image [https://i.imgur.com/P207PJp.jpg]

By the time we saw Heaven’s Falls, our dot nearly touched Flagboi’s. After another half of a day’s ride, we’ll become one big, happy list of names.

Fabulosa and I appeared to be nothing more than gaudy adventurers to the road traffic and homesteads. Merchants and families gave us wary glances, but after nodding and smiling, they usually relaxed. Because of the area’s civilized vibe, we didn’t bother covering our tracks.

Four mornings after our PvP battle, I slid down the Dark Room rope and restarted our campfire. Trees were scarce, so I used wood retrieved from my inventory. Duchess’s dot moved further north for reasons unexplained in the chat channel.

As we neared Heaven’s Falls, our dot almost touched Flagboi’s. After another half-day ride, we’d reach the city’s center.

While the contest map increased pressure by revealing everyone’s position, arguments could be made that it also decreased tension. Contestants could drop their guard without enemy dots nearby.

Toadkiller moved north of Grayton on the river. Flatboats weren’t fast, but their constant day and night progress meant he made good time. He passed areas I’d not yet explored, so I couldn’t quite name his position. I knew Fort Tilbury stood somewhere up there. Appearing a few days south of Heaven’s Falls, he’d need to disembark and hoof it through foothills, slowing him down to terrestrial speeds.

Audigger’s dot moved along our trade route between Fork Krek and Hawkhurst. I hoped she didn’t stop in Hawkhurst for too long. Things she said led me to believe she, too, practiced dark magic. I’d hate to imagine what chaos she could cause our settlement if she wanted to rattle us.

Darkstep enjoyed his aloof position somewhere in the southeast corner of the continent. Despite his cryptic behavior, his sedentary ways made one less contestant to worry about—until we resolved the Toadkiller situation, he could stay there as long as he wanted.

While the contest map removed surprises, one visitor set me aback as I warmed a kettle of water on the morning campfire. Fabulosa’s undead friend came to haunt us.

Name

The Yellow Palace Artisan Zombie

Level

15

Difficulty

Easy (green)

Health

440/440

The creature made no hostile movements after its discovery, standing with its arms hanging loosely by its side. The zombie wore translucent armor from head to toe, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to get close for a better look.

I drew Gladius to see if it produced any reaction, but it didn’t.

“Gladdy, are you seeing what I’m seeing?”

“Of course, my wielder. You’re in the company of The Yellow Palace Zombie. It’s the work of a master weaver, first showing up in Kra 210 years ago. There have been several sightings up and down the eastern continent since, but little else is known of it.”

“Is it aggressive?”

“In seven sightings, none have reported violence.”

“So it’s safe to get a closer look?”

“I cannot say.”

I raised my voice to wake up my partner. “Hey Fab. We have company. It looks like your friend Oliver is back.”

Fabulosa’s disembodied head appeared upside down at the top of the rope. I pointed to the zombie, and she grunted. “Ugh. Okay, just ignore him. I’m cleaning my boots. I’ll be down in a minute.”

Her head disappeared before I could ask another question.

She’d be down in a minute, but she never specified which minute. I’d long since learned to stop expecting her to get ready at any reasonable pace. Being down in a minute could stretch from fifteen minutes to over an hour.

She could hear me, so I approached the artisan zombie for a better inspection.

The thing didn’t object as I came toward it.

Its frosted glass armor featured inlaid floral designs that reflected their patterns in the morning sun. Bronze filigree framed each armor piece, preventing the glass from chipping. Glass armor provided impractical protection, and none of it glowed with magic. If someone got hit wearing such armor, the glass looked as if it would do more harm than good.

Metal inlays filled divots in the glass in alternate flower, feather, and ribbon shapes—possibly heraldry symbols for The Yellow Palace. In my research, I’d learned that the palace had been the site of treaties and ecumenical accords. Apparently, it had inspired a master weaver to fashion a walking tribute to it.

As I rounded the zombie, the campfire’s backlighting revealed the skeleton through the armor. Beneath its see-through helm yawned a single eye socket in which a blur of light glimmered.

I sniffed but only detected crisp morning odors of dew. Edging closer to its eye socket, I peered into the light and caught images of a room’s interior.

Looking into the zombie’s eye revealed a scene from a bad horror movie.

The laboratory’s foreground wasn’t special. I saw a desk with books on it. But beyond it, a dark stone wall with rows of hollows containing dead gnomes. A network of thin tubes connected to the corpses—though for what purpose, I couldn’t guess. The fresh conditions of the bodies made me hope the gnomes were dead, for straps and wires held them in place.

I backed away. This was a bit much to digest before breakfast.

Fabulosa finally emerged from the Dark Room an hour later. After she saw Oliver, she yawned and asked if all the food on the skillet was hers.

I hadn’t eaten but lost my appetite. “Why didn’t you mention the bodies in Flagboi’s workshop?”

“What bodies?”

“He has a wall lined with bodies.” I pointed to the zombie.

Fabulosa went to zombie, stood on her tiptoes, and peered into his eye socket. She recoiled, shaking her head. “Oh, gross! Okay, that’s new. Those hollows were empty when I last looked. But it’s been weeks since I’ve seen Oliver. Isn’t that right, Olly?”

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

The zombie said nothing.

“Why did you split up?”

“How should I know? I finished Ul Itor and headed to Minead to relax. He disappeared one day, and I haven’t seen him since. He does that—comes and goes as he pleases.”

The dead gnomes bothered me, but I tried not to sound overly concerned with saving NPCs. “What do you know about Heaven’s Falls? Do you have any clue what Flagboi has in store?”

“Flagboi’s a necro—so whatever he’s doing, it’s going to be gross.”

“Duchess said Audigger mentioned him hiding in Heaven’s Falls, but you know that. Audigger said he was like Doctor Frankenstein. Remember the galvanized zombies we fought in the arc weaver’s lair?”

Fabulosa sat down for breakfast. “Do you reckon gnomes have electricity?”

“I’d read a lot about gnomes while in Belden. Gnomes don’t monkey around with electricity. They’re not that advanced. They tinker with little toys and gadgets powered by springs or water—but nothing scientific. It’s more of an art to them than science. Oh! And they like botany.”

“Botany? Gnomes are into botany?”

I shrugged. “It was a book on botany. We found it in Our Lady of Balance. It made a lot of gnome references. Nothing fancy there either. Just little flowers like those little Japanese trees.”

“What do you know about Heaven’s Falls?”

I shook my head. “Nothing really. It’s on the map—that’s about it.”

“I’d heard a little from other travlers. It started as a small dwarven settlement, but the gnomes have taken over. It’s a surface town, so the dwarves didn’t mind.”

“What makes it so popular with them?”

“Gnomes aren’t subterranean, so their digging skills aren’t great. The travelers said the gnomes carved out homes from volcanic columns of basalt encased by limestone.”

“Volcanos? It doesn’t sound like gnomes in other games.”

“Old volcanos, long dead. They were prospectors and knew a lot about rocks. I couldn’t follow everything that they said.”

I grunted. “We’ll see soon enough.”

After breaking camp, Fabulosa and I tested to see if Oliver wanted to follow us or stand there all day. Once we started moving west, he lifted one leg after another and plodded along after us, albeit at a slower pace. His glassy armor rattled when he moved, sounding like someone carrying a box full of wind chimes.

Gnome buildings were small and half-buried in the ground. Their decorations included flowerpots, painted woodwork, and meticulous gardens.

Gnomes stared at Oliver as we passed, but none asked questions or inspected his fine armor. Because of his slow pace, I left Jasper unsummoned and finished our journey on foot.

Days after parting ways with Duchess, we caught our first glimpse of Heaven’s Falls—a name that didn’t do it justice. The city nestled into the crook of a rise of terrain stretching to the far side of the Grenspur mountain group.

Like other big cities, suburbs of homesteads and shops surrounded Heaven’s Falls. The northern soil wasn’t fertile enough for big farms, but nearly every building enjoyed a neat little garden ringing it. Forren had spoiled my appreciation for botany, but even I could tell the manicured bushes and flowers took fastidious care. Judging by their agriculture, they didn’t eat much—and perhaps that’s why they survived on such inhospitable soil.

Pockets of soil built into exterior walls supported flowers, vines, and herbs. Step ladders allowed their caretakers to reach everything. Gnomes stood only two-and-a-half feet tall and waved to us as we passed.

Heaven’s Falls bore little resemblance to its quaint and cherubic outskirts. The city’s jagged canyons cut into cliffs bearing facades similar to skyscrapers. Unlike modern metropolises, the streets tapered and widened organically, harboring plazas and parks between the towering architecture. The feel matched Wall Street’s crooked layouts more than Midtown Manhattan’s city grid.

Fabulosa’s earlier description of volcanic columns accurately depicted the cityscape. Columns of dark basalt mixed in with the lighter limestone. The sturdier rock served as the architecture and defined the varied width of the buildings and canyons serving as streets. The basalt pillars didn’t stretch more than a mile across, but Heaven’s Falls made up for it in verticality.

The city’s features relayed its origins. Volcanic shafts burrowed through the soft limestone and hardened long ago. Erosion and excavation removed much of the limestone, leaving freestanding basalt pillars—ripe for masons to turn into skyscrapers. Not every basalt column escaped the limestone. The towers deeper in the city melted into the mountainside. Basalt pillars sometimes merged into one another, forming irregular walls of apartments, while others remained freestanding spires.

A few wooden bridges spanned the chasms. Hundreds of gnomes must have occupied each pillar.

A thin waterfall dominated the central hub. The water produced coronas of color in the late afternoon sun.

“I didn’t know that rainbows were circles!” I spoke to myself more than Fabulosa, who’d said nothing since we could see the city, but I could hear her gasp over my shoulder.

We approached the city from a high altitude, almost looking down on it. Colorful tents and stalls famed the streets—the city’s equivalent of a free market. We still had miles of ground to cover before we reached it, but the roads stood in good repair.

From a distance, I could tell parts of Heaven’s Falls hummed with activity, but other streets looked quiet and residential. It seemed Heaven’s Falls believed in strong zoning laws. But the busy and quiet streets all looked tidy, reflecting what I’d read about the gnomes—their citizens were agreeable and enjoyed a harmonious culture.

The basalt columns bore architectural features where doors and windows punched through the stone. The gnomes embedded wood and metal fixtures into the rock. They carved ladders, stairs, balconies, and windows into the basalt, decorating the walls with hollowed pockets. The pockets held soil, allowing flowers to blossom up the length of the skyscrapers. Dozens of stacked houses stood on top of one another, twenty or thirty stories tall.

Every apartment differed from its neighbors, as if every household handled its own construction. Not every feature used basalt. Many stoops featured metallic rails and fixtures, stained wooden frames, dyed concretes, and colored ceramics. The busy façade made it difficult to distinguish one building from the next.

Each skyscraper bottomed into streets of varying widths. Tordons, horses, and harnessed birds as big as giraffes pulled coaches and carts. Street vendors bottlenecked the traffic. Shops pulsed with arteries of pedestrians crowding the streets.

The roads between the skyscrapers maintained no consistent width. Some tightened enough to block the passage of carts or opened to plazas and free-for-all roundabouts. No central planning commission governed Heaven’s Falls.

Door sizes and window heights accommodated human-sized patrons at lower levels, but higher floors tailored to gnomish dimensions. We passed rooms only four feet high.

Poured concrete capped with colored stones gave the streets a polka-dot effect, making it easy to read the topography. The gentle contours suggested little rain made it to the streets but collected in rooftop cisterns.

The central waterfall wasn’t the only cascading water. Aqueducts splintered the mountain water throughout the city like public spigots, dribbling from level to level in vertical chutes and channels. I filled my canteen by sticking it beneath the flow.

Fabulosa Do y’all have advice on finding Flagboi? We’re sharing the same dot on the contest map, but this place is more vertical than I expected.

Audigger Oh! You’re in Heaven’s Falls! Isn’t it gorgeous? I’m not sure if I should help you find him. It might not be good for my game.

Flagboi It won’t be for mine, but don’t worry, I’m pretty well hidden.

Audigger He’s not wrong about that. Searching for someone in Heaven’s Falls will be hard.

Audigger Have you finished your secret project, Flag?

Duchess Be careful, Flag. We thought we killed Apache, but he fooled us by killing a Familiar with his name. Watch the contest Interface to see if he’s still alive. Apache can cast Anticipate twice and swings a celestial sword. He can channel while fighting or casting other spells.

Toadkiller Oh! And you guys complain about me breaking the game?

Flagboi If I can get this done, I won’t have to worry about Anticipates.

Toadkiller That’s a bold statement.

Audigger What’s a celestial sword?

Duchess It means its rarity is purple. Fabulosa has a purple cape that turns her incorporeal, and she can fly in the wind.

Toadkiller Purples! I’ve only seen green items.

Flagboi Yeah, yeah. Whatever. If they’re so powerful, why are you coming up here, T?

Toadkiller I’m just wandering around, looking for things to do.

Duchess Yeah, right. You with your sixteen knockouts.

Audigger He’s snapping them up like baby sea turtles.

Fabulosa frowned. “Flagboi would be bragging if he was ready to fight us. I think we’re earlier than he wants. We want to find him fast.”

“You’re probably right, but there might be tens of thousands living here. How are we going to find him without finding us first? We can’t really go anywhere with these nameplates giving us away.”

“He’s a necro. I mean, just look at this place. How could a necromancer do anything here without attracting attention? It’s pretty here, but it’s a dumb place to practice dark arts. All we need to do is look for dropping property values.”

I laughed. “You’re probably right. Toadkiller will be here in a few days.”

“We’re going to have to face him eventually.”

“But if there’s an advantage in Oxum, I’d rather get to it before he does. Besides, why face multiple opponents at once?” Despite Flagboi’s protests, he and Toadkiller might be working together.

Fabulosa tilted her head to concede that I had a point. “We can use the battle standard to rustle up his location.”

“That’s a good idea. Still, the range is pretty short. It’s going to take a while to find him.”

Fabulosa nodded. “Let’s find you a mailbox and see what Darkstep has to say.”