~~~

  Sidney was, well, getting pretty nervous actually. After defeating the world boss his team had split up. Ella and Braid had decided that they’d actually get to marrying and settling down together. As their leader, he offered congratulations and enough money to travel just about anywhere away from this continent to properly settle down.

  Saintess Bethany had surprisingly decided to follow him. He told her about his strange new title ‘player in a bigger game’ and what it said and she’d just nodded and asked where they should go first. He didn’t let it reach his face, but he was all smiles on the inside back then.

  They’d decided to ask around for any strange happenings on the continent. Sidney had gone from pub to pub, mostly just been retold about the massive timburn in more and more dramatized retellings. Bethany however, had more long reaching contacts centralized from the church. There had been murmurings and whispers about the insectoid colonies up in the mountain range acting strangely.

  Usually, just hearing about colonies in the mountain range would be suspicious since the insectoids were known to be weak to extreme temperatures. Doubly so when it’s well known that most of the mountain range is wild dragon territory. But this was Dochna, the continent of the strong, the colonies had reportedly aspected heavily into the elemental extreme affinities. Nowhere else in the world would you find beings like the ‘hellfire antkin’ or ‘glacier mantisoids.’

  With no other current leads, the two decided to gear up for extreme weather and expedition in that direction. They had thought about recruiting some new team members first, but decided they didn’t have the time or trust to get anyone new on their team at the moment.

  And so, they purchased a lycizard, a cow sized salamander with wolf ears and fur covering most of its body, saddled it up with necessities and trekked up the nearest mountain to talk directly to one of the insectoid colonies.

  Their first mountain ended up hosting some rather placid and easy-going ‘permafrost beetlekin’ who informed them that they’d heard distantly of strange goings-on about three or four mountains up the chain.

  Now with a more directed heading, Bethany and Sidney opted to descend back down the mountain and go along the base of the mountains, passing through small towns and villages to hopefully gather just a bit more information.

  On an off note, they’d gotten attached to the lycizard at this point and named it ‘Willy’.

  Sidney had known Saintess Bethany for about three years at that point, slightly less than the other two recently departed teammates, but enough that he’d thought he knew her quite well. He was thus surprised when the portly holy woman had started to behave much more casually than ever before now that it was just the two of them. She had always portrayed the image of the motherly patron of their adventuring party up to that point, but now she had become much more brisk and blunt with him.

  Honestly? Sidney liked her like this much more. He’d always preferred a woman with a real ‘snap’ to her vibe.

  ~~~

  They headed up what they thought was the correct mountain and searched for a colony, finding a colony of ‘magma licekin’ of all things! Sidney had been quite wary of their parasitic nature, but they had assured him that they actually fed on their namesake, magma itself.

  Saintess Bethany had asked if they’d meant lava and the louse had just twitched an antennae before leading them to a cave entrance that absolutely radiated extreme heat. Sidney couldn’t hold back a snort as Bethany had flushed in embarrassment at the time.

  They’d asked the magma licekin if there had been anything strange recently and had been given the worrying answer that the mountain next to theirs had been rumbling and shaking recently. As well as an increase in magma being produced in their own caves.

  They had thanked their guide for the information and tried to leave when a single lousekin had caught up to them and asked to follow along. A male magma lousekin named ‘Gitta’ had proclaimed his desire to help and maybe explore with them even after.

  Lousekin had six limbs, two being legs and four arms, they had stout bodies and were still mostly abdomen. Their carapace was slightly transparent and thus glowed a dull orange as you could see their magma-like blood. The only thing they wore was a loincloth made out of heat proof monster hide.

  Being a male, Gitta was smaller than the more populous females, but had clearly more developed limbs.

  “Are you sure?” Sidney asked while looking closely at the insectoid. “It will be very dangerous where we’re going, we won’t be protecting you if something happens.”

  “Worry not dear travelers, for I am an advanced practitioner of the immolation fist!” He shouted confidently, his voice deep and booming with the occasional emphasized click to it. “My class is martial artist and I seek the experience necessary to change it to cultivator!”

  “Okay,” Saintess Bethany nodded, “but what about food? If you plan to keep following us we won’t exactly have access to magma or lava or what have you.”

  “The solution is simplicity itself!” He assured, stamping his foot. “For my kind can, in fact, subsist off the very earth beneath our feet! We simply prefer a warm meal over a cold one!” His eyes twinkled with a mirthful fire.

  With no real reason to deny him, they just looked to one another before looking back at him and nodding in agreement.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  ~~~

  He hadn’t been bad company as they made their way one mountain over, a bit overly boisterous in his words and actions, but Sidney had come to learn over the years that that was a rather common trait among fist users if his departed friend Braid was anything to go by. It was comforting, at least, to have someone fill a role they actually knew how to work with.

  Sure enough, as they ascended the correct mountain, fighting off a strangely high amount of elementals, they could feel the occasional rumble beneath their feet.

  “That is concerning.” Bethany said quietly as she looked at the ground beneath them.

  “Indeed. Mayhaps we solve this quickly so that nothing too untoward happens. I can take the heat, but rather prefer my surroundings to be more than simply choking ash and sizzling pumice.” Gitta agreed eloquently.

  “Wait, what?” Sidney asked, stopping to turn and look at Gitta and Bethany in confusion.

  “As we’ve seen, this mountain range is highly volcanic.” Bethany started in her motherly tone, having changed back when Gitta had joined the group. “Rumblings such as this can be an early warning sign of a potential eruption.”

  “Guff.” Willy the lycizard made a noise, almost as if in agreement.

  After hearing that, Sidney made sure they picked up the pace.

  ~~~

  After that they found a huge colony of hellfire antkin, had to fight some in a test of strength before entering, were sent on a quest to find a missing elder with the information they wanted, found him stuck hiding from an angered tornado elemental of all things, and after narrowly driving it away were finally told by the elder that he’d take them to the root of the problem.

  They returned to the colony and rested for a day, leaving Willy with an animal tender before going back to the elders and telling them they were ready to try and fix the root of the problem.

  Led deep underground through twisting cave passages to an ancient looking, half-ruined temple made mostly of obsidian and currently decorated in falls and streams of magma flows, the elder explained to them.

  “This place used to be a proving ground for our young warriors. On the verge of adulthood they would be led down here to fight the guardian elementals of this place. Only by gaining a guardian’s recognition did one of our colony become an adult in the eyes of all others.” The elder explained proudly before a pained look crossed her ant face.

  “But a few years ago, something changed. The temple was suddenly closed off, no one could enter so we couldn’t even ask the guardians what was wrong! Then the rumblings started. It was a small thing at first so we didn’t think of it as more than what it was.

  “Next, the elementals started gathering! Small ones mind you, but it takes alarmingly little time for a rockslide of earth elementals to coalesce into an actual rockslide elemental when their numbers get too high. The mountain quickly became chaotic with constant clashes of various elementals and it’s been all we could do recently to fend them off from making their way into the mountain and towards the temple.

  “I’d been sent out to find help, yet didn’t make it too far before that tornado elemental coalesced close by to me and trapped me in that shallow dead end cave. Thank you again for saving me.”

  They stopped in front of two massive obsidian doors.

  “Deep in this place, in the very heart of the mountain, is a throne room of sorts. Find a way there. Help the guardian general. He’ll know what to do.” And with that, she walked away, leaving the party to find their own way into the temple of magma.

  ~~~

  And thus a grand adventure ensued, through solving ancient riddles and traps, Gitta proved he was actually quite scholarly despite his appearance! Through battles with high tier elementals and damaged guardians the group polished their fighting techniques and methods. Finally, they were able to gain access into the ancient throne room.

  There they found a massive golem with a head like a knight's helm on its hands and knees seemingly holding together the floor with its physical and magical might alone. Both the golem and the floor were made of an amazing material that seemed to absorb massive amounts of mana like a black hole.

  “Warning: intruders detected.”

  A voice like the groaning of a mountain echoed around them.

  “Error: no time to deal with intruders.”

  “Error: mountain stability decreasing.”

  “Error”

  “Error”

  Another rumbling nearly sent the party sprawling with its strength. The first to recover, Saintess Bethany stepped forward before Sidney could say anything.

  “We were told what the hellfire antkin knew about the situation! We’re here to help you! Please, tell us how we can help fix this before the mountain erupts!”

  “Warning: we were attacked. The main magma chamber below was hit. Destabilization is imminent.”

  “Attacked?! By what?!”

  “By me!”

  A horrific entity seemed to just appear near a side room! A pyroclastic cloud holding the form of a humanoid! He was huge like a giant, almost the size of the massive golem, and quite bulbous too! Had it always been there, or was it really too fast to see?!

  Sidney brought up the entity's status while he could.

  Pyoro the haze of death, pyroclastic elemental, king of convergence, friend of ___.

  “I was gonna set this whole place off and just pick one of the survivors to sponsor, but then this jerk just had to get in my way AND seal me in here with it!”

  The elemental said angrily, suddenly appearing next to the golem to kick it… and yelping before backing away quickly as his foot was seemingly absorbed by the massive golem’s surface just as easily as the rest of the surrounding mana.

  “Stupid pile of rocks!”

  He cried out even as his smoldering foot came back together.

  “Ouch! No matter! Our new friends here have introduced the way out! I’m outta here! You! Louse guy!”

  Gitta pointed at himself dumbfounded as Pyoro motioned at him.

  “Yeah, you! Congratulations! I’m sponsoring you now! You made it this far, so you’ll probably survive what happens next! You’rewelcomealrightbye!”

  And with that the strange, terrifying being was just gone. Before the two humans had time to even blink their eyes.

  That guy somehow reminded me of that Mr. Fern creature back in the timburn hollow. Sidney thought to himself with a shiver.

  “Warning: magma chamber collapsing, eruption imminent.”

  Emergency quest initiated: Stop the-

  Error

  Emergency quest initiated: Reveal the-

  Error

  Warning: Two emergencies in the same area.

  Generating new quest to fit the criteria:

  Emergency quest initiated: Survive and save as many as you can.

  The more lives saved by your actions, the better the reward will be. Good luck.

  “Two?! What is happening?!” Saintess Bethany cried out in fear.

  “Intruders, evacuate the colony into the ancient bunker. They will know where it is. I will keep the lid on the mountain for as long as possible. There will be an artifact inside that can aid you in destroying that elemental. Now go.”

  “What?!” Bethany asked, overwhelmed. “But we-“

  “Go.” It rumbled more forcefully. Or was that the ground rumbling? It was a constant thing at this point.

  Saintess Bethany flinched and turned her ashen white face to whoever had put a hand on her shoulder. It was, of course, Sidney. He was just as pale faced as her, yet his eyes shone with a resolute conviction, steadfast as if he himself was a mountain.

  “We don’t have time for this, Bethany. We must go. Now.”

  He waited for her to nod before turning and all three of them running back the way they came! There wasn’t much time now.

  ~~~

  Please don't hate me.