150 Giess (1/2)

I breathed in, trying out the new air. The smell of oil and smog filled my lungs. A gray light leaked in from cracks in the walls. A muggy, thick atmosphere crept its way in. Rain pattered against the roof of the room we were still in. Everything smelled sterile, almost like a hospital. I turned to Torix,

“Where did you warp us on Giess?”

He frowned, “Somewhere I knew would be uninhabited.”

I walked forward, putting my hand on the doorway. I pushed the wall of dirt. It crumbled to dust revealing my first view of Giess. A murky rain fell, tapping against me. A thick mist obscured my vision in the distance. The droplets plopped against my helm. An acrid, nigh toxic smell soaked in.

I clasped a fist, creating an aura of antigravity around me. The rain fell onto it, sliding off the sides of the generated force. It was like I coated myself with a panel of glass. I squinted, taking my first step. My feet clanked against the hard ground. Cold, lifeless, and abyssal, Giess wasn’t looking so good.

Everything around me looked odd. We were in what used to be a city no doubt. At the same time, omens scattered about on the remnants of the old society. Cars with no windows connected with the metal ground. Some tiny insects ran on their surface, their movements robotic.

They ran along the surface of the car, fiddling with it. As they ran past spots on the car, they left it polished to perfection. Some places reflected light like a mirror. Varieties of these insects covered every surface, turning the world into an angular, hygienic wasteland. All the buildings shared this same effect.

These strange creatures plated skyscrapers with the same material. A whistling wind blew between the buildings. This constant breeze never relented, staying steady at all times. It carried bits of ash, spores, and a chemical stench. This was like a robot dystopia of some kind, and we were right in the middle of it.

I turned towards Torix, “Giess looks like shit guys.”

Althea snickered a little. When she stepped out, her grin turned upside down. She glanced around, taking the bleak landscape in, “By Schema...this is the new world we were supposed to go to?”

Torix waved away our concerns, “Are there not barren spots on Earth? Giess is no different.”

I pulled back my judgments for now. I stepped forward, my feet leaving impressions in the metal. A thin film of water poured down the hill between two buildings. Althea and I walked forward, finding this water forming streams. Tiny flows of murky water pooled into disgusting streams of noxious, purple water. Ashen spores clumped into bubbled blots of yellow at its surface.

At least it had some color.

Althea and I walked along the river, exploring further out. The pollution seeped into every square inch of the scenery. Tiny rodents ran over the surface of this lake. Metal coated their backs, and their red eyes bulged out of their heads. With pouches on their bellies, their bulbous hind legs shot them across the water.

They grasped the yellow bubbles into their arms, sliding it into their pouches. Once on land, they sprinted into concrete coves. A set of metal teeth grabbed onto a slower metal rat, crunching its ribs and spine. Plum colored mush gushed from the broken rat, a foul odor festering out of it. The fish pulled it into the water, no doubt feasting on the filth.

Everything ate the pollution. Several pelican creatures planted themselves on the side of buildings. With beaks of steel, they opened their mouths and caught the foul rain. One of these birds with a bulging neck and black feathers dived towards the lake. The fish with jaws of steel snapped out of the air at a rat. The bird squirted a stream of boiling water at it, the liquid hissing.

It shocked the fish, causing it to seize up. The bird flew down and gulped it into its steel beak, swallowing it hole. I looked at Althea. She looked up at me. We sighed together.

So far, Giess churned up one word in my mind - filth.

I scratched the side of my head, looking back at our teleported room. Torix and Kessiah scuffled through bags, getting ready to head out. Torix teleported the entire room, the dirt and stone singed at its edges. I raised my eyebrow at him, “So uh, why’d you teleport us here again?”

Torix pulled out a pack from a portal. He opened it, and tossed me a circular piece of metal,

“Because this area is closed off from the rest of Geiss.” I caught the piece of steel, and Torix continued,

“While I agree this is a rather unagreeable first view, I knew no one would find us here. The reason for that should be self-evident. It gives us time to prepare ourselves for what is to come.”

Kessiah put a circular tablet of metal onto her shoulder, “Well, what is to come?”

Pieces of metal clicked into place, expanding over her skin. Within a few seconds, power armor covered her from head to toe. She walked up to Torix who hummed away at a spell. His mana came together, casting a white forcefield over her that lost all color a moment later. I couldn’t analyze her status after the magic took place.

He cloaked her in some spell. Torix walked over towards me, “In the beginning, I believe we should scope out the common culture here on Giess. After discovering the comings and goings of this place, we’ll position ourselves around someone of knowledge. After learning what is going on, we’ll make our move.”

Althea placed a piece of carbon fiber mesh on her shoulder, “Then we’ll learn what we need to know?”

The fibers traced outwards, covering her from head to toe. A panel of tinted glass covered her face, showing her curvaceous figure. I took note, admiring her for a second. I focused on myself, placing the dark gray metal disc onto my own shoulder. It tried forming over me, but it struggled around the spikes of my armor.

I helped it out, molding my armor into the shape of the expanding suit. After a few finicky seconds, it formed over me. The inside was soft and air-conditioned. The mugginess disappeared, a dehumidifier humming lightly. I cracked my neck, the armor moving with me. I expected it to restrict my motions, but it didn’t.

Of course, it wouldn’t hold up against my sheer strength. It was perfect for a disguise though. As I glanced at my hands, Torix walked up and cast his disguising spell on me. The invisible shield formed around me like Kessiah before. Torix looked up,

“Based on the perception of your status, you should be disguised up till level 4,000 people appear. Considering the highest level person on this planet isn’t even 7,000, we should be fine.”

I nodded, “Alright chief, where to?”

He pointed towards the stream of gunk Althea and I just left behind, “Follow this river. Based on my maps, any river here should lead towards a reservoir.”

Kessiah jogged up towards the stream. Torix cast over Althea as Kessiah put her hand in the water. She pulled it out, the water sticking a bit like thin slime. She slung her hand, the purple muck flinging off,

“By Baldowah...you really know how to pick em, don’t you professor bones?”

Torix rolled his fire eyes, “Have faith in the process. Come on, let’s get away from this rank place.”

Althea leaped over the smooth steel. With agility and grace, she maneuvered with ease. Torix floated over everything, having his arms crossed behind him. A blackened circle of mana held him up, carrying him over it all.

I extended the armor on one of my fingers. I sliced out a chunk of steel coated concrete beneath me. With a gravity well, I pulled myself and the platform up with me. Kessiah dashed behind us as she jumped around obstacles. Torix shouted at me, “We can’t have her pulling us down, now can we? Could you assist her, perhaps?”

I rolled my eyes. I raised a hand, pulling Kessiah up with gravity. She fell through the air, confused as hell. After reaching beside me, a pool of filth raised up with her. I flicked away bits of trash and dirt with telekinesis. Kessiah wiped some muck off her armored face. She squinted her eyes at Torix,

“Thanks for suggesting the ride. Really thoughtful.”

A subtle grin ran up Torix’s lips, “Oh anytime for you.”

We raced through the broken city, the muck river growing in size as smaller streams fused with it. After a few minutes, the tall buildings gave way to grasslands. Grass mimicked a million scissors planted with the blades facing up. Light refracted off the shining edges, the grass deadly.

Trees of the same sort lined the horizon, expanding in our sight as we got near them. We passed geometric hills, combed and pruned by these strange creatures. More of them rummaged through the wastes, eating the pollution and each other.

One large creature rolled around, a fattened ball covered in metal. It opened up by uncurling its legs. It opened a hippo-like mouth, munching on rock and metal. These rolling blobs of clumpy steel raced over injured or immobilized creatures. In groups, the scavengers ate anything alive. It was hellish.

So far, this looked like a fringe world. After an hour of following the giant river of muck, we reached a wall of old bronze. Hundreds of feet tall, the wall towered over the horizon. Each of us passed over it. I lifted Althea with a gravity well like Kessiah, not wanting her to walk around the disgusting lake.

Oh boy, disgusting it was. We floated over a thick, gunky mess. Islands of Yellow eggs wafting on the purple abyss. Slow waves rolled across the surface, shifting the eggs. One cluster of them hatched, revealing a four-armed, gray humanoid. It lacked eyes, and a thin tongue jutted from its face.

It jumped into the deep purple surrounding it, dashing through the water with a black shadow showing on the surface. We passed over it, other shadows showing under the disgusting water. Some dwarfed us, leviathans coasting beneath the surface. At times they swam up and swallowed entire islands of the yellow eggs.

The water and wall stretched on like this for miles. Some massive, hulking beasts floated on the water with ecosystems on their backs. Other times swarms of insects fought for scraps on the surface of the ocean. After an hour of hovering, we passed the endless lavender pool.

As we passed it, fields of gray returned. A blip of green popped into the horizon afterwards. The blip spread out, turning into a green spot in the distance. At this point, Althea rode on my shoulders. She pointed at it,

”Do you see it? There's a forest or something.”

Torix gasped, ”By Schema I beleived this realm of gray would never end.”

Kessiah closed out her status. She chewed on some gum, rolling herself around in the gravity well, ”So you didn't take us to a trash world after all.”

Torix rolled his eyes. The changing scenery neared us, coming into focus. On the other side of it, I gaped at the sight before me.

The metallic, angular wasteland gave way to greenery. Like night and day, a span of twenty feet separated the lush forest and hellish blade trees. At the border of these two distinct environments, animals and insects alike fought fiercely. They stabbed. They bit. They crushed. They cracked. They tore at each other in a standstill.

Creatures out of fantasy hacked away at each other. Chimeras of mixed beasts fought hulks of steel. We passed by the battle, reaching into the lush forests. Within the greenery, the environment changed. Soft, cuddly squirrels jumped from tree to tree. If a bird swooped down at them, they shouted out ear-splitting cries.

Armored hawks fumbled through the air at this, sent into disarray. They crashed through branches, protected by thick plates of keratin. Once on the forest floor, they...channeled mana. They lifted the branches then shot them at the squirrels. Some squirrels evaded this unusual tactic. Others didn’t. Before they even hit the ground, the hawks dashed and gulped them down.

They were caught up in other creature’s battles, however. Large, glowing salamanders walked through the forest like dinosaurs. When they ate, they lit their whip-like tails ablaze. With a shattering smack of their tail, they whipped through tree trunks. The trees fell, and these fire salamanders expanded their jaws over the wood like huge anacondas.

I blinked at the sight, “Jesus. This is like a nature documentary for another world.”

Torix shrugged, “This is far more normal than what we saw earlier.” Torix pointed at the giant salamanders, “They are creatures that use mana. This whole planet is rich with species that utilize it. The native espens even have religions around it.”

I raised an eyebrow, “Espens?”

Torix nodded, “I dug up some knowledge of this place. Espens are the primary, sentient species. They and the gialgathens.”

Althea pursed her lips, “Gialgethans?”

Torix shrugged, “I know the name, nothing more. This planet didn’t have modern technology until 30 years ago. They’ve rapidly integrated Schema’s technology since the Culling over 20 years ago. Outside of that, there’s little information on Giess.”

Torix rubbed his hands together, “Isn’t it exciting?”