Rune Seeker

Hiral waved at the other workers as he jogged into the work yard—late from eating an extra pair of waffles—and silently marveled at how his mind filled in the names of everybody he saw.

Bevil, Hurdle, Nacey, Edyard, and Wilkes all waved back as he passed, and he eventually trotted up to the two men at the back of the yard.

The big guy with only one ear was Korkin. He’d lost the other ear in a construction accident years ago, and had a wife working in the kitchens, as well as two kids under the age of nineteen waiting to join them on the island. Beside him stood his best friend, Sander, a man half the size, but twice the volume.

And how do I know all this? Did I really experience it, or did the PIMP implant these memories in my head? And, if it did that, what else can it put in there…? Is this like learning a fighting style? Should we be worried about it, or…?

“Hiraaaaaaaaaaal!” Sander shouted when their eyes met. “How you feeling this morning?”

“You didn’t mention quite how strong your homebrew was, Sander,” Hiral said. The memory of the fiery liquid running across his tongue and down his throat almost made him gag all over again.

“Pretty sure I did,” Sander said, looking up at Korkin, who just nodded. “See, Kork here agrees with me.”

“He always agrees with you,” Hiral pointed out.

“’Cause I’m usually right,” Sander said with a wink.

“Then why do you always agree?” Hiral asked.

“Less work than arguing,” Korkin said sagely.

“Smart man,” Sander said.

“So it seems,” Hiral agreed. “What’s on our schedule today?”

“The usual,” Sander said. “You pile big bricks on top of each other while Kork and I make sure they stay there for the next few thousand years.”

“You know, considering I’m only doing this in my spare time, I really have to wonder what you’d be doing if I wasn’t around,” Hiral said. Dropping his packed lunch in the shade beside a pile of bricks they wouldn’t get to until the afternoon, he walked over to the stack for the first building.

“Probably more heavy lifting, don’t you think, Kork?” Sander asked with another look up at his big friend.

“Lot more,” Korkin agreed.

“You could help here,” Hiral said, reaching out to the ten-by-ten block they’d use as a foundational corner. “You know, show me how it’s done and all that,” he added while threading solar energy and lifting the stone up above his head.

“Eh, you’re doing good enough,” Sander said. “You know where that goes, right?”

“Of course I know where…” Hiral started, only to realize he was literally holding thousands of pounds of stone directly over his head. In one hand. Like it was nothing.

How…?

A subtle touch of his Rune of Attraction kept him from dropping the stone, but it was really his Runes of Gravity and Decrease doing most of the work. He’d reduced the stone’s weight to almost nothing. Without even thinking about it.

And, going through his memories, he’d been doing it for weeks.

“Hey, Hiral, you okay there?” Korkin asked, a hint of worry in his voice.

“Not going to vomit, are you?” Sander asked. “The booze wasn’t that strong.”

“Yes. No,” Hiral said. “I mean, I’m fine. Not going to vomit. Where’s this go?”

Sander raised an eyebrow at Hiral, then pointed to the gridded area where the stone needed to be placed.

“Thanks,” Hiral said flatly, carefully lowering the huge block into place. A second small shift made sure it was precisely lined up, and then he cut off his solar energy. The full weight of the stone settled in with a soft crunch, and Hiral stepped back.

No way my 28 Str could do that on its own. That much stone is thousands of pounds. Tens of thousands. How much solar energy did it…? 2%.

“Jokes aside, that’s just as impressive every time you do it,” Sander said.

“It is,” Korkin agreed.

“Though, it was pretty funny that first time when you tried to—what did you call it?—attract the stone over?” Sander laughed.

“Never seen anybody move so fast to get out of the way,” Korkin said.

“It was a big rock,” Hiral said, blushing slightly at his earlier mistake from weeks before.

“It was,” Sander said. “But you know, Hiral, I’ve been meaning to ask since we started working together, though I didn’t want to be nosy…”

“You wanted to be. You just forgot,” Korkin supplied.

Sander just waved a hand at the bigger man. “Where’s your golem?”

Hiral paused, then turned to look at Sander. “My what?”

“Your golem.”

“Heard you the first time, but it doesn’t answer my question. What golem?”

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Sander exchanged a look with Korkin. “You do have one of those fancy PIM things, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Hiral said.

“And you’re one of those… bonker guys?”

“Builder,” Korkin corrected.

“Yes, them.” Sander pointed at Korkin with both hands. “So, you should have a golem.”

“Sorry, still not following you,” Hiral said.

Sander crossed his arms and blew out a breath. “Kork, take over.”

“All the Builders we’ve met are working on constructing what they call golems,” Korkin explained. “Seems more like armor to us, but that’s what they call it. We’ve been told the crystal is what lets them use their runes.”

“They don’t have fancy, ridiculously soft black coats with runes sewn in,” Sander said. “Though, your outfit is a bit edgier, so I’ll give you points for that.”

“Thanks,” Hiral said flatly, “but these runes aren’t sewn in. Actually, that’s not important. Are you saying those Builders can’t use their runes without this crystal armor…?” As soon as the words left his mouth, the memory of a four-armed crystal monster floated to the front of his mind. Was that monster—the one who gave me my first rune—actually a Builder in their armor?

And does that mean I can make something like that with my Mold Crystal?

“That, and something about immortality, but who really listens to all the tall tales you hear over drinks?” Sander said. “You remember that one time the guy talked about finding a suit of silver armor with no face…” Korkin nodded along, but Hiral, for his part, wasn’t listening anymore.

Dr. Benza had said something similar before, about the Builders needing tools to use their abilities. This golem—or armor, or whatever—had to be one of those tools. But if all the other Builders needed them, why didn’t he? Sure, he could use things like his RHCs and the smaller gadgets he’d made for the others, but he could also use his runes directly.

What was different about him? Something to do with the Rune of Separation he’d received from that crystal golem—the Builder—they’d met. Had that even actually been a Builder under there, or had it been something… else?

He’d need to find a way over to the Builder island at some point to…

“Those stones aren’t going to move themselves,” Sander said, eying a pile of smaller stones, and Hiral brought his mind back to the present.

Even if he was somehow different from the other Builders, that was a question for later—and it wasn’t the real reason they were in the dungeon.

“Maybe not, but you’re going to help out this time,” Hiral said, putting his questions aside and focusing on the task at hand. The small stones had given him an idea.

“Aw, no. He’s going to test something, isn’t he?” Sander asked Korkin.

“That’s what it looks like,” Korkin said.

“Stop complaining and come over here,” Hiral said.

“How’s about you do your thing, then we’ll go over there,” Sander said. “It’s safe here.”

“You’re as bad as Seena,” Hiral muttered.

“But not nearly as cute,” Sander said. “And I don’t think I’m the only one who thinks that, eh, Kork?”

“You’re not,” Korkin agreed.

“Not this again,” Hiral said.

“Just saying. You’re the same age. Spend a lot of time together. End of the world is coming and all. Might as well…”

Hiral poured so much solar energy into his Runes of Gravity, Expansion, and Decrease that every stone block for forty feet in front of him practically leapt into the air. Small tethers of Attraction and Rejection pulled the floating bricks to orbit slowly around him, and he turned his attention back to the two men. “You were saying something?”

The pair of men eyed the dozens of two-by-two blocks levitating around Hiral. There were enough stones to build a whole house circling him. Or to flatten two nosy friends. They gently shook their heads.

“Just… just saying we should be helping you move all those blocks,” Sander said. “It’ll be much faster this way. Right, Kork?”

“Much faster,” Korkin said.

Both men tentatively moved over to one of the floating stones and gently poked it. The brick shifted slightly in the air, but nothing more than that.

“This isn’t going to fall on my foot, is it?” Sander asked.

“Not unless I lose my concentration because somebody annoyed me,” Hiral said, grinning.

“Wouldn’t want that,” Sander said.

“No, we wouldn’t,” Korkin agreed.

“We should be fine, then,” Hiral said. “I can hold these up for a bit, but let’s get them into position sooner rather than later.”

Pushing on one of the practically weightless stones, he carefully guided it over to where it needed to be. The other two men followed behind with their own bricks, then used their magic to seal the stones together.

Hiral watched with interest for a few seconds—Some kind of magic like what the Growers use—then realized he’d watched the same thing a dozen times. With a shake of his head, he walked over and grabbed the next floating block.

“How strong do you think these blocks are?” Hiral asked as he settled the next one into place. “After you guys work your magic, I mean.”

“How strong?” Sander asked, his face screwing up like he was constipated as he sealed the blocks together.

“Yeah,” Hiral said. “Do they have a Rank? Or, how much punishment can they take?”

The Rank terminology had started floating around more on the island as talk of the PIMs became more common, but it wasn’t like it had become universal.

“Kork, you know what Rank the stone is?” Sander asked.

“C-Rank,” Korkin said without hesitation.

That lined up with what Hiral knew of the buildings in his present-day Fallen Reach. “How about the towers they’re planning to build?”

“The towers?” Sander asked, sealing up the next stone while they talked. “What towers?”

“Heard they were putting up eleven towers,” Hiral explained, “running the length of the island from front to back.”

“Who decides where the front of a round island is?” Sander asked quietly, but Korkin spoke up before Hiral had to answer.

“I heard about that project. Don’t know a lot, but Yummi mentioned it.”

“That old bat?” Sander asked. “Must be something special if they’ve got her working on it.”

“Yummi?” Hiral asked.

“She’s part of the same union we are,” Sander explained. “Older than the hills and ten times as stubborn. But she’s good. Real good. If we used those rankings you were talking about, for skill, Kork and I here would be… uh… C- or B-Rank? Somewhere in there. Yummi would be above A. Is there anything above that?”

“S-Rank,” Hiral said.

“She’d definitely be S-Rank. If they convinced her to come out of retirement for something, it must be important.”

“Her and Fulerik both,” Korkin said, and Sander’s jaw dropped.

“They’re both here? Do you… do you think we can get his autograph or something?” Sander actually stopped to look around as if he’d spot the two people.

“Somebody else special?” Hiral asked.

“They’re the two legends of our union,” Korkin explained, Sander clearly lost in daydreaming about his idols. “Pioneered a lot of the techniques we use to reinforce buildings. Fulerik also worked a lot on our underground cities. Stopping the caverns from collapsing.”

“I saw runes used when I was in Ratchett,” Hiral said, thinking back. “Did he do those?”

Korkin shook his head. “No, Fulerik and Yummi use magic that naturally hardens and strengthens stone. Those runes were probably done by Catchin. One of Dr. Benza’s people. She’s working on this project, too, now that I think about it.”

“Think you could introduce me after we finish up here?” Hiral asked.

“Sure, you want their autographs too?” Korkin asked.

“Not exactly,” Hiral said with a chuckle.