Chương 464: Let's Talk

As the semi-controlled chaos swirled around him, Milo spent his time with a stack of maps. He'd gathered all the information the Engineers had available, even though much of their area had changed long ago, with tunnels collapsing and new ones forming from nature and monsters. Still, they gave him clues of where to look. The myconians were a sedentary race, and had little knowledge of the world around them.

The ratkin of Limburger Hollow knew of routes to other Hollows, but rarely went so deep into the earth and knew nothing of the lower caverns where Rumbottle Bay was being built. To what little he'd found, he added the package of old maps he'd been given from the Chimera's Reward Chest. Those proved to be both useful and frustrating.

Useful, because there was a huge amount of information available to him, and he delighted in matching up corresponding areas of the maps and working on a master map drawn on a convenient wall in pencil and charcoal. But it was also frustrating work. Some of the maps were highly detailed technical documents with depths clearly indicated and all details drawn to scale by dwarven tunnel scouts.

The Elvish maps were works of art, with detailed illustrations in all margins, flowing script, and minutely drawn monsters to show the danger of some areas. Sadly, the elves didn't bother with any numbers to show scale or how deep the area was, and artistic license was often used to create interesting, but ultimately useless maps. He also had faded journals, waterlogged bundles of notes, travelogues in various languages and handwriting, and a badge from the Gadobhra Exploration and Conquest Society.

That medallion was made of a carved black stone that he couldn't identify and was a mystery to all the Engineers. The symbols carved into it glowed a dull red in the darkness. It had come attached to a partial map showing a route that led from Gadobhra to unknown locations. One by one, he asked his family and friends to come in and look at his collection of items laid out on tables with his notes in front of each. Everyone had unique backgrounds, and he was hoping for some help with some of the odder items.

Min was able to identify one piece of tanned leather as being Orcish, and had a message noting that the 'City of Dead Things' had lots of treasure, but nothing to eat, and it should be taken out of the travel guide. Zander had picked up a smattering of languages from talking to someone he called BadNewsBenny, which, he stressed, wasn't his real name, and certainly wasn't a demon. That allowed him to read one of the water damaged books.

He sat in a corner reading for five hours, filled in a portion of Milo's map, then left, clearly disturbed but refusing to talk. Slowly, Milo was able to use nearly half of the collection to build a map of the areas surrounding Cracked Rock and the myconian city beneath them. It was enough to show him that there might be a route from the myconian area, to the place where he had fought the Gneiss Lurkers and acquired a large amount of the crystals used in magi-tech.

Between the need for those crystals, along with Silverite and Duram Argenti, the area was a treasure trove of rare materials that they needed. He'd gotten to that area by exploring deep into the caverns beneath Limburger Hollow. Going up from Cracked Rock to the Hollow, and then down a narrow stairway, twisting tunnels, and spiral stone stair cases was long and dangerous route. And one that was impossible to take the machinery to mine the ores, and deal with the Gneiss Lurkers.

He needed a better route, and thought he might have found one. It would mean exploring the snail infested areas beyond the myconian caves, and finding passages leading to the area where they needed to mine. The snails themselves were also an objective. If more of the larger snails were breeding somewhere, they were a threat to the myconians. Milo would happily help them out by culling the population, and claim the shells as his payment. The collective could have the rest for their mulch fields.

The Engineers had found many uses for the tough shells and were eager to get more. With the right solvents, they had discovered a method of separating the layers of each shell, giving them thinner pieces of shell that could be softened to form the shapes they needed, then hardened by baking the shells in a furnace. Ursula had been one of the first recipients of the new 'Snail-Tech' armor.

Under her first layer of metal armor was an inch-thick plate donated by Gargantua, making her very difficult to injure, even with high-power explosives that Boom-Boom loved so much. Professor Boom had done a great deal of experimenting on the material, finding that it resisted acid, fire, and physical force. She could still take damage, but nothing was quickly going to take Ursula out of the fight. After two weeks of working on his maps, Milo was interrupted by Belinda coming into the room.

"Do you know where we're going yet?"

"Sort of?" He pointed to two spots on the wall.

"We start here, and need to get somewhere over here. I don't have much info on what's in-between." She grinned evilly at him, "Good enough. Do you need to pack all of this up or do you have it stored away in that perfect memory of yours?" He looked around the room. Every wall was filled with drawings, maps, notes, with layers of more scribbles on top. But they were his notes.

"I'll remember it all, if I had to." Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

"Good. Time to go then." She tossed him a cheese sandwich that he caught and immediately took a bite of, famished from not eating all day.

"Go? You want the two of us to go alone." She considered.

"While that would be fun, all of the people waiting for us down in the mushroom caverns would be upset. I've been organizing the expedition for three days and we're ready to go as soon as I drag you by the tail to the elevator. Or, you can scamper quickly on your own, and try to make a quick getaway. That's up to you." The cheese was waking him up, and he was pretty sure she wasn't joking.

"I'm ready to go. Luckily, I travel light." He grabbed his backpack full of snacks and his staff.

"Pack light, my ass. I've seen the workshop full of stuff you can pull out of nowhere." Milo grinned at her.

"It does come in handy. Did I tell you about the time I found a sunken ship full of treasure?" They walked to the elevator as he regaled her with a daring story of stolen pirate gold. Cazact paced back and forth in his merchant stall. He was annoyed with the ratkin he had met. Somehow, this new person was not 'predictable and boring.' He was proving to be just the opposite. He was doing things that Cazact had never heard of being done before. The monstrous snail had been of mild interest to him.

It was a true monster, but he had journeyed to the Sunken Abyss and seen the Behemoth Sea Snails that ruled there. Granted, the way the ratkin had killed this one was innovative. And mysterious. None of the reports from witnesses gave a clue as to how he had created such an eye-searing explosion. One witness described it as 'like a star exploding inside a meat locker'. Then the arrival of the incredible: Dwarven Engineers actually taking a vacation!

Their garish clothing was said to have blinded several under-dwellers for days. It was impossible to contemplate that the ratkin had fought against three Ur-Khemysts without dying immediately. Such things didn't happen. No one defied Bloth. And yet this person had. It made Cazact incredibly curious, and the addition of a pack of migratory beach-dwarves entering the battle was maddening to him as well. He had so few details and he wanted to know the whole story.

Mainly because most of the people that might have witnessed the fight had turned and fled, except for the insane. Only crazed sentients would stay when Ur-Khemysts went to war. They were notorious for collateral damage with their caustic fluids and choking gas clouds. Cazact needed new things to interest him the way a drowning man needed air. But he needed to understand them. Pondering mysteries brought forth too many memories and threatened a cascade within his packed mind.

The recent events were straining him to his limits. He'd gathered all the information that could be found from talking with people in the city, most of whom bored him to tears. They knew the broad strokes, but it seemed the only people who knew exactly what had happened were somewhere else. Someplace he couldn't go if he was going to stay on schedule. Fulfilling his contracts for rare goods was his livelihood, and no one in that city would ever excuse tardiness.

He had to leave for Bloth tomorrow, and he had so many unanswered questions. The situation was intolerable. He was pacing back and forth when the bear came around the corner. It was the same bear... and yet it wasn't. Ursula was twice as big now, and moving like a living creature, running along beside heavy mechanical wagons, and walking contraptions, most of them modeled after a metal bear. And riding atop the bear was the person he'd been looking for. The ratkin named Tallsqueak.

He was going to walk right by, only a block away from Cazact, heading somewhere that wasn't the deep road, and creating more questions in his mind. He flipped the sign on his stall to 'closed', yelled for his helpers to watch over things, and ran toward the caravan.

"Pack it all up. If I am not back in 9 hours and 19 minutes, leave for Bloth. Meet the Caravan of Jorgoth the Deep-Throated and pay the normal fee plus 25%. Ask for his 'Special Guidance Package'." Then he ran to find the Ratkin he needed to talk to. Ursula saw Cazact standing in the middle of the street and stopped moving, emitting a curious growl. Cazact looked up at Tallsqueak.

"I need to talk to you. I have to talk to you. I will reward you with information if you answer my questions. Or gold, or anything else in my caravan." Milo looked down at him, "I want to know about Bloth. You've been there." Cazact was surprised at first, then nodded. Bloth drew people to it, chewed them up and never let them go. No one went for a short visit.

But there were always more heading to the city, lured by the chance to rise through the ranks, and this ratkin was just the latest to fall under Bloth's allure. It was sad, but he needed to know things only the ratkin could explain, and before he went to Bloth was exterminated.

"Ask your questions, and I will ask mine. We will share information." Milo motioned for everyone to continue without him.

"Very good. First question: What is distressing you?" Cazact fidgeted, "That is a difficult answer." Milo was in the middle of an expedition to find rare ores, kill snails, and test experimental weaponry. He looked at the bears as they walked by.

"I have time some time. Let's talk."