Chapter 329: William Oh: Matchmaker Extraordinaire

“You were born in this mountain, and you’ll die in this mountain! Just like my grandfather and his grandfather before him!” the wrinkly old gnome said, the patches on his brilliant silk clothes underscoring their intended grandeur.

“…What about your grandfather’s father?” Mong asked.

Father screwed a thick old-man fingernail into Mong’s forehead.

“He got turned into paste because he stepped outside trying to ‘explore’!” Father said, twisting the fingernail between Mong’s brows. “And now you’re trying to follow in his footsteps!”

“But father, we’re out of nearly every non-scrappable ingredient. Blessed steel is down twenty percent from two generations ago! Our miasma converter is limping along at forty-percent power! We’re running it broken and treating it like a faberge egg but sooner or later it’s gonna crack! We need new resources! If I can just time the deployments I could go out there and-”

“If we’re running low on everything, you can bet your ass that they’re running dry too. We don’t have to get new resources, we just have to outlast them.” Father said, taking his finger away from Mong’s forehead.

“What if they send someone out and they bring back new resources?” Mong asked

“Fat chance.” Father said. “Nothing can live out there, not even the gods themselves. Anyway, clear the hangar, you’re going to foul up the next deployment.”

“But-“

Knock, Knock, Knock.

“The Abyss was that?” Father grunted, his neck stiffening at the sudden banging sound coming from the hangar door.

“Sounded like a knock.” Mong said, much to his father’s ire.

“It’s not a knock, because nothing could possibly be alive out there.”

Father’s eyes widened suddenly, a flicker of recognition in his eyes. “Surprise attack! Deploy Big Bertha and Nancy! You thought you could sneak your way in between deployments didn’t you, but you’re about to learn why-”

“Milord, something just slipped in through Nancy’s deployment bay!” One of the station wizards said as he skidded to a halt in front of Father.

“…What?” Father’s wrinkled face went even paler as the blood drained from his skin.

Knock, knock, knock.

The return of the strange knocking sound ushered in a deathly quiet.

RRRRR.

“Something took control of the local Miasma and activated the hangar bay door!” another station wizard said, panting as he arrived in the hanger.

“I can see that.” Father said, even as Mong craned his neck to peer out at the sight of natural light that only a rare few deployment and recovery wizards ever got to see.

Father already knew the door couldn’t be reversed until it had

“Cut the cable! And bring in…The Last Stand!”

“We salvaged it last year, Father.” Mong said.

“Fuck! Well, what do we have!?” Father shouted, spinning to scan the empty hangar with bloodshot eyes. “It can’t end like this!”

“We have about half a dozen Stingers ready to go, Milord,” One of the wizards said.

The bright light strained Mong’s eyes, but even with that, he could see several pairs of oversized feet revealed by the slowly rising hangar bay.

“Umm, guys? I don’t think those feet belong to the Juniper sect.” Mong said, but his voice was drowned by the alarms, the whine of the hangar door, and the shouting of rapid preparations for battle.

“Gather all the combat wizards, and on my signal unleash HELL!” Father spoke, his fists crackling with energy as he drew Charge into the tattoos that Mother had carved into his flesh.

It was nearly impossible to accurately tattoo spells into one own skin, so it had become something of a marriage ritual. A child had temporary spells inscribed into their skin by their parents, their teachers, but the permanent ones were performed by the spouse, and it was how families became one: Sharing hidden spells that were only passed down matrilineally.

Naturally Mong wasn’t married yet, so his tattoos were temporary ones his mother had inscribed for him.

All the same, he pulled in Charge and waited with bated breath like the others as the doors continued their slow rise.

“Send in the stingers!” Father shouted, and an instant later, a half-dozen of the tiny self-detonating drones shot over his head and streaked towards the figures standing silhouetted in the glaring natural light of day.

The stingers exploded before they ever made it to their targets.

“FIRE!”

Lightning, beams of light, fluttering fish made of raw magic, all flickered out of the assembled combat wizard’s hands and shot forward in the blink of an eye.

The spells dispersed halfway to their target, becoming reduced to meaningless miasma and Charge that raised the temperature and warped the surrounding steel hangar bay with its transmutative power.

Through it all, the figures didn’t move. Though the acrid smell of burned rubber made his eyes water, Mong adjusted to the light and he was able to make out the centermost figure.

It was an unnaturally tall gnomoid creature with a featureless mask and a small one-handed axe on its belt.

At its side was a similarly tall creature with black pebbled skin, wings folded over it’s shoulders and a sharp-toothed grin.

The one in the center raised its hand, drawing their attention to it.

“Greetings.” The creature spoke, and suddenly the entire hangar reverberated with its voice. “We come in peace.”

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It’s replicating the vibration of its voice to the surroundings using some simple linking and atmospheric Charge.

It was a simple trick, but it was effective.

“SHOOT THEM AGAI-“ Father began shouting before his words were interrupted by Mong’s tackle.

Mong wrapped his hand over Father’s mouth and shouted.

“WAIT!”

Every eye in the hangar turned towards him, even the faceless mask. It seemed as thought it might pin him in place at any second, like a collected insect. The image sent a shiver down his spine.

“Welcome, foreign wizards, may we ask the purpose of your visit!?” Mong asked, practically shouting to make sure his voice cut through the din.

“We were hoping to remove the miasma converter you have set up on the Key Site.” The central creature said, causing everyone to stiffen.

Is it asking us to die!? Mong thought, frowning.

“Temporarily, of course!” The oversized creature hastily amended, holding out it’s hands. “We need to remove the converter from the Key Site to earn passage to the next Floor.”

“I’m sorry, but we absolutely cannot do that.” Mong said over his father’s muffled protests. “If we remove the converter form the stream it will go cold. If it goes cold, several key components will solidify and may never be useable again.”

“They said the same thing.” The black-skinned one with the long muzzle full of sharp teeth said.

“They did indeed.” The featureless mask spoke, stroking a bit of beard jutting from the bottom of it’s mask. “What should we do? I don’t want to just kill them, and there aren’t any monsters to take their place. This place could become impassable if we upset the balance.”

“You spoke to the Juniper Clan!?” Father asked, shoving Mong’s hand away from his lips

“Yes?” The featureless mask spoke. “Oh, introductions, my apologies. My name is William Oh, this is Loth the Luminary, Travis Oilton, Bethany Stokes, Jorn Hreinnson. Our other friend, Mason Lanover is waiting elsewhere because it would be bad if he got shot by the wrong thing.”

“Did you see inside their base?” Father asked. “How many-MMMPH.” Mong physically overpowered his older father as the other wizard looked on with discomfort.

“Nice to meet you, but as we’ve established, we cannot remove the converter from the key site, for any reason. If the machine cools and become unusable, we will die, without a doubt. We cannot take that risk. If you try to force us, we will fight to the death to stop you.” Mong said.

“They said the same thing.” Loth said.

“That they did.” William Oh said.

“Can you kill the juniper clan for us!?” Father said, prying away Mong’s hand. “We’ll pay you with whatever we have if you just disable their miasma converter.”

“They said that too.” William Oh said, musing. The mask’s tilt shifted slightly down, and Mong sensed that the creature’s gaze had landed on the tattoos on his father’s forearm.

“How about a deal? Give us the recipe for those tattoos, and we’ll disable the juniper clan’s converter.” William Oh said.

“Umm…those tattoos are passed down matrilineally through marriage, so asking us for them is a bit…” Mong said, mind working furiously. There were only a handful of marriageable young gnomes and none of them would be interested in marrying a giant.

They might be convinced if they believed it would win The War, but the belief that it could never be won was so deeply ingrained in their people it was almost a fantasy. Only the upper leadership and Mong understood how furiously they were dancing on the edge of a blade. Any day, any minute, the converter might finally give up the ghost and the Juniper clan could just walk in and slaughter them all.

“Marriage? They did not say that.” Loth said, rubbing her chin.

“So you’re the leader, and you’re his son?” William Oh asked, gesturing between Mong and his father.

“…Yes?” Mong asked, tensing. If he and Father died, their clan would likely collapse, and such probing questions set him on edge.

“And your concern is primarily winning the war between the Flock clan and the Juniper clan?” William Oh asked.

“Absolutely.”

“And you don’t care what underhanded methods you have to use to do it?” Will asked.

“Damn right.” Father said.

I have an idea.” William Oh said, raising a finger.

With a single gesture, an irresistible force cocooned Mong’s torso and neck before it swept him out of the front of the hangar, carrying him up into the air at a speed that beggared belief.

Between panicked shrieks, Mong was able to spot the most recent deployment, torn apart and scattered around the valley. Both sides had lost their entire standing army and salvage drones. A cornucopia to whichever Clan could take advantage of it.

Is he going to sell me to the juniper clan as a hostage.? It won’t work. There’s simply not enough leeway to pay anything to buy me back, and it certainly won’t stop them from fighting for their lives. There’s no use for hostages at this point. It’s simply a death sentence.

“It’s not gonna work, we can’t afford to-“

“Shhh…” the featureless mask raised a finger to where its lips should be.

An instant later, an unknown gnome arrived shrieking beside Mong, her hair windswept and eyes wide with terror.

Her stunned expression and disheveled appearance matched Mong’s point-for-point.

Her clothes were of similar quality to his, but he didn’t recognize her face. The colors of the heraldry on her robe was-

“Juniper!” Mong said.

“Flock!” She hissed, baring her teeth and trying to kick him through the invisible restraints.

Up in the sky where no one could disturb their conversation, William Oh reclined above them on a throne of compressed air, while Loth the Luminary stepped through a wrinkle in the fabric of space, sitting beside him.

“I see.” Loth the Luminary said with a mischievous grin.

“You see…what?” Mong and the unknown Juniper wretch asked, echoing each other.

“Why don’t you two get married?” William Oh asked, leaning back imperiously as he looked down at them.

“We can’t get married!” the two protested immediately.

“Why not?” Loth asked innocently.

“Because they’re from the Flock/Juniper Clan!” They shouted as one, gesticulating wildly.

“I overheard you saying that your resources are dwindling to nearly nothing.” William Oh said, making Mong break out in a cold sweat. How in the world did this monster hear that? Even worse it said it aloud in front of the Juniper clan scion. If the Juniper Clan knew their rivals were holding on by a thread…

He glanced over and could see victory written all over her face.

“And you only have a couple dozen members of your clan still alive, presumably because of a large-scale carbon monoxide incident that killed most of them a few years ago,” Will said, pointing at the Juniper woman, who paled as her clan’s weakness was revealed.

That’s not even enough people to run the base’s defenses. We could storm them with our combat wizards between deployments and win this war easily!

“Aha!” Mong said, trying to kick her back.

“However, unlike the Flock Clan your inner base defenses are solid. They’d never take it, but with only a few women and elderly remaining, the clan will die out in a generation. About the same time the Flock Clan’s converter breaks and plunges them into darkness.” Will said. “So why not…”

William Oh interlaced his fingers.

“Get married and solve everyone’s problems? If the two clans are no longer at war, then you can afford to take the converters offline for maintenance. You get a young man, and you can acquire new resources to keep your clan going.” Will said, pointing between the two of them as he spoke.

Mong glanced over at the young woman, startling when he saw her looking straight back at him.

“Well…he’s not a complete homunculus.” She said with a haughty shrug.

Kind of reminds me of my mom. The thought rose to mind unbidden.

“Excellent! Here’s the deal: I broker a marriage between the two of you and an exchange of vital supplies, and in exchange, the Flock clan temporarily removes their converter for maintenance, and I provide protection until it’s back in place.”

Mong raised a hand, prompting William Oh to point at him.

“Why us?” Mong asked. “Why do you care? There’s at least three other clans in other mountains. Why do you feel the need to interfere with us? No offense intended, sir, but you could force any of the others to obey.”

“Those other three clans are dead.” William Oh said.

“W-what?” Mong asked. “They send out their deployments against each other every day, just like us.”

“It’s automated,” William Oh explained. “The converters are still running, the machines are still fighting, still building more of themselves, but the bunkers themselves are filled with nothing but skeletons. You two clans are the last ones left, and I felt obligated to do something.”

“I know my family’s spell tattoos.” The juniper woman said, glancing over at Mong.

“…I’ll need my mother’s agreement for this.” Mong said.

The binds around the Juniper woman loosened her and she dropped with a squeak onto an invisible platform of compressed air, her limbs wobbling from adrenaline as she stood up.

A minute later, Mong heard his mother shrieking in panic, voice growing rapidly closer.

Gods above, I’m never going to hear the end of this. Mong thought, breaking out in a cold sweat as his mother arrived, gaze locked on him, her face turning purple.