Maria pulled a towel from the magical pouch on the back of her belt, wiping the rough cloth across her face. She looked down at cloth and the new green blood stains and sighed.
“Damnit. I think this is my last towel!”-Maria (Human adventurer)
The short halfling spoke up from where she was currently carving into the corpse of a huge worm like creature.
“You’d still have lots ifn youd hold on to em, stead of tossin em!”-Bikaa (Hafling adventurer)
Maria tossed the towel over her shoulder after she wiped the green gore off her sword blade.
“They start to stink if I keep them. Then everything in my bag starts to stink”-Maria (Human adventurer)
A tall male human dressed in dark cloth sighed audibly as he appeared out of the shadows.
“You know that’s impossible. That type of magic bag is an open-ended time space teleport. None of the items you register with it ever come in contact with one another.”- Conner (Human adventurer)
Conner slung the massively oversized bow over his shoulder where it shrank and adhered to a dark grey leather sling. Maria rolled her eyes as she looked back towards Conner.
“You know I don’t care how it work, and I’m telling you that if I put bloody towels into one of these magic bags, I can smell it on everything else I take out.”-Maria (Human adventurer)
Before Conner could say anything else Bikaa interrupted.
“Don’t be trying boy. Mari hasn’t changed since er first holding bag turned a weeks' worth of rations inta ofal. Even the goblin we’s was hunting ran from it!”-Bikka (Hafling adventurer)
Conner frowned, shaking his head. He moved over to check on the fourth and final member of their party. A young-looking man in leather was fiddling with a large box next to the pedestal where the dungeon core rested.
“What have you gotten us into this time, fearless leader?”-Conner (Human adventurer)
The man in leather continued to work while he talked.
“I believe that it’s a Mana Siphon. From what I can tell it will drain all the mana that the core collects. It’s ingenious honestly, since we normally can’t access the free mana radiated by every living creature, not to mention the ley line the core is drawing from.”-Lhoris(Half-elf adventurer)
Lhoris paused in his work, staring at the core, then back to the box he was magically fusing into the pedestal.
“It’s not storing all the mana though and since we can’t open it by contract, you’ll have to ask Maria what it does. It was her contacts that offered the job.”-Lhoris(Half-elf adventurer)
Conner looked back at Maria, cocking one eyebrow.
“Your mysterious Table again?”-Conner (Human adventurer)
Maria nodded.
“There will be more of these contracts too. Lots more, as long as we follow the rules.”-Maria
Conner looked at the box as Lhoris was working on it.
“Like we ever follow all the rules. Are you ever going to tell us what, or who, Table is?”-Conner (Humam adventurer)
Maria rolled her eyes at Conner, then pulled a pry bar from her pouch.
“You don’t like politics, dealing with nobles, or any of the games the powers play. So no, I'm not, and yes were going to follow the rules this time.”-Maria (Human adventurer)
Maria paused from walking towards the dungeon wall, pointing her pry bar at Conner, then Lhoris
“Don’t fuck around just to see what will happen. This is more important than just another job, way more. And you, don’t open that box just because you are curious, and I don’t mean when no one is looking.”- Maria (Human adventurer)
Maria waited to see if either was going to complain, before continuing in a very frosty tone when neither did.
“That box, and the many more we are going to be installing, is going to secure our survival. Fuck this job up and I’ll leave both of you in the cold. It’s going to be very cold.”-Maria
She glared at the two, then slammed the pry bar into a crack in the rough rock wall. Maria levered hard against the bar causing a small section of the wall to crumble revealing a dark opening beyond.
Conner and Lhoris looked at each other then back towards where Maria had revealed a new hidden passage in a dungeon that had been supposedly completely explored for decades. Lhoris shook his head then patted Conner on the shoulder, before speaking out as the party leader again.
“I still have no idea how she does that. Ok Conner, do your shadow thing and scout it out. Maria keep your eyes open while I finish up here. Bikka, wrap it up. 5 minutes and I’ll be done, then we follow Conner.”-Lhoris (Half-elf adventurer)
The rest of the party nodded. Conner disappeared into the shadows of the newly exposed passage, as Lhoris turned back to the box he was installing. Maria slide the now slightly bent pry bar back into her pouch and wandered closer to Bikka who was packing up the material she had been collecting from the corpse. Bikka took a quick look over at Lhoris then talked quietly to Maria.
“Gonaa tell me whtn were doing?”-Lhoris (Halfling adventurer)
Maria looked away keeping an eye on the exits.
“The Table found another world that can support life for everyone, but it doesn't have enough mana to support the evacuation portals. The boxes send mana they collect through to raise the level on the other side. Eventually the portals will open.”-Maria (Human adventurer)
Bikka dropped the last of the packaged materials into her magic backpack, then closed her eyes for a moment. All of the gore and blood on her body and cloths suddenly fell off of her and onto the floor in a wet squelch. She opened her eyes and stepped out of the ring of gore before speaking again.
“N how big er them portls yur Table is plannin?”-Bikka (Halfling adventurer)
Maria glanced back towards Lhoris.
“City sized, and in every country.”-Maria (Human adventurer)
Bikka scowled, then nodded.
“The bone head be thinking tis the end?”-Bikka (Halfling adventurer)
Maria’s head whipped around, her face completely surprised that one of her oldest friends knew who headed the table.
“What? I been walkn the land a few yers longer then you, and that glittery skulled bastard been stickn bony fingers in othr’s business fer longr than that.”-Bikka (Halfling adventurer)
Bikka smiled and punched Maria lightly in the arm, then sighed.
“We got ta job to get done. N looks like I’m back n the hero business.”- Bikka (Halfling adventurer)
Thank you for the chapter
Was not expecting another existential crisis, but compared to the others, this one is much easier to go through, personal opinion though.
Was originally going to explain the Table's plan by a conversation between one of the other world's kings and a Table representative, but I had no plans for those characters to appear again.
This way Maria's companions appear a little earlier, and I cover part of the plan, with the added bonus of the actual people that are carrying it out.