Eight: Chapter 5

The next day, I eyed the dragon’s turd. There were three approaches to getting the loot hidden inside: kill or drive away the flies, protect myself against their bites, or eliminate their attraction to the turd. The last was a chemical problem and outside of my expertise, while protecting against their bites needed either specialized clothing, armor, or magic, none of which I had.

No, the simplest approach was to drive them off, which meant tricking them into fleeing. I could’ve possibly waited until the turd dried out and set fire to it, but I didn’t want to risk a forest fire. A flaming five-foot log of turd would be no joke.

So, I came up with a plan.

To execute it, I gathered two piles near the turd. The first was made of kindling, and the second was of green leaves. I also found a large frond to use as a fan.

I set the kindling aflame with a brand from a campfire I’d started earlier. The flies noticed right away, and a few scouts rose up into the air to investigate. The memory of what they’d done to the digging stick was still fresh, and I felt sweat drip down my back every time one of them flew past me. I built up the small fire, and then let it burn down to embers. When the coals were ready, I tossed the leaves onto them.

Gray smoke filled the air, and I quickly fanned it toward the flies. “Look, it’s a forest fire. Time to flee.” Instead of leaving, though, the flies clung to the turd. Their buzzing grew louder as they used their wings to cool the turd. Bees did something similar when protecting their hives from forest fires; I just hadn’t expected the same behavior from these flies.

A handful lifted into the air to find the source of danger. I felt them ping like pebbles against my face and arms. One crawled inside my shirt, and its wings buzzed angrily against the fabric. That attracted the others, and when the one inside my shirt bit me—a sharp, shooting pain—I aborted the plan by diving into the pool. The fly bit me twice more before it drowned.

Thankfully, it wasn’t venomous. My Status was clear of the Poisoned condition.

From the other side of the Glen, I watched the fire burn itself out. The otter sat beside me. I thought she’d mock me for failing, but instead she looked thoughtful, alternating glances between me and the fire. She must’ve come to a decision about something, because she pulled me over to a patch of soft ground.

The otter brought out a short stick, almost like a dowel, from inside her pocket.

“Just how much stuff do you have stored in there?” I asked.

The otter quirked her head, not understanding.

“Never mind. What is it you wanted to show me?”

The otter drew in the dirt. She started with a rough oval and slowly added details, like a mustelid Bob Ross. At the edges, she drew happy trees. In the open space between them, little grasses sprung up, and in the center was a rock.

She gestured to the rock and began a new drawing. It turned out to be a mound covered in mushrooms, like a forest within the forest. Then she pointed to a mushroom and drew it in detail. It had a long stalk, and its head folded down like an umbrella.

The otter pointed at the drawing, then at the forest. She mimed walking in place and made up a gesture with her paws to represent the action of walking. Apparently unsure whether or not I understood the gesture, she also drew an outline of me walking toward the mushrooms.

“You want me to go there?” I asked. I repeated her gesture to show that I did, in fact, understand. It was faster than miming or drawing in the dirt.

The otter nodded, and then disappeared into the brush before coming back with a large frond. She pretended to wrap the mushroom with the frond and carry it back to the glen. She came up with gestures to describe those actions too. What a clever being she is.

“This is a quest,” I said, smiling. “I’m to bring back a mushroom.” Each time I spoke, I repeated her gestures.

The otter nodded, and her eyes got really serious. She put her paw on my hand to make sure I was paying attention, then pretended to take a bite of the mushroom. Suddenly, her whole body shook. She gagged, stumbling, her paws at her neck. Slowly, she spun around until she finally fell over as if dead.

I clapped at her performance. “No eating the deadly, dangerous mushrooms. Got it.”

The otter got up and dusted herself off. Then she made a drawing of a fire, pretended to toss the mushroom onto it, and pointed toward the flies. A vicious smile spread across her face, and I felt my face quickly copy hers. Just because I didn’t have the expertise to make an insecticide, didn’t mean there wasn’t someone nearby who could.

I took my spear with me, a coil of braided rope over my shoulder, and the frond. It must’ve been a sight, part Huckleberry Finn, part Lord of the Flies.

The meadow was in a direction I hadn’t explored, more green than woodsy. The thick bushes made for slow going, especially since I had to be careful of hidden dangers, like snakes, poisonous insects, and carnivorous plants.

I hadn’t confirmed the existence of carnivorous plants yet, but the day would come, I was sure of it.

Eventually, I felt myself move from one space to another. The feeling was weird, not physical at all. I’d passed through an intangible barrier, and something intangible inside me recognized it.

Is the area around the Glen some kind of spiritual territory? One belonging to the otter? If so, it lent credence to the idea that she was some kind of spiritual being. Or perhaps she was the servant of one.

I hadn’t noticed while I was inside, but outside the territory I felt the heat and humidity more, and I subtly felt exposed. The sensations were strong enough, I was surprised I hadn’t noticed it before. But then, I hadn’t had Ikfael’s Blessing until recently. There were decent odds the two were related.

I filed the information away to think on later and kept going. The pace was slow, since I continued to use my spear to test the ground and move branches aside. I was just congratulating myself for how well I was doing, when I heard a large body move through the brush.

I ducked behind the nearest tree and readied my spear, just in case. I prayed I wouldn’t need it though. One, I’d gotten caught up in recent events and still hadn’t made a lighter one. And two, whatever the beast was, it wasn’t afraid of making noise. It grunted and snorted as it heaved, and a small tree trunk cracked under its weight. There were licking noises, a dissatisfied grunt, and then the beast trundled away, the ground thumping from its steps.

I peeked from my hiding spot, but all I saw were bushes swaying in the beast’s wake and a tree, fifteen feet tall, its trunk splintered at the base. The bark was gouged where the beast had shoved the tree over.

Why that specific tree and none of the others? The only difference was a purple lichen near the top of the trunk. The area was covered in saliva, and only a few patches of lichen remained. I crept closer and found two small strips hidden underneath. Were they edible? A delicacy? I wouldn’t risk eating them, but the otter might like them. I wrapped the remains in some leaves and tucked the package inside my shirt.

I kept going, though I wasn’t sure if that made me courageous or foolish. Fortunately, I didn’t encounter any other giant beasts along the way.

The meadow was gentle. A breeze swayed through a lush and verdant field of wildflowers. There was a spicy-sweet scent in the air, like honey and ginger, and I heard the drone of bees nearby. At the center, like kings and queens on their thrones, were the mushrooms on their mound.

I sat at the edge of the meadow and kept watch, my paranoia at odds with the peacefulness of the setting. I tossed a rock into the field, but nothing happened, and no monsters appeared.

Where was the troll at the bridge? The enigmatic riddle to solve? This quest was too straightforward. Or maybe I’d just read too many adventure stories and had too many gamemasters eager to ambush my characters’ parties.

I picked my way into the meadow, careful not to disturb the flowers. The ground was more uneven than expected, and I nearly tripped twice. The hair on the back of my neck rose when I noticed the end of a pale, bleached bone sticking out. I pulled it from the ground and saw it was big enough to be from a large boar or sow. I dug and found more bones, from animals small and large. The meadow was littered with them.

All the while, the scent of honey and ginger grew stronger. It tickled my nose and found a path to my brain, tingling the nerves as it went. Pleasure seeped into my body and rolled through me in waves. All the tension I’d been holding dissipated like rain on a hot stone.

My worries fell away. At the same time, I grew hungry… so hungry. My mouth filled with saliva, and I had to spit it out. When I did, my mouth filled with saliva again.

The spicy-sweet scent came from the mound, where the mushrooms glowed in the morning light. They were beautiful, their flesh promising to fill my emptiness. I walked closer, and the smell soaked into my skin.

A dim part of my mind noticed that the earth around the mound was especially uneven. Many, many creatures must’ve died here, their bodies feeding the meadow.

Fascinated by my own actions, I reached with the spear and carefully severed one of the mushrooms at its base. Harming such a lovely creature was a tragedy, but it had to be done. Like a pallbearer, I lifted the mushroom up with the flat of the spearhead and placed it onto the frond, which I wrapped and tied around it like a shroud.

My body rebelled. It wanted nothing more than to tear the frond apart and shove the mushroom into my mouth. I didn’t though. I knew what would happen, the otter’s warning all too clear, and the point became moot. Meliune’s Blessing covered me and shielded me from the hunger.

Leaving was still painful, like I was tearing myself away from a lover’s embrace, but I couldn’t stay. Everything within me was ringing in alarm.

The scent lingered until the meadow’s edge. It clung to me as I passed the boundary out into the forest, and all the way back to the Glen. The mushrooms were insidious, seductive, and terrible in a way the baboon or even the dragon could never be.

I’d rather fight a troll on a bridge than face this monstrosity again.

I was in a daze. It was pure luck that I didn’t encounter anything dangerous on the way back. When I crossed into the otter’s territory, I felt like I was submerged in cool water. The longing for the mushrooms lessened, and I suddenly had space to think again. Meliune’s Blessing had lifted.

I immediately checked my Status, and saw that my attributes were a mess: next to most of the numbers were more numbers in parentheses.

Strength, Constitution, Intelligence, and Charm—all appeared to have negative modifiers—while Wisdom, Spirit, and Luck had minor buffs. There was also the Addicted (3) condition—which wasn’t a surprise given the cravings I continued to feel—and also Sensitive (2). When I focused on it, I felt naked and my nerves exposed to the air.

I ran the rest of the way home.

The otter was waiting at the forest’s edge and brought me to the cave. She’d placed five stone bowls on the ground. The arrangement looked like a combination of a pentacle and operating table. The otter gestured for me to undress and lie down in the center.

I nodded and did as I was told. What else could I do?

From the bowl placed above my head, the otter poured water into the air, and it hovered above me in a blob. My jaw dropped, but before I could ask about it, she grabbed the blob and stretched it, forming a flat rectangle. She looked exactly like an otter holding a tablet. My mind hiccupped at the sight—it was just so incongruous.

The otter ignored me and used the tablet to scan up and down my body. I was really curious to see what it said, but the water was clear from my perspective. All I could see were her eyes moving back and forth, like she was reading.

I couldn’t not ask about the magic, but when I started to talk, she placed her paw on my mouth and gestured for me to be quiet. She then moved to the bowl on my left and poured its contents onto my forehead. My mind emptied and all my thoughts turned transparent. There was no other way to describe it—I was pure consciousness.

I felt more than I saw how everything around me was both heavy and light: heavy in substance, light in spirit. Curious if that also applied to me, I turned my attention inward and saw a map unfolding, endlessly complex.

Three areas inside my body were lit up—in my belly, in my chest, and in my head. They were whirlpools of light, and connecting them were roads the color of stars. A golden syrup marred their cool brilliance.

When I checked my conditions, I saw that Sensitive had gone from (2) to (4), no doubt as a result of the otter’s magic.

The otter dipped her paw into the bowl on my right and traced the water onto my skin. A coolness spread through me, and where the water went, the golden syrup was wiped away. Every two or three inches, she washed her paw clean in one of the bowls at my feet.

Along the way, I compared the inner map to what I knew of Taoism, yoga, and brujeria. The three large energy centers in my body could easily be Taoism’s lower, middle, and upper dantians, and the pathways in between were the meridians. The dantians appeared to match up with structures that looked like chakras, and there was also a section that resembled the desert sun paired with a dark cave. It’d been a long time since I studied with mi abuela, but I was pretty sure the cave was supposed to lead to the place where the animal gods resided.

I also sensed that I wasn’t seeing everything. My view was incomplete, like using three-dimensional sight to gaze at a five-dimensional structure.

Or maybe there are layers and connective tissue that are still invisible to Sensitive (4)? They could also be outside of human understanding. There’s no sense in getting conceited—the world’s way bigger than anyone understands, including me.

When the otter finished, she gestured for me to dress and sit. She scanned me one more time with her tablet, pausing at the heart dantian. She chirped a question.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I… don’t know what you just said.”

She quirked her head, the motion a now-familiar expression of confusion. After a moment’s consideration, the otter sighed and let the tablet dissolve into water. She chirped and gestured, her paws waving at me, the cave, and life in general.

When she saw that I still didn’t understand, she shrugged and left to dive into the pool.

“That’s it? What about—”

I tried to stand to follow after, but my head spun and my legs gave out. She poked her head out of the water and chirped at me, this time more sternly. She pointed to the moss, and made a gesture that looked like a person sleeping. This time I got the message.

“Right, bed rest, I understand.”

She nodded and dove away.

I lay there for a time, meditating on what had just happened. The earlier excitement from exploring the System and seeing magic in action was quickly being tempered by the understanding of just how dangerous this world was. Even simple fetch quests could be deadly.

“Status.”

With relief, I also saw that the Addicted condition was gone. The otter’s magic was also dissipating, and Sensitive was down to (1).

As for my attributes, I assumed at first that the numbers in parentheses were temporary bonuses and penalties, but that appeared to be wrong. When I focused on them, they turned out to be directions.

In other words, the numbers in parentheses were the direction the attributes were heading. A Strength of 8 with 7 in the parenthesis would mean I was getting weaker over time, while a Wisdom of 14 with 15 in the parenthesis meant I was growing wiser.

The mushroom would’ve been incredibly debilitating, given its potential effects on Strength, Constitution, and Intelligence. Fortunately, the otter’s ceremony cleansed the penalties, while maintaining the bonuses—probably because my mind had literally been blown open.

I didn’t know the timing for when the new attribute numbers would go into effect, but I’d keep an eye out for the changes.

Oh, there’s a new talent.

When I focused on Qi Sensitive, I felt the benefits of meditation and qigong practice that had been accruing, day after day, year after year—a drop at a time until it was a sea. Superimposed onto this understanding was my recent glimpse into the nature of reality. I shook my head, still not quite down from the high.

I also received a notification for my first new skill.

It was for Qi Body at rank 2, and when I checked the skills page, it showed up under a new section: “Magical!” Focusing on the skill brought to mind the map of my body’s meridians. The memory was so clear, like it was etched in glass. And if I concentrated, I could even feel the flow of qi moving through my meridians.

All in all, I’d survived the quest, and even gained a new talent, skill, and handful of potential attributes from the experience. The problem was that I’d needed saving. And it hadn’t just happened once. I’d needed it every time. No, the problem—the real problem—was that I didn’t know enough about this world, and my mistakes were producing deadly consequences.

For the situation to improve, I needed to find a way to recover from my mistakes. To make them less than lethal. If I didn’t, then one day my luck would run out. There wouldn’t always be a Dr. Otter to save the day.