Chương 70: 69-Last Hope

The rift showed a snowy plain, with what appeared to be a lamplight twenty miles to the north. There was heavy fog all around, but its light was powerful enough to pierce it.

"What is the plan now, Jenna?" Bob asked.

"According to Exchange, the rift will take us somewhere into this world's past. That lamplight is our entry into the next reality. From there, a final trip through time, and we will reach our destination. I think the worst is over," said Jenna, jinxing it all again. As soon as she stepped through the rift, the corridor disappeared, and Bob found himself falling hundreds of feet through the air toward certain death. The snowy ground rose up to meet him.

Inside him, Charlie stamped on the brake of his imaginary car and swore. Suddenly, he was no longer Bob; he was Otra the manta. He glided gracefully, skimming the ground by only a few inches. He tried to contact Jenna and Billy via the Blood Link, only to remember it was not operational. He was not worried about Billy—the worst that could happen to him was dying in the fall. He hoped Jenna had reacted in time, just as he had. Who was he fooling?

She shifted stats at the speed of thought—he was the only Loser in any real danger. The fall aside, the rift had scattered them, and the fog made finding the others even harder. The cold wind hit him as an icy hammer. The Progressor's powerful form allowed him to fly, but it would not protect him against the cold. He did not think he could last more than five minutes in these conditions, manta form or not. He summoned the Arcane Die from his inventory and used it to cast a spell.

Circulate your Chi (Gambling 3): Your chi harnesses your body heat, preventing it from escaping and making you immune to extreme cold. Every ten minutes, there is a 1% chance that the spell will fizzle. This will make the Gambling Die unusable for one hour. Requires Rotate your Base (Fatigue Resistance 4). The cold went away. He could still feel the wind hitting his body, but it had the cool, refreshing quality of air conditioning. He used The Match Begins to put the die back in his Inventory.

He had performed the whole procedure without using his hands—he was getting better at this kind of thing. Bob considered his options. There was only one viable choice—he had to head to the Lamplight and hope the rest of the Losers made it there on their own. And he had to do it fast. Hunters usually needed only a few minutes to cross the time dungeon on their own.

The ones they had left behind would be lost for days inside the maze of corridors, but the Keeper would send a fresh batch with instructions on how to cross—they would need only minutes to reach the Losers' location.

"Let's head to the Lamplight, Charlie," Mrs. Bob told Vanaugh.

"Time to drive back the night." Charlie groaned.

"You really suck at this, don't you?" ◇ Billy contemplated his corpse. Only its feet protruded from the icy ground, almost comically. Nine times out of ten, he died by discorporation or explosion. He had almost forgotten that otherwise he left behind a whole corpse. Returning in his true shape now cost him only one point. He checked his Achievement Point tab. Ouch. He could return only thirty-nine more times before he ran out of points. Even his cheapest alternate shape was out of his budget.

Things were not looking too good—the cold was so intense that he doubted he would last more than ten minutes before freezing to death. He had better make the most of his thirty-nine bodies. He began to run. ◇ Jenna landed lithely on her feet after reducing her mass by 90% during the fall. She expanded her Spirit as she swore, trying to find out what had gone wrong. Some kind of spatial-distortion effect radiating from the Lamplight randomized the entry point of any interdimensional incursion.

It looked like some type of defensive measure. Her guess was that it had been placed there to prevent invasions from the time dungeon. Maybe that was the reason Exchange had selected this particular point in spacetime as the next stage in their odyssey? She had to find Billy as soon as possible. She could not count on Bob—he would assume Billy would turn into some flying shape and head towards the lamplight. It was the only stable feature in the landscape.

Jenna had been keeping tabs on his Achievement Points since that fiasco with the Experience Tonic in the dwarf citadel and knew he could not have more than one hundred left—the Thousand-Faced Dragon had taken most of them. He would freeze to death unless she found him first. He would freeze to death many times over. The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. She did not want to find a horde of Billy's corpses waiting for her.

◇ Bob knocked on the single metal door leading into the Lamplight. The building was enormous, much bigger than it had appeared from a distance. There was also a military vibe to it that had not been apparent before. Numerous firing ports studded the facade—this structure had been designed to withstand a siege. It was unmistakably defensive. The door opened, and Bob was suddenly yanked into the building, reminding him of his interrogation by the Dwarves.

He found himself surrounded by burly types wearing what seemed to be uniforms. Their clothes were rumpled, and most of them were unshaven.

"He is human!" the one who seemed to be the leader exclaimed.

"How did you survive out there? There is nothing but snow and predators!"

"I have come to warn you. An invasion is coming from the time dungeon. Two of my friends are still out there. We were supposed to reach this place—we were told you would help us escape this world."

"I told you, Van," one of the unsavory types said to the man Bob was talking to.

"I told you the dungeon invasions were not a myth."

"You must forgive us. Most of us have been incarcerated here for decades. We were warned this could happen, but so far, everything has been pretty quiet."

"Incarcerated? This is a prison?" Bob asked in surprise.

"I am sorry, I did not mean any offense.. At first, I thought this was some kind of military outpost."

"We are. This is a military prison. It is called Last Hope. We are doing time here. Life, actually. I'd better take you to Captain Slenn. He is the one in charge here." Only then did Bob realize that he could understand what these strangers were saying: they were speaking in an archaic form of Beli.

"How are things going in Belona?" one of the grizzled prisoners asked him.

"How are things back home?" ◇ Jenna summoned her Elven warhorn and called the Celestial Stag. For one hour, the creature would serve as her aerial mount. There was only one way to find Billy before the cold claimed him: fly in circles around the central building while enhancing her hearing. It took her twenty minutes and three complete circuits, but finally she heard the baying of wolf-like creatures on the hunt.

She guided her steed toward the sound and discovered a chilling sight: Billy was running, pursued by an enormous pack of wolf-like creatures; they would inevitably catch him and run him down. Then he would respawn a few feet away and start running, only to be caught again. He had left behind a line of seventeen identical corpses, but the cunning predators did not bother with them—as long as they kept chasing Billy, more food would keep appearing.

Jenna cursed the beasts, trying to imagine the agony he had been through. He had not even tried to use explosive charges, and she understood why—they did not know if this place had an active System. Billy could not afford to explode until he was sure he would get Achievement Points out of it. Jenna guided the stag until it hovered a few feet above Billy, grabbed his hand, and hauled him up behind her with one mighty pull of her enhanced strength. Then she urged the beast towards the Lamplight.

As they neared the building, they saw a group of figures at the base. One was Bob, waving them closer. Jenna spurred her stag, closing the final distance in a few seconds. As soon as they landed, a middle-aged man who seemed to be in charge gave an order in Beli. Suddenly, a force field erupted around the lamplight, sealing it off from the outside.

"Thank God," said Bob, hugging them.

"I was worried about you. I kept telling them not to activate the force field, but Slenn told me he could not afford to wait more than five minutes."

"The force field is up," hollered Slenn.

"Let's not make it easy for them—activate the Storm Machine!" The Lamplight began to hum as the arcane machinery inside it came to life. A ferocious gale took shape with the building at its center, engulfing the land for miles around.

"That will not stop them, but it will certainly slow them down."

"What are you talking about, Bob?" Jenna asked.

"Enemies started pouring out of the rift ten minutes after we crossed it. They are Timespiders, like the ones in the Web of Ananke, Jenna. There are thousands of them."

"Let's get inside," Captain Slenn told them.

"We'll be safer, and we'll get you a hot drink."

"Damn it," said Billy.

"What is the matter, Billy?" asked Bob.

"I have passively gained one Achievement Point—this place has an active System. I could have exploded all along," he said bitterly.

"Jesus, I went through all that for nothing." Jenna put an arm protectively around him. They followed Captain Slenn inside the tower. Jenna muttered to Bob in English.

"How are these people speaking Beli, Bob?"

"Because they are Beli, from Belona's past, at a point when Bounty had been active for only one year."

"But how have they managed to travel to another world? They are not supposed to be able to do that."

"They did not. A breach appeared spontaneously one year ago, and monsters started pouring out of it. They think it is some kind of dungeon. They do not suspect that it is a breach to another plane," Bob answered, also in English. No one knew how their hosts would take the news.

"They built the lamplight over the breach to prevent the monsters from crossing into Belona. The people here are disgraced soldiers. They chose this fate to ensure that their families would be supported by the state."

"No, Bob. They are not," Billy said softly.

"What do you mean, Billy?"

"They are not human—they are Essentials. Dungeon-born. Whatever memories they have of families or Belona were implanted in them. I don't think any of them have ever been there."

"Oh, please, no," protested Bob.

"Not another Repository. That business with the Amazons was just too cruel. I can't go through that again. I take it the whole Lamplight is a dungeon?"

"No, Bob. It is not. It is a normal building," answered Billy.

"He is right, Bob," Jenna confirmed.

"I have used Spirit to scan this whole plane. I can't find a single dungeon anywhere." That stopped Bob in his tracks. He examined their companions: the friendly Captain Slenn and the dour but helpful soldiers serving out their sentences.

"Where have these Essentials come from, then? How can they speak Beli? And what is this tower hiding?" Outside, the roar of the wind drowned out the soft but relentless chittering of the advancing army of Timespiders.