Transportation into The Maze was instantaneous. In one moment, Boyd was sitting inside a metal tube looking at fellow Combatants in some sort of mobile space station, and in the next, he was in a large open field. The effect stunned him and left him wobbly. When he regained his composure, he found everyone else was furiously at work in their packs rearranging things into belts and other places. Salia was outside of her VMR for amongst the only times he had ever seen her. Her tiny little body almost microscopic. She fluttered from point to point checking each tiny individual aspect of the VMR before the top of the suit opened and she squeezed into it.
Boyd owned nothing, so his pack was largely empty, except for some food and potions. The Clerics of The Filary has filled it with those items after explaining the others would need them some point. He was not to eat any food without permission and most of the potions stood a good chance at outright killing him. He wasn’t sure if this was true or told to him to discourage him from using them without permission.
Boyd stood still and took a moment to look around. He wanted to contemplate exactly where he was. If he knew what the Elysian Fields were, he would’ve assumed that was where he was. It was beautiful beyond compare, a field of flowers and grasses cutting every shape and size imaginable. Two bright orange suns bore down overhead, yet the temperature was perfect. It was peaceful. Serene. He marveled at the location, but it made him miss Oklahoma. Haskell wasn’t as pretty as this, but this place reminded him of the best mornings he had spent fishing.
Welcome to The Maze. This is Level 1. Currently 100/100 Forays remain.
Fleon said “Looks like it’s a Utopia level. Probably Portcullis if it’s Level 1. Should be simple. I’m guessing twenty seconds. Maybe less. Boyd, duck.”
"Ducks?”
“No, duck! Head down. Now!”
The first arrow fell well short of them, but it was clear that it was meant to hit. The next arrow was slightly closer and the following one was no more than 30 feet away.
The VMR’s head unit lit up and it spoke, “Slender Nomads from the look of the arrow. We should move back a bit. The arrows aren’t dangerous to the rest of us but the Monk might die if one hits him somewhere critical.”
Arrows started appearing from behind them at this very moment and shortly after that to the right and left. They edged ever closer.
“Right well, this should be fairly simple. Salia, how many would you guess there are?”
Two small devices popped out of Salia’s shoulders and went high into the air and then returned within seconds.
“Bout 40 on each side.”
“Who wants which direction then?” Fleon asked.
"Which way is North?” Boyd asked while spinning in circles and trying to figure out where he was.
“You do nothing. Stand still. I’ll take North, which is approximately that way,” Fleon said pointing towards the original group.
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An image appeared in Gmol’s stomach that everyone understood to mean South.
Salia simply said, “East.”
Jellybean Jenkins, Wolf-Lord of the Seven Plains had already began running to the west. Boyd watched him as he shifted between mostly man-like shaped and mostly wolf. Tufts of hair and tissue and blood fell from him as his body began to morph. After the first few steps, he became half-dog-man and half massive wolf creature and took off at nearly triple his original speed. He leapt up a hill and was quickly out of sight.
Fleon snapped on a golden helmet over his head and neck and began running himself. Looking at the direction Fleon was now running, Boyd saw approximately 40 creatures that amounted to almost two dimensional sticks riding on top of hot dogs made out of cacti. They were all holding bows which were nearly undetectable unless they were turned to the side. Boyd guessed each creature was no more than 1-2” wide at the most. In contrast, their cacti/hot dog mounts were thin but slightly less so and upwards of ten feet long. Each hot dog/cacti mount contained 3-5 of what Boyd had assumed were Slender Nomads. They fired arrows high into the air but approached slowly and with purpose.
A reticule popped over one of the Slenders that Boyd was focused on. Information poured directly into his mind. He wasn’t sure how it was occurring but he knew more about them almost instantly.
SYSTEM: Slender Nomad, Rank 2: The Slender are the natural result of creatures who grew up living in caves and rocks. It’s very useful to be able to slip between tight nooks and crannies if you live in a system of nothing but nooks and crannies. The Slender evolved just so. Whereas most creatures are approximately ovular in shape with legs and appendages, the Slender are extremely narrow, like elongated worms made out of spikes with tiny little feet and arms. In their own cave environment, they are reasonably difficult to deal with, but for some reason, The Maze put a bunch of cave-dwelling creatures in the middle of an open plain. Bully for you, confusing at best for them. Given their extremely sleight frame, a single Slender is not typically that dangerous. Even they realize this, so if you see a single Slender, expect a few dozen more any second.
Realizing they were getting closer, Boyd took a few steps back and watched Fleon. The first set of arrows plummeted into the ground all around Fleon, but were soundly rejected from piercing his golden mail. Despite being in platemail, he moved like a cat drifting past and between the cacti/hot dog mounts. Each time he swung his sword 3-5 cacti and their mounts fell in half. Within a few seconds, he had worked his way through his 40 Slenders without even breaking a sweat.
Boyd heard an arrow stick in the ground behind him. He turned around to see Gmol glowing with a rainbow iridescence. The eye/anus blobs on the top of his slime looked…angry.
The Slender Nomads from the South were charging at top speed ready to loose their next volley. Suddenly, one mount fell. Then the next and then the next. Boyd saw the mounted riders start to scream, which sounded like multiple tea kettles releasing steam at once. It quickly became apparent why. The ground was rising up to meet them. Upon closer inspection, Boyd realized it wasn’t the ground itself, it was thousands, no, millions of tiny plant like spores that rapidly enveloped the mounts and the riders. It grew over the top of them and coalesced into a single unit. The entire biome began to pulsate and shake. It stopped a few seconds later and the spores subsided. The only thing left was bones.
Boyd’s shock was abruptly halted by an extremely loud explosion from the East. Salia, via her VMR, was looking into the distance. It gave a firm nod and then went back to rearranging its pack.
SYSTEM: You have gained 160 experience.
You are now Rank 2 Monk (Unassigned).
You are now Rank 3 Monk (Unassigned).
“Oh hey, congrats,” Salia said.
Jellybean Jenkins returned from over the hill. He was covered in a mix of hot dog/cacti pieces and a brownish blood like substance that Boyd assumed had come from the Slender Nomads. He was holding a tiny bone in his left hand, which was human-like in shape, while running as a wolf with the other three paws.
Fleon returned in similar condition, but without the bone or dog-paws.
Salia and Gmol had barely moved.
Boyd threw up.