Chapter 17

The Third Icon

They bought breakfast for a higher than expected price, and some dried food, then left. Just as they left town they saw farm fields lying dormant for the winter and hoped Calico farmers could grow crops soon, as the city food supplies were running low. As they walked Rome said “We got more experience from killing the bigger razorlings here than the smaller ones at Calico.”

Arden looked at him and said “You’re always so scientific and crunching numbers Rome. Just enjoy the travel.”

But Torger came to his aid. “That’s something good to know Rome. I want to hear about stuff like that. The more we know about Nuva, the better.”

Rome gave Arden a smile. “Okay Torger. It seems we get a total of about fifty experience points per level of monster we kill, but it’s not exact. I think younger weaker ones give less experience points. Also we should all gain another ability point with whatever we kill next.”

“Thank you Rome.”

They walked until sunset and set up camp. During Brun’s watch, around midnight, he saw a razorling on a hill. He went into Torger’s tent to wake him up. When they got outside, there were four razorlings walking towards the camp. Torger shouted “Everybody up!” and he banged on tent flaps.

Brun knew he had to slow them down. He cast Ice 1 at the nearest one, and it flinched, but the other three charged at him. He cast Ice 1 twice more before had to run away. Torger stabbed at the last one that wasn’t hit with the spell, but he didn’t want to strike until everyone was ready. Four fireballs came out of his sword and three hit razorlings, negating the slow movements Brun’s ice spell had caused. He circled it, keeping his sword pointed towards its face, and heard Brun running. Arden was the first one out of the tent and tried to keep one occupied with his spear.

One of the other razorlings chased Brun and the last one tore into a tent. Antic and Rome came out foggy eyed but ready. Antic stabbed the lizard and Rome used analyze.

Razorling Level 14. Health 304/400 Mana 0/0

Rome cursed his stupidity. He didn’t need to analyze it, he needed to cast Ice 1 at it twice. He went back into the damaged tent and found Antic’s spears. He came out and helped him keep it away.

Jex shot the one chasing Brun. He heard it hiss and he saw Graul was the last to come out of a tent. “Graul cover me!” Brun ran at Graul looking for protection. Graul stepped to the side as Brun ran past and sliced off the tail of the giant lizard. It turned and hissed at him, but kept running at Brun. Graul saw that it couldn’t turn quickly without its tail.

“Brun run in a circle back to me!” As he did, Graul cast Slow 1 at it, then Slow 1 at another lizard. The next time Torger’s sword sent out fireballs, those two reptiles continued to move at a slightly slower speed.

Brun in his panic ran in a perfect circle back towards Graul, which meant the lizard had a lot less ground to cover. Jex shot it with another arrow into a leg and it slowed down again. When it came near, a fireball hit it in the chest. Graul ran towards it and shoved his sword in its mouth as it Brun ran past him. Surprisingly, it bit on the sword and it took off Graul’s hand. He screamed in pain, but he had also delivered a fatal stab. It plowed face first into the ground. Before it died, another fireball hit it in the side, and that finished it off. Graul had never had trouble with stabbing razorlings in the face before; these were definitely more aggressive.

Brun looked to see the other three razorlings engaged in battle. Torger was doing fine staying away from his, and Arden and Rome were making weak stabs at one, while Antic was thrusting his spear at another. Brun cast Ice 1 at the one fighting Antic, and it slowed down a little. Jex had multiple arrows into the one Arden and Rome were struggling to keep away from themselves. A few minutes later the battle was over. Graul staggered to Torger, who took Rome’s staff, and cast Cure 1 twice. Rome knew that should be his job and said so, but Graul encouraged him to save up for it. Rome already had an ability point saved, and that fight got him a second ability point and brought him almost half way to the next one. He knew he might get Cure 1 within a day. But ultimately he decided against it. Rome bought five more mana so he could cast Analyze 1 and still have enough leftover to cast Ice 1.

Graul’s hand stopped bleeding, mostly. Arden retrieved his spear and they all went back to bed. In the morning Graul had a small half formed hand. Sleeping didn’t fully cure that severe of an injury, and Cure 1 didn’t speed up the regrowth. He knew he would be no good in a fight that day. Luckily they came to the south side of the lake by nightfall. They made camp and Rome checked his map. The icon was on the north side, so they could look for it the next day.

The next morning Graul was glad to have his hand back. He swung the sword several times, twisting his wrist to make sure everything worked right. They walked around the lake and were on the north side a couple hours before dark. Rome looked at his map and said they needed to walk a couple more miles, then they would be within one mile of it, in any direction. They didn’t like not knowing exactly where it was, but unless they wanted to bring some greedy dwarves they had to look for it on their own.

When they got right on top of the icon on the map, it disappeared. Rome told them to look around. They spread out and looked all over the steep cliffs on the west side of the river, but when dark came they had to make camp. As they sat around the fire Antic asked where it could be, but they all knew the answer; they had to cross the river and look on the other side. They went to bed dejected and thought about how to get across. It was winter and the foothills were cold that night, and the river was swollen with rainwater.

In the morning the others awoke and took down the tents, but Torger looked up and down the river trying to find a way to cross. If it came to it, they would walk downstream a mile and cross in cold calm water, but that would make them spend the rest of the day drying out next to a fire. There had to be a way to cross it without getting wet, but how?

As he was thinking about it, he saw something strange in the way the water was moving. Torger had been white water rafting many times before, and had a pretty good idea how to read the water to see submerged rocks, but this was different. After watching for a while, he said “You have got to be kidding me!”

The others walked over to him and asked what was wrong.

He pointed upstream. “You see how the water breaks there? It’s hitting a wedge shaped rock about a foot under the top of the river. And you see how it breaks over there? It’s hitting a large round rock about two feet down.” He pointed a little downstream. “What do you see there?”

They looked and Arden said “It’s just fast moving water.”

“No, it swells up a little. Right in the middle of the river, it flows like there are no big rocks under the surface, but it bulges and forms a straight line going across the river, about three feet wide.”

“So? It’s a square rock buried deep.” Arden was unimpressed.

“Straight lines are very rare in nature. If it were a rock, the water would be eating the sides, trying to make it round, or slamming into the center and making it concave. There is nothing the water is doing to make it straight while submerged. At least it would be a one in a billion shot.”

“So what do you think it is?”

“Based on the water I can see at the surface, a submerged treasure chest.”

“How are we supposed to get it out?”

“I’m working on that.”

Everyone looked at the water flowing quickly over the odd shaped bump. They all thought about it for a few hours, but no good ideas came up in conversation. Arden said “It seems the tyters meant to get to it during the summer when the water level is lower.”

Since winter had just began, and the river would get even higher with snow melt in four months, they had to get it out that day or come back in six months. After discussing it even more Jex asked “How do we even know it’s a treasure chest? What if we’re wasting our time looking at an anomaly in the water?”

Torger responded “If we had a ten gallon fish tank I could submerge it two inches and you would be able to kind of see the bottom. I wish the dwarves made glass.”

That gave Rome an idea. “Maybe we can hire the dwarves to dig a canal and divert the river.”

“Not a bad idea, but we don’t have much money to hire the dwarves near Parker. We would have to go all the way back to Calico, collect silver, then come back again.”

“I meant the dwarves of Calico who are building the aqueduct.”

They all thought about that. It would be a three day walk there and three days back, if they kept up a quick pace the whole way. Finally after discussing it some more Torger decided to try to get the chest out themselves, and if they failed then they would go get Stone Fist and his crew. He reached into his back pack and pulled out a strong rope, tied it to himself in a harness, and everyone else held on to it, slowly letting out slack as he waded into the water.

The water was very cold and his legs became numb. His leather boots did little to keep his feet from sliding and keep him from twisting his ankle on the uneven rocks he couldn’t see. As he got stomach deep the current was too strong and it swept him down river several feet, but his friends held the rope tight and began pulling him back. He made it back to shore, failed in that attempt, but had another idea.

“I want to get all the way across the river and tie the rope to the pine tree, and you guys tie the rope to the pine tree over there,” he said pointing at the Ponderosa Pine. “Then I’ll tie a short rope to the main one and can easily make it to the center of the river, being tethered from the middle instead of from a shore.”

Everyone but Graul looked at him like they had no idea if he was speaking English. Graul explained the process by describing a hammock that sags in the middle, and that sag, if rotated sideways, would be where Torger would be tied at.

Once again Torger waded into the water, but much further upstream this time. He swam across as best he could, but still ended up twenty yards downstream by the time he reached the other shore. The large rope was tied to him, with the others holding the other end. They tied the ends to the two trees, then Torger tied a smaller but strong rope to his harness and the main line. With much fear, he held on to the main rope with both hands while wading into the water.

After several feet, his hands slipped and he was whisked a few feet downstream before his anchor line stretched tight and held him. The force of the water pushed him under, but he was prepared for that, having been ready for a foot entrapment to end his life.

He had tied the anchor to near the top of his harness, and while under water turned to face upstream. He grabbed the rope with both hands and pulled himself forward against the current until his head broke the surface and he gasped for air. Knowing his muscles would only last for a few more minutes, he quickly pulled himself back to the main line. Once there he used his hands to once again drag himself to the center of the river. He took a deep breath, held it, then let go.

The water immediately sent him several feet downstream until the rope tightened again. He turned his body to face down and opened his eyes. His guesstimates had been nearly right on because he could just make out the top of a brown rectangle box a couple feet below his stomach. The box was mostly buried in silt. On top of the box was some sort of palm reader that looked like it was made for a very large, three fingered hand. The first thought that ran through his mind was “Maybe that opens the box and if I open it, all the potions will float away, and we won’t get any. Not gettin’ any is always a bad thing.” His next thought was “There is no way we’re pulling this thing out with human force. It’s buried too deep and the water is too powerful.”

That made up his mind for him. The box would be opened that day, whether on shore or at the bottom of the river. He reached down to touch it, but reaching two feet below his stomach from his prone position made his palm face the wrong direction. He tried to turn his hand over, but couldn’t quite place his palm flat against the hand indicator. He was two feet too far downstream. He rolled onto his back and pulled himself upstream, and below water, with a hand over hand motion along the rope. Once he went far enough, he held on with his left hand with all the strength he had, and rolled to be face down again. He reached out his right hand and was able to place his palm flat against the lid of the box.

A yellow light lit up around his hand, then around the box. He didn’t know what that meant, but he needed air. The box could wait. He rolled onto his back again and reached up to grab the tether with his right hand. When he moved his hand, the box broke free of the silt and flew to the far side of the river. Torger didn’t know what that meant, but he was seriously short of air. He began pulling himself up the rope, hand over hand. Finally he broke the surface and took in a big breath. The sound of roaring water flooded his ears, but after a few seconds he heard distant yells.

He looked over to the shore and saw his friends pointing to the other side of the shore and yelling something he couldn’t make out. He looked to see where they were pointing and saw the box levitating above the opposite shore. It had a yellow glow around it still, and his right hand was still glowing yellow. His arm muscles were burning and he had to get to the shore. He pulled himself all the way up the tether to the main line and began pulling himself along that rope to the shore. His arms were killing him, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to recover any strength while in the water. He finally made it to a point where he could wade to shore.

A few feet from shore his hearing returned to him. He heard Arden yell “Raise up your hand! Raise your hand!”

Torger held on to the rope with his right hand, since the river was pushing him to the left. He raised his left hand and waved at his friends. He was exhausted and needed to rest and didn’t need Arden’s silly games right then. But everyone yelled “Raise your right hand!”

Not in the mood to take orders, Torger walked to the shore. Graul ran at him and grabbed his right arm and picked it up. Torger was surprised and tried to shake off his brother, but he was too weak from the most intense game of Marco Polo ever. Graul brought Torger’s arm away from the shore, while at the same time turning Torger to look at the water. The box was coming towards them, half way across the river. The gold glow was pulsating quickly like a car blinker with one of the bulbs out. The box itself was continually slamming into rocks as it came towards them, the sides and bottom bent and banged severely, with a few holes in it. Torger raised his hand higher, and the box raised higher.

Stunned, he brought his hand above his head. The box moved toward him a few feet, then stopped again. The pulsating yellow light had now started in his hand. This seemed to be some sort of timer. A timer to what he didn’t know, but it seemed to be getting close to ending. Fearing the box may turn into some sort of bomb he yelled “Everybody down!”

Torger turned away from shore and threw his arm like pitching a baseball. The box flew over everyone’s heads. While it was airborne the yellow light around his hand and the box stopped. As soon as that happened the box lost most of its momentum and fell to the ground. The corner it landed on crumpled, but the rest of it seemed to be OK. Everyone ran at the box to see what was in it, except Torger who crawled to his back pack and drank one of the strength potions.

His burning muscles stopped hurting and he checked his Stats. It showed his strength was at 2/13. He felt weak and beyond tired. His stamina was 1/48. He didn’t know why it dawned on him that the river climbing gave him another stamina point. He wished he had a stamina potion. Instead he drank another strength potion, which added another point. Having a little strength and no energy, he lay there waiting to catch his breath. He could hear his friends cheering in the distance, and he was glad they succeeded.

After several minutes Rome came over and handed him a white potion. He said “Drink this and see what happens.”

Torger wasn’t usually prone for tricks, but Rome was usually trustworthy to not pull a prank on an injured man. Usually. Arden and Brun were a different story. “Did Arden tell you to give me this?”

“No, I used analyze on it. It says it’s a low level stamina potion.”

Torger drank it. He gained a little energy, but not much. “I feel a little better. It increased my stamina by two.”

“Good, drink another.”

Torger wanted to say they should keep it for later, but he really wanted to be able to stand up. He drank it and gained another two stamina, and with another minute of rest he was at 9/48. He got up and walked over to see the world’s ugliest treasure chest. Made out of a brown metal it looked like it had been used at a rifle range, in which most bullets weren’t powerful enough to penetrate it. The dents were deep and everywhere, and there were five dime sized holes.

“How did any potions survive in this?”

“A few were broken, but most are safe, no thanks to you,” scolded Arden. “They would have all been fine if you didn’t keep slamming the box into every rock in the river while you came back to shore.”

Torger thought about his hand over hand movements pulling himself along first the tether then the main line to get back to shore, and imagined the box going left, right, up, down over and over again. The thing had to be nearly indestructible to withstand that abuse. But instead of saying that he chose to say “Sorry I was too focused on not drowning to care about the box for those twenty seconds.”

Arden gave him a look that was a mixture of anger and understanding compassion. “Just come see what we got.” Neither man was going to apologize and they both knew it. Arden was a natural Alpha male and Torger was a natural lone wolf, but now Torger was becoming in charge of the group and neither of them liked it.

Torger walked to the box and looked inside. His jaw dropped open and he had no words to say at the beauty inside the forgettable utility box.

Chapter 18

More upgrades

It took until after dark, but Rome analyzed and separated all the different types of potions. When he was done he made a list and handed it to Torger.

Health potions Low-12 Mid-13 High-13

Mana potions Low-13 Mid-13 High-12

Strength potions Low-19 Mid-12 High-13

Stamina potions Low-10 Mid-13 High-12

Rome said “They all started with fifteen, but some broke. You drank two low stamina potions, and we had seven low strength potions left over from the bear caves. We know for health and mana potions they restore nine points for low and nineteen for mid, and low strength restores one and low stamina restores two. We don’t know what the other ones do.”

Torger looked at him. “Rome, the elves sold me mid level health potions for three silver coins each. This would be a lot of money if we didn’t need it for ourselves.”

They both stayed awake after the others went to sleep talking about what to do next. When Rome’s shift was over Torger still didn’t have a plan of what was most important, but they woke up Graul for his shift and went to bed.

The sun was bright when Torger woke up. It was an unusually warm day for what might have been new year’s. Jex was cooking a deer leg over the fire and others were taking down a tent and packing bags. Graul and Arden were trying to get the treasure chest into the duffle bag. It finally expanded enough and then the box shrank in size to one twentieth and weight to one tenth the original.

As they ate breakfast Torger asked no one specifically “What do we do now? We can kill all the tyter prey south of here to complete the dwarf quest, or we can go to Yosemite to get the last icon of the tyters, or we can go take revenge on the goblins. I favor going back to Calico to get our steel armor. It was no fun fighting razorlings with leather armor.”

As before, Arden wanted to get the grenade icon from Yosemite and Brun wanted to take revenge on the goblins, but everyone else decided they needed better armor before they could do anything.

They headed back to Parker and again paid three coppers each to set up a tent in the town square for the night, and again overpaid for breakfast and rations. As they were leaving they were stopped by the guards.

“Word has come to us that you intend to free the dwarf slaves from the goblins and make them your own slaves. We were instructed to tell you that you will do no such thing until the annual council is concluded. As mayor of a dwarf village, you are required to attend. It will be held here in one month.”

Torger asked “One month from today? Or is it four weeks?”

Both guards looked away and refused to answer any questions. Torger got no further information from them. He would have to rely on Baybil for that. He also realized he would have to gain some respect points from the dwarves at Parker, so he didn’t completely offend the host village.

They left and had no incidents getting back to Stone Fist. The aqueduct to the Troll cave was coming along nicely, but they still had a long ways to go. Looking at all the stacked up stones to keep it level made Torger wish they didn’t have earthquakes. It wouldn’t take much of a jolt to bring it down. The next day they said good-bye to Stone Fist and his crew and headed toward Calico. At the end of the day they came to the six dwarf crew that was making the road. Torger was pleased to see their progress and told them to help with the aqueduct once they got there. They slept well that night and made it back to Calico two days later.

It was raining hard when they entered late at night. A guard stopped them, and once they identified themselves they walked through the shield and straight to their stone house. Arden lit a fire in the corner and they all fell asleep once they stripped off their wet coats and boots and dried off.

The rain had turned to snow at some point in the night. Rome was the first one of his friends to wake up and he walked outside. It was surreal to look up and see the bottom of snow sitting on top of the dome shield. Rome was amazed it didn’t recognize snow as an enemy trying to break in. Ever since coming to Nuva he had been bouncing around from place to place and one adventure after another, and being here in a small village of dwarves felt a little like coming home after a vacation that lasted too long. He knew they would likely leave again the next day, but being somewhere somewhat familiar and safe gave him a peace and happiness that caused him to have a big smile as he walked back in to the house and throw a snowball at a sleeping Arden. Everyone laughed, including Arden and a massive snowball fight ensued.

They enjoyed a breakfast of omelets. Thankfully the dwarves had been using the little goat milk the village produced to make cheese. Torger was delighted to see the village had almost completed a second common house to fit another twenty dwarves in it. That would still leave some dwarves sleeping in tents, in addition to the dozen that were making the path to Indio and aqueduct to the iron mine. While they had been gone Baybil’s and Strong Arm’s families were sleeping in the mayor’s house, and that still left room for the Regulators to fit inside, if a little cramped. But Torger wanted as many dwarves inside buildings as possible and having a leader from each of the two villages show cooperation in living together might help diffuse tensions built up from jealousy.

Strong Arm had been busy while they were gone. In his smithy he presented the four melee regulators with full sets of steel armor, and Rome and Brun each received a spare silver staff. Torger said “Wow Strong Arm, this is amazing! We are much better equipped for battle now. What do we owe you?”

“I’m glad you like it. It took the last of my iron to turn it into steel to complete everything, and I’ve accepted all the silver left over from the mines which belonged to the village. Even with that, you still owe me ninety silver coins.”

“Whoa, that’s a hefty price my friend. It’s a bit more than I expected. I hope the dwarves who work for the village have been paid.”

“Of course they get paid first, just as you directed. And I told you, as iron diminishes, the price goes up. And I am being reasonable. Hastaff I’m sure would have charged you more. Go ask him if you don’t believe me. Those two staffs of course took a lot of silver, and repairing the steel armor wasn’t all that expensive. But making a steel shield for Graul and steel spears for Antic and Arden took a lot of work and material.”

Everyone exclaimed “What? What do you mean?”

With a huge grin Strong Arm went to the back of the smithy and brought back a steel round shield and two steel spears, just as he promised. The three men they belonged to greedily stepped forward and accepted their new equipment.

“Strong Arm, I don’t know what to say. This is magnificent. I’ll bring you your payment right away.” Torger left to go back to the house to retrieve the last two gold coins he had saved from Treluge’s pouch. Graul, Antic, and Arden stepped out of the smithy and Graul held up the steel shield while the other two lightly stabbed at it with the steel spears. Brun went to put the two extra silver staffs in the duffle bag, leaving Rome and Jex behind.

Rome asked “How much is my cut? Maybe a half pound of ore?”

Strong Arm answered “Sorry Rome. This armor and spears has taken all of my time. The dwarves have been taking their silver to Hastaff to purify it. Maybe in a few weeks you’ll get a few good sized nuggets.”

Rome wasn’t too disappointed. He was glad the other black smith was getting a lot of work. That helped to ease jealousy between them. Jex asked “Do you have any steel or magic arrowheads for me?”

“Sorry Jex, as I said I ran out of iron. But I was able to make you eight more silver arrowheads, each with a fire damage of one. I used an amethyst for each of the silver staffs, and it would take an equivalent gem to make twenty-five arrowheads with fire one. Those gems are very expensive and rare, and each arrowhead only casts the spell once. It’s a horrible waste of money. But if you’re looking to waste money on arrowheads, the elves could make them have stronger magic value. Say lightning two on twenty-five arrowheads for a ruby like the one on Torger’s sword.”

“Just the one damage point from fire is still good. How come when I shoot a magic arrow, the spell only works one time, then it becomes a normal silver or iron arrowhead? Graul and Torger’s swords keep casting fire damage over and over again.”

“Their swords have a gem embedded that holds the spell. The gem became the source of magic with whatever the elves do to it. Your arrow heads have a spell cast on them, not in them, and when the arrow strikes the spell is used up. You would have to place a gem in each arrowhead to use the spells over and over again. Like the silver staffs I make. They’re not just a straight rod of silver. You see how they come to a point at the bottom, have a curve where the hand goes, and a large round bent top. The shape itself helps amplify spells, but there is a topaz, pearl, amethyst, or something like that in the staff itself that also helps to amplify the spells. Better quality staffs use better materials. With arrowheads we infuse the spell into the gem then melt it with the iron before separating and making individual arrowheads. The gem is destroyed in the process.”

Jex thought about the implications. Maybe she could get a gem embedded into her bow that would cast a spell on the arrows. In fact, maybe that’s how the Bow of the Owl worked. And getting staffs that would make spells even stronger seemed to become a priority.

As she and Rome were thinking about these things Torger returned. He handed a gold coin to Strong Arm. “You said I owed you ninety silver. I assume you have change.”

“Of course I do.”

After the exchange he handed Baybil a gold coin. “I still owed you five gold, now I owe you four.” Baybil accepted the payment and Torger pushed aside thoughts of being broke yet again.

“While we were travelling we heard all dwarf mayors have a meeting in a month, and I was told I should be there. Do you know about that?”

“Yes I do. It’s not all dwarf mayors around the planet, it’s mayors of the Cucamonga tribe. It’s very important that you attend.”

“Yes I want to talk about the dwarf slaves. I wasn’t given an exact date to be there.”

“Not to worry. It is in twenty-six days. I will leave here in twenty-one days.”

“Thanks Baybil. We should travel together. Is there anything going on in the village I should know about?”

“No, everything is running smoothly. Finally. Twenty-one miners from Calico go gather silver each day, and most of my dwarves from Small Hammer are building the path, the aqueduct, or Lake Silverwood. There is still a little greed and resentment that they can’t mine silver, but everyone is working hard and well supplied with food, water, and tools.”

Torger, a man of efficiency, was beaming with pride. He loved city building games back home, and now he was doing it in real life. Of course managing all the little intricate details was much more difficult in real life, but Baybil and Strong Arm were good trustworthy dwarves who carried out his plans. But he could also see that the larger a village became, the more difficult keeping morale high and crime low would be. And managing Calico and Indio at the same time would be near impossible. But he pushed that to the back of his mind. He had to try out their new steel armor and spears.