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Giant Treasure

Chapter One: The Orb of Time

In an old tunnel beneath the giant and ancient city of Gigantpaplis, a chaotic player is looking around the old passageways for any signs of dangerous traps by using her red scanner as a flashlight to see through the pitch black tunnels.

Her name is Mary and right now she is hoping to find some kind of new (or rather old) battle gear that could boost up her deck's power.

She had a lot of native American blood in her family, making her skin have a brownish tint to it. But Mary was too pale, and her facial features looked more European than native American for people to think she came from the old native tribes of North America. Standing at 5'6 tall and weighing 180 pounds, her body was in good shape. She had long, black hair with a streak of purple in it and a pair of bright green eyes. Her outfit was a simple green T-shirt, blue jeans, and brown boots.

She also had a large, black backpack filled with supplies that could last three days for her scan quest. Even though her scan quest was only supposed to be an all-day thing, she knew that more often than not scan quests don't always turn out as planned (a lesson Mary had learned the hard way back when she was a newbie). She had sworn on her scanner to never again go to Gloommuck Swamp without an extra pair a boots and air freshener.

Considering all the gross cobwebs, dust, and the unbearable stench (which Mary had no idea where it was coming from) it must have been a very long time since anybody had come down here. Or maybe someone or something did come down here and whatever bit of them that's left is what's making the gross smell.

"Man, there's nothing to scan down here." she whined, unhappy for walking for hours and only seeing cobwebs. She was starting to get very bored of this solo scan quest. She hasn't even seen or triggered a trap for two whole hours. "Maybe, I should just go home." she told herself. "And maybe I shouldn't talk to myself like a weirdo."

Thinking it over for a second, she decided it would be better to go to Chaotic and find someone to battle with than to stay there and keep running into cobwebs. And also, to get someone to talk to before she makes it a habit of talking to no one.

She was about to hit the return button on her scanner but stopped when something shiny on the ground caught her eye. She pointed her scanner's light at it.

Laying on the ground was this odd looking orb that kind of looked like the battle gear called a flux bauble but smaller and its chain was longer.

She picked it up by the chain to get a closer look at the thing.

It looked to be made out of gold and silver, and the orb encased inside the precious metals was constantly changing colors. It was pretty in her opinion, but she didn't care how it looked as long as it could provide something useful for her chaotic team.

"Well, better than nothing I guess." she mumbled, then held up her scanner in front of it and pressed the scanning button. Several small beams of blue lights shined from her scanner to capture the code and data on the odd thing.

When it was done, she looked at the card. "Orb of Time," she mumbled, thinking to herself. She never heard of a battle gear with that name before, but that really didn't surprise her all that much considering that it's probably very old.

What does it do, is the question she needs to answer.

"Okay the name obviously means it has something to do with time, but what?" she asked herself. She knew there were some mugix and location scans that could affect time and space, but she has never heard of a battle gear having power involving time.

She put her scanner away then looked at the strange item again, trying to find something about it that could give her a clue as to what it did. Turning it around a few times, she spotted a very tiny crack. It was so small; she was surprised she saw it in the first place.

Suddenly it began to glow a bright yellow and blue color, then a blinding light surrounded her.

In one second the bright light came and went away. She opened her eyes to see that nothing happened, she was still in the exact same spot that she was in and all the dust and cobwebs were still there. She didn't feel any different and all her limbs were still attached to her body.

"Must be broken or something." she said, thinking the tiny crack may be the reason for it not working.

Not wanting to waste any more of her time down in the underground tunnels, she walked back up towards where she came from. Since she has found something in the tunnels, she thought her luck on this scan quest was turning around for the better. With her mood turning better, she thought she could find something else above ground where there were no cobwebs to get into her hair and fresh air to breathe.

Still having the odd bauble thing in her hands, she thought she might be able to trade it to a creature as jewelry for a scan. It could turn out to be very valuable even with the tiny crack and she could get a great price for it. She already scanned the thing, so now it was only useful for trading.


After two hours of walking, she suddenly stopped dead in her tracks. Something was not right.

When she first came this way there was a trap that she stepped on by accident. The trap was a simple net but had a shock to it when you touched it. She was able to dodge it when it felled from the ceiling and she had left it there on the floor not wanting to touch it and get shocked. But now the net was no longer there.

She knew that she left the net there, because she remembered the weird stone pig's head that was on the wall next to the trap. It was the only statue between where she found the odd bauble thing and where she was standing now.

That put all of her senses on high alert. Three possibilities came to her mind: one, the trap can reset itself; two, a creature could have come by and took the net and three, a creature reset the net for some reason. There was only one way to find out which one was right.

She quickly stepped on the trigger plate and was barely able to dodge the net the second time. The net was much faster, which struck her as very odd. If she was able to dodge it the first time without knowing about it, then the second time should have been easier. Thinking it over, she decided that a creature must have come and reset it, but this time making it faster.

She looked back at the net, the electrical charge looked more powerful and possibly more deadly. She shuddered to think what could have happened to her if the net had caught her.

This scan quest was a total bust, so far the only thing that she found was that odd bauble thing that didn't even work and now there was possibly a creature who might want her dead, walking around in the old tunnels. Not wanting to meet the creature who reset the trap or waste any more of her time down in the dark and smelly tunnels, she transported her code to an Overworld city that had one of the largest shopping and trading centers in all of Perim. Maybe she could find a creature willing to trade something for the battle gear.


She transported just outside the city on a grassy hill-side where she could see the entire city with its stone buildings, a few small fields where the farmers grew the crops, and all the creatures who were out walking to their homes and businesses.

As she was admiring the view, she noticed that something about it looked different to her, but she couldn't put her finger on it. She has been here many times before and knew the city well. So she would be able to tell if there was something wrong with the city or if there was something amiss with the creatures who lived here.

She quickly spotted the main dirt road that would lead her directly to the city's front gates. The road had a few creatures on it either going or coming from the city, which was normal even though most cities in Perim didn't have that much foot traffic. It looked like most of the creatures were riding in wagons, some were on animals, and then there was the few like her that were walking on foot to the city.

She was not too far from the main road, maybe a two-minute walk at the most. But since she was in a hurry, she ran the distance, cutting the two-minute walk into just one minute.

Getting onto the road, she began to slow down to catch her breath.

As she was walking towards the city, she kept thinking of how it felt different. It looked the same, but something was definitely different with the Overworld city. She was too deep in thought to notice that all the creatures around her were giving her strange looks.

She finally got to the city and by this time she began to notice that all the creatures were staring at her. The looks she was getting did not really bother her all that much. She was used to creatures staring at her because they have never seen a human before, but she never got this kind of reaction from creatures in this city before.

It's not that uncommon for creatures not to know about or to never have seen a human before, but in this city Chaotic players were very well known so she was unsure why they would be looking at her like she was some kind of an alien (well she was technically an alien, but still that didn't mean they should stare at her). The realization of what was different about the city hit her like a ton of bricks dropping onto her head.

There were no chaotic players anywhere in sight. Of course, not seeing a single human in many of Perim's locations was not odd, but at this city you can find dozens of humans walking around the streets daily.

Chaotic players always come here to trade treasures they find in Perim; the creatures in the city were used to Chaotic players coming and going, they never had stared at her like this before.

The looks were really starting to bother her now and part of her wanted to hide somewhere, but she still wanted to go looking around the city to see if there were any other players there.

"This weird bauble must have something to do with this, but what did it do?" she thought while holding up the battle gear. Now that she was certain that the thing did do something, trading it for a scan was now the farthest thing from her mind. "It may be a good idea to port back to Chaotic till I figure out what's going on. I just pray that nothing weird has happened to Perim."

She didn't want to transport where every creature around her could see, so she calmly walked to a back alley where no creatures were around. She got out her scanner. But before she could press the return button, the ground began to shake like an 8.5 earthquake on the MMS scale.

Buildings began to crumble and fall, even the sturdier ones were collapsing. It was like the buildings were made out of cards instead of stone. Creatures were screaming in panic and running for their lives. Children were calling out for their parents, and friends were trying to find each other. No one knew what to do. Earthquakes never happen in this part of the Overworld, so there were no plans of emergencies for earthquakes. Everything had turned chaotic in only a few seconds.

Thinking fast, Mary tried to transport out of danger, but then a piece of rubble fell from one of the buildings and hit her on the head. It was not a very big piece, so the worst she could have gotten was a mild concussion.

Though a concussion was far from being her worst problem right now. When the rubble had hit her, she dropped her scanner and now she cannot see it.

Not only that but explosions began to go off and from the sound of the blasts, they couldn't be too far away from where she was at.

This could no longer be called an earthquake. The city was under attack. But by who or why Mary didn't know nor was she thinking about that. Leaving was the only thing on her mind.

She needed to find her scanner, it was the only thing that mattered right now, and it could possibly be the only thing that will get her out of this mess.

She was scared out of her mind. Her arms and legs were shaking from fear, and she was having a very hard time thinking straight. Mary, of course, has went through many situations just as scary as this one, but the fear of death never goes away no matter how many times she has escaped danger. Being a Chaotic player meant running into very grim situations every now and again while in Perim, but that does not mean players get use to all the deadly chaos.

Frantically looking around, she saw her scanner in the street a few feet away, but creatures kept kicking it around as they tried to get to safety. If they kept on kicking it so much, then it could soon break. Mary had no idea what would happen to a player if their only way home breaks, and she didn't want to find out.

She ran after it, bumping into creatures left and right. The creatures were running in the opposite direction of where she was trying to go making it feel like she was swimming up the Niagara waterfall.

Now that she was closer to the explosions, she could see why all the creatures were going the other way. Just up ahead there were Underworld soldiers firing at the citizens.

So it was the Underworlders attacking!

Looking up she saw Takinom attacking from the sky. But there was something odd with the way she looked. For some reason she looked much younger. She looks closer to the age of her adopted daughter Nivenna.

Mary didn't think too long on Takinom's new youthful look. She was in danger and needed to think only on escaping.

Suddenly, a massive red demon came out of nowhere and picked her up by grabbing her backpack.

"I've never seen a creature like you before." said Chaor. Mary has never been so frightened in her life. The most powerful Underworlder was inches away from her face, looking at her as if she was a bug to be squashed when he lost his curiosity.

"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" She repeated in her head, thinking how badly screwed over she was.

Chaor, like Takinom, looked younger by years, but Mary was too scared to notice; even looking younger, Chaor was still very intimidating.

"P-please let me go, Chaor." she pleaded. Chaor looked surprised at what she said, but she didn't know why. She thought he liked it when weaker creatures begged for their lives, at least that's what she heard from all the stories players talk about back in Chaotic.

"How do you know my name?" he growled. Mary was frowning because of what he asked. It didn't make sense. Everyone in Perim and Chaotic knew who Chaor was and what he looked like. Why would he be surprised that a chaotic player knew who he was?

"How can I not know of the all-powerful Ruler of the Underworld Tribe." she said, hoping to please his massive ego a little bit and maybe buy her some more time.

Chaor's face turned from questioning to dumbfounded.

Before he could say something else, a Power Pulse attack hit him in the back, making him drop Mary on to the cold, hard ground. Since Chaor was holding her up about eight feet off the ground, the fall really hurt, but the good news was now she spotted her scanner ten feet away next to a fallen house. Whoever it was that attacked Chaor, saved Mary's life and distracted him long enough for her to get up and run as fast as she could to reach her scanner.

It felt like an eternity, running through all the chaos and dodging the fire attacks from the Underworlders, but then she finally got to her scanner and quickly picked it up off the ground. She swiftly pushed the button, not even looking or caring what location it was set for and transported out of there in a blink of an eye.

Little did she know of the giant consequences that her slight intervention with the attack on the city has made in Perim and in Chaotic.


Her scanner was still set for the city, but it did transport her to a much safer place than where she had been at. She had transported to the same spot that she first transported to - the mountain side. But, seeing what was happening to the city and its inhabitants made her wish she could have transported anywhere else. Even an Underworld prison would have been better.

The city looked like an inferno. Underworld troops surrounded the entire city, there was no way anyone could escape the flaming city of death. She could hear the screams of pain from the poor unfortunate citizens who were being slaughtered by the hundreds and she could smell the burning of flesh all the way to where she was standing.

Seeing that there was nothing she could do and unable to look at the massacre any longer, she took out her scanner to transport back to Chaotic. Before she could press the button, the weird bauble began to glow again.

"Oh shit!" she yelled in surprise, as she reached for it, trying to stop it from whatever it was about to do, but it was too late. The bright light engulfed her body like before and just like the last time it went away as fast as it came.

Her eyes were shut tight, too afraid to open them, but even though she couldn't see, she could still hear and smell. All the screams were gone and were replaced with calm sounds of the wind and faint sounds coming from the city. The wind didn't carry any scent of fires or smoke.

She slowly opened her eyes to see that the city was back to normal and there were no signs that just seconds ago it was a blazing death trap. No Underworld troops could have been seen and all the creatures that she could see looked perfectly fine.

The Underworld invasion was over, or it looked more like it never happened in the first place.

"Great I must be losing my mind. No more eating week old pizza for me." she said, half-jokingly, but the tone of fear was undeniably heard in her voice. She was very shaken up about what she had seen, but she managed to pull herself together.

She had no idea what happened, one minute the whole location was in war the next everything was peaceful. She wanted answers and the only way to get them was to go back down to the city (though she really didn't want to go back down there after what happened).

Putting the strange bauble in her backpack for safe keeping, she made her way to the city.

The walk back to the city was more like running, but in her opinion, it might as well have been walking; she wanted to get there quickly, and her legs just were not fast enough for her taste. After a minute of running, she was out of breath, but at least she was finally at the city again.

The creatures were giving her the same stares as before, but Mary did not care about that anymore; she just wanted to know what was going on.

Sitting down at a table, eating lunch, was an elderly creature who looked like a dog with a scrunched up face. He saw Mary across the streets and noticed how she was looking around like something was going to jump out and attack her. He thought she was strange looking, but over the years he has seen many things and knew not to judge a creature on their looks alone.

Standing up and abandoning his food, the old creature walked over to her, "Excuse me young creature is there something I can help you with?" he politely asked. he wasn't the type to help out people in distress, but to him and other creatures, Mary looked very young. Young enough to still be called a helpless child.

Mary was surprised at first but was glad that someone might be able to answer her questions.

"Yes, thank you, Mr... " she began to say but trailed off when she realized she didn't know his name.

"You may call me, Glorot." The name sounded funny like a word some kid would make up to name a toad, but she didn't laugh. Many names in Perim are odd. Then again maybe human names are odd to creatures so she really shouldn't judge.

"Okay Glorot. Umm, well I was wondering if there was an attack by the Underworld army recently." she asked, hoping she didn't sound like a nutcase. He gave her a look that told her that she probably did sound a lot like a nutcase.

"No, there has not been an attack on the city by the Underworld for quite a long time now." he answered her. Glorot looked confused by her question, but Mary was thinking too much to notice.

"How long ago has it been since the last attack?" she asked, not sure if she even wanted to hear the answer.

"It's been eighty solans." he told her. Mary was having a really hard time processing what Glorot was saying. Eighty solans is around forty years. How is that possible? Just a few minutes ago the whole city was a flaming death trap. She stopped thinking of this bizarre situation for a second to see that Glorot was staring at her, probably waiting for her to say something else.

"Thank you, Glorot for your help. I'll leave you now, sorry for any inconvenience I caused you." she politely said.

"It was no trouble. If you need anything please just find me, my shop is only two streets away from here, and I'll try my best to help you."

"Well, thanks again for all the help." she said, then walked away.

The creatures around her kept looking at her, but she ignored them as she was thinking over the new information she got.

If what Glorot had told her was true then that left two possibilities: first, she somehow went back in time and possibly came back to the present or another different time and: second, would be that the Underworld attack she saw didn't really happen and it was all just some kind of hallucination. But the hallucination idea wouldn't explain everything that was happening unless she was still hallucinating.

Stopping, she just thought of a simple way to find out if she was or wasn't hallucinating. All she had to do was simply transport her code back to Chaotic! That way whatever mind control or unknown influence that is affecting her would go away once her code was safely transported there. She knew it had to work, because that's how some of the players were able to break free of the M'arriallian's mind control.

Not caring anymore if the creatures see her transport away, she quickly pushed the return button. Instantly her Chaotic body turned into blue code then vanished, giving the creatures who saw her disappear a slight heart attack.