Buttopia
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Chapter 42: Familiar Voices
🕑 Added 2024-12-12 00:00:04 +0000 UTC“What exactly makes the tent any safer?” I asked. As far as I knew, they generally only helped with the elements.
“Mel gave us a good deal on a D-grade tent yesterday. He figured we might need it at some point. It won’t defend us from a herd of those diredeer, but it should keep out any magic that’s blanketing the area,” Elicec answered for his brother.
“Ah, so you feel the weird peaceful feeling, too?” I asked, not really sure what it was.
“Yeah, I don’t trust it. I’d be even more worried if we hadn’t found the dungeon core but never trust a natural magical effect. Who knows what the cause or intention of it is,” Elicec said. I understood his point. In a world full of monsters and mana, not taking precautions was deadly. I stood up, feeling the effects of some healing magic kicking in. The food had restored some of my core energy and, in turn, had given me a tiny mana boost. I turned off regeneration and pain management, as they were the biggest mana draws, and just let cast and stitch do some work on my body.
“How long do you think we have until dark?” I asked. I wanted to make a trip back to where the ladder was and go over the corpses we’d left there. I wanted to make sure we grabbed any mana shards or anything else they might be carrying.
“About an hour, what are you thinking?” Cecile asked while staking down the tent.
“Going to run back to where we left the other diredeer. Figure we better grab anything we left behind; don’t want another animal coming along and gobbling up a shard, or who knows what,” I explained. I wasn’t actually sure if mana shards worked anything like a dungeon core, but it seemed like a bad idea to risk it.
“Good thinking. We can finish this up, should have it ready to go by the time you’re back, be careful, though,” Elicec said.
“Will do; see you all shortly,” I said, heading back into the woods. Our trail was easy enough to follow, thanks to the crushed plant life from our chase. I found the bodies just where we had left them and set to work picking out any of their shards. All ten each had one. The diredeer that had initially yelled at us had a whole backpack full of items. Where had it gotten that? Had they killed other adventurers and taken it? None of the possibilities I could think of were happy ones.
I opened my System storage and placed it on one of the shelves.
“Dave, wait, please!” a voice called out before I closed out the storage. There was only one thing I was aware of capable of intelligent speech in here, though it hadn't done so since I placed it in here.
“What? Find a new way to try to take over my body?” I asked, not sure if I should even be risking a conversation with it.
“No, I’m sorry okay. I’ve had a lot of time to think in here, and well, I’m really sorry. Can we just talk about it?” the dungeon core asked.
“I’ll consider it, but it won’t be happening right now. Maybe once I’m back in my room, and that’s a big maybe,” I said, closing the storage. What exactly did it want to talk about? Why did it feel like all my problems decided to grow bigger at the same time?
Once I arrived back at the camp, the brothers had already fully set up the tent, and it looked plenty big enough to fit us easily. They were sitting in front of a small fire roasting something. It smelled surprisingly good. Up until now, I hadn’t found any of their foods that appetizing, but this, I was tempted to give it a try.
“Hey Dave, find anything?” Cecile asked as I sat down on a log they must have placed for me.
“Yeah, that one that first attacked had a backpack. I haven’t gone through it yet, but isn’t that kind of weird?” I asked.
“It’s possible he got it from someone they killed, but yeah, kind of strange he just kept it. Usually, things like that get moved to a central collection spot or just destroyed. Once the dungeon core boss is smart enough, it generally wants everything for itself and then sometimes doles out part of the collection. I don’t see a whole backpack being something, though. We should check it out once we’re back at the archives with Mel. I might have a lot of knowledge skills, but he still has me beat,” Elicec said.
“What exactly do the knowledge skills do anyway? I know you said it helped with their weaknesses, but is that all? I haven’t touched any of them, figured I had more important things for my skill points,” I asked. I had figured they just gave more information about the monster’s species, but if Elicec was specializing in them, it seemed like they were worth more than that.
“Each rank directly helps you fight them; it kind of downloads information into your actions and reactions that automatically lets you better defend and fight back against the type of creature. My ultimate goal is to be some kind of magical sniper that pinpoints the weaknesses of anything we come across. I won’t be that great up close, but that’s what Cecile is for,” Elicec explained.
“Yep, sure am, can’t believe the hoe transformation worked. That was the first time I tried it out in a real fight. Pretty great, though, wasn’t it?” Cecile asked with a smile.
“It was definitely a big part of what got us through that fight. So, what are you two roasting over there anyway?” I asked, still hungry from earlier.
“Oh, this is a fruit Mel introduced us to. It’s called cloudum. Want some?” Cecile offered one that he already roasted. I grabbed the offered one and took a bite. A sweet and mildly spicy juice ran across my tongue. I liked it. I’d have to talk to Mel about some other potential food.
“That was great, thanks guys. Any objections if I head into the tent for an early night? I’m still pretty low on mana from earlier,” I asked, doubting they did.
“Nope, we’re heading in soon ourselves. I really don’t like the feel of the forest,” Cecile said. Elicec nodded his agreement.
I wasn’t sure I felt the same. Every since the weird statue had been destroyed, it felt peaceful to me. I didn’t know why we were having such a different feeling from it. It was possible they had very different senses than I did, which wouldn’t surprise me. Even on Earth there were plenty of animals with senses drastically different from humans, so I’d have to assume that the species of the Spiral had some of their own unique ones as well. I drifted off to sleep, trying to catalog all the ones I could remember from home, most of the list slipping away as sleep took me.
I woke up the next morning feeling more refreshed than I had in a while. Something about this place just felt nice to be here without diredeer. My core was fully replenished, as was my mana pool. Considering how unnerved brothers felt here, I was even more confused by the development and added it to the list of things to talk to Mel about when we returned.
I let the brothers sleep a little longer as I carefully climbed out of the tent to watch the rest of the sunrise. There was a man sitting on the logs around a freshly lit fire. He was cooking what looked like eggs in a cast iron pan on top of it. I knew the man, but it was impossible.
“Dad?” I whispered.
“No, not really, but come and take a seat. This seemed like a memory you enjoyed so I thought it might help relax you. I promise there’s nothing sinister here.” The voice matched the form in how convincingly it was my father. Not knowing what else to do, I walked back to my seat from the night before and sat down.
“It’s generally considered an asshole move to tarnish memories of loved ones where I come from. So, maybe not the best idea in the future. Who are you, and what do you want?” I asked, still not understanding what was happening here.
“I don’t really have a form that works in a reality like this, and you seemed to really like the memories of this man when I last saw you adrift in my home,” it said.
“So my dream of home, that was real then? And you somehow decided to follow me back here? Why?” I asked. Had this thing been causing what I was feeling here?
“Yes and no. I didn’t follow you anywhere, and while that wasn’t a dream, this is occurring in one, but it’s also real. This was the first time you’d been anywhere that the barriers were thin enough that I could reach you,” it said, pausing to place the eggs on a plate and pass them over to me. They smelled exactly like they had at the campfire my father and I had shared so long ago.
“None of that has answered why yet,” I said, taking a bite despite the danger. If it wanted to hurt me, I didn’t think there was anything I could do to stop it anyway.
“I don’t know, you were the first person I had ever seen there besides me. Before you, I had believed that there was only me, and now I just want to learn what else is out there or even how I came to be,” it said.
“Interesting, so my intrusion woke you up to the idea of consciousness. That has to be terrifying,” I replied.
“I don’t know if it is or not. Other than me, all I know is your memories. Would it be okay if I slip into your dreams when I can to learn more?” It asked. I didn’t really see any harm.
“Sure, but the next time we can have a conversation like this, I want to talk again. Just please pick a different form, okay?” I asked.
“Understood, and thank you, Dave,” it said. My eyes shot open.
What exactly are Gods? They exist. That much is known. Are they just extremely powerful people far along the System’s path, or are they representations of the System itself? We have enough recorded instances of their actions and presences even if we have no known first-hand accounts of their words to know something akin to gods roams somewhere out there, but whatever their greater place in the Spiral is either only known to them or people who are not sharing that information with others.
Grom’s Musings
