An average bonk is dumber, lazier, and uglier than the rock next to it. They are gray oblong denizens the size of ancient cows though have short stumpy legs and faces more wrinkled than raisins. But hey, at least they don’t have a smell and poop out stability fragments. You could rightly call them walking gold-mines.

Felix Andersson planned on buying a pile of bonks and living like a king when he made it big. For now, he focused on shifting through neon teal grass of Gunhild’s Bonk Ranch, hoping to fill his daily quota.

Smack in the middle of a rainwater puddle floated a promising milky lump. Felix sank his fingers into the slimy goop. He murmured a prayer to the Byss, “Don’t be shy, give me a prize...”

Felix’s goop drenched glove withdrew from the slime twenty stability fragments richer. After a quick wipe, he dropped the white fingernail-sized chips into a half-full waist basket.

“Hey hey, how’s the harvest?” The lazy voice belonged to Erik Gunsson, who hopped off a tall boulder. He had narrow sleepy eyes, short tousled hair as fair as Felix’s, and a five centimeter advantage on Felix. The chip picker’s suspender overalls fit him much better than the job did.

“Hey hey. It’s coming along.” Felix couldn’t hear a single chip rustling in Erik’s basket, and gave his friend an exasperated look. “And you? Do you even work here anymore?”

Erik laughed and patted Felix’s shoulder. “Sometimes. Mostly I’m making sure you don’t do anything stupid. Managerial benefits you see.”

“Right. She pays you what, half a chip an hour for that?”

“Plus coffee on breaks. Real beans.” Erik waggled his finger in mock pride.

Felix threw his hands up. “Real beans? Okay that's it! Tell me your secret. How does one get to become a big Mr. manager?”

Erik ran a hand beneath his smug chin. “With ruggedly handsome features and well timed compliments. See, old Gunhild isn’t exactly the summer rose she once was, but she still needs watering.”

There was a pause.

Felix’s face wrinkled up in a cringe. “Yikes.”

“Huh? Oh… Wait. No, no no. That’s not what I meant.” Erik’s face reddened. “My words are the water. I wouldn’t touch that hag.”

“Must be some delicious coffee.” Felix covered his mouth to hide a chuckle.

Erik flashed him a half-serious scowl. “Yea, yea. It’s hilarious. Drop it already.”

“Oh, sorry. You did set it up.” Felix’s conciliatory smile earned him a lingering glare, so he continued. “Come now. You know I’m just jealous for not being ruggedly handsome enough to get your job.”

“Hmph.” Erik straightened himself, his ego visibly recovering. “You’d get far by cutting your hair and growing a beard. Long hair makes you look girly.”

“It’s too patchy to grow out...” Felix breathed out and in, accepting the verbal blow for now. “Anyhow. I’m gonna comb the deepside for chips.”

An odd look crossed Erik’s eyes. “Wait, I’ll come along.”

“Finally decided you need to earn a wage?” Felix raised a brow.

Erik scoffed, a hint of a grin tugging his lip. “As if. Some of us are taking it easy because we’ve got bigger plans in life than to waste time as a safe-zone forager.”

“I have my own plans too.” Felix set his eyes on the path between rolling hills of knee-high grass broken by occasionally moving boulders, and softly mumbling bonks.

The deepside of Gunhild’s ranch was the only part of it not in the shadow of the Half-Valley’s abyssal port. Protruding from the cliffside, the web of piers and elevators loomed over the fenced safe-zones, bonk ranches, and delving access points. Incidentally, the deepside of Gunhild’s ranch had a number of sealed holes and crevices, which led into the deeper. Sometimes, you could hear Abyssal denizens scratching against them.

“Need any help with those plans? There are easier ways to earn chips than literally picking them up. Rejects gotta stick together after all,” said Erik.

“Thanks. I’m fine.” Felix left unsaid a comment about delvers having to earn their relics, and focused on not tripping into a hole.

“Nothing wrong with doing what we can to catch up. Most of them down there inherited legacy relics or their families had a relicwright design them one. Why should we waste another year of opportunities, when we can grab the chips, fame, and girls that we deserve today? We could be big and famous before next year’s interviews and get pushed straight past copper to iron torch.”

“I’ll think about it,” said Felix, pursing his lips together.

“You should.” Erik took a seat on top of a bonk. “You really should.”

“Mm-hm.” Felix wasn’t going to. Erik could keep his law-skirting side gigs to himself, so long as the guy didn’t end up in real trouble.

Mid-thought, Felix caught himself from stepping into a sudden plunge into blackness, and threw his weight back onto solid ground. “Crap!”

“Felix! You okay dude?” Erik sprinted over.

“Yeah. Dandy as a denizen.” Felix gathered himself and peeked into the two meter wide chasm. Smashed concrete and bent rebar clung to the edge. Behind it, the tunnel widened, twisted, bent, and branched into numerous dark crevies.

What little sunlight penetrated into the crevasse illuminated the weirdness growing on its walls. It was like someone had picked up a bunch of bugs, plucked their most alien appendages, and glued them into mis-matched bouquets. They jingled gently, while all manner of hairy blobs scurried underbrush.

Felix couldn’t take his eyes off the sight. “The Crawling Abyss. No…” He sniffed the hole and smelt a faint aroma of feet. “Fuzzy boys live in the Squirming Abyss, right? But how did they break the wall...”

“Let’s back off.” Erik pulled Felix’s arm. “The greedy hag must’ve neglected repairs.”

“Wait! What’s that?” Felix pointed down.

On a thin ledge seven meters down, nestled amongst foliage, pulsed a faint white light. The denizen was about bunny sized. It had beady eyes, x-shaped mouth, and two moth feelers growing from its head. In all his years of playing around the safe-zones, Felix had never seen the like, nor read of it in delvers’ logs. It was a deepborn denizen. Who knows how many yonders it had traveled to reach the surface? The real mystery, however, was how the denizen had obtained that bundle of delver’s foil, which its stumpy paws clutched. Felix had to investigate.

“What do you think, is that less than a turn down?” Felix glanced at the piers, trying to estimate whether he would still see them from that ledge.

“Even if it is, you aren’t supposed to go there.”

“There shouldn’t be anything too dangerous this close to the surface.” Felix unclipped his baskets and unfurled a rope from his safety harness, and handed the other end to Erik. “Could you gimme a hand?”

Erik didn’t grab the rope. “It’s so close to the surface, what are you even hoping to find?”

“The Abyss calls, so obviously I wanna take a look. Maybe I’ll see something new. Maybe I won’t.” Felix offered the rope again. “At worst, I’ll get to inspect a new denizen. It’s gonna be fun either way. C’mon. A quick delve in and out. Gotta stick out for each other, right?”

“Bah. Fine.” Erik took the rope begrudgingly and clipped it to his own harness.

“Thank you.” Excitement beamed into Felix’s smile. “Just a sec.”

He closed his eyes, focused on the stiffness of clear crystal and gooey stretchiness of web, and tugged on the relic buried in his soul. The relic answered.

A breath of winter blew through Felix’s bones. His muscles groaned as stiff webs intertwined with them. Manifested, the relic left Felix chilled, as if he’d finished a two day hike through winter. Felix rubbed his fingers to ward off the drawback.

“Okay. I’m ready.” He rappelled over the edge, his movements reinforced by the confidence in the relics power should he need it.

Fuzzy boys fled his presence, disappearing into their tiny burrows. A host of distant sounds echoed from the branching tunnels, and as he lowered into the cave, Felix caught glimpses of an underground trickle teeming with luminescent worms, a small swarm of walking patches of moss, and a stalagmite with a cozy little house built within it.

Fragile plants crumbled into dust underfoot, when Felix landed on the ledge. Cautiously, he leaned closer to the glowing white denizen. “Hey hey, you awake little buddy?”

No response.

“You’re asleep, huh?” Felix whispered.

The denizen wheezed and flickered faintly. However, it didn’t stir. Though Felix felt a pang of pity for the poor thing, his curiosity was tempted by what he thought was writing on the delver’s foil.

“Where did you find this?” Felix plucked the bundle from the denizen and felt its heft immediately. He couldn’t help but unwrap it.

The sight choked his breath to a cross between a ‘wow’ and a gasp.

Hidden amongst the red foil was a golden orb marbleized by animated stripes of rust-red that slowly shifted between incomprehensible patterns. Only once had Felix seen anything like it in a school economy textbook.

“A potency orb. A whole potency orb!” Felix’s hand trembled. He felt dizzy.

Erik shouted from above. “How’s the delve going?”

“Uhu…” Felix nodded, too dumbfounded to stitch together a proper reply. He turned over the delver's foil to read the dark-blue text.

̶B̶o̶y̶ ̶g̶i̶r̶l̶ ̶o̶t̶h̶e̶r̶ Dearest stranger,

Rejoice! This is your once in a lifetime ticket to success. Find me in the Hollow Conservatory, do me favor, and I’ll repay you with gratitude hunrdedfold the worth of this orb. My friend will guide you.

Yours truly,

—S

P.S. Sofie the Immortal plans on stealing Scandies soon. If you have loved ones there, you may wish to warn them. Consider this a freebie.

There were spelling errors, the blue ink was smudged as if written under duress, and yet every letter was decorated with ornate squiggles. The whole thing smelled five types of suspicious. It was absurd.

Felix laughed.

“All good down there?” Erik asked.

“Hey, Erik! Listen, this is hilarious!” Felix in his excitement, forgot about his relic-numbed fingers.

The potency orb slipped his cold stiffened fingers. Panicked, Felix grabbed it before it could fall and scratched the surface. One teensy flake fell off. Gently floating, it landed on a fuzzy boy cowering beneath a plant, and was immediately absorbed through its skin.

The logical thinker in the far reaches of Felix’s brain said ‘uh-oh’ and urged the rest of him to run. However, that part of him wasn’t in charge. The far less logical little kid part of Felix with a major wonderlust addiction told him to watch wide-eyed at the fuzzy boy. Golden light twinkled across its black spiky fur, as the denizen swelled to the size of a thumb, then fist, then melon, and then it kept growing past the point where all parts of Felix reached a unanimous agreement.

“Uh oh.”