Five million? Frost asked. That’s a completely insane amount of teleportation rods. At the close of their war, they somehow had the resources to make all that?

  Hunter was still flying around the room, opening drawers at random. It looks like it, he said. Every one of these has the same loadout.

  Is it that unreasonable? Ashtoreth said. If you look at the equipment of your standard GI from the first world war, then compare them to a GI from the American Military today, it doesn’t seem like that unreasonable a progression. You want smart, well-trained, well-equipped people, right? How do you invade a place that’s level-limited if they have a standing army of five million people who can teleport from any place on one realm to any place on another?

  Is it really five million, though? Hunter asked. Let’s assume, based on how quickly I spotted this place, that it was deliberately placed near the exit point of the warp conduit we found on Earth. And let’s assume, given that the one they dug for on Earth was conveniently located in one of the most remote locations possible, that there’s more discs.

  They could just buried it in Siberia because they wanted it in a remote place, said Kylie. It would have been obvious even thousands of years ago that there weren’t going to be a lot of people living in Siberia.

  Oh, said Hunter. Yeah, that actually makes sense.

  Still, said Ashtoreth. You guys—this find is insane! We can at least say for sure that Dazel had time to prepare, right? Normally, a state that’s in the last days of a losing war doesn’t have the time to mass-manufacture gear for a well-equipped army of millions. And we still can’t rule out the prospect of there being more armories to find.

  I think the shelves are built on rails, Hunter said, noticing a set of parallel grooves in the floor that led away from each. Or something. It’s very strange.

  Maybe to teleport the stuff out en masse? Ashtoreth asked. Be mana-intensive, moving that much magical gear. But at the same time, the logistics of getting millions of people through that one room would be a nightmare.

  It has only one entrance, Hunter said, looking back toward the small hall he came through. Also… this place has to be shielded from outside forces, somehow. Everything is still perfectly placed, and apparently the ventilation is working after thousands of years. There have to have been at least a few earthquakes.

  Not really, said Kylie. Tectonic activity isn’t something that happens on all planets. Also, they’d be called corequakes if they happened on Core.

  Hold on a second, Ashtoreth said. Corequake? No way.

  I’m going to look through the other rooms… Hunter said.

  Yes, Ashtoreth, said Kylie, sounding somewhat amused. The quake is named after the planet it’s on. Mars has tectonic activity, and they’re called marsquakes.

  See, this is why I love humans, Ashtoreth said. You guys are just so incredibly silly, sometimes.

  Hunter floated into the next chamber, looking around to see that it was another warehouse-like room resembling the first, save for its contents.

  Room two is looking a lot like the armory… except it’s a cache of materials. In fact… is that…

  What? Ashtoreth asked immediately. What is it?

  Hunter floated toward the familiar luster, blinking down at a reinforced shelf laden with thousands of ingots of a familiar metal.

  Yeah, like I thought, he said. Instead of magical equipment, we’ve just got shelves of mundane metals. He picked up one of the ingots, hefting it experimentally. Tons and tons of gold, that sort of thing.

  That’s not nearly as exciting, Ashtoreth said. Maybe look for something more exotic? Gold and jewels aren’t exactly tough to find when you can bind earth elementals.

  Hunter set the brick of gold back on the shelf. It’s mostly metals, he said, trying to do a quick survey of the room. I’m not sure which ones are rare or not. The alloys are marked by their composition, it looks like. He landed before a mixture of iron, chromium, carbon, silicon, and silver. Everything’s got a little placard talking about what its use in enchanting is.

  Well, we gotta make those new boots out of something, said Kylie.

  There’s an inventory of everything near the doorway, Hunter said. He reached into his own extradimensional storage, a wide pouch he kept on his belt, and pulled out his phone. I’ll take some pictures, then check out the third room.

  So Dazel left humanity a cache of resources, equipment, and knowledge, Kylie said as Hunter took his pictures. Which makes sense if we assume—reasonably—that he didn’t know for sure he’d ever get to return.

  If he didn’t, then your humanity might never have even gotten inside here, Ashtoreth said. After all, from everything we’ve seen, it’s safe to assume that I could only become a pinnacle curator by being a human monarch of Earth. If one of my sisters had won the monarchy, humanity would never have known any of this was here.

  If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Until Dazel found a way to sneak inside, you mean, Kylie said. If he’s the one who made the restrictions in the first place, it would make sense to assume he could find a way around them.

  Not a very comforting thought, Ashtoreth said.

  He could have given us a second chance if we’d lost, though, Kylie said. Stolen all the leftover humans away to a world that the forces of Hell still couldn’t access.

  Unless anyone who wins the monarchy can become human, Ashtoreth said.

  Also not a very comforting thought, Kylie said.

  I know—I prefer to think I’m special.

  Sure thing, Princess. But what do you guys think all this is here for? You think Dazel left this here so that one day, humanity could resume their war against Heaven?

  I don’t think so, said Ashtoreth. It makes more sense as something he could use to kickstart humanity into being a cosmic power again—into fighting off Hell. If waging war on the Authority of Heaven only took a few billion people with good gear, high levels, and a great racial, then my father would rule over all of creation already.

  Are you sure, though? Kylie asked. The angels were very skilled… but they were still just guys with stats.

  Okay, I wasn’t made to make war on Heaven—just Earth. So I never really got taught much about them, and I could be completely wrong about this, but I’m pretty sure that one of the reasons you can’t make war on Heaven is that, well… where do you even go? You can’t just warp to the Throne of Creation and drop-kick the Almighty in the face.

  So… one of Heaven’s main strengths is that nobody knows their address?

  I guess?

  So what you’re saying is… we just need to doxx God.

  I’m sure there’s more keeping my father from conquering all of creation than that nobody has doxxed God yet, though, Ashtoreth said. It’s more that Heaven doesn’t play by the rules of normal realms.

  But you don’t know for sure.

  I don’t, she admitted, but Hell essentially functions as their servant in all the ways that matter to them. There has to be a good reason for that.

  Maybe we’ll find it in the archive, said Kylie.

  Hunter finished taking his pictures, then put his phone away. I might be headed to the archive now, he said. I’m checking out the third room.

  When he got there, though, the room was much more disappointing than the huge array of glowing crystals he’d imagined. Instead he found another cache of supplies, one that seemed to be exactly the same as the room he’d just left.

  No archive, he told them. Just more worthless gold and stuff.

  Makes sense, said Ashtoreth. The archive is probably buried much deeper—meant to be communicated with, but not accessed. Anyway—Orchard?

  All right, Hunter said. I’ll try warping there now.

  He inscribed the runes for the Orchard warp spell into the floor, then cast it and got a message similar to the one he’d gotten when he’d first tried teleporting to Core.

  You get that? he asked after a few moments passed and he hadn’t been approved.

  Sorry, Ashtoreth said after a second. I was passing a bluff check.

  {A [Pinnacle Curator] has granted you access to Orchard.}

  Got it, Hunter said. Warping out now.

  He emerged from his teleport in almost total darkness, quickly conjuring a tuft of white flame to see by. He was in a huge, circular chamber, and saw nothing that indicated immediate danger. Instead, lines of glowing light began to appear around him, much the same as they had in the other chamber.

  Then he noticed that he’d received another system message.

  {You have been routed to Orchard Nexus 001.}

  I’m indoors, he said, looking around. A big, circular chamber. Apparently, this is Orchard Nexus number 1. And—oh…

  What is it? Ashtoreth asked right away. What’s Orchard?

  Well that’s interesting, Hunter said. The outer edges of the room were lined with objects that looked like a cross between an obelisk and a tuning fork: runed, two-pronged monoliths whose glossy exteriors reflected the lights of the room. Each of them was around eight feet tall, with a set of two steps leading up to the space between their little towers.

  Hunter. What’s interesting? Tell me.

  A range of numbers was set into the walls above each monolith, written in the glowing script of the ancient humans. The numbers went from 1-25… all the way to 900-1000.

  Hunter, please, Ashtoreth said.

  He smiled a little, then approached the monolith that was labelled 1-25. I think you might like this place, Ashtoreth. Let me check something.

  Please, she said, dragging the word out. Just tell me.

  He touched the monolith. Immediately, he felt a thrum of power and was confronted with another system message.

  {Transport via waygate? Y/N}

  Hunter, Ashtoreth said. I’ve been waiting for this ever since I heard the name Orchard. Don’t do this to me.

  To his surprise, Sadie’s voice entered his head a moment later. Stop making her beg you. I don’t like it at all.

  Hunter smirked… but there was no one around to see it.

  Then he affirmed the system message for the warp gate and was teleported once more, this time emerging into chilly night air, with stars shining overhead and a dark forest stretching out before him.

  His eyes cut through the darkness easily, though, and he quickly picked out a moving figure among the branches, tagging it see that it was a level 8 monkey-like creature.

  Hunter! Ashtoreth.

  I guess I know why they call it Orchard, he said.

  Hunter! Please!

  ‘Farm,’ would have been too obvious.