by Neven Iliev
“Another one, huh?” mumbled a nearby soldier.
“I mean, what’d you expect?” said another with a chuckle. “This sort of thing happens every time Fizzy goes out in public.”
“Yeah, but you’d think people would be used to her by now.”
“I dunno, man. I see her almost every day, and I still can’t stop staring at her sometimes.”
“Mmm, yeah, can’t argue with that.”
“Enough chit-chat!” shouted the officer-in-charge. “Appraisals are done, so go get your gear checked in for repairs and get some rest, you’ll be needing it!”
The troops saluted in a chorus of ‘yes, sir’ and started filing through the gatehouse in earnest.
“Fizzlesprocket – you, uh, do what you gotta do. Just be there for the debriefing in ten.”
“Sir.”
Fizzy responded like the others, prompting her commanding officer to turn around and walk away while maintaining a stern expression of ‘I didn’t see anything.’
With the rest of the squad orderly retreating, the golem turned her attention to the gnome still leaning on her. At some point, her blonde head leaned so low that it was currently pressing against the golem’s bosom. Fizzy, in her twisted mindset, interpreted that gesture as a somewhat inappropriate compliment. After all, she couldn’t blame this blondie for thinking that her chest ornaments were a soft and fluffy place to lean on when they looked the part. Indeed, though their size wasn’t all that impressive, the golem’s ‘girls’ had a supple and appealing shape that even the most plebeian meatbag could appreciate. They were practically works of art just like the rest of her, at least in Fizzy’s totally unbiased and flawlessly objective opinion. It was one of the reasons she felt it a damned shame that she didn’t get to exhibit her assets more often.
Baseless self-praise aside, the sorry sack of meat still clung to her shoulders and fogged up her sparkly frame with that disgusting breath, which was grinding the golem’s gears.
“Uhm, can I help you with something?” Fizzy asked through a strained smile.
“Haah, haah, haah, phew…”
Jessie, who had somewhat caught her breath, looked up with a face that was way too excited for her own good.
“I want to feel your insides!”
That shameless, full-volume declaration was perhaps not the best way to express her academic interest in the fascinating construct before her. The soldiers still within earshot couldn’t help but giggle audibly as they vacated the area. As for Fizzy, she let out a drawn-out metallic groan that sounded as if someone had passed out on a pipe organ’s keyboard. She raised her loosely clenched fist to the impertinent meatbag’s forehead and flicked her index finger against it. Though seemingly small, it packed enough force to knock the female gnome over in spectacular fashion. Her small body spun around ass-over-shoulders, sending her consciousness flying south for the winter while the rest of her face-planted in the grass-covered dirt.
Fizzy continued through the open gate while muttering something about ‘bloody gnomes’ under her breath.
Part Three
“Uuuugh…”
Jessie let out a low groan as she slowly came to. She groggily sat up while her brain did its best to remember where she was and what she was doing. Her head and neck ached a little, but that was only natural considering her bed had no pillow.
“… Bed?” she mumbled and looked around her quarters.
While it was called ‘her quarters,’ the space was simply a small room in a random house in New Whitehall. Although it was technically someone’s home, it had been converted into a women’s barracks to house the Republic’s Legionnaires. As one might expect, the men were in another building. Many other buildings, actually. Pretty much every house, shop, store, restaurant, and inn had been turned into housing for soldiers. Various industrial facilities – such as forges, workshops, and alchemical laboratories – were retrofitted for military use.
The citizens that once lived here had already been evacuated via Forest Gate along with any refugees from the surrounding towns and villages. There were, of course, those who didn’t wish to abandon their homes, but such individuals were forcefully relocated regardless of their intentions. Some condemned this decision as barbaric, cruel, or unfair, but it was for the best. Having civilians present in a war zone would only be a burden to the Republic’s Legions. Well, not unless the elves were willing to use the noncombatants as meat shields and Spell fodder, but no self-respecting military institution was that monstrous.
Ultimately, the only people currently present in New Whitehall were either military personnel, members of the workforce, or independent contractors like Jessie. The latter two groups were non-combatants and would be evacuated as soon as their work was done or the fighting reached the city, whichever came first.
“… Crap!” exclaimed the gnome. “I gotta find that golem before they ship me off!”
The sunshine coming in through the sole window and the clock next to her bed both suggested that barely an hour had passed since she was knocked out. She took this opportunity to recalibrate her Tick Counter Skill, which had gone haywire due to that harsh yet well-deserved blow to the head. With her internal clock in order, she got out of bed, ran to the front door, and flung it open.
*SLAM*
Only to then immediately slam it shut and lean against it. Her breath was uneven and beads of cold sweat formed on her forehead. This was bad. Once again, her overabundant enthusiasm got the better of her. The cause of her distress was a certain childish, superstitious, and wholly unscientific fear. Jessie knew better than anyone how nonsensical her phobia was, but logic and facts did little to abate the sheer terror she felt whenever she confronted the outside.
“It’s okay, Jessie, gravity won’t let you fall upwards,” she quietly reassured herself. “Gravity won’t let you go so easily. Heh. Hahahah. That’s right, gravity is your ally. Gravity is your ally. Gravity is your ally. Gravity is your ally. Gravity is your ally.”
She repeated her mantra over and over as she worked up the nerve to go against her phobia. It seemed silly from most people’s point of view, but her condition wasn’t all that rare. A common trait among certain dwarven and gnomish communities that dwelled underground or inside hollowed-out mountains was an illogical fear one might fall into the sky. Jessie grew up in such an environment, but the source of her agoraphobia was something else entirely.
Though she didn’t know it, the gnome had been bitten by an arachnid critter called a hexcrawler when she was a child. The creature was easily mistaken for a harmless variety of spider, especially since its venom was too weak to harm anything larger than a fly. However, it had a nasty trait of inflicting mild yet stubborn curses upon its victims. In the case of Jessiwick Wobblebang, it inflated her youthful misconceptions into a full-blown paranoia that didn’t rear its head until she was an adult. Divine magic could easily remedy the affliction, but the girl never sought treatment because she mistakenly believed it was all in her head.
“Alright! Let’s go find that golem!”
After psyching herself up a bit more, she took a breath, opened the door, and took a cautious step outside. She walked down the street allowing her nervousness and anxiety to weaken slowly yet surely. A few minutes later, her knees no longer shook and her breathing was less forced. Her anxiousness would never fully fade, but she refused to let it show on her face lest she disgrace the Wobblebang name. Not that her lineage was all that impressive, but it was still important to her.
After she grew more accustomed to not having a roof over her head, Jessie asked everyone she saw about the construct she encountered earlier that afternoon. The tiny woman wasn’t sure how successful her inquiry would be since her memories of the event were a blur. The only things she remembered was that she was looking for a mithril golem with a rather unique nickname. The apprentice Architect that told her that said some other things too, but Jessie ran off without hearing him out. The last thing she remembered before bla
cking out was leaning on that marvelous construct while she caught her breath. It seemed obvious that it had knocked her out, but Jessie wasn’t particularly mad about it. She assumed she must’ve set off some kind of self-defense protocol, so it was really her own fault for getting so touchy-feely without the owner’s permission.
Despite her concerns, the spirited Artificer had little difficulty tracking down the so-called Rustblood Juggernaut. It took less then fifteen minutes in total, actually. It seemed as though Jessie was literally the last person in the city to learn of the resident mithril golem, which made her feel incredibly silly. Then again, she hadn’t known about the incomprehensibly huge white spot she stood in, either. Nor would it be the last bit of common knowledge that she missed because of her shut-in lifestyle.
Nevertheless, the gnome made her way towards a commandeered smithy just outside the 3rd Legion’s base camp within New Whitehall. She took a deep breath and loudly knocked on the door, but there was no answer. However, judging from the noises within and the smoke pouring out of the chimney, someone was definitely hard at work inside. Jessie assumed they were too engrossed in their craft to notice they had company. This was a common trait among many artisans and craftsmen, and the blonde gnome was no different.
Therefore, out of consideration for whoever was inside, the woman decided to wait until they took a break before announcing her presence. There was no way she could barge in on them considering how much she hated it when people did that to her. The military types were the worst offenders in that regard. Why couldn’t they grasp the delicate nature of her work? A moment’s distraction could have dire consequences when handling explosives. One crossed wire, one wayward pinch of Firedust, one errant twitch – and KABLOOEY!
This wasn’t an Artificer-exclusive issue, either. Whether it was an Alchemist mixing volatile substances, a Blacksmith working an exceptionally stubborn metal, or an Enchanter weaving magic into mundane objects, all Artisan Jobs required immense concentration. It wasn’t unheard of for high Level practitioners to take on projects that required days or even weeks of constant work. While they didn’t always result in explosions, thoughtless interruptions would cost the Artisan dearly in terms of time and resources.
*BANG*
“Waaah!”
The blonde gnome fell to the ground while covering her head in her hands with surprising speed and dexterity. It was a reflex born from years of working with materials that tended to get very ‘angry’ when mishandled. Once she regained her senses, the tiny inventor realized the source of that detonation was inside the smithy. Figuring that whoever was inside might need help, Jessie leapt to her feet and threw open the door. She was met by a gust of pitch-black smoke that sought to escape its confines through the suddenly available opening.
“Koff! Koff! Are you okay?!” she shouted while choking on it.
“Ah? Yeah, I’m fine,” came the casual answer. “Gonna take a lot more than a little pop to hurt me.”
The owner of that strangely metallic voice, much like the rest of the room, was covered top-to-bottom in a thin layer of dark soot. Judging from the stranger’s shape and size, she was most definitely a female gnome. She was facing away from the door, but Jessie was confident this wasn’t one of her colleagues. Only three of them were female, and none of them were that… curvaceous. That aside, was this woman truly unhurt? It seemed unlikely, but she said she was fine, so Jessie took her word for it. Besides, there were more important questions on her mind.
“What the- Koff! Koff! What happened in here?!”
“Oh, nothing much,” the blackened gnome shrugged. “Just testing how much Firedust I can mix into the impact gel before it becomes too unstable – give my stuff a bit of extra ‘oomph.’ Seems thirty five milligrams of dust per a hundred milligrams of gel was pushing it, though.”
“Koff! Koff! You what?! Every idiot knows – Koff! – it’s twenty per hundred at most!”
The mixture in question was a key component in impact-triggered bombs, and getting the ratio right was of key importance. Too much impact gel and the explosive force would diminish. Too much Firedust and it was prone to spontaneous detonation. Creating it was a simple enough process, but it required steady hands and sharp eyes.
“Nah,” said the charred figure dismissively. “You can get away with thirty easy if you know what you’re doing.”
“That’s preposterous!” Jessie reflexively argued. “There’s no way it’ll be safe to handle beyond twenty!”
“Sure it will. Just gotta subject the gel to a mild electric current before- I’m sorry, but who are you again?!”
It was only then that Fizzy finally glanced over her shoulder.
“Oh, it’s that pervert,” the golem murmured.
“P-p-pervert?! I am no such thing!”
“Did you or did you not say – and I quote – ‘I want to feel your insides’ to me while rubbing your face against my breasts?”
Jessie merely stared back at her in stunned silence. It wasn’t until that moment the reality of the situation finally hit her. Looking into those pure-white eyes made her realize that the one she was having a spontaneous argument with wasn’t a gnome, but the very thing she came here to find. This was good because it meant her brief search was successful. However, Jessie was far more concerned with addressing the talking piece of equipment in the room.
“Holy crap!” she screamed with eyes the size of dinner plates. “It’s a sentient golem!”
“Seriously? You realize this now?! Un-be-fucken-lievable.”
“It spoke to me! Ohmygod ohmygod!”
“Oh, for the love of-”
“Yo Fizzy, what’s all the racket in here?!”
A two-meter-tall, woman-shaped battering ram named Lola poked her head into the still smoldering smithy. Ironically, she wasn’t referring to the botched explosion from earlier. The elf, much like the rest of the 3rd Legion, had grown accustomed to such disturbances and wasn’t worried about Fizzy’s safety in the slightest. After all, that golem was infamous for emerging unscathed from something her squad-mates referred to as ‘The Spicy Meatball Incident’ during the siege at Fort Yimin. The mere thought that a random explosion could injure or even faze her was preposterous.
“We got a screamer,” Fizzy gestured towards the meatbag currently losing her wits. “Can you take care of her? I can’t focus on my work like this.”
“Sure thing, Fizzy. Come on, you. Out you go.”
The black-haired elf grabbed the gnome by the scruff of her neck and dragged her outside the smithy despite her protests. The pair received a few knowing looks as Lola nonchalantly carried Jessie across the street and into the house serving as the female Warrior’s assigned quarters. Incidentally, all the glass windows were shattered and boarded up because of Fizzy’s ‘activities,’ so the inside was rather murky and dark.
Once Jessie calmed down somewhat, Lola stopped treating her like luggage and both of them took a seat. The elf then spoke broadly about the golem’s circumstances. About how she was on the run from the Empire after her parents were killed earlier that year. About how her life was saved by the God she now serves. About the curse she willingly bore as atonement for past sins. Of course, this was all simply Fizzy’s cover story. Technically speaking, even if 90% of the details were omitted, everything the golem revealed about her past was true. Even the part about her ‘sins’ held a nugget of truth as the former gnome still felt a tiny bit of guilt over her betrayal of Boxxy on that fateful day in her shop.
“I see…” said Jessie after hearing the heavily filtered tale.
She completely failed to consider that Fizzy might not be ‘just a golem.’ This was why she had spoken to her so crassly during their first meeting. Since then and until about just now, her intention was to take the construct apart for the sake of sating her own curiosity. She intended to put the thing back together, of course, even if she wasn’t quite sure she could manage it. Golem-crafting wasn’t her area of expertise, but she couldn’
t help herself. This was the first time she had even heard about, let alone seen, an honest-to-goodness mithril golem. Some part of her still wanted to pry open Fizzy’s chassis to poke at her internals, which did not make Jessie feel any less terrible about the whole thing.
“I can’t believe I was so thoughtless. She probably hates me now.”
The gnome looked down at her feet with guilt plastered all over her face, prompting Lola to cross her arms and lean back in her chair.
“She won’t hold it against you, so don’t worry about it,” the elf reassured her. “Her… religious persuasion and, uh, monster-like disposition make her act out sometimes, but she means well. All you have to do is keep in mind that somewhere beneath all that heavy metal beats the heart of a living, breathing, and caring person.”
The aspiring Artificer felt the urge to comment about how golems were not technically alive, did not breathe, and most definitely did not have hearts, but kept it to herself.
“Yeah, I will. Thanks. Uhm, could you please tell me her name?”
“Pretty sure I already did. It’s Fizzy.”
“No, not her nickname. I mean her actual, given name.”
“… Now look here, Jessie,” Lola’s voice turned stern, “her name is Fizzy, and that’s who she is. Nothing more, nothing less.”
“But… I mean…”
Lola sighed heavily when she realized this nosy gnome wasn’t going to let the matter rest.
“She doesn’t like others calling her by her actual name, alright? If you want to know that badly, then ask her yourself. Just don’t blame me for anything that happens afterwards.”
“Blame for what?”
The golem in question casually entered the room, the floorboards creaking under her considerable weight. Fizzy had wiped herself down as best she could, but had less luck with her soiled outfit and left it behind. At least that was the only logical reason for why she was standing there in the nude. Jessie’s eyes couldn’t help but wander up and down that body. She was slightly caught off guard by the revelation that this golem was more anatomically accurate than expected. Then again, that detail only supported the notion that she used to be a creature of flesh and blood once.