CC 10: Thesaurize ~ Eighteen!

After making temporary housing for each of the people that had rejoined what Joe considered the most civilized, polite society on the planet, he set out to make sure they had food and some comfort at the bare minimum. He explained the rules of their stay, and to his surprise got over a hundred notifications that people had accepted a quest he’d given them. After getting past his initial shock, Joe realized that he was considered a leader of this Town, and it only made sense that he’d be able to offer quests to people for the betterment of the Town as a whole.

Even so, when he got back to the Town Hall, he was quite annoyed to see that the overall morale of the Town had taken a nosedive. Not only were the new additions considered extremely negative, but there’d been very few Dwarves happy to see a new group of humans that were aligned with their racial enemy being escorted to the edge of Town to help defend them. “I guess I'm going to have to introduce new people pretty slowly if I'm going to… no, wait, I can just have them appear at the outer shrine in the future. That’ll make everyone involved quite a bit more comfortable.”

With all of the fires put out, all of the tasks he needed to complete done for the moment, Joe stepped across the world using his system of shrines and stood in the snow once more. Squawking, snarling, and growling echoed over to him, so he cautiously slunk his way through the precipitation and peeked toward where the settlement had once stood. The Ritualist needed to hold himself back from letting out a low whistle.

Thousands upon thousands of monsters were milling about the area, clearly the result of several more Beast Waves that had arrived while Joe had been working back in his own Town. “That's right, just because the Town Hall is destroyed doesn't mean the rest of the monsters don't show up. I wonder… is there a way I can exploit that?”

Joe spent a few minutes fantasizing about creating a ritual that would be strong enough to wipe out this enormous throng of beasts in a single fell swoop. Since he wouldn’t have to worry about any collateral damage, loss of life or levels, it was at the very least possible. He muttered quietly to himself as he slid on his belly back toward the shrine, “I think the mantle of this planet is too deep to make a volcano a viable option… maybe I should figure out a way to convince Havoc to drop meteors on a location like he was hinting at being able to do.”

Then he remembered that he’d need a firm foundation in earth and fire magics, and decided to give up that plan for the moment. At least unless he could convince his mentor to part with a spell diagram that he could convert into a ritual. Joe let his power fantasies play out in his head as he worked on his next bubble, but didn’t fully relax until he was once more in the air and speeding along. “Let's put a little extra mana here and warm this up… there we go.”

He massaged his half-frozen fingers, then pulled out his notes and grimoire, then got into a proper wizardly mindset. Eyes flicking back and forth as he scanned the words on his paper, Joe reminded himself exactly where he’d been in his thought process.

Hours passed in this way, as his bubble hurtled along at a consistent speed and heading. To his excitement, as well as a hint of consternation, as his transportation was reaching its maximum range, the chaotic, magical currents of Jotunheim began to whisper to him.

It took Joe a few moments to realize that it wasn’t some creepy extra-planar being; it was his Hidden Sense skill screaming to him, tinged with his Magical Synesthesia as an afterthought. As soon as he made the realization, Joe's eyes went wide, he scooped his materials into his storage, then began examining the area he was flying over in greater detail. “There's something out there… something significant. Powerful and important enough to call out to me through the obscuring environment. Down we go!”

Lashing out with his knife, Joe once more had the unpleasant experience of dropping out of the sky. This time, he attempted to land feet first, but ended up stuck in a pencil dive pose nearly ten feet below the surface of the top layer of snow. Joe tried to think of the positives of the situation, and decided that the fluffy drifts managing to collect to this height was a sign that nearly nothing came through these parts, willingly or otherwise.

Rather than struggling to free himself in an undignified manner, he simply set up a Field Array and converted all of the snow above him into Trash-tier aspects. Then it was simply a matter of closing his eyes and following his extra senses as the feelings became louder and louder.

Eventually, no matter which way he walked, the sensations began to get softer. Since there was obviously nothing on the surface, Joe decided to start digging. Enormous chunks of snow vanished one after another until he hit the hard surface of the planet itself. Even then, he knew he needed to go deeper. Chunk after chunk of stone and earth was destroyed as he sought out what his mind swore was there.

Then, in a very unexpected twist, one of the chunks refused to fully dissolve, leaving behind a strange spire of dull metal. Walking over to it, Joe tapped on its surface and gasped in pain as a huge chunk of his mana was sucked out of him, as well as having the odd effect decimate his magical protections.

Exquisite Shell: 1,200/12,002

At the same time as he pulled his hand back, the surface that he’d just brushed against shifted from a dull metal to a slightly-glowing enchanted metal. “Sure didn't like that.”

Joe still had no idea what he was looking at, and decided that it would be in his best interest to dig out the entirety of whatever he’d found. Dozens of Field Arrays later, he still hadn’t uncovered it, but he’d at least determined that it was a structure. Specifically a building of some kind. There were all kinds of reasons that was an exciting prospect to him, but the glow that had started near the tip of this enormous obelisk had covered the entirety of the surface he’d unearthed; and there was no way he was going to risk touching it again, let alone trying to break in.

It took nearly an hour of digging around the metallic structure before he found something that could be a door, but as he approached it, his senses began to scream that this was a bad idea. Joe paused, took a deep, annoyed breath, and walked away. “Time to get some outside assistance.”

He was pleased that he’d at least gotten most of the distance he needed out of this trip, and so didn't mind putting down the next node in the shrine network he was building.

Within an hour of returning and explaining the situation, a full expedition had been declared. Dozens of Dwarves, as well as hundreds of humans, were swarming around the strange structure deep under the snowy surface of Jotunheim. The bizarre building was exuding an aura of mystery and power, somehow completely untouched by time. It was also giving off quite a bit more light than Joe wanted, seeing as nearly every single person that had come along had found some way to poke the building and lose a huge chunk of their mana to it.

No matter how many warnings they gave out, every single human had touched it at least once, some more than that. Most of the Dwarves had also done so, but they’d at least tried to be subtle about it. Joe could only roll his eyes at how predictable everyone was.

Still, he couldn't blame them. His magical skills were still tingling, filling him with anticipation. Anyone who had any kinds of treasure seeking skills was having a similar reaction, but the Dwarves were treating this with a strange academic detachment. As the person who had found the building, as well as dug it out, Joe had total say over who got to do what with it, which meant he got first access to any information. It worked out well for him, but he hadn’t been able to make a decision on it until a scholarly Dwarf strode toward him with gleaming eyes.

Her mustache was bouncing in place as she tried to hold her smile back, failing when she got within a few feet of Joe. “Excellent, I get to be the one to tell you all about this. I do hope you’ll remember my contribution when we unseal the vault.”

Even if he hadn't been interested, that phrase would’ve caught all of Joe's attention. “A vault, you say?”

“Ohh, yeah.” She breathed out, practically hissing in excitement. “As far as we can tell, going by the intricate enchantments and markings on this building, we believe that this was a vault for the elite hunting groups of Vanaheim. We’ll need to break it open to be certain… still, there's a good shot that it's full. It's going to be difficult to make this happen, but the potential rewards are too enticing to ignore. It could be a cache of powerful weapons, legendary armors, preserved trade goods, or perhaps relics from the distant past that could explain the history of this world.”

Any of those options would be amazing, and it took Joe a few moments before he could trust himself to speak. “How long do you think before we can get in?”

“Not soon,” was all she could answer, though that statement was firm. “There are other, more pressing concerns as well. The presence of living people, as well as the glow coming off of this, is going to get pretty noticeable to the denizens of this planet. We need to think about setting up defenses, and figure out what we’re going to do when attacked. I’d recommend putting out an official quest for anyone who wants to help protect this, but the rewards are going to have to be pretty good.”

Joe's face fell, “I don't know what I can offer people. I kind of doubt that they’d take soap, and we just don't know what’s in there. If it’s not something easily divided up, I don't know if we can offer a percentage or-”

“So long as you offer a part of the profit to the Town, I think you can use your position as a councilman to make a fairly open-ended quest reward.” She shrugged at his plight, earning herself a light glare from Joe.

“That's a pretty cavalier attitude to have when spending someone else's money.” His words indicated his annoyance well enough that he didn't feel that he needed to say anything more.

All that earned him was a raised eyebrow as she gestured at the enormous structure. “Joe, I know a bit about your class. Even if there's nothing in there worth having, you get to take this building with you. Or at least you’d be able to build your own version of it if we manage to remove those magical protections. I'm pretty sure you’re the one that stands to gain the most profit from this place, no matter what happens.”

He couldn't fault her logic, so he discussed with her exactly what the phrasing of the quest should be, then brought that to a few other people to see if they could see any loopholes that would cause him annoyance in the future.

Getting the go ahead from several of his trusted sources let Joe feel at least better about the idea. Still, he was somewhat uncomfortable with the idea of being the source of quests. He had seen what could happen when you didn’t pay up promptly, and had no interest in that terrible punishment landing squarely on his shoulders. Unfortunately, there was no great alternative, and so Joe spoke the words that offered a general quest to anyone from Novusheim that was in good standing.

“I need people to defend researchers as they attempt to crack into a building we found in the wastes of Jotunheim. We need warriors, mages, and people of all types to attempt this. The quest reward will be based on contribution, as well as the value of what’s found within the protected building. To accept the quest simply go to a shrine, and set your destination as ‘mysterious vault’.”

He tried to control his breathing as he had over a hundred people accept the quest within five seconds, and the number began rapidly counting upward as more and more people appeared in the area.

“Great… yeah…” Joe fought against the tide of arrivals, moving around until he found an empty area. “I guess this is taken care of for now, so I’m gonna keep going.”

Amidst the hubbub of the suddenly-chaotic area, only one researcher watched as a shimmering bubble filled with an anxious bald guy shot into the sky and flew away.