“First up, all of ya start emptying yer storage space unless you’ve got some ability keep things fresh in it. Glorp, Cecile, and Elicec put everything where John tells ya. John is the guy that looks like Dave for those that don’t know,” Mel ordered the moment the door was closed to the house.
The entire squad started loading every surface down with different kinds of food, some prepared, some not. Cecile had even managed to take all the condiment containers. It took nearly half an hour and a lot of guesswork from John on where exactly to put everything, but we finally had it all stowed away. I wasn’t sure we had managed to grab nearly enough, but it was much more than we had started with, so I wasn’t about to complain.
“So, what’s this new crazy meeting about tonight then?” Alex asked me after we had finished getting the food put away. She was chewing on her lower lip like she had when she was a kid. That was something she had picked up from me and meant worry, which was probably my fault. Less than a day after learning I was alive, I ran off to another possible death. Then, there was her mom. We still needed to have that conversation, but I had decided that could wait until we did a little search and rescue of our own. If Mel wanted us to train by hunting down some of the orcs still on Earth, then that meant we had time to check several of the places they had destroyed.
“I don’t know everything Mel needs us to go over, but at the very least, we have to talk about what happened in the Arena, and I’m sure everyone will want to hear about our new members. I think everything mostly went okay, though. We only had one real problem, but I’ll explain that soon,” I said, trying and clearly failing to reassure her. The lip-biting hadn’t stopped.
“This is just our lives now, isn’t it? I’d like to say that I don’t know how long I can handle all of this, but it’s not going to go away,” She replied, looking at me for answers I didn’t really have.
“I wish it weren’t our new reality, but I do think things will get better. If we can get through the terms to truly start the faction, then we can go full tilt into fixing Earth and keeping us safe from whatever’s coming next. And I promise, I'm going to do everything I can to keep you all safe and secure,” I said, reaching out to hug her as I made my promise.
“I know, I know, part of this is just the baby hormones, I think. Which is a whole other thing I’m trying not to think about too much,” She said, accepting my offered hug.
“Alright, before I start, does anyone else need to bring anything up?” Mel yelled, gathering everyone’s attention to the living room, ours included. Alex wiped the tears from her eyes and found herself a seat before they were all taken. I stayed standing, deciding to let the rest of the limited seating stay free for others.
“Yeah, what the hell were the jesters?” I asked immediately, still unnerved by my own encounter and worried about what half the squad had experienced with them.
“I suppose we can start there, not that I know much either. May as well cover it while we wait fer Timon and Sanquar anyway,” Mel said. At the mention of Sanquar’s name, Connie dropped her food midbite.
“Not the legendary Sanquar, right? I’ve heard a lot of stories about him from gramps, but you can’t possibly mean him?” She asked with a note of confusion in her voice.
“It is, in fact, that Sanquar, and more or less how this all started. But I’ll fill you in tomorrow during our meeting,” I said, not wanting to cover it all again tonight, even if neither she or Glorp fully knew the story yet.
“Alright, back to the jesters. Someone got a squad of them in there purely to hurt us; no other way I can imagine that happened. I couldn’t tell you exactly what they are, but they ain’t welcome on virtually any Spiral world, and no one knows where their homeworld is either. The real problem comes if they manage to get their grip on ya,” Mel started to explain when Elody interrupted.
“Yes, and we have just such a problem. I did everything I know how to do for them, but each of them has a soul knot that I cannot break,” she explained, slumping deep into her seat as she did, looking defeated. That reminded me of Floor Master and Mel arguing to get them released to us, which further reminded me that Floor Master had slipped something in my shoe.
“I figured there was no way around that, but kinda hoped you knew more than that me,” Mel said, and while he was talking, I had fished a scrap of folded paper out of my shoe and opened it, quickly reading the contents.
Dave Imogen,
I am slipping this note to you in hopes it will help you in the future. With both Rabyn and Melhelm as part of your faction, I believe I can trust your intentions and, therefore, believe it is my duty to warn you. I am aware of the plot against you within the Arena, and as of writing this, they have managed to stack the tenth floor against you. I do not know the exact squad you will face, but they have managed to manipulate the parameters for the floor so that it will put you against the highest possible challenge it can within the bounds. That likely means you will be facing one or more people with a core rank of S. I can do nothing else to help you, but please inform Melhelm, as he may have ideas.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
Floor Master
“Dave, are ya listening?” Mel yelled as I looked up from the paper. I hadn’t been entirely, but this was important.
“Sorry, I missed everything after you said you hoped Elody had known more, but after the jesters, I’ve got another topic to discuss,” I said, flushing slightly. I hadn’t been called out for not paying attention since college. I hated it then, and I wasn’t big on it now.
“I was saying that those soul knots could turn into either nothing or a giant fucking issue; now, what was so important that drew yer damn attention away from potential soul domination,” Mel asked, glaring at me.
“Oh, just, y'know, Floor Master had snuck me a note, and I was finally reading it,” I said smugly and then followed up with its contents. Mel’s color slowly shifted to a dark red as I finished reading it aloud.
“Damn, just when I was starting to get hopeful, we might pull this off. Dammit, dammit, dammit,” Mel yelled, sounding somewhere between rage and tears.
“Honestly, I already expected something like that was coming. I don’t think we’ve already lost, but it won’t be easy,” Rabyn said, interrupting Mel’s outburst.
“Yeah, and how exactly do ya propose we get all of ya ready to face S-grade channels in a few weeks?” Mel asked angrily, his fury turning toward Rabyn.
“Constance, what exactly is your core grade right now? Yours as well, Elody?” Rabyn asked, ignoring Mel’s gaze.
“A, but only because of how much I’ve dumped into my class. I’ve regressed from S twice already,” Connie answered first.
“B, for similar reasons,” Elody followed immediately after.
“And I am currently sitting at an S core myself. I don’t believe it’s possible for the System to choose anyone with a transcendence level. So I have some confidence that this is entirely winnable if we can train up the other four more.” As Rabyn explained this, Mel’s shade started shifting back to green. That was also the first time I had heard anyone mention transcendence levels. I filed that way to ask about another time.
“No, yer right, it won’t be able to select anyone with transcendence levels. They get an instant bye past the first twenty-five, so they could only be there on a reascent. I knew Elody was up there, and I had my suspicions on you as well Rabyn, but I’m surprised the dwarf agreed to join us with that much power,” Mel replied.
“Gramps said the most important thing to do if I really wanted to experience Spiral life and climb the Arena was to find some interesting people to do it with, and well, you all fit that bill pretty easily. Most people would just want to use me to meet the old man anyway; you just want to use me because I’m that awesome. I kind of like it,” she answered with a smile.
“A dwarf, huh? Are you like really good at mining or crafting? Or is that just in books and movies?” Maud asked, suddenly speaking, up sounding intrigued. Had she not realized Connie was a dwarf until now? Then again, she really didn’t look anything like how Earth stereotypically depicted dwarfs, especially dwarven women. Sure, she had a beard, but she was dressed as though she was ready to put on a show at any moment.
“How crude. I am a student of the stellar Opera. I do not mine or craft other than crafting on my art while I mine for new inspiration,” Connie answered. It wasn’t lost on me that she fell into a different manner of speaking when she talked about herself and her class versus her more casual tone. The why she did it, though, I had no idea. Why people did what they did was never something I was particularly great at figuring out, and I had gotten much worse at it after the loss of my own parents. Likely another of the big reasons for my eventual divorce.
“Oh, oh, and ya just happened to be on the same first floor as this squad? Pryte, are ya thinking the same thing I am here?” Mel asked, suddenly looking at Connie very intensely.
“Possibly, assuming the gramps she has mentioned several times is Trelione, it’s hard to believe something like this could happen coincidentally. We already know Sanquar and the System were somehow friends. On top of that, we know it’s favoring Dave somewhat as well. So yes, I agree it looks like the System fought back a little against the Arena being stacked so against us,” Pryte answered as Mel nodded along to his similar conclusion, his color entirely back to the standard green.
“I feel like I’m missing something, which I usually do, but more so than usual right now,” I said, confused about what Trelione had to do with Sanquar.
“I confess I, too, don’t know the connection between Trelione and Sanquar,” Elody chimed in.
“Trelione is the last living member, or at least was the last living member, of Sanquar’s faction. He’s only still in the Spiral because he left it long before whatever happened happened,” Pryte answered.
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What little is publicly known of the faction Sanquar once led is that it was open to any and all who wished to join. As he fought in the Arena alone, no one else was ever required to do so. How many people he had at its peak has been lost, or more accurately, removed from the record. While this information almost certainly still exists in some noble’s personal archive, no one willing to speak on it has seen the figures, and what exactly happened to that faction once Sanquar was removed from the Spiral is another question all together.
A People’s History of the Spiral, Author Unknown