Chapter 2038: Chapter 2038

Back at the church, Jenkins had heard the latest intelligence on the falling ash. It was no mere pollutant carelessly discarded by the Difference Engine; upon contact, the cinders were rapidly heating the ground.

Furthermore, while machinery with gear-based structures showed no immediate effects upon contact, the Church of Creation and Machinery had discovered that the very composition of these machines was being altered.

The ash contained elements of both the black clouds and the gray mist. It contaminated crops upon falling into the fields, and while direct human contact had yet to show any effects, it was certain to be detrimental to public health.

For now, the Church had only detected the colossal whale above Nolan; the rest of the world remained clear. Yet no one doubted the Difference Engine’s creative prowess. Beyond its nigh-omnipotent calculations, its ability to forge machinery was what the churches truly feared.

It took the Church twenty minutes to devise a countermeasure for the black clouds. In that time, the temperature of the falling ash continued to climb. Eventually, the cinders emerging from the dark clouds were glowing with fiery light, still warm as they touched the earth.

This was not a good sign. Jenkins was about to attempt another forced entry when, thankfully, Mr. Gilbert appeared, carrying a box, and reached the team tailing the mechanical whale through the air.

"This will allow a single person to move within the black mist for a short time. But it will only last for twenty minutes."

Inside the box was a simple, ordinary white candle. It looked well-used, now nothing more than a stub. Jenkins felt that Gilbert's assessment of it lasting for "twenty minutes" was an extraordinarily optimistic guess.

"Are you sure you brought the right one?"

"If I'm not mistaken, while this Soul Fire Candle, B-12-1-2347, can dispel all surrounding anomalies when lit, it requires the sacrifice of a soul... Are you holding a soul canister? Are you really suggesting we burn a soul?"

His tone was heavy with disapproval, and the others understood his sentiment.

"The Church authorized it. Special circumstances..."

Gilbert said, his voice strained.

"That won't be necessary," Jenkins interjected. "Take it back. I have an idea."

He patted the unicorn's head, readying it for an upward charge.

"I just remembered," he announced, "I have a candle of my own."

The unicorn became a streak of white light, surging toward the cloud bank below. The Purification Candle, fused with the Fire of Grace, materialized in Jenkins's hand. He raised it high, its flame a feeble glimmer against the vast expanse of the sky.

But as he and the unicorn plunged into the black clouds, the warm, yellow light acted like an eraser on a pencil drawing, carving a clear, fiery path through the gloom in their wake.

The others from the churches immediately followed. Led by Jenkins and his upraised candle, they finally drew near the colossal whale gliding through the dark clouds.

Its immense body was concealed in the depths of the clouds, so vast that even the Purification Candle's light failed to illuminate its full form. As they were about to breach the transparent barrier surrounding it, Jenkins drew his sword with his left hand, preparing to strike.

Suddenly, a sound powerful enough to shatter eardrums blasted through the air.

The sound waves were so powerful they seemed to solidify the churning clouds. It was the call of the mechanical whale. The creature, which had been cruising along a predictable path, now altered its course. A section of its massive tail slipped past them, right at the edge of the candlelight.

Jenkins got a clear look. The tail was forged entirely from brass, and embedded in its center was what looked like a clock face. For the few seconds it was visible, he could even see the long second hand sweeping around the dial.

"Careful," he called out. "This whale might have abilities related to time."

He turned to shout the warning to the others behind him. When he looked forward again, an overwhelming sense of danger made his eyes fly wide. The unicorn's intuition was just as sharp; it too sensed a lethal threat emerging from the impenetrable clouds ahead.

He roared. He didn't need to explain. A kaleidoscopic array of luminous shields materialized before them, a defensive wall woven from the diverse abilities of their different faiths. The moment the wall formed, a brilliant light ignited in the depths of the black clouds.

From her vantage point in the church below, the silver dragon Anathasia saw a sudden, blinding flash erupt within the dark cloud cover. A massive blast of energy punched a hole clean through, revealing Jenkins at the forefront of the group, his sword cleaving the pillar of light in two.

The shield wall had already weakened the beam, and Jenkins's all-out strike split the remaining energy. The blast momentarily cleared the mist, granting everyone a view of the whale opening its cavernous maw toward them. From within its mouth, a massive cannon barrel extended.

Gears clattered and clicked. Hidden hinges engaged, pulling the cannon barrel back into the whale's mouth with a series of jerky motions.

"This again? Doesn't the Difference Engine have any more creative attacks?"

The unicorn carried Jenkins upward in another streak of white light. His sword pierced the barrier around the metallic behemoth, and together they shot toward its gaping, still-open mouth.

The great whale cried out again, a sound so unsettling that even people on the ground flinched. A blast of air rushed from its mechanical mouth, spraying Jenkins with a faceful of sparking ash, but it had no effect.

He intended to get inside the mechanical whale and destroy the colossal creature from within, but it gave him no such opportunity. After the last of the ash had been expelled, a torrent of fire, a veritable inferno, erupted from its massive jaws.

"Oh, Sophia, come and look! It's absolutely beautiful!" Nᴇw novel chapters are publɪshed on novelFirｅ.net

The silver dragon exclaimed from the window, her face alight with excitement as she watched the brilliant flashes within the dark clouds.

She pointed for Princess Sophia, who replied with a weary sigh.

"Aren't you going to help Jenkins?"

"He doesn't need my help yet. This is a small matter he can handle on his own. Sophia, you must never underestimate a living god!"

The shield wall blocked the inferno once more. When the flames subsided, Jenkins and the unicorn were already at the whale's mouth. A dense network of brass-colored components formed the giant monster. Up close, he could see that every single part making up the whale was in constant motion.

Gears spun, hinges pivoted, and pistons drove back and forth.

The whale made no attempt to close its mouth and block Jenkins's entry. Instead, it opened its jaws wider and wider. Pliant metals flexed, driving the components across its body into a more frantic rhythm of operation. There, before Jenkins, the mechanical whale revealed the very core of its inner workings without reservation.