For a long while, I sat there watching as the sun slowly crawled its way over the horizon. The Stele stood at my back. The winds were bitter and cold, and I could see some dark clouds gathering off to my left. It would probably rain today. Or snow. It was cold enough for that, I felt sure.
I shivered.
Icing on the cake, really. Icing on the epic shit-cake the last twenty-four hours had turned into. I felt numb. Chewed and spit out like a wad of forgotten tobacco on the sidewalk.
“Donum had never seen such bullshit before,” I mumbled to myself then quickly plastered a grouchy frown over my face. I snorted at the strangely appropriate yet silly little reference. But it made me feel a little better. I was coping, I realized.
What else could I do? Those last few moments with Bline had been… well, I was not certain any longer. They were starting to crumple and blur. Like the edges of it had been blunted. Almost dreamlike. Though still… present. I knew I would never forget that meeting, but there was a consuming quality to it that had been left behind.
Probably intentionally, I realized. That last copy of Her had cast some sort of spell at me. There was no certain way of telling what it had done, but my suspicion was that it was meant to help me deal with… whatever I had just gone through. If so, then I owed Her at least a modicum of gratitude.
Then again, She owed me quite a lot more than that—the least of which would be a proper explanation. Summon me with a Quest, ask me a bunch of nonsensical questions, and then freak out after sniffing me? What the absolute fuck?
Self-consciously, I lifted one arm and took a whiff of myself. I had not seen a stick of deodorant since I had landed here, but I could still detect a hint of the oils the lilim had rubbed into me the day before yesterday. It could have been worse. Then again, it could have been a hell of a lot better.
I shook my head. It was not my fault the hygienic standards on this world were so poor. What did She expect?
I didn’t even get to answer Her original question.
The thought made me sigh. What am I? It was a simple little question, really. But not so easy to answer. I was a lot of things. An adventurer. Quester for the Words. Something of a lover… or a pervert, depending on your point of view.
Just a regular guy, really. A human. Homo sapiens. Latin for ‘wise man,’ though that was a bit of a stretch. Despite what Jax often said of me, I felt rather lacking in wisdom. But then, Arx had once told me it was difficult to be wise without knowledge.
And I had sadly little of that.
So then… what do I know? For a few moments, I closed my eyes, trying to remember every detail of the conversation that I could. Bline had been so… domineering. So… well, god-like, to be frank, that it had been difficult to concentrate in her presence. And much like the other goddess I had met, She was crazy as fuck!
I hope they’re not all like that. The thought sent a shiver down my spine.
The only clue I had was in Her denial of having sent me that final message I had received while falling through the hole between worlds. ‘Welcome to Vrekfren,’ it had said. And from Her reaction, it was a piece of information I definitely should not have known.
The why of it was still a complete mystery, but I could at least say one thing. I had not been talking to Bline while falling through that void. She had not changed my name, nor had She given me this Class.
So who did?
The only thing I could think of was that it must have been one of the other goddesses. Why they would have pretended to be Her was beyond me, but then, technically they had not. I had only assumed. Whoever it was I had been talking to had never introduced themselves.
Still, that realization made the answer to the original question pretty obvious. Bline had said there was no record of any other human ever calling to her Power. She had even said that there was no such thing as a human. That meant She not know my origins and, most likely, did not even know about Earth.
It was a bit of a worrying revelation. Not only was some as-yet-unidentified entity out there masquerading as Bline, but worse, Bline did not even know how to properly use my… what? My brain? Or the construct inside of it anyway. And it was starting to cause problems.
I nodded slowly. Things were starting to make at least little sense now. I had no idea how to help Her with that, but I could at least answer the question.
“I’m an alien,” I said aloud. I did not belong here.
I snorted a moment later. I was pretty sure that was the first time I had uttered those words aloud. Not that anyone was around to hear them.
I was alone on this hill. The bitingly cold breeze and the approaching clouds that came with it carried my words away unheard into the distance. Jax was gone. I could not even feel her presence. And that could mean only one thing.
She was dead. Somehow.
There was no sign of any struggle that I could see. Not that I was any great tracker. The fence was busted up, of course, but besides that there were no blood spatters nor anything else to indicate a fight.
And Jax would have freaked once I disappeared on her like that. What she would have done afterward was the question. Short of attacking the Stele outright—which I would not put past her—the only other thing I could think of was that she might have gone in search of help. If so, then she could have met her end somewhere out in the plains.
Then again, I could think of lots of other possibilities. There was no telling how long I had been… wherever that was. It could have been hours as easily as years for all I knew.
I did not even know when she would be respawning. Bline was currently giving me the silent treatment—She would not show me my stat sheet much less respond to my queries about Jax. But given the state She had been in when I had last seen Her, that was entirely unsurprising.
Maybe my b.o. offended Her.
I chuckled quietly and shook my head. There was no need to be sarcastic about it. Even if it did make me feel better.
Now that I thought about it, though, Bline had mentioned another thing I needed to apologize for. For some reason, She had decided to temporarily set the matter aside, but things had gotten so out of hand, we had sort of forgotten about it.
Well, whatever. I could easily rectify that… if She was even paying attention. To my sensibilities it was less meaningful to apologize without first knowing your transgression, but according to Bline, She did not much care one way or the other.
However, when I took a breath to speak into the empty air again, someone else spoke.
“What’s an alien?”
Startled, I twisted around quickly, trying to find the source of the voice, but there was no one to see. Either they were invisible, or I really was going crazy. Finally. Then again, this was far from the first time I had heard voices coming out of the empty air—which I realize is not a great argument for the whole ‘not crazy’ thing.
“Hello?” I called cautiously. “Who’s there?”
No one answered at first. But then, a large, purplish-black grasshopper… thing landed on my knee. Grasshopper was not quite right to describe the insect, of course, but it was close enough. Lots of legs. Big ones at the back. Wings. Large, compound eyes. A few venomous-looking spikes. Basically a grasshopper.
“Just me.”
The voice emanating out of the finger-sized insect seemed appropriate enough—if any voice at all could be said to be appropriate for a grasshopper. It was squeaky. And kind of cute.
“Well…” I said, mostly to myself, “this is new.”
“What’s an alien?” the bug asked again.
I clicked my tongue. Sure. Have a conversation with a cricket. Why not? “It means… foreigner. Or something like that. But what I meant by it was that I’m not from this world. Place? I dunno.”
The bug rubbed its forelegs over its head. I was uncertain how to interpret the gesture. “Huh,” it said after a moment. “I’ll let Momma know. Thanks.”
With that, it spread its wings to fly off again, but I quickly held up my hands to forestall it. “Wait a second. You can’t just fly off! You’re a talking… bug! At least introduce yourself.”
The grasshopper seemed to consider that for a second before spreading its antennas into the insect-equivalent of a shrug. Or something.
“I’m not important enough to have a name,” it informed me. “I’m just a little Faen.”
“You’re a Faen?” I asked, incredulous. But then I turned my head to one side and lifted my eyebrows. Eh. Why not? My crazy-ass-shit meter had pretty much topped out for the day.
“Of course, I am!” it replied. “What else could I be? Kind?”
It started laughing then, as if it had told some sort of joke. Then again, it could have just been rubbing its legs together. It was hard to tell.
I rested my chin in my hand and shook my head. “Well, your sense of humor is certainly on point.” I always had felt like I was on the other side of an inside joke with them.
“Thank you,” it replied with a bow. Or a bob, anyway. “Goodbye.”
“Hold on,” I said quickly. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m assuming this mother of yours would be Ahnbe, right?”
It was a pretty safe assumption. She was the all-things-monster goddess, and the critter perched on my knee was certainly grotesque enough to qualify.
“Uh huh!” the Faen chirped happily.
I could not help but smirk at the insect’s enthusiasm. “Cool. Would you carry a message to Her for me?”
“I’d be happy—uh…” the Faen paused abruptly and rubbed its foreleg over an antenna. “Well, I’d like to, but I just remembered that I’m not supposed to let you know I’m here.” The grasshopper looked around as if checking to see whether we were alone. Then it whispered, “I’m a spy!”
I rolled my lips between my teeth in an effort not to laugh aloud. Despite its poisonous, bug-like appearance, this creature was almost adorable.
“I… I promise not to tell anyone.”
“Thanks!” it whispered gratefully. “Momma would get upset if she found out. She doesn’t do it on purpose, but she can be scary when she’s mad.”
I nodded with genuine sympathy. The one time I had met Her, She had spent a decent amount of time yelling at her servants. But given how spectacularly incompetent this one was at being a ‘spy,’ I could kind of see where She had been coming from. Kind of.
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.”
“You shouldn’t be afraid of her, Mr. D,” the Faen assured me, but then it seemed to chew on one of its legs in thought. “Or that is… she wouldn’t want you to be afraid of her. But you know…”
I took a considering breath and smiled softly. The little Faen somewhat reminded me of a child consoling one of its parents after they had fought. “I’ll do my best, but I don’t see that changing any time soon. Especially not while She’s sending spies to watch me. That kind of thing isn’t the greatest for building trust.”
The grasshopper fluttered its wings nervously but said nothing.
“Right… well, I did still want to send Her a message,” I muttered. And if She’s sending spies after me, then maybe I should deploy a touch of counterintelligence of my own. “But since you can’t do that directly… maybe you can just say you overheard me talking to myself?”
“Sure!” it enthused, happy at the shift in topic, and it excitedly began to hop back and forth between my knees. “What do you want me to say?”
“Tell her…” I paused to consider how to phrase this. The whole questioning-without-asking paradigm I had been introduced to with Bline had the wheels spinning in my head. It might be possible to get this Faen to reveal something it had not intended by feeding it the right information. “Tell her I was saying, ‘Never did explain what the hell that gesh thing was. I wonder whether Ahnbe had anything to do with it.’”
“Ooh~ that’s juicy!” it exclaimed. “Momma would definitely want to hear that. Anything else?”
Hmm… I’m assuming that means this Faen didn’t know about it. But it did not seem to be high up in the pecking order, so whether that meant Ahnbe was responsible or even knew about it was still a mystery. Okay, let’s try this…
“Yeah, add in, ‘And what was the deal with all those questions about Ahnbe, anyway? Why would She even care that we’d—‘”
“Oh my, oh my, oh my!” the grasshopper cried and began hopping up and down in its excitement. “I gotta tell her that!”
Without another word, the little Faen’s wings buzzed and it shot up and off into the distance.
“Huh,” I said shortly.
I had figured that would light a fire under it. I had made sure to emphasize the questions part and, given that the two goddesses were sisters, Ahnbe would have to know Bline was not partial to asking them. Could not, in point of fact. So that had to be significant.
Moreover, Bline had been plenty upset about what her sister had been doing, and as Ahnbe’s ‘chosen’ or whatever, I figured I owed it to Her to report that sort of thing. So, I was only playing my part. Never mind that the information was likely to piss Her off.
Just so long as She was not pissed off at me. That was important. And if this worked out like I hoped, maybe the two of them would be too busy squabbling with one another to mess with me for a while.
It was a pretty minor chip to play, all things considered. But I was a pretty minor player. And I was dealing with divine beings! I could be forgiven for resorting to manipulation.
Even if the creepy little bug had been cute.
“I just hope She doesn’t take it out on the messenger,” I muttered quietly.
With that, I rolled to my feet and dusted myself off. There was no point in moping around here anymore, but my options were slim. The only plan I could think of was to head back to the ruins of Raialie.
If I was at all lucky, there might be a few survivors, and I could offer my services as a healer. I might not have been entirely to blame for the town’s destruction, but it was the least I could do. Plus, once people started popping back out of the Dungeon again—presuming that at least some of them had survived—it would be helpful to have a healer around to help organize a relief effort.
And if I was not lucky… well, I was sure a merchant caravan or some such would show up eventually. I could easily play the part of the ‘innocent’ bystander and convenient witness to the town’s demise. So with that in mind, I set off back down the hill.
Just as I passed underneath the ruined slats of the fence, a gust of freezing wind hit me in the chest, and my entire body immediately clenched in response. The dark clouds I had noted earlier were coming in fast, and their leading edges were already beginning to obscure the sun.
“Ah… hell,” I complained ineffectually into the wind.
I had been hoping the storm would be kind enough to wait until later in the day. At least that way Arx might have had the chance to respawn, and I would have the benefit of her warmth. But it seemed I was doomed to suffer for the foreseeable future.
For a brief moment, I considered using my newest Class feature. I was supposed to have the ability to sacrifice my remaining Life Energy pool to revive one of my lilim. But that would render me unconscious. And while that seemed somewhat preferable to what I was about to go through, it also meant that whichever lilim I revived would then have to deal with my dead weight.
And figure out how to cram some Life Energy back into me before I died myself. So that was a bust. It was a ripcord for emergencies only, and I was not quite there yet.
“Maybe I will look into a clothes-summoning spell. A nice and thick windbreaker would be heaven right about now. And some underwear,” I muttered under my breath as I shivered my way down the switchbacks. I was not appreciating having gusts of freezing wind blowing my skirt up. It felt like my balls were trying to escape up my torso. “Or maybe some kind of instant hut? That’d be pretty sweet for waiting out weather like this. But if I can’t buy any of that yet, then I think a campfire spell at the bare minimum. Never underestimate a good campfire spell.”
By the time I made it back to the survey site, fat droplets of rain were already starting to plop against my face. And they were cold enough to sting. Sadly, there was no shelter anywhere in sight—not even an abandoned tarp. The only possible candidates I could see were a few shallow pits the surveyors had dug around the area. They would do jack-all for the rain, but if I laid flat inside one, I could at least get out of the wind a bit.
So with that in mind, I hurried forward, hunching over to protect a little of my own body heat from the freezing weather. But just as I passed the large signboard, the rain really let loose.
I was drenched in seconds. The rain was so cold and so torrential I knew there was little point in hurrying any more. Hypothermia was going to set in no matter what I did.
Besides… the little pits were already starting to fill with water.
“Well…” I sighed. “I guess it’s time to get horny.”
It was better than dying from the cold, but by my estimate, Arx would not revive for another half-day. And as the commercial had so often warned, you should seek emergency medical help for an erection lasting more than four hours.
Dejectedly, I glanced at the sign. I did not really care what it said, but I was delaying my inevitable descent into self-inflicted lust-madness. Nevertheless, I was glad I did.
In big, bold letters the sign read:
Incineration warning!
Do not touch the Stele!
Even an accidental brush with the stone
will cause severe or fatal burns.
I clicked my shivering tongue. “Well… now I know what happened to Jax.”
Clearly, Bline was not a fan of uninvited guests.
Jax had been right. We should have known better than to have sex right on the Goddess’ doorstep. And now we were suffering the consequences. She was taking a time-out in Deadsville, and I was freezing my tuchus off.
For a few moments, I had the passing thought that I should try to scratch a bit of my hard-won wisdom into the sign. It might be useful for future visitors to learn that Bline sometimes let people in, but my fingers were already starting to get too numb from the cold to hold my recently-purchased knife. And I did not trust myself to attempt it while horny.
The results might be… inappropriate.
Right about then, I heard a loud thwap rattle off the sign. And then another. And then a few more in the grass beside me. As a little frozen lump of hail rolled to a stop by my foot, I heaved a long-suffering sigh then turned my gaze to the clouds roiling above my head.
“Ah, come on!” I shouted. “Really?”
Shockingly enough, the heavens actually replied… in the form of an enormous eagle bursting through the cloud layer. It was too big to be real—the wings alone were wider across than a 747. And from the lightnings that arced and danced over its blue-gray feathers, there was only one word I could use to describe it.
Thunderbird.
And naturally, it dove straight towards me.
“Figures.”
I just stared as the legendary creature swooped low over the plains, picking up speed all the while. It cut through the curtains of rain like a knife while electricity spat and clawed at the ground beneath it.
As awesome and terrifying as the sight was, I did not run. And though adrenaline quickly flooded my system, I barely even spared a glance to the rain-filled pits that I might have ordinarily attempted to hide in. I had reached a state beyond panic.
The Demon Queen had come for me once. Now She had come again. And most likely, She would keep coming until She had succeeded. At least this way, out here and alone, there would be no more innocent bystanders.
But I had already stood before divinity. Twice! If She wanted a conversation, I would give Her one. And maybe I would give Her a piece of my mind while I was at it!
It probably would not be smart, but I was running awfully short of fucks to give.
As the eagle’s massive form swelled ever closer, the thundering from the constant lightning strikes began to bleed together into one continuous explosion of sound, and I was forced to cover my ears. So it came as no surprise that the last words I spoke before being swallowed by the gaping beak hurtling toward me were completely unintelligible even to myself.
However, an astute lip-reader might have made out, “Man… I wonder what Schwarzenegger would have said right about now.”
*****
The next thing I knew, I was staring at a flying saucer.
My eyes immediately closed almost by reflex. I had not been on this world all that long, but I had already seen some shit. And I do mean, I had seen some shiiiiit. I had stood before goddesses, been buried alive, seen terrifying monsters of many indescribable shapes and sizes—from Zombies to town-swallowing Wurms to ‘three-legged’ kaiju-Goblins—and any number of other crazy-ass things. But somehow, this place always found a way to surprise me.
I took a deep breath. And then another, just taking a few moments to take stock of my situation.
I was lying on some sort of hard yet textured surface, almost like a fine moss on a large, flat rock. Otherwise, I felt relatively comfortable. Not particularly cold nor hot. And I was not wet anymore.
So that was a welcome change.
The only other detectable sensation of note was the total lack of any other detectable sensations. There was no wind whatsoever. And I could hear nothing. It was possible I had gone deaf—that Thunderbird had certainly been loud enough—but my ears did not hurt, nor did I feel injured in any way. There was simply a pervading sense of stillness to the air.
And precisely none of that lined up to my perceived notion of what an impending alien abduction might be like.
Having calmed myself somewhat, I decided to take another look. The saucer was hovering perfectly still some distance above my head. Though, when I focused on it more closely, I found its design complex and oddly baroque. There were ten neatly even sections to it, almost like pizza slices, which were banded on all sides with a textured filigree in gold leaf. Each featured a spidery cobweb of repeated floral patterns that mirrored one another, slice to slice. Light emanated out of the sides of each section in a focused beam aimed at the sky around it.
Which was perfectly white. And also patterned with elaborate floral designs.
I had to give my head a quick shake as reality realigned itself in my mind. With it came the realization that I was staring at some sort of grand light fixture. Given its size, the materials it was made of, and the care and intricacy of its construction, it was expensive. And as I turned my head to one side, slowly tracing the continued patterns in the ceiling, the boxes of crown molding, and the faded murals within them, I had little doubt that the rest of the house would follow suit.
Or perhaps mansion would be a better word.
I sat up quickly and scanned the area, looking for potential danger. I knew this had to be the Dungeon—having been swallowed by a Mouth or two, one does learn to pick up the signs—so I fully expected to be greeted with some sort of ridiculously dangerous scenario. However, the only things I could hear were the rustling sounds from my own clothes.
As near as I could tell, I had appeared on a rug in the middle of a grand, entry hall for some kind of… palace? It was hard to imagine it being anything else. This one room alone was far larger than my apartment back home. And it had housed four of us.
There were spacious and elaborately decorated hallways leading off to my left and right with numerous doors scattered around. Chairs, lounges, and tea tables of various descriptions and sizes—all of which looked far to expensive to use—were installed into little conversation nooks all over the place, seemingly at random. And there seemed to be no end to them. Each of the hallways extended into the distance for several hundred paces before ever turning a corner, yet every few windows and doorways had a private living area around it.
Meanwhile, the bases of a pair of sweeping staircases met directly in front of me and led up to a landing a story above. They then met in the middle to form yet another set of stairs before disappearing up a third story where the elaborate ceiling began. The stairs both had a fine, red carpet running down the middle of them which ended just before reaching the bottom floor. Each featured a handrail of seemless, polished marble which were capped off by a pair of burnished bronze statues.
I recognized them immediately.
One was of Jax. The other, Arx.
Both quite nude.
“’Kay,” I muttered to myself, mostly just to say something. The sound reverberated around the cavernous room for a brief moment before dying away.
Climbing to my feet, I decided to get a closer look. The statues were only about the length of my forearm—a cubit as Arx often called it. Each were posed into the sensuous dance of a candle’s flame, with arms stretched above their heads, their hips cocked, and legs rubbing against one another. Their eyes were sculpted closed.
I might have described the statues as ‘tasteful nudes.’ If they had not been depicting my lovers. In somebody else’s house.
“Well, that’s… mildly disturbing,” I commented aloud as I wondered at the significance of the installation.
Off to my left, I caught a faint glimmer, and when I turned, I discovered a silver platter on top of a fold-out serving tray just to one side of Jax’s stairwell. Atop it was a neatly folded note and a tiny, blue crystal hovering just above it.
Ah, here we go.
Each version of the Dungeon I had been to thus far had been significantly different, but there were certain similarities. And these crystals were one. Sometimes they functioned as simple light sources, others were sculpted into strange yet functional shapes. But mostly, they were used as a way for the denizens of this place to communicate some important bit of information.
“Right, then,” I murmured before bending down to tap the crystal. “Let’s see what you have to say for yourself.”
The moment I did, the little crystal warbled out some sort of bird-like chirp then with flash, it simply dissolved into particles. Immediately after, the envelope just beneath it rose of its own accord off the tray to hover before my face.
The front was simply addressed, Donum, with a neat, yet flowing handwritten script. The envelope then flipped around to reveal a circle of pressed, red wax. The design was immediately familiar. It was the same one from the Dungeon coins—a silhouette of a woman with a pair of horns crowning her head.
The seal then popped open so that the note might unfold itself to reveal the text hidden within. There it remained, simply floating in the air just before my face so that I could read it at my convenience.
The whole thing had been extremely simplistic as magic went, yet it had a certain subtle elegance to it. Despite myself, I was impressed. It was like the Dungeon was going to some effort to put on a show.
With a slight frown of concentration, I took a moment to focus on the note. The interior was filled with the same handwritten script. It read as follows:
My dear and lovely mortal,
I would like to cordially invite you to attend a dinner with me at your earliest convenience within my solarium. Our repast will be preceded by cocktails, a selection of hors d’oeurvres, and scintillating conversation. Formal attire would be much appreciated.
And do please bring your companions, if you are able. I have long awaited meeting them in person.
Unfortunately, due to my nature, there are certain implicit and unavoidable complications to this invitation—the exact nature of which are left for me to decide. Thus, I have settled on the these few:
For one, you must discover the location and means of entry to my solarium on your own. The other is that you will need to find and ‘rescue’ your companions through whatever means you deem necessary.
I assure you, they are quite unharmed. Nor will any harm come to them. However, until such time as you discover them, they cannot be returned to you. Meanwhile, you are free to explore my home at your leisure. I am certain you will find it stimulating.
If, however, you decide to decline this invitation, you will find the exit behind you. It is unlocked. Pass through it, and your companions will be released before the passing of the sun. No consequence will come to you beyond my unending disappointment.
Yours before the Eye,
Xhinn
Seleroan If you enjoyed that chapter and would like to read more, consider signing up for my Patreon. I have plenty of advanced chapters available. And remember, every donation helps!
For a long while, I sat there watching as the sun slowly crawled its way over the horizon. The Stele stood at my back. The winds were bitter and cold, and I could see some dark clouds gathering off to my left. It would probably rain today. Or snow. It was cold enough for that, I felt sure.
I shivered.
Icing on the cake, really. Icing on the epic shit-cake the last twenty-four hours had turned into. I felt numb. Chewed and spit out like a wad of forgotten tobacco on the sidewalk.
“Donum had never seen such bullshit before,” I mumbled to myself then quickly plastered a grouchy frown over my face. I snorted at the strangely appropriate yet silly little reference. But it made me feel a little better. I was coping, I realized.
What else could I do? Those last few moments with Bline had been… well, I was not certain any longer. They were starting to crumple and blur. Like the edges of it had been blunted. Almost dreamlike. Though still… present. I knew I would never forget that meeting, but there was a consuming quality to it that had been left behind.
Probably intentionally, I realized. That last copy of Her had cast some sort of spell at me. There was no certain way of telling what it had done, but my suspicion was that it was meant to help me deal with… whatever I had just gone through. If so, then I owed Her at least a modicum of gratitude.
Then again, She owed me quite a lot more than that—the least of which would be a proper explanation. Summon me with a Quest, ask me a bunch of nonsensical questions, and then freak out after sniffing me? What the absolute fuck?
Self-consciously, I lifted one arm and took a whiff of myself. I had not seen a stick of deodorant since I had landed here, but I could still detect a hint of the oils the lilim had rubbed into me the day before yesterday. It could have been worse. Then again, it could have been a hell of a lot better.
I shook my head. It was not my fault the hygienic standards on this world were so poor. What did She expect?
I didn’t even get to answer Her original question.
The thought made me sigh. What am I? It was a simple little question, really. But not so easy to answer. I was a lot of things. An adventurer. Quester for the Words. Something of a lover… or a pervert, depending on your point of view.
Just a regular guy, really. A human. Homo sapiens. Latin for ‘wise man,’ though that was a bit of a stretch. Despite what Jax often said of me, I felt rather lacking in wisdom. But then, Arx had once told me it was difficult to be wise without knowledge.
And I had sadly little of that.
So then… what do I know? For a few moments, I closed my eyes, trying to remember every detail of the conversation that I could. Bline had been so… domineering. So… well, god-like, to be frank, that it had been difficult to concentrate in her presence. And much like the other goddess I had met, She was crazy as fuck!
I hope they’re not all like that. The thought sent a shiver down my spine.
The only clue I had was in Her denial of having sent me that final message I had received while falling through the hole between worlds. ‘Welcome to Vrekfren,’ it had said. And from Her reaction, it was a piece of information I definitely should not have known.
The why of it was still a complete mystery, but I could at least say one thing. I had not been talking to Bline while falling through that void. She had not changed my name, nor had She given me this Class.
So who did?
The only thing I could think of was that it must have been one of the other goddesses. Why they would have pretended to be Her was beyond me, but then, technically they had not. I had only assumed. Whoever it was I had been talking to had never introduced themselves.
Still, that realization made the answer to the original question pretty obvious. Bline had said there was no record of any other human ever calling to her Power. She had even said that there was no such thing as a human. That meant She not know my origins and, most likely, did not even know about Earth.
It was a bit of a worrying revelation. Not only was some as-yet-unidentified entity out there masquerading as Bline, but worse, Bline did not even know how to properly use my… what? My brain? Or the construct inside of it anyway. And it was starting to cause problems.
I nodded slowly. Things were starting to make at least little sense now. I had no idea how to help Her with that, but I could at least answer the question.
“I’m an alien,” I said aloud. I did not belong here.
I snorted a moment later. I was pretty sure that was the first time I had uttered those words aloud. Not that anyone was around to hear them.
I was alone on this hill. The bitingly cold breeze and the approaching clouds that came with it carried my words away unheard into the distance. Jax was gone. I could not even feel her presence. And that could mean only one thing.
She was dead. Somehow.
There was no sign of any struggle that I could see. Not that I was any great tracker. The fence was busted up, of course, but besides that there were no blood spatters nor anything else to indicate a fight.
And Jax would have freaked once I disappeared on her like that. What she would have done afterward was the question. Short of attacking the Stele outright—which I would not put past her—the only other thing I could think of was that she might have gone in search of help. If so, then she could have met her end somewhere out in the plains.
Then again, I could think of lots of other possibilities. There was no telling how long I had been… wherever that was. It could have been hours as easily as years for all I knew.
I did not even know when she would be respawning. Bline was currently giving me the silent treatment—She would not show me my stat sheet much less respond to my queries about Jax. But given the state She had been in when I had last seen Her, that was entirely unsurprising.
Maybe my b.o. offended Her.
I chuckled quietly and shook my head. There was no need to be sarcastic about it. Even if it did make me feel better.
Now that I thought about it, though, Bline had mentioned another thing I needed to apologize for. For some reason, She had decided to temporarily set the matter aside, but things had gotten so out of hand, we had sort of forgotten about it.
Well, whatever. I could easily rectify that… if She was even paying attention. To my sensibilities it was less meaningful to apologize without first knowing your transgression, but according to Bline, She did not much care one way or the other.
However, when I took a breath to speak into the empty air again, someone else spoke.
“What’s an alien?”
Startled, I twisted around quickly, trying to find the source of the voice, but there was no one to see. Either they were invisible, or I really was going crazy. Finally. Then again, this was far from the first time I had heard voices coming out of the empty air—which I realize is not a great argument for the whole ‘not crazy’ thing.
“Hello?” I called cautiously. “Who’s there?”
No one answered at first. But then, a large, purplish-black grasshopper… thing landed on my knee. Grasshopper was not quite right to describe the insect, of course, but it was close enough. Lots of legs. Big ones at the back. Wings. Large, compound eyes. A few venomous-looking spikes. Basically a grasshopper.
“Just me.”
The voice emanating out of the finger-sized insect seemed appropriate enough—if any voice at all could be said to be appropriate for a grasshopper. It was squeaky. And kind of cute.
“Well…” I said, mostly to myself, “this is new.”
“What’s an alien?” the bug asked again.
I clicked my tongue. Sure. Have a conversation with a cricket. Why not? “It means… foreigner. Or something like that. But what I meant by it was that I’m not from this world. Place? I dunno.”
The bug rubbed its forelegs over its head. I was uncertain how to interpret the gesture. “Huh,” it said after a moment. “I’ll let Momma know. Thanks.”
With that, it spread its wings to fly off again, but I quickly held up my hands to forestall it. “Wait a second. You can’t just fly off! You’re a talking… bug! At least introduce yourself.”
The grasshopper seemed to consider that for a second before spreading its antennas into the insect-equivalent of a shrug. Or something.
“I’m not important enough to have a name,” it informed me. “I’m just a little Faen.”
“You’re a Faen?” I asked, incredulous. But then I turned my head to one side and lifted my eyebrows. Eh. Why not? My crazy-ass-shit meter had pretty much topped out for the day.
“Of course, I am!” it replied. “What else could I be? Kind?”
It started laughing then, as if it had told some sort of joke. Then again, it could have just been rubbing its legs together. It was hard to tell.
I rested my chin in my hand and shook my head. “Well, your sense of humor is certainly on point.” I always had felt like I was on the other side of an inside joke with them.
“Thank you,” it replied with a bow. Or a bob, anyway. “Goodbye.”
“Hold on,” I said quickly. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m assuming this mother of yours would be Ahnbe, right?”
It was a pretty safe assumption. She was the all-things-monster goddess, and the critter perched on my knee was certainly grotesque enough to qualify.
“Uh huh!” the Faen chirped happily.
I could not help but smirk at the insect’s enthusiasm. “Cool. Would you carry a message to Her for me?”
“I’d be happy—uh…” the Faen paused abruptly and rubbed its foreleg over an antenna. “Well, I’d like to, but I just remembered that I’m not supposed to let you know I’m here.” The grasshopper looked around as if checking to see whether we were alone. Then it whispered, “I’m a spy!”
I rolled my lips between my teeth in an effort not to laugh aloud. Despite its poisonous, bug-like appearance, this creature was almost adorable.
“I… I promise not to tell anyone.”
“Thanks!” it whispered gratefully. “Momma would get upset if she found out. She doesn’t do it on purpose, but she can be scary when she’s mad.”
I nodded with genuine sympathy. The one time I had met Her, She had spent a decent amount of time yelling at her servants. But given how spectacularly incompetent this one was at being a ‘spy,’ I could kind of see where She had been coming from. Kind of.
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.”
“You shouldn’t be afraid of her, Mr. D,” the Faen assured me, but then it seemed to chew on one of its legs in thought. “Or that is… she wouldn’t want you to be afraid of her. But you know…”
I took a considering breath and smiled softly. The little Faen somewhat reminded me of a child consoling one of its parents after they had fought. “I’ll do my best, but I don’t see that changing any time soon. Especially not while She’s sending spies to watch me. That kind of thing isn’t the greatest for building trust.”
The grasshopper fluttered its wings nervously but said nothing.
“Right… well, I did still want to send Her a message,” I muttered. And if She’s sending spies after me, then maybe I should deploy a touch of counterintelligence of my own. “But since you can’t do that directly… maybe you can just say you overheard me talking to myself?”
“Sure!” it enthused, happy at the shift in topic, and it excitedly began to hop back and forth between my knees. “What do you want me to say?”
“Tell her…” I paused to consider how to phrase this. The whole questioning-without-asking paradigm I had been introduced to with Bline had the wheels spinning in my head. It might be possible to get this Faen to reveal something it had not intended by feeding it the right information. “Tell her I was saying, ‘Never did explain what the hell that gesh thing was. I wonder whether Ahnbe had anything to do with it.’”
“Ooh~ that’s juicy!” it exclaimed. “Momma would definitely want to hear that. Anything else?”
Hmm… I’m assuming that means this Faen didn’t know about it. But it did not seem to be high up in the pecking order, so whether that meant Ahnbe was responsible or even knew about it was still a mystery. Okay, let’s try this…
“Yeah, add in, ‘And what was the deal with all those questions about Ahnbe, anyway? Why would She even care that we’d—‘”
“Oh my, oh my, oh my!” the grasshopper cried and began hopping up and down in its excitement. “I gotta tell her that!”
Without another word, the little Faen’s wings buzzed and it shot up and off into the distance.
“Huh,” I said shortly.
I had figured that would light a fire under it. I had made sure to emphasize the questions part and, given that the two goddesses were sisters, Ahnbe would have to know Bline was not partial to asking them. Could not, in point of fact. So that had to be significant.
Moreover, Bline had been plenty upset about what her sister had been doing, and as Ahnbe’s ‘chosen’ or whatever, I figured I owed it to Her to report that sort of thing. So, I was only playing my part. Never mind that the information was likely to piss Her off.
Just so long as She was not pissed off at me. That was important. And if this worked out like I hoped, maybe the two of them would be too busy squabbling with one another to mess with me for a while.
It was a pretty minor chip to play, all things considered. But I was a pretty minor player. And I was dealing with divine beings! I could be forgiven for resorting to manipulation.
Even if the creepy little bug had been cute.
“I just hope She doesn’t take it out on the messenger,” I muttered quietly.
With that, I rolled to my feet and dusted myself off. There was no point in moping around here anymore, but my options were slim. The only plan I could think of was to head back to the ruins of Raialie.
If I was at all lucky, there might be a few survivors, and I could offer my services as a healer. I might not have been entirely to blame for the town’s destruction, but it was the least I could do. Plus, once people started popping back out of the Dungeon again—presuming that at least some of them had survived—it would be helpful to have a healer around to help organize a relief effort.
And if I was not lucky… well, I was sure a merchant caravan or some such would show up eventually. I could easily play the part of the ‘innocent’ bystander and convenient witness to the town’s demise. So with that in mind, I set off back down the hill.
Just as I passed underneath the ruined slats of the fence, a gust of freezing wind hit me in the chest, and my entire body immediately clenched in response. The dark clouds I had noted earlier were coming in fast, and their leading edges were already beginning to obscure the sun.
“Ah… hell,” I complained ineffectually into the wind.
I had been hoping the storm would be kind enough to wait until later in the day. At least that way Arx might have had the chance to respawn, and I would have the benefit of her warmth. But it seemed I was doomed to suffer for the foreseeable future.
For a brief moment, I considered using my newest Class feature. I was supposed to have the ability to sacrifice my remaining Life Energy pool to revive one of my lilim. But that would render me unconscious. And while that seemed somewhat preferable to what I was about to go through, it also meant that whichever lilim I revived would then have to deal with my dead weight.
And figure out how to cram some Life Energy back into me before I died myself. So that was a bust. It was a ripcord for emergencies only, and I was not quite there yet.
“Maybe I will look into a clothes-summoning spell. A nice and thick windbreaker would be heaven right about now. And some underwear,” I muttered under my breath as I shivered my way down the switchbacks. I was not appreciating having gusts of freezing wind blowing my skirt up. It felt like my balls were trying to escape up my torso. “Or maybe some kind of instant hut? That’d be pretty sweet for waiting out weather like this. But if I can’t buy any of that yet, then I think a campfire spell at the bare minimum. Never underestimate a good campfire spell.”
By the time I made it back to the survey site, fat droplets of rain were already starting to plop against my face. And they were cold enough to sting. Sadly, there was no shelter anywhere in sight—not even an abandoned tarp. The only possible candidates I could see were a few shallow pits the surveyors had dug around the area. They would do jack-all for the rain, but if I laid flat inside one, I could at least get out of the wind a bit.
So with that in mind, I hurried forward, hunching over to protect a little of my own body heat from the freezing weather. But just as I passed the large signboard, the rain really let loose.
I was drenched in seconds. The rain was so cold and so torrential I knew there was little point in hurrying any more. Hypothermia was going to set in no matter what I did.
Besides… the little pits were already starting to fill with water.
“Well…” I sighed. “I guess it’s time to get horny.”
It was better than dying from the cold, but by my estimate, Arx would not revive for another half-day. And as the commercial had so often warned, you should seek emergency medical help for an erection lasting more than four hours.
Dejectedly, I glanced at the sign. I did not really care what it said, but I was delaying my inevitable descent into self-inflicted lust-madness. Nevertheless, I was glad I did.
In big, bold letters the sign read:
Incineration warning!
Do not touch the Stele!
Even an accidental brush with the stone
will cause severe or fatal burns.
I clicked my shivering tongue. “Well… now I know what happened to Jax.”
Clearly, Bline was not a fan of uninvited guests.
Jax had been right. We should have known better than to have sex right on the Goddess’ doorstep. And now we were suffering the consequences. She was taking a time-out in Deadsville, and I was freezing my tuchus off.
For a few moments, I had the passing thought that I should try to scratch a bit of my hard-won wisdom into the sign. It might be useful for future visitors to learn that Bline sometimes let people in, but my fingers were already starting to get too numb from the cold to hold my recently-purchased knife. And I did not trust myself to attempt it while horny.
The results might be… inappropriate.
Right about then, I heard a loud thwap rattle off the sign. And then another. And then a few more in the grass beside me. As a little frozen lump of hail rolled to a stop by my foot, I heaved a long-suffering sigh then turned my gaze to the clouds roiling above my head.
“Ah, come on!” I shouted. “Really?”
Shockingly enough, the heavens actually replied… in the form of an enormous eagle bursting through the cloud layer. It was too big to be real—the wings alone were wider across than a 747. And from the lightnings that arced and danced over its blue-gray feathers, there was only one word I could use to describe it.
Thunderbird.
And naturally, it dove straight towards me.
“Figures.”
I just stared as the legendary creature swooped low over the plains, picking up speed all the while. It cut through the curtains of rain like a knife while electricity spat and clawed at the ground beneath it.
As awesome and terrifying as the sight was, I did not run. And though adrenaline quickly flooded my system, I barely even spared a glance to the rain-filled pits that I might have ordinarily attempted to hide in. I had reached a state beyond panic.
The Demon Queen had come for me once. Now She had come again. And most likely, She would keep coming until She had succeeded. At least this way, out here and alone, there would be no more innocent bystanders.
But I had already stood before divinity. Twice! If She wanted a conversation, I would give Her one. And maybe I would give Her a piece of my mind while I was at it!
It probably would not be smart, but I was running awfully short of fucks to give.
As the eagle’s massive form swelled ever closer, the thundering from the constant lightning strikes began to bleed together into one continuous explosion of sound, and I was forced to cover my ears. So it came as no surprise that the last words I spoke before being swallowed by the gaping beak hurtling toward me were completely unintelligible even to myself.
However, an astute lip-reader might have made out, “Man… I wonder what Schwarzenegger would have said right about now.”
*****
The next thing I knew, I was staring at a flying saucer.
My eyes immediately closed almost by reflex. I had not been on this world all that long, but I had already seen some shit. And I do mean, I had seen some shiiiiit. I had stood before goddesses, been buried alive, seen terrifying monsters of many indescribable shapes and sizes—from Zombies to town-swallowing Wurms to ‘three-legged’ kaiju-Goblins—and any number of other crazy-ass things. But somehow, this place always found a way to surprise me.
I took a deep breath. And then another, just taking a few moments to take stock of my situation.
I was lying on some sort of hard yet textured surface, almost like a fine moss on a large, flat rock. Otherwise, I felt relatively comfortable. Not particularly cold nor hot. And I was not wet anymore.
So that was a welcome change.
The only other detectable sensation of note was the total lack of any other detectable sensations. There was no wind whatsoever. And I could hear nothing. It was possible I had gone deaf—that Thunderbird had certainly been loud enough—but my ears did not hurt, nor did I feel injured in any way. There was simply a pervading sense of stillness to the air.
And precisely none of that lined up to my perceived notion of what an impending alien abduction might be like.
Having calmed myself somewhat, I decided to take another look. The saucer was hovering perfectly still some distance above my head. Though, when I focused on it more closely, I found its design complex and oddly baroque. There were ten neatly even sections to it, almost like pizza slices, which were banded on all sides with a textured filigree in gold leaf. Each featured a spidery cobweb of repeated floral patterns that mirrored one another, slice to slice. Light emanated out of the sides of each section in a focused beam aimed at the sky around it.
Which was perfectly white. And also patterned with elaborate floral designs.
I had to give my head a quick shake as reality realigned itself in my mind. With it came the realization that I was staring at some sort of grand light fixture. Given its size, the materials it was made of, and the care and intricacy of its construction, it was expensive. And as I turned my head to one side, slowly tracing the continued patterns in the ceiling, the boxes of crown molding, and the faded murals within them, I had little doubt that the rest of the house would follow suit.
Or perhaps mansion would be a better word.
I sat up quickly and scanned the area, looking for potential danger. I knew this had to be the Dungeon—having been swallowed by a Mouth or two, one does learn to pick up the signs—so I fully expected to be greeted with some sort of ridiculously dangerous scenario. However, the only things I could hear were the rustling sounds from my own clothes.
As near as I could tell, I had appeared on a rug in the middle of a grand, entry hall for some kind of… palace? It was hard to imagine it being anything else. This one room alone was far larger than my apartment back home. And it had housed four of us.
There were spacious and elaborately decorated hallways leading off to my left and right with numerous doors scattered around. Chairs, lounges, and tea tables of various descriptions and sizes—all of which looked far to expensive to use—were installed into little conversation nooks all over the place, seemingly at random. And there seemed to be no end to them. Each of the hallways extended into the distance for several hundred paces before ever turning a corner, yet every few windows and doorways had a private living area around it.
Meanwhile, the bases of a pair of sweeping staircases met directly in front of me and led up to a landing a story above. They then met in the middle to form yet another set of stairs before disappearing up a third story where the elaborate ceiling began. The stairs both had a fine, red carpet running down the middle of them which ended just before reaching the bottom floor. Each featured a handrail of seemless, polished marble which were capped off by a pair of burnished bronze statues.
I recognized them immediately.
One was of Jax. The other, Arx.
Both quite nude.
“’Kay,” I muttered to myself, mostly just to say something. The sound reverberated around the cavernous room for a brief moment before dying away.
Climbing to my feet, I decided to get a closer look. The statues were only about the length of my forearm—a cubit as Arx often called it. Each were posed into the sensuous dance of a candle’s flame, with arms stretched above their heads, their hips cocked, and legs rubbing against one another. Their eyes were sculpted closed.
I might have described the statues as ‘tasteful nudes.’ If they had not been depicting my lovers. In somebody else’s house.
“Well, that’s… mildly disturbing,” I commented aloud as I wondered at the significance of the installation.
Off to my left, I caught a faint glimmer, and when I turned, I discovered a silver platter on top of a fold-out serving tray just to one side of Jax’s stairwell. Atop it was a neatly folded note and a tiny, blue crystal hovering just above it.
Ah, here we go.
Each version of the Dungeon I had been to thus far had been significantly different, but there were certain similarities. And these crystals were one. Sometimes they functioned as simple light sources, others were sculpted into strange yet functional shapes. But mostly, they were used as a way for the denizens of this place to communicate some important bit of information.
“Right, then,” I murmured before bending down to tap the crystal. “Let’s see what you have to say for yourself.”
The moment I did, the little crystal warbled out some sort of bird-like chirp then with flash, it simply dissolved into particles. Immediately after, the envelope just beneath it rose of its own accord off the tray to hover before my face.
The front was simply addressed, Donum, with a neat, yet flowing handwritten script. The envelope then flipped around to reveal a circle of pressed, red wax. The design was immediately familiar. It was the same one from the Dungeon coins—a silhouette of a woman with a pair of horns crowning her head.
The seal then popped open so that the note might unfold itself to reveal the text hidden within. There it remained, simply floating in the air just before my face so that I could read it at my convenience.
The whole thing had been extremely simplistic as magic went, yet it had a certain subtle elegance to it. Despite myself, I was impressed. It was like the Dungeon was going to some effort to put on a show.
With a slight frown of concentration, I took a moment to focus on the note. The interior was filled with the same handwritten script. It read as follows:
My dear and lovely mortal,
I would like to cordially invite you to attend a dinner with me at your earliest convenience within my solarium. Our repast will be preceded by cocktails, a selection of hors d’oeurvres, and scintillating conversation. Formal attire would be much appreciated.
And do please bring your companions, if you are able. I have long awaited meeting them in person.
Unfortunately, due to my nature, there are certain implicit and unavoidable complications to this invitation—the exact nature of which are left for me to decide. Thus, I have settled on the these few:
For one, you must discover the location and means of entry to my solarium on your own. The other is that you will need to find and ‘rescue’ your companions through whatever means you deem necessary.
I assure you, they are quite unharmed. Nor will any harm come to them. However, until such time as you discover them, they cannot be returned to you. Meanwhile, you are free to explore my home at your leisure. I am certain you will find it stimulating.
If, however, you decide to decline this invitation, you will find the exit behind you. It is unlocked. Pass through it, and your companions will be released before the passing of the sun. No consequence will come to you beyond my unending disappointment.
Yours before the Eye,
Xhinn
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