CHAPTER 343 – AMASSING A FORTUNE
They set off to gather the items required to satisfy what Tom was convinced were particularly greedy surface kingdoms. All they needed was for the surface to switch what they channelled into their points of power for a single hour. Wind instead of fertility. It wouldn’t hurt them, and Tom doubted the yield of their crops would even be noticeably affected. For that, minor inconvenience, they were insisting on a massive bribe. Luckily, the dwellers had been happy to step into help. Their liaison had consulted experts and constructed the most efficient use of their time.
It was mining!
Technically, the plan was slightly more nuanced than that. Everyone else got to continue to kill monsters while Tom dedicated himself to extracting precious metals and gems. His unique domain, especially the inbuilt sensitivity of Earth Sense was the true asset their group possessed. Tom was surprised and also not. Logically, he knew that maintaining high tiered skills across dozens or hundreds of generations was difficult, but it still felt weird that his ability was so highly prized.
The dwellers lived exclusively underground. They were sapient; they were not stupid. As a civilisation, they actively cultivated spells and skills to peer through the walls to find treasures, but the abilities that they could pass from generation to generation were all lower tiered or not intended for how they were being used. The non-earth aligned abilities they had managed to maintain were flawed. In the best cases, they could penetrate a couple of metres into the walls, but more often than not they were only useful for a handful of centimetres. Unfortunately, a lot of the local rock was of denser varieties and often had properties that resisted such vision.
The earth aligned equivalents were valued for their range but generally needed too much time to initiate and possessed draw backs in the information given as they as a rule lacked depth perception. What Tom’s domain did from a sensory perspective was unique. They had historical records of a class that grew to have a similar level of sensitivity, but it was considered lost as no one had obtained it for generations. Much to their shame one of the prerequisites they had listed in their databases was missing or incomplete, but they still had hundreds if not thousands of people spending decades trying to obtain it.
That knowledge let Tom understand just how valuable his ability was to them and so part of getting their help to meet the heavy requirements of the surface was him using his abilities for the betterment of their civilisation. He was to walk through a set route to maximise the value they could extract from him.
They were not tasked with doing it alone. A party of over thirty of them had been assigned to assist them. They came from a variety of species; worms, slimes, snakes, lizards and mammals but the species was not as important as their specialities. Ten were warriors to keep everyone safe. Six tank classes and four specialists with spells to fill the more obvious gaps in his team’s capabilities. Chaos bolts could only do so much. Of the twenty support, four of them served the dual role of being both a guide and a chronicler of his observations. Not only did they lead Tom to destinations with a high probability of valuable materials they also recorded everything he saw but did not extract. There were stretches of tunnels that contained stuff like ferotite ore. It was precious but not high valued enough for him to waste mana mining it. Tom ignored it and the chroniclers logged the locations so that normal miners could come to the spot and extract it efficiently.
The number of deposits that he identified told him that there was going to be a burst of prosperity for the next couple of years for those who had access to the knowledge that he imparted. Another dozen of the dwellers were dedicated specifically to help his efforts. They were split between individuals with powerful earth moving abilities and diviners. Of the earth movers, one possessed a channelled spell that, in a minute could create a twenty-metre-long tunnel. He could only do it three or four times a day, but when he did, it gave them access to high valued areas that Tom sensed at the edge of his domain. The rest of that group had a variety of similar abilities. They had all been created from scratch rather than being part of a class or spells taught by masters. Which meant they acted via different mechanisms, possessed different frequency of use rules and varying levels of strength. However, to a person they were as effective as each other.
The second group consisted of long-range diviners, and this was a skill that they had master’s teaching them. The spell form of all five of them was identical, and that number was picked to ensure that even with the countdown the spell could be cast twenty times each hour. They were deployed to see if the rich materials Tom sensed close to the boundaries of his range were part of a narrow seam and therefore not worth exploring further or the edge of a larger deposit that required more attention. If the answer was yes, then the earth shapers would create a new tunnel to let him confirm the truth.
The last of the support they received had a variety of powers that allowed them to act as mana batteries. None of their abilities were as flexible as Harry’s ritual, but they all had the advantage of being able to be used while they travelled. When Tom or one of the other people ran out of mana, they were able to be topped up while moving. Some did burst restoration others increased mana regeneration so for Tom would only take three minutes instead of almost six to top himself up.
The whole thing was exhausting… not the magic, but the incessant talking. They wanted to know everything. When he mentioned a material, they’d press to find out all the details like weight, purity, exact locations, type of stone between them and the deposits and hundreds of other of what he considered to be immaterial details, and it wasn’t like he could play dumb. If he volunteered nothing, they would ask pointed questions and all four of the chroniclers had a truth sense ability running constantly, so he couldn’t even avoid answering those inquires.
Ahead of Tom there were the sounds of fighting.
With a frown he continued the process of extracting the mana filled gems his senses had found. It was disappointing to be unable to join them as they leapt into the fray. They were desperate for experience, and the watching fighters ensured they were in little danger. The warriors had orders to only become involved if one of the group was being overwhelmed but that oversight meant they fought with some level of safety. He privately suspected the locals understood that to the humans this was a trial where they had to maximise their contributions. To them it was a world shard, but they recognised the pressures that their guests were under and it was only slightly less efficient to indulge them, and so they did.
He glanced at the chroniclers next to him. If anyone was going to know, it was them. “Do you guys often get outsiders?”
There was a pause as the four of them looked at each other. “It is not an infrequent event,” Cado, a mole like creature eventually answered. “You come with a regular cadence. Not a discernible pattern or anything like that, but frequently enough that monitoring all entrances is a worthwhile investment.”
“What’s your view of them?”
The hairs on the mole puffed out. “A dangerous and erratic natural phenomenon. You guys seem okay but often…” there was a pause as he tried to find the words. “Frequently, to close a passage they’ll cave the whole thing in.”
“Well said,” Turnoka a slime type chronicler said. “Outsiders we find are unnecessarily destructive. Which they can do because,” he continued in a quiet annoyed voice, “because they are usually a higher rank than we can achieve in this world shard.”
“With strong magic,” Cado agreed.
Turnoka shivered. “And a ridiculous variety of abilities.”
“And like you, the ability to wish up a new type of magic to meet a threat. They can almost always find the perfect magical tool for the job.”
Tom studied the mole and wished he could read the body language. The cues were there. Different areas of the fur were puffed, but he lacked the experience to interpret. But the expressed view between it and the slime made the situation very clear. This zone was used regularly by the GODs in their competitor trials. That adaptability they were talking about clearly referenced individuals who had access to the experience shop or an equivalent. “Do you understand how they, how we, have such power?”
The mole person scoffed. “Understand? Of course, we do. We are civilised, we keep our records and once the threat was identified, finding out more was prioritised. Some told us nothing, but enough were like you that we discovered the secrets. The mechanism the outsiders have available is varied. About half are like you and have a shop for deliberate decision making. Others receive a GODs basin that would give them three choices to choose from and the last common alternative was an internal spring of gifting where they would acquire the new spell once they wished for help. Those didn’t get a choice, but in our observation what they received was usually more powerful than what was available by the other methods. That functionality of instant spell impression didn’t always exist, but most outsiders possess it.”
“Really? They don’t always possess the extra abilities?” Tom asked intrigued.
“No, some outsiders come from Existentia and they why not competitors know what the term means. In fact, a lot of our knowledge comes from their aid.”
“It must be horrible for you guys to be subjected to that.”
“A wise dweller doesn’t question the powers that sustain their existence.” Cado told him. “We’ve structured things to limit the damage. If the outsider is set on war the best solution is to pretend a capitulation.”
“And if we really don’t like them, we kill them early,” Turnoka said quietly. “Even if they’re more powerful than the rest of us, if we catch them unexpectedly and with numbers…”
“You’ve slaughtered groups like mine.”
Turnoka looked at him. “Rarely like yours. Most who play the system we tolerate. But some have something wrong with them. They’re very false and all they want to do is to kill and torture. Those are the ones we ambush.”
Tom licked his lips. He remembered the guide’s death and was very glad they had taken steps to keep it secret. “Why don’t you just kill all of us?”
It quivered in amusement. That was a tell he could recognise. “As my fellow chronicler stated a wise dweller doesn’t question the powers that sustain their existence.”
“You’re worried about the GODs,” Tom summarised. “Did they warn you at some point?”
The slime stopped. “Maybe, maybe not. It’s difficult to explain, but our consensus is built from our legends and fables. At least half of the outsiders should be given a chance to succeed, even if only a third are successful.”
“And us?”
“Unless your family above ground has made a huge mistake, you will survive. I think the novelty of the offer probably won them over.”
“Novelty? Haven’t hundreds or thousands of groups gone before us?”
“Hundreds is the right estimate.”
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
“If so many have gone through, surely our approach was not unique.”
“Ahh… You misunderstand your unique situation. You guys were weaker than usual and then you split your groups, and despite clearly being non-pacifist you did nothing hostile to sapients in either the above or below ground teams for a week. It looks pretty unique from my perspective.”
Tom was fascinated and wanted to ask more questions, but he stopped talking because he had sensed something. Quietly, he raised his hand and pointed. There was an object embedded in the rock that was fighting off his domain. It was even stymieing the Earth Sense component of the ability and it was a passive effect. Whatever was doing it was not living.
“What is happening? Is it a monster?” Cado asked, and then, not waiting for a response it whistled. There was the sound of fighters retreating from the frontline toward them.
“I don’t think so. But it’s something funny.” With a tug, he took control of the rock around the strange resistance and drew the substance closer without directly touching it with his domain. It had started almost twenty metres away and thirty seconds later a bubble appeared on the wall and from it a yellow green stone fell and clattered onto the floor.
They were so used to what he was doing no one even looked surprised, but like him they were examining the object.
He identified it and micro blinked into his system room to get the written details.
Fractured Gold Ettenoclasite – Tier 3.
This mineral fights off opposing magics and domains that touch it.
It is a rare anti magic warding material that is occasionally used in offensive attacks. If a piece of this stone penetrates a living creature, its passive properties will act as a powerful curse item by fighting against the creature’s internal magic control. Even a small piece can substantially affect the ability of most beings to use magic until they can extract the stone chunk.
Tom returned to the real world his mind blazing with ideas.
“I know this stuff,” Turnoka declared. “It’s often used to line small safes and sometimes it’s broken up and used in cannons. Such projectiles are very strong against ethereal or ghost type monsters, but it is only utilised like that in extreme cases due to its rarity. Most cities have a list of individuals that possess a safe made of the rock and in the event of a city ending ethereal threat it is repurposed to fight the monster off. It has some value, but Tom, it is not worth your time to mine.”
“Going forward yes, but this piece, in isolation. I’m sure Tom’s ecstatic he pulled it out.” Thor said suddenly. His team had followed the locals back to the location. “I think this is perfect for him. Yesterday, there was a refined version of this in the auction house. It was tier five instead of three, and I thought about acquiring it for you.”
“Presumably to link into Living Rock and then my domain.” Tom mused out loud and glanced at Thor and the big man confirmed that was his reasoning with a firm nod. Then he frowned. “Why did you only think about buying it. If we link it with my domain, it’s the perfect addition to it. It’ll make my projectiles that much more deadly.”
Thor grimaced. “I couldn’t justify the cost. Your helmet is different. We’ll get the money back from that. If I bought the stone for you, that ridiculous eight hundred thousand cost becomes credits that can’t be applied to purchasing the precognition blocker to put into the spear. We agreed that saving for that was to get priority over everything that wasn’t lifesaving. Plus, wouldn’t tier 5 have used up half your slots.”
“No, not half only six slots and I have thirty-two available,” he answered absently. “And it would have been worth it, but I guess this will have to do.” He snatched up the Ettenoclasite and shaped the uncooperative stone into a necklace by using other rock to force it into the shape he needed, as he couldn’t directly manipulate it. Even the small amount of magical interference to make it more flexible cost almost a hundred times what it should have. But with it settled over his neck he could start the process of absorbing it.
Theoretically absorbing the rock given its tier level was supposed to take only three days, but its unique nature told Tom that it would require two to three times that to absorb. He bit his lip and got to work.
Another day passed and like all the previous days his True Dream activated and once more pushed against the unyielding lock that left him with static. It wasn’t yet making observable progress, but the fact it was a recurring dream gave him hope that soon whatever barrier was resisting him would break.
At the midmorning break, Thor waved a note he had received around. He did not seem worried, which meant it had to have come from Selena’s team as nothing from the surface was expected before tonight. “They’ve linked back up.”
Michael smirked at the news. “So, as we predicted a couple of days ago the wador wanted to finish the global quests first.”
Thor nodded. “Yep, and now they are back they want to depart straight away. Selena felt very embarrassed when she told them and the inventor that they couldn’t do that because her team hasn’t finished, the personal quests and needed at least another day and possibly two.”
“I bet the wador loved that.”
“Selena was apparently dressed down by their leader for her incompetence. She does not sound at all happy.”
“And the inventor?” Michael asked.
“She’s conversed with him and describes him as a fucking alien. The wador look funny, but she very quickly was able to understand how they thought. They’re kind of like a close knit violent nuclear family from earth. She understands them. With the inventor, every second sentence is a miscommunication. Like Sheldon from the big bang theory but weirder and with no interest in talking to her.”
“And there was no true reason for Selena to be concerned about the delay?” Michael asked, with a very pointed glance from Thor to Tom.
The big man winced slightly. “Yes. Sorry Tom. You were right her concern was misplaced. The inventor insisted on finishing his quest and then it had been a few days and inventor knew where the enemies were, so the wador made an executive decision to complete them on the way back to Selena’s group.”
Tom cleared his throat. “And just confirming. Selena’s got the full dossier of information and has given it to the inventor.”
Thor frowned at that reminder. “She did. But he wasn’t interested.”
“What?” Michael said tightly. “He’s vital.”
“He’s with them, and that means something.” Thor answered the unspoken question. “My read is that he wants to interrogate Tom before he crafts anything. I also get the feel that what we’re asking him to do is immaterial to him a day of work as opposed to weeks. So, he believes that he’s better off waiting until all the materials are gathered and to make sure what he creates will never need to be recreated.”
Tom snorted. “Of course. They’re a species that doesn’t take kindly to improving existing objects. They want whatever they create to be perfect the first time around.”
“This letter doesn’t contain any statements like that, but I can certainly see how that type of thought pattern could apply.”
“Anything else?” Michael asked.
The big man’s eyes flicked over the notes once more. “Harry, apparently both he and Maher agree that their approach, theoretically of course, will get a random teleporter working to the specifications we need. They obviously have to test it, but…”
Michael perked up. “Really? They think they’ve cracked it?”
Thor beamed. “It seems that way… but we’ll have to wait until we join before confirming.”
As was often the case once the topic was raised. Everything descended in a chaotic debate regarding what they had to do and how they would do it. Tom pointedly listened to the chatter, but felt no need to intercede. Until there was a new dream, he had already told them all he knew, and all of his own ideas had previously been debated ad nauseam.
The days blended together, and after four, the dwellers accompanied them to the surface. Selena and the others had transitioned three days ago and had met up with Phil, but there had been no positive news from them beyond Selena’s belief that the wador had calmed down slightly in regards to their specific animosity toward him. Her arguments that his skill was involuntary, and the severe damage had been accidental had finally found purchase
“Nervous about the next zone?” Michael asked him.
“I’m a little worried about the reception we’ll get.” Tom admitted. “And not only from the wador I’m just as concerned about Phil and the giant.”
“We might have caught up to Phil in rank.” The healer suggested. “It’s possible he’s no longer a threat.”
“Might have,” Tom agreed. “But I doubt it. He wasn’t that strong at the start for no reason.”
“It’s because he killed his entire starting group,” Gerald volunteered.
“What?” Tom snapped, staring at Gerald just like everyone else. “Is that confirmed? Did Phil admit to it?”
The other man shook his head. “No, he didn’t. It’s just a theory we had.”
“It was not close to being confirmed,” Bao retorted sharply. “And it was one of many ideas we debated.”
“It was the theory that made the most sense.” Gerald argued. “And Olive thought it too.”
“Her ability was hardly reliable.” Bao countered.
“She vomited when we proposed the scenario. Phil was the first to arrive in his group, and he had already mapped out where he was going to spend his experience. When someone arrived before they could react, he attacked. After the first couple of kills and by the time people started coming faster, he would have dozens of extra skills and probably ranks. At that point, he was already too far ahead for anyone to do anything against him. He could easily have gone through the whole group, killing them one after the other.”
“I was there and confirmation that anything like that happened was not certain.”
“She vomited because she knew it was the truth.” Gerald glowered at her. “You know it, but don’t want to admit to such an awful reality.”
“It’s rumours and innuendo.”
“I should have checked.” Tom whispered.
“No, I don’t think you should have.” Michael interrupted.
“But if he did that…”
“Then it’s done, and now he is an asset we need to use. In most ways, it’s better not to find out.”
“But if he’s that much of a psychopath and now that he has already done it once. It means that…”
“No Tom. If he was a danger, your skill would have highlighted the threat.” He glanced pointedly at Keikain. “If Gerald’s scenario is accurate, and it’s probably not, then I suspect that an oracle question would probably have been involved.”
“You need more than just an oracle question to murder so many in cold blood. That is…” Tom shuddered. “I can’t even comprehend how. Keikain’s choices were bad, but with them I can at least imagine the thought processes you could go through to end up in that situation. But everyone in your entry group?”
The healer sighed. “I know Tom. But please don’t force this. If he was a danger, we would already know.”
“I… fine,” Tom groaned out the words. “But I’m not happy to be forced into this situation at this late stage.” He gestured at the tunnel that was taking them to the next layer. “To learn about this now, when it’s no longer possible to do anything about it. It pisses me off. As for you, Gerald, why the fuck didn’t you tell us this suspicion earlier?”
“He did,” Michael countered. “I told Vidja’s team not to share it more widely. This came up when I was fighting the shadows with them. It was pertinent to all of our futures so Vidja told me almost straight away. She had refused to send it by messages because she was afraid of any such attempt being intercepted.”
“Phil hasn’t bothered getting involved with anything in the auction house. He’s way too lazy to monitor it. She could definitely have sent something.”
“You’re reacting emotionally not logically, Tom. There are low-level precognition skills which theoretically could have prompted him to check the auction house. It was a real risk and Vidja made the right decision not to send them. Can you imagine if the scenario is right, and Phil found out and he knew and that we were gossiping about it? That instead of being blind idiots that we might actually be hunting him. That’s not going to end well for anyone.”
“Fine, I understand Vidja not sending notes but why once you knew did you decide to limit the information from us.”
“You know why, and I told both Everlyn and Keikain they agreed that keeping it secret was the right choice. Having a directed True Dream confirming this either way is a waste of your energy.”
“Bullshit… it’s.” he shut up and bit his lip. Social Silence had chosen not to interfere, but he was not an idiot. Logically, he knew Michael was correct.
“Anything he did back then doesn’t matter.” Michael told him kindly. “Now I know your plan. All that matters is what he does to help us defeat the dragon. We need him to maximise our chances of surviving. After that we’ll get a chance to execute your strategy to take another species’ racial gift. Everything else is secondary to those aims. And I mean everything! It doesn’t matter how distasteful those decisions are to us. We still have to make them. Because of that plan, we’re all serving a higher purpose now. Finishing it is more important than any one of our lives and definitely our morals.”
By mutual accord, they moved onto other topics. The plan Everlyn had constructed was calculated almost down to the hour. Their side of it was simple.
The bribe would be taken to the portal that led to the zone they were targeting. Once there, the goods would be assessed for completeness and piled together with humans in charge of guarding them. The dwellers would depart, and the surface kingdom fighters would give them space. There was no risk of the humans stealing the bribe because the locals knew how the world shard worked.
Anything they took would disappear.
Tom touched the partially absorbed Fractured Gold Ettenoclasite on his neck. Given how far the process had progressed, he hoped that would transition with them and not vanish like all the other loot would. Unfortunately, he was only about fifty percent done with it and they couldn’t afford to delay until it integrated.
The keys had all been handed out to the right people, and those who had experience used it to rank up. There was no holding off now.
“Everyone, you need to get as powerful as possible.” Michael reminded them. “The focus has shifted from positioning ourselves to best maximise the experience gain. That won’t work anymore. When we go through that portal, we’re going to meet the wador, the giant, and the inventor. Those first two groups respect strength, so we have to maximise what we show them. Hold nothing back.”
No one commented. They all knew the plan. It had been discussed extensively leading up to this moment.
When it was his turn, he shut his eyes. It was time to get more powerful!