The Gate of the Feral Gods

by Matt Dinniman

  The dromedarian children were in the middle of watching Toy Story 3 when we entered, and they insisted on finishing it before they left. For some of these kids, their parents were likely now dead. They probably needed to get back out there. But I didn’t have the heart or energy to say no, so I left them alone. Let them have their movie, I thought. Juice Box sat upon the kitchen counter, chatting away with Mordecai while the cleaner bot zipped about the room, clicking and beeping angrily, cleaning juice stains.

  “They’re all gone,” I said to Juice Box as we all settled in. “Henrik disappeared soon after the Wasteland fell.”

  She shrugged. “I am not a principal. Those guys have their own thing going on. They’re probably in the necropolis looking for that ghost. I don’t know what they’re going to do when they find her since you killed off the flesh mechanic, but those guys are crazy.”

  “The temple is flooding with water. They’re not going to get very far.”

  She just looked at me. “They’re changelings. The water will be no problem.” She hopped off the table. “Now I better get out there and see how much of the town you three blew up.”

  After we’d won that last quest, we’d all received a charisma bonus when dealing with changelings. I could already see the effects. We needed to talk more with Juice Box regarding this whole storyline with Henrik and the ghost in the necropolis, but first she needed to get out there and see we had indeed saved the town. I watched her head outside.

  I had three boxes to open, Donut had three, and Katia had two. Juice Box had left, but the horde of children remained, all glued to the screen. All three of us received the same Silver Skydiver’s box, and all three of them contained the same thing. Three potions of Half Splat.

  Mordecai grunted. “Keep those in your hotlist until you can get a real Featherfall, but they’re not that great. They’ll keep you from dying via falling damage, but you’ll be at 5% health after you hit the ground.”

  “They’re still better than that Dolores Doesn’t Splat potion,” I grumbled.

  “Hey now,” Mordecai said. “That potion is genius. It may not be pleasant, but your health was still at 100% when you landed.”

  I grumbled as I opened my next box. The Gold Makeup Sex is the Best Sex box.

  “What is this?” I asked, picking up the group of items. It was a sheet of paper and a quill pen. There was also a little jar that was capped and filled with black ink.

  “Odd,” Mordecai said, leaning in to examine the prize. “These aren’t rare, but they’re pricey. They’re used by scholar and arcanist classes who focus on scroll production. You’ll never have the proper skills to use this beyond a rudimentary level. If you can figure out how to write some basic scrolls, maybe you can make some money.” He shrugged. “I can use it, but I’m much better at potions. Besides, I can buy a writing table and be much more efficient. Your best bet is to just sell the set.”

  The last of my boxes was the platinum quest box. I held my breath as I opened it. I needed something good. Everything I’d been getting lately was either weird or something I couldn’t use just yet.

  The box opened. It contained 5,000 gold coins, twenty healing scrolls, and a little black rock.

  “Excellent,” Mordecai said. “Good, good. This was what I was talking about earlier. You’re starting to get items that will enhance your existing items. You have to use it now. This is for your gauntlet. All three of you are likely to get something like this.”

  I examined the black rock.

  Platinum Sharpening Stone.

  Warning: This item has a short shelf life.

  Apply this to any spiked offensive weapon to receive the following buffs.

  Plus (2 x current level)% damage to all attacks.

  Plus 1 to all current stat buffs. Does not add new buffs if they do not exist.

  It also makes the weapon look extra oily and mean looking. In other words, the weapon’s appearance may change. But only a little.

  Since the item had a short shelf life, I had to apply it right away. I formed my gauntlet and rubbed the rock it along the spikes. The whole thing glowed. The actual spikes grew a little longer. I received an extra point of dexterity and another to strength when the gauntlet was formed.

  I examined the other prize, the paper and inkwell, as Katia opened her Platinum box.

  Coffee Shop Author Kit.

  Alcoholism and crippling self-doubt not included.

  So you want to be a writer. It started with sappy poetry in middle school. You soon graduated to Naruto fanfiction. By the time you crash landed face-first into adulthood, your brain swelled with the misguided notion that your shitty novel with a self-insert protagonist sporting a traumatic childhood would change the world. Spoiler alert. Nobody is going to read your autobiography disguised as a space vampire and minotaur romance. You and every other half-wit out there with a nearby Starbucks and a laptop is writing the same bile. What you’re really doing is inadvertently live-blogging the story of human mediocrity, and the universe is now a better place that the Syndicate has put a stop to it all.

  Anyway, this is a magical sheet of paper. You will find you now have a second tab on your scratchpad in your interface. You can write something on this paper, and it will appear in the scratchpad and vice versa. If the proper spell and glyphs are accurately copied onto this paper, you can present the sheet at a market kiosk, and a scroll will appear for sale. Or if you have a printing press, you can make your own scrolls. Or even your own tome if you think you have the chops.

  I panicked at the mention of a second tab in my scratchpad. I already had a secret second one thanks to my cookbook. But thankfully I now had three tabs, with the cookbook tab being the last. I relaxed and turned my attention back to the paper.

  “I’m confused. I can just write out a scroll, and it’ll let me put a copy for sale in the market?” I asked, looking at the blank magical scroll. “How many can I sell? Will I lose this paper?”

  “Writing your own scroll requires skills you don’t have,” Mordecai said. “It’d take a week of practice just to write a simple Light scroll. Potions are much better, especially this season with the unlimited inventory. The only advantage is that you can sell unlimited scrolls in the market as long as you keep the spell written on the magical sheet. Once you erase it from your scratchpad, it’s gone from the market. You can get a printing press table and make your own scrolls, or you can set the price as low as it’ll let you and buy your own scrolls from the market. I saw one guy do that last season with Fireball scripts. Actually, that worked out really well for him. Turns out if you use the same scroll more than 200 times, you learn the spell.”

  I went to the new tab and wrote, “Does this work?”

  The magical pen rose into the air as the top popped off the ink well. The pen dipped within and wrote out “Does this work?” I drew a rudimentary cat portrait, and the pen copied my work.

  Donut looked at the cat art with distaste. “Am I a joke to you, Carl?”

  I laughed as I deleted the image in the scratchpad, and it faded away from the paper.

  “This is both cool and completely useless,” I said.

  “The ink isn’t bottomless, so don’t play with it too much,” Mordecai added.

  “Carl, are you quite done? I have a very important box to open, and you promised you’d watch me do it. And we still have to learn what Katia had gotten!” Donut said impatiently. She had her benefactor box from Veriluxx RealPet Companions. The one that Loita had said wasn’t a real box, but a “product sample.”

  In addition to the same basic items, Katia received a single crossbow bolt. “It replaces the free, unlimited basic ammo the crossbow normally comes with. It adds armor piercing and adds damage based on my level.”

  “That’s pretty cool,” I said, putting all my new gear into my inventory. I turned to Donut. “Let’s see what you got.”

  “Oh, goodie!” She hopped up and down a few times, her tail swishing back and forth. She’d removed h
er sunglasses, and her eyes gleamed. “Now remember, Carl. We have a television program to go on in a few days where we review the product. So pay careful attention. I do hope it’s an accessory for Mongo.”

  Mongo screeched in agreement.

  The benefactor box opened, and we all just stood there, staring at what popped out.

  Katia burst out laughing.

  It was Donut. A toy, robot Donut.

  The cat hopped out of the box, took a few steps out onto the table and started licking her paw in a stilted, mechanical manner. She was about ¾’s the size of the real deal, and her fur was wrong, like she was made out of rat hair. The thing looked to be made with technology only slightly advanced from where we were from before the collapse. Definitely not on the same level as the planet-destroying, dungeon-making Syndicate. The mini-Donut looked up at the room and said with a voice that wasn’t even close, “I sure do like lasagna. I hate Mondays, Carl.” The cat resumed licking itself.

  Donut continued staring at the thing open-mouthed as I examined its properties. The voice describing it was not the system AI, but a slightly-static, pre-recording of a deep voice that sounded like it came straight from a 1980’s toy commercial.

  Veriluxx RealPet Dungeon Crawl Special Edition Exclusive.

  “Princess Donut the Queen Anne Chonk.”

  Dungeon Crawler World: Earth.

  The ultimate play toy, Veriluxx RealPet Companions are budget-friendly, nearly indestructible collectibles that will give your child hours and hours of fun. Because these interactive toys do not require an implant certificate to play with and enjoy, parents needn’t worry about how many hours their children are spending with their new best friends!

  Mix and match! They fight! They love! They will share your deepest, darkest secrets! Each Veriluxx RealPet Companion is a fully licensed depiction of your favorite personality or creature. The onboard AI comes preprogrammed with a 100% accurate and realistic persona, and it will learn as it goes. It’s like having a real pet, but better! Available on the Syndicate Trade Network. Mongo companion sold separately.

  Veriluxx. For the children.

  Action-grip Hekatonkheires coming soon!

  “Lasagna?” Mordecai asked.

  “It’s Garfield,” Katia said. “It’s like they didn’t have enough Donut material, so they mixed her with the Garfield comic strip.”

  The robot cat sniffed about the air. “Ferdinand?” She looked at Mongo. “You’re not Ferdinand.”

  Ruby, the deformed, armless changeling was sitting nearby, eyes glued to the television screen, but she turned now as the robot approached her. She was in her weird, blank changeling form. She made a muted, terrified squeal and ran from the table.

  “Hey kid, it’s not going to hurt you. It’s a talking toy. Just like in the movie,” Mordecai said, moving away to go talk to her.

  Donut still had not said anything. She remained where she’d opened the box, stiff as a board.

  “Uh, Donut,” I asked. “You doing okay?”

  “I’m sorry, Carl,” the robot said, her head turning 180 degrees to look back at me. “The void is wet and hungry.”

  “Not you,” I said to the weird robot. “Donut?”

  Donut finally looked up, her yellow eyes shining. “They… they made a doll out of me, Carl. It’s merch. I have merch. This is the greatest thing that has ever happened since I won Grand Champion Best in Show last year in Cleveland.”

  Mongo continued to sniff at the imposter cat.

  “Are you a cocker spaniel?” the robot asked the dinosaur. The toy hissed and swished its tail at Mongo. “Cocker spaniels deserve to have their corpses desecrated.”

  Mongo screeched.

  “No, bad Mongo! Bad!” Donut cried, but it was too late. Mongo chomped the robot on the head, decapitating it. The body seized up and fell onto its side, smoke rising from within. The whole thing flashed and then caught on fire. The cleaner bot zipped over, beeping angrily and doused it with white foam.

  I fell over with laughter.

  “So much for being ‘nearly-indestructible,’” Katia said.

  Donut sniffed and poked the still-smoldering remains. Mongo continued to look indignant. A static shock burst out, striking Donut on the nose, and she howled.

  “This is most certainly going into my review.”

  Donut’s platinum quest box contained the same thing her last platinum quest box contained. A pair of fang caps and a skill potion. She promptly drank the potion down, and it added three points to her Animal Wrangling skill, bringing it up to eight.

  The last set of fang caps had given Mongo a damage buff and the ability to add a few debuffs like poison and paralyze, though neither seemed to happen often. Usually the mobs were dead if the dinosaur got to the point where he was chomping down on them. These two additional caps added 15% movement speed and 15% strength to the level-29 dinosaur. Once again, Donut made me place them on the dinosaur’s teeth. He had a little piece of robot Donut in there I had to fish out.

  After, I spent some time cleaning up the rest of the dead robot while Donut grumbled and complained. “I will not have my merch published by a company who puts out a shoddy product. I can’t wait to give them an earful.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “We should probably tell them not to use the Garfield thing, either. I’m not so sure they were using… official Garfield sources for their AI.”

  The movie finally ended, and the children reluctantly filed out of the space and back into the real world. Their version of it, at least. I walked them out while Donut remained inside. Katia and Mordecai were about to go to the Desperado to pick up some more supplies. We had to prepare for the assault on the floating house.

  “Can we come back tomorrow and watch another movie?” Skarn asked as we left.

  “Maybe,” I said, distracted. I looked up in the air. The town’s covering was half up, and the dromedarians worked desperately to repair the rest of it before the next sandstorm. Through one of the many empty spaces, I looked up into the sky. I couldn’t see it without the telescope I’d stolen from the kid, but I sensed it there. The remains of the castle. I sighed.

  I was so preoccupied, I didn’t see the blue dot approach.

  “Hello, Carl,” a deep, rumbly voice said.

  I turned to look at the tall rock monster. He looked similar to the guards at the Desperado, but he was made of red and black lava rocks. He had a whole mess of boss kills over his head and a trio of player killer skulls. The last time I’d seen him, he’d been magic-based. It appeared that he’d switched focus. He had a large, glowing spear hanging over his shoulder.

  “Hello, Chris,” I replied. “I’m glad to see you.”

  14

  I stared up at the level 35 creature as the children all moved off. He towered over me, standing at least seven and a half feet tall. I examined his properties.

  Crawler #324,116. “Chris Andrews 2”

  Level 35.

  Race: Igneous.

  Class: Zulu Warrior.

  Every time he moved, it sounded like rocks scraping together. I could feel the heat coming off him, like the center of his body was molten. He’d probably set Donut’s heat vision haywire. Chris returned my gaze, and I couldn’t read his expressionless face. His intense eyes were burning lumps of coal.

  “How did you get here so fast?” I finally asked.

  “I was in the water quadrant. There was a giant submarine called the Akula. We had to break in, and it was filled with robots. There was a bugbear head in a jar with mechanical spider legs, and we woke it up by accident.” He grunted. “It’s a long story. I smashed the glass, and that was it. We took the bridge, and it was over. But as soon as we did, the sub fired a torpedo right into the side of the mountain, and everything started getting sucked into the hole. Water started to fill the sub, so we had to run. We had three escape hatches. They were missile launch tubes, one leading to each of the other quadrants. The only other two survivors got in the tube that leads to the land quadr
ant, but I couldn’t fit with them. I didn’t want to go into the tunnels, so I came here. It fired me in the air, and I landed on a giant sand dune. It was wild. I thought for sure I was going to get broken into a million pieces. I landed here and I was heading toward this town when you—I’m assuming it was you—blew that giant thing out of the sky.”

  I nodded. All of that made sense in the context of what I knew about the water quadrant.

  I sent a quick note to Donut, Mordecai, Katia, and Imani, telling them what was happening. I told Donut to remain inside for now until I could get a sense of his state of mind. Katia and Mordecai were almost at the Desperado, about to purchase some supplies. We still hadn’t slept.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about Odette’s cryptic warning.

  Donut: MY VIEWERS ARE SPIKING REALLY HIGH. CHECK YOURS. SOMETHING IS HAPPENING.

  I never actually kept track of what the average view count was, which, I was realizing now, was a mistake. Donut actually had the little needle up at all times on her interface. I rarely went into the relevant tab. I needed to stop being so stubborn about it because it was a good indicator that shit was about to go down.

  Katia: I just received an emergency benefactor box. A silver one. We’re going to open it up in the other safe room. The one in Weird Shit Alley. It’s closer.

  Carl: Is it from the Squim Conglomerate?

  Katia: No. From Princess Formidable.

  Mordecai: It’s an emergency box. She needs to open it now. That box probably cost the princess a sizeable chunk of her net worth. We’ll keep you updated.

  A chill rushed over me. What was going on? This was Chris. Surely he couldn’t have changed that much. I was on full alert, but I didn’t feel ready. If something was about to happen, I wasn’t prepared for it. I’d already used up my daily Protective Shell while we were falling from the Wasteland attack. I hadn’t felt this tense about another player since we’d had the fight with Hekla. I hated this. I hated not being able to trust someone who was supposed to be my friend.