For a moment, Leo could only stand there, staring in shock at the sign of actual civilization. While he had only been on his own for the last week and change, it felt like far longer after everything that had happened to him.

  Before him stood four people, each one hard at work chipping away at some of the darker stalagmites growing out of the cavern floor. There were a handful of heavy-duty crates in between the crew of four, each one partially filled with what looked like clumps of dark rock. As Leo watched, one of the four miners, a woman who didn’t look much older than he was, finished knocking down the last few bits of her stalagmite. Wiping the sweat from her brow, she tossed her pickaxe aside and crouched down to start lugging the clumps into the nearest crate. But as soon as she reached out to grab an armful, she glanced up, and their eyes met.

  The woman froze, her eyes going wide as she finally spotted him standing at the edge of the cavern. Leo wasn’t actually certain how he must have looked at that moment, seeing as he hadn’t had access to a mirror in some time. But after all the blood he’d spilled, the poorly done haircut from the arrow-hawk, and fights he’d been through with magical beasts, he had a feeling he probably looked like some sort of wild roamer.

  The crudely made spear in his hand probably didn’t help.

  “Mao, what’s the hold up?” one of the other miners snapped. She was a heavier-set woman with a frame of pure muscle, busy smashing away at her own stalagmite like the rock had personally wronged her. “I want to finish up and start setting up camp within the hour. Quit slacking!”

  “Sorry, Jess, it’s just… there’s a guy over there.”

  The moment they heard that, the other three miners abruptly stopped what they were doing, turning to follow Mao’s pointing finger. Just like Mao, all three of them blinked in shock as they took in Leo’s sudden appearance. Deciding he’d been silent long enough, Leo cleared his throat, stepping into the cavern proper and doing his best to look nonthreatening as he smiled.

  “Hello,” he started with, realizing his voice was shaking ever so slightly. He hadn’t even seen, much less spoken with anyone since his entire plane had collapsed around him. Hiding the slight warble in his voice with a cough, he straightened his back and tried his best to look like the Cartographer he now was. For all he knew, these people were raiders or some similar such threat, and looking weak could possibly get him killed. “I’m a wandering Cartographer. It’s nice to meet you four.”

  “A Cartographer, eh?” the muscular woman, Jess, asked as she narrowed her eyes at him. Based on how the other three kept shooting her glances rather than say anything, it looked as though she was in charge of their little group. “You look like you’re barely old enough to shave. What are you doing out here?”

  “I’m a wandering Cartographer,” Leo repeated blankly, as though that were all the answer that was needed. To reinforce his point, he held up his journal, gesturing toward it. “What are you doing out here?”

  “Mining clay for a nearby plane,” one of the men answered, thumbing over his back at the mostly filled crates. “The clay in this plane is high-quality. Fetches a pretty solid price.”

  Leo didn’t let his guard down, but he let himself relax ever so slightly at that answer. From what he’d heard, raiders would never bother doing manual labor like this. They believed solely in attacking unsuspecting planes and taking what they wanted from those weaker than them.

  That said, if they truly were filling a job for another plane, that meant he’d stumbled upon a group of four gem holders. There was no telling how powerful their souls were or what gems they held within their cores. Caution was never a bad idea.

  “You wanna tell every stranger we come across our life stories, Max?” Jess asked, glaring at the sheepish man who’d explained what they were doing. “What if he’s an advance scout for a party of raiders? Do you want to run into an ambush on our trek back to the town? Because I know I don't."

  “Me a raider?” Leo asked, blinking at the accusation. He’d been so focused on his own safety, he’d never stopped to consider that others might have the same concerns that he did. “Didn’t you just say I didn’t look old enough to shave?”

  “I’ve seen younger raiders,” Jess frowned, spitting on the cavern floor. “Have you ever seen what happens when someone whose soul isn’t mature enough tries taking in a magical beast gem? It ain't pretty. Assuming they manage to survive the ordeal in the first place, which is a big if, it changes them, and not in the way it changed me or you. It takes something from them, some sliver of their humanity, turning them into a right monster. Personally? I think part of the magical beast’s soul survives being turned into power. That it merges with their own and makes them little better than a beast themselves.”

  “Jess, he looks like he’s been through a lot. Maybe tone it back a notch?” Mao asked, ignoring the older woman’s glare as she gave Leo an apologetic smile. “Sorry, you can’t get Jess started on raiders. She has some… history with them, and not in a good way.”

  “I wouldn’t want to meet the person who had any sort of good history with raiders,” the fourth man finally spoke up, walking forward and offering Leo his hand. He had long, dirty hair that Leo couldn’t tell if it was naturally dark brown, or just covered in clay dust. “I’m Chance. Nice to meet an actual friendly face out here in the middle of nowhere. You really must be a Cartographer, seeing as nobody else would bother coming out here. Which plane did you come from, anyway? Other than the one we came through, the only rifts near this clay deposit lead to either a poisonous wasteland, or a deadly forest nobody in their right mind would travel through.”

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  “What do you mean?” Leo asked, shaking the man’s hand as he tried to make sense of his question. “The forest with the arrow-hawks? Why wouldn’t anyone go through there? It's only a low-tier plane.”

  “Yeah, filled with arrow-hawks,” Max snorted, crossing his arms as he leaned back on his pickaxe. “They’re one of the more dangerous low-grade magical beasts out there. By the time you actually hear their whistle, your throat’s already been ripped clean out.”

  Arrow-hawks are one of the more dangerous types of magical beasts? Leo could only stare at the others nodding in agreement with Max as he tried to wrap his head around that. But they’re so simple. As long as you react the moment you hear the whistle, you’ll never be caught off guard.

  “We do our best to stay away from planes filled with magical beasts that could kill us in the blink of an eye,” Chance confirmed, grinning at Leo. “We’re gem holders, not Cartographers. No offense, but your kind are known to be a bit… reckless. Running around, throwing yourself into unknown planes and just hoping you come out on top? Yeah, no thank you. I’m quite happy to make a living collecting resources for the nearby towns and relaxing with a nice pint in the evenings.”

  While Leo disagreed with that thought more than Chance could possibly imagine, he merely nodded his understanding, not willing to get into any sort of altercation with his first potential lifeline to civilization. While he wasn’t about to rope in random strangers into his current quest to save the Nexus, there was a lot they could help him with.

  “Any chance I could borrow one of your maps?” he asked, trying not to let his hope show on his face. Having barely escaped his own plane through the secret rift, he didn’t have the slightest idea where he was now in the planarverse. For someone who had grown up studying maps and learning how to create them, it was an unpleasant truth, and one he was hoping to rectify as soon as possible.

  “It’s more of a sheet of scribbled directions than a map, but you’re welcome to it,” Jess said, giving him a more quizzical look. “...You don’t have your own? Aren’t you a Cartographer?”

  “I may or may not have lost it while being chased by a magical beast,” Leo said, doing his best to look embarrassed and sell the lie. He nodded toward his journal he’d already shown them. “I’m working on a new one, but seeing what you have would speed things up a good bit.”

  He wasn’t sure why, but his gut was telling him to keep everything that had happened to him a secret, despite the fact that the four gem holders would probably help him in any way they could if he simply revealed he’d come from a collapsing plane and was now lost. Planes collapsing wasn’t something that happened frequently, but the planarverse was potentially infinite. It still happened enough that it wouldn’t have sounded like a lie by any means.

  Jess continued giving him a strange look, her brow furrowed as though she were deep in thought. Slowly, she nodded, seeming to have come to some sort of decision.

  “Tell you what. You look like you’ve had a rough week. Why don’t you help us out with our mining, and in exchange, we’ll let you make camp with us tonight and share our rations. Come morning, we’ll be making our way back to town. You’re welcome to join us if you want. You’ll be able to find a far better map there, no doubt about that.”

  “Shattered gems, am I dreaming?” Chance asked, grinning at Jess as she rolled her eyes. “Our angry and stubborn leader, actually offering to help a wayward gem holder for a change. I never thought I’d see the day!”

  “If you can talk, you can mine,” Jess said, snatching up Chance’s pickaxe and tossing it at him. “The same goes for the rest of you. Mao, get him one of the spares and show him how it's done. Help him out if he has any questions.”

  “Got it!” Mao said, beaming at Leo as she walked over and took his hand, dragging him back toward the pile of equipment and weapons he was only just now noticing. Mao’s hand was calloused and hard, though somehow gentle at the same time as she helped him pick out a pickaxe from among the spares. “It’s really pretty simple,” she said, continuing to smile as she mimed hefting her pickaxe over her head and bringing it straight down in a controlled strike. “We want to break them into manageable chunks, so start at the top and work your way down. No need to stop and move the pieces into the crate until you’ve finished with the whole stalagmite.”

  “Sounds simple enough,” Leo agreed, returning her smile almost without realizing it. He hadn’t noticed just how much he missed simply talking to people. Hearing someone answer in response to his voice was something he hadn’t realized he’d taken for granted up until now, and he felt a fresh pang as thoughts of his father and everyone from town flashed through his head.

  “Are you okay?” Mao asked, lowering her pick and giving him a concerned look. “You aren’t injured, are you? We’ve got some medical supplies, but I’ll be honest, Jess might be hard pressed to share those. I’m with Chance, it’s actually shocking she was willing to help you at all. She’s not normally one to care about anyone beyond our group. She’s tough, but the four of us are like a family. We always look out for each other.”

  “No, I’m fine,” Leo hurried to reassure her. “Sorry, just some… bad memories. Don’t worry about me.”

  “What did I say about talking?” Jess called over, causing Mao to jump and immediately run over to the nearest stalagmite. “Same goes for you, new guy. You want to come to town with us, you gotta earn your way!”

  “Right!” Leo called back, picking a stalagmite next to Mao and hefting his pickaxe. He kept his spear close at hand, just in case, but he didn’t think he had much to worry about. If these people were afraid of dealing with arrow-hawks of all things, he couldn’t really see them trying to jump a fellow gem holder with unknown skills within his soul.

  Copying Mao’s movements, Leo swung his pickaxe over his head, before bringing it down hard on the spike of clay before him. Seeing Mao give him a quick thumbs up at the chunk he knocked off, he grinned, turning back to his clay and hitting it again. A single day spent mining in exchange for actual human interaction and figuring out where he was in the planarverse was a fantastic trade, and the first real step toward trying to figure out how he was going to deal with the Nexus and the Planar Lords.

  Once he got into town, maybe he could try and find some information on his mother as well.