Chapter 44: Keep your Fears at Arm’s Length

I had spent a third of my mana frantically casting [Spell: Incorporeal II], [Spell: Thorns II], and [Spell: Calcify: I], but none of it had mattered. The giant spiders, Skittering Weavers and Lurkers, had made quick work of me. They had ignored my threat reduction altogether. I felt as if it might have worked, because some hesitated for the spell’s duration. But the closest spiders resumed their crawling the moment the effect faded, pushed forward by those swarming in behind them.

Perhaps it was my wailing that had drawn them. I regretted it.

My thorns did next to nothing. The monsters slung silk over me, twirling me like a game foul on a roasting spit, ignoring most damage reflection.

As for my calcification, they just waited, then shook their long, ugly appendages. The thin layer of petrifying stone cracked and fell to the floor.

But they had not killed me, so now I lay in quiet contemplation of my doom, cocooned up to have every drop of marrow leeched from me at the spiders’ convenience. If I escaped this, I would bark from street corners, telling everyone I met to avoid dark hallways with giant spiders.

My curiosity—the prime culprit in my predicament—sparked anew when I heard something like voices intermingling with the rattling and scratching of the spiders’ pathing. But they were not speaking a tongue I knew. It was animal-like. Reptilian. Mayhap it was kobolds.

This was a development I could wholeheartedly embrace. I knew kobolds could be allies. If not allies, I could sway them toward neutrality... if it benefitted them. At the absolute least, they might not kill me on sight. The spiders delayed, so there was hope.

I felt a blade slice along my layers of sticky web wrapping. Another knife joined the task near my feet. The growly, snappy chattering took a turn toward the argumentative and I lay still as death, waiting for it to resolve. But it did not.

They threw me to the stone floor, spilling out of my cocoon like a dusty mummy, rolling to a halt. My [Spell: Vision Wisps III] was still active, and in pure dark, I saw them.

They were not kobolds.

But they might be kin to kobolds, some divergent evolution in the lore. These fellows grew larger and more threatening, but lacked kobolds’ crafty weaponry. There was a feral gleaming in their milky gazes and a nasty frothing at their muzzles and nostrils. I realized what I had thought of as knives were actually claws.

Still, they did not attack me. I rose from the ground and stood. An entire dungeon’s worth of monsters surrounded me in a sizable room, all arachnid and lizardfolk variants. All staring at me in the dark. A quiet fell. Even the two squabbling web-cutters were quiet now, as if awaiting some move. Expectant. But were they waiting for me to do something…?

Torches began igniting around the perimeter, revealing a dark, upside down forest of slimy stalactites several fathoms above. The first torch had been apple red, redder than a typical fire. The second had been yam orange, the third more citrusy, and I watched in perplexed interest. They continued sparking to life every few seconds, traveling the spectrum from red to violet, a rainbow of firelight. When complete, they blended to cast the cavernous space in a pure white light.

The monsters slunk away, hissing and growling to the wide, arching doorway. There was wrestling and shrieking as the dungeon mobs fought to escape the sudden brightness.

And then I saw Belvan, standing with hands clasped in the center of the room, placid.

But a blood chilling howl boomed through the cavern from above. A head appeared among the stalactites, like a cross between a kobold and a sky island dinosaur. Then the rest of its body wedged itself out of a giant hole above that had been invisible prior to torchlight.

The massive creature crashed to the floor and gnashed its teeth.

There was no way I could win a boss fight alone.

Its name was Glassaur the Bronze, and it struck an imposing pose, waiting for me to engage it. Programmed behavior, I guessed, to allow adventurers a moment to prepare for battle.

Belvan floated in the boss’s direction. He was shrouded in the same shimmery aura as at the old desert graveyard. I knew Belvan had no ability to combat beasts. What could he mean to do?

“Wait,” I said, holding an arm out. “Get away.”

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Not too distant in the past, Belvan had been but one among my yard of underlings. At least that was my perception then. He had changed.

At my warning, the monster’s eyes went fierce and hungry. It roared and rushed at me. Too astonished to cast spells, I winced, awaiting impeding doom yet again.

But it did not come.

I peered beyond the monster and saw Belvan had it by the tail. Where the bones of his hand touched the monster, a glitchy pixel swirl emerged.

“Go-go-go-goood ev-v-v-v,” came a low and saurian version of Belvan’s voice.

Shocked and confused, I stood gawping at the beast. I looked to Belvan, but he was concentrating, maintaining control of the boss.

I noticed I had a persistent, unnaturally bright notification blinking on my tablet. I grabbed it up and scraped my finger bones on the screen.

The lizard boss growled again, “Good evening. How may I be of assistance?”

I looked at the dialogue box that had appeared:

1) I’m lost. Help! (Marks map with your location.)

2) I need directions to the nearest town.

3) I’m dying too much. Can you suggest a more level-appropriate zone for me?

4) I’m interested in Spirit Mage training or quests.

5) Anything interesting going on in the area?

6) Know any jokes?

I was flabbergasted. This thing was even more unlike my Belvan than earlier incarnations.

But his dialog options were the same. His aura—and the rainbow of torchlight—told me the fae had possessed Belvan again. Had he appeared to give me another ‘key that is not a key’? Or come with important things to tell? We would have no idea where to go next until completing this quest step.

Neither Belvan nor Glassaur the Bronze said another word. They stood and awaited my menu selection.

I decided to make my way down the list from the top. “I’m lost. Help!” I said, and the saying of it came easily. I was truly lost and in dire need of help.

“I cannot mark your map with a simple location. The nature of your lost-ness cannot be expressed in that way. You are right where you need to be; to help bring about change.”

Whether it was him talking, or her, or they, I was unsure. Belvan had a penchant for responding in cryptic ways at times. Which was funny, given his role as an information fount.

I pressed on with option 2; “I need directions to the nearest town.”

“Though not the nearest, you may find ways to where you seek by paying the Nevahjian Enclave a visit.”

There was a rising hum of activity among my waxwork denizens. Reasons to learn more about Nevahj’s strangeness? A motivating notion. I was eager to gain more information.

Number 3 did not particularly apply to me, but my desire for completeness spurred me to choose it next, anyway. “I’m dying too much. can you suggest a more level-appropriate zone for me?”

“As I said,” the monster rumbled deep within its scaled chest, “you are in the most appropriate place. Your ability to commune passively with monsterkind keeps you safer than most. Keep your fears at arm’s length, Gnarlroot the Eld.”

It was shocking to hear another speak of my hidden ability as a matter of fact. I found it comforting, affirming. I was not imagining things and had evidence now.

Number 4 was almost my first choice. Azwold had said Ralos corrupted the Grandfather NPC by co-opting his coding. If I wanted to pick my own spells and abilities, I needed to meet a repaired Grandfather. “I’m interested in Spirit Mage training or quests.”

“You must not seek powers that do not belong to you. Be contented with what you have, lest you remain forever hungry. If you wish to start over and spend your points differently, I shall grant it. When Realms of Lore is once again inhabitable, you will find your abilities reset. Consider your expenditures wisely.”

This Belvan was officially my favorite Belvan.

I eagerly tapped option number 5. “Anything interesting going on in the area?”

“There is always something interesting going on everywhere,” said the fae through Belvan and into the Saurian beast. Its light-blind, cloudy eyes glimmered with temporary, graceful intellect. “There is a Telemoon Headquarters. You must travel there. Find the way within the Nevahjian Enclave.”

I stood, awaiting more.

“The Telemoon guild has imprisoned me, Eld. My dear spirit, go and find me. Undo what they have done. The wheels of life and death have been shaken from their cycles. The Mentalist Troika have created pocket dimensions. They toy with portal magic. They wish to recreate Realms of Lore out in the world. My world. They drain my forces and apply them to their own visions. Intelligence is but one quality of deityhood. They know not what they do.”

Vick5 told us of experimentation with the laws of karma. And Azwold speculated they were fueling their misdeeds with abducted goddess power. This sounded like confirmation.

“What do you mean ‘pocket dimensions’?” I asked. “And portal magic?”

I had seen portals in the game before. This burly lizard boss in a down-tuned Belvan voice had more to say. If only I could ask better questions.

But there was no answer. Only clicking a number worked, I supposed. I wondered why I had no stat bonus dialogue options like the Mage did. No charming or intimidating my way into more answers; a bold reminder that I was not a normal player, even with my freedom.

The only choice left was number 6; “Know any jokes?”

The beast’s huge muzzle bent in a way its programming did not allow for, showing a dagger toothed grin. There was a shuddering of its scaly monster model, like a glimpse of its programming framework just below the reptilian pelt. The swirling pixels where Belvan’s hand touched its tail froze, like a spiral galaxy that stopped spinning.

“I am re...minded o-o-o-of,” it stuttered, growing more growly with each syllable, “of the rid-rid-riddle of the Ko...Kobold King.g.g.g.g...”

Then it roared at the roof, cracking loose several natural spears of cave stone. There was crashing all around me as the stalactites shattered.

Belvan blinked out of visibility.

Then Glassaur the Bronze charged at me.