by Jerome ASF
“This is hot work,” the witch said. “I’d sure like a drink.”
“You can have a drink,” Bacca said. Then he added: “Of water.”
Bacca watched carefully as the witch took a glass bottle full of water and drained it. He wanted to make sure she didn’t drink a potion. Witches were not known for their honesty. Or, really, for anything other than throwing nasty potions and being generally unpleasant.
“Okay,” Bacca said. “Break’s over. Let’s get back to work.”
Working together, they continued to smash down the walls that hid the witch’s lair from the rest of the maze. Eventually, they broke through the outer wall entirely. Bacca stopped to compare their efforts to his map.
“Yes!” said Bacca. “We’ve done it. Now if we build it up and make it look like the rest of the maze, the rabbit will have its ear back. The emerald hare will be complete!”
Bacca put up brick walls around where the witch’s lair had been, and replaced her stone floors with blocks of green grass. Bacca overturned and destroyed all of the witch’s brewing equipment so it could never again be used to make dangerous potions. Before long, it was as though the lair had never existed.
“Boo hoo,” the witch sniffled. “All my stuff is gone.”
“You can go find a new place to make a lair . . . far away from where you can hurt anyone,” Bacca suggested. “But first you have to take the curse off of the Wizard. And apologize. I want you to apologize, too.”
“Uh oh,” said the witch nervously. “Witches aren’t very good at that.”
“Well you’d better get good,” Bacca said. “And fast.”
Bacca grabbed the reluctant witch by the back of her collar and marched her through the maze. Eventually, they arrived back at the Wizard’s workshop. A couple of times, Bacca caught the witch looking longingly down one of the forking corridors, as though she was thinking about making a break for it.
“Nuh uh,” Bacca said when this happened, and shook his head sternly. “Don’t even think about it.”
Bacca entered the Wizard’s workshop triumphantly. The Wizard was very surprised! When he saw the witch, he flew underneath a bucket and hid.
“Ack, the witch!” the tiny bat-voice said.
“Relax,” said Bacca. “I’m here too.”
The Wizard lifted the bucket just enough to verify this.
“Don’t worry,” Bacca said. “I took her whole inventory of potions. She’s harmless. More importantly, she has something she wants to say to you. Isn’t that right, witch?”
“Uh, yes,” the witch said. “That’s right.”
The Wizard crawled out from underneath his bucket.
“Why did you bring her here?” the Wizard asked. “I said to get rid of her.”
“I’m going to do that,” Bacca said. “But first . . .”
Bacca looked at the witch expectantly.
“I’m sorry for turning you into a bat,” the witch said with downcast eyes.
“And?” Bacca pressed.
“And for putting a hex on you so you could never leave the maze,” the witch continued.
“Good,” Bacca said. “Now lift the curses.”
The witch grumbled, but did as she was told. She waved her hands in the air and said some magic words. When Bacca looked back over at the Wizard, the little bat was gone and a normal-looking villager stood in its place.
“Omigosh!” the Wizard said—he had the same voice, but not quite as high-pitched. “This is wonderful! Thank you, Bacca.”
“You’re welcome,” Bacca said.
“Now, what are you going to do with her?” the Wizard said.
“She’s promised to leave and go someplace where she can’t hurt anybody with her potions anymore,” Bacca said, turning to the witch. “Isn’t that right?”
“Yes,” the witched said sadly. “Now that you’ve destroyed my lair, there’s no point in staying here. I suppose I’ll go somewhere out in the wastes and start all over again.”
“Yes,” said Bacca. “I think that’s a very good idea.”
No sooner were these words out of Bacca’s mouth when a strange glow began to appear in the hallway outside. It was a yellow light that radiated in such a way that it was clearly magic.
“Are you doing that?” Bacca asked the witch.
“No!” she cried from beneath her pointy hat. “I promise I’m not. No way.”
Bacca turned to the Wizard.
“Don’t look at me,” he said. “I don’t do real magic. But I have a feeling this might be connected to your solving the riddle.”
Bacca crept to the doorway of the Wizard’s workshop and took a closer look. The glow was coming from a strange beam of light that led away into the dungeon maze.
“I think you should follow it,” the Wizard said. “I bet it takes you out of the maze.”
Bacca thought this was an excellent idea.
“Thanks again for your help,” Bacca said to the Wizard. “And you, witch . . . you’re going to be nicer to people from now on, right?”
“I’ll, er, do my best,” the witch said.
“I think that’s the best you’re going to get from her,” the Wizard said. “It’s a sliding scale with witches, you know.”
Bacca decided the Wizard was probably right, but he still gave the witch one final stern glance.
“Will I see you again?” Bacca asked the Wizard.
“Hmm, it’s possible,” said the Wizard. “Now that I can leave the maze, I think I might be due for a vacation. Maybe I’ll go visit my brother in the lands to the west.”
“That sounds nice,” Bacca said. “Have safe travels.”
“The same to you,” said the Wizard.
And with that, Bacca headed back into the maze to follow the magic glowing beam of light.
Chapter Nine
The creeper spy was beyond breathless when he emerged from the maze. In fact, he was panting so hard he was unable to speak for some time. The rest of the creepers crowded around impatiently, waiting for any hint of what the news might be. When the spy was finally able to tell them what had transpired, a great fracas broke out through the creeper ranks.
“We’ve lost the witch!” cried one creeper. “That was never part of the plan!”
“She was one of our fortress’s finest residents,” said another with a sniffle. “She’d do anything for you. Give you an arm and a leg if you asked. I mean, they wouldn’t be hers . . . but still.”
“What a tragedy,” remarked a third creeper. “Who’m I going to get to make all of my potions of harming?”
There was a moment of silence as the creepers considered this loss to their community.
“This Bacca chap is proving quite a wildcard,” one of the senior creepers remarked. “Remember, all of this this is designed to test him, not to, not to . . . give him a chance to do whatever he pleases.”
“If it makes you feel any better,” a more junior creeper said, “his next challenge is Gargantua.”
The senior creeper’s beady eyes suddenly shone with a light they had not radiated for years. He began to laugh, deeply and evilly. It was a disturbing sound, even for the other creepers.
“Gargantua, eh?” the senior creeper said. From the tone of his voice, it seemed this was very satisfying to him indeed.
“That’s right, sir,” someone said.
“This will be the most dangerous test yet,” said the senior creeper. “I’d like to see what Bacca does with him! It’s not possible to defeat Gargantua! I don’t even know if a dragon could. This hairy little crafter may have had a few lucky breaks up to this point, but, gentlemen, I have a strong feeling that his luck is about to change.”
There was more evil laughter. This time from all of the creepers.
“Come on,” one of them said. “I’m going to go get a front row seat for this one!”
The rest of the creepers agreed this was a good idea, and hurried off to find a good spot to watch the action.
Off in an
other part of the dungeon maze, Bacca was following the glowing yellow line. It radiated light and made a faint hum whenever Bacca stepped near it. He had no idea where it was taking him, but from his maps it looked as though he was heading for the emerald hare’s mouth. (If it had to be one end or the other, Bacca was fine to take this one, thank you very much.)
Bacca reached a point where the glowing line terminated at a dead end. Yet no sooner did Bacca approach it than he heard the sound of stone grinding against stone and the wall in front of him began to move apart. A cave was revealed beyond it, the mouth covered in red sand.
“Yeah, I’m just going to say this is the rabbit’s mouth,” Bacca said to himself as he stepped through it and left the maze.
The cave beyond was well lit with torches set into sconces along the walls every few feet. The walkway underfoot changed from grass to dark blocks of stone and obsidian. Ahead of him, Bacca thought for a moment that the passage might dead-end or fall away. Then he got closer and saw that it was only the beginning of a staircase. A staircase leading down. Way down.
Bacca had built some very long staircases in his day, but had never seen one quite like this. It led down to the depths below the creeper fortress. Torches along the walls still lit the way, but they seemed to stretch endlessly into the dark obsidian depths.
Beside the staircase, next to the first step, a single mycelium block was affixed to the wall.
Bacca took a deep breath and read the words that had been etched across it:
What do men want?
What do women want?
Those answers won’t help you here.
But what does Gargantua want?
That is the key to everything.
“Gargantua,” Bacca said to himself. “Hmm. That means ‘very big,’ I think.”
Bacca wondered if Gargantua could be a person. Maybe a giant person. But also, Bacca thought, sometimes big people got nicknames like “Tiny.” So this could just be that principle working in reverse. Maybe you called someone Gargantua when they were really quite small.
Bacca decided to keep an eye out for something either very big or very small. Something in an extreme.
And then, Bacca thought, the riddle says I should find out what it wants. Hmmm.
With nothing more than this in mind, Bacca began to descend the long staircase.
Soon, Bacca was far underground. He did not know how deep he’d gone—it was easy to lose track—but this was very deep. We weren’t talking mine-deep or cavern-deep. This was more like center-of-the-Overworld deep.
As Bacca walked down the obsidian steps, the décor around him took a turn for the macabre and scary. He began to see skeleton skulls used along the walls in place of blocks. When he looked closer at the sconces in the walls that held the torches, he saw that they were skeletal hands.
“How long has that been going on?” Bacca wondered. He stopped and looked up the staircase behind him. It was skeletal hands for as far as he could see. Creepy.
Continuing along—but more carefully now—he also began to notice bones in the ceiling above him. Bacca knew that he was underground, but this felt too low for a cemetery or burying ground. Whoever wanted these bones to be here had brought them intentionally. All of this was intentional.
Intentionally spooky, Bacca thought to himself.
He continued down the staircase, and passed more ghastly, scary constructions. But what he did not see was anything (or anybody) very big or very small. Bacca hoped that “Gargantua” would not be so small that Bacca would miss him entirely.
Eventually, Bacca saw that—far ahead of him—the sloping staircase did finally end. Where it terminated, a stone archway was set, and beyond that Bacca could see a high-ceilinged room.
“Finally,” Bacca said to himself. “I thought I’d be walking down these stairs forever!”
He raced forward the rest of the way, excited for a change in scenery. Unfortunately for him, when Bacca arrived at the stone archway and looked through it, he saw that the room beyond was even scarier than the stairway.
It was an enormous place, and if there was indeed a ceiling above him it was so high he couldn’t see it. The walls were black obsidian, but terrifying bony constructions were everywhere. There were tables and chairs made out of bones, wall decorations made out of bones, and the chandeliers that hung in midair to illuminate the place were entirely made from skulls. Fire burned in their bony eye sockets. Even the giant pillars that seemed to support the room had been crafted in the shape of enormous leg bones. Instead of a traditional base, the sculptor had added bony feet and toes.
“Wow,” Bacca said. “This is really something . . .”
Bacca crept deeper into the mysterious room of bones and began to search for Gargantua—still unclear on exactly who or what it might be. The space was so enormous that it would be easy to get lost. The bony decorations also all seemed to look the same. As he made his way, Bacca was careful to keep an eye out for any movement in the bones around him. Skeletons were not—all things considered—the most challenging foes to face. But Bacca knew that facing a horde of skeletons out in an open field in the Overworld could be very different than trying to deal with them in confined spaces. On top of this, the creepers had already sent a giant horde of zombies at him as part of their second riddle. Maybe, Bacca thought, this one would involve a horde of skeletons. If even just ten percent of the bones around him suddenly came to life and began acting aggressively, Bacca knew that he would be in big, big trouble.
“Maybe there will be very tiny skeletons here,” Bacca thought to himself. “And to them, I’m so big that I’ll be Gargantua. Then the riddle is just asking what I want. Which is of course the Dragon Orb.”
Then Bacca said, out loud: “Why is it never that easy?”
“WHAT?” boomed an enormous voice in response. The voice was deep and powerful, and the sheer volume of it was enough to hurt Bacca’s ears. It shook the smaller bones in the fixtures all around him. The earth seemed to tremble very slightly underneath Bacca’s feet.
“Ow,” Bacca said, holding his ears. “Could you speak a little more quietly, please?”
There was a silence—probably an annoyed silence—and then the voice came again.
“What Is Never That Easy?” the voice said slowly and deliberately. It was still quite loud, but Bacca had been to louder concerts. He could manage.
“I’m looking for somebody called Gargantua,” Bacca said. “I’m solving a riddle. I have to find out what it wants. I was hoping it would be a trick, and Gargantua would turn out to be me. That way, it would be easy.”
“I Have Gone By Many Names,” the loud voice said. “But Most Now Call Me That One.”
“You’re Gargantua?” Bacca asked. “Where are you? Are you invisible? All I see in this room is bones.”
In response, one of the enormous pillars slowly took a thunderous step in Bacca’s direction. Bacca was dumbfounded. He realized that those were its legs. But what exactly was “it”?
“May I Pick You Up?” the thundering voice asked. “The Light Up Here Is Dim. I Cannot See You.”
“All right,” Bacca said. “Just be gentle.”
The loud voice sounded friendly to Bacca . . . but he kept Betty at the ready just in case.
From out of the gloom above came a creaking noise. A giant, skeletal hand extended down from the darkness. The first two fingers curled, making the universal sign for “Come here.” Bacca strutted over to the giant hand and climbed aboard. He lit a torch and held it aloft as the hand began to carry him up into the darkness.
By the light of the torch, he spied enormous leg bones, then enormous hips, then an empty rib cage that was larger than most houses. Finally, the huge skeletal arm stopped its ascent when Bacca was in front of the biggest skull he had ever seen.
“Ah,” Gargantua said. “You Brought Your Own Light. How Thoughtful.”
“You’re a skeleton!” Bacca said, stating the obvious. “And—wow!—you’re the bigg
est one I’ve ever seen! Are all skeletons on this server plane your size?”
The giant skull shook back and forth to indicate no. The sheer wind current generated by this was enough to ruffle Bacca’s fur.
“The Others Are Smaller,” it said. Bacca thought he detected a note of sadness in the bony giant’s voice.
It continued: “Always, They Are Smaller. Like You.”
“Are you the skeleton of a giant?” Bacca asked. “I mean, you must be, right?”
The behemoth paused and thought before answering.
“Skeletons Do Not Remember Who We Were Before,” it said. “We Only Know Who We Are Now. But I Suppose It Is Likely I Was A Giant.”
“Were you—are you—a boy or a girl?” Bacca asked.
“I Have No Recollection,” said Gargantua. “I Am Usually Addressed As ‘He’ . . . But This May Be Done In Error.”
“Do you have a bow?” Bacca asked. “Most skeletons have bows.”
At this, the giant raised its other hand—the one not holding Bacca—to reveal that indeed it did have a bow. It was the size of a clipper ship, maybe larger. The wood creaked and groaned under its own weight as the huge skeleton held it up.
“Thanks for not shooting me with that,” Bacca said. “Most skeletons shoot you on sight.”
“I Am Not Like Other Skeletons,” Gargantua said.
Then something remarkable happened. Just as Bacca was trying to think of how to bring up the subject of what a giant skeleton might want, Gargantua said:
“I Wish That I Was.”
“Excuse me?” Bacca said, cupping his hand to his ear. “What was that? You said that last part very quietly. You know, relatively speaking.”
“I Have Become Aware That My Existence Is Not Like What Others Have,” it said. “For Other Skeletons, There Are Crafters and Villagers To Hunt. I Have Only The Darkness. Other Skeletons Can Rest During The Day And Come Out At Night. I Have Only The Darkness Of This Place.”
