Golden Hand of Luik

"Aaaggh, that sounds so cool too!"

The argument went on between Page and Gror about whos village they should visit first, and it came down to a simple coin flip. Page pulled out a thick, one Styr coin and flipped it.

"Heads, we go to Melanis, tails we go to the Dwarf Village."

"Our village is called First Dwarven because we were the initial village that the other dwarf villages nearby broke off from."

"Okay, tails we go to First Dwarven."

The coin landed on the ground, bounced a few times, and rolled onto a picture of a man's face.

Page triumphantly said, "yesss~!" as Gror slumped down. But Page cheered him up by telling him that Melanis was on the path to First Dwarven so they were getting close to it either way, which cheered Gror up considerably.

They informed Alba of their intention to leave and Alba asked them to stay just a bit longer. She wanted to show them what the arrow in the Hidden Chamber could really do. They went down the path again, Zeeth reliving his most recent nightmare. The light in the room was a bit dimmer and he noticed the walls were a lot barer. Nearly all of the artifacts had been taken down, only a few had been left. The massive metal bow that the string had clung him to was still in the wall with the string. The strings had begun to shrink again, but it was still tightly holding on, one of the strings had apparently been pulled on and it was holding to the edge of the doorway, trying to pull the metal bow out.

"After taking down all those artifacts, we have found that the arrow began to grow thinner as the radius of its kill circle expands. We can now kill things near the shattered judgment stone and still have those count as arrows for feeding this bow. We have one more cow saved up from a recent hunt that we want to sacrifice for Luik here. I believe this last kill should be enough to grant us one more artifact. I want to give you guys the honor of killing the cow."

A cow was brought into the room with them and she handed them a long knife. The hilt was decorated with gems and gold, the blade was a shiny steel color.

After a short debate, Page took the knife and aligned it with the cow's neck. He took one large swing and drove it into its neck with a buff arm and swung it down, giving it a quick, relatively painless death. The blood dribbled down the neck and splashed onto the floor. The arrows that were surrounding the shaft in the middle were joined by another one that materialized out of the cow. All of them sped up, circling the shaft like speeding cars that headed for the middle. They eventually combined together to become one larger, golden arrow and started slowing down again as the sides grew into another shape.

Suddenly, from the side, the metal bow that had been pulled on by the strings had been yanked out of its deep socket and pulled out the door, clearing the walls of any artifacts. The yellow glow from the walls dimmed a bit and then strengthened yet again. Even from outside the cave, a faint yellow glow could be seen.

The golden arrow kept changing but a massive golden hand was reaching out of the shaft that the other arrows swirled out of. The hand grew larger and larger until it could easily grab a person within its palm. The arrow continued changing shape in front of the golden hand as they both grew and they seemed to be sucking in some glowy essence from each other. The arrow finally stopped changing just as the hand stopped growing and became a bright blue bow with string made of a golden thread.

A soft, echoing voice seemed to speak from the hand, "finally, I, the right hand of the Goddess Luik, is released from my bind.

Where would you like to go?"

The glowing faces of all of them there from the golden hands and walls were staring at it. Page broke the silence, asking, "what is going on? How were you released from the spell?"

"After removing all the artifacts created from the same energy were removed from the walls, there were no more dampeners on me. I was free to come out."

Alba asked, "can you tell me what this bow does?"

"Yes."

They waited a few seconds for the hand to answer but it simply held itself there. "So can you tell us?"

"Oh, you wanted an explanation? The language is very different now, things weren't implied before, simply told. The bow grants incredible speed to its holder. However, some power has been siphoned between the two of us and the owner can also teleport short distances when stringing the bow."

"So what's your power?" Zeeth asked.

"The person I am holding can be teleported anywhere within a 40-mile radius or a triple in your speed for a day. My powers can be used thrice a day."

"What happens after that?"

"I power down and wait until I am back to power. More sacrifices will make me stronger."

"Will more artifacts be made?"

"Yes, but if the sacrifices are killed for artifacts, then I won't become stronger."

"Why are you just a hand?"

"Luik was only able to seal the powers of her hand in this bow. There should be others scattered in the world, I just don't know where."

Zeeth suddenly asked Page, "wait, how far away is Melanis?"

"I think it's about 50 miles away."

Alba asked, "Melanis? What that?"

"It's a city full of dark magic and curses."

"It's only 50 miles away, how come I've never heard of it? We even know of Jarlon, many come from there."

"It isn't a very social city being self-reliant and all, but it's pretty famous in dark magician circles. They don't spread their name that far to reach every city, just around to dark magicians so it's very possible for it not to be heard by you guys."

"Well then, step on in, kids." Alba stepped aside to allow them to walk to the hand.

"Thank you, Alba. We'll send you letters on whats it's like from Melanis."

"Oh, ho. Thank you, kids. I haven't talked this much in a long time. Ever since I married Tatio, I felt the need to be in the background, but now I feel so free and fun."

"Why did you marry Tatio then? Doesn't sound like love."

"It was our parents who arranged it. I had no say, but it feels so good to finally have him caught. Well, move along to your next destination."

"Okay, thank you again!"

"No problem, come whenever you're walking by, alright?"

One by one, they walked into the hand. Zeeth went in first, waving as the hand closed around him. The golden glow enveloped him until he couldn't be seen anymore, and then it chucked him into the sky and threw him away. He closed his eyes from the brightness and felt a warm ball at his center. A few seconds later, he felt his feet hit the ground and he opened his eyes to a rocky, grey field. Page and Gror followed shortly after and landed next to him.

The plain was fairly empty, small hills and spikes of rocks rose here and there. They saw some slow walking rock covered mules, grey snakes, and bushes with green leaves and grey branches.

Zeeth was about to pull out some slimes but Page stopped him, nodding at Gror, who didn't know about his slimes yet. They simply had to walk the rest of the way. Zeeth and Page wanted to run with magic but Gror couldn't keep up too well and had to stop a lot to rest since his legs were shorter and he didn't focus on magic as much.

Page had to make use of the camels why grabbing three and having them ride it.

Zeeth took his camel and tamed it for the, but he asked, "Page, these camels are slower than us, why don't we just walk?"

"They are only slow because of all the rock they have on their backs. The rocks are like their shell of protection, like our nails or hair. We can carve them off like getting a hair cut and they become much faster. They can trot like horses and their stamina is incredible from spending all their life under such heavy rocks."

"How do we carve them?"

"Gror has a knife that he took that can cut simple concrete or rocks like butter. We just need to be careful not to hurt it, they are very easily scared."

Gror pulled out a pocket knife from his back pocket and began carving off the tops of the rocky camels.