Drip-Fed

The Omniverse had been twisted into an ouroboros. The crown of the great tree gnawed at the roots, the maw like a flower pierced by thorns. In the middle of the depiction was a star, made up of four overlapping leaves of the many branches that came from the bent trunk. Around it was a halo, similarly made from the leaves, and beyond it, a white void.

The depiction was detailed down to the veins on the leaves. Like the true Leaves of the Omniverse, so were the depictions of them little portals into the worlds they housed. Images of houses, of lives, of structures, of scenery, and of monsters.

Apexus brushed over the depictions of everything that he saw. He hoped that his fingers would find details in the massive picture that his eyes could not. Even standing on his toes, his outstretched hand could not reach the top of it and the span of his arms did not cover half of its width.

While he studied every detail, Aclysia sketched it all. She was decent at it, capable of catching the overall shape of it on paper. The true beauty and scope of it was lost, however. By her nature, she had talent as an artist, but she had not honed this.

Reysha sat several metres removed from the two of them. Her butt was firmly planted on a toppled pillar that had come loose during the fight they had in that room. The corpse of Semi-Sphinx they had fought here had been eaten already, leaving only the marks of the battle.

A Dungeon that sustained battle damage was unusual at their level. Like many things, it would become more common as they progressed. In the business, they called the destructible environment Landmarks or Weakspots. It was the grace of the gods that made lower-level Dungeons physically stable. Indestructible walls took a consideration out of the motions of combat. Introducing parts of the room that could be destroyed meant there was more to track and more to plan with. A simple and effective way to increase the difficulty.

The destructible pillar had almost smashed Reysha under it. She had not expected it to fall over. Firing up all her magic circuits to empower her speed had allowed her to narrowly leap out of the way. She would take that as a warning experience.

Korith was chipping away at the pillar out of boredom. She swung her Hoard-granted hammer, repeatedly testing its hardness against that of the Dungeon stone. The rhythmic sound was the only thing that really tracked the passage of time down there.

Suddenly, Reysha whistled sharply. “Are ya about done with that?”

“Patience,” Aclysia responded. “We spent plenty of time on your violent pursuits, we can sacrifice some for academic matters.”

“Fucking ‘some’, Aclysia? We have been here for at least two hours – No, I am not doing my usual exaggeration for comedy.” Reysha got ahead of Aclysia’s response before the metal fairy could do more than open her mouth. “I’ve been sitting here, watching you two ponder the wall painting.”

“It has been that long,” Korith reinforced.

“Has it been that long?” Aclysia raised her head from the sketch and looked around, blinking at the surrounding room as if she was only now awakening from some kind of slumber. “I… suppose we are being pulled in by the temptation?”

“Ya could suppose that,” Reysha drawled, then snapped her fingers a number of times. “Hey, Apexus, you in there?”

“I am thinking,” he answered, while studying the way the four leaves at the centre intersected. Blue was slightly overrepresented. ‘What reason might there be for that?’ he pondered. ‘Winter is the season of stillness and quiet. Is this star rich in stability?’

“Yeah, you’re being tempted into overthinking,” Reysha told him. “I’ve been patient, but we still got the rest of the Dungeon ahead of us, so maybe don’t try to find something in this picture that’s not there?”

“How can you know it’s not there?” Apexus studied the texture of the paint. It was rough in some places, smooth in most, and had the scent of fresh grass. “This could hold the answers to my origin, Reysha. I cannot leave any stones unturned.”

“If we had gone down the food path, this is the point where we would be sitting at a table that just conveyor feeds us more delicacies,” the redhead warned. “We would just be sitting there, stuffing our faces, until we’re too heavy to move.”

“This is different. We do not become plump and immobile from not gathering knowledge.”

“Two – hours,” Reysha reiterated. “We’ve been immobile for two hours.”

Apexus had no immediate retort to that. He traced one of the roots that emerged from the flower maw. ‘Parasytes eat the Roots? The Roots pierce the Parasytes? If the Progenitor is classifiable as a Parasyte, then this matches the origin of dragons that Maltos told us about. Where do the formless ones come into this?’ “There has to be an answer in this.”

“N-not really?” Korith carefully suggested. “Uhm, it could just be a load of pretty nonsense to distract you.”

“We have established that the temptations provided are real.”

“We’ve established that the first temptations provided are real,” Reysha corrected. “Not that the second ones are nor that any of them are good for you.”

“Knowledge cannot be bad.”

“Yeah, sure, ya know what else can’t be bad? Money.” Korith nodded three times to that. “Ya know what can be very, very bad? The way ya get that money.” Korith gave half a nod to that. “Come on, Apexus, you’re one of the smart ones here. We are in a Temple of Temptation. It’s bad to give into them, you know that, you Monk.”

Apexus only answered with a low hum. There was a sinking feeling in his stomach, a physical manifestation of discomfort at her words. His need to know struggled with the wisdom in her words. The intellect was easily goaded with answers. Like a sheep chasing hay, the mind would steer towards what it desired and the smarter a person, the better they could rationalize to themselves.

Had it not been for Reysha’s needling, Apexus and Aclysia would have remained there for days.

Apexus forced his eyes to close. ‘Is there a Charm on me or is it purely my curiosity that shackles me?’ he wondered. No answer to that, just as little as there was an answer to be found in the picture. Reysha was right. He was sieving minute details in an effort to find the answers.

Exerting his willpower, he took a large step back. His eyes only opened once he had turned away from the picture, lest one of the details grab his attention and pull him back. “Will we move?” Aclysia asked, sounding disappointed.

“Yes. It is the wise decision to make.” Apexus gave Reysha a nod. He tried to make it thankful, but it came across as robotic. In truth, he wanted to stay. Every drop of his being wished to keep studying this piece of art the Dungeon had placed for him.

Aclysia made some final pen strokes, waited for the ink to dry, then put the folded paper into her diary. It would not be part of the notes for the Guild. This was a purely private endeavour.

“You do not have to wait two hours to call us out,” Apexus said, once they were walking through the adjacent corridor.

Reysha opened and closed her hand, making a dagger disappear into and manifest from the Weaponmaster’s Vambrace repeatedly. “I’m just used to you two being the voice of reason.”

“Reason can be led astray,” Aclysia said. “Faith and instinct have their place in making good decisions.”

“Yeah, and I’m not the one here that usually makes good decisions,” Reysha joked. “I’ll call you out when I feel confident it’s necessary. Korith will too, even if she will need three times as long to do it.”

“I can be decisive!” the kobold asserted. “I just… don’t feel like it most of the time.”

“Story of your life.” Reysha laughed at her own statement and went through another cycle of manifesting and dismissing the dagger.

“You know… I have a question,” Korith said, with an eye on the vambrace.

“No, you can’t have it, it’s mine.”

“That was not going to be my question… although having one myself would be useful.”

“Arguably more useful than Reysha having it.” Aclysia looked at the large hammer Korith lugged around and thought to the spear that was currently in the kobold’s Adventurer’s Bag. “I would reckon it more useful to have the ability to manifest a cumbersome weapon.”

“Yeah, that’s about the topic of my question as well – you have two daggers and an axe in there, right?”

“This is true facts,” Reysha confirmed, cycling through the three True Silver armaments quickly. “I guess there’s a follow-up coming?”

“Uhm, yeah. Why not have the big stuff in there. Runeblade, warpick, mace…?”

“Huh, I expected Aclysia to not understand, being a mage and all, but you? Guess you’re not using multiple weapons a lot, so I could have expected it…” Reysha trailed off, then suddenly vanished from the senses of the other three party members.

Korith blocked a kicked with her arms. The strike surprised her enough that she was driven against the wall next to her. Reysha re-appeared to perception, the Shadowstep broken, her hand now wrapped tightly around the shaft of the hammer.

“Assume I’m a big mean monster, big enough to actually hold you down,” Reysha purred and growled in equal measure. “All you could do in this situation was punch me. That works for you, but widwle owld me isn’t that strong. I need something sharp and I need it fast.” She activated the Weaponmaster’s Vambrace again, now holding a dagger in her hand. “Problem solved.”

She took a step back.

“Yeah, but… you can pull a dagger from one of your fifteen sheathes on you?”

“It’s thirteen and only one of those is for regular daggers.” Reysha pulled at one of the many belts that kept the sheathes in place. “Actual counterpoint: when I need a dagger quick, I need it QUICK, squishy. I don’t even know if my hand can get to one of the sheathes if there is a monster on top of me. Now, the Runeblade, I will start most fights with. I’ll draw it while there’s still distance. I’d also change to one of the other big weapons when I have space for it, not in an emergency where every second counts.” She shrugged. “Ain’t saying you’re totally wrong in your approach, but I think my way is better.”

“It’s more rogue-ish,” Korith agreed.

“Tool use is overrated,” Apexus said and wiggled his fingers.

“Not all of us are freaks of nature that can just mutate whatever they need,” Reysha countered. “Some of us need our organs to survive.” She stopped for a moment. “Actually, why did the gods make us that way? I mean, they’re clearly capable of not doing it.” She gave Aclysia a clear look.

The metal fairy slowly shrugged. “To this I have no satisfying response. I should note, however, that I am as dependent on magic as you are on food. Perhaps it is a simple question of scarcity? Food is more abundant in the world than magic is. Were all of sapience to draw from the veins of the Omniverse, the Leaves might wither under the unified pull?”

Korith gave that a slow nod. “That… sounds logical enough. Kind of how it’s fine if a lot of people draw from a river, but if you dam it at the source, no one gets any.”

“Dams don’t consume water,” Reysha pointed out.

“Yeah they do?”

The entire rest of the party stopped and looked at the Warrior. Since she was walking at the helm, she needed a moment to notice. “Are ya for serious?” Reysha asked, flabbergasted. “It’s a dam, it’s just a wall that keeps water on one side.”

“Uhhh, yeah, but… if they do not use any water, where does it all go?”

“…Korith, have you ever actually seen a dam?”

“She is not serious,” Aclysia said.

“…Am I being got?”

“Awww, you can’t give the game away so quick,” Korith lamented. “I wanted to see how long she’d believe me.”

Bantering like that, they moved on deeper into the dungeon.