The Gate Traveler

While standing by the Gate in the morning, Mahya exclaimed, “Shit, we forgot Lis’s advice about getting better armor. John, would you mind lending me armor again?”

I handed her the armor she had previously used and asked Alfonsen, “Do you have armor?”

“I do,” he said, retrieving a leather armor adorned with small metal plates in strategic areas and the largest shield I had ever seen. The silver-bluish color of this shield was also unlike anything I had ever seen.

“What’s the shield made of? I never saw anything like it.”

Radiating pride, he said, “Mithril.”

Mahya whistled and said, “Wow, that’s expensive.”

“I’m from the royal family; money is no obstacle,” he responded with a tone of condescension, looking at us down his nose.

Mahya and I exchanged a glance but remained silent. Sometimes, a single glance says it all; there is no need for words.

I wrapped Rue’s body in the snake armor Lis had made for him and asked him, “Is everything okay? Are you comfortable?”

“Yes! Kill! Snakes! Yum!”

We all burst into laughter. Scratching his ear, I assured him, “We’re looking for monsters, but if we come across a yum snake, we’ll do our best to eliminate it for you.”

The speed at which his tail wagged made me fear for its safety.

“Do we plan on being invisible?” I asked.

Mahya shook her head and said, “No, we need the monsters to see and attack us. If not, we’ll be stuck searching for them for hours. When we cross back, we’ll do it while invisible.”

I nodded. “That makes sense.”

Mahya took out wooden poles and started sticking them into the ground a few meters from the gate.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“We don’t need unwanted visitors.”

When she finished placing all the poles, we crossed the Gate. On the other side was a forest filled with short, twisted trees, thick leaves, and the scent of damp soil. The smell reminded me of the swamps in New Orleans: wet, musty, and with undertones of rotten eggs. Sneaking along, I focused on listening intently to the various noises around us, determined not to be caught off guard. That thought reminded me of my mana sense, and I spread it as far as possible. After walking for about twenty minutes, we heard noises in the distance, but nothing yet entered the field of my mana sense.

Mahya told me telepathically, “From now on, we should only communicate via telepathy.”

We pressed on, and the noises drew nearer until a gigantic rat suddenly burst out from the shrubbery. It was even bigger than Rue! I jerked in surprise, widened my eyes, and briefly stared at it. Fortunately, Mahya had more experience than me, so she quickly killed the rat by shooting a bolt into its eye while I was still stunned.

I shook my head. You’re here to kill monsters. Don’t freeze if you actually see them.

I took out my crossbow and started looking around more intently.

Mahya said, “John, start harvesting it for the crystal. Alfonsen and I will take care of the other monsters. If we need your help, we’ll let you know.”

I split my mind to stay aware of my surroundings and encompassed the rat in mana. Oddly enough, it didn’t dissipate. I diagnosed it and discovered it was an ordinary animal, or at least close to ordinary. The internal organs of the rats in this place were in different locations, and I found a beast core, but it wasn’t a monster.

“These are not monsters but mana beasts,” I sent to both of them.

“We need to get back to the Gate NOW,” Mahya said urgently.

In unison, Alfonsen and I asked aloud, “Why?”

“These are rodents. They swarm. I don’t want to fight hundreds of them.”

Hundreds sounded terrible, so I immediately said, “Let’s go.”

We hurried towards the Gate when rats began leaping on us from the trees. I stashed the crossbow and swapped it for the two Katana-like swords. Of all the weapons Lis trained me in, those were my favorites and a gift from him.

A rat leaped at me, and I struck it with a sword. It flew away but didn’t look injured. Instinctively, I covered the blade with a mana edge and hit the next rat that tried to jump me. It took its head off. More and more rats were leaping at me. They stunk to high heaven, and each leaping rat assaulted me with waves of stench.  Their movements confused my mana sense. It was hard to keep track of what was happening when everything appeared three times: In my nose, in my field of vision, and my mana sense field, so I turned it off.

I kept fighting and killed a few rats.

Oww!

A rat bit my leg from behind. I immediately activated my mana sense; being confused is better than being attacked from behind.

More and more rats leaped at me, and I fought them with both swords. The training that Lis forced me to do paid off big time. I moved on instinct and didn’t have to think about what to do. I moved and fought, almost like a dance. A rat bit me on the shoulder, and I nearly dropped the sword from the pain. I overcame the instinct, split my mind into the third part, and started casting Healing Touch.

Mahya yelled, “John, store the rats and keep moving. Don’t stop to fight.”

I tapped the rat closest to me with my foot and gave the command to store it. To my surprise, I stored all the rats within the range of my mana field.

 Excellent!

I ran between the rats as I fought, stored them all, and kept running towards the Gate while fighting and healing myself. I wasn’t an expert fighter yet and got bitten several times, but I healed myself and kept going. A rat bit my ankle hard, and I fell, rolled on my back, killed it, healed the leg, got up, and kept running.

I went through the Gate to Earth and realized I was the last to make it through. I looked at the others. Mahya looked fine, Alfonsen had blood on his legs, and Rue looked the most injured. Immediately, I healed him. Bites covered his legs, and a nasty bite on his neck made him whine in misery.

After I finished healing him, he said, “Rue hate rats!”

“Rue, you said a complete sentence!” I exclaimed enthusiastically and hugged him. “Now practice saying the sentences instead of shouting them into our heads.”

Alfonsen stomped over to me and barked, “Enthusiasm can wait. Heal me!”

Diagnosing him made it apparent that he had several bites on his legs, including one quite deep. After healing him, I examined myself and discovered that my armor was destroyed. I knew I had endured multiple bites, but I was so immersed in the battle that I didn’t register all the bites; I healed myself and kept on fighting. Checking my mana to figure out how much I healed myself, I saw it was 1470/9300.

Wow!

I used a lot for the mana edge and to heal Rue and Alfonsen, but it still was a lot of bites.

To be on the safe side, I diagnosed Mahya, and she had a minor scratch on her hand. I was glad I diagnosed her because I detected an infection or disease in the scratch, not only the skin wound. After everyone was healed, I cast clean on Rue, Mahya, and myself.

“Thanks,” she said.

“Of course,” I said, took a deep breath and added, “That was intense.”

“I hate swarmers,” Mahya said with an angry glower.

We sat for a few minutes to recover. Rue put his head on my lap, and I stroked him.

Mahya told him, “Congratulations on the levels.”

I identified him:

 

Rue Bonded Familiar Level 8

 

“Buddy! You got three levels! Congrats!”

“He got two levels,” said Mahya. “He was level six.”

“Not five?”

“No, he was level five after the dungeon and level six after the nest mother.” She gave me a reproachful look and asked, “You forgot to identify him after the snake fight?”

I nodded, embarrassed, and rubbed my neck. She and Alfonsen started laughing.

“Hey, don’t laugh! You grew up with this shit; I didn’t. I remember to use most things, but it takes time to become a habit. For almost forty years, I didn’t have those abilities!”

She patted my head like a child and said, “Yes, dear. Whatever you say, dear. There is a reason your Archive moniker is ‘Clueless.”

I gave her a dark look and cut this conversation short.

After fifteen minutes, Mahya said, “We should start processing the rats.”

Alfonsen made a sound of disgust, like he was choking. “Their scent is rather offensive.”

I gave him a medical mask and said, “Put this on; it might help.”

Mahiya held her hand to me. “Can I have one too, please?”

We donned the masks, and I took out all the rats. Wow! I knew I had fought a lot of rats, but not that many. Over thirty rats lay in front of me! And Alfonsen was right, they stunk to high heaven. It was like a combination of a baby diaper and roadkill that were left for a week to bake in the sun.

Ugh!

I activated Appraisal, and the only thing that drew my attention was its head.

 

Beast Core 2-4 Gold

I didn’t remember how much I appraised the beast cores of the wolves and bears in Tuonela, but I knew for a fact that it was higher. After removing the core from the rat, I understood why. It was as small as a grain of rice.

“Aren’t those too small?” I asked Mahya.

“We can merge them.”

“How?” I asked in surprise. I never heard of such a thing.

“The same way you merge a dungeon core. You hold two together and flow mana into them until they combine. That’s the difference between mana crystals and gems. And the capacity, of course.”

I stared at her, completely bewildered, and said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Lis never explained?” She asked, looking surprised.

I shook my head.

“I won’t go into all the uses mana crystals have. I’m sure you have a few books on the subject. Maybe even books you learned the language already. Lis has tons of books on mana crystals. But we’re really after their ability to function as mana batteries.

“You can store mana in several ways, but gems or crystals are the most effective. You can use diamonds or mana crystals without aspect to store mana for general use. In other gems, the aspects are inherent and cannot be removed. Fortunately, you know how to remove aspects from mana crystals, so we don’t have this problem.

“Also, mana crystals are best for this purpose because you can store the same amount of mana in one of these tiny crystals as a twenty-carat diamond or even bigger. If we merge them to this size,” she showed me a circle the size of a grape with her fingers, “something like thirty crystals, we can reach the storage amount of a diamond over a thousand carats big. Besides, your house’s charging station is incompatible with gems, so we need mana crystals.

“After I place them in the boat’s system and balance all the flows, we can take them out, put them in the charging station, and return them to the boat when full. If we fill all the nodes, we’ll have enough mana to sail to the US and back.”

“Appreciate the explanation,” I said, giving a nod. “How many rats do we have?”

They both took out all the rats they had stored, and after counting them, we had eighty-seven rats.

“Is this enough?” I asked Mahiya.

She sighed and said, “No, we need at least five times that and preferably ten times that.”

Alfonsen looked aghast, shuddered, and shrieked, “Are you proposing that we partake in a battle against eight hundred rats? Have you lost your mind?  They pose a risk, smell terrible, and are revolting!”

I was in complete agreement with him. Eight hundred rats? I shuddered, too, and said, “He’s right. No way I’m fighting eight hundred of those stinky things.”

Mahya’s shoulders slumped. She sighed, and said, “Maybe the Gates in Tibet will have a better option.”

We continued to process the rats, and all the while, my mind was working to find a solution. After removing the cores from all the rats, I turned to Mahya and asked, “What do you want to do with all the bodies?”

She glanced at the pile of rats, then back at me, shrugging nonchalantly. “Let’s throw them back into the Gate,” she suggested, her voice casual, as if this was an everyday task.

“How?”

“I’ll show you.” Mahya grabbed one rat, holding it up by the tail. She walked confidently toward the Gate, touched the inside of one of the anchor stones with one hand, and with a swift flick, tossed the rat inside.

Huh?!

My eyes widened as the rat disappeared through the Gate. “How did it get through the Gate?”

“I activated the Gate when I touched the anchor stone,” she explained matter-of-factly. “And since the rat is dead, there’s no problem throwing it in. It won’t work with a live creature.”

After we finished throwing all the rats in, I cast Clean on Mahya, me, and all around the Gate to get rid of the blood. Satisfied with the result, I turned to Mahya and said, “I might have an idea of how to collect the rats that we need.” I scratched my chin as the thought solidified in my mind.

Mahya’s eyes lit up with interest as she stepped closer. “How?”

“If we poison them, will it harm the beast cores?” I asked.

Mahya shook her head. “No, and it’s a good idea,” she admitted. “But how will we get them to ingest the poison? Mana beasts are smart; they won’t just eat it because we want them to.”

“Rats like cheese,” I said, tapping my temple as the idea clicked into place. “So we can use the smelliest cheese we can find. It should mask the smell.”

“Ugh,” Alfonsen groaned from behind us, wrinkling his nose in distaste. “The odor of smelly cheese is more potent than that of the rats.”

“Yeah,” I chuckled, “but we need the fuel to reach the US, and I don’t know about you, but I prefer to smell stinky cheese instead of fighting murderous rats.” I gave him a pointed look, raising an eyebrow in challenge.

He sighed audibly, his shoulders slumping in defeat. In a resigned tone, he replied, “Yes, I concur.” He paused for effect, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Cheese is the more favorable choice when compared to bites.”

After returning to Hangzhou, we took a day off to recover from the battle, then went looking for stinky cheeses and rat poison.

In the first cheese shop, Rue said, “Cheese yum! Rue cheese!” And, of course, he wanted the smelliest one they had. I bought him one, which disappeared in four bites, and the rest of the options for us.

In the next cheese shop, he announced, “Cheese stink! Rue hotel!”

“If I remember correctly, in the previous shop, you wanted the stinkiest cheese they had. Explain to me how the smell now bothers you. Hmm?” I told him.

He looked up at me with innocent puppy-dog eyes and wagged his tail. “Rue smart! Rue change mind!”

“You mean Rue wants to go watch a movie?” I asked.

He lowered his head and watched me from the corner of his eye.

Busted!

I took him back to the hotel, and we continued to look for stinky cheeses. After we bought fifty kilograms of them, we went looking for rat poison. We were looking for a liquid poison to inject into the cheeses, but unfortunately, we only found grains.

When we returned to the hotel, we all put on surgical gloves, took thin wooden sticks, made deep holes in the cheeses, and stuffed poison grains inside.

I called Rue and asked him, “Smell this, please.”

“Stinky!”

“Does it stink like cheese or like poison?”

“Cheese stinky!”

Good enough!

It took us hours to stuff all the cheese, but finally, we were done and went to sleep.

The next day, we returned to the Gate. Mahya again placed the camouflage poles, and we crossed the Gate, this time invisible. The other side of the gate was full of bones.

Ugh!

The rats ate their family. The thought made me shudder in disgust, with goosebumps all over my body.

We moved all the bones so they wouldn’t prevent us from crossing back and crept to where they first attacked us. We didn’t see or hear a single rat.

I telepathically asked them, “Shall we continue, or leave the cheese here?”

“Maybe it’s better to go back towards the Gate where we don’t have to go far to pick them up, spread the cheese, make a lot of noise, and cross the Gate back when they come,” Mahya suggested.

“Commendable idea,” responded Alfonsen.

We returned to the Gate area, and fifty meters from it, we started walking around and scattering the cheeses. After we scattered all the cheese, we stood by the Gate, canceled the invisibility, and started shouting and making noise.

I shouted, “Stupid rats! Delicious food here! Come eat!”

Mahya and Alfonsen snickered but said nothing.

When we heard rustling in the trees, we quickly crossed the Gate and decided to wait a day and see what happens. We returned to the lakeside and spent the rest of the day swimming and playing in the water. We didn’t use the E-foils; the lake was too peaceful, and we didn’t want to disturb its tranquility.

The next day we crossed the Gate while invisible and immediately saw corpses of rats. We walked around, collected them all, and I asked Rue, “Look for the ones we can’t easily find and store them. Give them to me when we cross back.”

“OK!”

Good thing his shouts were mental, or all the living rats would be here in minutes.

We collected more and more bodies—I personally collected over two hundred and I had no idea how many they collected. After ten minutes without finding another body, I returned to the Gate.

I asked them, “Are we done here?”

All three of them sent a “yes” in unison. Rue, of course, yelled it, and we crossed the gate back.

On the other side, we removed all the rats and started processing them. I didn’t count the rats, but simply opened the head, took out the core, threw the rat into the Gate, and moved on to the next rat. We continued to work like this until it was dark, and me and Mahya cast our light balls and continued to work. At some point, I could no longer throw rats into the Gate. Something blocked me.

After casting invisibility and attempting to cross the Gate, I came face to face with a mountain of corpses. I pushed the mound, but only the ones I touched moved, and it was disgusting. Switching to telekinesis, I kept pushing them further and further until the mound was ten meters from the Gate.

I feel sorry for the Traveler who will try to use this gate in the near future. The stench will be appalling.

We finally finished processing all the rats sometime in the middle of the night. I cleaned Mahya and myself and also the entire area around the Gate, and we returned to the hotel just after sunrise. After counting all the crystals, including the crystals we collected the first time, we had nine hundred and sixty-four crystals.

“Is that enough?” I asked Mahya, rubbing my shoulders and glancing at the pile.

“I’ll know for sure after we merge them to a good size, but I think so,” she replied, her eyes narrowing in concentration as she examined the pile.

“We’ll take care of it tomorrow,” I said, stifling a yawn. “I’m going to bed.”

Before I went to sleep, I went to shower. I had the Clean spell, but I needed water. I took a long shower, scrubbing myself and washing my hair repeatedly, shuddering now and then and getting goosebumps. It was a harrowing experience.

Before falling asleep, I thought about it and concluded that while it was disgusting—especially the stench of the rats and opening their heads to remove the cores—overall, this experience was good for me. I saw I was no longer helpless but could fight to defend myself and deal with particularly unpleasant situations.

But there were still things I needed to work on. Like remembering to move and not waiting for Mahya to remind me. Also, practicing my mana sense. It was a fantastic tool, but I wasn’t using it enough. Lis taught me to fight, but I needed to develop myself in those things. Overall, I felt I did well in my first actual battle. It felt like a significant achievement. I was also glad we didn’t have to fight eight hundred rats. I shuddered at the thought.

It was always better to work smarter, not harder.