Summoned A Hundred Years Too Late

When the world reassembled around them, Alexandra, Willow, and Kam immediately understood why the Gray Basin was called that. They appeared alone in the middle of a clearing. Not the clearing of a forest, surrounded by trees and vegetation, but a clearing in a sea of stone.

Gray rocks dotted the landscape, as if a storm had rained meteors down on the basin.

Without a word, Kam climbed up the nearest rock to get a better view of their surroundings.

“Hills,” he said. “Rocks everywhere.”

Alexandra and Willow looked at each other.

“Do you feel it?” Willow asked.

Alexandra nodded. “The ambient mana is different.”

But now wasn’t the time for studies. After Kam confirmed that their immediate surroundings were safe, Alexandra put her pack down and summoned her journal.

Daily quests summary: Three Quests Completed -> +30 exp, +1 STR, +1 DEX, +1 CON

Daily Quest Streak: 96 -> 99

Manyfold Style 7 -> 13

Basic Enchantment 7 -> 10

Basic Hygiene 4 -> 5

Light 2 -> 7

That was the extent of her progress in the past two weeks. She’d been really focused on grinding contribution points, to the extent that she was getting close to being able to afford an uncommon skill.

Still, with Manyfold Style running out and losing access to the Troll Cave, she was worried about her progress slowing down.

It was morning, so a new daily quest had appeared. Alexandra set it aside and turned the pages of her journal to the contribution point shop.

Contribution Points: 30,074

She was about to set her uncommon skill purchase back, but she already knew she needed the skill, so she purchased Stasis Core Seal.

Contribution Points: 30,074 -> 25,074

Feeling the sting in her point stash, Alexandra winced. She wasn’t sure if saving up for an uncommon skill was worth it. After all, she could buy ten common skills instead. But she couldn’t know for sure until she browsed the uncommon shop, so she had to be patient.

Next, she read her daily quest.

Quest Journal

Daily Reset: 06:00 | Streak: 99 Days | 5% All Stats, 5% Skill experience

Next Milestone: 100 Days

Daily Quests:

Find a settlement (0/1)She frowned.

“What is it?” Willow asked.

“Find a settlement,” Alexandra answered.

“That’s fine, isn’t it? We were going to do that.”

Alexandra closed her journal and put it away.

“It’s not the quest. My streak is going to reach 100 today.”

“And that’s bad because…”

Alexandra shook her head. “It’s not bad. I’m happy. It’s just that with the milestone, my skills are going to level up faster again.”

She took a deep breath. It would lose her a few contribution points, but she wasn’t going to interrupt her streak for that.

“We should get going,” she said.

“You’re forgetting something,” Kam said from atop his rock.

Alexandra looked up.

“Your hair,” the boy added.

“Right.”

A few minutes later, Alexandra was sitting on a rock, looking at her nine fingers while Willow applied the dye to her hair. While she was under no illusion that agents of the orders would find her eventually, she was determined to make a good first impression with the locals.

It took half an hour to apply the dye.

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“Done,” Willow said. “It… doesn’t match your Bronze robes.”

“Uh?” Alexandra grabbed a strand of hair and pulled it in front of her eyes. “Why is it blue!?”

“It’s hair dye,” Willow said. “Of course it’s blue.”

“But…” Alexandra lowered her head, which had the effect of pushing more hair into her field of view. “Why not black? Or brown? I’d even take a blond.”

Willow scratched her cheek, spreading the remaining blue pigments on her skin. “Ah, shit. Erm, I don’t know what to tell you. Hair dye is blue here.”

The three of them changed from their robes into trousers and shirts that made them look like regular travelers.

“Which way should we go?” Willow asked.

Alexandra looked at Kam, who’d come down from his rock. “Any clue from up there?”

The boy shook his head.

“Let me check.” Alexandra jumped on the rock.

All she could see were rock-dotted hills with a few trees growing here and there. Tall yellow grass sometimes peeked from beneath the stones.

Her perception had reached 70. She should be able to find something.

Nothing. Just stone and grass and the wind pushing through both.

Alexandra closed her eyes. Perception wasn’t the only tool she had. She sifted through her list until she landed on the one she hadn’t touched in weeks.

Tracking – Common

Helps you identify and follow trails of living creatures

Each level increases detail detection.

Humans were living creatures, and sure enough, she spotted a few old tracks at the edge of the clearing.

“This way,” she said, jumping down from the rock.

The terrain was hard to walk on. Rocks slipped under their feet, and they almost fell multiple times.

“This place is desolate,” Willow said, following right behind Alexandra.

“It’s a good thing we have water and food with us. I don’t know how long it will take us to find people.” She looked back. “Kam, you’re good?”

The boy nodded.

“It’s a bit cold,” Willow said. “Colder than Kator.”

“At least it’s not raining,” Alexandra answered, feeling solar energy permeate through her skin.

Alexandra’s boot dislodged a stone. It rolled, but not where she expected.

She looked down.

”Willow.”

”I see it.”

The stone kept moving, as if it were alive. Kam had already stopped walking.

”It’s not just there,” he said. ”Under us, too. Small movements. Everywhere.”

Alexandra went still and let her eyes drift across the landscape. Three more skipping stones, all moving in the same direction. She’d walked past a dozen of these without seeing them for what they were.

”What is it?” she asked.

”Don’t know,” Willow said. “We’re about to find out.”

The ground rose just ahead of her feet before she could step back.

Gravel fell in sheets as the shape hauled itself upright, a boulder the size of a cart unfolding four thick limbs like a spider standing for the first time, each leg ending in a slab of stone instead of a foot. No head. Just more rock, veined with thin lines of dull silver light.

Alexandra looked at the spear on her back, then at the sword on her belt. “I should have taken a mace.”

“That thing’s Silver,” Willow shouted, already moving.

“Can you fight?” Alexandra asked Kam.

The boy shook his head. “Not a Silver.”

“Then fall back.” Alexandra grabbed her spear and started running toward the beast. It was completely made of stone. She wasn’t sure if her weapon would do anything, but she and Willow had to attract its attention away from Kam.

The creature’s leg came down where she’d stood a half-second before, and stone cratered where her boot print had been.

Alexandra drove the spear into the gap between two plates on its foreleg. The tip skidded, caught, then snapped clean off, leaving six inches of shaft buried uselessly in rock.

”Fuck. Spear’s out,” she called.

Willow, armed with a sword, found the same seam a moment later and did no better, bouncing off with a crack that jarred up her arm to the shoulder. She swore and backpedaled as the second foreleg swept horizontally, the blow close enough to clip her hair.

Alexandra dropped the broken spear and drew her sword, circling wide, looking for anything that wasn’t solid stone. The silver veins pulsed brighter each time the creature moved, brightest along a line at the base of its foremost leg. She aimed there. The blade rang off without biting a fraction of an inch.

”Nothing’s soft,” she said.

”Noticed,” Willow answered.

The beast turned, slab-foot arcing toward Alexandra’s ribs. She got her sword up in time to deflect the angle rather than the force, and the impact still threw her sideways into the gravel, elbow first. Pain lanced up to her shoulder.

”Alex!”

”Up.” She was already pushing herself onto one knee when the ground behind her buckled. She threw herself forward, avoiding a boulder tipping toward her. “It’s moving stones underground!” Alexandra repositioned and tried feeling the beast’s mana. It was moving along the silver veins, pumping from the ground.

“Can you cover me?” Willow called. “I have a spell to try.”

Alexandra grunted and hit the beast’s leg with her sword. With no head, she wasn’t sure how she was supposed to provoke it. The stone leg swung again, and Alexandra avoided it.

”Now, Willow!”

Willow’s hands were already moving, angling toward the beast, and the space between her palms collapsed into a point of white-hot pressure.

”Down!”

Alexandra dropped flat.

The bolt cracked past her and hit the beast square in the chest. For a moment, the silver veins running through its body went dark all at once, plating cracking along a dozen fault lines like ice under a hammer. The creature staggered, one leg buckling.

Then the veins flared back to brightness, brighter than before. The cracks sealed themselves shut, gravel and dust drawn back into the fractures like water into a sponge.

”That’s not enough,” Willow said, breathing hard. ”It’s healing off the ground.”

”Then don’t let it touch the ground.”

”It’s made of the ground, Alex.”

The rocky monster found its balance and turned toward Willow, silver light pulsing faster now, agitated.

Something behind them caught Alexandra’s attention. She turned around just in time to see one of the skipping stones hit Kam on the back of the skull.

She dashed toward him. “Kam! It’s controlling the stones.”

But the beast was faster and slammed a stone leg in her path.