“I don’t know, Bouldy,” Amber said, eyes down as she fidgeted with a loose straw on the brim of her summer hat. “It’s more complicated than that.”
“Friend?” the golem asked with a sympathetic tilt of his head.
“I swear Madame Ruby and the other guys from our group aren’t so bad,” said the young birdwatcher. “Well, except Flint, of course.”
“Friend,” the stone giant said.
“Yes, I know, unleashing that lich down there sounds pretty… bad. But… I’m sure if we could all discuss things, talk everything out, we could clear up that neither side is what the other thinks, you know? You, Balthazar, and everyone else around him are alright, I know that, and with the right opportunity, I’m sure Madame Ruby would understand that too.”
The animated construct delicately placed the tip of his huge finger on the girl’s shoulder and smiled at her.
“Friend.”
Amber looked up at him and forced a smile.
“Thanks, Bouldy. That means a lot,” she said before sighing. “I just don’t know if I’ll be able to convince her.”
“Don’t worry, you won’t get a chance to try,” a voice said a few paces behind Amber.
“Huh?!” the alchemist exclaimed, turning around and jumping onto her feet.
At first, she frowned, seeing no one around in the empty hall space surrounding them, but then a man blinked into existence right in front of her.
“Flint!” Amber said, startled.
Bouldy stood up, stony brow frowning. “Friend?”
“You’re coming with me!” said the adventurer in gray armor as he grabbed one of the girl’s wrists. “The guild will have your neck once I bring you to Ruby, you turncoat!”
“No! Stop, Flint!” the younger birdwatcher yelled, struggling to free herself from the gloved hand wrapped around her arm. “Let me go!”
Seeing his friend in danger, the stone guardian stepped forward, reaching down with his giant hand toward the man.
“Back off, you dumb rock!” Flint shouted, his voice thick with contempt.
With his free hand, the geomancer made a pushing motion in the golem’s direction. Magical lines lit up all over the leather surface of his thick gray glove, and with a shocked expression, Bouldy found himself being forcefully pushed back like a feather blown in the wind.
“Bouldy!” Amber screamed as she struggled against Flint’s grasp.
“That’s right,” the smirking man said. “No one’s going to mock my skills anymore. I can do a lot more than just move pebbles now.”
“What did you do?!”
“I put these stealth and invisibility potions to good use,” the geomancer said. “I’ve followed you, I’ve been watching you and your new allies. And when everyone else was gone, I paid that Altar of Potential they found down there a visit too. With these boosted geomancy gloves I got from it, everyone will know what I’m really capable of.”
Bouldy raised himself back onto his feet from where he had landed, several dozen paces away from the two humans. Still dazed by the unexpected tossing he had just suffered, the golem shook his head and started making his way back to his friend for round two.
With one gloved hand still tightly wrapped around the girl’s arm, Flint raised his other hand without even looking at the giant and held it in the air like a claw.
The stone guardian froze midstep, his entire being held in place by an invisible force pressing against his body from all sides.
“Friend?!” Bouldy exclaimed, feeling his stone being squeezed by an unseen grasp.
“And don’t get any ideas, rat,” the geomancer said with a fiendish grin as he brought his face closer to Amber’s. “The first thing I did with my new gloves was tear apart that stone altar, so now no one else will be benefiting from it.” He turned his gaze to the restrained golem and malice sparked in his dark eyes. “Maybe I’ll do the same to your friend here.”
“Leave Bouldy alone, you monster!” the alchemist cried, pulling against the man’s grasp as her other hand reached down into her satchel.
Flint focused on the golem and slowly closed his clawed fist, causing noises of cracking stone to come from all over the living construct.
While he was distracted Amber pulled a bulbous glass bottle filled with a dark green liquid from her bag and smashed it against the other adventurer’s face with all her strength.
“ARGH!” the geomancer yelled, letting go of both his grasps on the girl and the golem to clutch his face as he stumbled back.
Both Amber and Bouldy fell to the floor while Flint tried desperately to wipe off the thick substance clinging to his skin and producing a sizzling sound along with a disgusting smell of burnt hair.
“What did you do to me?!”
“Get up, Bouldy,” Amber said as she got back onto her feet and tried to run toward the golem. “My venom bomb won’t damage him for long and—”
A chunk of rocks broke apart from the base of one of the marble pillars and shot out toward the girl’s legs, hitting her on the shins and ankles, causing her to fall forward.
“You’re not going anywhere but with me,” Flint shouted, wiping the rest of the alchemical concoction from his cheek while retrieving a rope from his satchel. “I’m going to serve you right up to Ruby and Jasper and prove I was right about you all along.”
Before she could flip over and get back up, the bigger adventurer grabbed Amber’s hands behind her back and quickly tied them together.
“Friend!” Bouldy angrily shouted from across the hall, pulling his arm back as if preparing to throw a punch.
The two humans looked up just as the golem shot his hand forward, releasing a tiny pebble toward the man.
“Crrrrreee!” Pebbles yelled as she darted through the air, her tiny eyes frowning with cute determination.
But just a few paces before reaching her target, the small rock came to a full stop, suspended in the air.
“Cree?!”
With one hand still holding the ropes binding Amber, Flint held his open palm forward in front of his face, keeping a distant hold on the living pebble with his powers.
“Really? Trying to attack a geomancer with a stone?” he spat. “You really are dumb.”
“No!” Amber cried, fighting fruitlessly against her restraints. “Put her down, Flint! Please!”
The man smirked maliciously.
“Fine, if you insist. I’m tired of these rocks in my path anyway.”
A boom echoed through the halls as Flint pushed his hand forward, sending a powerful force out that repelled Pebbles back and toward Bouldy.
“Friend!” the golem shouted as he braced to catch his offshoot with his hands.
As he did, the geomancer’s force push hit the giant too, sending him flying like dirt in the wind.
Bouldy crashed through a pillar, and then another, all while cradling Pebbles against his chest to protect her, until he landed against a wall with an explosive crash.
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A section of the ceiling above the two destroyed pillars collapsed, and hundreds of rocks and dirt fell over the golem, burying him under before he could regain his bearings.
“Frieeeend!” Bouldy desperately yelled as he watched his alchemist friend be dragged away by the vile adventurer while piles of dirt and rocks quickly cascaded over his head.
***
Balthazar and his group walked through the tall corridor toward the giant metal gate in silence. Joshua walked by Thunk’s side as she helped Khargol—who was still recovering from his berserk rampage—move by carrying his arm over her shoulders. Behind them, Hannabeth marched on cautiously with her shield held up at the ready, as if expecting an attack to come from any direction at any moment. And even further behind came Sir Edmund Auclair Allard’s pale phantom floating along with his zombified corpse, Ned, who mindlessly shambled after his glowing ghost.
The air grew heavier with every step toward the massive double doors. Along the tunnel walls, dozens of torches guttered and flared in turn, their flames battered by a windless current that seemed to press in from every direction.
Something about that place was making every bristle in the crab’s body stand, and an eerie feeling crept its way inside his shell the closer they came to the end.
The group came to a stop a couple dozen steps away from the towering metal structure.
It was a double gate made of dark iron, no markings, no carvings, just a simplistic but solid structure, easily five times taller than Bouldy, and big enough for even a giant red dragon to pass through once open. At the center, where the two doors connected, at about the height of a human’s chest, was a bronze metal circle, like a disc lock without a keyhole.
“Something about that door makes me feel uneasy,” Hannabeth said, lowering her shield and abandoning her knightly tone.
“Me too,” said Thunk, her bright blue eyes fixed on the gate, and despite only having said two words, Balthazar felt even the barbarian’s voice sounded different from her usual crude and simplistic tone.
The merchant stared up at the black iron portal standing before him, something in the depths of his mind compelling him to come closer.
“What are you doing?!” Joshua said, seeing the crab step closer to the gate. “Is that a good idea?!”
Without paying the farmer any mind, Balthazar approached the doors and raised his pincer toward it.
As the tip of his claw touched the cold metal surface… nothing happened.
Just silence.
Not even the crackling of the fire from the torches could be heard anymore.
The crab’s eyestalks frowned, and he brought his face closer to the gate.
Something on the other side.
An echo.
Several echoes.
Voices.
Something calling.
Beckoning.
Pleading.
Balthazar pulled away from the iron doors.
“How do we open it?” he asked, eyes on the bronze circle at the center of the gate.
The knight and the barbarian looked at each other and shrugged.
“Don’t look at me,” said Joshua, shrugging too. “I plant potatoes for a living, I’m way out of my depth.”
“It’s a core gate.”
The crab turned in place to look at Sir Allard’s phantom, floating in place, his pale visage gazing up at the gates with an empty stare.
“You know what this is? Where it leads?” the merchant asked, eyes wide.
“I’ve read mentions of them in ancient texts,” the ghost replied. “Back in my scholarly years, when I was still alive. They are gates meant to guard the cores of the world, created by some sort of primordial beings in ages past, if you are one to believe such things. And no, I do not know where it would take us. I don’t think anyone does. There is no record, myth, or tale I’ve ever read that mentions one being opened.”
“This thing,” Balthazar said, pointing at the bronze disc. “It must have something to do with how it’s opened.”
“It needs a key,” Khargol’s deep and serious voice said, still leaning on the barbarian to stand. “Our clans have old tales about such gates too. I remember hearing about them from our elder shamans. They only open to the right kind of core key made for it.”
The crab looked at the obstacle in his path, keeping him from getting to the answers that his subconscious demanded, when an ever familiar system line appeared in his eyes.
[Quest updated: find the key to enter The Core]
Of course… the merchant thought, deflated. Always something, always another quest.
“And where do we find such a key?” he asked.
The orc chieftain shook his head.
“Nobody knows. The divines likely did not mean for just anyone to cross these doors.”
Balthazar exhaled sharply.
“Maybe if I got Bouldy down here, he could punch through it. Or maybe it could be melted with Blue’s fire. Or perhaps with the fire from a dragon…”
“You don’t understand, friend,” Sir Edmund said. “This is not a common door one can force open with physical might or magical power. This is a world entity. For what little scholars understand of them, even if you were to somehow successfully punch a hole through it, you’d find nothing on the other side but more rock wall. The gate does not open to another place—it takes you to another place once opened.”
“Then… what do we do?” the dejected crustacean said.
“Leave?” Hannabeth said timidly. “I don’t like this place. I don’t think we should be here.”
“No loot,” said Thunk. “Me want to leave too.”
Balthazar looked at the two adventurers. He knew what made them feel that way. He knew the instinct pushing them away from anything that might make them know too much. He had witnessed it before with Rye and other adventurers. The same system trick that fogged up their memories of their past lives upon arrival on Heartha.
Khargol let go of the barbarian’s shoulder and limped his way to the crab.
“I can sense your struggle, friend,” the orc chieftain said, placing his hand on the side of the merchant’s shell and gazing up at the iron gates too. “But this is not a foe we can battle tonight. We are all battered and tired. There is nowhere to find what you would need to open this gate down here. A good leader knows when it is time to retreat and figure out a new plan.”
Balthazar looked around at the long, empty corridor.
As much as it cost him to accept it, he knew the orc was right. There was nothing else down there, the quest objective was no help, offered no guidance, and they weren’t going to just stumble upon a key to open that door on the floor or under a rock.
He would have to figure it out some other way, as usual.
Feeling defeated after all the effort they had gone through to reach the center of the mountain, the crab and his group walked their way back up to the mines, Balthazar staying mostly quiet and pensive the whole way through.
He did not care about the system, quests, conspiracies, or any of that big-scale world stuff. Yet, something compelled him to want to reach that so-called Source, and he could not explain why.
Was he really becoming so alike the adventurers he always complained about that he couldn’t help but mindlessly chase after hazy objectives just for the sake of it? Or was it something else? Something more profound?
Balthazar did not know, and that bothered him greatly. For some reason.
After reuniting with Druma and Blue at the kobold’s shelter, the party gave the good news about the lich and the undead ogres having been defeated to Kole, who was being cared for his injuries by his tribe.
The kobolds agreed to go up to the surface and visit once they resettled in their territory, to celebrate the goblin hero—and also his crab helper.
Usually this would have bothered Balthazar’s ego, but his mind was so lost in thoughts of that gate, that he did not even care when the orange cave dwellers showered his green assistant with gifts and offerings instead of him.
Multiple samples of rockwood, a few chunks of primordium, and even some mined chocolate to bring home. All was dumped into the crab’s pack once Druma’s small satchel was too full to carry any more gifts from the thankful reptilians.
Exhausted and feeling the drain of all the adventuring, traveling, and battling they had done, the group of nine friends—including the ghost of Sir Edmund and his zombie half—made their way back up to the Semla Halls at a slow and dragged pace.
“Wow, what happened here?!” exclaimed Joshua, who had reached the top of the stairwell first. “Is that your golem?”
Noticing the section of collapsed ceiling above, Balthazar quickly pushed past the others to look at the hall ahead.
“Bouldy?!”
On the other side of the hall, the golem was clawing his way up from a huge pile of rocks and dirt pinning him to the floor, with a deep frown the crab was not used to seeing on the stony face of his friend.
“What happened?” the merchant asked, skittering closer as the construct freed his legs from the debris and stepped over them.
“Friend,” the golem said, his voice even deeper than usual.
“What?!” Balthazar said. “Who took her?”
Bouldy proceeded to explain what happened to the crab.
“Friend.”
Balthazar rubbed his chin with the tip of his pincer.
“So he upgraded his mittens on the altar. That explains how he could toss you around like this.”
The golem lowered his massive hand in front of the crab and opened it to reveal Pebbles, intact but with her eyes still spinning and looking dazed.
“Is she alright?” the crustacean asked, carefully taking the tiny rock into his pincers.
Bouldy shrugged with an expression of uncertainty.
“Friend,” the golem pleaded.
“Of course we can’t let him take the girl to the other Birdwatchers. She helped you—she helped us. As you said, Amber is a friend now.”
The merchant looked back at the others.
“We’re not in the greatest of shapes right now, but we can’t waste any time either,” Balthazar said to the construct. “Go. You might still be able to catch him before he reaches the forest. I’ll take Pebbles and the others to the bazaar first, and then catch up with you.”
Bouldy nodded firmly and turned to take off toward the exit.
“Wait,” the crab said, carefully setting Pebbles down on the floor and reaching into his backpack. “I think I have something to help you.”
With one pincer inside his Crab Bag and the other touching the golem, Balthazar scrolled through his list of skills.
[Imbuing activated]
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