Formatting is killing me, does -- invisible text -- not work? if you can see that best head on over to space battles until I fix it.
https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/enchanting-dreams-the-wandering-inn.1166514
If anyone knows how to fix it PM me?
1.02
They had recovered Oliver’s possessions. Oliver’s phone was still on, 11% battery. Idiot.
Though Harry and Oliver had been friends enough that they knew each other’s password, Oliver’s phone wasn’t exactly hard to guess. Harry typed in without even thinking, 80085.
It unlocked straight to the Gallery, still open since last use. And there were pictures. Dozens and dozens of recent ones.
Pictures of the new world.
And some videos.
“I’m sitting right here you know.” And there across the ashy remains of the pyre, sat the original owner of the phone, or an apparition of one at least.
“No, you’re not.”
“Seriously, don’t look at those. It’s kinda embarrassing.”
“Then why did you record it, you dumb ass?”
“What was that?” Theo had fetched some more fruits for both of them. He was getting better at throwing rocks.
Although the fire had burned for hours, it had not been hot enough to burn the bones. And the smell was even more shocking. Neither had complained but Theo had built their campfire a bit away for the night even further from the river while Harry buried the remains.
Pocketing the phone, turned off this time, Harry returned back to the campfire. “Nothing. I think there is someone out there. I sensed them dreaming earlier.”
“What? Across the river?”
For all their trials together, they didn't really know each other. Harry had no idea how to go about convincing Theo, and no one needed a reminder of the previous night.
“I know it’s a bit wet, but we’re in need of a bath anyway, right?” He tried a bit of levity.
“In a river with huge snakes and god knows what else? even the fish has teeth here”
Harry might have imagined the flare of pain in his chest and tried not to wince at Theo's comment. “But there could be safety, civilization. Besides I think he was hurt too; he might need our help.”
“We need our help.”
“And it might be there. Come on, it's not like we have anywhere else to go ”
With a bit more arguing and Oliver's support, Harry managed to persuade Theo to cross the river tomorrow.
--
Ranger level 10
[Unerring throw]
[Weakness exploit]
[The bigger they are]
[The harder they Fall]
Theo awoke in the middle of the night when Harry was keeping watch. Harry had [delay exhaustion] thus volunteered to guard and had spent the time trying to sense magic. Theo had the morning watch as Harry slept. They would be crossing the river today. Honestly, Theo thought that it was a suicidal idea, but there was a sliver hope too. Then again, he was a pragmatist what others claimed, and things had very rarely gone his way. He had plans nonetheless. Harry kept tossing and turning in his sleep and woke up a bit late in the morning, grumpy and grumbling.
“Fuck [perfect recall]. Fuck [lucid dream] while you are at it too. Can’t even turn it off without getting nightmares.”
After a breakfast of fish and fruit, they headed past the snake carcass.
“How long do you think before it starts to stink?”
“I don’t know, I haven’t even seen flies around.”
Nearing the river, Theo began his preparations, they smashed the poisonous cores and scattered it all over the river. It was proving more useful than they initially imagined. Oliver had planned for using it as a stink bomb or repellent of sorts. Theo’s new skill, [unerring throw] just increased his ranged options too.
“What do we do about our phones? Got any waterproof bags or something?”
Theo gulped down the last of the water, and handed the 2 litre bottle, which had a lid large enough for their phones, to Harry. “ Here, put it in this. If it can keep water in, it can keep water out.”
--
In contrast to Harry's expectation, the water was rather pleasant if not for the rightly deserved paranoia. In their anxiety driven rush, they crossed over too quickly to enjoy anyway and still much slower than they would have liked. They hadn't forgone their clothes in case something happened. Thankfully nothing attacked them.
After a brief check for leeches or similar creatures, they walked on in their wet clothes. Unlike Theo and his water sense, Harry didn’t have any guiding feeling from his skill so they walked in the general direction where he thought the dream originated.
After about 5 - 10 mins of walking, the landscape began changing visibly. Not in the sense that they were out of the grasslands, but rather the grasslands had been altered artificially. Slowly at first, but when they were right in the thick of it, the ground looked like a warzone.
Craters, scorched earth, and puddles of dubious colours littered the area and more prominently
Bodies.
A lot of bodies
Obviously Non Human, yet still anthropomorphic enough to be creepy.
Ant people, to be precise, an occasional lizard species and whole lots of dismembered limbs or unrecognisable parts in various states of decay.
“Fuuuuuuck” Harry put in succinctly.
Theo couldn’t have said it better himself. Fuck indeed. When Curiosity and instincts honed from years of gaming finally kicked in, he inspected the nearest non decomposing body which happened to be a lizard man.
With the spines, it resembled a muscular bipedal Iguana. At first glance he thought it had very little equipment, but considering the broken bits of strapping around he came to a conclusion that the body must have been looted by another party.
“I guess Asteroids didn't wipe out the dinosaurs here.”
A glint on the ground caught Theo’s eye. Swiping away some dirt and grass he found a broken top half of a sword. 2 feet long, double sided, just the blade, broken at a slight angle. Finally a knife, half of one sure, but the useful half. Now if he could find the rest of it.
“Holyshit, if dinosaurs can evolve into these, what if some dinosaurs survived in our world, you know the conspiracies about shape shifting lizard people controlling the government in our world?”
“Heh.” Harry reacted to something in the air Theo couldn't see, most likely Oliver. “Evolution took a completely different turn and they still managed to hack each other with sharp metals.” Harry came over when he saw Theo digging the ground. “Nice to know it's not just the humans.”
They didn't find the handle half in a quick search close by. The half they had was still sharp, no visible bends near the broken edge implying that it either shattered or something sharper cut it and steel felt too good to have been either of the possibility.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.
Having not much more to find they got to the main reason they were here.
“What did the dream guy look like? What species at least?”
“I don’t know, I thought they were human. The dreams were … intelligent? he was using a shovel to dig so not feral or barbaric at least, right?. Although, since it was digging, maybe an Ant?”
“Any chance they’re not one of the bodies and incapable of helping us?”
“I think I felt pain in the arms and legs, so maybe look for ones with damaged limbs.”
“Sure, that's only a hundred ants to go through. Or simply HEY, IS ANYONE ALIVE?” Theo shouted, a bit of annoyance leaking through.
“ … ”
“I guess not.” Theo walked away and was about to go grave robbing when Harry cut in.
“We can't just leave. Maybe they’re unconscious. We might even find something useful like the blade”
“...Fine” He wasn't going to leave anyway. Might as well prioritise ant bodies.
--
Theo had seen magnified closeup images of ants on the internet. This looked nothing like it. Well maybe something like it but there were differences. Of all the things he remembered, the thing that stood in most contrast was the hair, or lack thereof. The internet pictures were hairy. … The pictures of the ants on the internet were hairy. He remembered this because he was shocked when he first saw it, and noticed it on every subsequent ant picture. The giant ant people had smooth, hard shells, and no hair, or maybe microscopic hair, and he was shocked, this time, by opposable thumbs and hands, all four of them.
By his fourth body searching, he had noticed two distinct sub-species of ants, and not all of them had hands, some had shovels instead. Shovels for hands? All four of them? Why do you need four shovels? What made them evolve four shovels instead of hands? They already have hands, wouldn't the less useful genes recess out? Unless it was a recent development. How long does it take to evolve hands with opposable thumbs?
He was inspecting said shovel-hand, when he almost had a heart attack. The shovel had pushed him away. Not very strongly but that was definitely an intentional shove. The ant was alive.
“What? What happened?” came Harry’s voice. Had he screamed?
“Fucking hell, scared the crap out of me. Almost literally.”
“What is it?” Harry was looking at the ant. Lying in the green puddle, missing two of the four hands he almost believed it was dead. Then he realised what was throwing him off.
“They don’t blink. Or move their eyes. That one’s alive.” one of its antennae twitched at that.
“Oh, hey, we’re here to help, uh… are you ok?”
“...”
“I don't think it can understand us? I mean, what are the chances we have the same language?”
“...”
Harry was about to pantomime helping when the quiet was cut through by a shrill sharp cry from behind, and Theo was cut through by a sharp dagger in his back.
--
Harry turned around just in time to catch a faceful of flailing mass of teeth and claws of his own. His already aching chest made the situation worse. The green thing took him by surprise, biting, scratching, clawing and even trying to stab him with a sharpened piece of wood. Harry was twice its size, and in a physical struggle, size definitely mattered. But before he recovered from panicked reactions, it still managed some deep bites and scratches.
The creature was humanoid but much smaller than Harry, about the size of a five year old. And despite its frantic energy, once Harry regained his composure and seized control of the situation, it couldn’t match Harry's strength, bolstered by half a year of regular gym workouts. It wasn't much but compared to the creature, he was a goliath.
Once Harry had it in a headlock, it was decidedly his victory, there was nothing the green demon could do, yet the thing would not stop squirming. He didn’t know what to do next so he looked at Theo’s situation.
Theo had it much worse than harry. First, the other goblin, for it could be nothing other than a goblin, attacking Theo was much bigger and bulkier and- wait - First, Theo had a hilt sticking out of his bleeding kidney.
They were locked in a fight of their own, but contrary to expectation not much of swinging was going around as you would see in a streetfight. It was simple and lethal, the goblin was trying to kill Theo and Theo was trying to prevent that and just locked pushing and pulling each other, trying to get the better of the other. Although Theo had managed a slash on his opponent, he had hurt himself as much with the handleless blade before dropping it.
From where Harry knelt, grappling his own smaller goblin, he could see Theo was losing and would lose all together soon. And he could not go help Theo with his hands full with a little demon. Not unless he killed it.
He briefly considered killing the thing in his arms, but he wasn't sure he could do it physically or mentally. Ultimately, he decided to get up off his knees, the goblin still flailing in his hold, and shoulder charged the larger goblin.
--
The Goblin was just as surprised as Theo when Harry charged, and better yet it had dropped the damn shiv. The goblin was bleeding from the chest and the arm holding a wooden club. Still it recovered quickly and made some distance now that he was seemingly outnumbered.
The smaller goblin was still screeching in Harry's grasp and the larger kept glancing at it. A stalemate. Theo couldn’t help but notice the calculating intelligence in its eyes, or was he projecting?
The goblin kept switching his focus between the two humans, reassessing its odds, sizing its opponents, just as the humans were sizing it. After an eternity of a moment, the goblin seemed to have made a decision. Keeping a wary eye, it fumbled into a small hip pouch and took out a small glass bottle, half filled with muddy green liquid, splashed some on his chest and drank it.
Is that… is that motherfucker healing?
And all hell broke loose, again.
Theo grabbed the dropped shiv.
The goblin sensing the lapse in observation, charged in.
But not towards Theo, it attacked Harry forcing him to divide his attention between the two goblins.
When he lost his grip trying to avoid the larger goblin, the smaller managed to bite Harry again and get partially free.
The smaller goblin wasn't immobile but Harry still had a hold on its thin biceps.
With everything he had, Harry tossed the little gob to the larger goblin. He missed. Harry went for a tackle anyway. This one he didn’t miss. Both Harry and the goblin toppled to the ground in a tangle of limbs.
And Theo, taking advantage of the situation, stabbed the larger goblin in the neck.
It was neither quick or clean but a flurry of adrenaline fueled frenzied stabs that missed more than it hit. Some slid off bone, some stabbed the hand trying to defend. The goblin was pinned under Harry until the smaller one jumped on him biting, clawing, shrieking, crying.
Harry managed to yank the smaller one off his back and slammed it into the ground, a bit harder than he expected and knocked the breath off of it.
And suddenly it was all too quiet. All except for the too loud gurgling and the smaller one choking, gasping for breath.
When the smaller goblin recovered its breath and got to its feet, all they could do was tense in anticipation of an attack that never came. Not that they couldn’t but rather they didn’t want to continue.
The small goblin looked up at the victorious humans, then down at the dying goblin, sobbed once and ran.
And Harry couldn’t help but think how human it looked.
--
The fight was over, they survived but it was hardly a victory. When the adrenaline drained away, Theo collapsed to the ground, no longer able to stand.
“Theo…” Theo had lost a lot of blood and he was still bleeding. Harry knew pulling the knife out would only make the situation worse and that was the extent of his first aid knowledge. The results of his previous improvisation still haunted him.
A chuckle from Theo broke his rumination of indecision which in turn was broken by a pained cough. Theo spat out a surprisingly bloodless saliva. “Just call me Ted, or my ghost at least. … But just in case, my name’s Theodore, Theodore Hughes. My parents are in Dore sheffield - shit you’re not gonna remember this. The college, University of Melbourne, they have all the - ”
“No, no, no, not you too”
“It's ok, I'll still be here. Survive, will ya. Tell my parents … god, I don't know. Ghost me will probably figure it out. And Chloe …”
“The pothion, the goblin had a healing potion. He might have more”
Harry reacts to something Oliver says “Potion?” and snaps his head to the now dead goblin.
Of course, the potion. The goblin used it to heal, didn't he?
Harry desperately tears open the small pouch from the goblin and pulls out a similar bottle. Similar but different, the bottle the goblin drank from had been greenish, this one was purple.
But what choice did they have?
Harry had a moment’s hesitation before he pulled the knife out, splashed some of the potion on the wound and made Theo drink some, just like the goblin had done.
“Ugh” Theo coughs out, “That's disgusting.” and hopefully looks at the wound. “I can’t see back there, how does it look? Is it healing?”
It was bleeding faster.
“No, no, heal dammit.”
“Tch, heh, It's up to you now, Survive.”
Did goblin potions not work on humans? Harry looks at the purple potion. Was it not a healing potion? Still a third left in the bottle. Harry drinks the rest of it just to test and see for himself.
Nothing happened. The bite wounds in his arm did not heal, the pain in his everywhere didn't lessen. Or was the pain getting worse. He was developing a migraine and there was a tingling static all over his body.
Theo had just about given up too. Harry noticed a distinct lack of hope Theo had when they first brought up the potion and had more of ‘yea, that what I thought’ look. His hands were in an awkward position trying to stem the blood flow.
Harry had no idea what to do next. In desperation, he helped with the only thing he saw, putting pressure on Theo.. Ted’s wound.
“Fucking heal goddammit.”
And a flash of pale blue light emanates from the splashed potion.
Auther’s Note:
Anther 221-3 survived 9 days so we know antinium are a hardy bunch. Our Ant guy hasnt been here as long. In fact he’s been here exactly since the boys arrived in the world. Funny how that happens. See, drakes and Twisted antinium hive were having their weekly dance party when Wrymvr crashes in, after wiping out the ant mobs drakes tele-out. Or they try to their tele-out spells get tangled with our boy’s tele-in spell and the plot ensues. But what are chances that they randomly decide to in the direction of their exact cause of the mishap, you may ask. Sounds suspiciously like a simurg- *ahem* i mean Grand design plot.
Yeah, that felt too contrived to me too. So i havent put it into fanon but it's still what happened in my mind. I dont think its going to ever come up anyway, no one’s gonna know except maybe GD, and she doesn't care.
[The bigger they are]
[The harder they Fall]
Are just Mounting and flinch mechanics, don’t look too much into it. Mounting mechanic is a hybrid between MHW and Dragons Dogma.
In the monster hunter, I main SnS. That should tell you everything you need to know about me. But I like the Idea of transforming weapons like SA and CB lot. They switch between fast melee and slower Heavy melee. But that’s It, just melee to melee. I think they missed out on melee to ranged. Sure, there is IG but who even plays Kinsect. And gunlance is just a explod-y melee. It has no range and is very clunky, in real life scenario, that would just be a rifle with a bayonet and a shield. I mean proper aim-able, ammo management ranged and melee transforming weapons. Although armour skill would have been a hassle for the game. But not for literature, who’s to say. So, that’s what Theo’s gonna have. Not a fancy switching weapon but the playstyle. Think Crossbow Stan with melee. For now. Well, not now but in the near future.
Doing magic, according to Pisces as reflected in his teachings to Erin and Rags, is easier when there is alot of ambient mana in the area, according to Ceria when she taught Ryoka, is understanding the structure of magic to achieve desired outcome. Valetarisa straight up blinds her students and tells them to be desperate for light. Sugar, Spice and everything nice.
As the author, my perspective is colored by what I know from the fic’s future. The anticipation and the act of writing itself makes it fun for me. I don’t imagine it’s the same for others. I would like to know how it comes across to the readers. Tell me what you guys think of it. Speculations and Conspiracy theories in the fic are especially helpful but any remarks or constructive criticism is appreciated, and thanks for reading.
Oh and if you found all the puns, Easter eggs and foreshadowing / secrets , a nod to you. I'm not gonna be pointing it out for people who didn't notice. here on out