Forge of Eternity: Alpha Testing, page 42
“You’re certain this isn’t some remote death ray, right?” Goodwin asked as the gauge ticket up to full. A light began blinking on the dungeon attunement button.
“Not certain at all, so brace yourself,” I said, slamming an open palm on the blinking button. The image in the crystal winked out as all the lights dimmed. An eerie twilight glow illuminated the room and the tangy metallic scent on the air became more prevalent. The ground began to rumble with a deep vibration, violent enough to rattle the crystal shards in the room into each other. All the surfaces of the room sparked and popped as the debris agitated with enough force to combust.
A shrill scream from the back of the room made my heart skip a beat. I turned, drawing my wand with a small fumbling motion. My quick reactions were rendered moot a moment later. The right side of my neck erupted in pain, a feeling like having my skin and muscles pierced and pulled away by molten hot needles from Satan’s tattoo gun. I was probably trying to scream, for all the good that would do with my lungs seized in agony.
I blacked out for an indeterminate period of time. The only indication that anything more than a second had passed was the fact that the pain in my neck reduced from mind-splitting torment to only a severe throbbing pain. My mind was still reeling from both levels of pain and it took me a moment to realize I was on the ground with crystal shards digging into the side of my face. Opening my eyes showed that the rest of the party also decided it was mid-dungeon nap time, and that the room had returned to its standard lighting. Deacon and Goodwin were beginning to stir as I watched.
“You have made a terrible decision,” an unfamiliar voice said, its tone resonant and smooth. There was just a hint of some accent I couldn’t quite place. Maybe vaguely British?
“Who was that?” Deacon asked, fumbling the warhammer out of its sling. Its head struck a series of crystal shards in an unwelcome cacophony as Deacon used it to lift himself upright.
“An extremely appropriate question,” the voice responded, full of bitter amusement. “I was an Argus of the Tempering Fires, Marked Custodian of a Forge, and a Smith of Destiny.”
“I notice all those titles sound like they’re in the past tense,” I said, my wits returning as the pain continued to fade. “Who or what are you now?”
“I’m a damned crystal mana battery apparently,” the voice replied, dripping with disdain. “And, unless you remove me from the dungeon controls soon, I won’t even be that.”
Mostly recovered, I stood and cautiously approached the ignition lever. The orb was glowing steadily and I could see the hints of facial features when I focused on it. The rest of the party crowded around behind me, a stunned silence hanging over the room.
“Oh, so you all are just going to stand there and watch as my essence is drained to run the command center?” the orb asked, brightness fluctuating with its words. “We’ll be here for the better part of an hour if that’s your intent. Just so you’re aware.”
“Why should we save you?” Deacon asked, putting his hammer away and looming over the console. “What’s in it for us?”
I opened my mouth to answer for the orb, the value of its knowledge was reason alone to save it, when Deacon softly, but deliberately, kicked me in the calf. It was subtle enough that an observer probably wouldn’t have picked up on it. His intent was clear though. Of course we were going to save the spirit crystal thing, he just wanted to negotiate terms first. Since I’d already opened my mouth, and I felt it was a safe assumption that the orb thing could see us, I decided to set the stage for Deacon.
“Do you think it’s dangerous?” I asked Deacon, exaggerating the concern in my voice to play along. “Did we summon something by accident?”
“I think this is the only power source we found,” Deacon said, pausing to consider. “It might be another trap. If it wants to be more than a simple battery though, it should probably start providing us some tangible benefits.”
“Ah, now that is something I’m more than happy to do,” the voice said, still full of sarcastic enthusiasm. “Let us not waste time here on mind games or trickery. I can tell you’re attempting to pressure me into some sort of deal or arrangement. That tells me you don’t fully understand my situation. At this point, I have no ability to interact with the physical world or defend myself. I am at your mercy and fully motivated to do anything I can to ensure my continued survival. Whatever you want from me will be freely given in exchange for letting me live.”
“That’s the thing though,” Deacon replied without any hesitation, “I don’t know if you have anything we can benefit from. For all we know you were a janitor here with no knowledge or skills we can leverage. The titles you gave are just words.”
“Okay then,” a hint of heat entered the voice as it spoke, “let’s start with this as my abbreviated bona fides, shall we? You bumbling idiots just bound your souls to this dungeon and the forge below without any preparation or safeguards. I know how to keep you from dying, or devolving into completely mindless puppets of forces beyond your comprehension. If you choose to let me fade I can at least take comfort in the fact that I will face oblivion as my own person while your souls distort and wither.”
I blinked a few times, taken aback by both the emotion displayed and the content of the message. Then I remembered the sections of the console I’d engaged and realized it was probably trying to scare us. “I think you’re bluffing. I engaged the track party and attune to dungeon options. Neither of those should have negative effects.”
“Whoever taught you the High Elven tongue should be bound, gagged, and forced to watch your attempts at translation.”
“Okay, ouch,” I said, placing my hand on my chest for emphasis. “I feel like I’m doing a fair job translating a language I’ve only ever read in the halls of an ancient dungeon. If I’m wrong, I don’t mind having my translation corrected, but you don’t have to be rude about it. What did those controls say?”
“What you assumed was to track the party actually determined the type of binding they’d received when you pressed the ‘channel forge’ button.”
“Wait, what does that mean?” Deacon asked. “What type of binding? Is this track like some sort of meta-class advancement level?”
“Similar. The selector was assigning your role. You could have been marked as Champions, allowed to activate the forge focus to craft or conjure gifts. Selecting Argus would have granted you a place here, overseeing the operations of the dungeon. If you chose Attuned, it would have allowed you into the full true raid dungeon. Instead, you chose an option reserved for the most powerful, or the most expendable.”
The silence stretched on longer than I felt was reasonable. “Okay, I’ll bite. What did we choose?”
“I’m sorry, I must have dozed off,” the orb replied with a loud yawn. “Having my life force drained to power the control room is making me a bit sleepy. If only there was some way to fix this. Like, perhaps, removing me from the console.”
Deacon reached out and put his hand over the crystal. “Anyone disagree with this?”
Everyone either shrugged or shook their head, so Deacon plucked the glowing orb out of the socket, eying it suspiciously. The runes and controls faded back to their inert state.
“Master Deacon, I understand this is a strange question, but are you still feeling like yourself?” Gavin asked, causing the tank to break his staring contest with the rock. “And, can you tell me where we slept last night?”
“Yeah I feel fine, and we slept out on the switchbacks. Why?” Deacon passed the crystal over to me. “Here, you hold this.”
“It occurred to me that the crystal may try to possess your body, so I wanted a measure of assurance that your mind is still intact.”
“I hadn’t considered that,” I said, taking my own turn to glare at the sphere. “Is that something we should be worried about?”
The orb hummed in my hand as its voice snorted in amusement. “Please, if I could do that I clearly would have cast a spell disabling most of you and started running away.”
“Glad to hear that you’ll bolt the second it’s possible,” I said, casually tossing and catching the crystal in my hand. “Guess you’re not getting a body anytime soon.”
“You’ll forgive me for not immediately trusting a bunch of clueless adventurers stumbling around where they shouldn’t be.”
“You’re forgiven,” I said, cutting off the rant. “Now, Mr. Crystal, what’s a Forge Seal and why is it bad?”
“I have a name you know,” the orb replied, lapsing into silence instead of answering my question.
“Are we supposed to be guessing?” Uri asked, tapping a finger against his lips. “Chris? Billy? Uh, yeah, that’s all I have right now.”
“Lendralgin Oik,” the orb replied before anyone else could start guessing.
“Lenny it is then,” Deacon declared as if bestowing a lordly title upon the sentient rock. “Now, answer the question or you’re getting demoted back to battery status.”
“Oik would be preferable if you insist on giving me a diminutive name, not that you’ll respect that. Gods forbid I want to receive a modicum of courtesy,” Lenny grumbled. “A Forge Seal is normally a rare gift granted to the strongest of warriors who have completed all the trials in the Tempering Fires and become inoculated to the pull of the forge. Either that or they already possess a gift from another forge. Anyone receiving the seal without the right conditions are, for all intents and purposes, cursed.”
Deacon - Dumb Luck
“Hold up,” I interrupted the arrogant orb, scratching at the burn on my neck nervously. “Is this a literal curse where bad things happen to us, or a figurative curse because we have enough power now that our lack of judgment or misuse of that power will cause the world harm?”
“It can be a bit of both, to be honest,” Lenny replied from Amalie’s hand. “If your will is not strong enough to resist the efforts of the Forge, the seal could leak when pull from it. Best case scenario, in that case, you temporarily become a conduit for its power and channel the raw power of creation for a short period. You wouldn’t be able to stop the flow of power on your own and may not be able to control what happens.”
“That doesn’t sound terrible,” I said, finally taking my hand off my neck and resting it back on the head of my hammer. “And the worst-case scenario?”
“Well, both your mind or body could potentially become overwhelmed and burn out,” the orb dimmed for a moment, continuing quietly, “the damage to your mind may leave you as a mindless husk for a time. It’s always possible you could develop a mild to moderate case of lingering insanity. If your body fails you may simply be incinerated on the spot, merge with the force of the power you’re wielding, or be fundamentally altered by it.”
“I’m sure it’s also known to cause cancer in the state of California,” Phelyya waved dismissively, “who cares? What about the good stuff?”
“I’m curious about the good parts too,” I said, raising a hand toward Phelyya to stall further comments, “but what I’m more interested in is whether we can remove the Forge Seal and get a less dangerous binding instead.”
“Maybe the Forge of Destruction could sever that binding,” Lenny replied, held in Amalie’s outstretched hand. “But there’s no function for removing the gifts of the Forge here. We evaluate teams seeking to explore the forge’s true dungeon and grant limited access to its depths. You can only have one gift from each Forge.”
“Wait,” Amalie said, pulling the orb closer to her own face, “was that the whole thing about running the dungeon multiple times to unlock the other entrance?”
“Oh, that?” the orb laughed, “yeah. If you weren’t showing a proper level of resistance to the forge’s pull by your third run we’d stop matching the power of the enemies to the party and just let them attack at full power. Nobody survives that.”
“Such cavalier disregard of life is… unnerving,” Gavin said, chewing on the end of his pipe. “I suppose those entering were aware of the risk though if not the fact that someone may have their finger on the scale.”
My tremorsense screamed a sort of tactile static into my brain seconds before the room began to shake with a violent grinding rhythm. I heard Gavin’s teeth clack on the end of his pipe and Amalie made a squeak of surprise, pulling the orb close to her chest for protection. Something felt distinctly odd and I had a sudden urge to raise my shield over my head.
The chunk of stone that fell from the ceiling had enough force behind it to bounce my shield off my shoulder on impact. I didn’t lose any health, even though it sent pain radiating up my arm. A few more bricks fell from above and I swatted them away from the party members nearby. Uri almost took one to the face as a result, dodging with magically enhanced speed at the last moment. The intensity of the earthquake subsided gradually over the course of a few minutes.
“That was not a good sign,” Lenny said, the standard sarcasm completely absent from his voice. “As much as I’d like to keep playing the questions game, I feel we have more urgent matters to attend. Elf girl, can you show me the state of the controls on each console? Quickly, please.”
Amalie moved about the room with the crystal, which began speaking to itself softly as they went, so I took stock of everyone else. Goodwin leaned against the door frame, his eyes closed while Uri stared off into the middle distance. Gavin and Phelyya followed Amalie, leaving a little distance between them while remaining within earshot of the mysterious orb’s mumbling. I was a bit shaken, both literally from the quake and figuratively from finding that I had a potentially insanity-inducing curse now.
“First week in, and already cursed,” I said, trying for a light-hearted tone. It rang hollow to my ears, but Goodwin cracked a smile.
“You know, I figured immortality would provide a level of safety,” the monk shrugged and opened his eyes, turning to meet my gaze. “I was also worried that would make things boring.”
Uri blinked and focused on us, a grin slowly spreading across his face. “Either of you checked your logs or quests recently?”
I had minimized the running log and every other non-essential item from my heads-up display on the way down to better hunt for traps. Re-enabling the windows was a minor effort, the display providing comfortable familiarity I hadn’t realized I was missing. Quickly scanning my recent logs showed me why Uri wasn’t more focused on our potentially life-altering brand.
Achievement unlocked: Forge Touched I.
You have uncovered all secrets of the Tempering Fires.
You have assumed control of the Tempering Fires!
Achievement unlocked: Dungeon Master.
You have elected to unearth the Forge of Creation.
Quest Complete: Earning Your Keep!
Earn something of value 1/1
Establish yourself 1/1
Complete objectives before end of Alpha Testing 1/1
Reward:
continued access to character classes, levels, and respawn mechanic.
500 Experience
(Optional) Invite others to the hidden dungeon: 1/1
Quest complete: Learn to Know!
Investigate the pit 1/1
Clear the dungeon 1/1
(Optional) Uncover the history of the hidden dungeon 1/1
(Optional) Invite others to the hidden dungeon 1/1
Reward:
1000 experience
Achievement: Dungeon Master
Ensuring immortality and gaining control of a dungeon in exchange for receiving a potentially sanity-destroying magical brand wasn’t really that bad, as far as trade-offs go. Then again, not what I would have chosen if the options were presented to me at character creation. At least the curse seemed avoidable, can’t be cursed if I don’t use the Forge powers. Whatever those powers were, we still needed Lenny to explain that. I started digging around in my menus to try to find more detail when an exasperated cry from the orb broke my concentration.
“You soft-headed glint hunters! This is exactly why adventurers need a proper cleric, scribe, or even a gods forsaken bard with them at all times. I knew my ‘kill the dumb dumbs’ policy of wiping any party lacking at least one brain between them was necessary,” Lenny berated us, ending with a long groan of frustration. “Okay, I’m going to put this in simple terms so you understand how absolutely hopeless you are. Are you ready?”
“I’m about ready to spike your smug spherical face into the ground,” I said, gripping the head of my hammer hard enough to make my knuckles ache. “Explain what we did and how to fix it. I could care less about the insults, but the lack of detail is making me anxious.”
“Good, you should be anxious,” Lenny said, sounding extremely satisfied. “At this point, it probably doesn’t matter if you shatter me now, or if I am destroyed in the inevitable explosion you dinguses set into motion. Let’s start simple then. Do you know why you shouldn’t fire a bow without an arrow in it?”
“Because you won’t hit anything, obviously,” Phelyya said, rolling her eyes.
“While that is technically correct, Lady Phelyya, it is not the answer Master Oik is seeking,” Gavin said, sounding less upbeat than normal. “When a bow is fired dry, all the force that should be sent out with the arrow, and thus into your enemy, is instead rebounded inside the bow. This is bad for a bow in good condition, and a weakened bow may crack or shatter.”
“Precisely,” Lenny said. “Looking at the state of the console, I can tell you that the main console power is offline, mana-sinks have failed, the self-repair functions are running on residual power, and none of the maintenance functions have run for over two hundred years. To put that in perspective, maintenance should be run at least once per fortnight. When you activated the console using a mana battery, yours truly, you selected the option to prime the Forge Focus. Do you know what that does?”
