Magical Engineering

“I’m going to miss these weird plane things once we’re back on Earth,” I said as I stepped out of it, my boots splashing as they made contact with the puddle we'd managed to park next to.

“Yeah, there’s nothing like ‘em back in Erkinmushave either. Mostly on our big trips, we take the shroomdog sleds,” Cecile said, the brothers joining me in the puddle.

“I hope after everything is over, I somehow get to see your world. It sounds so extremely alien to what I’m used to. I don’t know how you two have managed to handle all this so well compared to me,” I said. Any small difference sent my brain wandering down a path, trying to understand what was happening, and somehow, it had never occurred to me that they must have been experiencing the same. Sure, they had the System already, but from the stories of their home, it was nothing like this.

“We had a lot of time to prepare, lots of stories from all the elders on what they knew, but you missed the first two weeks in the lines. We didn’t do nearly as well as we are now, and yes, you have to come to visit some of the fungal farms with us. There are amazing hot springs,” Cecile offered. To my own surprise, I wanted to go. What had happened to the man I so recently was, who’d loved his solitude, shut off from the rest of the world?

The feeling of the dungeon’s presence swept over us suddenly, which was strange as we hadn’t moved yet. “Uh, guys, I assume you felt that too?” They both nodded. Cecile had drawn his hoe. I looked behind me to see the transport already far in the distance. The dungeon had waited until our only getaway was gone before imposing itself, great. I decided Cecile had the right idea and pulled out my mallet.

“There’s something large moving through the deeper water over there,” Elicec said, pointing at a dark shape moving quickly below the surface. Before anyone could respond, a giant frog leaped from the water, crashing down hard enough to knock us all to the ground. It had several crystalline shapes jutting out from its flesh, with a large blood-red one on its head. I had a feeling I knew what was going on.

The dungeons themselves were mobile due to the two dungeon cores taking on what was essentially the same host. Somehow they were able to quickly move the borders, possibly due to the strange minerals attached to the mutated creation. My theory, while interesting, did nothing for the problem at hand, though. The battle had just started, and this thing was already winning.

The brothers were back on their feet before I was. Which left me to watch in horror as its tongue shot out and wrapped around their legs and instantly retracted, their body disappearing behind its closing mouth. “Dammit,” I yelled as I forced myself up and toggled my mana orbs back to the elemental ones.

I focused hard on the Aether orb. There had to be something in the Fundamental Forces skill that could help here. Just as its mouth opened again, ready for a second snack, new words poured out of my mouth, as unbidden as the time before. “Molecules, sever your bonds, dry this amphibian’s flesh!” I took several rapid steps backward, reasonably sure I had just split the water molecules all around the giant frog into hydrogen and oxygen gasses. I didn’t think some hydrogen gas was a big issue to breathe, but it wasn’t something I had ever really looked into. While I knew heavier-than-air gasses could be dangerous, hydrogen being lighter than oxygen meant it probably wasn't a huge problem, but that didn’t mean my body would like it. I hoped the brothers were fine inside the frog from this.

The frog shuddered, collapsing forward in pain. Had I really done that much damage just from drying out its skin? The reasons didn’t fully matter at the moment. I had to get the brothers free. I ran forward, bringing my mallet down onto its soft head. As I lifted my mallet for another swing, I felt a blast of energy surge across my body. The dark red crystal had shot me point blank. Apparently, they could operate independently of each other.

I had once shocked myself pretty badly in an experiment during my first year of college. This felt so much worse than that memory. I was having trouble focusing beyond the pain and was forced to cycle back to my Life mana orb just to keep me going. I jumped onto the creature’s head, stomping down hard as I did, swinging my mallet at the crystal. It bounced off, but a small chunk had broken where I had hit it. It was glowing brightly now, and I had a feeling I was about to get hit by another blast. I swung as hard as I could, worried it was my last shot. The crystal cracked in half. The energy exploded anyway, and I flew backward, hitting a tree hard enough that my vision started going dark.

No, I screamed in my mind, trying to fight past the blackout. Cecile and Elicec were still inside that thing. I have to save them. The struggle was in vain. I felt my head slump to the side. The fight was over, and we had lost. Something inside my mind yelled back.