Netori: Stealing The Hero's Party!

While the army suffered from the poison in Eclanor, Daine, Lana, and Zoey were all packing their bags to join the hero in that city. Having stayed behind to conclude some business as well as avoid the harsh journey through the desert, the family was finally ready to leave, but not without adding another person to the trip.

"Are you sure you're not coming?" To their surprise, however, that person couldn't come with them.

"I told you she's not going anywhere, neither is June nor the rest of the battalion!" Helga complained as the group walked down the steps of Mono's secret lab.

"Whatever, I'll just wait for everyone to come back, I guess…" A bit annoyed that she couldn't tag along and be with her boyfriend of one year–Raven, Shamisha puffed up her cheeks and simply led the group deeper and deeper into the underground lab.

"Let's hope the war ends quickly then," Lana suggested, her hand clasped in prayer.

As she closed her eyes momentarily, however, her body bumped into Zoey, who then complained.

"Walk with your eyes open, Mom!"

"S-sorry, sweetheart." Letting out an awkward laugh, she quickly brushed off the embarrassment.

"We're almost to the lab," glancing back at the group, Shamisha looked at Daine. "Why do you wanna meet with her anyway? I thought you wanted to get me, not Mono."

"Well…" Wearing an awkward expression, Daine scratched the back of her head. "We recently learned that the queen can look through the eyes of all automatons in the city, and since we have so many in the establishment…"

Heaving a sigh, Diane looked at her wife to complete the rest of the story. Nodding back at her, Lana took a deep breath and came out with the truth.

"All that illegal stuff that we've been doing, she already knows. We thought she didn't, and we just wanna apologize before leaving."

Clicking her tongue to that realization as well, Shamisha shook her head for everything, including her deal with Linkle for the item to defuse Mono, was obviously also known to her, even if she hadn't said anything.

"Ughh…thank god we didn't get to use it. She probably had some way figured out to make that thing useless anyway," Shamisha muttered to herself, glad that the now useless item had no use as Mono's mental state had stabilized quite a lot in recent days. "Well, whatever, let's go meet her."

Beckoning everyone to come with her a little further down, Shamisha led them through the singular door, which opened into the queen's workshop. To her surprise, Mono was already working on something with a demi-human boy.

"What are you working on now?" She asked, slowly making her way closer to the massive, hollow workbench.

"Shhsss~ I need to focus, stay there, I'll talk to you in a few minutes," Mono replied, her hands lifting a piece of broken metal from what seemed to be Grace's body.

Even as she let go of the metal piece, however, it continued to float in midair and joined a clutter of floating broken shells just to Mono's left. Taking a few steps even closer, Shamisha finally saw what was happening. The kid and the queen were taking out unstable pieces from Grace's body core with another automaton body linked directly to the frame with a bunch of cables.

"Shamisha?" Mumbled the body next to Grace, but the voice was the same as hers. "Wh-what are you doing here?"

"Quiet down, Grace, we still need to transfer your heart. Don't push yourself by talking," Mono suggested, and the automaton quickly fell quiet.

However, the way her eyes slowly closed, it almost felt like her body was struggling to keep awake instead of simply listening to her master's order to be quiet. Taking a closer look at the new body while curious chatter echoed behind her from the group that she'd brought, Shamisha touched the automaton frame and instantly jerked her hand back.

"A-Avarice?" Lifting her gaze, she quickly looked at Mono. "You're giving Grace Avarice's body core? What the hell are you thinking?"

"I said quiet…" Whispering with her teeth gritted shut, Mono lifted the tweezers and pointed to another table not far from the workbench. "I dismantled that bitch's autonomous system, she's dead–"

"Like cutting the spinal cord for a human and giving the body to someone new instead," Lutz interjected, smiling innocently.

Eyeing him for a moment, Shamisha looked up again and grunted.

"And you're using a kid to do this stuff? Have you gone insane again?"

"He asked to help~" Shaking her head, Mono set the tweezers aside and lightly touched the beating heart. Pulling her hand away, she raised her finger, and with it, the heart began lifting out of the frame. Artificial blood pooled out of the snipped veins, but being used to such a sight, Shamisha focused on something else.

"And of course, you mastered my ant-gravity tech because why couldn't you?" Grunting in frustration, she took a step back and decided just to watch it all happen.

"Comparison is the theft of joy, woman. Accept what you got and move on, isn't that right, Lutz?" Mono said, looking down at the boy closely, keeping an eye on the moving heart.

"Yes, ma'am!" He responded.

Chuckling just a little, Mono shot Shamisha a quick glance.

"I already like him better."

"Oh, fuck you."

"Ask your boyfriend, sweetheart." Even though Shamisha knew that Mono was simply teasing her, watching another person taking her place, she could feel jealousy welling up in her heart.

"Keep the chest cavity open, I'll connect the arteries to the artifuse. Then we can start with oil and artificial blood injection." Following Mono's every order, Lutz did as he was told without asking any questions. Just watching Mono work, he was learning more than he had ever before, especially since the scholars in the spires mostly worked on theory instead of getting hands-on experience like he currently was.

"Oil? Why not go full artificial blood like the current models, why the proprietary stuff mixed in with the new?" Shamisha inquired, trying to point out Mono's fault.

"Because…AGhh!" Lowering the heart by hand and aligning the arteries with the artifuse, Mono focused on the body instead of looking at Shamisha as she answered. "Grace wanted something close to her last body, otherwise I would've given something real flashy."

Finally setting the heart in, the queen looked at the young boy, and he instantly knew what to do. Closing the cavity with a body core shell, he quickly covered the beating heart and grabbed the iron pipes attached to a warming box. In the meantime, Mono removed the connection that connected the old body with the new, and without wasting even a second, Lutz snapped the pipes into the same place.

A pumping sound erupted from the warming box as the contents began pouring into the new body. And before long, Grace's eyes opened with much more strength in them than before.

"There…done." Turning to the guests, Mono undid her gloves and placed her hands on her hips. "What can I help you guys with?"

But after watching everything that had happened in front of them, none of them spoke a word, feeling unsure about how to break the ice.

"Hmm? Hard to talk? Let's get out of here and get some drinks first, then," the queen offered and given the state of the place, nobody refused.

There was much that needed a discussion, but before that, Mono decided to break out a bottle of dragon's blood wine, which was stashed in the room right next to her workshop. Needless to say, from that point onward, the conversation flowed smoothly, especially since Mono no longer minded whatever Shamisha and Daine's family had been doing behind her back. She knew it all already and recognized that she, too, wasn't without fault.