Chapter 10: Time, Rime, and Brine

[Player Minion has reached level 6!]

[Player Minion has reached level 7!]

[Player Minion has reached level 8!]

“Grats cubed!” said Azwold, joining me.

The sparkling lights and fanfare of leveling up were disconcerting. “You’re a game developer? Perhaps you could put in a word… leveling up does not require such pageantry.”

He laughed, ignoring me in favor of listening to himself speak. “Cool, letting you last hit nets some tasty XP. And best of all, your basic melee can poison if you use the vine hand. That’s good to know. Once we level you up, that’ll be handy.”

“Handy? Har har.”

“Don’t hate,” he said.

“I’m afraid hatred is part of my character, remember? It’s in the quest text.”

“Fair enough. Alright, help me strip these guys. I wanna try to reverse engineer their gizmos. And let’s hurry. I don’t know the location of every graveyard on Stonesthrow.”

We set about unburdening the bruiser of his battle harness. He was heavy, but we managed. Busy with big guy, the other one revived, and disappeared in a ball of sparks.

Seeing my disbelief, Azwold clarified, “Elec Mages get a blink ability. Like a short distance teleport. Just let him go for now.”

“Elec?”

“Electricity is one of the eleven schools of magic,” he said. “But people say ‘Elec’ for short. I’d call it ‘Lit’ for lightning, but Light is a school of magic too. Lots of acronyms and abbreviations in games like these. Hopefully your lost memories leave you extra room in there for learning new stuff.”

“I thought Telemoon only used gadgets?” I grew weary of having too much to learn.

“You have to choose a school at character creation. It’s integral to the game systems. Can’t play till you pick. But Telemoon are the epitome of min/maxers. The Mentalist Troika—their guild leaders—are always running numbers trying to determine the most efficient character builds based on guild need. So Electricity is an easy #1 since it gives a bonus to Gadget Craft, and they can use Elec spells to power their machines. Fire is another popular one. They use the heat or combine it with Water at higher levels for Steam effects. Metalworking too. Earth, like our robo-punch guy here, is common with them because it helps with mining and gems and raw materials. It also has strong tank builds. You get the idea? Exploiting game mechanics for Telemoon ends, it’s their modus operandi. Efficiency over everything.”

He took a long pause, staring at the corpse.

“That other guy rezzed like ten minutes ago,” he said. “Maybe this one’s taking a leak IRL or something?”

“Well, I was afeared at the time.”

“What time?” Azwold’s eyes narrowed.

“When I scratched him.”

“Your point?”

“Fear and anger are cousins, are they not?”

“Wait,” he said, eyes livening. “Wait, wait wait… whaaat? No way.”

I shrugged.

“You pulled a Ralos on him with just a scratch?!”

“So it would seem.”

“This is a literal game changer,” he said. “Now I wish we’d gone after the other one. Info is power with these guys, and you’re guaranteed to be the biggest news of the week. They don’t like sharing, even news. They’ll spin it or keep quiet, I bet. So we’ve got that going for us….”

“I am not your personal assassin,” I said.

“Debatable,” he said. “One less Telemoon goon who can log on is a good thing. Alright, let’s see about that tower. I want to give them their 2nd headline of the week in one day.”

“Aye.”

We returned to the tower’s nearest foundation block. I followed, gritting my teeth against the buzz. Azwold tossed a rock like a skipping stone at the concrete base, and it plunked off and into the dirt. He put on [Serpent Hide Gloves], reaching out a tentative hand to the concrete. The force-field did not encompass the foundation’s edge.

The kobold Shaman appeared from behind an opposite foundation block. She pointed to an interesting node near the ground. Azwold ran a finger over the flat cement and found a thin, rectangular crevice.

He retrieved the silver-and-gold tooth-key from a coat pocket, and knelt to see. He tried to push it in, but did not go. Then he flipped the tooth over and tried again. No luck. Azwold flipped it over to its original orientation, then pushed again on a hunch.

It plugged in… but nothing happened.

He stood, peering at flashes of light which cast a cluster of madrone into silhouette. The skeletal kobold emerged, lurching at us, clutching the tablet between bone paws. It offered Azwold’s tablet and he happily took it. The flashlight was still on. Battery low.

“See, normally,” said the mage, “‘Low Battery’ is just a reminder that you should find an inn. To log off and pretend you have a real life. But with all this weird stuff going on, I’m not so sure my tablet won’t up ’n die.”

The Shaman tapped a claw on Azwold’s device. It must have sparked an idea. Azwold swiped a finger around on the tablet screen, navigating. It takes time to become gadget savvy, I imagined. For now, I placed a shred of faith in the mage. He selected a phrase he had located; ‘Aurum Dente,’ then activated some kind of cypher. A progress bar appeared above his hands, and I watched it fill. Recognizable words on his screen morphed into something alien to me. I looked to the tower, scanning for any change in the force-field. Azwold waited, then grinned when his bar pinged green. He selected something I took to mean “deactivate” from a short list of options.

With a crackling zap, I felt the power withdraw. The field fell. A frazzled and thin raccoon scrambled away, following a thick black cable into the underbrush.

Azwold stepped back and tossed a pebble. It sailed easy as air, drawing a tiny dust trail as it rolled away.

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He huffed, “Well that was easy, right?”

“Very good,” I said. “Now, your thoughts on felling the spire?”

“Telemoon built it,” Azwold replied. “Telemoon should wreck it.”

I shifted my frame contrapposto.

“Let’s find some corpses.”

“Ah. Aye.”

Azwold gripped his [Mantis Goggles] which hung between his collarbones. He looked at the tablet; 7%. It would have to be enough. He ducked back onto the dark path to look for bodies.

~<>*<>*<>~

A gang of Telemoon ghouls lumbered around the base of the tower. They banged on the metal beams with sticks and stones, swiping, grabbing, bumping. They wove in and out between concrete blocks and under metal lattice, shuffling across the dirt. Azwold suspected something had gone foul with his [Spell: Rise Hex], the same spell he had let fizzle in the lizard cur graveyard. Its normal function was to summon six ghouls to defend the caster, empowered by graveyard proximity.

Now the tablet and the mage’s mana were both low on energy.

One risen Telemoon ghoul stood out from the rest. Azwold was peering at it, and I too noticed a familiar aura hanging around it.

“You know,” it rasped eerily, “the worst of them are alone in there with me out here.”

“What?” Azwold was taken aback.

My gaze drifted toward the ghoul’s silvery edges. Auras resolve better when viewed in periphery; this was innate knowledge.

“Believe me, I’m as amazed as you,” said the corpse, inspecting its own hands, “Wonder how temporary this is? You don’t have a mirror on you, do you?”

“Ralos? How?”

“Not the foggiest. Things like this can’t happen. Not even by accident. Its beyond my abilities anyway. Thought I’d be in there a long time.” He stretched. “This is a pleasant change, though. Being Warden isn’t a walk in the park.”

Azwold’s hasty wish could have contorted worse. He seemed relieved, but the unintended consequences concerned me.

“Well, it’s good to have you here,” he gave ghoul-Ralos an awkward shoulder pat.

Ralos had reason to hate me, having trapped his spirit in my graveyard. Best not divulge the botched wish just yet; the world had plenty of angry ghosts already.

“Mmm,” Ralos grunted, “so the idea is to knock down that tower? Those brutes won’t know the first thing. I can tell you that much. Neither do I, for that matter.”

“I think it’s steel,” Azwold said, grimacing at the incessant clanking of ghouls smacking the structure. One was trying to climb it. His body thudded to the dirt. I noticed a countdown timer above the ghouls’ heads; all but Ralos. I inferred the ghouls were temporary, and Ralos less so.

I saw now why spirit magic was best kept away from inept hands. Which begged questions about M’Lord.

“Metal is it?” said Ralos. “You’re a Spirit Mage, Azwold, just like me. Let’s make it grow old. Let time near the sea bring it down. Time, rime, and brine. What better agents of rust?”

Azwold hesitated. “Rust magic? That’s way outta my element. I doubt I could pull it off fully rested, even.”

“Why not signal the Queen? You need to become comfortable being on the hook for favors if you’re gonna make it in our line of work.”

“The Queen of Bees? She can help?”

The Ralos-in-a-young-corpse gurgled a laugh. I imagined it smelled like things gone wrong in the icebox. “Of course she can,” he said. “An assist from the colony can give most any spell a boost.”

“Alright, so how do we signal?”

“Well,” said Ralos, “use the scepter to find a bee. Tell that bee to go find her. And bring friends. Bees share a link to the Spirit Realm, see? Just imagine a world where they don’t deliver pollen. Food won’t grow. Life withers. If that isn’t power over life and death, what is?”

“Ahem,” I strummed my ribcage like a xylophone. Several honeybees crawled out and began buzzing zigzags like a fluttery heart.

“How did they survive under the waves?” Azwold’s eyebrow creased.

“Like I already said, they’re new,” I shrugged. “Found me on the island. They toil at repairing the waxwork. They seek me out.”

The bees in my chest felt normal. Vital, even, because I was growing fond of having a voice again.

Ghoul-Ralos glared at me with an unreadable expression, then leaned in to whisper to my ribcage beehive. The bees swirled out. Azwold directed them with a wave of the scepter. I opened my jaw to protest, but my bees deployed elsewhere, as if sensing a complete lack of nectar on Stonesthrow Island.

“And now we wait.”

The kobold Shaman reappeared, followed by a sizable entourage of her tribe folk. At the sight of Telemoon ghouls milling about, the group tensed. They took up their weapons in a cascade of yips and yowls. The Shaman raised her staff to quiet them. She had discerned the humans’ undead state.

The old creature came to me, then. She held out a detached hand with a silver ring looped on a bony knuckle crook.

“Ah,” I said, “many thanks, madam Lizard Wizard.” I took my lost hand back with a theatrical bow.

Azwold held his palm open to me, “She’s a Shaman, not a Wizard. Ring, please.”

My opinion of this was scowly. I deposited the ring in the mage’s palm and Azwold screwed it back to the scepter’s pommel. I pocketed my hand.

As if summoned, a bee appeared. Big, honey gold, and fuzzy black. It buzzed a few circles around the scepter, then landed on it. My colony came buzzing home moments after.

“Alright, let’s try some rust magic,” said Azwold, gazing into his tablet screen. Its battery promptly died. “Rats,” he hissed.

“Mmm. Don’t worry. We can manage with help,” said Ralos, looking quizzically at the kobold Shaman, “probably. I think we’ll need beeswax for this. If I recall correctly, there’s some correlation between wax and steel. Wax and honey are weather resistant, and that plays into and the oxidation effect we’re looking for with our magic.”

“They mightn’t like it,” I said, tugging a chunk of [Honeycomb] down from the hive in my chest, “But I reckon they’ll build a new one. It feels odd to use a piece of myself as a quest item, I’ll have you know.”

Ralos took a handful of hive wax from Azwold, working it into a clay-like ball. The Shaman stepped forward, holding out her paw too. The three paid a visit to each tower support, rubbing rings of wax around the metal.

Azwold pulled on his goggles, then recited from memory. He swung the [Hive Scepter] around in a careful, geometric dance. Ralos and the kobold mumbled along. The golden Queen clutched to the scepter’s crest; a tiny figurehead with wings buzzing a blur.

Bubbles coalesced around the wax rings. Like time-lapse planets, each bubble whizzed through the metal’s seasons. It corroded.

Azwold fell to his knees, and the spell ended. His dreadlocks faded, adding a pinch of salt to the pepper. He looked up, frowning, “Alright. Let’s hit it with one of those cranes.”

“A suggestion,” I held up a finger bone, “We aim its fall toward the machine yard?”

“Brilliant,” Azwold barred a canine.

“I…” Ralos’s Telemoon host fell to a knee.

“What is it?” Azwold rushed to his side, winded.

“I feel the pull of the Hive,” he looked at the scepter in Azwold’s grip.

“No…” Azwold hung his head.

“What is this?” he asked. “Do you know?”

“The Shaman had me make a wish,” Azwold confessed, “and I… wished for you to be alive. I didn’t think. But only NPCs and bosses can use wish spells, right? This questline is officially off the rails, IMO.”

The Telemoon ghoul’s face grew long.

“Foolish. This cursed tower…” said Azwold. “And now that the tower may fall. The wish might die too.”

Ralos’s eyelids drooped. “It’s okay,” he said. “I, I believe in your work. And the scepter needs its Warden.”

“I read [Grandfather’s Journal], you know,” Azwold said. “Have you read it yet? I need to know more. One night’s not enough time. You could’ve helped me make sense of it.”

Before a reply, we glared to the edge of the site. A spotlight blasted down on us and an engine clamored to a rumble. Inside the cockpit of a giant crane, I spotted the bone kobold. It clutched at the controls, its toothy muzzle gaping.

The crane’s boom swung wide across treetops. It thundered into the tower’s steel, and one swing was all it took. The rusted base of the tower twisted and cracked on impact. But the cable’s big iron hook looped around a tower leg like a grapple.

The kobold golem rattled inside the crane’s cabin as the weight of the tower dragged the machine down. As it fell, the creature tumbled to the dirt, scattering to a dusty pile. Pine branches broke like the cracking of a dozen baseball bats. I felt the crane crash through the ground, quaking up my shins.

When the noise lessened to a dim ear ringing, Azwold turned back to his friend. He searched for Ralos’s eyes inside the Telemoon ghoul’s. But they faded out. The corpse fell forward to the ground. Empty.

Azwold’s voice caught in his throat. Anger flashed in his eyes. He clenched his fists. Did he intend to confront the Shaman? A swift semicircle of kobold kin formed around him. Weapons drawn.

“That’s how it’s gonna be, huh?” Azwold shook the scepter at them. Their weapons pointed closer. “I fix your problem and you go right back to hostile?”

“Perhaps our time of exit has arrived, M’Lord?” I said over his shoulder. “I’ve got my hand back, you’ve got your lamp-book, and all. Let’s save our luck.”

Azwold took a deep breath and huffed it out, “Yeah, okay. The tower’s down. I guess that’s what counts most.”

“Aye, so let us away? To the canoe,” I handed Azwold his oar. “You left this,” I said, “where you left this,” and held the executive’s tooth-drive cradled in a bony palm.

Azwold nodded, snatching the oar from me, and pocketing the tooth-drive.

I remembered my foot in his coat pockets. The old rage in me stayed kindled, but I held it in… so long as our paths stayed aligned.

A small loot chest materialized on the ground. Our booty, methought. The mage snatched it up under an arm and stormed off.