Mask of Humanity

The pickaxe was heavy and cumbersome, but it would go through a skull as easily as it would knock chunks of rock out the walls. Nicolai hefted it, and stepped towards the nearest miner. He twisted his body. The heavy metal pick swam through the air and smashed through a skull. Blue light misted out and hovered, confused, before darting away.

The other skeletons all turned to stare at Nicolai. Then they turned away from the wall and came for him.

Nicolai grinned as he moved to meet them.

About a minute-and-a-half later he stood there in the tunnel, surrounded by chunks of bone, his heart-rate and breathing elevated. With the skeletons destroyed he was free to take his Seed from his mouth and put it against the Oma crystal chunk in the wall. It gnawed away, and he kept one finger gently touching it and his Mark’s menu open, showing his Seed’s statistics.

From twenty-one to twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four... Nicolai took his Seed away and considered it. It had made quite a large dent in the chunk of crystal. It seemed a shame to stop, but his worry was that if Oma went over soul, he would have no method to get rid of that Oma and bring it back into balance, so he wanted to play it safe.

However… He did know how to send Oma out of his Seed, at least into an Imbued. Would the same method work with no Imbued? Quickly connecting to it, he took control and bade it to send Oma out, just as he would if sending it into an Imbued item. As he pressed, the Oma left the Seed and seemed to simply evaporate into the air, and its stock went down, from twenty-four back to twenty-three.

As easy as that. His eyebrows rose. He put the Seed back against the crystal, and it resumed eating, its count ticking back up. When it reached twenty-four percent, it stopped, and feeling at it through the connection he sensed how it was full and sated, how it needed more Soul before it could consume more Oma. He placed it back in his mouth and tapped his Mark.

User Interface 376 | Player #53,217

- Cultivation

> Seed Progress

Soul: 20%

Oma: 24%

Resting his pickaxe on his shoulder, and placing the pot-shaped helmet on his head, he headed out of the side tunnel and into the main, where he saw some skeletons coming towards him. He waited to see what they would do.

They passed him by without interest.

Nicolai left the tunnel and entered the pit, passing hundreds of skeletons, none of which reacted to his presence. He began the climb, heading up the slope.

By the top, the issue of thirst had begun to press upon him. That was the only real problem with his plan. He’d left his water bottle and was sure that it would have been taken during his capture if he’d brought it. What to do?

He passed by the tall zombie directing the skeletons, and headed to the administrative building, ignored by the guards.

Inside he approached the talkative zombie which was staring at the wall. He stopped in front of it and it slowly turned its head to look at him.

‘You’re back,’ it said. ‘Why are you back?’

‘I need water,’ Nicolai replied. ‘Otherwise I’ll die of thirst and be unable to keep mining.’

The zombie considered this. Nicolai gave himself fifty-fifty odds whether it would help him or say something like “okay that’s fine, keep mining until you die”.

In the end it rose from where it sat, hopefully to get him water. Encouraged, he added: ‘I also need food, or I’ll die of hunger and be unable to keep mining.’ He was about to follow it when it flapped a rotting hand at him.

‘Stay there,’ it said.

It returned a short time later, and handed him a green clay bottle wrapped in twine and two sustaining seeds. ‘This bottle refills itself,’ it said, and sat back behind the desk, returning its gaze to the wall.

Nicolai considered trying to befriend it again, but he doubted he would do any better than before. He’d gotten what he’d come for.

After leaving and finding a quiet corner Nicolai examined the bottle.

Green Water Bottle

A friend to any exploring Cultivator, this bottle gradually restores its stock of water which is unusually hydrating. It also provides a small boost to wakefulness.

Much like his blue water bottle, then, except that it would also help keep him awake. Which wasn’t actually ideal, considering it was his only source of water and eventually he would need to sleep. After examining the sustaining seeds he found they were identical to those he’d found before.

He considered attempting to try and get the zombie to give him more useful things. I need Imbued weapons, or I’ll die to monsters and be unable to mine… he doubted it would be convinced, and making such an obviously manipulative request might cause an unfavourable reaction from it. For now, at least, he opted to stop while he was ahead and not get pushy.

Nicolai hung the bottle from his shoulder and pocketed the seeds. The examine text springing from his Mark had reminded him of something else. He tapped his Mark and navigated to Quests, which was blinking with a new quest notification.

Chained Titan

Gorf the Titan is trapped, chained to his forge. Free him, or kill him, to complete this quest.

Short and simple, when put like that, but Nicolai didn’t think either option would be easy. He hadn’t a clue how he might go about getting those chains off the Titan, and killing it seemed equally difficult. He was surprised to see that killing the Titan was an option, but he supposed he shouldn’t be. It had been the same with some of the other quests, hadn’t it?

After a moments thought he closed the new quest and opened the Quests menu itself, viewing all he’d received.

Chained Titan

Gorf the Titan is trapped, chained to his forge. Free him, or kill him, to complete this quest.

Heart of Darkness

A being calling itself “Forgotten” wishes you to find its heart. It says its heart was thrown into the mines.

Retrieve the heart, and return it to Forgotten, or refuse and keep it for yourself, to complete this quest. If you choose to keep the heart, that will constitute the quests reward and you will not receive a reward shrine.

A Skeleton’s Request

Maric wishes to reach the upper floors of the library. Find the keys or another route, and take Maric up there so that he might search for what he wants, to complete this quest.

Return of a Disgraced Knight?

You have entered into an agreement with Kleos the Traitor to procure him a body. You may complete this quest either by fulfilling your agreement and finding him a suitable body, or by finding a way out of the agreement and slaying Kleos, ending his hopes of a new life.

A quick glance through the four made him note a bit of a pattern, in that three of them had an alternate method of completion, methods that ran exactly opposite to the desires of the individual who had given him the quest. Forgotten wanted him to bring it its heart, and he could either do that, or keep it himself. Gorf wanted to be freed, Kleos wanted a body, and he could either do as they wished, or kill them. He found it curious that so many of his quests came with these opposing methods of completion, all but Maric’s. It seemed as though Heaven, or whatever it was that gave quests, was not particularly attached to the people giving out these quests.

He stepped out from where he’d lurked around the corner from the administrative building and trekked over to the tall undead.

‘I need a new group,’ he told it. It stared down at him silently, then gestured to where a few skeletons stood listlessly nearby. Nicolai joined them and waited, watching as a smaller group trundled up the slope towards them.

Once close enough the tall zombie gestured Nicolai and the skeletons he stood with to join with this group, and they did so, following along as the undead towed their cart around the edge of the pit. They were heading toward an area he’d identified as part two in the mining process. The undead down in the pit didn’t mine the crystals perfectly from the rocks, they just knocked chunks of rock with crystals inside free and dumped them in carts; part one.

Part two, this place, was where more undead who wielded hammers and chisels worked to free the rough crystals from the rocks. It was a great open area full of long stone tables, the ground carpeted by a mess of discarded stone, filled with tinking and clinking sounds as the undead worked away with chisels.

Nicolai observed with interest as he kept pace with his own cart, seeing a great wealth of crystals being freed from the stones. On one side of it all was a giant pile of unprocessed rock studded with crystals. On the other, one entire side of the pit was full of numerous sprawling hills of stone discards, with roads winding between them where more undead with more carts were visible transporting the off-cuts.

Meanwhile, the undead with chisels would place those crystals into carts which were significantly better guarded by undead knights and hooded zombies with staffs. As Nicolai watched, one of these carts, filled with crystals, was being pulled into a tunnel that sloped downwards. To the castle core?

The undead he’d joined with stopped and prepared to dump their load on the edge of the big pile of rough, crystal-studded stone, but first they poked at something inside the cart.

‘Ok, ugh, ok,’ mumbled a voice, and a bleary eyed man poked his head up then clambered out to crumple onto the dirt. His eyes fell on Nicolai. ‘Huh?’ he said, frowning and squinting and staring. He wore a ragged cloth around his waist, and like Niciolai, had a band around his neck, and a water bottle hanging from his shoulder. It was from red clay, differing from the blue and green clay bottles Nicolai had found himself. He also had a pair of small pouches on a cloth belt around his waist.

Nicolai was hard pressed not to stare with matching confusion back at the man. It took him a moment to get his thoughts in order, watching with a blank face as the man, who seemed to fill up with sudden energy, thrashed his way to his feet and stood before Nicolai.

He hadn’t suspected he would need to pretend to be human anytime soon and struggled to work out the proper reactions.

‘Hey!’ gabbled the man into his face. ‘You… you’re human! You’re alive!’ He let out a half-crazed laugh. ‘Where’d you come from? How’d you get down here?’

Nicolai forced himself to smile as though he was equally happy. ‘Hello,’ he managed. ‘My name is Nicolai.’ Immediately he cursed himself, struggling not to scowl. He should have said Vikrum.

‘Yeah, great, great! I’m Harold, Harold, that’s me!’ The man laughed again. ‘Oh god, you don’t know how long I’ve been down here, all by myself. I… I can’t find a way out. You have to tell me, you have to! How did you get in?!’ He grabbed Nicolai and shook him and this broke Nicolai from his state of uncertainty as he shoved Harold back to fall to the ground, the man letting out a yell of surprise.

‘Don’t touch me,’ snapped Nicolai, struggling with himself.

‘Sorry, sorry!’ yelped Harold, eyes wide. ‘I’m sorry! I just… please! Please tell me how you got in here!’

Nicolai had no intention of doing so. His route in-and-out led directly to his safe place. He didn’t know this man.

‘I fell,’ he said. ‘From up there.’ He pointed at the gap, the sky above. Harold. The name rang suddenly in his mind. The creature in the rocks had mentioned Harold. He eyed the man, curious.

Harold stared back up at him from the ground. ‘No, you didn’t,’ Harold said, features twisting into an uncertain grin. ‘Don’t mess around. Come on, how’d you get in here?’

‘I had a magical ring that let me fly,’ said Nicolai. ‘I used it to slow my fall.’

‘Where is it?’ asked Harold, wide eyed and at least a little convinced.

‘They took it from me and locked it away.’

Harold stared at him, face paling as the words set in.

‘We’re stuck here together.’ Nicolai shrugged.

Harold let out a sharp scream and tore madly at his hair, which caused Nicolai to take a wary step back. ‘Guh! Hnngh!’ Harold sobbed and wailed and screamed, red face scrunched up with furious despair. Their troop of undead weren’t bothered by this, forming up and heading towards the slope. Perhaps they’d seen it before.

‘Come on,’ said Nicolai, pulling the unresisting man roughly to his feet, ‘let’s go,’ and he towed him towards the cart.

‘Up you go!’ he said, shoving Harold towards the cart as it began to rattle down the slope. With the help of Nicolai’s pushing and urging, Harold scrambled up the side and Nicolai followed him, the two of them sitting inside. The undead didn’t seem to mind.

Harold then sat there, staring dumbly up at the gap Nicolai had supposedly fallen through. Nicolai had managed to sort himself out and put himself into the proper frame of mind for Talking To People, and had arrived at the conclusion Harold needed to be jostled from his numb state. This man was a source of information, one that Nicolai intended to squeeze every drop out of. He grabbed the man by the shoulders and shoved his face in front of him.

‘We need to work together, you and I,’ he hissed, and shook Harold. ‘There must be a way out, and we are going to find it!’

Harold glugged at him, eyes wide.

‘Come on, man!’ Nicolai seethed.

‘A way out,’ murmured Harold.

‘A way out!’ Nicolai howled, shaking him.

‘A way out!’ yelled Harold back at him, head rocking, eyes wide.

‘Yes, yes!’ Nicolai screamed.

‘Let me go!’ Harold suddenly shoved back, and Nicolai released him, sitting back.

‘Jesus,’ Harold muttered, running a hand through his hair, then he laughed. ‘It’s nice to talk to someone, finally,’ he said.

‘What’s it been like, down here? Were there others with you?’ asked Nicolai.

Harold shook his head, lips tight. ‘Horrible, horrible,’ he muttered, his brows drawing together, looking like he might fall back into his previous state.

‘Hey.’ Nicolai put a hand on the man’s shoulder, gave a gentle shake, and Harold looked to him. Nicolai formed his mouth into a sympathetic smile. ‘It’s gonna be okay,’ he said.

Harold smiled and it seemed almost like he might cry, looking away for a moment and taking a deep breath.

Where the zombie had seemed practically immune to Nicolai’s charms, Harold’s heart and mind were open to him, bristling with levers that merely required the right words and expressions to draw out the proper reaction.

He smiled again, and it was a kindly, endearing smile. You’re putty in my hands, Harold. I wonder what kind of shape I’m going to twist you into?

Internally, he was monitoring himself, and he was pleased. His acting skills were returning to him. It was time to make use of them; time to plumb Harold for all the information that could be extracted.