Artorian's Archives Omnibus

by Dennis Vanderkerken

  Artorian smiled at the use of his name, and agreed before setting off, “Let’s! Though, don’t be surprised if trouble is on my tail when I dash across your trap lines. After all… you know me.”

  Haw laughed and let their friend go. Artorian started gathering air Essence. The wind around him swirled and gathered below his feet, layering several techniques within the confines of his expanded Presence. He fully capitalized on the fact that usage was ‘free’ so long as the Essence remained contained within your ‘body’.

  The philosopher had puzzled on that fact for many a pleasant day. What was a body? Did it refer to one’s physical confines, and only that? Did that hold true once someone became a cultivator?

  An answer had come after his individual Auras merged to become his Presence. The physical was a part of it, sure. Yet… such limiting views were no longer the deciding factor where Essence became concerned. The last thing Hawthorn heard from his friend was an outburst of pure liberation, the old man shooting off with an exhilarated “Whe~e~e!”

  They rose their hands in goodbye as the human winked over his shoulder and leapt into the sky with an explosive *poof*! Hawthorn stayed. Watching the fluttering form rise above the clouds, vanishing to the size of a pinprick as he went; only to bounce off one of the puffy clouds and bunny-hop along.

  “Of course he found a way to fly before the Mage ranks.” Haw chuckled, and didn’t go back home just yet. He stayed, staring at the sky as the dot in the distance became smaller and smaller, eventually vanishing altogether. He remained not for himself, but for all the others looking through his eyes.

  There went their first ever human friend, off to brighten the sky for someone else.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Kinnan the bard tuned her lute with fingers that were slowly succumbing to frostbite. At least, burdened by the banter of her fellow lyricists, she was trying to do so.

  “If you can’t make it rhyme, then don’t give it the time,” Pollard sagely declared, ripping off yet another sheet of musical notes to throw onto the dying fire. Abyss it was cold.

  The third bard, Jillian, shrugged and pulled tight a cover around his neck, a cover which was supposed to go around his instrument. He had a good reason for this: he got cold, the lute didn’t. “Sh...sh...shut up unless you’re about to make a joke that involves thyme. It’s bloody cold, and I am too cold f… for such garbage.”

  Jillian hated this; he was barely able to feel the tips of his purpling fingers. He was just about touching Pollard’s head with his own from how closely the trio leaned over the dying campfire. Kinnan heard the ‘twang’ of another string snapping from the cold, and gnashed her teeth. Kinnan had told herself repeatedly not to tune her instrument unless she was going to play; strings were protected from the cold by loosening them. “I told you those maps were outdated. The road had a canyon in the way.”

  Jillian pushed his hands closer to the remains of the campfire. “M… map shows no canyon. How were we supposed to know? We packed for a quick journey in warm w… weather.” He sucked in a breath, shivering badly. Pol and Kin knew he wasn’t likely to make the night, they just didn’t have the means to stay warm. They could burn their instruments, but that would buy them a few hours and cost them their living.

  Pollard checked his bag for the seventh time. No additional rations had mysteriously appeared in the corner between the seams. Not a crumb. The bag went into the fire. An extra handful of minutes bought.

  “Why did it even snow? It’s supposed to be warm in this region!” Pollard shrugged at Kinnan’s question. Kinnan was seriously considering burning her lute as the cold stabbed deep. “Adventurer’s Guild had rumors of heat being sucked out of the region off and on over the last few seasons. The ground tremors that reached all the way to the capital were a very good reason not to go this way.”

  Kinnan held her head and tried not to break into a sob between her laughing gasp. “All this to find some dungeon that supposedly creates puns instead of traps? No wonder there’s no information about the place! It’s not even real! Or if it is, nobody makes the trip because the weather betrays you. Can we even make it back?”

  Neither Pollard nor Jillian wanted to entertain the thought of that question. “If you can’t make it rhyme…”

  Kinnan spat back at them with a groan. “Don’t give it time. Yeah, yeah. I know.”

  A gust of wind made them jolt and push closer to the flickering fire. Anything but letting that go out. They managed to save a tiny little flame, but bringing it back meant they’d have to… sacrifice.

  “Watch out belo~o~ow!” a voice the bards didn’t recognize bellowed from above. They’d lost it, apparently. The cold and lack of food had finally caught up to them. Voices didn’t come from above, unless it was from an angered love interest about to throw a flowerpot.

  The ground shuddered from an impact that bounced them the full length of their bodies up into the air. They hit the frosted ground hard, and the last remains of their fire died as the remaining coals flew off. Spitting out a mouthful of grass and snow, Pollard rolled onto his back and pushed up with his arms. The cold hit him immediately, stealing his voice. “W… wha?”

  An… elderly man with a robe crafted from golden and pink flowers brushed himself off. There was a glow surrounding him, a glow that dissipated before he was properly visible. He took something off his head and put it in his pocket bag, but the bard couldn’t tell what it was before a hand reached down to help him up. “Terribly sorry, my boy! I tried to adjust my way down, but falling can be horribly imprecise.”

  Pollard was pulled to his feet like he weighed less than a stone, and the old man went around gathering his other two fallen companions. His shivers had stopped, but Pollard was too distracted to notice that the snow in their vicinity was melting. “Did you just fall from the sky? Who are you?”

  “Now, now, boyo, no need to be brash. I did apologize. Was it not enough?” Artorian pushed his fists to his hips. The old man muttered to himself for a moment, fingers holding the base of his chin. “I have not been out in a while… it’s possible. Well, why don’t I give you a bite to eat, then? That should suffice!”

  He opened his coat partway and pulled a still-steaming confection from seemingly nowhere. The tantalizing treat released a freshly-baked scent, as if it had been pulled right out of the oven. Toasted wheat stuffed with sweet filling…? “Would you like some honey pie?”

  A perplexed trio of bards each received a piece of bark with a hand-sized slice of honey-stuffed, sugar-oozing pie. It even had fruit inside. Their complaints vanished into the background as their immediate needs took center stage, and the hot meal did much to silence a cold and empty stomach. *Oof.* “A bit nippy down here, hmm? Even the sky is warmer.”

  Kinnan choked on her confection, flecks of it sticking to the sides of her mouth. She was burning her tongue trying to eat it too fast, and her mouth sprayed pie-crust as she spoke, “Mwhy were chu in the shky?”

  Artorian sat and crossed his legs, leaning his cheek on a pensive hand as he stared upwards. Clearly he was stuck somewhere, pondering the problem. “Why, I was trying to figure out how to fly, of course!”

  The remaining two bards choked on their meals, then proceeded to hit their chests with balled fists to get the food down. No way was that coming back up, bonkers news or not. People couldn’t fly.

  The old man appeared to have some kind of epiphany by the way his eyes sparkled. “I just had an excellent idea.”

  Glowing light encapsulated the figure, and the surrounding snow melted fast. The gathered fatigue of the bards joined the snow, and minor injuries they sported mended without their knowledge. They just knew they felt better, though they thought it must have been the warm meal.

  Jillian couldn’t find his words. He just started sobbing as his shivering stopped, and he realized that he could feel his fingertips again. More than just not being cold, it meant his gift for his instrument may not vanish as frostbite took everything from him.
The old man shifted to sit next to him, laying an arm across his back. “It’s okay to cry. I had the same reaction the first time.”

  The bards believed he referred to just about freezing to death, but Artorian was talking about the first time he’d eaten honey pie. He’d snuck off with an entire stash of it on this trip, enough that he figured he could get back to the Elves before he ran out if he rationed carefully. After rubbing the crying man’s back, he realized just how chilly the clothes were, even if they were getting cleaned from the inside out as his Aura worked its magic. “Dear me. You’re freezing! Didn’t you notice that…?”

  He looked to the others and noted they were in a similar state. “Oh… why don’t you lot take these.”

  Three full-sized bear rugs were again tugged from nowhere. They just… appeared in the old man’s grip. He must have hidden those… somehow. Kinnan started mumbling manically, “Yeah. Don’t question the strange man that falls from the sky and gives you food and blankets. Gift horse. Mouth. Don’t do it.”

  The pelts were massive. They covered the bards entirely, and their warmth was amazing. “What were you all doing out here? It’s the middle of nowhere! The empty landscape goes on for leagues… I didn’t even see a town from up there.”

  Jill and Pol looked at one another to decide who was going to answer. Kinnan had fully burrowed herself under the pelt, and was currently not interacting with them. Pollard, being the oldest, picked up conversation with the odd deity in human guise. “We… we were looking for a dungeon. Supposedly it held intelligence in the form of speech, and made pun-based traps?”

  Artorian made an *ah* sound, nodding sagely. “Yes, I know the one. It’s gone now, the earthquakes got it. Sunk right off into the depths of the canyon. It’s either eradicated or buried under several countries worth of stone.”

  The bards around him groaned and deflated. Artorian had just lied through his teeth, but he wasn’t about to subject these common non-cultivator folks to days of having earth-corruption-filled feces thrown at them. That dungeon didn’t need to be… visited.

  “We came all the way for nothing!” *Aaaargh!* Kinnan returned to the conversation, just to complain. This was her specialty, according to the others.

  Artorian coughed and moved on. “Sorry to hear that… by chance, could you point me in the rough direction of the City of Walls? It might be called ‘Oldwalls’, or ‘Menhir’s basin’, depending on where you’re from.”

  The bards pointed eastward, and now it was Artorian’s turn to groan. Based on the direction they pointed, he’d gone too far south. He didn’t comment on their near-perfect synchronization; that had become normal to him. That very normality was also preventing him from noticing some otherwise key details about these three people. “Thank you kindly. Will you three be alright on the journey back to wherever you’re going? It’s quite chilly out.”

  The bards shared a look of concern. “We… need to find provisions and something to burn so we can stay warm. We likely won’t make the trip back even now that we know there’s no point to going forward. Even if we found a way across the canyon-”

  “Canyons. Multiple,” Artorian corrected the man. An aerial view gives a great idea of landscape design. He could likely scribe a killer map if he had the time or tools. Alas, he had neither. “Why not just cut some wood down?”

  Jillian shook his head. “No axe.”

  Artorian reached into his supplies pouch and pulled out a Dwarven Axe, tossing it handle-first to the man. “Axe.”

  He said it matter-of-factly, not bothered by the loss of a single axe. He had a few throwing axes stocked up from Dwarven games after all. Jillian was rendered speechless, a shock for the verbose bard group. Kinnan continued muttering since the sunny man had just pulled a weapon from nowhere. It may be a bard’s need to get as much detail as possible, but this wasn’t the time to do it. “Don’t ask. Don’t ask. Don’t ask.”

  A package of nuts and dried fruits was set next to the dead fire. The mixture was vast and extravagant. To Artorian, it was only a day’s snack since he needed a hefty variety of nutrition to keep in tip-top shape. To the bards, this was a week of meals. “Snacks for the trip home.”

  Pollard’s face shifted into a slack-jawed expression, and Artorian brushed himself off as he stood, getting the rest of the snow off his petals as he looked to the sky. “Give this old man a hug before he goes, you all look like you need one.”

  The bards didn’t deny the request from the person that was guaranteeing their survival. Artorian smiled, nodded, and looked the three over with confidence. “I think you’ll be alright.”

  He winked and patted his pocket. “I’m off now, I’m sure I’ll find someone else to give some pie!”

  The jovial old man adopted a pose full of style, flushing out his robe behind him. Wind blew past the bard’s ears, gathering under the elder as he prepared to… jump?

  “Take care now, youngins!” He slapped hands on his stomach, drumming a makeshift tune. It was music to the bard’s ears, who all suddenly recalled their professions. With a wave of his hand, a crater formed in the ground where the elder had been standing. A *poof* heralded his exit as he shot up into the sky and out of view.

  The bards clutched their bear pelts as snow once again fell to touch their noses. They realized they felt warm, and good. The shivering had left them, and their skin was no longer chapped or bleeding from chilblains. Pollard held the axe in hand, and Kinnan carried the woven ration bag that smelled suspiciously of vines.

  Jillian looked between both of them and threw his hands up, but not enough to throw off the bearskin. “What just happened?”

  “A ballad. A saga. A miracle.” Kinnan still stared, and some words came to mind. “Old man Sunny fell down from the sky.”

  Pollard continued, tuning the same lines of thought. “Said ‘young lad, you look hungry, have a slice of honey pie’.”

  Jillian clicked into gear, and glanced at Pollard. “Patted him on the back, said it was okay to cry.”

  The bards shared meaningful glances. “Have a little snack, I’m just trying to fly.”

  “Sort of just writes itself, doesn’t it?” Kinnan beamed at Pollard's words, then switched to listen as Jillian copied the belly-slap tune. Didn’t even need an instrument for that.

  “It really does.” They came to an agreement in unison.

  “It sure does, and we certainly have the Thyme to make something of it.” Jillian grinned widely as he finally got to make his joke, the other two groaning.

  “Celestial, man! Did you have to say it?” Pollard's grumpiness made Jillian’s grin continue, and he wiggled his functional fingers at the both of them.

  “Couldn’t resist, got so much of it on my hands now.” A second round of groaning died off, turning to laughter. It was time to go home and write a new song.

  ‘Oh, Mr. Sun’ was going to be huge.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  The D-rank Morovian Sabertooth-Liger was emperor of both steppes and plains. Waking in the morning, the mighty seven-foot-long male stretched. His jaws extended in a yawn, matching their namesake as massive fangs protruded from its frontal jaws.

  It wasn’t hungry. Yet.

  The day before, a party of pink-fleshed walkers had attempted to cross its domain. Though some had crunchy shells, that had not prevented a juicy red meal. The pink-flesh were walking treats! They ran on occasions, but what prey didn’t run when faced with the might of claw and threat of fang? Ten-inch claws fully exposed from both puffy front paws as the elaborate stretch continued, and a nearby marula tree was used as a scratching post.

  The yellow-purple ball of sturdy muscle and fur would likely have gone ignored if not for its morning ritual. The creature was known as a Moro for short, mostly because only morons tried to tackle it. This thing was a predator. You avoided its territory if you knew what was good for you. It could see clearly for miles in any direction across the plains, and had a sense of smell that put Bloodwolves to shame.


  If there was anything the Moro did not like, it was birds. Birds could fly away, avoid its claws, and flee from its twenty-foot pounces. No other prey was out of reach for the beast. No pink-flesh could sneak up while it slept in the yellow wheatgrass. Only the purple fur gave away where it might be, and that blended smoothly with the green stalks of the baby wheatgrass.

  A Moro knew where you were better than you did. Especially on its home turf. It knew all the smells, all the sounds, all the expectations that came with its terrain. Every brush of movement against the ground was but another source of food to sate the beasts’ hunger.

  There were no sounds that were foreign to it, and even the *humm* of Essence was no stranger to the Core in its forehead. A Core that *thrummed* with the gathered energy of its meals. It didn’t know the words, or what it was; only that it was tasty, and made the hunt better. Faster. Easier.

  A sharp whizzing whistle that filled the air made it freeze up and look around. That was a sound the Moro did not know. A high-pitched… cutting sound? A bothersome, painful screech that irritated the ears. The Moro flicked its sizable, fluffy ears. They swiveled around on its head as it tried to find the source, but the pitch was gaining intensity.

  Up?

  The Moro squinted as it looked up at the sun, blinded for a moment. It could not see past the bright rays of aggravating sunshine.

  “Paws off my friend!” A bone-breaking impact cratered the Moro. The majestic creature’s skull took a blow that made its contents explode outwards. Its muscle and bone were too sturdy to fracture so easily, but the soft gelatinous bits had no such protection against the traumatizing blunt impact that sent said skull six feet into the ground in the timespan of a blink.

  Artorian balanced on one leg atop the voided Moro skull. He knew what the creature was, but slapped himself upon realizing that Marula—the wood elf he knew that matched the tree this Moro had been clawing—was nowhere near this place. This cat creature hadn’t actually done anything to his friend, and he’d killed it via orbital drop. “You old fool! We’re long out of Forum range.”