I didn’t dare cross the desert, even though I was pretty sure I wouldn’t sink in the sand. I climbed the mountain and descended through the tunnel I dug, doing the opposite job the gnomes did, taking debris out and throwing them down the mountain. Another few days of work in which I ate the softest rocks because it was cheaper effort-wise than carrying it out.

Never mind how the System could explain a flesh creature surviving as a lithovore if it is allegedly “anti-magical” but there I was, munching on a piece of slate.

I stopped because I sensed gnomes on the other side. “Hey! You on the other side of the debris, move away and clear the landing down there! This is unstable and may turn into a landslide!”

It was worse. As I removed the second-to-last layer of rocks, the air decided it wanted to play upstairs. It blasted up, throwing a plume of dust at me and then making a rock avalanche roll down the stairs along with me. I wasn’t used to it. I could dive into stone, for crying out loud. I took a lot of damage and ended with a dislocated shoulder at the end.

“Wyxnos’ grace! He brought you back to us, but you are injured!” A gnome climbed on the pile of rocks and stared at me.

“Your God cares not for you. He thought you should all be dead,” I grunted back in mild pain. It’s been ages since I hurt like this.

My warning backfired spectacularly. Like all religious fanatics, the guy interpreted the message however he wanted, I mean, in a way that would confirm his beliefs.

“WYXNOS HAS SPOKEN! Wyxnos is displeased with us because we haven’t yet exterminated the kobolds! Ready the machines!”

After I climbed out of the rocks, I pushed my back but it would keep me from working for a few days. It was humbling to no longer be the invincible goddess.

The gnomes started to run up and down the tunnels, spreading the “holy message”. Wyxnos wanted the gnomes either victorious or dead. I followed a throng of gnomes on the warpath into a chamber I hadn’t yet visited. I made a point of NOT exploring this gnome cave crap-hole as it was as disgusting as an actual, unclean, crap-hole. Just the fact everyone drank filtered pee was already bad.

I went to the nursery to take care of my shoulder.

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While their society was matriarchal, some spaces were clearly delimited as “boys only”. The workshops were one such place but I eased my way in like a Prometheus made in Taiwan by offering them knowledge of metallurgy and medicine. The vehicle garage was one such place. A female was too precious to send to certain death in the sands outside. Entering the forbidden place, I heard coordinate shouts and sounds of metal hitting metal as I was assaulted by a stench of old sweat and rust.

“HOLD TIGHT! Don’t let go or it will...”

A shout followed by the sound of a spring slapping a dozen gnomes echoed in the garage cave. One of the coils they used to power their vehicles broke loose, unwinding and slapping the hapless boys as they were sent flying to become splatters against the cave wall. The metal band of the coil warbled its screeching note as it flailed loose in the garage.

I threw myself on the ground for dear life as one part of the coil flew past where I stood. The other gnomes who’d witnessed it before were lying flat on the ground except for a few older men who were holding tight to their own coils else the entire garage would come undone. After a minute, the metal band lost its energy and laid flat on the ground.

I stood up and saw them for the first time. I’d have bent over laughing if it weren’t for the tragic accident. The gnomes’ vehicles were wind-up toys. I’d seen parts crafted in the workshop but never the whole car assembled.

They had four wide wheels covered in leather to lower pressure on the sand and a series of cogwheels to transfer energy from the coils to the wheels. Slap a frame around it to hold the pieces together and stretch furs over the frame so people can stand or sit. The only hard horizontal surface was a wide bed in the middle made out of looted shields cobbled together to hold the loot.

The chassis was a bent and battered jumble of plate breastplates, shields, rotten wooden boards, the hafts and shafts of several weapons or tools, rusted chainmail hammered in place with rustier nails. They had rustic welds but mostly stayed together because they rusted that way. The older and more venerable vehicles were covered in old bloodstains and caked in dried gore. These were the reliables vessels, the ones that didn’t fall apart on the first sortie. The gnomes’ small size was an advantage here. A breastplate belonging to one of the largest species, like a minotaur, for example, could easily be half a vehicle’s chassis.

Such funny wind-up cars they had.

Steering wasn’t achieved by turning the front wheels. They had a rudder in the front and steered like a ship. The reason the rudder wasn’t in the back like a ship was that it was the place where the fighting happened, with the kobolds giving chase. I could only imagine the immense drag this rudder caused while in the sand. It seemed to lift when the vehicle was moving straight ahead. Then to turn around, you’d need to plow it into the sand deep enough to make it turn.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Finally, they had no walls. Weight was a huge concern as every pound of vehicle was one less pound of loot they would bring back home. These gnomes had no word for “safety”. Lose your balance on the speeding vehicle with no walls and you’ll dive into the sand. Get knocked by a kobold and you’ll dive in the sand. Tear the leather you’re fighting on, and you’ll dive in the sand.

I helped move the dying gnomes and comforted the ones still conscious as they whimpered and bled out. After examining them, I knew the gnomes who were hit by the coil were beyond hope. Maybe with magic but alas, we had none. Maybe with a proper surgical center but again, we were out of luck.

“Wyxnos’ mercy!” One of them coughed blood and called me. “Would you hear my last wish?”

“Of course,” He had a broken spine and was paraplegic. He also ruptured his spleen, kidneys, pancreas, and punctured his bowels. {Appraise} told me all that just to spite me.

I still tried to comfort and treat them. Mostly because it was the humane thing to do and also for the Proficiency gains.

“I don’t want to die without ever kissing a girl, Wyxnos willing!” he cheekily confessed with a bloody grin.

I deadpanned, “I got you. Too bad we won’t find one in time, dude. Wyxnos doesn’t care about us. But you’ll get your wish. In the next life. Believe in it.”

“Wyxnos be praised!” He exulted, then spat a blood clot.

Maybe Wyxnos did care but for the wrong reasons. He didn’t want the mysteries of this dead magic zone revealed. Something really, really fishy was going on with this zone. One could only access it if they knew it existed, otherwise the System would just divert their attention elsewhere. Maybe it could distract would-be visitors by spawning a monster attack out of no...where…

Oh, damnit. Was the System Core just a giant worldwide Dungeon Core? No wonder the elder fairies hate it so much and the Fulgen elves are so standoffish about it and the Pantheon. But now I had to go out and see for myself what was in these sands. Or underneath them.

The funny guy expired without getting his kiss. How cruel of me.

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After we gave the dead a scavenger gnomish burial, we went back to work. What was their burial rite? Strip the bodies of any valuables, then dump them at the lowest levels for the dung beetles' great contentment. Because if anyone thought the dung beetles down there were normal Earth beetles, I have some terrible news. They weren’t aggressive but they could chew through bone if you let them. These beetles were all low level, about four to five. I killed a few of them until I found a Core. How I would take my loot out with me was anyone’s guess. I might someday carry everything up a mountain and stash it in a cave, dragon-style.

Back at the garage, I helped them rewind the coil. I was probably the only gnome with a Strength score over 100, counting berserker rage. After the rank-up, I had enough rage time to keep it on indefinitely.

The best pieces of plate armor they obtained were cut in strips, hammered straight, and welded to make these coils, their power source. The gnomes in the garage would wind up the metal spirals and carefully mount two or three of them on the vehicles. These coils were considered sacred as they were too important to lose. The gnomes would rather have the vehicle and coil back with only the driver and no loot than the entire crew returning on foot. Once a guy ran back to the garage carrying only the coil. He was hailed as a hero. The coils had no casing whatsoever and had to be tied with leather straps once fully wound up to be mounted on the vehicles.

The gnomes were incensed. They saw the coil going loose as a sign that Wyxnos was impatient and wanted results. That meant winning the war against the kobolds. The crew affixed the coil to one of the vehicles and we climbed aboard to go out and raid. I mean we, because I won my spot on the vehicle by kicking another gnome out and telling him I’d introduce him to some girls at the nursery with one of my jewelry pieces as a gift. A few gnomes aboard our car looked at me like they too wanted to be kicked out.

The mechanist engaged the main coil and the car did a wheelie as it dashed out of the garage, propelled at the maximum acceleration by the powerful coil. They didn’t have any gear system. It was either full throttle or idle. I almost fell down but grabbed onto one pole as our ride went out on the sand with the gnomes screaming.

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The leather-covered wheels kicked up a plume of sand as they desperately pushed the vehicle forward. A tension coil sang a dissonant note as it unwound to power the wheels. Atop the crazy contraption going at uncontrollable speeds, the passengers fought for their lives.

A gnome gave me a long shaft with a hook at the end. I was supposed to fish loot out of the sand with it as the car passed by the loot. It counted as a spear so I was pretty sure I could get tons of loot. I strapped a belt around my waist tying me to the car pole and held the hook-spear ready to get loot. As I looked at the sands, I gagged. The sand was yellowish-brown and was covered in millions of... of… turds.

I retched as the stench of sun-baked poop assaulted my delicate nose. And that with my stench-dampening Perk. As I watched, I saw feces materializing around fifty meters up in the air and falling on the sand to join its millions of friends. These feces splashed on the sand with a dash of urine.

Everything made sense. Everything.

This place was really the trash dump of the world. Adventurers delving the vast underground Dungeon tunnels (AKA the Labyrinth as people used to call it nowadays, with the artificial Core-generated Bit-Blessed Dungeons on the rise) usually joked about how the Dungeon ate their shit. Everyone knew how things left unattended for long just vanished from the Dungeon. And now I saw the other side of the story. All the poop of every Adventurer that ever took a dump on a corner of the Dungeon tunnels throughout all these thousands of years ended up here.

“Be careful of the splash! Wyxnos’s stinky stuff is nasty!” A gnome chortled and slapped me.

Scavenger gnome poop didn’t stink as much because they evolved to use almost everything their food provided. Compared to these tiny people, the humans and other species out there ate like kings and wasted a lot of nutrients in their poop just because their bodies didn’t need as much.

“There’s a good one! Hey, let’s see how you fish treasure like a girl!” Another taunted me, pointing at a monster carcass in the distance.

I leaned to the side and prepared my hook. I snagged the neck of the carcass and felt the hook hit the spine. Then I hefted it and hauled the monster body on the vehicle.

“Too late, you could’ve done it earlier and get it on the car without straining it too much. See, you made us turn!” The senior gnome pointed out.

“Meat!” Another gnome cheered. “By Wyxnos, I love meat!”

“I like a soft warm woman more!” Another joked. He got a slap on the back of his head as another gnome pointed at me.

“I like women too. You guys are disgusting,” I sneered at them, causing the crew to erupt in laughter.

I sensed danger.

“KOBOLDS! On raptors!” The spotter shouted.