Chapter 13-362: Okay, It’s an Island of Survivors... (2/2)
The rest were... anthropes.
Bunny-women, cat-women, mice-women, dog-women, fox-women, squirrel-women, raccoon-women, bull-women, deer-women, pig-women, various forms of bird-women, and monkey-women, just at a glance, and not all of them were of the same breeds or subspecies, either.
No human women, however, and nothing reptilian.
I wasn’t human, either, so I couldn’t fault them for that, but it set off an alarm of some kind, and not just for strangely kinky sexual proclivities.
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A crowd came down to meet us, comprised of said females and some older men, many of the latter needing to be helped along to see us. Some of the younger men, with bone structures that said they didn’t have human mothers, had raced ahead to bring the news that I was someone from the other world, that I had come there deliberately, and that I could bring them all home!
I dismounted the Old Steed, and bid him go investigate the immediate area. He galloped off, turning invisible as he did so, which made the more thoughtful among everyone realize that I was being very open by not sneaking in first.
I was ushered to the meeting area, really nothing more than a depressed area in the stone chipped out with seats and spots where most of the town could stand and look down at whoever was speaking. I looked out at the vague depression and irregular and uncomfortable standing areas, and just sighed.
“A moment before we begin,” I requested of them, and as they blinked, I unleashed my Duskstopped Widened Stone Shape VII on the place.
That worked out to about four thousand cubic feet of stone I could reshape every six seconds... which was quite a bit by any mortal standards.
The very rough amphitheater platform beneath me smoothed out and rose, forming a protruding lower stage in front and a higher, broader stage behind. The other half of the circle reshaped itself into concentric rings, leveling out and reforming into seats, footwells, railings, stairs, and walkways.
The change was like flowing water, pushing up and out and away, often right under the shocked feet of the people who got there first. By the time I was done, the place was at least four times bigger than it had been, capable of holding the entire population of this settlement twice over, and with a bigass stage with a backdrop behind it.
It also had drains and subtle inclinations to deal with what were undoubtedly frequent rains here.
It was a display of power, sure, but also of thoughtfulness. Among other things, there was space behind the stone seats and an opening for the tailed women to stick their tails through if they were of a mind to.
I also had especially wide seats in places, specifically sized for the three bull-women and the one bear-woman and those like them, with other seats sized for children or the smaller people, which they glommed onto quickly. These seats also sat up higher so their view didn’t suffer.
It also thoroughly subdued the spellcasters, who were dominated by the elven-blooded women. At least, I didn’t see any spellcasters among the human men, and the anthros were registering mostly as Primos, and not very talented at the spellcasting thing. Apparently, they gave up something in the mental arena for the animalistic gifts, which probably didn’t hurt in a primitive world like this, where physical power and keener senses were extremely valuable survival traits. Tool development took time, generations of experimentation, and passing the knowledge on, after all, and magic was a very demanding tool.
Several of the older captains had moved to the Force Disks I’d made up, which I’d politely molded to them and which could be pushed around effortlessly by their escorts.
Detect Human III was pinging off all the anthropes present here. Whatever was done to them, they could all interbreed with baseline humans. All the younger men had anthrope mothers and human fathers, and all the anthrope women likewise, meaning that bunny-woman with the floppy ears, killer figure, and rabbit’s feet and tail had a younger brother who had a bit of a softer line to his face, but was otherwise totally human.
The older elves took their places with the captains, two accompanying the older men, three seated alone on Disks. All of them were very wary, having only to feel the Caster Level on the Disks beneath them to realize I was towering over them in power, and it wasn’t even a contest.
None of them had much in the way of Class Depth. I was actually unsurprised to find that the dark elves and their children were using the Elven Racial Class, as many of the younger people were using the Human Racial Class. The men that came from the surface were Class-based, and most had advanced to Four or higher in them, with an Expert/10 actually the highest-Level of them, a spry fellow with an early-graying beard and weathered appearance who Assayed as Professor Shellingfield, a famous anthropologist who had gone missing in Africa somewhere in 1948.
He also seemed to be designated the unofficial elder of the community, taking the initiative to speak up after everyone was seated, rising from his Disk to address me and bow formally.
“Lady Traveler, I bid you welcome to the settlement of Waterdown,” he said in a once-British accent that had faded in the face of time and other languages over the years. “I am Professor Cecile Shellingfield, once of Wiltshire, England. While we welcome all people from the other world, this time, it seems, your arrival is propitious!” He smiled in expectation as he straightened. “Please, tell us about yourself, and the world without. It has been nearly twenty years since the last time we had new people arrive through the Vortex.
“Also,” he hesitated for a moment, “could you confirm the date for us?”
“Today is March the Twenty-First, 2019, Professor Shellington,” I stated with certainty, and the men from the surface all sighed and closed their eyes.
“Only three days off,” the Professor smiled sadly, as he reclaimed his seat.
“Also, you are not on another world. You are Inside your homeworld.” As they all blinked at the impossibility of that, I raised a hand to the sullen orb overhead. “This is the Hollow World, a dimensional space excavated out within Terra itself. The dimensional passages which brought you here merely bypassed the Felldeep to deliver you to this place. The access points are limited in number, but they have been forced to open by the Shroud of the planet above you. There is at least one permanent passageway at the North Pole that is keeping this place stably locked open and accessible from the surface, without need of the Vortex there, or whatever means brought you here from Africa, Professor.”