Chapter Twenty-Nine
The sky of the eleventh floor had turned blue. Vester stared up at the warm, gentle rain falling on his face, stunned at how much the floor had warped under Non’s influence.
As far as Vester could perceive, the floor was covered in soft green grass, bright purple clovers, and vibrant blue flowers.
The huge stone columns had transformed into towering trees with widespread branches that cast shadows over the ground below.
The shape of the blossoms was all wrong, but they still reminded Vester of cherries.
The smaller pillars were different types of trees, the trunks appearing to be oaks, maples, and other hardwoods. The vast trees somehow let enough light in that the plant life beneath them might survive, but the scale of those giant trunks defied Vester’s imagination.
He turned in a slow circle and found that the blood elflings had made fast time in emptying their city.
The towers they’d lived in were now made of wood, ridged bark carved in elaborate panels with bright green shutters and doors to mark the entrances.
The streets were lined with smooth marble spheres, the paths covered in cobblestones that reminded Vester of turquoise jewelry.
“Wow,” he murmured, a hand lifting to shade his face so he could get a better look. “You completely recreated the floor in moments, Non, did the monsters change?” he asked. His eyes went to the dragon while she dropped onto her stomach and the ground shook beneath their feet.
“The titanbats are still here,” she said, a claw rising to scratch the underside of her jaw. “The swarms remain, though they’ll both likely transform to be more nature focused. New spawns will slot into the ecosystem and make it work. The System is remarkably resilient.”
The dragon’s tail swept around, curling to form a wall that encircled Vester’s Party and drew them all against her side.
Her scales were surprisingly cool, a faint vibration meeting Vester’s skin when he leaned into her.
It took him a moment to grasp she was humming too low for him to hear the sound.
“Do you do this often?” Krysta asked. The pandali actually climbed onto Non’s foreleg, resting her hand against the dragon’s bicep, or whatever the muscle was called for that type of leg, and stared up at Non’s chin clear amazement.
“The environmental transformation is incredible… it’s so beautiful here now! ”
“No,” Non admitted, looking down at Krysta. Her wings rose and fell in a shrug that caused the plants all around them to sway in the breeze. “Honestly I couldn’t control the way the Great Dungeon processed my energy—this is all mostly random.”
“ ‘Mostly’?” Kora Dol repeated while coming to stand by Vester’s side. Her tails brushed against his back, and he saw that she’d put away her tower shield. “How much did you control of what just happened?”
“I wanted someplace green, with a blue sky,” Non informed them.
She glanced up at the ceiling and the brilliant gemstone radiating artificial sunlight.
“This isn’t quite the same as my vision…
but it’ll do for now. There was a time I flew Ordinal’s skies whenever I wanted—that time is long past. I guess I was feeling nostalgic. ”
Then Non’s head tilted down and she snaked her neck in a half circle until her nose was almost touching Vester.
“I’m impressed you all haven’t started checking your Grimoires yet.
It’s not every day someone completes a Quest that involves divine intervention and the potential creation of a new sapient race on their own realm.
Aren’t you curious what reward you received? ”
Vester reached up, his hand rubbing against the tip of her nose.
“You vanished before without a word or explanation,” he said, then he rested his masked face against her snout.
“Rewards can wait. I’d rather spend some time with you.
You look beautiful like this, by the way, and you did wonderfully. ”
To Vester’s amusement, Non genuinely blushed.
Her black-purple scales slowly brightened to a deep scarlet, then went pink from the tip of her nose back to the base of her horns.
The god twisted her neck, burying her face against her foreleg for a moment.
The move forced Krysta to leap up and over a horn, which caused the pandali to yelp in surprise.
“Why are you blushing?” Vester asked, unable to conceal his surprise. “It’s not like I’ve never complimented you before!” He was genuinely baffled that simply telling her she was beautiful as a dragon seemed to have flustered her.
“Maybe she was nervous about you seeing her in this body?” Li suggested. The oni moved to stand next to Vester on the side opposed Kora, and he felt Reve looming over him from behind as well. The Avatar of Life’s arms went around his neck and her breasts pressed into the back of his head.
“Many humanoids are unable to find monstrous beings beautiful,” the bat-winged woman offered. “Even in the Empire of Beasts there is a distinct preference for warm, furry bodies, so many look upon reptiles and insects as filthy creatures.”
“That,” Non agreed, pointing over Vester’s head at Reve with the finger that tipped her wing-elbow.
“Most people find dragons terrifying, and when they call us beautiful, they usually compare us to storms, forest fires, or calamities. We’re beautiful the way nature is: by being too powerful and too vast for mortals to comprehend.
They don’t think we’re hot or anything… but, you… made me feel sexy. It was weird.”
Vester didn’t get the sense Non was complaining about his praise.
She slowly pulled her head out from where she’d curled it, and somehow that left Krysta on top of Non’s head from dodging the horn a second time, where the pandali appeared to be petting the dragon with a look of amazement that wouldn’t go away.
Non’s snout returned to where Vester could reach it, so he scratched the fine scales around her nostrils—well, one nostril. He could reach both if he stretched his arms, but it wasn’t comfortable, so he focused on the side closest to him.
“You are sexy,” Vester stated, firmly and clearly.
He planted a kiss on her scaly nose, or tried.
The thunk of his mask hitting her snout had him scowling behind the porcelain barrier he’d forgotten was there.
Vester carefully did his best to avoid thinking anything profane at Non’s parents, though it was a near thing.
The pink scales along Non’s head spread, and they extended down the length of her neck when Krysta and the others broke into giggles. “Is that what I look like when Vester compliments me?” Reve whispered, leaning down to Li Ra.
“Yup,” Li said with a nod. “Even Kora makes that face sometimes, though she’s the best of us at hiding it.”
“Vester’s good at flustering people,” Skylar said. Of all of them, she was the only one who hadn’t drawn too close to Non, but that was because she was going over Dent with a measuring tape and writing down notes on a sheet of parchment that Woody held up for her.
She just got Woody up and running and she’s already working out how to improve the next one, Vester realized.
Have to admire her dedication to her craft.
I suppose she has even more incentive now that she knows there’s a path she can follow to push them into true sapience.
She won’t stop until her golems are living companions.
“Can you imagine the devastation he’d have caused as a Demon Lord?” Non murmured. A dragon’s murmur was still quite loud, though, so everyone could hear her. Vester got the impression she was trying to change the subject.
“Why isn’t he a Demon Lord?” Kora asked. “I only know of one in Ordinal’s history… and she was brutally slain by… well…” The kitsune trailed off, waving a hand in Non’s direction. The unfinished truth was that the Demon Lord had been killed by Ordinal’s gods on their rise to power.
“He was prevented from becoming a Demon Lord by the combined power of the pantheon,” Non explained with a sigh.
“Julius and I tried to counter it, but hidden under the primary purpose of each Curse is a seal to prevent Vester’s true power from manifesting.
Similarly, Peace’s Blessing boosts Denny’s nature to ensure he gets maximum advantage for being a Hero. ”
“That’s not—” Krysta began.
“Fair, yes,” the dragon finished with a nod.
“And Julius and I agreed. Unfortunately, we were outvoted. The last Demon Lord to hit Ordinal was gifted in necromancy—Delar was actually his apprentice before we turned her to our side. That’s what led her to become the Goddess of Death.
But Demon Lords are also hard to predict due to their passionate natures.
The other gods prefer controlling as much as they can, so they reject adding such an element to Ordinal. ”
“But the Goddess of Change does not flinch from such things,” Li observed. The oni’s stoic face was contemplative, though Vester knew her people revered Non as their primary deity.
“Why does the God of Life side with Chaos?” Reve inquired.
“Vester has told me the god is your brother… but one would think Life and Chaos would not go hand in hand.” The woman flexed her wings, curling them to fold them across Kora, Vester, and Li Ra’s backs—though she kept her arms solely around Vester.
“Life has another name,” Non explained. “Julius is also the God of Opportunity and Beginnings. In a rigid world where nothing changes there can be no new opportunities. Law, or Stability, is the force that resists transformation. Death is Endings; she heralds her own form of change, where the status quo ceases. War is Conflict, but also Entropy; he is any force of opposition.”
“What about Peace?” Kora asked. “The Church of Light claims to be focused on healing and progress, but their doctrine focuses on racial purity and their own dogma… I don’t see the connection.”
“Goddess of Castes, Hierarchies, and Slavery,” Non said bluntly.
“Her entire family likes to bill themselves like they’re the force of good, but they’re just obsessed with ruling.
They have a strict idea of who is worthy of their attention and who should know their place.
My father fought them before he became a god as a Demon Lord resisting their advance across several planes, and he’s clashed with them since as a god.
It was a power play on the part of Peace’s family to try and keep Dad from earning more pow—”
Non vanished and the sudden absence of the dragon caused the wind to suck into the spot she’d occupied.
The vacuum collapsed with a thunderous boom and the soundwave washed over everyone.
Krysta dropped to the ground, her squeal of surprise lost in the displacement, and Vester found himself landing on his ass from the sudden shift.
The push-pull combined with the surprise had managed to overwhelm his dexterity.
“What the hell?” he exclaimed, looking around in frustration.
“Again?” He really didn’t like the fact that one of his girlfriends could just get yanked out of existence right before his eyes.
He had no idea what triggered the disappearances, and this time Non’s features had been large enough for him to see the surprise in her eyes.
She doesn’t know when she’s getting pulled away either, he realized. I’m not sure if it’s something that the System is doing, one of the other gods, or maybe even her parents… but she wasn’t expecting to get yanked.
His fingers curled around his cane, which was the first time he realized it had appeared in his grip.
He took a deep breath, but before he did anything else a warm drop of rain hit him in the eye.
The mask is gone again, he thought. He looked up in time to hear thunder rumble overhead, and then the massive tree branches shook as a storm broke above them.
“Let’s get down to the city and find a place to set up a secure camp,” Kora called over the rising storm. The gust front hit and the huge trees began to creak and bend. Vester saw blades of grass tearing up and blowing away, and flower petals began swirling through the sky. “This could get bad.”
None of them had any desire to disagree with the kitsune.
Kora and Reve helped everyone to their feet, while Li Ra and Krysta raced around the Sanctuary to gather all their belongings.
Skylar was cursing up a storm, her parchments wet from the falling rain, but soon she was helping the others prepare.
Vester brushed himself off and contemplated trying to create some kind of canopy to protect them from the weather, but he didn’t want to imagine how much mana it would cause to create a huge moving umbrella.
At least it’s not a cold rain, he thought while more drops splashed off his forehead. If the wind wasn’t picking up so hard, I’d say it feels like being in a show—
A deafening roar echoed across the eleventh floor and Vester knew it wasn’t thunder.
Whatever had made that sound was alive.
A second roar suggested it was also moving their way.
The ground shook: once, twice, a third time.
The fourth impact and the tempo of the vibrations caused Vester to realize that whatever it was, those were its footsteps.
“Reve, fly up and get us an idea of what’s coming,” Vester called.
“Skylar, move the golems to the back. Li Ra, scout ahead. We need a defensive position.”
“On it!” Li called. She left Krysta to finish picking up the camp stove and ran forward through the trees toward the city. That was when Vester realized the Great Dungeon had been filling in the forest while they’d spoken with Non.
Sightlines to the tree city had faded at some point, replaced with trunks and branches to the point he felt like he was standing in an old growth forest of red woods. It took no time at all for him to lose sight of Li Ra, so he sent a brief prayer to Non for the oni’s safe return.
Reve had spread her wings and launched herself into the sky. The Avatar of Life twisted to pass through some of the smaller trees, then vanished around one of the titanic branches that formed the forest canopy.
“Sounds like two legs,” Kora said, her ears cocked back in the direction the roars had come from. “Nothing that should be on this floor—at least not before Non changed it. Whatever this is, it’s new.”
“New means dangerous,” Skylar added. She snagged Krysta’s elbow and brought the pandali away from the empty campfire. “We need to get moving. Whatever that is, I don’t want to run into it before we have a chance to evaluate what we’re fighting.”
“Seconded,” Krysta said while gripping her staff hard. “Let’s follow Li. Maybe we can find an abandoned elfling house to secure.”
Another roar shook the air and a huge branch crashed down to the forest floor not far from Vester. “Yeah, let’s get the fuck out of here.”