I lit the nails all at the same time, and the result was more violent than I had expected, even after having seen the power of the explosions first hand. It was like the crack of thunder that signals the beginning of a cataclysmic storm, the sound any pagan people would have attributed to the anger of a vengeful god. Everything seemed to be rocked by it, like if it had been any more powerful I would have knocked the planet off of it’s orbit. The shaking, though short lived, was like an earthquake, and the three of us were thrown off of our feet.

Then came the hail. Showers of silver and gold rained down, pelting the floor with treasures. Among these treasures were weapons, so it was a particularly lethal rain - I’m sure that a few surviving Kalamuzi met a terrifying end, buried by their own greed, impaled by the weapons of their victims in a twist of cosmic justice.

I thought at first that the terrible noise following the explosion was their death rattles, but I quickly realized it was the cry of Olsgolon herself. A piercing wail, screamed from a being with no mouth that I had seen, sounding like it came from inside my own head.

I had had the good sense not to place a bomb right in front of us, but still there were stray projectiles. I thought it was all over when I saw a halberd heading towards me with a meteoric speed, too quick for me to crawl from in my exposed position. But Amaia’s magic turned it aside - by the time the eruption subsided, I’d only been hit by a few coins and gems, which I pocketed. Couldn’t completely forget about the debt. In fact…

“RENA,” I said aloud, ignoring the possible reactions of my compatriots, ignoring RENA’s greeting, ignoring the last remnants of the falling debris. I couldn’t move yet anyway, as the smoke had yet to clear, and we could hardly see beyond a few feet then. “I’m absolutely surrounded by treasure here. Get ready to transfer as much as you can. Think you can do that?”

“I’ll start now, Miles. We appreciate your hard work, as always. You may be interested to know that the staff here at Dimen-X has had a running bet on whether or not you’d resort to terroristic bombings before the month’s end. I’ve been authorized to inform you of this. You’ve just made certain members of the Dimen-X family quite happy. That is, they will be happy, when the report is delivered.”

“What’s terroristic about this?” I asked, annoyed.

“Certain organizations would classify this as a holy site of the indigenous people’s religion,” RENA said. “But protocol instructs me to ignore this in the face of such profit.”

I laughed. “Priorities, huh? Fine. Just grab as much as you can.”

“I’ll do my best, Miles.”

With that, I turned up my head, assessing the situation as it now stood.

Besides a sliver directly ahead of us, the pyramidic pile of loot had been tossed aside, revealing the core itself. Or herself.

It was a massive sphere, easily three or four times the height of a man, perfectly rounded in a way that looked otherworldly and alien in that low-tech planet. The surface was like chrome, reflecting the surrounding smoke, dyed in the red light cast by the flames. The temperature of the chamber had risen considerably by now, and sweat began pouring down my back, my arms, my forehead, and the appearance of that thing did not help. It didn’t look like an enemy, but some sort of anomaly, a mistake, something that shouldn't exist.

From it stretched hideous organic tendrils and webbings of flesh, tethering the orb and connecting it to what remained of its pile - and I couldn’t rightly tell where the biological and the orb met, one flowing smoothly into the other as if it weren’t impossible. Exposed veins, many now severed and cauterized, ran in strange patterns over the surface of the now semi-exposed stone floor, spread like an arcane circle I’d imagine someone on Earth using to try to summon a demon.

But more than anything I looked at the surface, that reflective, metallic surface, and saw the three of us, saw me, and obscured by the clearing smoke, I almost mistook the image for someone else. I looked away before the sight mesmerized me - I knew almost by instinct that it could.

“Damnit,” I said. “I don’t see a crack in the thing. We’ve still got to bust it open.”

“Hand me my staff,” Naomi said. “And I’ll slice through it like a hard-boiled egg.”

“You think that would worked?” I asked. “Also, I thought you weren’t talking to me.”

“I wasn’t. I was, like, just thinking aloud, or something.”

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“If anything, I think I should give it to Amaia,” I said. “Maybe a Second Ring mage could use it without knocking herself out.”

“Probably,” Amaia said. I proceeded to hand her the staff - I doubted that it would do me any good with the core. That was a job for the drows. Olsgolon looked as fragile as a crystal ball, and I hoped that proved to be accurate.

Besides, I could always get the staff back after I reached the Second Ring myself. Which, I hoped, would be very, very soon. I supposed I should give it back to Naomi eventually, but she was much more useful without it.

“Are you kidding me?” Naomi said, hands once again on her hips. “Yeah, like I’m really going to stand by and let this happen. Sure. Hand it o-“

Just then, another explosion, and more screaming. This was concerning, as I didn’t have any more bombs. The noise had come from above us. I glanced at the walkway which curved around the wall - and I didn’t see anything at first, as it was directly overhead. But I walked a ways to our left, hoping to get a better look. A little further on, where the path curved down a bit, I began to see them. Kalamuzi. A horde of them, marching, and a cadre of talkers at the head.

“Fuck,” I said. “They must have blasted their way in. Alright, here’s what we’ll do. Amaia, you play defense. Naomi-“

But my planning was cut short. Two tendrils of red flesh shot out from the core on either side of me - the one to my right shooting between me and where Naomi and Amaia still stood.

The tendrils hadn’t come anywhere near hitting us, but it didn’t seem like that was the intended effect. They burrowed into the wall of the chamber, and below them hung cobwebs of gore, dark like dried blood, through which I could see only pockets, but clearly couldn’t simply walk through. It was like it was on purpose, like Olsgolon had wanted to single me out. And this was one situation where having a drows rather than a sword was rather inconvenient - I couldn’t slice through it with what I had on me.

It seemed like it should have just impaled me, but maybe it couldn’t. Other that the shots it fired at us, it seemed to move slowly - otherwise, couldn’t it had birthed an army of Kalamuzi to fight us? Maybe it simply didn’t have the power or mana to simply fight us on it’s own.

Through the gaps I saw Amaia approach, sword in hand, while Naomi ran around in panic in her golden dress, clearly unsure what to do and wanting, I was certain, to run away.

Amaia sliced at the webbing, but the sword sunk into it like slime, and it was difficult for her to get it back out. When she did, only minimal damage had been done to the obstacle.

“Don’t worry about me!” I yelled. “This doesn’t change anything. Hold off the Kalamuzi as long as you can. I’ll handle destroying the core.”

I could just barely see Amaia nod. Then she walked over to Naomi, and I think patted her on the back, said something to her - but, I noticed, did not hand her the staff.

“Good,” I muttered to myself. “Because I’m not carrying her out of here.”

I figured that they should be fairly safe, for awhile. If Naomi was willing to use her magic, and wasn’t knocking herself out, and if Amaia could use the staff, it might take a very long time before the Kalamuzi could touch them. Maybe if we had given Amaia the staff from the beginning, they never would have been captured in the first place.

I turned back to the core, and recoiled at what I saw.

It was me. Not my reflection, but me. What I would look like, I imagined, if you skinned me alive - but recognizably me, all the same.

As I watched in horror, the mass of flesh began to grow skin, features started to coalesce, even clothes began to be created as if from nothing. I noticed the tendril running from the right ankle, which ran back to the core. It was creating it, somehow. Maybe the same way it had created the Kalamuzi.

The skin worked it’s way like a wave up the figure, and the last thing to form, even after the leathers that perfectly matched my own, was the face. I gasped.

It was Tom.

My heart skipped a beat at the sight, even though I knew that it was an illusion, that it had just been created before my eyes, even though it only looked like Tom because I looked like Tom, had undertaken herculean efforts in order to look like Tom. But knowing that was one thing, and seeing Tom, alive, in the flesh - that was something else.

A weapon formed in his hand, a squared rod matching my drows, except that it was made of white bone. Then a layer of metal creeped over it, and it looked like my mine.

And the creature smiled, and it was Tom’s shit-eating grin down to the smallest detail.

I laughed, and I guess my face didn’t look too dissimilar to that grinning freak.

“You have no idea how much I’ve been looking forward to this,” I said. “Thanks, Olsgolon. It’s like Christmas came early.”

I grabbed my slingshot. The core hadn’t finished that detail yet - it was slow work, forming treasure and sacrifices and fresh Kalamuzi corpses into a human body complete with armor and weapons. And I knew there was no way it could imitate my magic.

I aimed quickly, and fired - this time certainly without Amaia’s help. The shot flew as well as I could have hoped, restoring some confidence in my aim, but it didn’t matter.

The doppelganger didn’t even bother to dodge, nor did it raise and aim it’s own slingshot. Instead, it merely raised a hand - calmly, no hurry - in the path of the steel ball. The ball embedded itself it the palm.

I ignited, and the figure only smiled at me.

The hand fell off, a clean break at the wrist. Immediately a new hand began forming while the old one seemed to melt into the floor, absorbed, leaving a little burning ball.

Then, still smiling, the lookalike fired a projectile of its own.

I had already seen Olsgolon do this before - that streak of white from atop the pile. But this was more grotesque - a sharpened bone opened a wound from within the palm of the creature’s hand, and the bone then shot forward - propelled by who knows what - shooting at me with deadly speed. I jumped aside just in time, but didn’t have much room, the wall of flesh webs being close at hand.

It was clear that a ranged encounter wasn’t going to work. I’d have to get close.

Even better, I thought. I can get the satisfaction of beating his face in.

But Olsgolon didn’t wait for me to approach. It seemed to take time to create those bones, but not enough time - shot after shot was launched at me, and it took everything I had just to keep from getting hit. But the moment I tried to press forward, one did hit me - the bone’s tip carving a neat line across my left forearm. I cursed aloud. This wasn’t working.

In a desperate play, I shouted at the core - unsure how sentient it was, whether or not it could understand me at all, and certainly not confident in the monsters sense of honor. “I challenge you to a duel!” I yelled. “No ranged attacks, no magic, just our anti-swords.”

To my surprise, the shooting stopped. Suddenly laughter sounded in my ears, a feminine laugh - I thought at first that it was RENA, but the voice was different. Somehow less human.

“I accept.”