Turns out the next problem… is a big one.

I step through a Portal to the small Settlement of Mosfellbaer, barely 10km east of Reykjavik, which is now an obviously fresh and complete ruin. Bodies are strewn everywhere and the town has been absolutely ripped apart. It looks like someone grabbed everything in the Settlement like some crackers in a giant hand and crushed it, then threw it back down on the ground.

My Danger Sense flares and pushes on me as strongly as it ever has. The air is thick with danger and I can feel Mana churning everywhere around me, including under my feet. I look up to one of the flat peaks at a massive, hulking figure that looks more like a chunk of mountain than anything else. Surely this is the most powerful thing on the planet right now, at fully 200 Levels above anything I’ve ever seen.

Hvitserkur (Level 514 Rock Troll)

Health: 58900/59100

Mana: 12450/14600

Conditions: Ascended Regeneration, Unbreakable, Elemental Mastery, Magma Born, Stalwart Aura, Resolute, Mark of Resilience, more…

I do a double take, having assumed this was a Monster, but the notification clearly indicates Hvitserkur is sentient. Rocky knobs and spikes cover his oversized limbs and fierce face which is dominated by a massive jaw and glowing green eyes. It’s hard to even get a sense of proportion immediately from this distance but as I hone in with my Perception I can see his rough, thick skin the color of weathered granite looks to be scarred from centuries of weather and battles.

My Affinity flares and alerts me to a still open Wormhole not far away, no doubt the source of these creatures and possibly a longstanding one that the Influx has forced open.

Hvitserkur notices me immediately, fixing me with his gaze and shifting his stance. It sounds like an avalanche each time he moves.

“Human!” he rumbles in a voice that seems to shake the foundations of the ground all around us, yet somehow my SMI translates it into one simple word.

Mental influence resisted

Fear effect resisted

Despite my focus on the Rock Troll, my Perception tells me there is more to this than is obvious and I open up my minimap. Thousands of dots, many of them red, are sprinkled around the area. A push with my will overlays them on everything I can see and now it’s obvious there are many, many more Rock Trolls here, hunkered down like boulders and rugged features of the landscape. Some of them are still in the Settlement blending in with the rubble, surrounded by dead humans.

My anger rises up to war with my concern. I throw myself headlong into situations all the time but this one makes me hesitate. With Reykjavik so close, if these Rock Trolls decide to move in that direction it will be a bloodbath. There’s no way I’ll be able to stop them, there are too many at too high a Level, and I wouldn’t even know where to begin with Hvitserkur. As all of this flashes through my mind there’s only one option I can think of as all around me rock formations begin to stir and surge up from the ground.

I trigger Omnipresent and find Finn, then manifest the Portal and step through. I see immediately he’s shapeshifted into a powerful cat standing at least as tall as me at the shoulder to hunt down a herd of Red Deer who live up to their name. Each massive beast gives off a red glow and all of them have a varied intensity of light swirling inside their antlers. I watch for a second as Finn bounds after them and then pivot to my right as my Danger Sense presses on me. Two intense beams of energy from two of the Red Deer who have built up enough charge slice past me and cut through the forest. Each of the beams lasts long enough that the Red Deer try to track me and whip the beams across my body and although I’m not super worried based on their Level I trigger Greatest Need to land beside Finn at a full run.

“I need you,” I send to him through our Group Party Chat. He’s not really a member of the Sentinels anymore, but since our group is scattered right now and I haven’t formed a new Party, all the originals are still connected to my GPC when we’re in range.

Finn glances over, his feline eyes locking on mine, and instantly shifts back to his human form, stopping dead. The change in momentum is abrupt, but my Acceleration is turned up and I match it without any problem.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Good to see you,” he says. “What’s up? You know we’re still sticking to Ireland, yeah?”

“I know, but you need to make an exception. Showing is easier than telling and I’ll leave the Portal open so you can step back here,” I say to him.

We’ve had our differences and our paths have diverged, but there’s still a lot of history fighting and bleeding and saving each other’s lives together, so I expect Finn to give me the benefit of the doubt just like I would do for him, and I’m not wrong. He gives a quick nod and I trigger Omnipresent then open a Portal back to Iceland.

“Jesus fuck, Bronwic,” says Finn when he steps through the Portal. We’ve emerged in plenty of heavy shit before, but this is next level. In the brief time I’ve been gone the army of Rock Trolls has increased its movement and Hvitserkur is rumbling slowly through the town wreckage in the direction of Reykjavik.

Three Rock Trolls each around Level 100 move closer to us and I expect an attack that doesn’t come. Finn and I stare at them and then Finn glances over at Hvitserkur.

“Watch my back,” he says to me without any hint of a question as he kneels down and plants his hands on the ground. I can feel the disturbance in the Mana around us that signals he’s triggered multiple Skills and spells at the same time, some of his strongest ones. Finn’s Level isn’t far off mine and his Class of Gaia’s Chosen gives him capabilities I can’t even dream of. Just as I feel the Mana disturbance, the Rock Trolls all crack and crunch at the same time to orient on us. At least Finn’s got their attention. I cycle through my options and get ready with a Wall of the Clan, just in case.

The ground beneath us trembles as Finn channels his power and Mana ripples around us. I check Gift of Gaia and am relieved that it’s unaffected by whatever Finn is doing since I’m going to need every advantage I can get. My Swords appear in my hands without me really thinking about it and I tighten my grip on them as I watch Hvitserkur and trust in my minimap, Perception, Foresight, and Danger Sense to warn me of anything I have to react to immediately.

“He’s so strong,” Finn mutters, his voice strained with the effort of whatever he’s doing. My mind races to try to devise a strategy but the odds are stacked heavily against us. Slowly at first and then with an increasingly deafening rumble, thousands of Rock Trolls start to converge on our position. They give us a wide berth, but more and more of them are headed toward us. We can always escape, but then what about Reykjavik?

I glance between Finn and Hvitserkur then check Finn’s Mana to see what I suspected, his Mana levels are dropping like a stone and he’s only got less than a third of his Mana pool left.

“Can we draw them away from Reykjavik?” I ask Finn, but he’s lost in whatever he’s doing. These are the times I wish I knew more about magic. I’m tempted to open another Portal to Jon or Jeff for reinforcements. Just in case, I plunge the syringe of a Mana potion and then a Mana regeneration potion into Finn’s neck, bypassing his armor. He doesn’t even stir and his Mana continues to race toward zero, albeit a bit slower.

The Rock Trolls around us regard us with unmoving granite faces while Hvitserkur rumbles toward us with the sound of a thousand ton avalanche. The ground bucks and cracks everywhere around us except a radius around where Finn and I are. Hvitserkur is still a fair distance from us when he stops, although his massive frame looms over us even from far away. I admit I’m tense and playing the sequence of Skills I’ll trigger over and over in my head if Hvitserkur gets any closer to use or the Rock Trolls rush us.

Then Finn stands up, slightly woozy. I grab him and hold him upright for the second it takes for him to collect himself and return to himself properly.

“They’re stranded,” he says softly to me, his eyes still far away. “Their world is years, maybe months, from fracturing and so they can’t go back. This Wormhole was a blessing for them but they don’t understand our world or even anything about the Sapient Species Alliance, or anything else. Hvitserkur has been holding back the catastrophe for a long, long time but it’s at the point there’s nothing he can do.”

I give Finn a questioning look, unsure of whether his information is reliable.

“I spoke with Hvitserkur directly, through the Earth, through the power of our shared Elemental Mastery. Don’t mistake their story with them deserving sympathy. He doesn’t care about us, views us as nothing. He only exchanged information with me briefly because I am Gaia’s Chosen; I suppose maybe he held a similar position on his world, so that part at least he has some small degree of respect for.”

“So… what now?” I ask, glancing around us. The potential for violence still hangs heavy in the air and I’m not stupid enough to be confident in defeating this thing in combat. Even though I understand a bit more about why it’s happened, there’s also the fact we’re still surrounded by a Settlement that’s in ruins and that’s hard to just ignore.

“Now… now we leave Iceland to them or they’ll take it for themselves.”

Finn looks around like me, assessing whether we could bring enough firepower here to defeat them. Whether it’s even worth it to make sure Iceland is in human control. He comes to the same conclusion as me.

“Then we turn back the latest fucking Influx and, if Iceland becomes an issue one day, maybe we get back to this problem.”

“The folks of Reykjavik might not like that,” I say, not arguing his view. I’ve had a version of the ‘abandon your home’ conversation hundreds of times before and I know the struggle people have between doing it and facing impending danger. I also know so well personally the internal conflict between wanting to defend a human Settlement and trying to give them the best chance of survival which is sometimes to cut and run.

Finn shrugs, which isn’t like the Finn I got to know who was always trying to fight every battle to the fullest and defend people to the end, but we’ve all had plenty to deal with and adjustments to make.

“There’s no choice. Hvitsekur is going to settle here and we’re actually lucky this is just an island instead of the middle of North America or Asia. I’m happy to help whoever who wants to leave make a transition to Ireland and of course anyone who has the ability to leave can do it. Everyone else will die.”

“I don’t doubt it for a second.”