“So what is it that you wanted to show me, cartographer?” the Greatest Hero of the Celestial Empire asked, as they were reaching the waterfall.

“A very strange thing,” the Cautious Surveyor replied.

Princess Zhuangjing noted the presence of a treasure chest half-submerged in the pool. There did not seem to be any guardian, but she assumed that the upper tier four Great Hero had dispatched it long before. A mere tier two guardian would not last long against a genuine nearly-five opponent, even if alone.

The man moved under the waterfall, beckoning to the Greatest. She went, unbothered by the splash of water. Professional clothing was more or less impervious to water anyway.

She was not too surprised to see a tunnel. A few smaller Power Crystals encrusted in the walls brought a wan light into the depths.

“Is there something special to this lair?”

“The waterfall pool is the last guardian’s spot,” he replied. “This is beyond the normal lair. Do not advance too much, though, and be ready to retreat.”

“I doubt there would be any tier two guardian that could…” she said before stopping.

Unworthy. -1% to all Potentials and vitals.

Then, as she looked surprised at the status, it went up.

Unworthy. -2% to all Potentials and vitals.

“What’s causing this,” she said, as the status went up again to three, and she retreated a step.

The status blinked, then started going down back to two. Then one. Then she noticed that the man had moved a bit further into the tunnel and was looking at her.

“You… are unaffected?”

“I am, Greatest. And I have to warn you, the further you go in, the faster it grows. Beyond a dozen bu, it already grows every five miǎo. To go deep is to court Final Death unless someone can bring you out and perform a Resurrection.”

“It seems strange that the tier seven Greatest Hero would be deemed unworthy, while you would be considered worthy. How did it happen?”

“The Greatest probably knows that this one is tasked to map carefully those new zones, so that we may move our ever-growing numbers of new Heroes and train them properly. The amount of new recruits now dwarfs the capacity of the zones near the Entrance, and we are always looking for new zones in which to move new tier two Heroes for the experience. I found the waterfall early. Its guardian is tricky, but not very high level, a mere 80. The cave was there and I entered, and retreated immediately as I was unworthy indeed.”

“But you no longer are.”

“What I did was to keep on my mapping. I spend three months scouring the zone, going to the deeps to the tops. All of the lairs I found, I think. But when I came back to complete my observations of the waterfall cave, I found myself being able to enter without any ill effect and go to the deeps.”

“How deep does the tunnel go?”

“Around a hundred bu,” he replied. “I’ve been careful in my measuring, and the rear cave is ninety-seven bu from the waterfall itself.”

“And what is in there?”

“A Gate, Greatest Hero,” he replied.

Teaching Spellbender Zhuangjing was, for once, surprised.

They had left the cave entrance and moved to the pool’s banks to discuss more easily.

“We are in the middle of the Celestial Plane. There are never any Gates between the Planes so far inside one,” Zhuangjing noted.

“This one is… different. It does look different as if it was made of metal bricks thrown by a careless mason, rather than the work of a master sculptor as do the Gates.”

“Did you go beyond?” she asked. Then she realized that she might have asked the Great Hero if he took a dump in the mornings.

“I did. I found a strange zone, Miltovar. Full of walking flowers, like roses that had grown three legs, and thorns in their petals. They are all of the highest levels for tier two. But the location descriptor hinted at strangeness, and I found one, indeed.”

“What strangeness?”

“The location was named a trunk as if the zone was part of some great tree of the Heavens. So I assumed it would have something special at its centre, and I found one indeed. A Legend.”

“A Legend? Like one of the upper tiers?”

“It was labelled thus on the descriptor. A worthy Legend, a massive bush walking on extended stems rather than a mere flower, and one with a dozen flower mouths. It was guarding the Plaza. A branch extended toward me as if it was seeing me, and I ran away. It might be a level 119, and me a level 277, but I am certainly not able to fight such a Legend on my own. Its vitals were far above mine, and I can only wonder what else it can do.”

The Princess pondered the idea of a Legend in a tier two. If the cartographer could be trusted – and she did not see why he’d lie to her… although, if no one was deemed worthy.

“And no one but you can enter the tunnel,” she said.

“Until last month, it was so. I asked a former teammate of mine, Massive Paladin Lian Xia, who could not enter the cave to do a full round of the Plane with me.”

The Greatest immediately caught the implication.

“And suddenly, he could enter.”

“Once he’d completed all the lairs I had found previously, he was no longer deemed unworthy to access the Gate.”

The Princess looked at her team.

“The Skylord of Banskar isn’t coming back for a month. I think I’ll visit a tier two zone for once,” she said.

Cautious Surveyor

(tier 4)

Required: 85 FOC, 36 WIS

Provides:

+5 health/+10 endurance/+7 mind/+18 aether per level

+1 Milestone/12 levels

Cautious Surveyor Milestone: 9 FOC, +5 STR, +4 WIS, +3 CON, +1 AGI, 1% movement speed

Skillset: Environment / Control