Like the mouth of a wolf, the city’s skyline was fanged. Buildings hung down from the ceiling and shot up from the earth. The occasional spire connecting the two. Oval shaped, domed buildings dotted the bottom of the skyline. And at the center of the cavern, a massive building dwarfed the rest of the structures in the city, blending the two clashing styles. Three pillars connected to a massive dome that from this far away looked like the skeletal torso of a starved beast.

  As we neared the city, we spotted a new path which just began in a random spot in the tunnel. Made from a kind of timber I didn’t recognize and six planks wide. The wood itself was pockmarked, as if someone had driven thousands of needles into the wood. As we followed the path, I noticed the sections that made it up were a chaotic mess of quality and condition. Some were rotted or broken, giving way as we passed overtop. While other nearby portions were so pristine, they could’ve been installed the day before.

  As we neared the city, more detail came into focus. We approached its first and only line of defense. A series of five, ten feet wide and twenty feet deep ditches spanned the width of the tunnel. The path spanned all the ditches, raised stilts at the bottom of the trenches supported the weight. I was unsure what they defended against if they felt the only defense required was ditches. But clearly, they felt the precaution required. Otherwise, why waste the effort digging five when one would have provided the same amount of security theatre?

  Like weeds around a dying tree, miles of abandoned housing surrounded the city. We followed the pockmarked path past endless blocks of uniform square shacks in various states of disrepair. The rubble of collapsed buildings blocked off entire streets. And all too often we passed homes that lent up against each other in a final embrace before their stone work fell apart and they too became rubble.

  The entire time we walked, I hadn’t seen or heard a single sign of life. Not a fire, the smell of food, the quiet chatter or people, or the bustle of everyday life. Everything we passed was abandoned. At one point, we passed a wide-open space probably intended to be a market. A building had collapsed into the pathway and forced us to climb over top the rubble to continue on.

  Oddly, it looked like the centuries of adventurers who came before us carved a stairway up the rubble. Stone blocks taken off and put to the side by those who walked this road before us. The rubble stairway was little help in getting over, however, as whatever held the building together was sticky as all the Hells and each step tried to keep us trapped against the stone.

  Every single one of us, including Maggie, got stuck at one point or another during the climb and required the help of at least two other people to get unstuck.

  It took the entire length of one of Dustreach’s districts for us to finally see our first person.

  I’d felt her before she even turned the corner from an alleyway into what I assumed had been a main thoroughfare. The woman had her aura flared out, not violently as Tia had, but as a display of strength. The result was a slight feeling of anxiety, like when you have to own up to a misdeed in front of a commander.

  They were of a species I’d never seen before and towered at least a foot in height over me. Her size wasn’t what held my attention, however. Where a set of human legs would have begun on her torso, her body flared into that of a spider’s. Expanded to weigh at least half a tonne. At the rear of her lower half was a four-foot-long tail that ended in the same wicked barb as a scorpion.

  The barb hung poised above her head, ready to strike at a moment’s notice. Unlike other species I’d met with tails, this woman did not seem to require it to keep her balanced. And even as she moved, the barb stayed perfectly still above the crest of her helmet.

  The woman glanced first down the street towards the heart of the city, then she looked our way. When the woman saw us staring, she made the very human motion of heaving a sigh and approached. Her steps rang out against the wooden platform like heeled boots, the sound full and weighty.

  “You are here for the auction, correct?” The woman asked in heavily accented Trade Tongue. The syllables trapped at the back of her throat and only reluctantly released.

  “Uhhh, yeah.” Nora said, dumbstruck, before Maggie lightly elbowed her. “I mean, we are, yes.”

  “You must approach the large spire at the center of the city. The auction is the squared complex nearby.” The woman said. Her too human expression of boredom visible through her open-faced helm.

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  “Thank you, we-“

  “You are going to keep your staring in check. Others might not be so relaxed if you stare at them as if they are a part of a spiress’ menagerie.” The woman interrupted. Her strange accent making the rebuke sound as harsh as a death sentence.

  Nora thanked the woman, but she ignored us and continued on her patrol. As she left, I couldn’t help myself from watching the way she moved. There was almost no sway or bounce to her steps. It seemed almost mechanical, like she was a clockwork golem of some kind.

  The five of us watched her leave in silence until Ellen broke the moment and continued walking. We followed and together we entered deeper into the city. Both more curious and wearier about the place we travelled to.

  As we entered what I thought of as the heart of the city, the buildings transformed abruptly from hovels into the spire and domes that I’d seen from a distance. Now that the city was actually populated, we ran across more of what I assumed to be the aranae.

  Women with multiple tails and others who lacked any tails at all. Those without seemed far more common and made up around eighty percent of everyone we saw.

  The other peoples we saw, I assumed, were part of the species collectively called goblins.

  The first variety we came across was routinely at least nine feet tall and lean. Their bodies made of whipcord muscle and sinew. Every individual we passed of this species was entirely hairless and so pale that under certain light I could see the red of muscle underneath their skin. As we saw more and more, I noticed that they all had the same piercings.

  They started just below their throats and continued down their sternum until they disappeared underneath clothing; each of the piercings was made of a gemstone I was unfamiliar with, and carved so that both ends were visible to form stylized arrowheads pointing in both directions.

  I couldn’t help but wonder what they could symbolize to the goblins because every member of this species I saw was pierced, including the children who, on average, were only slightly shorter than I was. The goblins also seemed more social than the aranae because I’d only seen the aranae with tails speak to those without twice while at least half the goblins we passed were engaged in conversation with a member of their sister species.

  Similar to the pierced goblins, their sister species was around nine feet tall on average, but they differed in two major ways. In contrast to the whipcord muscle of the other species, layer upon layer of fat caked this one. Everyone, including the children, must have weighed upwards of five hundred pounds. Similar to the goblins with the piercings, the members of this sister species all wore the same accessory. Every single one of these new kinds of goblins that we passed had wrapped themselves in some kind of fern. Like a toga that started just below their stomachs and continued to wrap around one or both of their shoulders.

  It was hard not to feel small down here. Since I was a child, I’d always been one of the largest people not only in Twin Oak, but in the entire Cult. As we passed people who towered over me like I’d done to so many back home, I felt the beginnings of nerves creep up into my throat.

  Trying to focus that anxious energy, I started trying to pick out minor details in the city around us. As we passed more of the oval shaped and u-framed homes that lined the cavern floor, I noticed that every single one had an entrance decorated with three things. Bone trophies, and a sigil on either side of the door. The sigils on the left side of the door almost always belonged to one of three, with a rare fourth making an appearance every twentieth house. The sigil on the right side of the door was unique to every house we passed, however.

  Aranae homes, or what I assumed to be aranae homes in the webbed spires that hung from the ceiling, were fairly uniform. A single column of web and stone that grew towards the cavern floor. However, I noticed that in the most prominent spots in the city, such as at major intersections or near markets, the aranae spires almost always had begun the process of mineralization. The webbing at the top slowly transforming into the red stone of the mesa. Water droplets forming red tears that ran down the side of most of these homes.

  Goblins or aranae weren’t the only enlightened, and on several occasions, we spotted another group of adventurers who usually stopped to say a quick word of greeting before they moved on. Occasionally we passed a storefront, either cut from the base of a spire or as an add-on to one of the domed houses, that had a human in civilian clothing manning the counter or grill.

  As we neared the center of the city, the space between buildings shrank and the two styles of architecture on display clashed against one another. Spires anchored to the top of a dome house, or a goblin home that blocked the path for a hanging spire to connect to the ground.

  Eventually that clash manifested itself at the center of the city in a massive plaza that contained the building the aranae guard had told us to seek out. Each spire connected to the massive dome was at least halfway done mineralizing and becoming columns of stone completely.

  Like the woman told us, off to the left of the plaza was a compound designed entirely from cubic additions, like someone had left a toddler unattended with some blocks. A tapestry draped across the entrance read ‘Heremar Auction House’ in stylized Trade Tongue.

  “What do you guys think Heremar means?” Nora asked.

  “I’ll bet a gold piece it’s the name of some rich family.” Maggie said with a grin.

  “I’ll take you up on that, I bet it’s the name of the city.” I returned.

  “You’re both wrong. It’s the native name for the Under Tunnels.” Mika countered.

  “My money’s on it being what they call humans.” Ellen chimed.

  “I’m with Bran on this one. I think it’s the name of the city.” Nora said with a smile she plastered on as she crested the last step of the auction house’s porch and swung open the large door.

  When we entered, a member of the fat species of goblin greeted us. Like every other member of its species I’d seen, it wore only that fern and left the rest of its modesty to the folds of its flesh. What gender it was I couldn’t tell, as I assumed it was mammalian and both genders had significant breasts.

  “Welcome to the Heremar Auction House. My name is Zoh. What can I do for you today?” The goblin said.

  Their voice was soft and whispered, a contrast to the sheer size of the person in front of me.

  “We’re actually here to put ourselves up for auction and were wondering how to go about that.” Nora said, falling into her role as our face easier than she had before.

  “Wonderful!” Zoh said with a smile that showcased omnivorous teeth punctuated by two larger fangs on the bottom jaw. “If you’ll just follow me, I’ll introduce you to my coworker, Jezu.”