Idols of a Lost World

Ignatius, Ozyrus, and Siegmund stepped onto the magic circle and warped into Brightlord Temporix's domain.

Rather, they warped into the space within the Eternal Tower which he had claimed and carved out for himself.

The pocket dimension was large by the standards of mortals. It was a section of river valley a thousand kilometers long and five hundred kilometers wide, with sparkling blue waters at the bottom of a vast canyon.

Lush greenery grew up above on the crest of the gorge, and its walls were covered in what looked like shimmering sheets of crystal from a distance. Up close, the sparkles were revealed to be swarms of tiny worms, the largest of which was barely the size of a grain of rice.

These were the progenitors of Brightlord Temporix himself, the spontaneous evolution of alien bacteria which had arrived on the planet thousands of years beforehand via a meteor…

…and which had fed on the radiant Immortal energy which lurked beneath the surface of the planet itself at that place until, billions of generations after the first of these bacteria had begun to feast, a child was born to their species with the capacity to think.

This child had devoured his unthinking siblings, absorbing their power, and began to grow larger and larger. He shone more brightly than the moon as he fed for over a decade, first on the lesser worms, and then on huge chunks of radiant rock which he tore from the ground with ever-larger talons.

As he grew, the creature shed his skins in the manner of a lizard. These skins contained no Immortal light, but nonetheless still had a vital force attached to them. Over a span of about a hundred years each, these shed skins regenerated into the first dragons of the world, each flying far away from the creature which had spawned them.

Then, at some point, the shining dragon who had once been a miniscule worm's store of energy grew too massive for biological flesh to sustain him. His flesh dripped back into the ground as liquid light, leaving only a living skeleton of gleaming crystal behind.

This was that Ignatius, or any other player, knew about Brightlord Temporix's origins. This had all been recorded on bits of lore which were mostly taken from this story mission itself, written down by the tribes which had worshiped their living, always-feeding light god for an unknowably long span of time.

Exactly how Temporix had come into contact with the other Brightlords had still been a mystery nine years into Path of the Immortal's existence. In addition, the exact location of the place on the planet where Temporix had grown up was also a mystery.

Everyone agreed that the gorge with the countless shining worms on its walls likely no longer existed in the current timeline of the game. Temporix had surely created a replica of it as his pocket dimension in order to revisit a time and place that had been lost long ago.

And because Path of the Immortal was an MMO, everyone likewise assumed that every detail of the pocket dimension was a clue that they could follow. If Temporix's energy-filled flesh had dripped back into the ground, replenishing the stores of power which he had devoured from the stones themselves, then that power could surely be claimed by whichever players found it!

Everyone had believed this would be the key to gaining enough power to reach Floor 100 of the Eternal Tower itself.

Well…

Someone 'had' reached Floor 100 in Ignatius's original life.

As best as he knew, finding the current location of Brightlord Temporix's birthplace had nothing to do with it.

Regardless, when the two players and Siegmund were transported onto this special floor, they found themselves ankle-deep in the coldest water imaginable. It was a biting pain that felt as though it crawled up the veins and bones of the legs… and it gave a 20% speed penalty for everyone who stood in it.

Ignatius pointed this out, and all three of them stepped carefully out of the water and onto the gravel bank on one side of the river.

"Well?" Ozyrus asked, looking around. "Where are these four guardians you spoke of?"

Ignatius turned and studied the landmarks of the place they'd been dropped into the gorge. Though the geography of this level was always the same, each party who spawned into it was placed in a semi-random position along the riverbed.

Not too far away, thankfully. It was impossible to be spawned in so far away that the party's Hunger Clocks would be wasted simply by running down the riverbed.

No. The purpose of the randomization was simply disorientation, and that meant nothing to someone with Ignatius's experience.

"In the jungle at the top of the gorge," he said, "is the remnant of a temple created by a long-dead tribe that used to worship Brightlord Temporix. He's placed one of his rib bones in the heart of this temple, using it as a dimensional anchor to allow him a tiny amount of control over the Eternal Tower."

Ozyrus remained still and silent. He'd already made it clear that he cared little for the lore of the game.

Ignatius smirked. "Alright, I'll skip the story details. There are four idols in the temple, one representing a different facet of Temporix's power: the bat, for his wings. The crocodile, for his jaws. The cobra, for his tail. The tiger, for his claws."

He held up four fingers. "The order we kill them in is important, because once the third idol dies, Temporix will spawn in. He'll eat the remaining idol, powering up the associated body part. If we had more people, we could try to leave two of them with just a sliver of health and then kill them at the same time. This would skip the power-up phase and make Temporix himself a lot easier."

"But you predict that will be impossible for us," Ozyrus said. It wasn't a question.

"Exactly," said Ignatius. "I suggest we leave the cobra—the tail—for last. That will power up his melee AoE attacks. Siegmund will surely die very quickly, and Temporix will hardly ever use his tail swipes when there are only two of us here. The alternatives would make for a much harder fight."

Ozyrus grunted in acknowledgement. "I'll follow your lead to the temple, then."

They climbed the side of the gorge, which was a fairly tricky process. From that point, Ignatius knew exactly where they'd find the temple, and he led them swiftly toward it, avoiding the locations of various traps and packs of vicious wildlife which he'd long since memorized.

Finally, through the thick jungle trees, the small temple of the idols was visible ahead. "This will be a bit tricky," said Ignatius in a low voice. "If we go inside and touch the rib in the heart of the temple, all of them will wake up and attack. The same goes for if we attack one of them while inside the temple. But if we stand far enough away and hit one of them with a ranged attack, only that one will wake up and come looking for us."

He glanced at Siegmund. "Would you do the honors?"

The Onion Knight gave a swaggering salute. "Anything for you, my friend."

He stooped and picked up a handful of rocks, then trudged through the jungle and to the entrance of the temple.

A few moments later, his voice called out in triumph, "I got him, the villainous bugger! Oh, he's a quick one…"

Siegmund's severed head flew through the air and came to a rolling stop in front of Ignatius's feet. A moment later, a tiger made of living stone with burning red eyes stalked through the jungle into the clearing where the players were standing.

It gave a roar which sounded like an avalanche of stone, then pounced!

Ignatius simply raised his super-powered gauntlets and began the fight.