“I’m usually not one to question things like this, but…” Isaac started “What is this guy thinking?”
“What’s your beef?” Marie turned around. “Personally, I think it’s a great idea!”
“Well sure, it’s never been done before…” Isaac grumbled. “But…”
“Why the heck are we trudging through a snowfield to find a hot spring?!” he yelled at an uncaring sky. For miles around them in every direction lay nothing but drifts of pure, white snow. Between the pale blue of the sky and the eye-piercing whiteness of the ground, everything fell into a dreary monochrome of icy hues.
“Keep your voice down idiot, you’ll cause an avalanche!” Marie cautioned him, putting a gloved finger against her lips.
“An avalanche?” Isaac exclaimed. “This entire region’s flatter than Manitoba!”
“There may be no danger of avalanches, but I would advise you keep your voice low nonetheless,” Tenshi cautioned, lightly bounding across the snow towards the two of them. “I have scouted the parameter, and found no signs of the monster the quest alluded to. However, I sense something amiss, so be on guard.”
“Please Tenshi,” Isaac scoffed. “We can see everything for miles in any direction. If there was a monster nearby, we’d certainly know abou-ATCHOO!” Isaac broke off in a sneeze. “Why can we even catch a cold in a virtual world?” he questioned bitterly. “How much further, Tenshi?”
“Only about another half an hour,” Tenshi assured him. “I have already located the believed location of the spring. Our only task is placing the Excavation Rune and the Teleportation Rune, and after that our job is complete.”
“You forgot the part about guarding the runes until they finish,” Isaac grumbled. “Who knows how long that could take? Where are we, anyway?”
“According to the map, we are presently in Alsium, a country in the far North-Eastern area of Aternum, close to the border of the Vysklands,” Tenshi answered. “It would seem that the man who contracted us has quite a long arm, for him to have a network of teleportation runes set up this far.”
“As long as he pays us what he promised, I guess I can go another half hour.” Isaac sighed, trudging onwards. “These winter clothes are pretty nice though; did he mention whether we can keep them or not?”
“He says he has a whole warehouse full, so he’ll throw them in as a tip for answering his request so quickly.” Marie danced ahead exuberantly. “Still, how can you be so upset about this? Finally getting a chance to play in snow…this is awesome!” So saying, she threw herself on the ground, flapping her arms and legs to make a snow angel.
“What part of Quebec did you come from to not get snow?” Isaac asked bitterly. “A couple winters in PEI, and you’ll be sick of the stuff, I promise you.”
“This is my first time experiencing snow as well,” Tenshi commented, reaching down and scooping some up in her hands.
“Well you two can have it all.” Isaac sighed, pushing on ahead through the dunes of white.
*******
True to her word, less than half an hour had passed before the trio had reached the indicated location on their map.
“You sure this is the spot?” Isaac asked. “It looks just as bleak and deserted as, well, the whole rest of this place.”
“This is unmistakably the location,” Tenshi affirmed, taking a cubed machine out from her pouch.
“It’s rare to see you actually have a pouch to carry things in, Tenshi,” Isaac joked. “Couldn’t you have just kept that behind your hair like the rest of your stuff?”
Tenshi looked at Isaac, unblinking. “No, I could not. Why?”
“Oh… okay,” Isaac muttered confusedly, turning to Marie. “So, we just place that cube thing in the center, and it should make a rune by itself, right?”
“So he said,” she replied offhandedly, looking around keenly.
“What’s the matter?” Isaac inquired, trying to follow her gaze.
“Nothing, just…” she stopped. “According to the summary, the team of excavators were defeated by a monster here,” she explained. “Yet…there’s no evidence of any struggle. He did say that it snowed recently, so that explains the lack of tracks but… How were they attacked without them noticing first? As you said, we can see for miles all around us.”
A shiver went down Isaac’s spine. “It is pretty odd…” he admitted.
“I am activating the Teleportation Rune device.” A message from Tenshi popped up on their screen. Marie looked back to see Tenshi waving in the distance.
“Well, a couple minutes from now, it won’t matter either way,” Marie remarked
“Wait, let me think…” Isaac muttered to himself. “There weren’t THAT many monsters that lived in tundra areas. Besides, most of them you would be able to notice coming, even if they WERE white, like yetis or polar bears. Even if they flew, in a clear sky like this, there would have been plenty of warning. For them to have been struck off-guard, the attack would have had to have…” Isaac paused suddenly, his eyes going wide.
A second message popped up from Tenshi: “Do you two detect a faint rumbling?”
“I thought you said there couldn’t be any avalanches in a flat area!” Marie exclaimed to Isaac.
“Ohhhhh crap,” Isaac murmured, realization dawning on him.
“What was that?” Marie asked, putting a cupped hand to her ear.
“It came from underground!” Isaac yelled, eyes wide. “Tenshi, get out of there!” He ran back towards Tenshi, waving his hands. Tenshi looked up confused, then gave a friendly wave back.
“Agh, run Marie!” Isaac yelled, as the ground started to convulse more heavily. “I know exactly what kind of monster we’re up against!”
Just as soon as Isaac had finished speaking, Tenshi suddenly vanished from view.
“TENSHI!” Marie yelled, breaking into a headlong dash, churning up the snow in every direction.
“I knew it…” Isaac muttered to himself, eyes wide. “Earth Wyrms! They always try to find areas where there’s a lot of geothermal heat, usually around geysers and hot springs. I didn't think of them, since they usually don't inhabit tundras!”
With an ear-splitting bellow followed by a tremendous cracking sound, Tenshi reappeared, launched upwards through the air. Suddenly, bursting out of the ground after her came a truly fearsome sight.
Looking less like a definable creature and more like some odd appendage off another impossibly larger beast, the Earth Wyrm stretched easily five stories into the sky as it chased after Tenshi. Further, judging by its car-sized width, it must have continued on easily five times that again underground. All pale, greyish skin, the only irregularity the tube-like creature sported was the gaping, multi-toothed mouth that emerged from the eyeless end of it. Marie and Isaac could only watch in horror as the giant creature caught up to Tenshi and, with a single snap of its jaws, ate her whole. Bending in mid-air, the creature hit the ground head-on, drilling its way back into the soil at an incredible speed.
“That was most unpleasant.” Tenshi’s voice came from directly behind the two.
“I promise you, it’s also pretty unpleasant to keep watching you die.” Isaac grimaced wryly.
“I will try to do it less often,” Tenshi promised. “Now, how do we go about killing the creature?”
“That wasn’t part of our contract!” Isaac exclaimed.
“Unless we kill that thing, the hot spring won’t be worth a single gold piece,” Marie reminded him. “Besides, we were offered double for the creature’s head as proof.”
“What?!” Isaac exclaimed. “Just when were you going to tell us that?”
“Oh, er, I didn’t?” Marie looked away sheepishly.
“You were planning on keeping the extra portion for yourself, weren’t you?” Isaac accused.
“Shush, there’s probably no time for this.” Marie smirked. “Look, this creature’s gotta have some kind of weakness, right?”
“Oh… fine,” Isaac muttered. “It doesn’t really, though. If you damage it anywhere below the clitellum, that thicker band below the head, it can simply drop off its tail and regenerate. They love to gather at hot springs because they need two things; heat and moisture. That’s why they…” Isaac stopped. “Tenshi, is that Teleportation Rune complete?”
“Indeed, it finished right about the time I was being eaten,” Tenshi confirmed.
“Okay, I have a plan,” Isaac closed his eyes. “This is going to be neither easy nor pleasant, but it’s the only way I can see us killing that thing. Are you all with me?”
“Damn straight!” Marie grinned.
“Affirmative,” Tenshi intoned.
“All right then,” Isaac loaded his pistol belt. “Let’s go Wyrm-fishing.”
*******
Stepping quietly to avoid summoning the Wyrm, the three made their way back to the site.
“Excavation Rune primed!” Tenshi announced, stepping back from the large glowing red circle.
“The Teleportation Rune’s working just fine too!” Marie called over from a slightly smaller blue circle.
“All right team, remember what I said. This thing's completely blind, so it’s working based on its other senses. The less you give it to work with, the better.” Isaac opened up his menu and activated SNEAK. “Not trying to leave you guys with the hard part, but this should give me a little protection,” he messaged. “However, I won’t be able to contact you except through text as long as I have it on, so make sure you follow the plan!”
“So that’s why you had me be the bait,” Marie grumbled. “Tenshi’s got her clones, and you’ve got your sneaking power, so you guys are nice and safe.”
“Think of it as recompense for trying to make off with the quest bonus,” Isaac texted her.
“Thanks, I’ll remember that while I’m getting eaten.” Marie grimaced. “Okay, I’m in position, let’s get this over with.”
Tenshi tapped the cube-shaped machine in the center of the Excavation Rune, then leapt back as the rune began to glow dimly.
“Let's just hope things go according to plan,” Marie called over from the Teleportation Rune. “It’s a good thing our employer added me to his friends list, I can teleport to any area he can.”
“I figured as much, since we were able to teleport all the way out here,” Isaac texted, sprinting a little way from the two runes and sinking low into the snow. “Don’t forget, the worm is blind, so hiding from it won’t make any real difference. However, keeping low and making as little noise as possible is probably the closest we can get to being concealed.”
“…Not like that helps me any.” Marie sighed, standing up and stretching. “Tenshi, how much longer until that rune acti…?” Her final words were cut off as the Excavation Rune gave a conclusive flash, followed by a shower of snow and dirt flying in every direction.
“There’s your answer, Marie!” Isaac’s word came silently over text. “Tenshi estimated about a minute and a half for the rune to pierce through the permafrost, followed by another three minutes until it reaches its destination.”
“Judging from the tremors, we have less than thirty seconds until the beast returns,” Tenshi’s message cut in, herself already running from the location of the rune as fast as her legs could carry her.
“Tenshi, wouldn’t now be a good time to start summoning those clones?” Isaac texted, agitated.
“It is not so simple a process as you assume,” Tenshi shot back in text. “To begin with…”
An explosion of snow and ice cut off the conversation, heralding the reappearance of the Earth Wyrm, the tremors of its arrival masked by the drilling of the rune.
“It’s here!” Marie yelled at the top of her voice, the noise splitting through the frigid air. The Wyrm paused as if surprised, then slowly bent its head in her direction, its mouth opening in anticipation.
“Baptême,” Marie cursed, turning on her heels and dashing away from the towering monster.
“Remember the plan, Marie!” Isaac’s text flashed on her screen.
“Do not worry Alex,” Tenshi texted consolingly. “Earth Wyrms typically take days to digest their prey, so in the likely event that you are consumed, we can rescue you from its stomach at a later time.”
“Not helping, Tenshi!” Marie yelled, tears of exertion streaming from her eyes, as the Wyrm bellowed and dove after her, sending waves of snow flying as it burrowed under the ground again.
“Calm down and analyze it, Marie!” Isaac texted her. “We need to predict its movement patterns for this to work!”
“Easy for you to say!” Marie bellowed, scrambling through the snow. “You come down here and have it chase after you for a bit, and tell me what you learn!”
Suddenly, the ground beneath Marie gave way, revealing the awaiting mouth of the Wyrm, tunneling up from beneath her. Marie shrieked, lashing out with a kick that split one of its teeth, propelling her out of harm’s way in the process as the Wyrm bellowed in pain, shooting up into the air again.
“Marie, run back towards it!” Isaac texted her.
“Ah ben ça parle au yâbe, are you bloody crazy?!” She yelled back, turning to look at the already six storey tall Earth Wyrm.
“Listen to me, I noticed something!” Isaac texted back hurriedly. “Because of its thick skin, it can’t turn in a complete “U” shape that well! The closer you are to the point it emerged from, the further you’ll be from it when it dives underground again!”
“You’d better be right about this.” Marie gulped, turning back and sprinting towards the bulk of the Wyrm’s body, even as it began to bend, preparing for another plunge.
True to Isaac’s prediction, the Wyrm made a wide arc, coming nowhere close to Marie. Dodging the end of the tail as it whipped out of the hole, Marie continued running onwards, back towards the Excavation Rune.
“The drilling has reached the second stage,” Tenshi’s text warned. “There is very little time left!”
“Marie’s not gonna make it!” Isaac texted back, disabling SNEAK, and getting up and running towards the pair of runes. “Tenshi, can you do anything?”
“Leave it to me,” she responded. On cue, a clone of Tenshi crested a snowbank behind Marie, sprinting over the top and easily closing the distance to her.
“Fly, Alex,” she whispered, as the Earth Wyrm exploded out of the soil behind them. Before Marie could react, Tenshi grabbed her by the nape of her cloak with one arm, spinning around and bodily throwing her just shy of the runes. Smiling with satisfaction as Marie stumbled back to her feet much closer to the rune, the Tenshi clone turned to face the Wyrm, as the first Tenshi dashed across the snow towards its duplicate. As the Wyrm began its next dive, the first Tenshi dashed up the back of the clone, jumping as the clone pushed her feet up, launching her into the air after the beast.
“Just you try and eat me again,” Tenshi whispered, planting a hand on the top of its head and hoisting herself onto its back.
Roaring in anger, the Wyrm continued to plunge downward, headed straight for the Tenshi clone, which was now running back towards the runes after Marie.
Isaac had only just reached the teleportation rune in time to see the giant Wyrm bearing down on Tenshi’s clone. “Even at her speed, she’s not gonna make it!” Isaac direly predicted, gauging the distance.
“Have a little faith.” Marie dusted herself off, planting a hand on the Teleportation Rune. “If anyone’s calculations are going to be accurate, it’ll be Tenshi’s. She’s an AI, remember?”
As the Wyrm plunged after the clone, it suddenly jerked upwards, its mouth shooting open, followed by the foot of a third Tenshi. “Watch what you eat,” Tenshi muttered, leaping out of its mouth and delivering another solid kick to its jaw.
“It’s the original Tenshi it swallowed earlier!” Marie cheered. “Damn, I knew she had this!”
Flailing, the Wyrm shot completely over the head of the second Tenshi clone, heading straight for Marie and Isaac.
“Well I’ll be, she actually did it!” Isaac laughed. Then, suddenly the reality of his situation dawned on him. “Incoming, Marie!” he yelled, eyes wide. “Are you ready?”
“Any time!” she called back, throwing off her jacket. “Winter clothes off Isaac, you won’t need them where we’re goin’!”
Fumbling with his buttons, Isaac threw the coat off and turned around, coming face to face with the giant mouth of the incoming Wyrm.
“Marie, NOW!” Isaac bellowed. In response, Marie slammed her palm into the ground, and with a blink, Isaac, Marie, Tenshi, and the Wyrm vanished, leaving the winter wastelands barren again, save for the two clones.
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