The oily blister pulsed and shone as it grew and grew, a thin film separating us from the monster inside. I could see stone legs scratching against the inside of it, pressing up against the protective coating in sharp points the size of trees. It was almost incomprehensible how huge this thing was, but it was comprehensible in its incomprehensibility. The stingprey had been so monstrously huge that I couldn’t even make sense of it, but this portion of the creator was just on the cusp of being too huge to take in.

{Pick me up pick me up pick me up!} Okeria desperately pleaded, struggling to get to his feet against the crystals restraining his hands and feet. {We need ta get ta the exit before this thing kills all of us! Go around!}

Jun looked down at Okeria as I bent down and threw him over my shoulder. “We’re not even trying to fight this thing?”

I shook my head. “Not all hazards make you defeat the boss before they let you leave. A good rule of thumb is that if you find something in a hazard that’s way above its hazard level, it’s either a hidden boss or a deterrent. And if it starts chasing you when you’re near the exit, then surviving it is the final test.”

{Right! Run!} Okeria confirmed, then ordered. {Go! Around! It!}

“Alright, we heard you the first time.” Jun said with what I imagined was a roll of her eyes. “How do you expect us to run around a small mountain before the monster inside of it bursts out and kills us?”

{Well, it ain’t by standing around like this! That’s exactly the opposite of what we’ve gotta be doing. Might I suggest, oh, I don’t know, this might be a little too foreign for you… how about RUNNING?!}

“Don’t make me drop you.” I laughed, nudging Jun towards the slightly smaller side of the blister. “Go to the right. It looks a little shorter that way around.”

The blister burbled while Jun started running. We both kept our eyes on the soon to be born segment of the creator, which seemed to be growing increasingly frustrated with its prison by the second. Its legs pushed further and further into the blister’s elastic membrane, making it look like a porcupine that was missing the majority of its quills. Or a lopsided sea urchin. It didn’t seem to be lashing out at us in particular; it just attacked wherever it could, hoping that it would be able to burst free.

“Leg!” Jun called out, flattening herself on the ground as an oil membrane-coated implement of destruction raced out at us. I barely had time to follow suit, tumbling forward and smacking Okeria into the ground as the leg barely grazed my back. “Seb? Are you ok?”

I let the leg retract before I tried to stand, finding that my legs still worked just fine. “I’m fine. And from the way Okeria’s complaining, he’s fine too. How’s Mortician?”

“We’re fine! A little dazed and worried, but fine nonetheless. Relatively speaking.” Mortician rattled off one after another, their voice nervous and shaky. “We would very much like to get to safety.”

“That’s what we’re trying to do, don’t you worry.” Jun said reassuringly, patting Mortician on the back as she got to her feet. “Not even a tenth of the way around this thing and we’re already getting tripped up. We really need to hurry.”

I didn’t point out the obvious: that we were hurrying as much as we possibly could, since I knew Jun was just voicing her own worries. “If it comes to it, I can carry all of you so you can focus your etchings’ effects on me alone.”

{Fair warning; it’s probably going to come ta that, so ya should be ready.} Okeria chimed in. He’d gotten over his annoyance at being dropped very quickly. {I can make a sled-like thing for ya ta pull if ya don’t have another way ta carry all three of us.}

That would probably be helpful. But it would be absolutely useless if it took more than a second to make while the creator was bearing down on us. “How long would it take you? And can you do it while I’m running?”

Okeria thought for a few seconds, then blew out a long breath. {About nine seconds, and sort of. I can do the design in my mind, but I can only put out so much metal at a time. If I start working now, and ya can take a little extra weight while ya run, I’ll be able ta put together the sled in two seconds of real-time. Is that too long?}

It very well could be. But if that was the absolute fastest Okeria could do, then Jun and I would just have to compensate for it in other ways. Like watching the blister like a hawk for the first sign of emergence. Even still, I needed one other person’s confirmation before I said anything.

I looked over at Jun, who shrugged. “If that’s the best he can do, we’ll make it work.” She said with confidence. “I’m not letting us get this far just to die right when we can see the exit.”

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“Good to know we’re on the same page.” I agreed with a smile. “Get on it, Okeria. It’ll be very obvious when it’s your time to shine.”

{I’d hope so.} Okeria chuckled, then shifted on my shoulder. He let his head point down at the ground, summoned a small sliver of metal that ended in a round point, and started moving it around against empty air. I’d almost forgotten what it was like to not see someone’s interface while they were using it.

“And what do we have to do?” Mortician asked worriedly, their helmet fixated on the creator’s gestating form. “Because there is not… much that we can offer. Sorry.”

“Leave all that to us. I know what it’s like to be new, and there’s no shame in having someone help you out.” Jun said with a glance over at me. “We’ll help you get stronger just like Seb helped me.”

“You just got really unlucky with your spawn point. Even more so than Jun.” I added.

Jun nodded vigorously in agreement. “I would’ve died if Seb wasn’t there to help me, but you wouldn’t exist at all if we weren’t here. That’s a whole lot scarier to deal with, and you spawned in a level twelve hazard compared to our level one. Not the safest place to be newly minted.”

“Not at all.” I echoed, turning to keep my eyes on the mountain. More sounds were starting to come from it, like the shriek of a stone-cutting saw combined with the roaring rush of the bottom of a waterfall. “It sounds like the creator’s actually forging this thing right next to us.”

“Does that mean the one we fought before was pre-made? A disposable molded soldier?” Jun shuddered. “I don’t like the thought of that one bit. Hopefully it tries to make too much and we get to the exit before it can burst free.”

Hopefully. I personally didn’t bet on it, and from how Jun sped up immediately after she said it, she hadn’t put a whole lot down either. We ran and ran and ran for what felt like just a minute or two, and we found ourselves running away from the mountain instead of towards it. We were halfway past, and if my feeling was correct, we were making good time. The exit couldn’t be that much further.

“How much further?” I asked out loud.

{Six minutes if ya can keep this pace.} Okeria informed me without lifting his head. {I’ve got the sled done, and I’m just fiddling with it ta make it a percent or two better now. It might be better if the two runners pull us two dead weights now, so ya don’t have the awkwardness slowing ya down. It’ll only take a second for me ta widen it.}

That was sound logic to me. “Jun? Do you want ta… er… do you want to use the sled?”

“If it’s better than this, yeah.” Jun said, hefting Mortician on her shoulder for emphasis. “Do it, Okeria.”

{Alrighty then! I just gotta modify it a little ta make space for the both of ya at the pulling end…} Okeria trailed off, quickly and precisely swiping his stylus across his invisible interface. {Presto, one pulling sled all done and ready! I’m pulling it out now.}

I dug my heels into the rocky ground in a spray of pebbles, but no oil. I frowned and looked down at my feet to see a terrifying lack of any darkness in the ground. All the oil had drained away, and I had a pretty damn good idea where it had gone. Okeria’s sled slammed to the ground before I could think myself into a stupor, pulling my mind in the right direction as my head swiveled to see what he’d made.

Two simple bars of glimmering silver metal hovered above a flat sheet of the same stuff. There was a sort of… electrical interference between the bars and the sheet, and when I leaned in to take a better look, I heard something I could only describe as white noise. And that was it. Two long rectangles hovering over a flat one.

“This doesn’t look safe or pullable.” Jun commented, leaning down to gently place Mortician in the sled. They barely took up a quarter of it. “But it looks like it's big enough for both of you, and me if it comes to that. Please tell me you have a way for us to actually pull this.”

{Of course I–} Okeria started, then winced as I lowered him onto the sled. {Oh. I thought ya were gonna drop me. Thanks for not doing that. Here; take this and give the other one ta Juniper. They’ll connect ya ta the sled.}

Okeria held out a crystal-coated hand that had two silvery-blue marbles hovering above it. I grabbed them both without asking what they were for, handed one off to Jun, and looked down at Okeria for an explanation.

{Just keep that on ya somewhere that isn’t in your inventory and start running. They’re magnetically tethered ta the sled alone, so ya won’t have ta worry about tripping over some rope or anything.} He explained helpfully, then patted Mortician on the back.{I’ll be making sure neither of us fly outta here or get sideswiped by the creator, so put some blinders on and run like the wind.}

I shared a look with Jun for a quick second before we both took off running. I felt the weight of the sled catch after two and a half steps, but after that initial yank, it barely felt like I was pulling anything. I worriedly looked back to make we hadn’t lost our precious cargo and found myself staring at a sled that hovered two feet above the ground.

{Magnetic repulsion.} Okeria stated when he saw me looking. {So ya don’t have ta worry about us getting caught on the pebbly terrain.}

“If he could’ve done that this entire time, why didn’t he say so earlier?” Jun grumbled, rapidly shifting from looking back to looking forward so we didn’t run into anything. There were quite a few more ruined buildings and things I could’ve imagined as fountains, walls, or any number of civilization accents then there had been before.

“Who knows?” I said with a shrug. “We’ll pick his mind once we’re safe in The End’s embrace.”

“That doesn’t sound ominous at all.” Jun laughed. “It’s a date.”