Chapter 110 (Patreon)

The first thing Donut did was bounce over to the mailbox and grab her spellbook-of-the-floor club prize as we headed toward our personal space.

“Maybe it’ll be a flying spell,” Katia muttered.

“We won’t be so lucky,” I said.

We did, however, have three very rich sponsors amongst us, and we were about to receive three more. I hated, absolutely hated, having to depend on them for help, but I was at a loss as to what we were going to do.

“What’s the point of being able to leave the bubble if we can’t get into the other bubbles?” Katia asked.

“Right now we need to focus on that flying castle,” I said.

Imani: Hey, Carl. What’s a backstay?

Carl: In sailing terms? It’s the rigging that runs from the mast to the back of the boat. There are different kinds.

Elle: There are 20 of us, and not a one of these old farts has ever sailed a boat. Can you believe that? I told them not to put me into Meadow Lark. I would’ve been better off in one of the more expensive old folks homes surrounded by rich old codgers who grew up on boats, but no. The system is giving us a sailing tutorial, but it doesn’t tell us where the things are. How are we supposed to pull the boom vang when we don’t know what it is? This thing is more complicated than those trains.

Imani: We need to figure this out quickly. There are rocks everywhere. What’s a spinnaker? Wait, never mind. We don’t need that part yet.

Carl: Jesus, you guys need to be careful. Sailing a boat isn’t something you can figure out on the fly. It takes months.

Imani: We would have an NPC helping us if Elle hadn’t iced him.

Elle: He was being suspicious. We’re on our way back to the floating island. If we crash this one, we crash. There are boats everywhere. We have our pick.

Imani: Not all of us can float, Elle.

Carl: Weren’t you on the island already? You know what, never mind. Just be careful.

Donut gasped. “Carl, Carl, I got a good one this time!” She glowed as she read the book.

I took a deep breath. “Donut. We talk about the spellbooks before we read them. Remember?”

“Unwad your panties, Carl.”

Katia laughed. “You got that from Elle.”

“I know, right? She’s been teaching me sayings from the olden times.”

“That’s not very princess-like,” I grumbled.

“Oh, Carl. Just chillax.”

“That is a good spell,” Mordecai said. “It’s another utility spell, like Hole.”

“What is it?”

“Astral Paw,” Mordecai said. “Not as good as Astral Hand because there’s no thumb to manipulate and hold things. But there’s more force to it, especially at higher levels, and it can be used as a weapon. She can grow claws on it at level five. At level 10, she can make the paw a lot bigger. At level 15, her skills and abilities will translate directly to the paw. That’s a big deal since her regular swipe is pretty strong. There’s a similar spell we might want to get for you. Astral Fist. Anyway, she can manipulate items at a distance as if she was physically touching them. Distance grows with level-up. At level one, it’s about 10 meters.”

I laughed. “Hey, Donut. If we were back home, you’d finally be able to knock that vase off the high shelf.”

“That thing was a menace, Carl.”

We’d had a high shelf covered with knickknacks and some heirloom vase thing over the television in our apartment. She’d tried several times to jump up there, but never got close. Sometimes she’d sit on my lap while I was playing a game, and she’d stare up at it and start meowing.

We returned to our personal space. Almost two days later, and the cleaner bot had not yet finished cleaning all the blood. It was almost done. It was on the couch, sucking away at the back of the cushions when we entered.

“That thing needs a raise,” I said.

The bot beeped in agreement.

“Open your boxes and then assign your stat points,” Mordecai said.

I sat in the kitchen chair and pulled up the achievements I’d missed. I had several, including a few really good ones. I did not get any sort of credit for killing the mimic, though I hadn’t been expecting it. Most of the achievements revolved around dealing with Grull and tossing the Nightmarethrough the portal to blow the soul crystals.

New Achievement! Let There Be Chaos.

You have successfully summoned a god into the dungeon. That’s a great way to get more friends. Everybody loves it when someone brings immortal death machines to the party.

Reward: It might’ve been a bad idea, but it’s sure going to be entertaining.

New Achievement! Divine Epiphany.

You have seen a deity. Don’t get too excited. It doesn’t mean you’re a prophet or anything like that. This is a pretty common achievement that all crawlers eventually receive if they survive long enough, so you aren’t really that special. Finding a god is easy. What you don’t want is for that god to find you.

Reward: You now have the option to worship the god Grull.

Admin Note: There is a new tab now available in your interface.

I laughed. I looked up at the ceiling and said, “Grull can suck my dick.”

Donut and Katia, who’d just received the same achievement, both also laughed.

“Worship Grull? At this point, I’m quite sure it’s the other way around,” Donut added.

New Achievement! Indomitable.

You have been physically attacked by a deity, and you survived. This is a feat that has only been accomplished by a handful of crawlers in the history of Dungeon Crawler World. Good job! Unfortunately for you and anybody around you, whenever this happens, the other deities tend to notice.

Reward: You have received a Legendary Deity’s Box.

“Wow,” I said. A legendary box!

The next achievement came in the AI’s creepy, I’m-touching-myself-and-smoking-a-cigarette voice.

New Achievement! Smushed for Daddy.

You have been stepped upon by a deity. You have survived the encounter. And while this wasn’t the pink-fleshed suppleness of a human-shaped foot that crushed your fragile, wet body underneath it, it’s nice sometimes to switch things around. You know, just to test the boundaries of your own limits. When one experiments, oftentimes one finds new and exciting ways to get that rush.

While fun, it wasn’t quite the same. You probably don’t realize how lucky that is for you.

Reward: You have received a Platinum Spicy Box.

“For fuck’s sake,” I muttered. I remembered that moment, when the god had stepped upon me. I would’ve been obliterated had I not been under that potion’s protection. I remembered the dungeon had rumbled, but I was a little preoccupied to notice it at the time. After that, there were only a few more notable achievements.

New Achievement! Hail Mary!

You have initiated an attack that has caused more than 100 casualties more than 100 kilometers from your current position. You’re either the universe’s greatest sniper, or you’ve been a sneaky, little, portal-using bitch. Either way, that’s rather impressive. You’d have a great career in politics ahead of you if, you know, we hadn’t destroyed your world and all the governments and stuff.

Reward: You’ve received a Gold Sniper’s box!

New Achievement! Extinction Event.

You have, with a single attack, killed every last member of a non-unique species on a dungeon’s floor. That’s not an easy thing to do, and it takes a special brand of asshole to pull something like this off.

Species killed: Wall Monitors.

Reward: You have received a Platinum Asshole’s Box!

The wall monitors were the lizard creatures that lived in the abyss. When the train had popped through the portal and blown everything to hell, we must’ve killed them all.

In addition to all of that, we’d all received two bronze boss boxes for killing the mantaurs even though we hadn’t technically killed either of them. Both had been summoning vessels for Grull. I wasn’t going to complain. Nobody else in the party received the Indomitable achievement, though Katia had received a similar one for surviving a god’s magic attack, but it was only a gold box. Apparently, Elle was the only other one to get the Legendary box.

I also received a Silver Fan Box for having the most “switchovers” during a battle. I didn’t know what that actually meant, but we’d find out tomorrow what the people had picked for me. Since it was a lower-tier fan box, I wasn’t too enthusiastic.

Of the three of us, Donut had received the least amount of boxes, though she did receive a Platinum That Wasn’t Too Smart, Was It? Box for attacking the Province Boss. Her two regular boss boxes were coins and healing-themed scrolls. However, she did receive a scroll that filled me with dread.

Scroll of Water Breathing.

Allows you to breathe underwater. Lasts as many seconds as your intelligence stat times three. It does not protect you from swimmer’s ear or being eaten by a shark. I hope you know how to swim.

“I am saying this right now, Carl,” Donut said the moment she received the scroll. “I am a cat. Cats do not swim. Cats do not go in water. It is unnatural, and it is not going to happen.”

Mordecai: Goddamnit, Donut. Don’t say that stuff out loud.

Donut: I CAN’T EXACTLY SAY IT IN CHAT ANYMORE, CAN I, MORDECAI?

Mordecai: Your chats are still protected if I’m in on it. If you need to vent, make sure you do it to me.

She swiped her tail angrily several times. “This is not acceptable. I do not like this one bit.”

“The scrolls are clunky,” Mordecai said, sighing. “If I can get the right materials, I will make a potion for water breathing. There are also several different spells that’ll allow you to travel freely in water.”

“What about flying?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Spells and items, yes. Lots and lots. But potions? If you’d saved one of the bench upgrade coupons, then maybe. I really need two upgrades. Otherwise we’ll have to do it another way.” He said this loudly. He was really talking to our sponsors.

Donut’s final, platinum box contained another magic book. It was a 15-mana spell called Wall of Fire.

“That’s an escape spell,” Mordecai said. “It’s about a 10 meter wide, two meter high wall of fire that lasts 15 seconds at level 1. It’s a common spell. Powerful later on, but it’s also fire. Fire tends to spread. When the magic goes away, if it’s cast on something flammable, it’s stays on fire. I’ve seen it a hundred times. Fire gets out of control very easily.”

“Can we use it light bombs from a distance?” I asked.

“Definitely. But her Magic Missile would work for that, too.”

“It’s not Fireball,” she grumbled. “That’s what I really want.” She glowed as she read the book.

Katia opened her boxes next. In addition to gold, she received several more of the water-breathing scrolls along with antidote potions, in both the boss box and the adventurer’s boxes. They seemed to be pretty common, making them this floor’s version of the torch and the bandage. In her gold Survivor’s box, she received a skill potion that she was forced to drink right away. It raised her Catcher skill, which she’d been training relentlessly, up to level 11.

I went next. My boss boxes contained a few healing scrolls, a useless magical shirt, and a handful of the water-breathing scrolls. But I also received one more invisibility potion. That potion had saved my ass during the fight with Grull.

“That’s an easy, but expensive, potion to make,” Mordecai said. “Some of the materials for it are rare. It’s good that you’re getting them.”

“It’s like once you start getting something, you’re more likely to keep getting it,” I said.

“That’s absolutely right,” he agreed. “And sometimes things, like those water-breathing scrolls, are a not-so-subtle hint about what you might find on a level. See all those antidote potions Katia received? It means we have lots of poison-dealing monsters and traps on this floor as well. Good thing both you and Donut are immune to poison.”

“How wonderful for you,” Katia said drily.

I received 40,000 gold for surviving the level in the top 10. Donut had gotten 30,000 and Katia 10,000. We still needed to purchase some environmental upgrades for the space, but at the moment we had about 650,000 gold between the three of us, and that was before I opened the rest of my boxes.

My gold sniper’s box contained a crafting item. It was a case containing 25 small, black items, each about the size of a bottle cap.

Surefire. Crafting item.

A Surefire adds the “Guided” status to any projectile, powered or not. It may be utilized on a vast array of crafting tables. If added to an arrow or bolt, you must choose a target prior to unleashing the weapon, and the projectile will seek that target.

If added to a trap, additional options become available. Such as “Target any healers within range” or “Target anyone who thinks it’s okay to put mayonnaise on hotdogs.”

If added to a powered weapon, such as an explosive-based rocket, targets may be assigned during the crafting process or upon firing, but not both.

Note: this upgrade alone does not add range to the projectile.

“Cool,” I said, moving to my two platinum boxes.

The platinum Spicy box—the one I’d gotten because the system AI was a goddamned pervert—contained a toe ring.

Enchanted Toe Ring of the Leprous Bandit.

This is a unique item.

Most children in the universe know the exciting tale of the Leprous Bandit, the infamous human thief whose people were starving to death because of a planet-wide quarantine. While all the planet’s residents were carriers of the disease, it did not affect them. But because the disease was deadly to the Forsoothed, the planet’s regents, the aliens placed themselves in floating protection platforms, guarding the gardens and food stores in hopes to starve the humans all out.

The bandit climbed a mountain, jumped onto a platform, and broke into the floating garden. He was quickly killed, of course, but not before he infected the Forsoothed and caused them to flee the planet. Thanks to the bandit’s intervention, the human planet survived another 100 years before it was obliterated in an unrelated conflict. To this day, the Leprous Bandit remains an inspiration.

This toe ring imbues the following:

The Sticky Feet Benefit.

The Super Spreader Benefit.

“Two benefits in one item?” Mordecai said. “That’s a pretty damn valuable ring. That’s almost legendary tier.”

Sure enough, I stuck it in my inventory to check, and its value was up there, right above the Ring of Divine Suffering and below that Kimaris figure. I inspected the two benefits.

Sticky Feet.

Once every six hours, for (Dexterity x 2) seconds, you may walk upon a non-horizontal surface, such as a wall or ceiling. Gravity will not change, so leave your beer on the ground and make sure you tuck in your shirt first. Your bare feet must be in contact with the surface. No socks, no shoes.

“Hey, I’m like spiderman,” I said. “At least my feet are. Too bad it’s only once every six hours.” I looked at the second benefit.

Super Spreader.

You have been given the power of every plague rat and kindergartner since the dawn of time. You may pass any active debuffs onto a target of your choice once per hour. This does not remove the debuff from yourself.

“Gross,” I said as I slid the toe right onto my left pinky. I sighed, looking down at my shiny feet.

When my next box opened, the Platinum Asshole’s Box, I realized what it was the moment the symbol appeared in the air.

“Oh fuck me,” I said. A moment passed. I looked at my arms. I rubbed my hand across my neck. “Where did it go?” I said.

“It’s on your face, Carl,” Donut said, disgust in her voice. “You’ve been ruined. You look like one of those white guy rappers now.”

Katia laughed, leaning in. “Don’t worry, it’s tiny. It’s just below your left eye. Barely noticeable. Like a teardrop tattoo, but smaller. It’s almost like a freckle. What is it? It looks like a gecko foot. It’s cute.”

“It’s a tattoo of a lizard foot,” I said.

Extinction Sigil Tattoo

Wall Monitor Race.

Removes automatic hostility for any natural enemies of lizard-class creatures.

Warning: holding this Extinction Sigil will cause lizard-class enemies to deal 20% more damage against you. Any Wall Monitors will deal 150% more damage against you.

You may only hide this tattoo with a cover-up sleeve.

“How in the hell am I supposed to use a cover-up sleeve on my face?”

“Hmm,” Mordecai said, also examining the tattoo. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this. I’ve seen plenty like that goblin pass tattoo you have, but not like this. Everybody hates lizards, but I don’t know what their natural enemies are. Maybe birds. They like eating eggs.”

“I guess we’ll find out,” I said, reaching up to touch the tattoo under my eye. I now had three tattoos. My goblin pass, my Desperado Club pass, and now this. Hopefully it was as small and unnoticeable as Katia said.

I had one item left. My legendary deity’s box. It was a potion. It looked different than most potions. The bottle was rounded and more ornate, like an expensive perfume bottle. Smoke rose from the glass.

“Holy shit,” Mordecai said. “Can I see it?” He picked it up, and his hands were shaking.

“Who’s Pawna?” I asked.

“She’s the goddess of peace,” Mordecai said. “In the pantheon, she’s Grull’s sister and arch enemy. Don’t take this now. Save it.”

I passed the potion around to the others and then took it back. I added it to my inventory. It was the first item I’d seen that was valued higher than the Kimaris figure.

The description was very simple.

Pawna’s Tears.

This potion adds plus five to any spell or skill of your choosing.

“Why is it so valuable?” Katia asked. “Because it’s plus five? We’ve seen skill potions before. We’ve seen potions that max out skills, like that one that Maggie My lady has. Plus there are those Cheat Code potions that do the same thing, but for three skill levels.”

Mordecai answered. “It’s valuable, my dear, because it’s not only plus five, but he can choose any skill he wishes. Legendary skill potions that max out skills are also quite valuable, but they are only available for a limited number of skills. The Cheat Code potion is also very valuable. It is plus three to a random skill. However, the Cheat Code has a short shelf life, meaning he has to take it immediately. With this potion, Carl can save it. He can now train one of his skills to fifteen, take the potion, and raise it to twenty. It is, quite simply, the single best item of loot he has received since he entered the dungeon.”

“Not including the pet biscuit,” Donut said.

“Not including the pet biscuit,” Mordecai agreed.

“My powerful strike is already 13,” I said.

“It’s 13 because you have six levels from equipment buffs. We’ll want to use it on something that’s naturally 15. But I think Powerful Strike is probably a good choice. We don’t have to decide right away.”

“Didn’t Elle get the same box? What did she get?” Katia asked. The god had physically swiped at Elle a few times, though he hadn’t actually touched her. She’d still gotten the box.

Carl: Elle, what did you get in your deity box?

Elle: Not a good time to talk. Imani crashed the boat. I had to freeze the water to keep everybody from drowning. But I got a spellbook called Graupel. Big ice storm. Most powerful spell I have now, but I’m kinda scared to try it. It costs 50 mana. Long cooldown. Talk soon.

I told them. Mordecai shook his head. “That’s a war spell. Tell her to be careful with it while we’re stuck in these snow globes. Do you know anybody who is in this same bubble?”

“That’s a good question,” I said. “I haven’t asked yet.”

“I asked the former daughters, but nobody answered me,” Katia said. “By the way, Eva is still alive. She’s still on my chat.”

“If she’s not in this bubble, then we don’t have to worry about it. Keep your find crawler up and running.”

“I have been. There are eight crawlers I can see nearby, but I don’t know any of them. They’re all in the low twenties.”

“Hmm,” Mordecai said. “I wonder if they’re averaging out the player levels in the bubbles. That’ll explain why we’re stuck with the dregs. Carl, your level 41 might be the highest in the dungeon. We won’t know until the top 10 populates.”

I sent out a group message, asking if anybody else was in bubble number 543. I received only one reply. A human named Gwendolyn Duet. She was a level-27 Boring Ol’ Fighter. That was her class’s actual name. “Boring Ol’ Fighter.” I’d seen “Fighter” listed before, but not that one. I couldn’t remember meeting her, but she was pretty vocal and outspoken in the chats.

She was in the Land quadrant, so somewhere far below us at sea level.

Gwendolyn Duet: Oh, hey bomber guy. It looks like we’re neighbors. All of these dumbasses I’m stuck with don’t know what they’re doing. Me and the other two folks in my team are the highest level here. We rolled land, and we rolled something called the Sand Castle of the Mad Dune Mage. There are giant snakes, giant spiders, and these half-human, half-scorpion punk rock guys with no shirts and nipple rings running around all over the place. Plus bird things carrying chainsaws, though we haven’t fought them yet. We haven’t checked out the castle up close, but it’s a big ‘un. There are four levels of walls. It’s built into the side of that giant tomb or mountain or whatever that is. I don’t know how we’re going to get in.

Carl: Do you have a Desperado Club down there?

Her damn name took up half the screen. I went into the chat interface and changed it to “Gwen.”

Gwen: There are three villages not including the castle, and I heard one of them does, but this one doesn’t. I don’t have access anyway. I’m a proper fucking lady. I got a Club Vanquisher ring.

Carl: Okay. Keep me updated. If you know anybody in the sea or the tomb quadrants, let me know.

Gwen: 10-4. There’s a coral reef ringing the island. You can see it from the shore. I’ve seen sharks and jellyfish. Don’t know where the sea castle is. Ain’t seen nothing on the surface yet.

Fifteen days suddenly seemed like an impossibly short time.

~

Post nap, we reset our buffs. After a quick discussion with Mordecai, we decided we needed to keep up our strict training schedule. Katia and Donut hit the training room while I returned to the village. We gave Mordecai our environmental coupons and several hundred thousand gold. He and Donut were going to purchase the store interface and kitchen upgrade. Donut also wanted one of the social upgrades, something that’d allow us to see messages from followers. None of us except her thought it was a good idea, and she’d been pouting about it for an hour straight.

I let Mordecai deal with that while I stepped out of the Toe. The “sun” was out, though it was threatening to sink below the western edge of the tomb’s lip. I had to hurry. Several black dots dotted the air, many more than before. Most were obviously living beasts, but some appeared to be floating in place.

All up and down the street, the prostitutes standing out front of the other bars suddenly turned into human women. A few of them gave themselves ridiculous proportions, like Odette-sized breasts. They turned a rainbow of colors. I noted about half of them were male before the change.

There didn’t appear to be any other customers about. I shook my head and moved one street closer to the wall. “I can be anything you want, honey,” one of them called after me as I walked away.

I found the house I was looking for and knocked on the tall door.

I was expecting a tall dromedarian, but the door was answered by a small, gray, featureless humanoid. Surprised, I took a step back. It was like a person wearing one of those body socks. No nose, no eyes, just a blank mannequin. The thing stood only about five feet tall. It reached forward and touched my leg. I took another step back. If it didn’t have the white dot of an NPC, I would’ve clobbered it. I read the description and was glad I’d stopped myself.

Skarn. Level-3 Changeling Juvenile.

As I watched, he changed, features lumping together and clumsily forming into that of an eight-year-old boy. Unlike Katia’s early attempts at changing, by the time he was done, he was indistinguishable from a regular human. He wore heart-covered boxers and clothes identical to my own for about ten seconds until it changed to a dromedarian-like robe. The tag over his head even changed. The kid looked up at me, wide-eyed, not saying anything.

“Uh, hey kid,” I said. “Is your mom or dad home?”

“My parents were killed in the bombings. Flint is out on patrol and won’t be home until late. He takes care of me now. He says I should always take the form of new people I meet so they feel more comfortable.” The kid delivered it in a robotic, completely unnatural voice, like he was talking for the first time in his life.

“Yeah, good idea,” I said, completely freaked out. It hadn’t been a thing before, but I now had a new phobia. Creepy-ass little kids.

What the kid had said finally registered. Shit. “I see you have that cool telescope on the roof of your house, and I wanted to use it to look at the gnome castle.”

The kid, whose name was Skarn, brightened, suddenly becoming animated. “The Wasteland? I can show you that!” He paused. “Flint says I’m supposed to ask for a gold coin. He says orphans can only get by if they use their talents to take money from people dumber than them.”

“I take it Flint is a dromedarian?” I asked as I followed the kid into the house. It was a wide, open room with a straw bed, a tall table, and a whole wall of herbs and vegetables hanging from it. A ladder led to the hatch in the ceiling. The kid scurried up it, much too quickly.

“We had a village, but the gnomes bombed it,” Skarn said. “Most of us died, but the dromedarians took us in. Not many kids lived.”

“Why did the gnomes bomb you?”

“Flint says it’s because gnomes are short little assholes who deserve nothing but to be trampled to death and to be ripped apart by the feral geese.”

“Ah,” I said, coming unto the roof.

From here, I had a panoramic view of the city. Most of the buildings, including the Desperado Club one street over, were only a single floor. The city hall was nearby, rising about four stories not including the massive fabric swirl atop it, which was another two. With the air clear, I could see the entirety of the “bowl.” It was almost, but not quite, a circle, maybe a little more than three miles from edge to edge. I could see the other town in the distance, a mirror of this one on the opposite wall. Sand dunes and cave entrances dotted the dune-swept badlands between the two towns. Metallic wrecks dotted the landscape. Hulking shapes patrolled the desert, too far to see what they were. The area appeared much smaller than it had seemed now that I could see it all.

This is all we have to work with.

Skarn moved to the telescope, which was pointed toward the desert. “I like to watch the patrol to make sure they’re okay. Flint says if I grow up big and strong, maybe they’ll let me stay and I can join the patrol one day.”

I thought of the mass of desperate prostitutes one street over. It still didn’t make sense to me, but the story was becoming a little more clear. Skarn moved the telescope, searching. The telescope was a massive, white tube covered in pipes and gears. The material of the body was odd, like maybe ceramic. I examined it.

Enchanted Gnome FarSeerer.

Used to sight long-range targets for their bomb runs, the FarSeerer is credited as one of the five key inventions that allowed the Dirigible Gnomes to obtain air superiority. When properly installed on a Gnomish Dreadnaught, this device increases the accuracy of gravity-based bombs by 75%. Allows for inspection and information on objects at a distance. It’s pretty good for spying on your neighbors, too. You don’t need porn when you got this thing hanging off the edge of your airship.

Warning: All gnomes targeted with this device are given a notice that they are being watched.

“Where did you get this?” I asked.

“Flint found it in the dunes. There’s lots of crashed stuff from the last war out there. There! There it is! Okay, you can look now. Hurry ‘cause it moves. But you gotta pay.”

I flipped a gold coin to the kid, who let it fall to the roof. He picked it up with two hands and did a little jump. “Thanks, mister! Use the turny thing on the right to zoom in and out.”

“Sure, kid,” I said, leaning into the eyepiece. I was expecting the image to appear upside-down like in most telescopes, but the gnomish castle came into view, big and clear.

“Whoa,” I muttered, surprised at the telescope’s clarity. “It’s huge. It looks like a goddamned floating junkyard.”

“It used to be bigger, but most of it broke off and fell in the water.”

The Wasteland Castle appeared to be a jagged-edged, almost-rectangular island ripped straight from the ground. There was so much going on with the thing, it was difficult to focus on the whole. From this angle, I could only see the top, metallic parapets of what appeared to be a building sitting on the center of the landmass, but dozens of other smaller structures dotted the edges, most of which were made with what appeared to be corrugated metal, similar to the walls of Hump Town. A group of absolutely colossal balloons kept the island aloft. Three brown, blimp-shaped balloons were flanked by a pair of even-bigger, round monstrosities. The five balloons were individually attached to the island by glowing ropes, and the whole group was held together with a net. The distinctive glimmer of a magical shield surrounded the balloons, causing the whole top section to shimmer in the dying light of the day.

If the scale was correct in my head, the island itself was approximately the width of three football fields. Like a goddamned floating aircraft carrier, but wider. Several of the small buildings dotting the exterior were actually weapons, I realized. I could see ballista and trebuchets and all sorts of weird odds and ends.

Hundreds of ropes and chains and other strange items hung from the bottom of the flying island, twinkling in the light. This included what appeared to be small, round huts. Some of the items only hung a few dozen feet, but other chains and ropes and oddities dangled past the telescope’s display.

Also attached to the side of the floating island were dozens of different flying machines of various sizes, from tiny, single-person hot-air balloons, to bus-sized, floating boats that appeared to be held aloft by magic. Most were moored to the far side of the island. All of the devices seemed to be mismatched, rusting hulks that shouldn’t be aloft, like the cars in a Mad Max movie. As I watched, one floating vehicle, the size of a rowboat, floated into view. The driver was clearly a gnome, similar in size and shape to the Bopca Protectors, but maybe a little smaller and with even more bulbous noses. It wore the stereotypical red, pointy hat. In fact, I realized, the whole damn island was covered with the little, red hats bouncing around.

The small airship was held aloft like a drone, with a set of four propellors spread out under the vehicle. The distinctive shape of a refrigerator-sized bomb dangled precariously underneath the small airship. I zoomed in further, and to my surprise, all the information popped up like I was examining it up close.

Gnomish Knock-Knock

Type: Fuel-air bomb.
Effect: Thermobaric Explosion.
Status: 40. Barely stable. I wouldn’t be tapping on the thing.

Ever seen a hundred Dromedarians die because their lungs imploded, followed by their skin getting melted off their body just before they all shatter into mist? Well now’s your chance! Fun for the whole family, this was the main weapon of the Gnomish Bombardier Squads. There are only a few of these things left, and they’re usually strapped to the failing air force’s most reliable patrol ships.

The fuel-air Knock-Knocks were once used to devastating effect in the early days of the last conflict. The remaining weapons are instead used as a mutual-standoff weapon. These are simple, crude, but highly-effective bombs. They are detonated using an adjustable, pressure-based fuse that can allow the bombardier to adjust the height at which they explode. Requires the bomber to know the altitude of their target to obtain maximum efficacy.

Famously unstable. But god-damn do they put on a show.

“Yikes,” I muttered, pulling back. I looked down at the kid. “Did they drop one of those knock-knock bombs on your old village?”

“Yep,” he said. “It was a long time ago, though. I don’t even remember it. Flint says the gnomes are bomb-dropping cowards. He says anybody who uses a bomb is a pussy.”

“Flint sounds like a real peach. Why don’t the gnomes drop bombs here?”

Skarn shrugged. “Flint says it’s because of what they have in the town hall. The Bactrians have the same deal. That’s why there’s peace.”

“Really, what is it?”

“Flint says they don’t know what the Bactrians have. But here in Hump Town we have something that makes it so the gnomes don’t bomb us. The gnomes have a leader guy who’s really mean, but we have something he wants to keep safe, so he doesn’t bomb our town.”

“What is it?”

“I don’t know. I’m not allowed to go over there. I know it eats a lot of mushrooms.”

***

Woohoo! The world inside bubble #543 is starting to take shape.  Hope ya'll have a great and safe Halloween.