==== Investigate

My surrounding changed abruptly. One moment I was jumping through the air, the world becoming hazy, when just as suddenly the air about me solidified into a different scene. It took me a moment to realize that my feet were touching the ground. I knew I was definitely somewhere else. The thing was, where?

I looked around. It looked as if the expanse around me was almost completely ice. Spires of it rose from the ground, while others rose up in clumps. It was almost as if the place was made of glaciers upon glaciers.

Behind me resembled a forest, except the trees looked to be completely frozen over and encased in white. Icicles dribbled from their arctic branches, and there were shards on the ground; a collection of broken ice created by ages of freezing. Judging by the look, it seemed that this frigid land experienced rain, but not snow. Rain that fell only to freeze soon after it landed. At least, I might have. I wasn't sure how long this place had stood, frozen in time.

I looked forward and saw spires rising from the white expanse. They looked like huge pillars of a castle, or factory. Now that I thought about it, there were a ton of machine parts and scraps of mettle scattered about. Most of them were buried under ice, but there were a few loose scraps.

The wind was blowing even stronger now, and even with my warm clothing I knew I needed to find shelter. I could feel my face stinging from the air catching the heat away as it blew by.

I hurried as fast as I could toward the pillars in the distance, and as I neared, they seemed to grow. By the time I arrived at the base, they extended far above me.

So there I stood, in front of a huge doorway to this mysterious tower. I could see that it actually extended much farther down, and I was just on a balcony with a door. I didn't mind, I just wanted to get out of the biting wind. Besides, maybe I would be able to find out a little more inside than I could out here.

I looked at the doorway, but I couldn't find any way to open it. Through some further investigation though, I found that there was a pulley hanging next to the door. I tugged on it, but not only was the rope frozen solid, but the mechanism at the top wouldn't budge either.

I pulled out my energy wand. I admit, I wasn't expecting to use it for anything besides battle, but there was a creative use for everything. Pointing it at the pulley mechanism at the top, I fired a small ray of heat toward it, forcing it to thaw.

The ice slowly turned into water and began to drip down. Eventually, all the ice was gone, so I gave the frozen rope another tug. It still didn't budge.

I thawed the rope, and examined the pulley further. It looked like the rope went into a hole in the wall, so I thawed it up to there. After that, the pulley seemed to budge slightly, but it felt like I was trying to move something that was immovable.

That's when I got a thought. If this pulley was rigged to trigger the opening of the door, I should thaw the hinges it would swing on. After all, it would be kind of hard to swing open if it was frozen shut. After a little warming of the hinges, I tried the pulley once more. This time, as I pulled, I heard a click, as if something had been triggered. I backed away, and the doors swung open in front of me, admitting me entrance to the darkness within.

I looked around for a moment, and shot a beam of energy into the entrance, illuminating the room. I didn't see anything hostile, or even animate, inside, so I walked in.

I took stalk of my entire surroundings, just to make sure I was alone. There were levers and pulleys on the wall to my left, and an ice statue that resembled a turtle looking like it was reaching for one of the levers. There were scraps of metal strewn about the ground. Likely fallen from the walls, for they were made mostly of bars. Additionally, some of the levers were broken off. Besides the door I came from, the only exit from the room seemed to be another, smaller door on the opposite side. The freezing air was still rushing in, so I pushed myself against the doors, forcing them closed. I felt a lock tick in place, telling that the door was successfully shut.

I walked to the center of the room once more. The place looked like it had been utterly frozen as well, just as everything else in the land, except it was less ice, through there were some corners full of it, and the ground was slick and walls were shining. Except, now that the light was no longer streaming in through an open doorway, the room had become pitch black. I decided that if I wanted to see anything, I would have to create my own source of light.

I toggled my gloves so they would glow. Ah, that was better. Light radiated from them, casting long shadows on the walls, giving the place a more eerie, mysterious feeling. I walked toward the door on the other end and tried to turn the knob. However, it was completely frozen shut. I should start expecting that, I guess. After all, that is what everything in this land seemed to be. It was beautiful in a way. I loved this land already. It was… comfortable. I just had to watch my back for monsters that the game was going to throw at me. I decided then and there that I was going to find out what this factory was for, and what I needed to do. I knew there was something, and that feeling was telling me that this was the beginning of the adventure that Sammysprite was telling me about. Not I think I understood why the game wanted me to figure out what my quest was. After all, that was what made the whole experience so mysterious and exciting.

I held my wand in front of the door and thawed it. After that, it easily opened at the turn of the knob. I walked through.

Inside was yet another breathtaking spectacle. I was on a balcony in a huge room, likely the main interior of the tower. On the sides of the inside was a spiral staircase, extending around in a circle the circumference of the tower. To my right the stairs led up and my left they lead down. However, in the middle was a long tube of metal, extending from as far down as I could see, up to where my vision could no longer reach. Likely even to the very top of the tower.

I looked down to see that the blackness engulfed the staircase. After all, the illumination from my gloves could only extend so far. Something shifted in the blackness below, and it looked to be big. I decided that my best bet was to travel upward. At least I knew how far up it went. There was no telling what could be down there.

I made my way up the spiral staircase. There were some parts where it seemed that the way had been broken and fell away, but in those cases I had to climb over by using the railing. I was glad that my gloves had some grip to them. I would probably be in trouble otherwise.

I went up for quite a time. Likely my trek went for about a half an hour before I couldn't go up any farther. The stairs seemed to be in too rough a condition to be traveled up in safety. I decided I would try up there later, when I had found a way. I started going down the stairs once more, except I stopped at the first doorway I came to. It once again was frozen, so I thawed the lock and hinges and opened it.

Inside was a glistening room. It didn't have the levers of the one I saw earlier, but it had some sort of machine that resembled an engine. Gears covered the walls and scattered the floor. It looked like there were quite a few that had fallen from their mounts on the wall.

There was another one of those turtle statues in this room, except this one was bending over to pick up what seemed to be a lever that was lying on the floor. A crevice on the wall looked as if something fit into there, so I decided I would pick up the lever and find out.

After thawing the lever and melting the ice that encased the crevice, I put the lever into there. It seemed to be a perfect fit, but it didn't stay. I pointed my wand at the end of the lever for quite a while, until it started to turn red, and eventually sag. I did the same for the tip of the crevice for a while, and then connected the two, waiting for the extreme cold to do its work of wielding the two parts back together.

After that was done, I tried a little tug on the lever, but it didn't budge. I decided to look around it for the reason why. Sure enough, the gears it was connected to were stuck. I thawed those as well, and tried the lever once more. To my surprise, not only did it crank the gears, but when I pulled the lever down, the ones I had thawed began to move, as if propelled! I looked at the wall, and guessed that was the puzzle. I needed to get all the gears moving, until they reached that large engine-like machine that was in the wall. I pulled the lever back up, causing the gears to slow and stop, and got to work immediately.

The first thing I did was thaw all the gears on the wall. It was simple enough; warm all of them enough to make sure they spin again. I was surprised at how smoothly they spun after probably being frozen for so long. They didn't even need oiling.

After that was done, it was time for the real puzzle: finding out which gears fit where. It took me about an hour, but eventually all of the gears were back on the wall and thawed. I went over to the machine and warmed it with my energy wand until I was sure it was thawed enough to work. Well, whatever it did. I guessed I was about to find out.

I went back to the lever and pulled it down once more. This time, however, it was the whole wall that seemed to move. The gears that I had put in place caught each other and turned. First slowly, but eventually they began to speed up. I looked at the machine, which was now making a churning sound. I went over and found that it was warming up further. In fact, after a few minutes, the air around it seemed slightly warmer.

I was definitely open to warming up this room, so I went over to the door and closed it. I thought for a moment, and then slid a cache in place that looked like it was there to lock it. I tried the knob. Sure enough, it was locked.

I looked around the room and admired my handiwork. The gears were on the wall turning, and the engine was heating up the room. I thought I might as well stay here a while and make sure my Client player was doing fine.

I paced around the room, trying to find a comfortable place to sit. I found one near the door and went ahead and sat in it. It seemed like a simple polished wooden chair, except the whole thing was frozen stiff. I really needed to get over that. Of course everything in this place would be frozen. It's probably ten below in here. Well, not this room. Already it was probably a little warmer than the rest of the factory.

I turned on my holocomputer and pulled up my server program. It looked like Jessica was still sleeping, and Georgesprite was looking around the place. It seemed that the door to her bedroom was safely shut. There were imps on the other side, but they couldn't even make it to the door, let alone try to open it.

I looked and saw that her windows were barricaded as well. That was a good idea. She was thankfully safe for the night. I guess she should rest and get ready for the day ahead of her. To be honest, I sort of wondered what her land was like. The yard around her house wasn't frozen like mine was, and her house was light when she entered. It was dark outside her house now, but that was probably because it was night. My land seemed to already of been dark when I arrived. However, I wasn't sure if that was because it became night here sooner, or if it was just always dark.

I saw that her grist cache was a bit fuller though, so I built her house up to the first portal. She would probably appreciate that when she awoke.

I got off of the server, and thought for a moment. There was probably a way to spy on the other players that I could use, but even then that would take some alchemizing. Since I wasn't anywhere near something that could do that, though, I guessed I would just have to wait. Besides, I wanted to find out the secret of this factory.

Wait a minute. Someone sent me a message on steam. I opened it up and took a look.

I was hit by a moment of shock.

It was Jeremy.

"Hey, I hope nothing messed up from me not making it into your session. You seriously wouldn't believe what has happened!"

I was seriously relieved that he was alive!

"What happened?" I asked.

"Well, I lost connection the second time because of another meteor that hit near my house. The thing was, it somehow carried with it the Forge! I tried to connect again, but apparently everything was down. I thought I was done for. Todd got hold of me though, and now I'm in his session. Are you all ok?"

"Yeah, we're fine." I messaged back, "We got another person to enter instead, and she connected to me. I'm actually at my land right now! My guide told me you weren't supposed to be in our session or something, but I'm definitely glad to see you're doing fine."

"Yeah, it's been crazy! When we started most of us weren't sure what we were doing. We got the hang of it though, but sadly not everyone made it. I've mostly been hanging out with Todd, but some of his other friends are here too. I'm actually the space player here! It's all well, but at times frog breeding gets pretty boring and I decide to do something else. It's all cool though."

"Frog breeding?" I typed, confused.

"Oh, hey, I have to go. I'll talk to you later, Lexie's in trouble again. It's nice to know that you guys are ok! I'll see you later, and hopefully it won't be a month again, haha."

And with that he was offline. What? A month? What was he talking about? It's only been a day since the last time we talked.

I shrugged it off. Perhaps he was talking about something else. I would have to ask him next time he was online. It was really good to know that he didn't die, and I nice bonus to see that some of my other friends made it into the session.

It was getting warm in here, so I decided to take off my winter clothing and turning off their heating feature. I looked around. It seemed that while I was occupied the room gradually had gotten lighter. It seemed as if the bars on the walls were glowing. Ah, so that machine must have been a generator!

I surveyed the room once more. Everything looked like it was thawing nicely. In fact, if not for the ice in one corner and the water on the floor, I wouldn't have guessed this place had ever been frozen. The metal was no longer white and covered in frost. Not even the statue!

Wait a second, did that statue just move?

I carefully pulled out my energy wand, just in case the statue was somehow yet another hostile.

"Wow, what happened? I'm so sleepy." The statue said.

Holy crap, I don't think that's a statue. It just talked. I got ready to say something, and ready to attack just in case.

"You were frozen." I said, "I had to thaw you."

The turtle statue, or formally a statue, whirled around to face me. The look of surprise on its face was evident. I took a quick rundown on the thing to gage its threat level.

It looked to be about three feet tall and although it was a turtle, it stood on its hind legs. It looked more scared than threatened though, so I relaxed slightly.

"Are you... The Seer?" It asked.

"I don't think so." I said, slightly confused, "Who are you?"

"Oh my gosh, it really is the Seer! I can't believe it! This is the best day of my life!" The turtle yelled, running towards me. I hastily lifted up my wand and gave q quick burst of energy. Not enough to kill or even really harm it, but it still made it stop in its tracks and back away. "I'm so sorry! I'm sorry, Seer, please don't hurt me!" It pleaded.

"I'm not trying to hurt you." I said, lowering my wand slightly, "I'm just trying to figure out what happened."

"What? What happened?" It asked. I was surprised that it didn't remember that it was just frozen, but I thought I should probably reveal what I knew. After all, he probably would remember something useful.

"When I got here, this factory was covered with ice. Not a single machine that I know of was running, and pieces of machinery are scattered everywhere." I looked at him levelly and continued. "Everyone here was also frozen solid. After I got this room back together again and that generator running, this room thawed out, and I guess it brought you back to life. I would seriously appreciate it if you could give me any insight as to what happened, and where this place is."

The turtle just stared at me, evidently in shock. Poor guy, maybe I shouldn't have laid it on him so suddenly. Then again, if he was going to help me, it would be best if he knew it all right off hand, rather than breaking down again and again.

The turtle suddenly broke out of his trance. "That is soooooooo cooooool!" it squealed, running up to me again.

Okay, I was seriously not expecting that. I just closed my eyes and braced myself as the thing's wet cold arms encompassed me in an awful embrace. I really hoped these things didn't give you salmonella like the ones back on earth did.

Finally, the thing let go, and still seemed giddy. To be honest, I was beginning to second guess how reliable these things would be for information. I decided I should try another approach.

"Yeah, I guess it is. Say, since you are the first of your race to be revived, what do you say about being my sidekick?"

"Really?" It asked, eyes wide. I nodded.

The turtle squealed again and gave me another cold uncomfortable slimy hug. I managed to pry it off of me only after a whole minute had passed.

"Alright, but there are a few rules first. Okay?"

"Okay!" The turtle giddily responded.

"First of all, no more hugs, unless I ask for one, alright?" I said.

"Got it!"

"Second, you need to tell me everything I ask for to the best of your ability."

"Sure thing!" The turtle happily nodded, before running over to be and hugging me again."

"And third, could you please stop hugging me?"

I swear, what was wrong with it? Things completely frozen in ice aren't usually so full of energy. Especially when they had been thawed out literally only five minutes ago.

I managed to pry the turtle away once more. "Seriously, no hugging." I said, "If you want to hug something, hug this. And with that, I handed it the harmless Want of Light I still had on my person. "It is a wand that can shoot beams of light if used correctly. I figure if you're my sidekick, you might as well have a wand."

"Really? Oh my gosh! This is the best day ever!" The turtle squealed. He really was annoying, but at least he was going to try helping me.

To be honest, though, I actually didn't mind if he tagged along, as long as he didn't get in the way.