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Chapter 97 - Self Configuring Modular Robot[]
Dinh Diep Valley, Kowloon...
The dirt and dust in the valley moved.
"What...is that?"
"Excavators and diggers." Duke Ngo told him, "Elizabeth's projects can be...interesting. They're gathering radioactives for conversion to fuel and removing the overburden in areas for our investigators."
"The lack of heavy equipment suddenly makes sense. These are similar to the devices in use by the Draconis Combine, quiaff?" Nelson asked nervously.
"Probably. They're derivatives of the same discoveries. Though I think my sister's working with a better team-she's focused most of it on force-multiplying our industries or handling certain types of delicate work, rather than having roving machine-plagues turned loose with simple instructions to devour and reproduce."
"They are...safe?"
"For a given value of safe, sure." Patrick said, "Safe enough I'm willing to walk among them, anyway. Don't get me wrong, if someone else programmed them, I'd be looking at the site from orbit, but my sister is a prodigy, and she made these." Pat regarded the Khan with a brighter smile, "You're not scared, are you?"
"Neg. Lead on." Nelson lied.