"This is... not where I thought we were going..." Amunet said after a long while.
She had been forced to keep her mouth shut on the way here for fear of a fly flying into it or something. At these speeds, that was a real possibility, and she wouldn’t even realize until it had already hit the back of her throat.
Well, that and she was pissed that they really did have no choice but to cling on Grey. Mauve climbed in front of him and was better off, but Amunet got the shit seat in the back and could only cling onto his waist.
Then there was Brad who was stuck even further back, and he just accepted his fate and pulled out a rope to tie himself to the seat. His arms were long enough to wrap around both Grey and Amunet at the same time, but he thought better of it after they both gave him a glare.
"What do you mean?" Grey asked with a grin.
"I bought a map of the general location of the last part of the Lineage. This place is practically in the opposite direction."
"Oh, that’s because this isn’t for the Lineage just yet. I came to pick something else up real quick."
The location was deep within a maze of ruins. But compared to everywhere else, these ruins looked... mighty different.
Rather than dilapidated stone and broken pillars, there were instead sparking electric lines and what looked like torn conduit. It was like cyberpunk and what was left of ancient Rome came together and had a very ugly baby.
"You want to enter this ruin? It’s strong." Amunet said after a bit of hesitation.
"I just need to fight something. Shouldn’t take too long."
Amunet hesitated again.
"Just speak. It’s not gonna kill you." Grey said with a yawn.
"I have an item that tells me how dangerous an Instance or ruin will be before I step into it."
Grey raised an eyebrow. Now that he thought about it, Amunet seemed to have a lot of things on her person that didn’t seem to be hidden away in her inventory like it should have been.
For example, he hadn’t seen Mon Frere in her inventory at all the first time he purged the whole thing.
"What level is that item?" Grey asked.
"What? Are you going to steal it from me too?"
"Maybe? And what of it?"
Mauve and Brad stood to the side after climbing off the bike. They gave each other a look, and then looked back at Grey and Amunet, then back toward one another.
"You can see the sexual tension too, right?"
Mauve’s lip twitched and she pretended like she hadn’t heard what Brad said. She would prefer to not comment on a minor’s love life, no matter how obvious it was.
"It’s a Legendary item." Amunet said through gritted teeth.
Grey chuckled. "Man, you sure collected a lot of good items. I get backstabbing does have its perks."
"Anyway, just listen to me. The item is Legendary so it’s smarter than you think it is. It’s factoring in all of us, and it’s still saying that this is too dangerous to attempt."
"Mmm." Grey nodded. "Well, I only have two weeks to clear this thing—well, less time now. So I’m not going to wait around for it. Also..."
Grey looked out into the distance. "Your item might be right, but I don’t think it’s referring to what you think it’s referring to. Good luck, and try not to die."
"What?"
Before Amunet could get an answer from Grey, the bike had vanished and he had entered the ruins.
If she had read the introduction of Grey’s quest like he had, she would probably have a pretty good guess of what Grey was referring to.
—
Operation: The Call of the Mechanical Jaw Spirit
Quest Rank: Legendary
Mission Type: Retrieval
Objective: Retrieve the Mechanical Jaw Spirit
Description: ...
Rewards: Full access to the Mechanical Lineage Tome. Mechanical Jaw Spirit.
Note: The Spirit has spent too long without a master and it loses energy every day it must fight off those it deems unworthy. Time is running out. Time remaining: 13:23:59:53
—
That note in specific was what made Grey pretty sure of what would happen here. If the Spirit was fighting off those it deemed unworthy, then that meant that people frequented this region specifically for it.
And considering where they were on his map, Grey was pretty sure that those "people" came from the nearby city, a city that probably had its own group of Holy Knights. And if the Holy Knights Grey had known were anything like him.
They hated the Savage Races.
Had he planned this out to make Amunet’s life a living hell? Of course not. He would never do such a thing.
Did he seem like a petty man?
Amunet stiffened when a few powerful auras entered the range of her senses.
"Shit." Her head turned toward Brad and Mauve. "I hope you two can fight. Otherwise, stay out of the way and don’t get killed. I don’t need another tsunami of backstabbing jokes."
...
Grey chuckled to himself as he strolled into the ruin. Despite his nonchalance, his Resonant Sense was focused on the region, trying to pick out any changes.
He didn’t actually know how Amunet’s treasure worked, but even if it was intelligent, it wasn’t like it could guess he’d leave Amunet stranded outside. That wouldn’t just be being intelligent, it would be seeing the future.
That was to say that the treasure thought that even if Amunet and Grey worked together against the Mechanical Jaw Spirit, they would probably lose.
Now that... intrigued Grey.
Was the Mechanical Jaw Spirit really that powerful?
A roar hit Grey in a wave of heat, whipping winds, and the scent of rot.
Grey’s eyes sharpened, but then just as quickly widened.
’What the... Actual fuck is that...?’
Grey didn’t know how else to describe it other than to say that the Mechanical Jaw Spirit... looked like if a member of Great Udon’s Race had begun to decompose.
A floating zombie mask of flailing pieces of rotten skin appeared before Grey.