Rune Seeker

Chapter 9: Achievement Unlocked?!

“Hold on,” was all Hiral had time to say as they raced toward the wall. How strong would it be? Would they bust through or splatter against the surface? Favela… She was in front! He needed to shield her somehow, needed to…

The wall was right there, and Hiral did the only thing he could, hauling his legs up in a vain attempt to go over the wall he clearly was heading straight for. It was never going to work. His mind ran through the vectors in the split second before he hit, and he braced for the flight-ending impact…

That didn’t come.

Huh?

Hiral glanced down as his legs barely passed over the top of the wall, which somehow looked shorter—what in the…?—but he didn’t have time to dwell. Ahead of him, the island was barely more than a thin strip of land, more like a bridge covered in thick grass than an actual island. They were going to overshoot it!

Already halfway across and with the far edge coming up fast, Hiral tried to let go of the kite—his only real choice—except his fingers didn’t respond.

What is it with kites and not letting go today?

He looked down at Favela. “You need to let go. Now!”

“No!” she said, shaking her head and then burying it in his neck.

Fallen’s balls, he didn’t have time to argue or fight with her. The edge wasn’t more than seventy feet away, so he focused again on his hand. He’d held so tight, and for so long, that the joints screamed in protest as he asked them to unlock.

Come on. Come on.

Fifty feet, and the first finger came off.

Almost there.

Thirty feet, and the second came off.

He wasn’t going to make…

The other two fingers completely gave up, and Hiral’s stomach jumped into his throat as he fell. Instinct kicked in again as he wrapped his now free arm around Favela’s head and tucked his left shoulder to protect her from the worst of it.

Still, this was going to hurt.

Hiral closed his eyes as the green grass raced up to meet him, then clenched his jaw. His shoulder hit first, but the collision didn’t shatter every bone. Instead of flipping and rolling, it was like he was digging into some kind of… cushion? Still, with the momentum they’d built up, the slide—or maybe it was a skid—went on for long seconds until they finally came to a stop, and he felt something almost spongey under him.

“Favela? You okay?” he asked as he opened his eyes, finding himself half-buried in what looked like some kind of super-thick moss. But wasn’t it grass…?

“My hand kind of hurts,” she said, and looked toward where her arm was between Hiral and the thick moss.

“I’m sorry,” he said, shifting a bit and then pulling them into a sitting position in the middle of the long, earthy divot created by their… landing. “Let me see it?”

The young girl gingerly pulled one arm from around his neck, though the other stayed firmly in place, and showed him where her forearm and hand had been badly scraped. The fact that she wasn’t bawling her eyes out was actually pretty impressive.

“Can you move your fingers? Your wrist?” he asked. Nothing looked obviously broken, but better to be safe than sorry.

Favela winced, but she made a small fist and turned her wrist without too much problem.

“You’re such a brave girl,” he said, putting his right hand—which didn’t hurt much, all things considered—on her head and gently rubbing it.

There was movement around them as well. Mainly people rushing over to see what in the Fallen’s names had just happened, but it was the sudden blue screen that popped up in front of Hiral’s eyes that grabbed his attention. His status window? No, that wasn’t it, but it was similar.

Congratulations. Achievement unlocked - Terminal

You achieved Terminal Velocity without meeting a Terminal End.

Please access a Dungeon Interface to unlock class-specific reward.

Huh? Dungeon interface? Class-specific reward? What were either of those things? And he didn’t even have a class!

“Hey, you two okay?” a woman asked, dragging Hiral’s attention away from the strange prompt, which immediately vanished. “Oh, dear, look at your arm. Come here, let me take care of that.”

“No!” Favela said, wrapping the arm back around Hiral’s neck and burying her face against his chest.

“Uh, she’s probably just a bit…” Hiral started, then looked at the faces very intently staring at him. Or rather, at the Meridian Lines on his face, most likely. Luckily, Favela’s arms would probably be covering the tattoos on the sides of his neck, but there was no hiding he was from Fallen Reach.

“Why… exactly… does an Islander have one of our kids?” a man asked, coming over to stand beside the woman who’d offered to look at Favela’s arm. “Just what do you think you’re doing?”

“…was he going to do to her?” another asked.

“Can’t be anything good,” said another.

“Is he kidnapping her?” another voice asked.

“No, he was saving her,” a familiar voice shouted, and Seena pushed her way through the gathering crowd. “Being really stupid, but saving her,” she amended as she crouched down in front of Hiral. “Hey, Favela, how’re you doing?”

“How did you get here so quickly?” Hiral asked, but then caught a glimpse of the Platform of Movement through the break in the crowd as Arty and Caaven also rushed over to join them. “Ah, never mind.”

“Funny-face saved me,” Favela said, pulling her head away from Hiral enough to look at Seena.

“He did,” Seena said before turning to Hiral. “Doesn’t look like she’s letting go any time soon. Can you stand?”

“Yeah, I think so. The landing really wasn’t as bad as it looked thanks to this…” He trailed off as he eyed the ankle-high grass all around him. Did he… imagine… the moss?

“Give me your hand,” Seena said, standing up and offering her arm.

“Yeah, thanks,” Hiral said. Making sure he wouldn’t drop Favela, he took Seena’s hand and let her pull him to his feet. Huh, didn’t even strain her—she must have a decent Str.

“You idiot. What would I have told your father, or—Fallen’s rutting toenails—your mother, if something had happened to you?” Arty fumed as he stormed up to Hiral. “I leave you alone for five minutes, five minutes, and then somebody comes in screaming you jumped off the island! What did I say about trouble?”

“Wasn’t like I planned it,” Hiral said.

“Nobody plans getting into trouble,” Arty said, but then took a breath and seemed to visibly calm down. “Are you okay? Anything broken?” the man asked while Caaven joined the group of Nomads and quickly explained that no, Hiral was not kidnapping the girl.

“Nothing broken,” Hiral said.

“Your sword is all dirty, though,” Favela offered, giggling.

“Oh?” Hiral said as he turned his head to look at the hilt over his shoulder, dirty with earth and moss. Okay, so at least he wasn’t imagining that.

“Come on, let’s get back up to Caaven’s,” Arty said, and gestured back to the platform. “We can talk on the way. Starting with how you ever thought that was a good idea.”

“I didn’t think,” Hiral said as they walked, Seena falling in on his other side. “Kind of just… acted.”

“You have no idea how lucky you are,” Seena said quietly. “The kind of kite you grabbed wasn’t meant to be used like that. How it didn’t burst apart under the strain, I’ll never understand. Or you, doing that with one hand… What level are you anyway?”

“Ah… that’s a bit complicated,” Hiral said as they got on the platform, and Shaper Jenno stepped up in front of him, her head a solid foot above Hiral’s.

“That was impressive.” Jenno gave him a quick pat on the shoulder, then went back to stand beside Shaper Fual.

“Impressively stupid,” Arty said.

“Okay, I get it!” Hiral deadpanned. “It all worked out in the end, though, right?”

“It did,” Caaven said, joining the others as Shaper Fual lifted the platform into the air. “Really, we can’t thank you enough for what you did. With the missing party, everybody was distracted from what they should’ve been paying attention to.” The man spared a small glance at Seena. “An accident like this never should’ve happened.

“How can we thank you for saving Favela?” Caaven finished, putting his hand on the young girl’s head. By the smile she gave him, they were pretty close.

“I…” Hiral started, but the memory of the strange blue prompt flashed through his memory. Of the mention of a class. A dungeon interface, huh? What if that could help figure out what was wrong with him? Well, there was one place he could probably find something like that. “I want to go with Seena to help find her sister.

“I want to go to the surface.”