The Lighthouse is largest cube, sized large enough for the Lightkeeper to enter and actually control the Lightcubes and others. It's like a 3D interface inside, but with magic
Open screens, move them around, send orders to lightcubes, the works.
(Caerwyn: Edit your HP to 25 and Swiftness to1, since that's how many they buy with 5 points each. You -are- in. Here's a list.)
Caellath, Spinal_Taper, Tiruin, Caerwyn, wolfchild.
I think that makes 5. I don't know if all of the classes are here, though. We have two Warders, and ... we're missing a Searcher.
Q: Why can't we become 0-certified Pathfinders?
"
Well, for one, Pathfinders can't be just Pathfinders. They have to have training in other positions, usually Lightkeeper or Searcher, before they can handle being a Pathfinder. I'm a Lightkeeper, by the way. Also, Pathfinding is a pretty boring job, and you hot-blooded younglings probably won't like it."
He chuckles.
Q: Health potions?
He shrugs. "
Don't look at me, I don't go anywhere near the apothecaries."
"
Okay, if everyone's ready, all aboard the Void express!"
Parker waves towards the ugly box and gets on himself.
....
The delvecart slowly drifts along the yellow line leading out of its berth, then joins more yellow lines, gets into a long line of other delvecarts, some large, and some small; the queue inches forward until the delvecart the team is in is at the front. Some men exchange signals with flags, then scurry off to a side. The platform starts to descend.
The crosshatched steel lift shudders down the shaft, sometimes revealing lit but abandoned caves, sometimes showing rusted metal, sometimes rough rock. The monotonous grinding fills the air. Every once in a while there is a old-fashioned lantern fixed to a girder, which have guts of cutting edge magitech, keeping up a wan light that banishes darkness but doesn't quite introduce light to the sides of the vertical tunnel. Though the lift often shudders as it meets a rivet or a seam, the slight suspension of the delvecart above the surface prevents most of the shock from being passed on. The bore is said to lead more than a thousand feet into the ground, passing through strata innumerable and through eons of ages of geology. The magnificent
terra firma of the old earth passes through the hole, or rather the hole passes through the layers upon layers of natural history. The Light wasn't destructive, then, but no-one alive now still remembers that time, except some of the oldest Delvers. Strangely, working in the Void and other worlds makes the people who did age slower. It is not known why.
Eventually, a brilliant deep blue starts to light up the shaftit is the Void, lit up by an endless eternal blue. The platform meets the end of the lift's rails and halts. It then slowly tips over, letting the delvecart slide off and into the Void. As the team falls, someone looking out the rear window would see the platform right itself and start its retreat up the rails.
The Pathfinder stands at the controls and concentrates, then throws a huge lever. The delvecart stops falling with a clang, then rolls along like it is on a solid road. Where there was nothing but more eye-blinding blue before, a small vertical line of navy appears, widens and engulfs the cart. The light goes away like someone threw a switch to shut off a Lightcube.
World 17-flat"
Well, we're here. Before getting off, I'd advise the Lightkeeper to enter his House and turn on a few Lightcubes. The dark bites.
"In case you have more questions, just ask me as you go. I'm also a Lightkeeper, like I said, so I'll be eavesdropping on communications and generally be ready to react. I have to send a Cube after Joker, anyway. Remember once more: both Extractors and Searchers can find ore and float stone, but the Searcher does so from further away with Searcheyes. Aaaand, go."
A pale grey Lightcube pops into vision above Joker and clicks on, giving him a white halo and shadowing his features in an interesting way. He grins and looks ready to slip out after the others.
Parker maximizes his Lighthouse and steps inside.
The dark cave outside is damp and chilly, and no wind blows. If one would step out onto the ground, they would feel something splash.
Currently, there are no lights at all outside.
Author
Topic: Delvers The First Mission (Read 12000 times)