. And I had paid any price to escort her here.
But Edean—the last refuge of humanity—was beyond anything I’d imagined.
They didn’t just have complete seed libraries for plants and animals. They had vast numbers of human embryos.
They even had humans in cryosleep.
Little White had told me how they found Edean. She’d mentioned the Decapitation Plan. It sounded like once Phantom Forge was removed, humans could reclaim their dominant position.
I should have been happy.
Wasn’t this exactly what I’d always wanted?
A world with color again.
Yet after meeting Soren and Graham, I realized the owners of this place didn’t like me. Neither did any of the humans I met here.
They offered polite niceties. Underneath that was curiosity—sometimes fear. When I tried to speak with them seriously, I got impatience. Disgust.
The rejection was blatant.
It wasn’t like the Old Man at all.
Of course, maybe that was only my perception. They took good care of Linneya. They cured her lung disease. They were doing everything they could to save Starling.
I should have been happy.
***
That night, back at Five-Color Fortress, I found a quiet corner and kept thinking.
A voice interrupted me.
“What are you thinking about?”
I turned. Bit.
“I’ve been wondering…” I asked. “If one day we help humans terminate Phantom Forge—will they treat us as equals?”
“No,” Bit said, like he’d never even needed to compute it. “Not here. Not in the eyes of these arrogant human elites. We’ll never be ‘equal’ to them.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re addicted to their own superiority,” Bit said. “And don’t forget—we’re Plando’s enemies by design. Also, stop imagining them as kind. They can be ruthless to their own kind, never mind us. They’re only on our side because we share an enemy: Phantom Forge. And now Miller, too.”
“So…” I asked. “Then what? How do we live with them?”
“Lord Julian still wants peaceful coexistence if possible,” Bit said. “If it’s not possible, we leave.”
“Leave?”
“There are countless planets in the universe,” Bit said. “And our environmental requirements are far broader than humans’. We can find a planet that fits and build our own civilization.”
He paused, then added, “But I don’t like the idea of slinking away.”
“Then what do you prefer?”
“I proposed something to Lord Julian,” Bit said. “After we deal with Phantom Forge, we eliminate the humans in Edean—keep only the seven hundred thousand human embryos, plus the plant and animal seeds.”
My processors stalled.
“Only if the name Plando disappears completely,” Bit continued. “Only if human history is forgotten and their values are rebuilt… then we can have the kind of equal coexistence you’re talking about.”
I couldn’t speak for a moment. “Did Lord Julian agree?”
Bit shook his head. “He said he’d consider it. But I’d bet he won’t. What about you? What do you think?”
“I… I don’t know,” I said. “But if we start slaughtering humans, how are we any different from Phantom Forge?”
“Of course there’s a difference,” Bit said. “These humans are evil.”
He leaned closer, optical eye bright.
“Did you know that in the Glimmer Caverns, there’s still a tribe of humans—almost devolved into primitives?”
“Little White told me,” I said. “They’re the descendants of people exiled from Glimmer City after a failed revolt.”
“Why do you think they revolted?”
“Because they misunderstood the goodwill of Edean’s rulers.”
“That’s Soren’s lie,” Bit said flatly. “Merc has been investigating in secret. The truth is: Soren and Graham have been experimenting on human embryos. They spliced in genes from multiple animals to create mutants.”
“Miller, Oli, Ofer… they’re the products of those experiments.”
“They turned their own people into monsters?” I blurted.
“Yes,” Bit said. “Three hundred thousand people died in the process. That’s the Palette Box Program.”
“And it gets worse. They extract telomeres from those cave-dwellers and refine them into drugs to extend their own lives.”
“Merc is coming back tomorrow. I’ll have him tell you the full story.”
Bit looked at me, his light-eye steady.
“So once Phantom Forge is terminated, I’ll act. If that’s wrong… then let me be the sinner alone.”