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Chapter 242: Cube - Markets and Multiverses
🕑 Added 2024-05-09 06:21:30 +0000 UTCSlippy and his group continued walking through the wilderness, slowly approaching the mountains. His group had dodged six different groups of coalition soldiers over the past week. Despite the danger lurking in the area, Slippy had never felt more alive.
The two weeks he had been free had been eye-opening. He wasn't a soldier or an assassin anymore. He was free to live his own life and make his own decisions. Nobody ordered him to go to the lab and run tests. Nobody ordered him to wake up at the crack of dawn for training. Nobody made him infiltrate enemy camps and kill soldiers or leaders. He was in charge of his own life now. And Slippy was starting to love that feeling.
Which was also why he had chosen the destination for the group.
The mountain range on Verne’s southern border.
Rumor had it that a few years ago, there had been some sort of catastrophe that decimated the area. Both sides had fought over something, only to have it blow up in their faces. Most of the mountain range had collapsed during a massive earthquake. Once the battle had ended, both sides had ignored the area afterwards.
Slippy figured both sides had probably fought over a Zelyrian artifact that caused earthquakes. Some madman had then activated it in the middle of battle. Probably the losing side. Having worked with the military, he knew how spiteful the generals were. The moment they started losing, they threw a temper tantrum and blew everything up.
It was part of the reason that the civilian casualties were so high during the war.
Either way, no soldiers went into the area anymore. No civilians risked travelling through the area either, because it was dangerous. But all seven children in his group had abilities and exceptional physiques. They might be able to survive where others couldn't. And the biggest threat right now was being captured by the coalition.
“The mountains really do look awful,” said Mint, breaking Slippy out of his thoughts. "Are you sure
Slippy looked up, and couldn’t help but agree. The mountains barely looked like a mountain range now. Entire mountain had turned into rubble or sunk into the earth. It looked like a giant had carelessly knocked over children's wooden blocks. The once towering mountain range had been leveled.
Slippy looked at his best friend, and sighed, before he nodded.
“It may look awful, but that also means nobody will find us for a while. We can hide out there until we grow up. After that, we won't have a hard time blending into a city anymore,” said Slippy, before sighing. “Well, for now, we need a place to hole up and get our bearings,” he said. "We can make more concrete plans after that." The food that they had taken with them was starting to run low. One of their group members could gather water from their surroundings, so water wasn't a problem. But without food they would still starve sooner or later.
Mint sighed, but nodded. “All right. I’ll trust your judgment. But we need to be careful about landslides. Only Vim can survive being buried alive.”
"We don't have much of a choice. If we go somewhere else, we’ll get caught by the coalition. Besides, there haven’t been any reports of landslides or earthquakes in the past three years. Whatever destroyed this mountain range should have been a one-time thing. We’ll be safe for a while if we hide out here.”
Mint sighed, but she didn’t say anything else as the group continued walking. Slippy could feel anxiety radiating off of his best friend, but couldn't think of a way to reassure her. Despite his confident attitude, he was also a little worried about landslides.
Soon, they reached the foot of the mountains. Mint scratched her head as they got a closer look at some of the damage done to the mountain range.
“Slippy, are you sure that earthquake magic did all this?” She asked, as she pointed at a nearby crater.
Slippy looked at the crater and frowned. The crater that mint was pointing at was a perfectly spherical chunk of missing earth. There were no nearby objects that could have fallen and created an impact crater. And Slippy didn't think impact craters could be so perfectly spherical, either. It almost looked like the ground itself had vanished into thin air. He had no idea what he was looking at.
He scratched his head in confusion. “I… I don’t know. That doesn’t look like earth manipulation. I was so sure it was earthquake magic…” he said. Maybe he had been too confident about their destination? He started to feel more nervous. If he had misled the group, he would feel awful.
“I don’t think it was earthquake magic either. Maybe the earth was teleported away?” said Del, taking a step closer to the giant crater. “I remember a kid I worked with a year ago could teleport earth around. When she used her ability it looked kind of like this.”
Slippy looked at the spherical crater, before he nodded. “That’s not something I thought of, but it makes sense to me. It would also explain all of the landslides and destruction here...” he trailed off, as he tried to imagine bits of mountain teleporting away. Part of him wondered where the random chunks of mountain went if they teleported away. Maybe they got teleported into the ocean? A moment later, he shook his head. “It doesn’t matter to us now. In fact, that makes me a lot more confident about hiding out here. There's no way teleportation can happen without a lot of essence. There's no chance of it happening accidentally. So if we hide here, we just need to worry about more mundane landslides.”
A few of the other group members hesitated, before some of them nodded in agreement. Slippy turned towards another of the group members.
“Melody, can you get me some eyes in the sky? I want to see if there’s a particularly stable-looking area,” said Slippy. Melody nodded, and Slippy felt a surge of essence leave Melody’s body before it drifted into the air. A few moments later, she grinned.
“If we can make our way over that mountain, there’s a little valley on the other side. It's less than two kilometers away." Then, she gasped in excitement. "I see berry bushes and rabbits in the valley! I can also see some wild carrots. We can definitely forage for some food there. Maybe we can even settle and start stocking up for winter. We still have plenty of time to get food reserves ready, as long as we work fast,” she said. Then, Melody turned towards Will. “Hey Will, can your ability help plants grow?”
“I don't know. I could try..." said Will. “It’s not what I usually use my ability for. Once we get there, I'll give it a shot,” he said.
"If it doesn't work, don't worry about it," said Slippy. "I know you're a lot better at using vines to strangle people. You could still help us catch rabbits, even if it doesn't work for growing berries.” Will looked a little less nervous after that statement.
Slippy grinned as he imagined settling down for a few days, or even a few months. It was all coming together. Food and water were secure. They could build a few huts with some time and effort. As long as they all pitched on, they could survive here. Someday, they could leave and really live lives of their own.
“All right, let’s keep moving. I want to get there in an hour or two if we can,” he said, before leading his group forward.
A few minutes later, Slippy spotted a purple-green rock sticking out of the soil. It looked like a miniature pyramid, and stuck out like a sore thumb. Slippy frowned.
Gold-purple wasn't a type of rock he had ever encountered before.
Caught by curiosity, Slippy walked a little closer. After a few moments, he realized that he wasn't looking at a rock or a pyramid at all.
Instead, he was looking at the edge of a buried cube of metal. Next to the cube, there were also a few tattered pieces of clothing. Slippy had no idea what happened to the owners of that clothing.
How odd, he thought, as he leaned down to touch it. He could only see a corner of it, but when he tried to move it, he realized that the cube must be quite large. It might even be the same size as he was.
“Can you help me dig it out, Vim?” he asked.
“I got it,” said Vim, as her arms started to shimmer with essence. A few moments later, she plunged her arms through the dirt, almost as if it were air, and then grunted with effort. “It’s way bigger than I thought,” she said, before she managed to drag a large metal cube out of the ground.
Slippy looked at the weird metal cube, and his confusion deepened. The cube's exterior had intricately carved symbols on it. The symbols crackled with a weird type of essence that just felt wrong to him. The cube was nearly half the size that he was.
It was a Zelyrian artifact.
“Hmm…” said Slippy, as he inspected the weird cube “What the heck is this thing?”
“Maybe it’s the artifact that made this mountain range blow itself up?” asked Mint, as she squinted at it. “I don’t know if messing with it is a good idea. If we cause another earthquake to start right on top of us, we could die.”
Slippy nodded. Mint was right. He was curious, and he even had thoughts of using a Zelyrian artifact to keep everyone safe. But activating an unknown Zelyrian artifact was dangerous. “Let’s bring it with us, but make sure not to feed it any essence or touch the surface of the cube. Only touch the mud caking most of the exterior. In fact, Vim, could you smear some more mud on the uncovered metal?” he asked. Vim nodded, and added some mud to the only uncovered parts of the cube. Slippy grinned. “Let’s make sure we don’t push a button and kill ourselves.”
They could always inspect the cube later, when they had settled down for the night. Slippy wasn't dumb enough to feed an unknown artifact essence - but he still wanted to see what the cube did. It might turn out to be a valuable way to keep the group safe later.
Author’s Note:
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Comments
Rain
TFC
Adleiavde
TFTC, but there seems to be a lot of typo and small errors. Early in the chapter Mint's question is cut off. The 'rock' also turns from green-purple to gold-purple. There are a few other mistakes so the chapter might require some proofreading asap.
