Chapter 21: Flyntling Gun

Flynt cackled maniacally as his contraption spit lead into the sky. The Roc’s warcry cut off abruptly as it dove for a goblin and was quickly riddled with bullets.

Blood erupted from the impacts as the bird crashed into the ground. Stray bullets from Flynt’s Gatling Gun sent puffs of dust into the sky. The goblins ran screaming from the wagon and away from the bird.

“Run while you can!” Flynt cackled maniacally as the gatling gun released a tide of death into the back of the retreating goblins, cutting them all down in the field.

I decided to keep my sword out.

Flynt kept cranking until the shots stopped, then sighed and leaned back.

“Thanks for the help!” He said. “Those damn birds get smarter and smarter!”

Flynt was bald, his head reflecting the light that made it through the cloud cover above. His face was sweaty; the area on top of his cart was burning hot with the release of steam behind us. The ends of his gatling gun, too, were red hot and distorting the air around them. He had a large, bushy mustache, and he fiddled with the ends of it below large, boxy goggles.

“No problem?” I asked, not putting my sword away.

“The damn bird swept down and damaged my wagon while I was in the field! Was using me to bait out goblins here and hunt them.” Flynt snorted. “The diaspora from Spearpoint left these wilds painfully under managed. Monsters slipping in everywhere. But this bad boy here is the solution!”

Flynt slapped the top of his Gatling gun.

“A… gatling gun.” I said. “What does it do?”

“No! Not a Gatling Gun! I call this a Flyntling Gun. Damn system named it something silly. I have no idea why!” Flynt played with his mustache. “I’m going to sell them for a hundred gold a piece. Get them installed along the wall. Enough of them and even non-combat classes will be able to bring down Titans! Not to mention what will happen once the users start getting related classes. Imagine! A Flyntling Gunner class!”

Flynt gestured wildly.

“I see.” I said, leaning backwards away from the mad man. He was far too enthusiastic about his product. “I hope that goes well.”

“Apologies, my boy, did you need a ride to the Titanfall dungeon?” Flynt asked.

“I got lost in the woods. Saw the Roc I was hunting harassing you and — ”

“Ah! The Roc. You should go finish it off before it bleeds out! I’ll get this pipe fixed and then I can give you a ride.”

I turned and looked at the bird. It was still breathing in the field. I took another look at Flynt’s Gatling gun, but jumped off and headed for the bird. I didn’t think the man had any ill intent.

In the worse case, I would just use my movement technique to run. I still kept a close eye on Flynt as I approached the corpse. I stopped entirely as I watched Flynt grab hold of the burning hot pipe that had been shooting a cloud of steam into the air. Then he squeezed the pipe shut with his bare hands, bending the metal and rolling his hands over it until no steam leaked out.

He flicked water from his now wet hands and turned to smile at me.

“Damn things.” He frowned. “Going to need to forge a whole new pipe now!”

Non-combat classes seemed just as dangerous as combat classes.

I offered him an unsure smile and turned back to finish off the Roc.

The bird had a massive wing span, easily a dozen feet across. It’s body was riddled with wounds leaking blood onto the grass. I could hear its ragged breath.

I walked to the monster’s head to make the kill as quick as painless as possible.

That’s when it snapped up at me. It moved so quick I almost failed to perceive it. Then it started to hobble up onto its legs.

I brought my sword down, stabbing the creature in the head. It continued to thrash even with the sword embedded in it; I chanelled qi into the shapes of the Anti-Light Herald. Black lightning danced on the edge of my blade. The bird screamed, then stilled.

The blade dripped blood and ichor as I ripped it free.

Then I brought it down again, separating the birds head. From my bag, I pulled one of the little storage cubes free and touched it to the bird’s head. It disappeared. The tiny cube sparkled.

Satisfied, I put the cube away.

“How far away is Spearpoint from here?” I shouted over to Flynt, who was loading up the spilled storage crates onto the wagon.

“Just an hour’s ride! Grab the goblin ear’s and hop on. I’ll take you to the Titanfall dungeon. There’s a road south directly to Spearpoint.”

“The goblins aren’t worth the silver.” I said with a shrug. Then I climbed aboard again. Flynt played with a dozen levers, and then, to my shock, the wagon started rolling forward.

“This is enchanted?” I asked, looking over the side for any indication of the qi-mechanism driving the wagon.

“No, my boy! It’s all mechanical!” Flynt laughed. “Powered by steam and coal. Made more effective by my class!”

Flynt had a big, blocky smile that displayed rows of white teeth.

We trundled into the treeline, the wagon bucking with every minor hill and rut. I expected it to get stuck, but it chugged on faithfully.

“What has you hunting Rocs in the Savage Expanse my boy? Leveling a new skill?” Flynt turned back and forth from the steering wheel of his wagon to me, giving me that gigantic smile. Every time he turned back he had to jerk the wheel to keep us from running into any tree.

“Just leveling.” I replied. My hands maintained a white knuckle grip on the side of the wagon as it bucked and tried its best to throw me off of it. Flynt seemed far too comfortable as the wagon leaned dangerously to either side. One of the crates slid back and forth on the ground until Flynt stuck one of his boots on it.

“Surprised you’re not at the Titanfall dungeon, then. Most people below the first tier get what, ten levels out of those?”

“Did you say ten levels?” I asked. That was more than I had ever gotten from a single source before.

“Yessir, ten levels. I’m on my way now to try to sell the use of this prototype here.” Flynt said, reaching an arm over to slap the end of his Flyntling gun. “I only get levels in my class when other people use my inventions, you see?”

“I see…” I said, staring at the Flyntling gun and seriously considering using it. If I had that, I could probably cut down the entire line of goblins I had ran away from. “I wouldn’t mind trying out your invention, sometime.”

Flynt reminded me of the mortals of my own academies — non-combatants who pursued a Dao all their own. I wondered how useful his invention could be back in the Feng Dynasty.

“Well, for you, I’ll make the fee ten silver for every belt of ammo. It’s not profitable for me, but you did get me out of that situation!” Flynt laughed like his earlier life or death situation was nothing. For all I know, it was; he was nearly level fifty.

“What’s the inside of the dungeon like?” I asked.

“They reflect the person… or thing… what died and created them. Heard this year it was some kind of storm monster. A really big version of the Roc. If only I had made it in time to sell this.” Flynt sighed, eyeing his Flyntling gun before jerking the steering wheel to move the wagon out of the path of another tree.

“Did you say person?”

“Yessir. Any human Titan will leave one too. Damn things will spit out monsters unless someone routinely harvests them or shuts them down. Lots of the guilds have a legacy dungeon or two from their founding members to train their own members in. Course, the Trailblazers is back in the old country and they haven’t locked down any here.”

“I’ve seen a dungeon before. I think I’ll explore this one as well.”

They reminded me of the legacies left behind by cultivators; like the so called precursor dungeon or the one beneath Sandgrave, they were often built to pass down and preserve their legacies and cultivation. But come to think of it, it was odd how often cultivators built them; even cultivators with disciples would often go through immense undertakings to construct these labyrinths later in life.

“Ah — here we go!” Flynt said.

We trundled out of the treeline and into a cleared meadow. The first thing I noticed was the gigantic corpse, a bird that could stretch across a city block — or what remained of it. It looked like it had-half melted and half-crystalized, gigantic open beak large enough for Flynt’s wagon to drive into open on the ground. The inside of it shifted and hurt to look at.

The bird’s bones glittered, silver and white crystalline structures revealed beneath flesh that slowly dessicated as I watched.

There must have been a few hundred people milling about the meadow. In the far distance, I saw someone firing arrows into a troop of goblins trying to intrude into the massive clearing.

The next thing I saw was that this wasn’t a meadow.

Stumps decorated the hillside where the entire jungle had been cut away; a trio of fortresses occupied the space. Two atop distant hills, a third farther away. They were tiny forts, barely the size of a city block, but men and women gathered on their walls. The Titan had been brought low between them.

People were erecting camps and starting bonfires. A wall of wagons made a windbreak around the massive camp, and the wagon stopped bucking as much now that Flynt left the rough game trails behind.

There was an audible pop behind us, then the wagon stopped dead. Flynt turned around, a look of undisguised horror on his face as steam started to pour out of another hole in the pipes.

“Not again.” He said.

“Looks like you need a few more levels in engineer.”