“You’re really good at solving puzzles, Nitana.” I nodded approvingly as we pushed the last piece of rubble in place, reforming a broken stone seal. It depicted a serpentine creature with four wings.

After we finished the picture, the floor rumbled, and the seal descended into the floor, revealing a ramp. Nitana was already walking toward it before the quaking stopped. She beckoned at me as her fairies flew down to light the way. “Let’s go. Just a few more and some fighting, then it’s pretty much straightforward ‘til the exit.”

“It’s great that you’re here,” I said, following her. Wouldn’t hurt to show some appreciation—my payment for her help. A very hefty payment was the praise of Herald Stone. “I would’ve spent… maybe an hour trying to solve this alone.”

Likely more, if truth be told.

But I didn’t want to tell.

It was a complicated puzzle involving rotating pieces and decoys from other seals in the chamber meant to mislead players. If Nitana weren’t here, I’d look for a guide online instead of trying to solve it myself. There should be one, as all Mardukryons had to do this quest to reach the other side of the cliff walls and progress their respective main quests.

Always take the shorter and easier way.

Unless the longer and harder way would generate bragging rights.

But even with a guide, figuring this out might still take time. Worse, if the guide provided the wrong information. Back in the day, I had encountered supposedly experienced gamers making guides full of spoiled meatballs. This issue with self-proclaimed experts wasn’t isolated to RPGs. When I started to self-study about business and investment, there were plenty of financial gurus on the internet with horrible pieces of advice.

It was better to have Nitana along even if I’d share Essence and Gli from quest rewards with her.

We trotted through a tunnel carved by ancient Mardukryons. It had smooth walls and a uniformly arching ceiling, with relief carvings of seemingly historical scenes interspersed along its length. According to an NPC that pointed me here—this path only opened after finding him in the village, and he freaking transferred location after the world quest—a Mardukryon tribe that had perished long before the Great Quake built this network. Some say their entire town was swallowed from below by the Mountain Guardian. The hole the Mountain Guardian left behind might provide clues to escaping this mountain, but it was unfortunately out of reach of players for now.

Nitana handled the puzzles hindering my path, including a difficult question posed by a talking statue. It wasn’t exactly a riddle like those that went, ‘Who is a dick and an asshole at the same time?’ The answer is Luds.

This was much harder, a trick question that required listening skills and attentiveness to the storyline. I had talked to a dozen NPCs in the course of this quest but paid only half attention, maybe less than that, when they doled out exposition. I wasn’t a lore kind of guy, even back in my Nornyr online days.

Fortunately, Nitana remembered the answer from when she had done this. Having help from friends who had already completed a quest I was doing was godsent. Me-sent.

Not only did they know what to do, but I also got DPS buddies on call. It reminded me of when I’d wait at Vanguard Gaming for my friends to arrive so I could do a particular quest that was a slog for a solo tank.

Though my teammates were willing to help me, the whole party didn’t need to come. It was better for only one to join my separate party so the Essence and Gli rewards wouldn’t get divided too much. At most, it’d get halved. And the rest of my teammates could continue practicing with Blighted Great Hunt monsters and farming Blighted Tokens.

Chief Nogras announced a one-day mop-up operation to ensure the tunnels were truly cleansed. I took that to mean that the Blighted missions would continue until the morrow. I should check the event shop to see if there were anything else I could get.

I did the first few parts of the chain quest to reach the other side of the cliff walls on my own to solo the Essence and Gli. When I reached the boss golem, I asked Paritor to join me to kill it quickly. I bet I could do it on my own, tanking while poison DoT did its job, but I let Paritor have his limelight.

And also to get closer to him. My Aritu Form Ocadule was about to level up, and it might be a good time to talk about the Big M.

“So, it was the grandfather of Okarlon who left it here?” I looked over my shoulder as we walked away from the Spirit Carved statue that somehow gained sentience after a few centuries. “Good thing you’re with me, Nitana, or I would’ve been stumped.”

It had blocked our path and would allow passage only if we could find the Mardukryon who created it. Nitana told the statue that its crafter had died long ago. I wouldn’t have guessed it because the statue itself hadn’t realized three hundred years had passed since it was left behind. I assumed one of the villagers I had talked to was its creator; I didn’t expect the correct answer to be a long-dead guy, only mentioned in a couple of throwaway lines by a blacksmith NPC.

“Yep, his grandpa,” replied Nitana. “If we had visited Okarlon’s house, we would’ve found more clues there.”

“Too bad for the statue, then. It was expecting its creator to retrieve it. Should we take it back to Kurghal village? It’s too heavy, but if there’s some way to put it in inventory or—"

“Don’t bother. The next time you pass this way, you’ll find the statue just a pile of rocks.”

“What’ll happen? Is someone going to destroy it?”

“Nope. It wants to find the soul of its maker or something, so it’ll decide to escape its stone body. Without the energy or whatever inside, the statue crumbles away.”

“It can do that? Will it be okay?”

“The living thingy inside there can really leave the statue. It did in my case and will do in yours. But I don’t know where it went or if it can survive outside its body. Probably not.”

I blinked, processing the story. “If not, the statue is forever dead… along with its owner.”

RPGs sometimes had these dark tales tucked in their lore, waiting to be discovered by those who bothered reading or listening to the dialogue. But most people, including me, wouldn’t even realize things like that. Perhaps I should pay more attention to other things—I only cared about important matters, such as the quests of Mehubanarath and Gula.

Perhaps the world would be a better place if people cared more about each other—the words of Herald Stone. Amen.

“It’s pretty sad,” Nitana said, her words not matching her usual bored drawl. “But maker and creation are reunited in virtual world heaven, so it’s also a happy ending.” She snorted. “Ugh, I sound like Megan.”

Fifteen minutes later, Nitana was done with her role as my tour guide and puzzle solver, and we surfaced to the ‘lobby’ of the tunnel system. Kezo and the rest of our party emerged from a different tunnel. Excellent timing. Megan galloped to Nitana with open arms as if they hadn’t seen each other in ages.

“How did it go?” Megan asked as Nitana shoved her away. “Did you complete the brainy puzzley-puzzles part of the tunnel quest?

“No, we failed,” Nitana answered, completely deadpan.

“What!” exclaimed Megan. She looked at me. “How did that happen? Did the world quest change the—?”

“We finished the puzzles,” I said. “There were some changes because of the world quest, but not a big deal. Nitana’s just pulling your leg.”

“You liar!” Megan dramatically said to Nitana, bringing out a wand for poking. “And don’t you mean pulling my hoof?”

Nitana rolled all her four eyes. “Oh, come on. Don’t turn stuff into horse puns.”

“Mardukryons are half-bulls, cows, bovine-whatever,” insisted Megan.

They continued with their banter as our party chuckled. It seemed fitting to have a laugh track for their antics. Two demon bull-centaurs bickering about puns and play-fencing with a wand and staff seemed a good pitch for a sitcom.

“Up next will be the Maggroth-infested caves,” Kezo loudly said to me over Megan’s and Nitana’s voices. “You’ll search for the crystals shards swallowed by Maggroths. Keys, really, to open the final door.”

Megan whined, “God, I hate those giant worms.” She stopped trying to poke Nitana. “Different kinds of them too. Just run, run, run for that part, Herald, until you find the specific ones you have to kill. Not hard to find. They look way, way, more gross than the other worms because the keys mutated them.”

“Get their dropped crystal keys and scram,” added Nitana.

“I know you can do it on your own, Herald,” said Kezo, gifting me two thumbs up. “As a tank, you won’t have any problem surviving while looking for the keys. The adult Maggroths are around your level. The highest is thirty-two, if I’m not mistaken, the Copper-Headed Maggroth. It’ll be a literal stroll in the park for you. Stroll in the cave. More importantly, you’re capable of killing the key-eating Maggroth despite being a tank.”

“Unlike me,” grumbled Melonomi. “I had to ask for a DPS carry. I had just reached level thirty when I tried to do it solo, bonking the worms with a mace while downing potion after potion because they were all attacking me. I wasted tons of bottles only to fail.”

“If I were there,” said Paritor, “I would’ve aided you.”

“Maybe if I invent a time machine,” she replied with a raised brow, “I’ll tell you to come along.”

“I-I can help you ma-make a time machine too,” Paritor hesitantly quipped.

Melonomi’s chuckles stopped it from reaching awkward territory.

“Can I kill the Maggroths?” I wondered, shifting the attention back to me, where it should be. I had reached level twenty-seven while doing the puzzles with Nitana—their Essence rewards were substantial. “I’m rushing to level thirty with the Great Hunt starting, and I’m thinking of power-leveling off them since that place will be densely packed with enemies.”

“The Maggroths are numerous,” Paritor said. “It might prove a difficult endeavor.”

“For Herald? Nah,” said Nitana. “Knowing him, he’ll figure out how to do it.” Surprising that she raised my banner. Heavens would indeed bless her and generations of her blood. She turned to Kezo, asking, “It’s not like they infinitely spawn, do they?”

Kezo shook his head. “When my party did that quest, those we killed didn’t return. But there are many of them like Paritor said, and they fill more than a dozen caves. You don’t have to kill all. I can give you a map of where to go and—”

“I’ll try killing all of them,” I said. “Can’t let the Essence and Gli without level gap penalty go to waste. It might not be fast, but I can do it with DoTs and retribution. Are you guys fine waiting for me another hour?”