“Is that a damn whale?” Timothy thought to himself.
This may be a dangerous situation, especially if they let it unfold as such. However, they didn’t know how to prevent such a disaster from ‘unfolding’, so all three of them kept quiet for the sake of avoiding any unnecessary attention, as they did not want to get eaten alive by these monstrous fish! They remained quiet.
“Is this a new species?” Arvena asked herself, “I don’t remember seeing anything like this the last time I was here, hell no. But then again, I got chased out of here before I could explore the sea at all! Those bastards I guided weren’t as assertive, useless pricks!”
Two minutes had passed, and these twenty-meter long whales of sorts had not attacked, and since they seemed so docile, the team started thinking about sneaking out of here as quickly as they could. This ruined city had plenty of spots to hide in, so they figured that they could eventually make some good distance away from this potential slaughter that they’ve found themselves in! They had to give it a shot.
Right before they were about to move, they spotted something that could either be considered terrifying, or potentially helpful, but either way it was exciting. They saw several goblins swimming down from the couple of whales, as in, it was very likely that these goblins had ridden on the whales up until a moment ago!
“Ah shit… well at least goblins are easier to kill.” Tim thought, and started charging a lightning-bolt on his palm.
Tim thought that he had a shot to survive here, but then he noticed that the goblins were absurdly fast, they would not allow loose ends! Less than ten seconds later, someone had even snuck up behind him, and was holding him at gunpoint. Well, they didn’t have guns, but he was still one wrong move away from getting his head fried, as the goblins had magical powers at their disposal as well!
“Gegegegegeegegegegege,” The goblin exclaimed.
Tim could not understand this goblin, that was for sure. However, when he turned around, he noticed that he and it were of the same species, this was an aqus goblin who threatened him! When the goblin then spoke again, its slurred speech was suddenly more coherent, Tim could understand everything this time, as his brain adapted to their language!
“Why do you impersonate us?!” It asked, “I can smell your horrid, degranus stench from a mile away! You can't hide from us.”
“Degranus? Nah, I’m originally a stingray, so your nose isn’t as great as you think.” He taunted.
Tim was being put under pressure here, he was being threatened, yes, but that didn’t stop him from saying what was in his mind. They couldn’t force the amped, lightning-bolt out of his hand, so he could kill at least one of them if the situation demanded it so. He remained unwinding.
“A stingray? I never heard of anything like that before.” It followed along, and it stopped holding Timothy at ‘gunpoint’.
Then, it asked. “Why would you leave your comfortable seas just to get here? Fish aren’t supposed to be greedy, and we have a couple of large examples above our heads, even. Those spring whales are our pets, their whole ambition is to serve us. Did you come here to serve us as well, stingray?”
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“Fuck you, and your whales, pencil dick! Put some damn clothes on. I came here to spite the gods, not to be your pet.” He answered.
After that point, he wanted to blow this guy’s head off, and tried to figure out the best way to aim, but then he noticed that the other’s attitude was changing towards the better, for some reason. This was a confusing conversation overall.
“Degranus goblins have invaded many of our temples in the past, and that is why we try our best to kill any new goblin that enters our oasis, we were about to kill the four of you as well. However, we can’t kill a fish who challenges the gods, the latter is unheard of, so we won’t fight you, because you might win and embarrass our families for the next few decades, we won’t risk it. We will leave you be, but if you came here to cause trouble like the typical goblin does, then we will have your heads, regardless of how many of us die while doing so. Seek power, but seek it in a fair, balanced manner, don’t force our hand.” It said.
This was a lengthy, and unexpected explanation, but it was best that they were talking it out. It was better than getting ruthlessly attacked by these beings, because Tim would have lost, regardless of what the collective consensus was. However, since he and the team also hated the other degranus goblins that lived here, the two parties managed to understand each other really well.
The aqus goblins then left as quickly as they had arrived, they were gone in half a minute. His friends were shocked by what happened, the whales had scared them quite a bit, but all-and-all it was great that not a single drop of blood had been spilled throughout the encounter. Tim saved his friends by being his normal, insufferable self!
…
Tim and his friends spent three more hours in, and around the city. They had the freedom to do so, and this helped them figure out the infrastructural layout of the vicinity. This city was too big, so it couldn’t be so lacking in ‘holy sites’ to the extent that they initially believed it was, there had to be something available to them.
One-hundred meters away from the city, they found something that was buried within mud, gravel and sand. It was a temple! They could tell that it was a temple, because the tip of it was cone-shaped, and was made of stone. Such a design was really difficult to craft, so they figured that the past residents invested in this building, because its bowels bore some kind of importance!
Arvena spoke her truth too, she explained. “There’s plenty of mana down there alright, it can’t be anything else. I haven’t felt this alive in erg… weeks.”
“So we have to dig it out, then? I think it’s buried pretty deep, so it’s gonna take us a while if we have to dig around it.” He said.
However, just a second later, he remembered that he bore a special, and mostly unused ability that might help him dig. Well, they won’t be able to remove the sand with ‘the flick of a magic wand’, but in this nano universe, neither of them wanted to spend more time than they had to!
“Bone multiplier, that was its name!” He celebrated, inwardly, and then he pitched. “I have a sort of power that might help us dig this place out faster. We don’t need to spend months here, that would be really unproductive.”
“Let’s get productive, then. There’s mana down there, so it should be a holy temple. If it’s a temple, then we can also remove the bracket on our mana quality in there.” Arvena followed along.
It didn’t take any more convincing after that point, Tim got into work. However, as Skendus witnessed the events unfold, he couldn’t help asking himself a question. He was skeptical.
“The city behind us is ruined, but it isn’t buried, yet this temple is… This is getting creepy, why would they bury only one building out of the entire city? This fiend says it smells like mana, heck, I think it smells like trouble!” He thought to himself.
Then, he became more alert, and thought. “I’m gonna try to keep my friends alive, that’s the least I can do for them if everything goes wrong…”