Ch 28

Casimer and Melchsee were sitting in an office, about a cubic foot in size. To call it an office, though, would a major deception. It could, instead, be described as a room which was eerily close to looking like an office, as though it rested in the uncanny valley of room design. The office was made from dirt and ideas Casimer had no concept for, and suffered appropriately from that disadvantage.

A major argument that had gone into it's creation was about what exactly a water cooler was, and why it was so important. Casimer had been baffled and irritated by the simple design, and eventually outright refused to create one. Instead, an extremely crude and artistically questionable bronze statue of an insectoid chimera stood in it's place. The statue was a new effort for Casimer, the first time he had created something from an original idea, rather than simply replicate something he had absorbed. From there, their argument had devolved into a harsh critique of Casimer's work, shaving bits away and reconstructing it entirely. It's final incarnation was a sort of scorpion centaur with the top half being a vaguely manlike spider with pincer arms. Clutched in one of the pincers, folded as though being crushed, was a tiny water cooler with a continuous stream of water coming out of it like a fountain.

Casimer sat, resting in a humanoid form, made of thick dust, his gem hidden inside the body. His face was ill defined, featureless, like a mannequin. The particles that made up his body were dry, fine fragments of dirt that formed a hard packed cloud, the surface of which seemed to have storms of microscopic specks in ever changing, fractal patterns.

“They really place a lot of value on water, then,” Casimer said, sounding mildly put out, sitting with his face against the desk, breaking Melchsee away from her train of thought. One of his arms turned into a smooth tentacle that deftly removed the bronze water jug, the pincer unclenching to release it, then placing it in the center of the table “If they're really making things like this to dispense it in such exact quantities. Just look at it,” he said, body unmoving “what is it you said, that 'if manufactured correctly, not a single drop of water will be wasted in dispensing', isn't that what you said.”

“You are really making a much bigger deal about this than I expected,” Melchsee said, preparing to explain the basic reality of living in a world that had limited, not unlimited, resources “but yes, water is an absolutely crucial resource for all living creatures here on earth.”

“Not to me,” Casimer said “I don't get thirsty. You know what I do get? Hungry.”

“I see,” Melchsee said.

“I didn't even know the meaning of that word until we went to that Dungeon of Dungeons. The air there is thick with, with. . . food. That was the first time I wasn't hungry, and it felt amazing, like I was suddenly alive for the first time. Now? Now that I've experienced that? I'm,” he paused, and the building around them collapsed, turning to dust “Discontent.”

“I am aware, and have been working hard on multiple solutions to the problem,” Melchsee said, projecting a clipboard into her hands from the opal in her forehead.

“I'm sure you have,” Casimer said “and I'm sure they'll work. I need to eat now, today, or I'm going to go crazy. I'm already halfway to creating a swarm of infernal insects and eating every living thing on this mountain. I know it's a stupid idea, the meager life of this place is all that's keeping me going, but I'm not thinking straight!” Casimer shouted, his voice shaking the mountaintop, all the space he controlled, yet still managing to sound weak. “Ever since I merged with that second core, my appetite has just grown larger, and it's getting bigger every day. I need more than a light snack, Melchsee, a couple of mice and some bugs aren't cutting it anymore.”

Melchsee looked at him, and then, like some mental dam breaking, she spoke.

“Well, I've got a solution for that as well. Do you remember when I had you send a giant mouse outside the dungeon?”

“Yes, of course,” Casimer said “you wanted to see how long it lasted.”

“Yes, and it lasted over four hours,” she said “and then it suddenly fell apart. Remember why?”

“It's core wasn't being powered by me anymore, and it's physical form fell apart as a result. After four hours, there wasn't any mana left in it.”

“Correct. Though, my demands are considerably more extreme than a large rodent, and so I will need the largest core we have available.”

“Why?” he said, and in the distance, a giant tree collapsed and a basketball sized rough crystal core shot in their direction. “Where are these things coming from anyways, I'm sure as fuck not- nevermind, I don't care. Why do you need this?”

“Because I'm going to need a big battery if I want to go into town and grab us a bite to eat.”

–

Melchsee had been as surprised as Melmat when The Master picked this mountain in the middle of Nevada as the location for their ritual. She had always placed her chips over the Atlantic ocean, somewhere off the eastern coast of Florida, somewhere with lots of aquatic life and a reputation for unstable space, but she couldn't argue with results. . . They had succeeded, the Dungeon was here. She just wished it had taken her like they had planned instead of. . .

Melchsee flew, the core heavy inside of her body, keeping her solid in the world outside the dungeon. It was hot, like a burning coal as the mana inside of it evaporated out into other dimensions, no longer stabilized by Casimer's influence. After how off the rails things had become, she was surprised that they had been right about anything, that even a single one of their theories was proven correct. Mana would never exist in this universe, and never could. Not without help.

It was such a strange substance, the medium through which thought could interact with the physical; the emulsion agent which could mix oil and water. Mana, stable mana, that was the philosophers stone her master's people had been chasing for millennium, the ultimate prize for a hidden civilization who had mastered their minds and dominated the lesser man-apes effortlessly. They had mocked him, cursed him, banished him; called him a madman and a traitor to their ideals; said he threatened their supremecy upon the Earth. Melchsee remembered his anger at how they ruled the world like a farm, controlling the weak, unenlightened humans like cattle. This world was meant to be a garden, running wild yet carefully maintained.

Vengence. . . they didn't know it yet, but vengence had been wrought upon them.

She flew, the shadow painted night desert was a blur below her, rushing towards the nearest town. She knew every detail of every map she had ever read, and that information told her to head to Hope.

She laughed a little to herself. Sometimes, life was just funny.

–

The men she returned with walked as though asleep, led around by a length of long string tied around their wrists. There were four of them, walking in a single file line, Melchsee ahead of them, holding the string like a leash. They had tied themselves up, after Melchsee had asked them too. They walked up the mountain, rough terrain going unnoticed, until all at once, the path became smoother, as though it had been prepared just for them.

“Let them loose,” Casimer's voice whispered in her ear.

In response, Melchsee nodded, then vanished with a bright burst of light, and the sound of clapping. The men suddenly stood up, alert, looking around and wondering what had happened, and why they weren't at the bar anymore.

“Who are they,” Casimer asked, voice ringing out across his domain, a note of desperate hunger in his voice.

“Bad men with interesting guns,” Melchsee replied, though the bad men in question couldn't hear her speak. They were each short, stocky men with bald heads, each of them had automatic rifles strapped on their backs.

One of the trees rose up from the ground, standing twenty feet tall, trunk splitting and forming legs and arms. The men couldn't see it, but embedded near the top was an oval stone six inches long that shone with an inner, swirling purple light.

One of the men screamed, his voice raspy and half drunk as he readied his weapon and fired. They all did, and sprays of red mist came from where the massive tree was struck, and did nothing to slow it's slaughter. It moved faster than something of that size should have been able to, piercing a man and tossing him aside. The ground shook with Casimer's relief, something like the scream of a reptile and the roar of a mammal filled the air, the death easing his pain and clearing the fog from his mind.

Casimer attacked with vicious, savage attacks, ripping the men to pieces with terror inducing strength, the air vibrating with a low, painful tone. The final man was struck with such force that his body ripped in half at the middle, the pieces flying in separate directions. The tree planted itself into the ground, vibrating slightly, blood dripping from it's leaves and branches.

“Why did you use something so big?” Melchsee asked, awe in her voice.

“Why?” Casimer said with a drunk, half delirious laugh “Because I didn't want them to even stand a chance.”

–

Their bodies disappeared, along the scattered blood, and their clothing, everything save one rifle. There was a pop of light, and a creature that looked exactly like one of the recently deceased men materialized, naked. The beast-man responded to some silent psychic urging, and grabbed the weapon, taking aim and opening fire. Brass casings sizzled as they bounced off of his naked body, but he didn't seem to notice the pain.

“So that's how it operates,” Casimer said, the mechanical movements of the rifle in operation firmly recorded in his mind. He sent the monster away to patrol the area, it loped about on all fours and occasionally attacked a bug. There was another pop of light, and an automatic rifle materialized. It was gripped by unseen telekinetic energy, projected by Casimer, and as it opened fire, it was totally stationary in the air, as though embedded in stone.

“Hmm.” Casimer seemed amused by something, and the weapon in his hands blurred for a moment, and when it normalized, a smoking, glowing red gem was embedded into a solid magazine fused with the gun. When the trigger was pulled, the gem glowed, and bullets of pure mana flew uninterrupted for forty-fie seconds, devastating the rock wall, leaving a noticeable depression of pock-hewn stone.

The gem stopped glowing for about five seconds, and then flared back to life, and Casimer fired for another forty-five seconds.

“I would call that a straight upgrade,” Melchsee said, scanning the weapon and then projecting a window with all the technical details, a parts list, and a general overview of the weapon. Seemingly on a whim, though Casimer was beginning to suspect that nothing this being did was an accident, Melchsee managed to attach the window to the core. It vanished and reappeared whenever she touched it.

Automatic Mana Rifle

An original creation of The Dungeon, this weapon stores ambient mana and is capable of expelling it with devastating force. Fully expending the charged mana will cause the weapon to become inert until it has fully recharged.

“Well, isn't that handy,” she said, sounding pleased.

Casimer's gem was deep inside his growing pond of liquid mana, but his presence was everywhere on the mountain. His attention moved like the wind through his territory, causing grass to sway, and dead matter to vanish. His presence was especially strong in the oasis, near Melchsee as she worked. It was something that could be felt, the feeling of another being present.

He created another modified assault rifle, then a body of dirt to hold it, then waved a dirt hand and conjured a status window before attaching it to the new gun.

“You never told me how you managed to do that,” Melchsee said, attention focused on manually editing her analysis of the gun as she took it apart and examined it more closely.

“What, the window trick? It's really not that hard to figure out,” Casimer said, “Even a bug could do it, probably.” He was quiet for a while, and then started speaking again. “You know, a part of me thought I would want go back to that place we met Labrynthee, the dungeon of dungeons,” he said “but now that I'm here, satisfied and relaxed, I don't think this world is so bad after all. It's actually rather beautiful.”

“Oh really,” Melchsee said, and through their psychic link, Casimer could feel something akin to disgust mixed with amusement, along with something painful he couldn't identify.

“This place,” he said, lifting a ball of dirt, grains tightly packed together but never touching “is far more complex than that otherworld. Take this dirt, for example. The further I examine it, the more secrets it reveals to me. The fossilized remains of an endless number of creatures are buried inside of here, tiny fragments of plants and animals like little pieces of a puzzle, waiting to be fit together. The dirt in that other place, that dungeon. . . there was nothing to it at all. The same tiny cube, endlessly repeated.”

“Melchsee,” he said “I'm tired of starving. I want to live here, in this beautiful world, and enjoy my life, however long it might be. I don't know how I'll manage it, but I will. Will you help me?”

“I'm not free,” she said immediately “You'll have to pay me. I didn't particularly enjoy breaking the minds of those men and leading them here for the slaughter, no matter what kind of criminals they were. It was horrible.”

“Oh? I see then. What would you like? I'm sure I can give you just about anything, given enough time.”

She tapped the side of her face, walked around for a few seconds, then broke out into a broad grin.

“A castle. A big castle and ten thousand servants.”