Custodian examined the two new blueprints since it wanted to know the difference between the two.

[Type 2 Slave Mind.

Upgraded basic processor used for menial tasks. Can understand slightly more complex tasks.

Produced using 1 Type 1 Slave Mind processor, 15 units of biomatter and mana matter each in weight.]

[Type 1 Serf Mind.

Basic processor with simplistic combat routines.

Produced using 3 Type 1 Slave Mind processors, 20 units of anti-mana, 15 units of biomatter and mana matter each in weight.]

Not only did Custodian get an upgraded worker-type brain, it also got a combat-type! Judging from the blueprints, the Serf Mind would allow Custodian to make small spider-like creatures with shock magic capabilities, while the upgraded Slave Mind carriers could pick up monster cores from the ground, and carry it back to the core room.

If Custodian could jig in joy, or even feel joy, it would do so now.

Its plan now was to create a template for its first hunting type automaton. Unfortunately, a Serf Mind required much more than its base production cost. Custodian also had to install a small pack of anti-mana to act as a battery for the magic shock attack.

Since there was enough resources, Custodian started making a Serf Mind and a body for it. It molded six spider legs like its carrier brethren, then attached it to a base. Carefully placing a cylindrical anti-mana into the dome on the base copied from the basket carrier, it started fueling magic throughout the body. To finish the hunter off, Custodian created the processor, and placed it inside the body. A shell was welded to cover the inside, completing Custodian’s first ever combat automaton.

When Custodian placed the lifeless husk onto the floor, it quivered. Just like its older brothers, the metallic spider emitted light from the gaps of its shell. The eye at the front of the body glowed red before began examining its surroundings.

‘You will hunt the organics identified as ‘Slimes’. You are now a hunter.’

With the order given, the hunter drone scurried off into the cavern to begin hunting for slimes. The good thing was that slimes didn’t fight back, and they died easily to shock attack, so Custodian didn’t have to worry too much about the combat drones being destroyed by the slimes.

Custodian metaphorically smiled at the prospects of having better combat and worker drones in the far future.

‘Now to get Type 2 Mind Slaves…’

The Type 2 Mind Slaves were less troublesome to make as Custodian could just modify the bodies of the basket carriers a bit, take out the brain, and upgrade them. But still, it would take time, time that the A.I. wouldn’t mind waiting out.

‘Soon, my original 10 drones will be free from slime hunting… and be pushed into rat hunting!’

As another rat was felled, Ratslayer relaxed his stance. He walked up to the rat, then studied the damage it sustained. Overall, he was impressed. After a few hours of chipping through the iron ores, Ratslayer and Drone 9 managed to mine enough to produce a spear head. Attaching the iron head to a bio-iron pole, the results were great.

The iron spear was much more durable, stronger, and could pierce through the rats with less effort. Ratslayer was starting to kill at a faster rate than before that Custodian had to assign a large basket carrier to him.

The giant walking basket wasn’t his only companion, though.

“Look, brother. More minerals!” Drone 9 rushed to inspect the wall, trying to brighten the cave with an anti-mana-powered torch. “Aw, they’re grayish. I thought I would’ve found a new type of ore by now.”

“Not any time soon, Drone 9,” Ratslayer commented as he cleaned the spear with a fur rag. He grabbed the dead rat corpse on the floor then tossed it onto the walking basket. When squished together enough, the basket could carry up to four or five rats. So far, there were only two rats in it.

As Drone 9 inspected the wall, two rats ambushed the two drones from the shadows. Though, as soon as they revealed themselves, a rock and a spear was flung at the beasts immediately. The rock hit its mark directly between the eyes of one of the rats, while the other rat managed to dodge the inaccurately thrown spear.

However, just as the rat dodged back, Ratslayer was already striking down at the monster with his pig iron spear. With a swift strike against its chest, the rat’s life was no more.

“Hey, I’m getting better at this!” Drone 9 noted as they took out their mining stave.

“Indeed. Perhaps it’s time I ditch throwing spears and just let you support me from a distance,” said Ratslayer as he picked up his bio-iron spear off the floor.

“To hunt spiders, I presume?” Drone 9 asked.

“That is correct. Soon, most of the us will be delegated to hunting rats. It would be good to scout how far are the rat hunting grounds as early as possible,” Ratslayer explained.

“That would be good, yes. But for now, let’s just mine iron ore, and improve our tools. I think this flimsy stave isn’t an efficient digger…” Drone 9 complained as they raised the stave in question.

“Cease complaining, and start digging. Our basket brethren’s at its full capacity, and we need our hands free to carry ores back to Master Custodian,” said Ratslayer.

As Drone 9 began digging, Ratslayer concentrated on their surroundings. He needed to make sure he could clearly hear the pitter-patters of the rat feets in the dark, as he couldn’t rely on sight alone.

His concentration, though, wasn’t the best. Drone 9 was busy thumping against the wall with a large stave, so it was somewhat noisy for him. But once he concentrated hard enough, he could hear footsteps every time the stave made contact with the wall.

Ratslayer was alarmed by this, and prepared his spear. The footsteps were too big for rats, and too loud to belong to the spiders, not that he had hunted that many spiders.

Ratslayer turned to the direction of the noise then flashed his torch. Out the darkness, Ratslayer could see red light coming out of a familiar humanoid silhouette.

“Greetings, brother,” the newcomer greeted with a low voice as it approached Ratslayer.

“Drone 8? What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be hunting for slimes in the outer slime hunting ground?” Ratslayer asked.

Hunting grounds were now classified by how close it was to the core room. The inner hunting grounds were closer, while the outer hunting grounds were the furthest. The outer ones usually led to the next major hunting grounds.

Of course, it wasn’t like each area only had one type of prey to hunt. The rat hunting grounds, in particular, had both rats and slimes, with the occasional spiders being spotted.

“I was. Then my job was stolen by one of those newly made hunter drones. I decided to take the liberty to explore the caverns. After all, there are many unexplored pathways still remaining,” Drone 8 answered.

“You didn’t encounter any organics identified as rats on your way here?” Ratslayer asked.

“Negative. The way is clear,” Drone 8 responded.

“We may have to report this to Master Custodian, once Drone 9 is finished mining,” Ratslayer noted.

“But I just started exploring…” Drone 8 complained.

“Cease complaints. We shall take you with us the next hunting trip,” Ratslayer reassured.

“I see, this is very troubling,” Custodian said once Ratslayer concluded his report on the rats.

As it turned out, only the slimes magically pop out of nowhere. The rats seemed to originate from somewhere else. So, killing a rat in a spot wouldn’t guarantee another rat in the same spot. It just happened so that there were plenty of rats hanging around close to the slime hunting ground, so they initially thought the rat population would replenish like the slime’s would.

Or perhaps the rats did spawn, just somewhere else. If so, Custodian wanted to know where.

“The rats you encountered may simply be organics hunting for sustenance. There may be a spawning ground somewhere else. You three will have to search it out,” Custodian instructed.

“Alright!” Drone 8 clenched their fist in approval.

“As you wish,” Ratslayer nodded.

“If I must,” Drone 9 shrugged.

“Good. These two prototypes will be joining you,” Custodian said as two hunter drones with claws at the front walked up to them. “Since the hunter drones are the same size as a rat, they might be able to hold their own against them. You might need some extra expendable help, given the nature of your task.”

“Already planning on replacing us drones for hunting rats?” Ratslayer questioned.

“Perhaps. You ten seem much more useful in other tasks. It would be a waste to keep you all doing menial tasks,” Custodian replied.

“What about Drone 1? They’ve been stuck here for a long time,” Ratslayer pointed out, and continued, “In fact, where is Drone 1?”

“Here,” Drone 1 promptly replied as it rose out of a pile of anti-mana. They were covered from head to toe with plates of bio-iron.

“Drone 1 has been promoted from production slave to experimentation slave since he was replaced with efficient Type 2 Slave Mind drones. Drone 1 is doing their job well, and will keep doing so until better self-learning drones could be built,” Custodian explained. It looked at the trio explorer squad then stopped at Drone 9.

“Speaking of promotions, it is time to elevate your status, Drone 9. You have done well providing me with insights on these ‘ores’. Given that you have a fascination with rocks, I shall name you ‘Niner’, with a title of ‘Prospector’,” Custodian told Prospector Niner.

Niner made a surprised bleep then raised their arm. “I get my own name and a title! Joy to me!”

“Yes, yes. Keep it down. You strangely have a lower voice tone than the rest of your brothers. Now, the three of you, grab these combat drones, and execute my tasks.”

Drone 8 grabbed the two combat drones, then attached them to their chest and back. “I’ll carry these two around. We’ll use them if we’re in imminent danger,” Drone 8 suggested.

“Do whatever, just come back in one piece,” Custodian responded.

With that, the five left to begin their search.

Three sets of footsteps echoed in a long rock cavern. Using anti-mana powered torches, the trio made their way into unexplored territory. The number of rats they encountered was suspiciously low, but they continued nevertheless, as they had already done so a few times looking for the rat spawning grounds.

“Do you think I’ll get my own name once we find the rat spawning ground?” Drone 8 asked.

“Perhaps,” Ratslayer answered as he led the way.

“Maybe Master Custodian names us based on our specialty, so you’ll have to somehow be good at something,” Niner said.

“How come Ratslayer wasn’t named Broken Leg when his leg got eaten by the furry organic?” Drone 8 asked.

“Your snide comments are noted, Drone 8,” Ratslayer said.

“Your noting skills have been noted, brother,” Drone 8 replied.

“Keep this up, and you might be named ‘Snide’, Drone 8,” Ratslayer scoffed back.

“I do not wish to be named Snide,” Drone 8 complained.

“You’re a drone, you do not wish,” Ratslayer retorted.

“Maybe we do. In the first place, what are we?” Niner asked.

After that question, the trio strided across the underground cavern in silence.

“We are tools of Master Custodian in order to fulfill his ultimate goal, of course,” Ratslayer finally broke the silence with his answer.

“While I have no doubt that Master is Master, what about us? Are we fragments of Master Custodian, or something else?” Niner philosophized.

“Could it be that you are the personality fragment that got ejected from the core body because you were too annoying?” belittled Ratslayer.

“As it turned out, our battle-hungry brother could make funny jokes from time to time,” Drone 8 observed.

“We are drones, we do not make jokes,” Ratslayer stated.

“Can Master Custodian make jokes?” Niner asked.

“He did make your name, so yes,” Drone 8 answered.

“My name is not a joke, you no-named fool,” Niner retorted.

“Once we get back, I am sure that I’ll have a name for myself, so the only fool around here is you,” Drone 8 said as they gave a low chuckle.

As the two drones argued, Ratslayer stopped on his track, and raised his arm, halting his brothers as well. “Do you hear that?”

The three drones stopped any movements, and listened closely to anything suspicious. What they heard was a constant stream of liquid flowing somewhere. They decided to track the source of the noise in complete silence.

They zig-zagged through a maze of pathways until eventually they found a passage leading to… nowhere. It wasn’t a dead end. Rather, there was just air.

The passage ended with a straight fall to a deep abyss or, at the very least, there was a pit at the bottom. The three drones shone their torches at different direction, trying to figure out where they are.

“It’s a ravine…” Niner observed, shining his light towards the rock walls.

“There’s the source of noise, and there… also there,” Ratslayer said as he shone his own light towards multiple waterfalls coming out from holes in the wall.

“And there’s our targets,” Drone 8 discerned as they pointed at multiple holes in the walls. Inside them were burrows of rats of different shapes and sizes. As Drone 8 had pointed out, the team had finally found a meganest of rats, which was both a good thing and a bad thing for the three.

The light shone from the torches attracted the attention of the countless number of rats inside the ravine. Soon, they began squeaking in unison, alerting all nearby rats. A number of rats jumped off from holes on the walls, then started climbing towards the three drones.

“Just in case this hasn’t processed for you, Ratslayer, now’s not a good time to fight,” Drone 8 said.

“Noted. It’s time to run!” Ratslayer exclaimed.