“It is odd enough, but I don’t see the stats of this artifact, Teacher.”
“Put it to your chest,” Vey the Shamrock said softly and then, so that everyone could hear, he added loudly, “Good luck to you! Make global achievements and get the loot! Get your revenge on these light bastards!”
The wizard disappeared while the group screamed excitedly in response.
Yar put the crystal to his chest, as Vey advised, and the artifact seemed to stick to him, and then it leaked through the armor. There was not even a trace left on the outside, and Lyan didn’t even worry.
“Wonderful. Lyan, bare my chest.”
Yar didn’t see the crystal, but he could see violet flashes through his skin. The man touched the place in his solar plexus area reflexively; he didn’t find anything foreign. However, he saw stats, written in alien letters, turning into readables right before his eyes:
Grim Punisher
(an adjustment to the owner, progress ... 0.63%)
Energy storage (volume is not determined)
Absorption:
(Surpluses, places of power, accidental emissions, any hostile environment)
Synchronization:
(Sources, wire paths, concentration nodes, artifact interactions)
Unavailable ???
Unavailable ???
Unavailable ???
Unavailable ???
Unavailable ???
There was no time left to speculate on what it was and how it was applicable. Yar received the joyful Burn’s message, and this immediately turned his thoughts back to the journey.
Master, the entire group has arrived at the scene. I watch the Sugar Palace. The forest in a radius of fifteen to twenty miles around the target is oversaturated with patrol teams.
Burn
Yar scratched his head thoughtfully.
Well, first I need to look around on the spot carefully. Maybe I will have to change the preliminary plan. It’s better to decide on Elate, Yar thought and wrote back.
Well done, Burn. Find a secluded place in the zone fifty miles away from the Sugar Palace to teleport the group to and send me its visual image.
Yar
The required information came almost instantly. Yar raised his hand, and the conversations stopped immediately. The clan members surrounded him.
“Attention. We are starting!” Yar declared loudly.
The image was clear and detailed.
Chapter 49. Approaches to the Sugar Palace
T here was darkness, light, new strong smells, and the ringing trills of unusual birds. The group of saboteurs squatted and looked around anxiously. It was early morning on Elate, and it was impossible to see anything.
How could Burn see anything here? Yar thought in surprise.
The dense fog seemed to hide everything. Only the skeletons of huge trees, like massive columns in an endless hall, could be guessed through the thick white veil.
Blacky seemed to orient perfectly in the woods. Like a silent shadow, she walked around the Midnighters, jerking her tail and heading into this whitish cloud.
“Get into a column of two. Follow Black Rainbow,” Yar ordered.
They were sneaking almost until noon, when the fog suddenly faded away. Undoubtedly, there were in enemy territory, but the nature and the forest were amazing. Of course, the elven forest couldn’t be compared with the magical forest at the tower. However, there were also places where Yar wanted to sit down and relax, enjoying the beauty that surrounded them. He wanted to watch how the quiet warm wind stirred the leaves of the majestic trees, how the dew glistened like diamonds on magnificently beautiful flowers, and listen to how the small birds sang in the thickets.
Suddenly, Blacky lay down. The detachment fell on the grass and subsided. They lay still for a few tense minutes, waiting for a collision with the enemy.
Blacky sees something, Yar decided, watching intently how the huge cat was looking through the foliage.
Finally, Yar also noticed movement three hundred yards from their location with the help of his Atomic Scanner, and he saw five nimble figures clearly. They were slowly moving away to the south, and, after another hundred yards, they sank down into the grass. After waiting a moment, Yar’s squad crawled back behind the bizarre rocks, similar to rearing ice hummocks. Blacky was near Yar in one leap.
Leader, gather the flock. There is important information you need to know. He heard her soft and gentle voice in his head.
Yar gestured for everyone to gather. After a few heartbeats, they were sitting in a circle under the cover of the picturesque rocks. A three-dimensional image appeared in the center.
What a clear image ... how does it see through foliage and other obstacles? Yar admired Blacky’s talent.
Five elf rangers were sneaking around within the projection. Then they stopped, stared, and listened for a few seconds.
Finally, one of them said, barely audibly, “Halt. Aaris is the first observer.”
One of the rangers climbed the nearest tree like a squirrel and disappeared into the foliage. All the other elves crouched on the grass.
Someone invisible asked in a whisper, “Kanis, why is there an alert in the forest? I haven’t seen such security enhancements in a long time.”
In response, they heard a displeased, even irritated voice reply, “The ruler called on all the vassals. They filled the whole palace, and they have gold. It looks like they have to fork it out today. That’s the reason for the security enhancements, I guess. I heard that three hundred separate detachments went out into the woods.”
Apparently, the light elf wanted to ask a question, but the commander interrupted him.
“Enough. No more words; have a rest.”
The saboteurs of the Midnighters clan, sitting on the ground, were silent and discouraged. It was clear to them; all carefully specified plans were now useless.
“Well, that information is valuable. Now we have to think hard,” Yar admitted.
“What are we going to do, Master?” Uyu asked.
“I have an idea,” Yar answered, rising to his feet and scanning the ground around them. He declared, “It seems that we are lucky. There are a lot of voids under the ground. I hope that such soil structures are basic here, then maybe I will be able to pave a course to the foundations of the ruler’s palace, even from here. Okay, I’ll give it a try.”
Yar looked at both Uyu and Gelic.
“Stay with the main group, I need more air and speed. No!” he spoke shortly, seeing that Uyu was ready to object.
“It’s a good place. Disguise and wait; I will try there.” Yar pointed with his thumb down. “I will try to cope with everything quickly. As soon as I reach the place we need, I’ll teleport everyone immediately. Until then, stay close to each other.”
Yar looked at Blacky and, hearing her short, added, It’s okay.
He took a few deep breaths, and with the words, “Mother System, help me!” he activated the Gap Spindle.
Yar was instantly dragged into an invisible point in space, and after a small clap, the Gap Spindle appeared suspended in the air. It was unusually small and even looked a little fragile. Spinning wildly, a small tornado flew ten yards away. Twitching within a yard, as if aiming at something in the depths, it stopped. Hanging like this for a few seconds, constantly increasing its momentum, the Gap Spindle then suddenly slammed into a heap of stone slabs and went down inside. Several Midnighters tried to cover their heads, waiting for the hail of stones and soil. However, there were neither fragments of rock, nor a sonic boom. A few centurions ran up to the place where the Spindle entered the rocks and found nothing there to their delight. The bundles of grass on the stone slabs appeared as usual.
Yar overcame two thousand yards to a small cave in an instant, and he did not have time to blink an eye. Having flown into this cavity, he braked, clearly fitting into a small space, and thinking with satisfaction, I knowingly leveled up this skill! The Spindle has become nimble, very obedient, and a wonder
of technology. I stopped at high speed and felt nothing. Although I would be more comfortable in a cocoon, I have to admit. I got the impression that I could feel even the smallest deviations from my course.
Yar looked around. It seemed that nothing dangerous could be observed in the surrounding space, and so his intuition was silent.
He stepped onto the stone and engaged ‘Satellite’. The cave was small, the air was dry and somehow musty, and it was difficult to breathe. The arch of the cave at a depth of two miles under the ground was impressive: heavy stalactites hung over his head, and deep cracks gaped between them. It seemed as though they were about to collapse.
Okay, I won’t stay here for long , Yar calmed himself. He sat down, surprised at the hard work of both his sources. They were at a maximum, and their power grew little by little, but still they worked surprisingly smoothly.
Does the crystal given by Vey influence me? It certainly seems so.
Okay, go farther.
Yar relaxed, closed his eyes, and enlightened the soil in front of him with the help of his Atomic Scanning. The necessary voids were found almost immediately.
It seemed to him that even his taste buds were involved in this matter. Yar clearly felt the taste of gold in his mouth, and also there was a strong mixture of something else that was very familiar.
What is this? What? Listening to his feelings, Yar thought, smacking his lips like a real sommelier.
Books! These are books! Many books! Awareness suddenly came to him.
Well, well. It seems to be a vaunted elven library. They hid it under the ground!
He was already shaking with impatience, so Yar unfolded three two-yard scan results before his eyes and turned it so that he could read them from above. The results of the scans were encouraging, Yar even screamed, rubbing his hands, and then cautiously looked at the ceiling and took a breath.
Yeah... all investments were fully justified—even with a surplus.
He saw the massive foundation of the elven palace, and the emptiness indicated by different colors. The distance from the surface was indicated by arrows, and there was a lot of information. However, most of all, Yar was struck by his location and the red line, laid along the voids, signed as “The most effective route to the goal”—although the arrow went to the side and made some impressive zigzags, entering the palace area from the other side.
Suddenly, Eva said, “Master, you’ve just received a very important message.”
The long-awaited news emerged before his eyes, and Yar barely restrained himself not to shout at the top of his voice, fearing stalactites in the cave.
Hi Yar,
We are in the Tirr World, and all people are healthy and full of energy. When we learned that Earth was once again ours, and you took the Palace of Capture by storm, we rejoiced and grunted so that many lost their voices. We are waiting for the transfer. Everyone is waiting to meet you, and we also have a surprise for you...
Taisia the Blizzard
I have to hurry, Yar said, using the Gap Spindle. He was smiling, despite the upcoming event.
Chapter 50. Unexpected Meeting
T he caves were different: karstic, volcanic, glacial, erosive, tectonic. That was all that Yar knew about the mountains.
At the same time, perhaps, he received the greatest impression of the caves while contemplating the Shadow Land near Pulkovo Heights. After his last period of travelling underground, he reasonably had the belief that all these cavities could no longer surprise him. It turned out he was wrong.
Yar followed the guiding red line, and the very first cave he came across puzzled him with its unusualness.
It consisted of a high vault and a terrible jumble of planes—they were ideally smooth, almost as if polished, slabs with a thickness of about half a yard, penetrating into the cave space in different directions and with different degrees of inclination.
Water flowed through these plates to the thinnest layers, in most cases breaking all imaginable laws of physics in doing so. There were lizard-like creatures with raised, bushy rainbow-colored tails, similar to peacocks, depicting living fountains. These strange creatures whirled around, shaking their wet tails and stamping their paws as thin streams of water poured out of their mouths at varying heights, creating incredibly attractive compositions with the splashes. This idea seemed somehow wild, wonderful and at the same time otherworldly.
Is that a marriage game, or is it really a failure in some other reality? Yar thought.
He stopped there to check the route and compared his positioning to the landmarks. Impressed by this unreal, dizzying spectacle, Yar rushed farther along the route at full speed.
He flew by a couple of caves without stopping, but then he was lucky. It was a small cavity, rather, nothing more than a cleft, where getting up seemed to be problematic, but there he could do something for which he had started all this.
Yar checked his sources, everything worked properly, without losing any power at all. His energy system was at its maximum, as it was at the very beginning.
He drank mineral water slowly, watching the work of his source with interest. The source reached the maximum smoothly, and when it seemed that an overloading and dumping of the surplus to the understudy was about to occur, a small power rollback took place, as if he had used a spell.
Wow, this is a level-up! It goes slowly but surely, Yar thought excitedly. The man had no doubt that the crystal was working in this way.
I wonder if this process works while I sleep? Yar wondered. I should ask the Guardian Ryiri to look after me when I sleep.
Stop it . The clan leader of the Midnighters forced himself to return to work, launching the scan as he did so.
Everything turned out to be much better than he had expected. He moved into the cavity at the very center, and the data immediately showed his current location.
Then Yar rushed without stopping, watching slides opening in short flashes.
“Open up!” Yar yelled, breaking into a huge open area. It was light, dry and quiet in this realm of massive and endless rock that smelled strongly of gold. A huge table was piled up in the center of the wide space, where three elves currently labored on large parcel books. Next to them, a hundred giants in loincloths were divided into groups of a dozen, and they were headed, it seemed, by foremen. They were sullen, fourteen-feet-tall, and had the strongest looking arms Yar thought he’d ever seen.
After a split second, Yar realized that it was necessary that the storekeepers or librarians did not have time to react to his appearance and raise the alarm. Twisted lightning burned one of the elves’ heads, and he collapsed back into his chair, his ears falling onto his knees. Then Yar removed the heads of the other elves with energy swords.
Yar threw the corpses into Oblivion Cage. The giants did not even move in response to all these hostile actions. Instead, they continued to stand idly, before one of them boomed like a ship horn, “Hello, new owner, Yar Row Dark!”
“Why?” Yar was puzzled. The giant shrugged and, politely lowering his voice, boomed, “According to the oath, the Mauls serve the owner of the main warehouse.”
“Okay,” Yar grumbled, looking at the stats of the owner of the deepest bass voice he had ever heard, and he sweated a little, then he almost laughed, reading the last three skills.
(Maul) O’Krazh
Main Loader, level 9 000
Health 9 002
Force 9 420
Endurance 9 420
Movement speed (warehouses, storages, ports) 9 000
Loading Master 9 221
Dangerous Goods Detection and Handling Wizard 9 756
Handling Master 8 750
Rolling Master 8 300
Heavy Duty Master 9 050
Swear Words Master 9 901
Singer 9 921
Musician 9 921
* Note
A number of parameters are reduced, recovery is possible
“Yeah ... contradictory and incredibly powerful,” Yar descri
bed what he saw. There was no time to think. However, the loaders continued to stand silently and calmly before him.
Yar wrote a message quickly: Uyu, how are you? Yar.
It seemed to him that at the same second a short answer came in response from the head of the diversion groups:
Master, everything is okay. We are waiting for your orders. Uyu.
The earthly word ‘Okay’ in the elf’s lexicon impressed Yar, and he brought the portal to a well-remembered place, where his detachment was now, giving the order to teleport.
With a slight delay, the portal was installed, as requested.
Apparently, there are many energy suppressors around the Sugar Palace here, Yar thought. He was completely right to receive confirmation from the system.
Attention!
A temporary two-way portal has been installed
23 Karn Suppressors (Magic of Affect) were ignored
Territorial tracking systems (Magic of Affect, Grim Punisher) were successfully bypassed
“Wow.”
Yar heard the rumble of his colleagues.
He agreed with this “wow”. Trillions of gold were impressive.
An excited Uyu jumped toward the clan leader and offered quietly but quickly, almost in a patter, “Master.” She then nodded at the loaders. “Are they Mauls? It is very good. They can really speed up the work on the collection.”
“Do the Shadows know anything about these giants?” Yar asked.
Uyu nodded.
“Just a bit. These are the very ancient slaves of the light elves, the most valuable workers, the builders. They were believed to be completely extinct a couple of thousand years ago, and here I see at once one hundred and twenty-six specimens! It’s amazing! It would be nice to make them your allies.”
“Thank you, Uyu,” Yar said and went over to the Mauls. An alarm bell was already ringing in his head. You must hurry! Hurry up!
Yar approached O’Krazh. The power of the giant was stronger the closer he came.
Yar handed the UPSC to the giant. Vey the Shamrock had given this ancient artifact to him, or rather, there were three such things. The wizard explained that the name stood for ‘Universal Portable Storage’, and the final letter ‘C’, in his expert opinion, was most likely the capital letter of the creator who had already sunk into oblivion. Yar wanted to refuse, considering that he already had many artifacts, and three more were superfluous.
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