It took about a week to sort out the water and housing issues. Merumeru, after making the revenant more "edge-lord," helped uncover the city's central fountain, which had been buried in ash. With Rose's assistance, they were able to water jet away much of the buried infrastructure. The fountain was ruined, but buried pipes could be fixed by a diminutive plumber.

  Edelweiss used many of her drill-tips for her spinning nce, cutting out stones to repair a ruined reservoir a few miles up towards the caldera. By repurposing debris and unearthing useful items, they gathered enough materials for essential buildings: a warehouse, a bcksmith, a rope run, a tanner, a tailoring shop, and a mason's lodge.

  They also built chicken huts, cleared paths for grazing, and set up a fletcher hut. Most importantly, a cobbler's shop secured a coveted spot on what was quickly becoming the main street. Further excavation revealed a ruined dry dock area that had also been buried in ash.

  “Phew,” Alex dusted herself off from the giant mess of ash. “This pce must have worked on ships that were quite rge.”

  “You think that we could fit the flying cloud in here?” A little ice fairy fluttered around inspecting the ruins.

  “Possibly?” Alex pointed at some walls, then to some holes and pipes that led to what might have been some kind of magical pumping station. “But I don’t know if we could get everything working again.”

  “It would be nice if after we pirate the ship we could put all the clockwork upgrades in the toy model in.” Ariel practically vibrated at having such an advanced clockwork ship.

  “For being greedy,” Alex grabbed the ice fairy. “You get to be my dress up doll.”

  “Fine.” Ariel conceded. “Though as a sea elf I barely wear anything.”

  Alex thought Ariel was a cheater. Her magical girl transformation created clothing from magic.

  “Unless you turn back into your old self tomorrow you are going to need something cuter.” Alex turned to Ariel’s familiar. “Isn’t that right Funi?”

  “Yeah.” Fufi and Funi both flew down and started judging the simple toga that the magical girl ice fairy now wore. “She could use a new outfit.”

  “Thank you for helping my contractor.” Funi bowed her long neck towards Alex.

  “In the carriage there are three patterns that might interest you.” Alex pulled out the patterns and showed them to the fmingos, slime girl and the ice fairy. “There is the sailor girl school uniform, the cssic sailor outfit, and the fmboyant one with the unreasonably rge and feathered hat.”

  “Oh that fancy one looks amazing.” Ariel eyed the pattern, fluttering her insect-like wings.

  “Are you sure?” Alex showed her a picture of it on her phone. “I’d have to alter the great coat to get your wings through it and it still might be problematic.”

  “It’ll be a good test to improve your skills.” Ariel didn’t sound phased.

  “We believe in you!” The two fmingos cheered in unison.

  “Meru!” Merumeru cheerfully added.

  “Okay,” Alex didn’t sound confident. “But if it makes it harder to fly, it is because I am not a flight engineer.”

  Merumeru went off to go do plumbing but the two fmingos stayed and chatted up a storm together. Alex did some magic with some measuring string, a needle and thread and a pair of scissors.

  A few hours ter and with the donation of a small chicken feather a doll-sized outfit took pce. It had a big hat with a feather, a red greatcoat, pantaloons, tiny boots (not made by Alex but a special request from the local cobbler) and a frilly matching set of a shirt and cravat.

  “Try this on.” Alex handed the outfit to the ice fairy.

  She doffed her toga and donned the pirate captain outfit, fitting her wings through the slits on the back of the greatcoat carefully with her familiar. “Oh this is nice.”

  “Just be careful about flying.” Alex snugged the greatcoat so it clung to her torso tightly. “The garment will billow around in high winds, likely making you unable to fp your wings. Also, they look delicate, so be careful. So make sure you button it up tight.”

  “I feel like I can be an even better privateer captain!” The little fairy squealed in joy.

  “Meruuu!” Merumeru joined in.

  “Let's go take to the seas and send demons to sleep with the fishes!” Ariel flew around the carriage in circles, her insect-wings buzzing.

  Merumeru followed, bounding down towards the harbor. “Meru!”

  “Don’t mind her.” Funi covered for her contractor. “Merumeru’s been helping power level her. With the pew pew pod, she got a couple levels before they got caught by the ice demons. And now that she is smaller, she doesn’t have to ride it like a dolphin and can sit on Merumeru’s shoulder in the cockpit.”

  Alex waved the fmingo away. “It is okay. Though sometimes I feel like I’m the adult here, but I’m fairly sure she’s more than twice my age.”

  Funi chuckled and looked at the fairy with the zoomies.

  “Thanks.” Alex waved at the departing Fmingo. “Though if they want to take the pipe I’m going to have to make her a doll-sized plumber outfit. Don’t get lost at sea.”

  “She won't,” Funi said, almost out of earshot. “Her css lets her find her way on the open ocean with ease. If we find any treasure though we might need help bringing it back. The little submarine can’t really haul much and Merumeru mostly collects pipes. Not sure how many pipes she can carry, but we’ve yet to find the limit!”

  After everyone but Fufi left, Alex took stock of the supplies. “We used a bunch of ammo when retreating.”

  “Those flying imps are difficult to shoot.” Fufi agreed.

  “Most everything flying is difficult to shoot.” Alex looked at the empty repeating crossbow magazines. There were hundreds. “That is why I made the hero doll’s weapon have such a high rate of fire.”

  “High level archers make almost every shot count.” Fufi shuddered. “Even against flying targets.”

  “It is a good thing you don’t have to worry about that.” Alex smirked. “The st time someone tried to shoot you a whole region fell.”

  “That’s not funny.” Fufi stuck her beak up. “I’ll have you know that I was quite scared when the power armor started burning.”

  “One of these days we need to get you better power armor.” Alex shook her head. “That wooded one was not so good. The next one at least needs to have flight. In hindsight taking away flight from a bird was a terrible idea.”

  “It got us through the anti-fmingo barrier.” Fufi wouldn’t let Alex be too hard on herself.

  “That it did.” Alex looked around the fastly-constructing vilge. “I can’t believe we had to just up and leave like that. I wish there was at least some iron around here. This wood and stone being the only widely avaible material is starting to get old.”

  Alex ordered more bolts from the fletcher, including a special request for Lily's doll-sized ammunition. The fletcher grumbled about the miniature craftsmanship but ultimately complied, acknowledging Alex's role in fighting off demons.

  “I suppose I could do some more excavation.” Alex commented to Fuf after they left the fletcher’s hut.

  “It is more like archaeology around here.” Fufi pointed to the ruined gnomish houses that they had already unearthed. “A whole town, just gone.”

  “Hopefully some of them survived and made it to safety.” Alex got her setup for spraying water and drilling through rock going with a trip back to the nearest water source for Rose to do her super-spray dance.

  They spent the rest of the day doing so but found what looked like an odd brass tube with tiny engravings on it in one of the ruined buildings.

  “I wonder what this is.” Alex took out her phone to take a picture.

  “I’m not sure.” Fufi looked over Alex’s shoulder, also noticing the unevenly pced grooves.

  The magical girl turned it around in her hand and some text appeared on the phone.

  [Detected audio recording, py?]

  [Y/N]

  “I think it is a record!” Alex gasped and pressed yes.

  The recording pyed out:

  “Brothers and sisters of brass and bone. The time of the flesh is over. No longer shall we bow to the fickle winds of the old gods, those idle deities who watched the world and did not spare us. Did their mercy spare our kin from the demon hordes that cw at our shores? Nah, they are our ruin.

  But behold! From the forges beneath the earth, from the hiss of the steam vents and the spin of the great gyroscopes, He awoke.

  All praise the Gearfather.

  He speaks not of temporary things, but in the precision of pistons. His gospel is etched not in crumbling paper but in steel, unburnable, unbreaking.

  The flesh is treacherous. It festers, it aches, it bleeds, it dies. But the metal limb does not falter. The ocur lens does not weep.

  You call yourself gnomes, children of curiosity and invention.

  Then why do you cling to rot?

  In a world where demons burn all pnts, all animals, and turn this pce into a wastend there is only one salvation. All peoples will starve without food. The only that will survive are those who do not eat.

  Already the reforging has begun, repce your hands with tools, your eyes with arcane optics, your heart with thaumaturgic dynamos. Feel no fear. No hunger. Only crity.

  Reject your flesh, cast off the csses of the old divinity. The machine is the only god that answers.”

  Alex blinked. “What did we just listen to?”

  “Some kind of priestly homily.” Fufi looked at the phone then the old-style phonograph. “I think that the gnomes decided that being made of flesh was a bad thing.”

  “So they wanted to become some kind of magitech cyborgs?” Alex thought that was nuts. “Why would people want to do that to themselves?”

  “I don’t know.” Fufi shook her beak. “Professor Copperpot might know more? He’s been around a long time.”

  “Did Hester say something about gnomish machine cultists?” Alex couldn’t recall. “You don’t think there are any on this isnd?”

  “I didn’t see anything, me and my cousin have flown around quite a bit, so if there are gnomes they are hiding.” Fufi considered for a moment. “Or like gnomes tend to do, they are underground.”

  “Have you seen anything like vents or a mine entrance?” Alex worried. “Maybe we shouldn't be digging so much if we accidentally unearth their home.”

  “There might have been some mines at some point?” Fufi put a wing to her beak. “I think I’ve seen some things that might have been tailing from a mine on the other side of the volcano, but with the eruption it could also just be a rockslide that happened a long time ago.”

  melchi