Poseidonis

August 27th, 10:52 UTC -2:00

Megan shapeshifted to have gills—but didn’t make herself look like my description of the Brine Dwellers. That was okay. Coupled with that and her cute mermaid tail, and I could honestly say that I had hit the girlfriend lottery. She had even become smaller! She was so cute now.

I stood suspended in water, Infinity holding fast a smooth air-bubble that I replenished with usable oxygen by filtering it out from the water, a process that required more energy and mental power than I had expected—but not so much that I’d ever experience a moment of true danger, even under the most extreme circumstances.

If my oxygen filtration failed me, then as a last ditch effort, I could just use the Reverse Cursed Technique to keep my brain oxygenated at a constant rate. It would guzzle power like nothing else, but it would give me time to get out of the water in a pinch.

I watched Megan swimming around me, batting her fish tail and contorting her body, twisting artfully to reduce drag. Megan stopped to raise an eyebrow at me, grinning but bemused. I didn’t know you were sexually attracted to Atlanteans.

I’m sexually attracted to you. And I’m a boy—and mermaids are mermaids.

She raised an eyebrow, disregarding the obvious sexual incompatibilities—

A man can dream, Megan. A man can dream.

She giggled at that, Hmmm, you said your birthday was December 7th, right?

Right, I said, feeling a little flat-footed by the question, Why?

No reason. Anyway. Can you take us to the Brine Dwellers now?

I created an orb of Blue to drag me towards the direction I wanted to go—the closest point to Poseidonis’ city limits. Megan and I floated over vast buildings made of stone and corrals blended with technology and arcane symbols, driving the city and its mission to make sure that Atlantis’ king and royal family remained as unburdened to humanity’s waste as possible.

I didn’t expect the Brine Dwellers to be particularly nice once we got to meet them. I could see hundreds of thousands of them roaming around underneath the ground, in a complex—albeit rundown—society that was almost completely cut off from the rest of Poseidonis, but for a few avenues. It seemed like the Brine Dwellers exported minerals mined from underground to the Atlanteans.

What if they speak another language? I asked.

They undoubtedly will. And I will translate.

Right.

It took us a few more minutes until we finally started hitting the outskirts of the city. Megan swam quite a bit faster than the average Atlantean was capable of, owing to her telekinesis, and I wasn’t even swimming at all. Once we finally approached the final house before the open ocean met us, along with an emphatic drop in ocean depth—I spotted something.

A group of Brine Dwellers shaped like a bunch of only vaguely humanoid sea creatures were chasing after a smaller specimen, cradling a child—possibly. Or maybe just a smaller but mature Brine Dweller that couldn’t move as fast. Best not to make assumptions.

Hero time, I said, quickly getting to brass tacks, I’m taking us down to something that looks like a chase. We go down, get the situation sorted, and you get your primary account for the plight of the Brine Dwellers.

After hearing Megan’s telepathic nod, I warped us into the deep darkness of the sea. If it weren’t for my Six Eyes, I wouldn’t have been able to see anything as we appeared here—except for the Brine Dwellers themselves, who were covered in bioluminescent markings that reminded me of Aqualad’s skin icons. Off in the distance, I could make out some natural growths that were also bioluminescent—it seemed like that was the primary source of illumination in this undersea world. Megan took a moment to furrow her eyebrows and—become smaller. From tail to head, she had to be around five feet long now—but since most of that length was her tail, in real terms, she would have been in the mid-to-low four foot range if she had legs.

The escaping Brine Dweller saw us and stopped before us in a panic. Then it started moving its mouth, but I couldn’t… really hear anything until, “Help us, please!”

The pursuing Brine Dwellers came to a stop before us, looking at us in what I could slightly clock was… anger? Disappointment? Joy? I could, in fact, not clock anything from their fishy, crustacean or decapodian expressions. All just fish to me.

…I couldn’t help but find them adorable. All of them, really. The fact that they looked so monstrous, but were really just people deep down was… it gave me a nice feeling. Which begged the question—why would anyone oppress these funky little fish people?

“Explain to us the situation, please,” Megan said, putting herself between the little guys and the bigger ones. “Why must you chase them?”

“I will not be made to repeat this lunatic’s crimes again!” the front most Brine Dweller, that looked like a humanoid lobster, shouted, “Out of my way, let me at this degenerate! Let me make him pay!”

Degenerate? I looked down at said degenerate. He looked like a shrimp, and his eyes were very expressive in that they looked sad and pathetic. But maybe that was just the way shrimp people looked? “What’d you do?” I asked.

“Nothing!” he cried, “I did nothing at all!”

Huh.

I wasn’t buying it.

Hey, Green Bean, this feels like a situation I might have misread—maybe the small guy’s the bad one?

He is, I felt a mental shudder through our link.

Wait, what did he do?

I don’t feel comfortable repeating it, she said. “You, and your accomplice. You did a very bad thing to these people. You need to make things right somehow.”

The accomplice in question shook himself out from the shrimp’s embrace—a scaly humanoid fish creature with a fat neck.

“They’re lying to you!” the small Brine Dweller claimed.

Oh god.

I mentally tuned out from this… mess. Megan seemed happy to try and wrangle them into doing what was right, somehow managing to dodge any and all prejudice against her. They must have assumed her to be some kind of Atlantean, but they were happy to talk with her as equals.

Finally, once the two degenerates had been made to pay for damages—trading words about ‘defiled livestock’ though I tried not to listen for any specifics after that point—, Megan broached the topic of why we were here in the first place.

“Excuse me,” Megan began, “But the truth is, I am not from Atlantis. I am from Mars. I have been using telepathy to make it look like my companion and I have been speaking, but we have not. I hope this is okay.

“Sure…?” the lobster said.

“I have been fascinated with Atlantean culture for some time now, and I would like to learn more about your people—our guide called you the Brine Dwellers. Is this an accurate name?”

The lobster man and his friends—a crab man, several fish-men, and a Moray eel-headed man—stopped and turned their bodies towards Megan. She had their attention for sure. “No. It’s a name for cast-offs, and those not allowed into the gleaming city of Poseidonis. We are not different from the Atlanteans. Not in our blood. But where they succeeded in every way, we… didn’t.”

“And whose fault is that?!” The Moray eel-man said angrily. “The former king Oron—”

“Quiet, Hysenth!” the lobster man hissed. Then he turned to us, “The answers you seek are not ones that you will like to hear.”

“We don’t have any loyalty to Atlantis,” I said with a frown and a shrug, “Really, go ahead and besmirch them as much as you want. We came down here to learn about you people from you, instead of having to rely on a museum guide who clearly had something against you Brine Dwellers. We can’t promise to help. We probably can’t anyway. But at least you’ll know that someone else knows about you.”

The lobster man shook his head, “That is kind of you. You are young, yet kind. That is a good mark. Yes, what do you want to learn?”

“Why it sucks down here,” I said.

“Sa-chan!” Megan chided.

The men just laughed. The lobster man’s laughter rumbled, low and deep, echoed by his companions. Even the Moray eel-man, Hysenth, let out a bitter chuckle. Megan even went out of her way to transmit their laughter to me, which was nice. “You surface-dwellers speak plainly,” the lobster man said. “I’ll grant you that.”

“It’s a fair question,” I replied, crossing my arms. “If your life is rough, I want to know why. And if it’s something someone did to you, then it’s fair to name them.”

The lobster man tilted his head, his antennae twitching thoughtfully. “You wish for truth, then? Very well. Know this: it wasn’t always like this. Once, long ago, there was no division between us and those who live in the gleaming cities above. We were one people, united in the days before the Fall.”

“The Fall?” Megan echoed, her voice soft but intent.

He nodded solemnly. “The Fall of Atlantis into the ocean. When the Great Sinking came, the magic that saved our civilization also cursed it. Those most exposed to the magic were… altered. Warped. Where others became beautiful, graceful beings of the sea, we became… this.” He gestured at himself and his companions.

Honestly, they were the coolest Atlanteans I had seen thus far. They looked like monsters from old Super Sentai shows—and I always did love betting on those hapless guys. I found them kind of cute.

“And because of that, we were cast aside,” Hysenth spat. “Told it wasn’t our fault, but treated as though it was. Poseidonis built its walls high, its towers gleaming, while we were told to fend for ourselves in the depths.”

“The Former King Oron, a despot that ruled a hundred years past, made it worse,” the crab man muttered, claws clicking. “He was the one who sealed the gates, cutting off trade and aid to us entirely. Said it was ‘to preserve Atlantean unity.’ What he really meant was to preserve Poseidonis’ pride. He passed policy after policy to corner us until we were seen as no better than animals. And that was when the cullings started!”

“You’re speaking out of turn, Torsk,” the lobster man warned, but there was no heat in his voice.

“You say ‘former king,’” I noted. “Does that mean Aquaman didn’t keep this policy?”

The lobster man regarded me thoughtfully, then nodded. “King Orin has done more for us than any before him. He reopened the gates, allowed for trade, even granted us a voice in the Atlantean council. But old wounds do not heal easily, and pride does not vanish overnight. We are still seen as… less.”

“Not by everyone,” Megan interjected quickly, her face full of earnest sympathy. “We have a friend in Poseidonis that I’m sure would support your course. So there are definitely people on your side.” I’d hate for Kaldur to turn out to be a racist, but honestly it wouldn’t break my heart. People were awful in all sorts of ways. It was normal.

Kaldur is not awful! Megan chided.

I felt a stab of guilt at that, I didn’t mean to imply that. I just meant—it wouldn’t…

That it wouldn’t hurt you. Because you expected little of him. But is that really true? I think you would be disappointed, too, Sa-chan. Mull on that while I talk to the Abyssal Folk.

I mean… she was right, I guess. I would be disappointed. I’d have expected more from him after all. Maybe it was just… easy to say that I expected nothing? The feeling of disappointment did suck after all.

“There are,” the lobster man admitted. “But they are few. Most see us as a shameful reminder of their past—a blemish on their perfect society. It is easier to look away, to pretend we do not exist.”

I leaned back on my heels, frowning. “So, you’re stuck in a cycle. They won’t help you because they think you’re fine where you are, and you don’t push because you know they won’t listen.”

The lobster man’s mandibles twitched in what might have been a smile. “A plain way of putting it. But yes. That is the way of it.”

“That’s crap,” I said bluntly.

“Sa-chan,” Megan hissed, but the men laughed again, louder this time.

“You are not wrong, surface-dweller,” the lobster man said. “But tell me this: what would you do differently?”

I opened my mouth, then closed it again. I was about to give the easy answer—kill the royal family and steal their stuff. If they fought back, I’d fight back, too. I’d sooner turn Poseidonis into an oceanic desert before I ever let myself live in this crap-hole while those blessed by the heavens got to live in the gleaming jewel of a city.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

That was my honest answer. And it wasn’t the wrong one, either. Why should one society live happily while another suffers in the dark? The mere existence of this system was an injustice. Their mutual reduction into this level—that would be equality. And it would be justice. Unpleasant, but at least that unpleasantness would be shared.

It would kill millions, Megan argued hotly. There has to be another way, Sa-chan. There has to.

I tried to think of that other way. Incremental improvements? Expanding the borders of Poseidonis? I didn’t know, I wasn’t sure how these people could ever all become blessed by the bounty of that city. It just didn’t make sense—mathematically, in fact. The only way for them would be them figuring out some sort of niche in production—an untapped natural resource, or something—, using that to get rich, “I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know what you guys should do. I’d just go for the bloody revolution option and make sure anyone that made me live in this way would have to do the same—at least if we couldn’t share.”

The lobster man regarded me for a long moment, then nodded. “Many of us think this way, too. And many of us would rather not lose what little we still have to lose—our lives. But it is the place of the young to dream of violence. It makes sense. You speak plainly, and that is a good mark too. Thank you for listening.”

“Yeah,” I said, stepping back. “Thanks for telling us the truth.”

One of the fish people scoffed, “We told you a few sentences. How can you now know the truth?”

“Where is the truth?” Megan asked, “Where can I find it?”

The fish people looked amongst themselves, and exchanged brief nods. “Come with us,” the Moray eel man said, then grinned, “If you dare.”

I laughed. “We are not in danger, but sure. Thank you.”

“Where are you taking us?” Megan asked, “And may I ask what name your people refer to yourselves as?”

“Point in your favor to even ask,” the Moray eel man said, “We go by different names depending on the community, of course. Brine Dwellers are a category of society describing those at the bottom, so obviously there’d be different bottoms with different names. But I guess, in the Crevices surrounding Poseidonis, we like to call ourselves the Abyssal Folk.”

Wasn’t many ways one could pretty up the fact that they lived in the lowest elevations that the earth had to offer. The name gave me middle-school syndrome vibes, but the name was definitely right for these people in particular.

“And we’re headed to this crevice’s shaman,” the Moray eel said, “Keep up!”

We followed the Abyssal Folk through the dimly lit crevice, swimming deeper into the trench where the faint light from Poseidonis no longer reached. The bioluminescence of the Abyssal Folk themselves guided the way—a soft, eerie glow emanating from the Moray eel man’s skin, the crab man’s claws, and even the fins of a few fish people who joined our procession. It was beautiful in a stark, alien way, illuminating the cold, rocky walls of the trench with shades of green, blue, and pale yellow.

The society of the Abyssal Folk was scattered along the uneven ocean floor. They lived in makeshift structures carved into the rock or made from salvaged debris—twisted metal, pieces of coral, and ancient shipwreck wood woven into ramshackle homes. Some had enclosed walls; others were more open, giving a glimpse of small families huddled together for warmth and safety. Despite the rough construction, there was an undeniable ingenuity in how they used what little they had.

I saw children darting through the water, their laughter muffled but unmistakable, playing with glowing jellyfish tethered to strings made of kelp. Adults worked in clusters, mending nets, weaving garments from seaweed fibers, or repairing tools clearly designed to harvest food from the ocean floor. They were resourceful, their lives centered around survival in an environment as unforgiving as the abyss itself.

But there was an underlying tension. Every face carried the weight of resignation, a quiet acknowledgment of hardship and isolation. Their eyes, some large and fishlike, others more human but no less haunting, followed us warily as we passed.

And, of course, the undeniable reality of living in humanity’s dumping grounds—the trash. Microplastics, macroplastics, random junk, things that hadn’t been repurposed for something useful yet, just lying the ground and filling the space with ugliness. Finally, some real evidence of humanity’s mistreatment of this ocean. Something to finally make me feel something! And I felt… slightly hungry.

We’ll eat soon after we meet the shaman, Megan reassured me mentally.

“Keep moving,” the Moray eel man barked, and I caught the faintest edge of protectiveness in his tone. He wasn’t scolding us—he was ensuring his people wouldn’t feel threatened by our presence.

The trench grew narrower as we descended further, the water darker and heavier. Here, the Abyssal Folk’s bioluminescence barely lit the way. Strange, translucent creatures drifted past—alien fish with sharp teeth and glowing lures, and jellyfish-like organisms that pulsed with dim light.

We finally reached the deepest point of the trench, where the rock walls widened into a cavernous opening. It was here that the shaman awaited us. At the center of the cavern was a natural platform made of volcanic rock, surrounded by swirling, phosphorescent algae that gave the entire space an ethereal glow. Seated atop the platform was an older Abyssal man, his features more aquatic than human. Long, flowing fins extended from his arms and back like a ceremonial cloak, and his eyes gleamed like polished black pearls. He had a long, protruding pair of lips, and above his eyes were brow ridges that were bent permanently into a determined scowl.

He was so adorable.

He opened his mouth to speak, and his voice carried through the water with a strange, resonant quality, as though the trench itself was amplifying his words. This sound was more than just Megan’s telepathy—I could truly hear him.

“A surface-dweller,” he said, his tone measured and calm, “I am intrigued that you would make this journey. Tell me, children.” He looked over to the Abyssal folks that had taken us this far, “What is their purpose?”

Hysenth stepped forward and gestured to us, “You can speak with them yourself. The human can understand and hear us. These people sought us out to learn the truth about us Abyssal Folk.”

“Did they now?” the shaman asked.

“Ah, I’m also a surface-dweller,” Megan admitted, “I’m actually a Martian. I’ve shapeshifted to adapt to these conditions.”

“I’m surprised to hear that tell of our plight has reached another world entirely.”

“That’s the problem, your eminence,” Megan said, swimming a little closer, “I never heard anything about your people up until now.”

“We are, as you may say, an open secret,” the shaman said. “You seek the truth of the Abyssal Folk. But truth comes with a price. Are you prepared to pay it?”

Dammit, he wanted money? This was just a tourist trap after all! A really… shitty… tourist trap.

“What price is that?” Megan asked, eyes innocent, naïve as could be. She sent me a brief glare, as if to say ‘you’re wrong about him’.

“I want gold,” the shaman said.

I was not, in fact, wrong about him.

Okay, then.

I scanned around the ocean floor for ‘gold’. Should be around here somewhere—I had read in a science book that there was almost thirty million kilograms of gold in the ocean. But it was some random trivia in a science edutainment book.

I had to cut off my Six Eyes Reversal as my head started pounding hard. I couldn’t keep that up along with the air bubble—I could only stretch my concentration so widely before something would give.

Before I gave up, I did end up finding gold. Just not in a raw form, but inside one of the many, many junk heaps in this network of ocean floor crevices. I teleported it to my hand—a broken piece of stamped gold bar.

The shaman’s calm eyes regarded the piece. “That should suffice.”

Oh?

I broke the gold in half and proffered the smaller piece, “Should this still suffice?”

The shaman’s jaws clenched before he relented, “Very well. But not an ounce less.”

“Oh!” Megan’s eyes lit up at me and she turned to the shaman, eagerly anticipating the story.

“You may think me greedy or opportunistic,” the shaman said, looking at me, “But why do you expect me to dredge up my pain for free? I cannot trust that you two will empathize enough to make this sharing worth it. I must preserve my peace of mind for those who are in my responsibility. The people of this crevice. Not you. You have yet to prove yourself to this community.”

I folded my arms, “And you’re doing a pretty bad job at making me care.”

“The reward for your sympathy is not so substantial,” the shaman said frankly. It wasn’t even to insult me, really, but to tell me his frank truth, “Not to the point where I must seek it with greater enthusiasm.”

If he knew how much of a big deal I was, he’d definitely want to treat me a mite better.

Sa-chan, please stop it. He’s right. We can’t ask him to drop everything and tell us his story just because we’re outsiders. He has greater things to worry about than appearing hospitable to guests. And deep down, I can sense he’s not a bad person.

Blergh. Fine. Whatever. Hospitality was overrated, anyway. I always viewed it as more of an elaborate lie than something that ought to be done for a society to be orderly. This guy telling me to take a hike and pay him was… kind of a breath of fresh air. He clearly didn’t care what I thought, and that was power. Also meant he wouldn’t lie to me either.

“Alright then, good sir.” I floated the ingot over to him with Blue. He looked at it suspiciously before snatching it out of the water and putting it in his pocket. “Share with us the truth of your people’s suffering.”

The shaman raised his hands, and the world fell into darkness. I could still pierce through it with my Six Eyes, and I sensed that no one else was moving either.

Then finally, a light appeared, slowly transforming into… a projection. The shaman’s voice resonated as the projection took form—shimmering images suspended in the water around us, like memories brought to life. They were vivid and unnervingly real, moving with a fluidity that made it hard to separate reality from illusion.

“In the earliest days of Atlantis, before the great calamity split the city beneath the waves, we were one people,” the shaman began, his tone calm but heavy with the weight of sorrow. “But as the cataclysm forced us deeper into the ocean, our forms began to adapt… some for society, and others for survival.”

The first image showed Atlanteans fleeing a collapsing city, their faces etched with terror. The sea swallowed their homes, and as the water rose, so did desperation.

“Those who changed with grace—their bodies streamlined for speed, their lungs for the depths—they became the Poseidonians, the true scions of Atlantis’ first city-state, the proud inheritors of what they deemed the true Atlantean spirit.” His voice grew colder. “But not all of us were so lucky. Some of us twisted and warped, our bodies deemed too grotesque for their gleaming city. We had adapted too well. Too thoroughly. Too… monstrously.”

The projection shifted. A small group of malformed Atlanteans—limbs combined with fins, gills placed on the torso and not the neck, faces contorted into fish-like miens—stood before a council of regal figures in Poseidonis. Their pleas echoed in silence as the council turned away.

“They called us ‘failures,’” the shaman continued. “At first, we were banished to the outer trenches, told to fend for ourselves while the noble Poseidonians rebuilt their city. But as Poseidonis grew stronger, our existence became a stain on their perfection.”

The next scene turned violent. Armed guards from Poseidonis stormed the trenches, dragging away families, destroying meager homes, and leaving a trail of blood in the water.

“They feared us,” the shaman said, his voice unwavering despite the horror of the images. “Feared that our forms, our lives, would corrupt their ideals of beauty and strength. So they took it upon themselves to erase us. Many were slaughtered outright. Others were taken for experiments, dissected to better understand why they had ‘failed’ to evolve properly.”

I clenched my jaw as the scene played out, my grin long gone. The brutality was stark—guards spearing through helpless people, children crying as their parents were dragged away. Some of the children were not spared from the violence, either. Men in gleaming armor trampling over helpless Abyssal children in their way, ruthlessly herding them like cattle.

I cracked an incredulous grin. Where the hell did those small fry get off acting like they were actually above the Abyssal Folk? Poseidonians, Abyssals, they were all the same before true power. I felt a burning urge to see what would happen if I fired off a single Red towards a battalion of those bastards. See how they liked it when they were the weak and frightened party quailing before someone more powerful.

“They treated us like cattle,” the shaman spat, “Sold and used our bodies for every purpose one could imagine. They were monsters, haunting the nightmares of our children. These are not illusions but captured memories from the survivors of the Age of Pressure. They destroyed our languages, initiated breeding programs, sterilized us, purged us from every solitary position of status in society, down to the lowliest merchant trading fish.” Images flashed faster and faster, of horrors. Of pain.

My cursed energy flared in response as I read this pain, resonating and… becoming more somehow. I frowned intensely. What was that? The ‘more’ was minuscule, almost unnoticeable. I tried to use it as fast as possible in order to push it out of my system.

I could generate energy through the pain of others…

Somehow, at this very moment, that revelation wasn’t as important to me as that pain was. I wrestled my mind away from worries about what Klarion’s meddling had done to me and refocused on the images, staring at them without flinching. I couldn’t say I had seen anything as bad as all of this, but I could handle it.

I could lock in on what exactly to do about all of this and hold onto that sentiment with a righteous fury. Wield that surety like a spear that I would use to stab through the bastard heart of anyone that would deny what this was.

I really want to punch the shit out of something—or someone.

“And yet, we survived,” the shaman said. The projection shifted again, showing the Abyssal Folk retreating deeper into the trenches, building the rudimentary homes we had passed earlier. “We endured. We found ways to live off the sea floor, scavenging from the wreckage of ships and the refuse of Poseidonis. And in time, we grew in number. But our suffering has not ended.”

The images turned darker, more recent. Modern Atlanteans patrolled the borders of Poseidonis, turning away Abyssal Folk who sought to return. Those caught crossing were beaten, some left to die in the open ocean. “To this day, we are treated as less than nothing. Poseidonis thrives while we scrape by, forgotten and reviled.”

Megan’s hands were pressed to her mouth, her eyes wide and brimming with tears.

“But why?” I asked, my voice cutting through the weight of the moment. “Why keep this up? Poseidonis is practically perfect now. I even saw a couple of you Abyssal Folk wandering about—one guy had the head of an octopus. So… what about the rest of you? Why does this still exist? What do they gain from this?”

The shaman’s eyes locked onto mine, his gaze piercing. “Perfection demands a scapegoat. A symbol of what must never be allowed to resurface. We are that symbol. And as for the few of us Abyssal Folk that managed to make the climb—why don’t you ask them what they think of us? They will be the first to revile us in order to protect their precarious position in Poseidonis. King Orin has done his part in lifting us up from the muck, but he has not erased the muck. How would he benefit from that? Nations despise competitors, after all. The Aquaman has a good heart, but he is still a king. And I, for one, do not wish to live in Poseidonis. I want their greatness here.”

The projection faded, and the oppressive darkness lifted. The shaman folded his hands in his lap, his expression calm but resolute. “Now you know the truth. Do with it what you will. But remember: truth alone changes nothing.”

I floated there, silent, trying to reconcile this gut-wrenching history with the shining city of Poseidonis I had seen earlier. Megan finally broke the silence, her voice trembling. “There has to be something we can do.”

The shaman smiled faintly, as though he had heard those words countless times before. “Perhaps. But you are not the first to make such promises, nor will you be the last.”

I started grinning, and I was about to open my mouth when Megan interrupted me.

We are not bringing him to the Atlantean banquet, Gojo. Don’t even think about it.

Dammit!

She could stop me from bringing him, but not his ideas.

Gojo… no.

I proffered the other golden piece, “Imagine I was King Orin. What would you say to me?”

The man looked at the golden chunk and eyed me suspiciously. Then, his placid expression turned into a wide, satisfied grin. “Strap in, young one. I’ll tell you everything you need to know.”

Megan groaned mentally.