Ruler’s Blessing allowed me to bestow special titles on those who served me. Apparently these titles would make the recipient stronger, but unfortunately, the description didn’t really say anything more about how it worked.
Gate to the Unseen Realm allowed the wearer of the ring to enter the Unseen Realm, a special dimension where the Unseen Court was located. I’d visited the Unseen Realm a few times for quests in the game. It was the home of the Queen of the Unseen, who ruled over all Sprigians. She was more dignified and beautiful than cute, but I didn’t dislike her as a character. Once again, though, the description didn’t specifically mention how to access the Unseen Realm, so the skill was useless to me.
Heir of Balance was much more useful. With this skill, I could raise the power of one combatant in a battle, and/or lower the power of the other, until they were evenly matched. In essence, it forced two parties to fight on equal terms. As a dungeon master, this was a premium skill with all kinds of potential for abuse. I could flood a dungeon with level one cuties and then make each one the same level as anyone who fought them. This was a skill I definitely wanted to try out.
Looking up from my tablet, I realized the sun was getting low. In a normal fantasy world adventure, you’d be able to just follow the first river you found and eventually you’d run into people. People tended to build towns and cities next to bodies of fresh water, so that would be a pretty safe bet. However, in the game world of Questonicia, everything was generated by artificial intelligence; it didn’t adhere to such real-world logic. In fact, it would have been troublesome for players if it did. Since one of the main things to do in the game was build things, the game didn’t really generate many towns and cities on its own. So if I’d been somehow transported into the game world, following the river could potentially take years and ultimately lead nowhere.
My best bet in this situation was to create a dungeon. A Sprigian tower dungeon always had a room available for the dungeon master’s exclusive use. From there, the dungeon master could plan the layout of the rest of the labyrinth, including the placement of monsters, traps, and treasure. Some dungeon masters left the entrance to their room open to visitors with themselves as the final boss of their dungeon, but not me. After all, a sealed dungeon master chamber was impervious to any form of attack. No place in the entire game was safer. It was also one of the few rooms in a Sprigian tower dungeon that could be placed underground.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t just stick a dungeon anywhere I wanted. There were rules. First, I needed a hollow tree. Any kind of hollow would do, as long as it was large enough to fit a Labyrinth Seed. In the game, Sprigian players started with only a single Labyrinth Seed, but once they’d built a dungeon and developed it past a certain point, they would get more of them periodically. They were hard to get when you were first playing, but right now my inventory was loaded with hundreds of them. Each one waiting to become a new dungeon.
As the sun sank low in the sky, I walked casually through the forest in search of a hollow tree. I had access to the skill Fairy Wings, which let me fly quickly to cover large distances, but I wouldn’t be able to spot hollow trees well from the air. Even if I spotted a city, I probably didn’t have anything that the people there would consider money. My inventory did have plenty of things I could sell, but they were divided into three broad categories: disposable items that might be dangerous in the wrong hands, stuff I absolutely wanted to keep, and things most people probably wouldn’t buy. Some of the items probably fell into more than one category. I was going to need to know a lot more about this world before I just randomly started selling stuff to people.
In the game it was possible to create toll gates, which other entities had to pay to get through. I’d never used this feature much because most of the items I bought were real-world money purchases. Anyway, the in-game currency was “crystals,” so it was pretty likely the people here wouldn’t care about them. Unless of course this was the game world, in which case the odds were low that there was any sort of civilization nearby. Sprigians tended to avoid cities, since many of their skills didn’t work there.
For example, as I walked through the forest, my Loved by Nature skill caused the trees to literally get out of my way. Even the gnarled roots slid underground to avoid my bare feet. The forest itself couldn’t bring itself to inconvenience me, even a little. Contrast that with a crowded city, and you could see why Sprigians preferred the outdoors. Of course, there were other skills that didn’t work indoors. Natural Stealth, Detect Malice, and Nature’s Accomplice either didn’t work at all or had limited function indoors.
Anyway, I did end up finding something, but it wasn’t a hollow tree.
I could only see the shape of it in the distance at first. Its outline looked like a figure wearing armor. My first contact with a being from this world.
Will they be friendly? Will I be able to understand them? Will they be able to understand me?
Those were the questions in my mind as I approached, brimming with hope. As I drew closer, I realized my mistake, but not before the creature noticed me. On closer inspection, it looked like a bear standing on its hind legs, but its body was covered in thick armor-like plates. Each of the claws that extended from its front paws were almost as big as one of Lilac’s forearms, and there were four of them on each paw. The huge, armored bear turned toward me and let loose a terrifying roar that sent thick strands of saliva flying from its mouth.
I swear its eyes are glowing red. It isn’t cute at all. If anyone made a plushie of this, I’d definitely slap them. Hey, maybe it’s friendly. I should try talking to it. Who could say, it might be sentient. Maybe we’ll become best buddies, and then years from now we’ll laugh about this encounter.
“Uh, hello?”
“GRAAAAAAAUUUGH!”
Nope, it was roaring again—unless that was bear-speak for “It’s really nice to meet you, let’s be friends,” I was pretty sure it wanted to kill me. Let’s see... If this was a regular grizzly bear, playing dead might work, but that’d only be if it thought I was a threat to its territory. If it saw me as food, and wanted to eat me, then that’d would be suicide. I either had to make myself as much or as little of a threat as possible... Maybe I should just back away slowly. That might work.
“GRAAAAAAAUUUGH!”
Great, it’s charging at me. Lunging forward at full speed. Didn’t I hear somewhere that an adult grizzly can run faster than— Wow, it looks even bigger up close. Maybe it’s just my sense of scale being thrown off by this new body.