His voice carried dry humor, but there was an edge of genuine fear beneath it.

"Which is why I won't fail. I never do."

They emerged back into the creation chambers, where several pools continued their churning processes.

Slaves moved between stations and demons stood guard at key points.

"This factory represents decades of research," Loryn said, his skeletal fingers resuming their rhythmic tapping. "Everything I've learned, every technique I've perfected, all focused on one goal. Creating life itself."

He turned to look at Jack, and something in his expression suggested he was about to say more than he'd planned.

"You know, Jakar, power structures are temporary. Pho thinks he's eternal, that his gold and fear will keep him secure forever. But everything ends eventually."

Jack remained silent, letting Loryn talk.

"One day, someone else will control Floor 24. Someone who understands that true power isn't gold or fear... it's creation. The ability to make life itself serve you. To build an army from nothing. To be indispensable rather than just powerful."

Loryn's hollow eyes gleamed with ambition that went beyond mere pride.

"The perfect demon," he said quietly. "That's what I'm really working toward. Not just soldiers. Something that combines the best of everything. Power, intelligence, absolute loyalty, and the capability to lead other demons. Create that, and nothing else matters."

'One day, someone else will control Floor 24…. that someone will be me.'

He caught himself, seeming to realize he'd said more than intended.

"But that's theoretical, of course. For now, we serve Master Pho faithfully. As we should."

The contradiction was obvious, and Jack noted it without comment.

'Loryn wants to replace Pho,' Jack assessed, watching the skeletal demon try to walk back his ambitious declarations. 'Good. Ambition makes people careless and too trusting when they think someone might help them achieve their goals.'

"Come," Loryn said, moving toward another section of the factory. "Let me show you the refinement timelines. Understanding how long each stage takes will help you appreciate the complexity."

What followed was a detailed tour of the factory's operations. Loryn walked Jack through every stage, explaining the precise timing required for each process.

How long cores needed to refine, when hearts should be added to the mixture, the exact temperature blood vats needed to maintain.

Jack absorbed it all, not just the information Loryn volunteered but also the things he didn't say.

The day stretched on.

Loryn demonstrated how he monitored multiple creation pools simultaneously, showed Jack the record-keeping system that tracked every demon created, explained the logistics of getting raw materials from the pits and barracks to the factory.

"You have questions," Loryn observed during a brief pause in the tour. "I can see it in how you observe. You're analyzing everything."

"How do you manage the workload?" Jack asked. "This is a massive operation. Even with slaves and created demons, the oversight alone seems overwhelming."

Loryn's skeletal fingers tapped against his robes, he pondered for a moment before answering.

"Delegation and systematization. Every process is documented, every step outlined. Slaves handle routine tasks, created demons provide security and manual labor, and I focus on the components that require actual expertise."

He gestured to a slave who was adjusting a magical array.

"That one has performed that exact task two thousand times. He doesn't need instruction anymore. His body knows the motions, the timing, the corrections. I just need to verify he's doing it correctly, which takes seconds rather than hours."

The efficiency was impressive in a horrifying way.

Loryn had turned demon creation into something approaching an assembly line, with every step optimized and every worker reduced to a component in a larger machine.

"You'll return tomorrow," Loryn stated. "There's more to learn, and I want to show you the experiment once I've stabilized the control system."

Jack nodded once, his red eyes still visible through his visor.

"Good. Meet me at dawn."

Jack left the flesh factory as the fortress's evening routines began.

Behind him, the smokestacks continued their endless output, and within the factory, slaves continued their mechanical work while Loryn oversaw another batch of demon cores being refined.

The next day followed a similar pattern. Jack arrived at dawn, and Loryn immediately pulled him into the day's work.

But this time, instead of just touring, Loryn had Jack observe specific processes in detail.

"Understanding is one thing," Loryn explained. "True comprehension requires seeing how each component affects the whole."

They spent hours at a single purification vat, watching as impurities were gradually filtered out of demon blood.

Loryn explained the magical theory behind each stage, pointed out subtle color changes that indicated successful purification, and demonstrated how to adjust the arrays when the process started to drift.

"Most demons could never grasp this," Loryn said during one of these demonstrations. "They see power as something you're born with or take through combat. They don't understand that power can be created, refined, perfected through understanding and effort."

He looked at Jack, his hollow eyes carrying an intensity that suggested this was more than just education.

"You're different. You understand discipline, control, the value of systematic approaches. That's a very valuable trait to have."

'He's trying to make me dependent on his knowledge,' Jack realized. 'Showing me just enough to demonstrate his value while keeping the real secrets to himself. Building a relationship where I'd need him alive to fully understand what I'm seeing.'

The second day also included watching another demon creation from start to finish. Loryn had Jack stand at the pool's edge as the magic circles activated, explaining each step as it happened.

"The cores provide power," Loryn narrated. "The hearts provide life. The blood provides form. But the magic circles provide direction. Without them, we'd just create a blob of demonic essence. With them, we create something with purpose."

The new demon emerged as the previous one had, fully formed and immediately aware. It looked at Loryn with that same instinctive recognition, and Jack could see the bond forming in real-time.

"Every demon I create knows me," Loryn said softly. "In their essence, they understand that I made them. That I could unmake them just as easily. It's loyalty at the deepest possible level."

By the end of the second day, Jack had seen dozens of demons created, watched hundreds of slaves perform their mechanical tasks, and absorbed enough information about the factory's operations to understand its rhythms completely.

Loryn seemed satisfied with Jack's attention and comprehension.

"You'll serve under me, won't you?" Loryn asked as the second day drew to a close. "I can teach you things the others can't. Real power, not just brute force or merchant tricks or intelligence gathering. The power to create life itself."

Jack gave a response that was carefully noncommittal but could be interpreted as interest.

"I'm still observing. But what you've shown me is... impressive."

Loryn accepted this, his skeletal fingers tapping in that satisfied rhythm.

"Good. Tomorrow you shadow Kaedor. Learn what he has to offer. But remember what you've seen here. Remember what I can teach you."

Jack left the flesh factory for the final time, his mind full of information that went far beyond what Loryn had intentionally revealed.

He knew the factory's layout completely. Knew when Loryn worked alone, when he was surrounded by created demons, when the slaves were most concentrated.

He knew where the control orb was kept, how the bond system worked, where the experiment was contained.

And he knew Loryn's greatest weakness.

Ambition that made real too much and trust too quickly when he thought someone might help him achieve his goals.

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