From the nd of the towering steel spires and the venomous mists shall it emerge. Its hunger insatiable, never quenched by the bountiful harvest of the shifting sands. Nay, it shall make its way to the sea that is but a memory, trapped and entombed in halls of white as pure as milk.

  A grave, long forgotten and left to the ages, shall stir once more, its power unleashed to cim the final reckoning. A scion of the ravenous people, born to bring destruction and ruin to all that stands before it. False justice and chaos its only companions, heralding the coming of the apocalypse.

  The harbinger of the ultimate cataclysm, it shall not rest until all that was once known is consumed by its insatiable wrath. None shall escape the doom that it brings, for its power is absolute and its hunger unending. The end is nigh, and no man, woman, or child shall be spared its merciless fury.

  - Attributed to the Wrack Witch before her execution circa 245 AC.

  Our group eventually reached a blocked part of the shaft where a rge amount of stone had fallen from the ceiling, obstructing further passage to the deeper parts of the mine. Some of the other dwarves suggested digging around the shaft to create a small connecting tunnel, but Durhit decided that we should pce beams to support the roof while we break up the rger pieces of stone and clear the way.

  The work was strenuous, but our group worked quickly under the skilled guidance of the dwarves, without the need for the extra motivation of a whip. I was shoveling gravel and loose debris into my wicker basket when a man of average height approached me. He had a lean and feral appearance, with scars running up and down his limbs. A receding hairline, thinning hair, and bald spot on the top of his head gave him the look of a tonsured monk. He greeted me with a rakish smile and began to talk.

  “Haven’t seen your type before around here. Name's Elwin, Elwin Tucker," he said with a cheerful tone that seemed out of pce in the setting. He then pced his shovel in his left hand and reached out to shake my hand with his calloused grip.

  I shook his hand with moderate enthusiasm and replied, “I've never been to these parts before, but I think the hospitality and accommodations could use some improvement. I would very much like to end my journey in these nds."

  A small smile began to form at the corner of my mouth, and I found his friendly attitude infectious. “My name is Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh of Uruk."

  “Hah! I'll drink to that, Gil, if only there was anything to drink. You don't mind if I call you Gil, do you? There's no escaping now that they've got you," he pointed to his heavy iron colr. “You could put one of these things on a giant, and it wouldn't be going anywhere fast!”

  “I wouldn't know about that.” My tongue loosened under his easy-going charisma, and I had to make a mental effort to stop myself from continuing foolishly. “I mean, I've never had one of these lovely pieces of jewelry on me before,” I finished a little mely.

  The man looked at me quizzically before returning to his work. "Not for ck of trying on my part," he said, gesturing to his colr. "I've tried many things with this thing. I've hit it with something, tried getting my mates to hit it with something, and that took some doing. I've even tried grinding it against some hard rock, and let me tell you, that is not an easy task. It felt like I was sawing away at my own neck! But everything ended in pain." He shoveled another load of dirt and gravel. "Once, I was even able to get a good distance away from this lovely holiday spot. But I was caught by those cursed Tides, writhing on the ground in pain so great that I'm sure my bastard children's children will feel it. They had a good ugh at that."

  The temptation to reveal to him that there might be a way out of our situation grew stronger along with my sympathy, but I knew I had to keep this particur card close to my chest. I had only just met him, and I began to wonder if this was some sort of test. I had absolutely no reason to trust this man, despite his friendly demeanor.

  Venturing to change the topic, I gave him a brief summary of my origins, leaving out the detail about coming from Earth. Unlike Kidu and Durhit, he appeared a bit skeptical about my story, but was nonetheless understanding of my fabricated memory loss. At some point during the conversation, Kidu, who was busy breaking up rocks nearby, began to interject, correcting some of the details to fit his own version of events.

  The brutish orc was carving up the stones in front of him, a pickaxe in each hand, and gouged through the stone with consummate ease and bestial fury. Kidu responded in turn, blonde dreadlocks swinging with each mighty flourish of his mining tool, and a sort of rivalry had grown between the two. Elwin and I hurried to keep gathering the smaller stones and detritus out of the way.

  During a small lull in the work, even the formidable Kidu had to begrudgingly concede victory to the orc. Impressed by Kidu's performance, I decided to discreetly cast an Identify spell on him as he breathed in and out like the bellows of a forge. I was a bit surprised that I had not thought to do so earlier.

  Kidu Kreshin - Hunter (Human lvl.11)

  Health: 211/214

  Stamina: 02/47

  Mana: 5/5

  Kidu's statistics were impressive, and it was no wonder how he was able to keep up with the orc for as long as he had. His css designation of Hunter made sense from his tales of the frozen north of his home, his skills no doubt honed by dealing with the great beasts that lived there.

  We asked Elwin about his own origins. The temptation to cast the spell on him as he began his little tale was strong, but I decided to refrain until we were at a safer locale.

  “My tale is a simple one. I was a Forester for a lord. My whole family had been Foresters since way back in the March Reaches of Aranthia,” he began in his naturally friendly tone. “Our lot in life was to protect the lord's game from the hungry types and the occasional goblin. One year, after perhaps the bitterest winter and poorest harvest of the ages, I found out that one of my neighbor's sons had been putting a little extra in his game bag. Wilf, Silf, I can't even remember his name now... it seems like another lifetime. But I do remember that it was hard to enforce Reach justice, which called for death for the crime of poaching. All of this was for a lord whom I had only met once, to punish a man who had a starving family and a wailing bairn. I let it go, and perhaps even snuck him a bit of coin every now and then." He paused for a moment, as if gathering himself.

  “It began with poaching, and it seemed that poaching was a stepping stone to banditry for young Wilf. Needless to say, someone who was deep in their cups told someone else, and then a different someone pointed a finger at me. The Arbitrator said I was responsible for the crimes of the man whom I had willingly turned a blind eye to, that I was some sort of a corrupt civil servant. I was sold off to pay for someone else's crime and as a demonstration of the Lord's authority. And here I am, toiling under the earth, when I should be under the boughs of the trees breathing in the clean forest air.” Elwin tried to finish in resignation, but he couldn't quite help adding, “Which sure beats the stench of you ds. The bunch of you could kill a full-grown buck just standing downwind. I'd probably be dead already if my nose wasn't already!”

  We replied with a weak ugh, as a dour, gray-bearded dwarf gestured for us to get back to work with a scowl and a wave of a shovel that scraped the ceiling, coating his beard with fine white rock dust that looked like blue snow in the gloom.

  "On my honor, I wish for nothing more than to be free and wreak vengeance on the Children!" Kidu decred in his simplistic way, his voice filled with strong determination as he resumed carving up the rock, no doubt imagining he was caving in the faces of the Children of the Tides.

  A few hours ter, we had finally cleared enough of the shaft's obstructions for two abreast to walk through. Under the blue glow of the Zajasite lightstones, we allowed ourselves a small break to rest our tired and sore muscles. Durhit sent Elwin back up to the surface to call for much-needed supplies.

  A group of younger sves, led by Elwin, returned to us ter. Water-bearers brought with them baskets of bread, which we scarfed down almost as quickly as they handed them out. A familiar face passed, his eyes hot with rage but downturned in fear.

  “Gunne,” I stated, recognizing him. The boy flinched, surprised that I had remembered his name. “Son of Gundug. Will you have your revenge this day?” I continued slowly, my tone filled with petty spite.

  To his credit, he didn't rise to the provocation and silently handed out my portion of bread just as Durhit arrived to check up on us.

  “Don’t be terrorizing the d too much. We are…” he began but was cut off as the earth suddenly rumbled and the walls shook as if they were receiving blows from mighty fists.

  Losing my bance, I was tossed against the wall, accidentally striking a sve whose name I did not know with my shovel and sending him to the ground. Powerful vibrations shook the mines, causing our hastily made supports to quiver against the seismic forces and stone dust to fall from the ceiling. Somewhere in the chaos, I could hear wailing and panicked screaming as the earth continued to convulse like an angry and uncaring god.

  Suddenly, one of the supports exploded under the strain like a tree in the coldest winter, making a sound like a gunshot and adding to the cacophony of chaos. This triggered a chain reaction as rocks began to fall from the ceiling. First small loose stones and gravel hit with a rattling sound, followed by hulking jagged boulders that added to the disorder and caused injuries in the blue-stained pandemonium. As I looked down, I was met with horror as the sve I had accidentally struck was smashed by a rge rock, utterly squashed under its great weight.

  You have sin a Human 95 experience gained.

  You have gained 1 Luck.

  You have gained 1 Dexterity.

  You have reached level 7.

  3 unassigned attribute points.

  1 unassigned skill point.

  Even as the earth rumbled in its rage, rocks falling everywhere, I frantically navigated through the interface to assign my skills. In a split-second decision, I added a skill point to Dodge, and as was my custom, I allocated all of my attribute points to Constitution. Being a fraction more agile, I was able to avoid another falling rock and even pushed Kidu out of the way of a rge, plummeting white stone just in time. But that was the st thing I remembered before something hard struck the back of my head, causing a sharp pain to rattle my skull. Then the world went bck, and I knew no more.