Archetype: Scholar
Special Classification: Fire Caster
Nick sheathed his sword, his brain scrambling for a proper response.
“Uh, hi?”
The small woman more slid than climbed down her book horde, stumbling and flailing her arms wildly to maintain her balance upon reaching the bottom of the upside-down library.
“I didn’t think I’d find anyone else down here,” she said, smoothing out her jacket. “Well, not anyone who was lucid and friendly.”
“So you’ve seen the specters, too?” Frost asked. She’d yet to put away her weapon, and her expression was carefully guarded.
“Oh, I have,” Violette said. She tucked her book under her arm so she could tighten the cloth tie of her ponytail. “Not the friendliest bunch. I ran from any I saw, once it was clear they would stop me from exploring.” She squinted at them. “I presume you two are a bit friendlier than the specters?”
“Just a bit,” Nick said, and he smiled wide. “I’m Nick, and the lady holding the sword is my friend Frost.”
“Nice to meet the both of you! Are you exploring the ruins, too?”
“In a way,” Nick said. He knew he should distrust a stranger they just met in such a bizarre location, but Violette’s personality was so bouncy, so happy, he could not help himself. “We’re looking for someone.”
“Someone?” The small woman gestured toward the pile of books. “Sorry, I don’t think you’ll be finding people down here, other than myself. What you will find, though, is an absolute treasure trove of information linked not just to the Sinifel Empire but all the way back to the original Majere…at least, it would be, if most of them weren’t filled with garbled, nonsensical lettering.”
Nick approached the pile and lifted one of the books, curious about what she meant. When he opened it, he immediately understood: The beige paper was wrinkled and stiff, and written on it were not shapes or letters, but vague, smeared approximations of writing. The resemblance struck Nick immediately. It looked like when a picture failed to load correctly when sent through the world gate’s information network, resulting in a distorted, low-resolution version of the original.
He flipped through several pages, found them all similarly garbled.
“A shame,” he told Violette, and tossed the worthless book back to the pile.
Were these even written by a person? he asked Cataloger silently. Or are they just approximations of books that exist here because this is a library?
This library dates back seven hundred and fifty-three years, founded in the third and final era of the Sinifel Empire—nothing in Yensere is approximate
Then what happened to these books?
They are damaged with age
Nick shook his head, not buying that answer. Paper and ink didn’t weather in such a way, their pages looking like he was viewing them through an improperly focused telescope. Just like the rest of the Swallowed City, it felt like this simulation of Yensere struggled to properly load or remember what had once been.
“We need out of here,” Frost told Nick while sliding her sword into its sheath. “At this point, I feel confident that my sister isn’t here. And she”—she paused to point at Violette—“clearly needs to be brought somewhere safe.”
“I can defend myself, I assure you,” Violette said. She tossed the last book onto the pile. “But regrettably I’ve found little worthwhile within these ruins and planned to leave anyway. I’d be thrilled to have your company during my exit.”
“Lovely,” Frost said, her sarcasm heavy enough to sink boats. “But that does beg a new question… Do you know a way out nearby? The layout of the city is…interesting, and the building we climbed is pretty far. I’m worried we’ll encounter more of those specters on the way.”
“I don’t think any direction we pick will be free of those things,” Violette said, brushing a bit of dust from her coat. “But I can show you how I got down. It’s not far and just requires a bit of stair climbing.”
The trio exited the library, and Violette took the lead as they traversed the eerily empty streets. She talked as they walked, the lowering of her voice the only hint of her acknowledgment of the dangerous environment.
“I’ve always been fascinated by the Majere,” she said. “The Sinifel are interesting, too, but their religion, art, and music carry too much nihilism for me to appreciate. But the Majere? People who could master death itself, and live on as skeletons, or even bone constructs? That’s who I want to learn more about. What kind of person does a human become if you live forever?”
“I imagine a very tired and cranky one,” Nick said, grinning at her.
“But what of the learning you could achieve?” Violette insisted. “You could perfect playing every instrument, write books, memorize poems…it doesn’t even need to be artistic. You could, I don’t know, become a master baker and make the most amazing cake Yensere has ever seen.”
“How does one benefit from a cake when you’re a walking skeleton?” Frost asked. “Or did they still have to eat? And how would that even work? I can’t imagine them still having tongues…”
Violette laughed as she leaped over a crack in the ground whose depths were so dark and endless Nick dared not stare down it for more than a second.
“I can sense you’re joking, but you’re asking legitimate questions whose answers I would burn down half the Silversong Sanctuary to learn.”
“What’s the Silversong Sanctuary?” Nick asked, but Violette did not answer.
Location: Silversong Sanctuary
Description: An academy located in the city of Malarus, dedicated to the study and preservation of significant historical events, along with a strong interest in the manifestations of and uses for magical spells, artifacts, and incantations
Thanks, Cataloger, Nick thought. But I was mostly trying to have small talk with someone I just met. You know. Get to know them better.
Does my sharing of information enable you to know me better?
More than you might believe.
Violette stopped before what appeared to be an enormous tower. Unlike most buildings they’d encountered, it was not upside down, which, as far as Nick was concerned, was a good sign. The problem was, a gaping maw of nothing surrounded its entrance.
“We’re here,” Violette said, winding around to where the ground had heaved unevenly, forming a sort of staircase of boulders and slabs toward the tower entrance. Nick followed, careful of his footing. At the top of the slabs, it was only a short hop to cross the empty gap to land on the steps of the tower. Nick went last, glad for Frost’s help to steady his landing.
“I hate this place,” he muttered, glancing at the abyss mere feet away.
“Feels like all of Yensere does, too,” Frost said, following Violette inside. Like most buildings, it was hollow and void of any sign of life. Along the side rotated a lengthy staircase reaching all the way to the top.
“Please be very careful,” Violette said as she led their climb.
The aged and brittle stones certainly inspired no confidence. Nick trailed behind the other two, wishing there was a guardrail of some sort. Instead he pressed his left hand to the wall as they climbed, ascending halfway before the trio came to a halt. Two of the steps were broken, the stone having fallen to the floor below. Violette bent her knees for her best standing high jump and then vaulted over the gap.
“Sorry, this was certainly easier coming down,” she said, spinning about with a flutter of her red coat. “Just be careful, and I’m sure you’ll both be fine.”
Once Violette made room by climbing higher, Frost leaped up and over, softly landing two steps beyond the gap. She then turned and frowned at Nick.
“Can you make that jump?” she asked.
Nick stood before the gap and made a show of being offended.
“I’ll have you know my jump skill is…” He paused for Cataloger to pull up his stats. “Uh. Six. That’s…that’s good, right?”
Frost grinned at him. “Do you want an honest answer, and do you want it before or after you make the jump?”
“Ignorance is bliss, Frost. How about never?”
“Never it is. But just in case, I’ll stay right here to catch you.”
Nick descended two steps, then turned about. He wanted a running start, not easy to do when climbing stairs. Still, that had to be better than nothing. Clapping his hands together to work up the nerve, he began his sprint.
On the second step, the entire stairway below him gave way in a great crumble of stone. His arms flailed, reaching for Frost’s extended hand, but he swiped only air. Frost’s voice chased after him as he dropped toward the tower floor.
“Nick!”
He cried out upon landing, a horrible blow to his knees. The pain, however, was only beginning. The entire floor immediately broke underneath him, and he screamed even louder as he slid along the surface, which pivoted sharply to a sudden angle. His sword slid from his grasp, bouncing and clattering behind him. He braced for impact, only the wall did not stop him. He burst on through as if it were paper, and then for one agonizing moment he saw only a great expanse of pure darkness. He flailed his arms and legs, his body pivoting as he fell.
And then he was fully upside down, and his fall slowed. The air felt cool around him as his stomach performed loops. Above was cavernous stone and a gray square that was the floor of the building he’d fallen through. Craning his neck, he saw a rooftop approaching. Much of it was glass, and he had no time to decide if that was good or bad before he smashed straight through. Shards rained down as his descent continued, those pieces landing before he did because they, unlike him, seemed to understand how gravity worked there.
Nick’s feet swung to right himself, he let out a gasp, and then he landed on his back amid the broken pieces.
That his back wasn’t broken was beyond his ability to fathom.
“What,” he said, sucking in air as if he’d just run down a flight of stairs, “was that?”
You descended
“That’s one way to put it, Cataloger…but it’d be more accurate to say I fell.”
He could almost feel Cataloger’s confusion as she tried to rework what happened into something she understood.
A fall is uncontrolled—yours was a controlled choice to delve deeper into the city
That was definitely not a choice Nick had made, but at least the strange geography of these overlapping cities had saved him from being thoroughly crushed upon landing. He stared up through the broken glass and saw welcoming sunlight streaming through, which of course made no sense, given that he was even deeper underground than he’d been before his fall.
“Where am I?” he muttered as he sat up. It felt like he’d gained a dozen new bruises, and his lower back ached from the motion.
Location:
Description: A city destroyed during ——— the former capital city of ——— ruins built over by the Alder Kingdom
Average level: 8
The building was massive, its rooftop coming together to form a triangular point at its high center. Much of its walls and roof were clear glass, clouded and cracked. Raised shelves surrounded him, some wood, some stone. What might have been plants were but powder atop long stretches of pale earth within pots and trays.
A greenhouse, perhaps? he wondered. Dusting himself off, he turned and froze at the sight of the decoration adorning the greenhouse center.
What is that?
Upon a raised dais, towering twice Nick’s height, loomed an enormous statue carved from bronze. The upper half appeared human, emaciated and with ribs poking out through its skin. Four arms stretched from its sides, none of them human, but instead ending with claws, pincers, and hooks. It bore no face, just a smooth oval surface. Horns stretched from its sides, sharp and curling. The monster’s legs, which were many, were curled and twisted underneath. Its body was bent low, and five men climbed atop it, stomping broken, twisted legs and grasping at wrists and horns. Their swords plunged into its sides, and though the statue bore no face, by the way the neck was tilted and the upper pair of arms flailed, there was no denying the monster endured great pain.
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Below the statue lay a desiccated corpse dressed in rusted mail—a dead knight. His arm was outstretched toward the statue, as if paying tribute to the statue even in death.
“Cataloger?” Nick whispered, the frightening sight taking away his ability to project.
This is a Sinifel statue depicting the god Eiman, whom they named the Beast of a Thousand Mouths
Movement behind him. Nick turned while instinctively reaching for his sword despite having lost it in the fall. The doors to the greenhouse were enormous, stretching all the way to a ceiling that was at least forty feet tall. The hinges were covered with rust, and the doors were cracked open. Through the gap, Nick saw a trio of men, though they did not appear to be the same ghostly soldiers as before. They were naked from the waist up, their bodies so skeletal that their pale trousers flapped loosely about their legs. Their hands dripped blood from where their fingernails were missing. Their chests pulsed from the visible movements of their hearts.
They had no eyes or noses, just circular mouths that stretched from the top of their foreheads to the lowest jut where their chins should be. Drool trickled down their necks. Massive lips parted, and within, where should have been teeth, were jagged pieces of broken glass, colored and stained as if stolen from a painting.
Archetype: Heretic (Eiman)
“Oh, that’s not right,” Nick muttered, his eyes widening at the sight. Even if killed, Nick knew he’d come back, but the thought of dying to those mouths tearing open his flesh chilled his blood. A sword. He didn’t have his sword. A
The dead knight! Nick turned back to the corpse before the altar. The armor might be rusted and too big for him, but what about a weapon? Nick sprinted to it as the three bizarre “heretics” entered the greenhouse, their mouths clicking and snapping. The sound of their “teeth” scraping against each other spiked uncomfortable shivers down Nick’s spine. The nearby corpse lay on his stomach, and Nick shoved him over to expose a face fully eaten away. The bones that remained were crunched inward in an unpleasant warning of what might yet await Nick.
To his relief, a sword was held firm in the man’s rigid gauntlet, and it seemed spared the rust of the armor. Its hilt was wrapped in soft black leather straps, and the blade itself was similarly dark, looking more like obsidian than steel. It somehow opened up just above the cross guard, swirling into multiple thick threads to leave a hollow gap within the center before merging back into the remainder of the blade. Faint runes were carved along one side, shimmering a faint red, and to his surprise, Cataloger did not translate them in his mind.
Item: Sorrow
Quality: Tier 15 (Unique)
Classification: Arcane Weapon
One of the four judgment blades of the Sinifel Empire, wielded by their notable heroes in their war against God-King Vaan in the twilight of their reign
Special Attribute:
The supposed strength of the weapon left Nick in shock. What did it even mean for a weapon to be tier 15? And why would some of the information not be available for things originating in Yensere? He pulled the weapon free from the corpse’s grasp and held it in his hand.
“What does this say?” he asked Cataloger, running his finger along the runes.
I cannot answer
“Why not?”
It would be too great an invasion of privacy
The answer made no sense, but Nick didn’t have time to question it. The heretics were too close. He could hear their shuffling. Turning about, he gripped the long hilt in both hands. If the math in his head was correct, a single slash was all it’d take to bring these horrific monsters down. He told himself to ignore the biting, the drool, and the clacking of their glass teeth.
One of the three stumbled ahead of the rest, and it reached out with its nubs of fingers, its entire non-face opening wide to expose dozens of colored glass teeth arranged in a circular pattern around a black gullet. Nick set his feet and swung as Frost had taught him, a wide slash from the lower right hip up to the left shoulder.
Blood spilled as Sorrow tore through the thing—yet it was far from what Nick expected, nor enough to down the monster in a single blow. The foul creature’s hands pressed against Nick’s face and neck, grabbing and scraping. The blood dripping from its fingers was cold, so cold. The gaping mouth neared.
Nick screamed his panic, but his movements continued. Hours upon hours of practice had taught Nick the stance he was to shift into after that initial hit, and he moved even as horror blanked his mind. His sword cut right, a perfectly horizontal slash straight through the neck. The obsidian blade cleaved the head from the monster’s body, which finally collapsed and lay still.
I don’t understand, he thought as he retreated several steps as the other two heretics approached. Why isn’t the sword hitting like it should?
Because I have not given you my power, pillager.
The voice was the opposite of all that was Cataloger. It was deep and unpleasant, speaking in his mind with an air of contempt. Nick stared at the blade as the red runes along its side briefly shimmered.
“Impossible,” he said, his mind breaking at the thought of the sword speaking. His understanding of Yensere and its limitations appeared to be painfully limited.
Deny it if you wish, pillager. I do not anticipate suffering with you for long.
Nick slashed at the reaching arm of the next heretic, severing it at the elbow. It howled, the scream coming out of that enormous mouth weak and shrill given the emaciated lungs trying to give it birth. Nick chopped straight at that mouth, cleaving its head in half with Sorrow’s sharp edge. He yanked it free of the gore, then plunged it into the chest of the third, whose teeth flexed and scraped with eager hunger as Sorrow’s tip punched straight through the heretic’s beating heart.
The strange thing collapsed, blood pooling underneath its body. A brief flash of the white bar, and he derived satisfaction in watching it fill toward another reassessment.
“That’s right, Nick,” he told himself as he pulled Sorrow free. “You can do this. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”
Except a painful death.
Nick glared at the blade.
Are you capable of hearing my every thought? he asked without speaking.
Sorrow is
I am.
Nick winced.
“Fantastic,” he said. “My mind’s getting more and more crowded.”
Something must fill the empty void.
Nick strode toward the broken doors of the greenhouse.
“Now, that’s just mean. Are you some sort of comedian?”
Sorrow’s answer rumbled heavy in his head.
I am one of the four judgment blades, imbued with the dying faith of the Sinifel, forged in fires of seething hate to destroy the false god-king seeking our ruination. No, I am not a…comedian.
He spoke the title as if it were painful to his tongue. Not that Sorrow had a tongue…nor was Nick sure that he should refer to the weapon as “he” given it was a sword, but the voice was deeply masculine.
In life, I was indeed a man.
Nick peered out the cracked door, and he rolled with the news the best he could.
“Of course you were once alive,” he whispered. “Why wouldn’t you be a former living being turn into a sentient weapon? Makes as much sense as anything else here.”
When Nick didn’t hear any nearby heretics, he stepped out into the “street” of the bizarre landscape.
Surrounding him was another city, the architecture less rigid and boxy than that of the one above. Rooftops bore gentle curls and tilts, and no door was perfectly center within the face of its home. The rooftops were of wood shingles, somehow still preserved, while the walls were carved of a yellow-brown stone Nick did not recognize. Little flourishes of spikes and rings marked the many corners and apexes of the rooftops. The city spread like a strip, east to west, and Nick could tell the direction because somehow a faint orb of yellow light hovered in the sky. A sun, where a sun should not be, because swallowing the entire city was a gigantic tunnel carved through dark black rock, its surface just barely hovering above the highest tips of the city’s homes.
“Where am I?” Nick asked, mesmerized by the sight. Cataloger’s explanation had been woefully lacking.
Abylon, Sorrow answered. Before it was destroyed, and Oeseli built in its ruins.
“It sure doesn’t look destroyed.”
While the other portions of the Swallowed City had been scraped raw of any signs of life, rendered void of color and decoration, the same could not be said for the gargantuan tunnel. Crimson curtains floated from windows. Doors bore spiraling designs of two colors, most often white paint mixed with a second, deeper color. Nick had to admit many were beautiful. Many crossroads were decorated with statues of men and women, some wearing armor, others lengthy dresses and strangely designed suits whose sleeves and coattails were unnaturally long and wide. When Nick glanced at the plaque of one nearby, he found only the same garbled, blurry nonsense that had been in the books in Violette’s library.
He spun in place, glancing down the empty streets. What had it been like when the city was alive, full of soldiers, traders, crafters, children, and the elderly?
Do not think on our children, pillager. Your god-king spilled enough of their blood to flood the rivers red.
“Whatever this Vaan is, he’s not my god-king,” Nick muttered, turning away from the statue. “And if you’re going to police my thoughts, you may soon find yourself abandoned to some forgotten sewer trench the moment I find a less cranky blade.”
Sorrow fell silent, for which Nick was thankful. He had larger worries to deal with. Two more heretics had stumbled out from one of the nearby homes, the painted door breaking at their emergence. Nick lifted the blade and planted his feet. The heretics showed little awareness or sense of tactics. So long as he kept a calm mind and steady hand and didn’t let them overwhelm him, he’d be fine. The first of the two stumbled within reach. Nick cut across its neck while retreating a step, the spilled blood a vibrant red as it poured forth. The heretic dropped, nearly dead already. Nick focused on the second, positioning his sword so the thing impaled itself during its charge. Sorrow sank into its chest up to the hilt, twice dealing its damage to the heretic to bring it low. Kicking the corpse off, Nick avoided a panicked swipe of a hand from the other, then smashed Sorrow down upon its skull. The heretic lay still.
“Not so hard,” Nick said, shaking a bit of gore off the blade.
Indeed, very impressive. Foes worldwide quiver in their boots at the thought of you.
“Must I deal with your sarcasm now?”
Would you prefer my honest opinions instead?
“I think I’d prefer silence.”
He continued wandering, which took him past what was once a garden. Vines circled the iron gate sealing over the entrance. Nick peered through the bars. A tiled path led through carefully organized clusters of flower beds and bushes. The nearest was full of red flowers resembling roses. Each and every flower bore the exact same shape and hue. Though no wind blew, they gently fluttered as the green of their stems flickered in and out of existence.
Nick tested the gate and found it locked. When his hand brushed one of the vines, it passed straight through as if it were a mirage. When he tested it again, trying to grab hold of one, the vines vanished completely, leaving only the rusted iron of the gates.
“Cataloger,” Nick whispered, “what just happened to the vines?”
I do not understand—there are no vines
“No…I guess there’s not.”
He continued onward, following a stone wall. It curled alongside the road, then sharply cut inward, leading to a second barred entrance into the garden. Just beyond towered a massive statue cut from white stone. Cracked paint and plaster covered its surface, adding a semblance of black armor and flowing red hair to the proud figure of a man standing atop a pedestal. His fist was raised to the heavens, and his face cast to the floor.
“Who is that?” Nick asked. He disliked the idea of entering the garden, nor did he trust the plaque underneath the statue to be legible.
Gothwyr, Sorrow answered. Our final emperor, who gave his life in battle against Vaan and his Five Harbingers.
Nick wished he had an idea of what was going on. Had the Artifact simply made an error and layered multiple cities upon one location? Perhaps it had botched timelines, thinking destroyed ones still existed? Whatever this was, it could not be. No sun should shine this deep underground, in a city beneath a city.
“Do you know any way out of here?” Nick asked as he walked. “I’m taking suggestions from either of you, by the way.”
I do not.
Analyzing this terrain is proving difficult
“Fantastic,” he muttered. “I guess we wander and hope for the best. That, or Frost and Violette find a way in.”
Another heretic, climbing out a window. Nick approached and jammed Sorrow through its head while it still lay on its stomach from the fall. One forceful hit was enough. As he pulled his sword free, he heard a distant rumble, like shaking rock.
“What is that?” he asked.
Find out yourself, pillager.
Another rumble, then silence. The hairs on Nick’s arms and neck stood up at the sound. Cataloger had listed the area as an average level of 8, yet so far he’d fought only level 4s. Given her smug crack about how averages worked, Nick disliked the idea of what might be causing the sound of those very big, very heavy footsteps in the distance. Standing out in the open felt like being a rabbit in a flat field. He hurried along, and when he saw a heretic wander out from an alley, he ignored it and kept going. He didn’t want to stop, didn’t want to fight. He saw another heretic push out from the door of a dilapidated shop, and a third out a window.
Damn it, he thought, holding his ground and turning. He couldn’t let them chase him. They were easy to handle for now, but if they gathered into a swarm…
Feet set, Sorrow ready, he cut them down one by one. There was something satisfying in the act, to swing his sword, see the damage spray out in white or red, and then witness the steady growth in his experience bar. It almost made up for having to witness their terrifying mouths and hear the clatter of their glass teeth.
“Three down,” he said, glancing about the city. “Unknown many more to go.”
Deciding wandering was more likely to get him killed than help him find a way out, he instead tried to think logically. Frost and Violette were certainly looking for him. If so, where would they go?
“To where they think I would go,” he said. “And where would I go? To the biggest, flashiest building around. That makes sense, right?”
Uncertain
Are you asking me?
“Fantastic, this is all perfectly normal,” Nick said, holding back a sigh. “But if I’m right, then that temple there makes the most sense.”
The building was slightly elevated above the rest of the city with dozens of steps, as if built on a man-made hill. Nick sneaked past two more heretic creatures, then began his ascent, his eye on the grand doors. They were currently closed, their surface painted all in red but for a multitude of hands drawn in black rising from the bottom of the doors toward an unseen sky.
These steps, Sorrow said. It is painful to look upon them once more. Take me elsewhere, pillager.
“Try asking nicely next time,” Nick said. When he pulled on a door handle, it thankfully opened, though he was less thankful for its loud, creaking groan. “We’re going in.”
After so much destruction and death, Nick was shocked by the sudden beauty of the building within. The stone pillars holding the roof aloft were carved into mesmerizing swirls. The floor was built of red-and-black stone, arranged into patterns that shifted and ebbed like waves upon an ocean. Tattered white curtains hung over oval windows, their binding threads sewn with silver. Every wall was painted top to bottom with frozen moments in time. The nearest scenes were of pastoral fields of wheat and the familiar mountains he’d seen west of Meadowtint. The closer to the front, the more they darkened, the sky turning red and the ground blackening.
“This must have taken years to build,” Nick said, mesmerized by the sight. “It’s beautiful.”
It was my place of worship, Sorrow said, and there was no hiding his grief. Once. But yes, it is beautiful. We made it so, with our prayers, our sweat, and our faith.
There was no furniture, no chairs or benches, just an empty floor. Nick walked across it, his footfalls echoing in the somber silence. His gaze locked between two separate stairs leading higher up into the temple, to a painted mural filling the entire wall. Along the bottom was what he suspected to be Abylon, only properly set aboveground and wrapped with a crenelated wall. The yellow sun had set, though the black sun remained high in the sky above the city. Its size was dramatically wider than he’d ever seen before, and dramatic blue fire rippled about its edges.
From within the black sun emerged endless monsters. They flew on wings, some feathered, some furred, and some insectoid. Each one appeared to be an amalgamation of an existing creature, only grotesque and enlarged. They flowed as a tremendous stream to the city, whose citizens fled in despair. Many were depicted being torn apart, and others, eaten. All the while, the city burned.
“What is this?” Nick whispered, both entranced and horrified.
The needed cataclysm, Sorrow answered. The cleansing that must be made true lest we suffer Eiman’s wrath.
“You sacrificed yourselves?”
You err in calling it a sacrifice. Is it a sacrifice when snow melts beneath the sun? We beheld the way of the world, that only a fool would deny.
Before Nick could answer, the ground shook underneath his feet from another rumble. He grabbed Sorrow’s hilt, his eyes widening as he looked about. That was much too close for comfort. What could be—
And then the back wall exploded inward, bricks flying amid the dust and clatter as the gargantuan monster emerged.