It awoke once more. It didn't need sleep; it had no eyes to see with, no brain to think with. Yet it thought, it felt, and it moved.
It was in another new container. Glass, with a solid steel end. It felt some of its cells within the steel, slowly getting pushed out. It tried to pull them back, to return its body to a whole state, but it couldn't. Something was pressing against it from the opposite side. Something wide, something that left no room for even a single cell to move from the core to the other side of the odd barrier.
It felt as the thing holding the container laughed. The slight vibration of their fingers as they pressed against the glass. It spoke, but the thing inside could not understand. All it knew was the sound, not that it meant anything.
It was so hungry, this horrible place had none of the crystals it was fed while it was young, nor did it have any of the gaseous substance. The tube was too tiny, it couldn't hold even a particle of the odd particles. The thing could feel the particles, as if they related to its fundamental nature. It could feel the particles outside the container, but could not reach them. Even outside, the particles were few.
While it desperately tried to push itself free, to sate its hunger, the vibrations grew strong. Shoe against metal, the slight tremor in the hand as its counterpart opened a door. The thing knew all of these sensations well. It screamed inside its own lack of mind. Incapable of feeling, of thinking, of any more than instinct. But it knew, it knew that the cold suddenly touching the glass was bad.
As it froze over, it only felt an instinctual rage overtaking it. Rage at the world, rage at its situation, and rage at its existence.
Azotreh awoke once more. The sun outside was rising, shining through their window. Their new augments hurt and ached, but Azotreh was used to the pain by now.
Doctor waited a week before deciding to move forward on the continued augmentation of Azotreh. He gave the child time to adjust to the new implanted eye and to overcome the pain of near-death. Then he began again.
The second time hurt less than the first, not just because of their new Pain Resistance, but also because the reaction wasn't as violent. Unlike the implantation of two different draconic parts, Errazorrus explained, the implantation of a third hurt substantially less. The rejection still existed, but a rainbow dragon would not try to destroy itself in order to stop the implantation of another chromatic draconic part.
It still hurt to have something shoved into their spine, and to feel new nerves slowly springing to life over the course of a week was nightmarish. However, once they were fully integrated, Azotreh was rather thankful to have them.
Humans, even augmented ones like Azotreh, weighed substantially more than a bird. Most sapient species did. This caused them to either require larger wings to accommodate flight, or required magic to sustain themselves in the air. Even harpies had far larger arms than a bird of similar proportions, despite their hollow chests.
Dragons instead took the other approach, using magic to enhance their flight. Red dragons apparently used the heat of the air to continue their flight, which made no sense to Azotreh. Nicholas seemed to understand, at least. Something about physics and chemistry. Azotreh simply didn't understand.
The wings now placed into Azotreh's back had belonged to an adolescent blue dragon, the fastest of the chromatic dragon species. Due to their underwater lifestyle, their wings were made for both quick underwater movement and swift air movement. This made them weaker than other dragon wings, but weaker than other dragons still meant that they couldn't be hurt by most normal weapons.
Due to Azotreh's size, the wings were massive in comparison. If the wings of a proper adult or, gods forbid, an ancient blue dragon were used, they'd be taller than Azotreh. The adolescent wings still wrapped around them like a blanket while folded in, and dragged along the floor as they walked, but it was better than having to walk on them like a wyvern. The very idea made Errazorrus cringe.
Azotreh was escorted from their room by two guards, their wings wrapped around them like a protective cloak. Even if they wouldn't help against the guards, Azotreh still felt a little safer like this.
The lights flickered, a more and more common occurrence as time passed. Doctor said repeatedly that he was going to fix it, but still hadn't managed it. Commander was growing increasingly frustrated as time passed. These seemed to be coordinated attacks, but none of the experiments were ever found to be involved. Not even a trace of their auras were left behind. Commander had mentioned all of this accidentally while telling the experiments that they were safe inside.
Azotreh was doubtful. The memory of a conversation about a lead rank superboss monster in the facility appeared at the forefront of their mind. What if something bigger and meaner appeared? Something higher rank?
They passed through the mess hall and into a little hallway. Something else was in the hallway with them, a little something. It was escorted by three guards, all holding tasers. It was a deep blue, closer to deep water than the cerulean of mana. It also seemed to have a golden crown atop its head.
It was a blob, like the oozes Azotreh had heard about. Maybe a little closer to a water elemental, one from the deeper depths of the elemental planes. But it didn't splash or reach out blobby tendrils. It didn't have tentacles, only a pair of little pseudopods holding tightly onto the crown on its head. Despite not having a face, it seemed rather indignant about keeping the odd object.
Azotreh looked to one of the guards as the thing moved away. The guard caught his eye and snorted at Azotreh's confused look.
"It's experiment SL-006. They were trying to make a new form of life based on that abominable incursion up north. Something about weapons for the war. But the little things are awful as weapons. They keep trying to drink all the energy from people around them, or try to create babies. They're also weirdly intelligent…"
The last comment was offhanded, but still got him a slap from the guard to his left. He grimaced at Azotreh.
"They're like beasts. Stupid here thought one of them shot him a funny look, but none of them have eyes. I don't know how one could shoot anyone a funny look."
"I swear it did," the first guard responded, "an eye appeared in its mass, one made of cycling crimson and blue. The thing shot me a dirty look and then vanished the eye before any of you saw it."
The second guard poked the first with his stick, "Doc said they're incapable of doing anything but eating, making more of themselves, and eating more. Personally, I trust the gold ranker more than your stupid face."
"My face isn't stupid…" said the first guard, clearly upset. The second barely choked down a laugh. Azotreh just looked between them with wide eyes. Weapons of war, that thing was a weapon. They couldn't imagine it.
At their expression, both guards went quiet. Azotreh knew they were also designed to be a weapon, augmented to enter the war as a powerhouse of their rank. Azotreh was meant to be like a dragon rider of old, but they were supposed to be both dragon and rider. Even so, looking at something so innocuous and thinking of it as a weapon was disturbing to Azotreh.
The lab was quiet today. Doctor was playing birdsong through his speaker as he put something into the fridge. When he turned and saw Azotreh, his metallic teeth opened, and the voice box in his mouth spoke. The birdsong turned off as he did.
"AZ-087. Wonderful to have you back. We have one final augmentation to add. We were going to add more, but I was strictly told by my higher-ups that I can't."
The gold ranker looked rather upset as he conveyed the news. Disturbing as he may be, Doctor truly enjoyed his work. To see how far the body can be pushed before it breaks. And he was just told to stop pushing.
Azotreh looked at him, confused as the guards left. Azotreh had been feeling like they were sinking recently, as they felt confused every time something happened. First, this whole triple personality thing, now an end to the augmentations.
To Azotreh's look, Doctor just sighed and began to explain.
"I know you're young, AZ-087. But the war with daemonkind has been escalating over the last thousand years. Normally, that would mean one of us releases something grand, and we refuse to be the losers who have to lick our wounds. The cardinals and my king won't take it. We need a weapon to either counter theirs or to deal heavy enough losses to force the machine to not activate, whatever it is."
Doctor only looked sadder as he continued, "and you're the last AZ experiment left alive. Every other one either died during the second or third implantation. Whatever let you live, the higher-ups want you to be one of our weapons. They aren't willing to sacrifice your potential. Especially after the slimes turned out to not have a battle impulse."
"Slimes?" Azotreh asked. They assumed the blue thing they saw in the hall was a slime, especially after hearing it was called SL-006. But they still wanted confirmation.
"The weapons based on Qirazarric's abominations. Little masses of cells. We made them desire to devour, so we could drop them onto enemy lines and cause mayhem. But they're just as happy eating the damn dirt as eating a daemon. So we're classifying all but the initial twelve as failures."
Azotreh was about to ask what made the first twelve of them so special, but before they could, the lights flickered again. Doctor looked up and sighed.
"I think we're entering their endgame. Whatever has been attacking the facility has almost broken the array." Doctor spoke under his breath, or lack thereof. His voice sounded like steel on steel as it emerged from the box in his throat, less like the human voice he normally used. His words drove fear deep into Azotreh's heart. The array kept them in, kept Azotreh from using the Skill System, but it also kept them hidden. They didn't want to imagine what would happen if it went down.
Even so, there was also hope. Hope that if it went down and something powerful appeared, it would ignore the little tin ranker in favor of the two gold rankers.
Azotreh was brought from their revelry as clamps emerged from the floor. Azotreh was placed on the bed, face down. Their wings were held open and spread, but relaxed. The gag was returned to their mouth.
Azotreh's pants were removed, and part of their shirt burned away. Then the thin wires began to dig. Right through their skin, and touched their tailbone.
At this point, Azotreh had reached 0.08% heat resistance and 0.15% pain resistance. But that didn't help as the metal wires dug deep. They wrapped around Azotreh's tailbone and then dug back out to reveal a hole right to their spine. The hole was made of charred flesh, and pristine white bone was visible beneath.
The lights flickered, and Azotreh got a notification.
[You have obtained a Body Scar. Damage Threshold: 0.09%]
They didn't know what it meant, but were sure they'd find out at some point.
Azotreh's pain was immeasurable again, and they felt their resistances tick up a little as something cold was attached to the base of their spine. It was frigid, fleshy, and surrounding its soft inside were hard scales. Azotreh couldn't see it, but could feel it as it was fused into their body.
It hurt, not as much as the red dragon's eye, but it still hurt. Their body rejected the new implant, but Azotreh's will clamped down, reinforced by Nicholas and Errazorrus also pushing. It took an hour before their body stopped rejecting it.
Doctor stood them up and made them drink a recovery potion. Their resources were drained again, all except Vitality. But it was clinging on by a thread.
Then the lights went out again. Azotreh barely even noticed as Eye of the Black Dragon kicked in and illuminated the entire room. The colors were a little washed out, but still present. Doctor beside them was illuminated in red and yellow as Eye of the Red Dragon activated in tandem, showing Azotreh the gold ranker's heat.
However, just as they waited for the lights to re-engage, the entire facility rumbled.
The lab was thrown away. Doctor was pulled through the floor, as he was connected to the building. Azotreh crashed into the wall, right on top of the fridge.
Looking out of the fresh hole in the floor, now a wall, Azotreh saw a massive monster. Taller than a dragon, it stood on eight spider legs. It had two canine heads emerging from a furry arachnid's body. Necks connected at the same spot as a spider's would be.
On the back of the monster was the giant head of a seahorse, which blasted the facility with jets of concentrated water. Not the facility, Azotreh realized. Doctor was on the roof, using the very facility itself to defend against the monster.
Walls of black steel rose, lines of blue arrays still inscribed after the array broke. But they didn't hold up against the sonic blasts of the two wolf heads. The concentrated water sliced through magically reinforced metal like a hot knife through butter.
Azotreh didn't even notice Commander emerge, but one moment there was nothing, and the next a giant stood. Taller than the monster, with two scorpion tails in its hand. They were connected to the spider's web spinner.
A giant made from plants battered the monster, while the facility was taken apart piece by piece to defend.
Azotreh watched in fascination, so they didn't feel the cold blue fluid climbing across their body until it found a hole, and began to enter.
Pain, even worse than before, overtook Azotreh as something crawled into their veins.
Even as the battle continued in the distance, Azotreh passed out.