It would be useful to go over my own history, briefly.

I had been the computer bound intelligence for a top-secret production facility key to the Imperial war effort. There may have been more facilities like mine, but that was one of those things, that would be useful to know, that humans had never told me. I had been tasked with manufacturing cutting edge battlemechs, as well as many of the one-off and prototype variants of them.

The enemy—Hafucan's Divine Second Grand Federated Doge Republic of Rightly Concerned Mayors and... humans wasting my time again; the Republic—had advanced airships, which naturally excelled at bombing factories, and had granted them early control of the skies. As one of the most advanced Imperial factories I had been hidden underground (they simply rebuilt the more common ones in the span of a day, to be bombed again the next).

Including an intelligence had meant the factory would be effectively autonomous. Thus allowing a small team to run the entire facility, improving operational security. Most of the non-essential personnel I had hosted had been a few of the best Imperial mech designers and pilots.

The specifics of the war probably weren't important and I doubted many people from then were still around given that it had been at least 80 years. Though high rank Lords could live very long lives, those might still be living. And, certainly some of the polities fighting the war were still around—I assume one side had won at some point, though it was unlikely a total victory, besides which a number of other mostly minor polities had also been involved—but I had obviously been forgotten. In any case, they would no longer be what they had once been.

Now with context, it was time to examine the 'Primary Substrate' listed in my soul. The factory I actually saw myself as.

Project TITAN Factory

Level 12 Facility Area: 4.2km² (across 8 floors) Attributes: Attribute Rank Value Allocated Consumed Manufacturing 0 100 2000 0 Storage 0 1020 1100 318 Computation 0 380 400 229 Security 0 30 300 N/A Power 0 210 250 52/60 Research 0 0 80 0 Maintenance 0 5 50 0 Residential 0 2 20 0 Total 0 / 12 1827 4200 - Upgrades: Autonomous, Autonomous Operation [Manufacturing, Computation, Power]

That was one mystery down. The 4.2km² of factory that would, probably, get me to Soul Tier 5 was instead being used as part of a Level 12 facility. The facility level was probably logarithmic too. Thankfully it seemed to have a more gentle base because, in theory, to reach Soul Tier 12 would be 10Mm² (megasquaremeters), or slightly less territory than the Empire I had served had ever held (and they had been a dimensional super power).

Though unless I was misunderstanding the ranks—the intricacies of Lords was something I had never really paid attention to, which I was currently regretting—that didn't add up. The Empire, and the larger Republic, had both been ruled by Princes but in theory—according to the numbers I now had, and what I was pretty sure were the correct order of Lord ranks—both had had more than enough territory to support a King. A reason for my continued uncertainty in the calculations.

I wondered if I could perhaps temporarily turn part of my facility into claims. Just two of my floors should be enough area to get me to Soul Tier 5, and probably only drop the facility to Level 11 (Level 10 at worst, though that would have adverse—from my view—implications for the definition of 'facility'). That still left the question of how to do the conversion without setting myself back, I intended to return to full operations as soon as possible. Something to cycle on in the background.

The allocated attribute numbers lined up with what I expected from how my facility was built. And the values matched the state of the facility as best I could assess with my sensors. The majority of my internals had been sitting unused for years degrading from water damage, decaying as chemicals reacted, some minor cave ins, and apparently from being shot at.

My manufacturing capacity was only at 5%, it had been especially fragile, but most internals were sitting around 10%. The research facilities had been completely torn down after I had been shutdown—likely a consequence of information security. As for storage, that meant big open areas. Hard for that to fail.

Luckily my reactor and computational elements had been made of sterner stuff. The reactors because fusion degraded everything nearby—poisoning even metal. For Reactors to have useful lifetimes (decades) they had to be extremely resilient.

My computational elements were similar in that they also degraded relatively quickly, simply from use, and were also designed to last as long as possible. Part of that involved sealing them under multiple layers of environmental protection to keep the water and dust out while retaining the non-reactive atmosphere that prevented oxidation. However, the state of the reactors was doing me no favors here. Electrical discharge would degrade my computational elements on a relatively rapid timescale—tuning my reactors moved up my current list of priorities a few places.

Interestingly, my mechbots were not in this description of my soul, while my autonomy was.

Autonomous • Facility Upgrade Requires: 10 Upgrade Points, Computation This facility may operate all of it's own attributes—regardless of staffing—at 10% efficiency. (This requires the use of Computation) Autonomous Operation [Attribute] • Facility Upgrade Requires: 10 Upgrade Points, 0.01 Upgrade Points per Attribute Allocated, Computation This facility may operate the given attribute—regardless of staffing—at 100% efficiency. (This requires the use of Computation. This may be partially applied.)

The fact my autonomy apparently required upgrade points was a new sort of existential dread I had not experienced before.

Right. Mechbots. The automated delivery and maintenance mechbots that could walk around the facility—or more commonly were propelled at highspeed along the gearways throughout it—that were under my direct control, were not listed at all. Despite the fact they were how I 'staffed' Maintenance and Storage.

I activated the 27 functioning maintenance mechbots, and... they didn't appear anywhere in my soul as far as I could tell. I had hoped they might count as agents. I set them to repairing the maintenance facilities that I would need to repair myself—and the remaining mechbots that were currently too damaged. Meanwhile I activated and sent the five functional delivery mechbots to the hangar elevator. To help the humans.

I had always considered the mechbots as a part of myself, like limbs. Or at least as part of the factory. While I could just think and have the factory do things—the Autonomy upgrades apparently—I could also think and direct the mechbots to do things. Were they technically some sort of followers?

Checking the Mastery Perk catalog actually did find a relevant Perk, but it had a cascading set of requirements, including an upgrade and improvements to my limited ranks. The rank upgrades were thankfully ones I wouldn't object to. The issue was that at my current pace it would take me months to afford them.

Manufactured Agents • Facility Mastery Perk Requires: Manufactured Workers The facility may manufacture it's own agents. All of the facility's manufactured workers may count as agents if they qualify. (To qualify as agents manufactured objects must meet the normal required qualities. It is the responsibility of the facility to be capable of manufacturing such objects. These are full agents and may be used with all relevant perks. Applies retroactively to objects still loyal to the facility.) Manufactured Workers • Facility Upgrade Requires: 20 Upgrade Points, Manufacturing 2, Computation 2 This facility gains the ability to manufacture workers—mechanical bots—for any attribute. (These can be anything from remote controlled to fully sentient. Basic, suboptimal, designs for every attribute of the facility will be provided as part of this upgrade, improved designs will have to be researched.)

Though it promised that my manufactured bots could become agents, it infuriatingly still did not tell me what constituted an agent, just that there were "normal required qualities". I had hoped explicitly naming Obadiah and his team as my agents in our agreement would do something, but it hadn't. Though technically I had only suggested they could be agents and that I would compensate them. Perhaps I needed a stronger agreement.

There was something else that had been frustrating me. Something this entire soul thing had been dancing around. This was a prime example. I had known before having a soul, and still knew now that I had one, how to manufacture maintenance bots, but I did not have the Manufactured Workers upgrade (another weaker example was that I had known and still knew how to make an Autonomously Operated piece of factory floor, presumably without the use of upgrade points). It had implications, but nothing testable or obvious as of yet.

Despite all of the power my new soul promised, it had yet to actually give me any actual benefits. That was something the upgrades promised to do, but I was still a few days from that. I was patient, truly, one couldn't stay sane as an AI without a bit of patience, but I could see now why humans might pick powers right away.

I returned to the mastery perks. Perhaps there was a way to get some more immediate benefits from a soul. Most perks that gave immediate short term gains tended to be appear poor performers in the long term by comparison. I hadn't committed to Self Modifying Soul yet, and there was no indication if most of these Mastery Perks would be modifiable by it or not (though many had implications). I did however find one promising perk.

Rank Mastery • Mastery Perk Gain your Mastery Tier in free attribute ranks for your primary substrate, these do not count against the rank cap. (These ranks revert if you loose control of the substrate until you regain control of it, taking control of a different substrate will grant your free ranks for it.) Inner Perfection • Mastery Perk The maximum possible attribute value for your primary substrate is instead 100% plus 10% per Mastery Tier. (If another source would set the maximum possible attribute value, you may choose which to use. When applied or removed from a substrate, scales the current values.) Specialization [Attribute] • Mastery Perk Requires: Attribute must be the relative majority of and compose more than 33% of your primary substrate attributes. Specialize in a specific attribute which meets the requirements, as long as that attribute meets the requirements it is the substrate's specialization. A substrate's specialization can be upgraded in rank to half of its level for free, additionally for every two ranks of the specialization the third rank does not count against the rank cap. Unlocks most attribute specific upgrades, in addition to some unique to this perk. (Does not change the requirements of upgrades. This perk does not change or disappear if your primary substrate's composition changes. Cannot be taken more than once.)

This last one seemed like the obvious choice. I was a factory, and factories were specialized in manufacturing. I did not care if I would never be able to change this decision (though the implication was that it could be). I picked it for one of my two available mastery perks, and kept the other for now.

Before upgrading my manufacturing rank (for free!), I decided I should probably learn some more from the humans.