Riding the Light to insert myself into position above the waterfall wouldn’t be that hard. I had a previous scrylock, near-orbital survey, and I was very good at the math.

  I would leave from the rim of the volcano where Ketnan had held sway. As I had promised, Ketnan had been Resurrected early, taking the time and spending the mana so it didn’t interrupt my normal six a day, slow and sure. His uncle, sister, and parents had been overjoyed to get him back, his body basically spun out of nothing in something akin to a Deathstone revival.

  Unsurprisingly, he had absolutely no knowledge of what had transpired after he died and his body was made into a ghoul. Rarely were the true souls of people involved in the undead that could be made of their shells.

  He did remember his grim tale of survival there at the end, the way the tuskers turned hostile as the Isparians were freed of Bobo’s charms, and his desperate mastery of magic and organizing the Isparians to defend themselves against increasing tusker aggression.

  His tale of defending the Emporium he had turned into a last redoubt was a tale for the ages. His mercantile empire would likely never exist, but Ketnan was going to be famous and appreciated for what he had gone through.

  He was also unsurprisingly cool about the whole revenge thing, especially when he learned Mudmouth was probably the force behind everything. He had Leveled to over 200 in wild and crazy fashion during the year after the Fall, mastering the magic he’d never put any effort into in his life with the zeal only a desperate survivor could have.

  That said, he had literally been fighting for his life and watched everyone die around him, before dying horribly himself just a short time after. That was dead-dead, not Deathstone dead, and a whole lot of PTSD came along with a magnificent last stand that had still, in the end, not been enough, and ended in massacre and failure.

  The bones of the dead had been split and gnawed by the ghouls and ghasts, and were wholly unsuitable for Resurrections, tainted by negative energy and basically forcing the dead to stay dead there.

  It had been too long, with too much undead influence and negative energy. I could bring him back because of his ghoul providing a thread tied to his soul as an NPC, but not the rest of them.

  It was very depressing. However, if the System had collected their souls, there was hope!...

  On the flip side, his treasure chest was credited to him, and he was pretty damn wealthy instantly because of it. Pyreal wasn’t worth a whole lot, but probably the one bright light in all of that was he found himself VERY interested in Artificing and making reliable magic, especially after the catastrophe of the Fall, and now he had the time and money to pursue such things.

  As for his debtors, if any came calling, there were numerous people totally willing to put a yard of steel in their guts for even mentioning anything so stupid.

  ------

  In between a visit to Martine and Hea Rheaga, Kris and Briggs worked on making a basic Armor set up for Tim. At their level of skill, they could eyeball the measurements, so the main thing was the amount of weight the additional gear was going to put on the big guy, necessitating some things be put into place for improvements so he could wear them.

  Also, a Titan-sized set of armor wasn’t going to be done in only a few days. It was simply too damn much metal to have to shape up.

  Happily, when you are forty feet tall, just getting lower body armor is a pretty good set of protection as it stands.

  ---

  “Hands out!” I instructed Tim, who dutifully extended his three-fingered hands in puzzlement.

  A thousand meat pies were taken out of Itemization (dutifully transferred there from Tapestry), and I placed a hundred of them in his over-sized palms.

  “Slowly,” I told him, as his triple eyes boggled at the sight and aroma of what was in his grasp.

  He kind of slurped them up in shock, more when a barrel of wine was tapped and a stream of it came coiling out of the barrel, sitting there in midair for him to slurp at… which he did energetically.

  Like most Jotuns, he could handle a huge amount of food when given the chance to, and a thousand meat pies wasn’t too many for him to handle, nor were forty gallons of palm wine.

  At the end, I let him take the barrel and go off, sit down against the side of the hill, and ruminate on life as he watched the sun go down, slurping a gallon of wine at a time slowly and in obvious comfort as he did so.

  “Tim, we have a problem on the islands you used to call home, out to the east there.”

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  One of his three stacked eyes turned to look at me, parked there on his shoulder. “Tuskers bad,” he growled, clearly remembering an epic fight he’d lost. “Chase Tim from home.”

  “To be fair, you were eating them. It was kind of warranted, don’t you think?”

  “Tuskers fat and good eating,” he sighed. “Also, big fat juicy bugs. Tim loved big fat bugs!”

  I had to raise an eyebrow at that. “Well, you won’t be hungry in the future, but we can certainly make some really, really good bugs for you then.”

  “Really?” Two eyes were looking at me now. “Promise?”

  “Dangerous sword princess knows some recipes that will have you glowing happily for days.”

  “Good! What Tim have to do?”

  “You know the shades and the virindi, right?” I asked him, and he blinked once.

  “Nasty, cruel things. Alien. Not belong here,” he pronounced solemnly.

  “I agree. There’s a thing on the islands, made from shades and virindi. It’s rotting out the islands, putting that shadowy Taint into the place, and we have to stop it. Also,” I let my voice drop conspiratorially, “it made a fake tusker king. Looks exactly like Bobo. We have to stop and kill that thing, too.”

  “Tim get to fight Tusker King again?” He ruminated over that, clearly not wanting to lose again, although eager for the tussle.

  “Well, this time we’re going to be helping you. You’re going to go into that fight looking like this.”

  I waved up a nice big life-size illusion of what Kris and Briggs were planning. His three stacked eyes stared at the image of himself in surprise and awe, because he looked pretty damn impressive that way.

  He pointed repeatedly with his free hand. “Tim look like that?” he asked in a hushed rumble.

  “With spells to help you out.” Imitations of magic flashed and settled over the image, making it straighter, taller, more vigorous, smoother, and faster. Spells and rocks smashed into the image, doing next to nothing, only making the image snarl and lift a massive spiked club in his hands, ready to use.

  “Tusker King used magic to beat Tim,” the great monuga mumbled. “Maybe Tim use magic to beat Tusker King?” he asked hopefully.

  “That’s the idea… along with a whole, whole lot of other tuskers.”

  “Tim happy to go fight on old islands!” he pronounced enthusiastically, raising his quarter-barrel of wine. “Eat well, fight well!”

  “You’re going to find out what it means to be fighting alongside little people with magic, as opposed to against us, Tim. I think you will enjoy it.”

  He blinked all three of his eyes slowly, ruminating on that as the illusion vanished. Then his gaze dipped to the barrel in his hand, and he said, “Finding out new things, Tim is,” he finally admitted. “Things not like the ways of Tim’s people. The children are not very smart,” he confided in me. “Always think with fist and clubs, not able to make stuff well. Not like little folks,” he waved at me.

  “How bad was it, growing up? It doesn’t seem like many of you make it to your full growth, Tim.”

  His expression turned sad. “Tim not meet any real adult monugas. They all magical things, chained spirits,” he waved derisively. “Cannot talk, even dumber than children. Tim try to talk to ones in magic valley, they stupid. Talk to one virindi think can force to grow to adult, it even stupider and mad with pain, slave to virindi, born to go mad and die. Silly one up in north, chops down trees which keep regrowing, dumbest one of all, but has nice shirt, and big blue ox very friendly.”

  “Does Tim like aurochs?” I had to ask.

  “Auroch okay eating, like tusker. Have to pick meat off the bones. Shellfish, bugs, just peel and eat, much easier.”

  “Well, there’s two huge aurochs on the cold islands up thataway, off the shore.” He turned his head to follow my pointing figure, nodding after a moment. “Really big. Big as the blue auroch. We’d appreciate it if you killed and ate them so they don’t come back.”

  He blinked. “Really big auroch? Might take Tim a while to eat all that,” he confided in me after a moment.

  “Kris said she would make the absolute best steaks out of them you ever tasted, too.”

  “Sword princess cook for Tim again?” he asked eagerly.

  “She would.”

  “Tim will kill big aurochs if needed!” he promised fervently.

  “Well, thank you for that. Are you familiar with Eaters?” I whipped up an image of the eating machines made by the Fiuns at normal size.

  He leaned forward for a better look, so I brought the image up closer to him, imitating their running motions and attack patterns.

  “Alien thing,” he grunted, sipping his barrel and shaking his head. “Not know how taste.”

  “They eat everything. If they get loose on Dereth, it would look like this.” I waved my hand, and replaced the trees and brush and green of early spring here with a barren, rocky, wind-swept desert, bereft of even weeds and scrub, everything alive eaten away.

  Tim tensed as a wave of Eaters rampaged across the distance, running over the landscape on their stubby legs, looking for more food, always more food. His eyes were a glare as they surrounded a lone stubby tree, quickly tearing it apart and consuming the wood, then digging at the ground to actually drag out its roots and eat them, too.

  “Have to die,” he pronounced. “Eat too much.”

  “That they do,” I had to agree with them. “Question for you, Tim. Do you know how to help other monugas grow up? There’s no need for you to be all alone.”

  He was silent for a long while, looking at the sunset. “Need magic,” he finally said. “Lots of magic. Have to eat lots of magic, get stronger inside, as well as outside. Kids have problems eating that much magic. Too much, get sick and die. Too little, not get strong enough, do nothing. Tim see many children die in magic place, trying to get stronger and failing.”

  “Is this magic place a secret? I understand if you do not want to share it, and will not make you answer.”

  He deliberated on that for a long moment. “Tell little lady user of magic. Tell no one else?”

  “Sword princess will have to know, but she likes Tim.”

  He hummed deep in his chest, puffing up slightly. “Magic place is mushroom forest, across the water.” He pointed west, towards the setting sun and the Direlands beyond. “Must eat the mushrooms. Lots and lots of the mushrooms.”

  “Huh.” Magic giant mushrooms made Tremendous Monugas. Who would have thought that?

  Bringing back a race of Jotuns might not be too wise, but the gromnatross/dragons were already back, so what was one more uber species joining us, especially natives who might be allies?

  I considered the setting sun as it went down, and what our next moves were going to be.

  ============================

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