Beyond the Horizon | Unraveling
The following is the third chapter of our first Gooeys lore book, Beyond the Horizon. Lore chapters will arrive once a week for three weeks each month, with the last week dedicated to our Team Medium updates.
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Sage Gumbo wished with his entire being that he could blast daggers into Mushroomhead’s back from across the room.
The scene was as amusingly unfortunate as its concept indicated: a meeting of prissy Sages — in an abandoned, but in surprisingly good condition palace — to debrief on the magics used to free their time-lost princess from her overlong, stoic slumber.
Like many of the old Gooeys in the chamber, Sage Gumbo was rather bulbous. He in particular had a dark blue body with fish-like markings. Perhaps his size had been caused by a lifetime of guzzling rare fruits, but it was far more likely that Gumbo failed to walk anywhere — he was one to lean on the magics as much as possible to ease the quality of his life.
Unlike the other Gooeys in the room, he never had much affinity for the elements. However, by distilling the core fundamentals of both fire and earth magics, Sage Gumbo cultivated the skills that brought the old codgers together for the first time in five decades — and also allowed him to create magical objects that did his bidding.
“Sealing Magic. The singular magic each of you failed to understand,” Sage Gumbo’s large body rotated around the room, in his levitating palanquin — powered by petrified Owlkin Eggs. “If only you had bothered to read any of the magical tomes from the Droplet Society libraries…!”
Mushroomhead cleared his throat to speak. Sage Gumbo glared at his rival from the safety of his pretentious contraption.
“Sage Gumbo, your genius with applied magics knows few bounds. Surely, without you, our dear Princess Amelie would be lost!” Mushroomhead lowered his voice to an unpleasant growl. “However, I heard a curious rumor that another Gooey may be responsible for this nigh-impossible feat.”
Sage Gumbo furiously drew his palanquin’s curtain with a sharp shwick!
The other old Gooeys began to mutter to each other, growing tired of this age-old feud between the original founders of the Droplet Society. From inside his shuttered palanquin Sage Gumbo shouted:
“A misunderstanding! It was ME! I freed Amelie! I — ” Sage Gumbo was cut short by the chamber’s doors being flung open with a weighty thud.
He only needed to take the credit for this; he could not have that incompetent pile of goo, Presto, ruining his plan. Peeking through his curtain, his breath caught and he sputtered uncontrollably.
Purposefully placed footsteps clicked down the stone steps leading into the chamber. Long, draped cloth slowly swooped and scritched across the floor with a distinct staccato. Princess Amelie drifted to the head of the table, her chin held high and her overgrown, violet hair obscuring her face. Runes glowed where her eyes ought to be.
Every Gooey rolled themselves up a little straighter in her presence. Sage Gumbo quietly drew open his curtain and lowered the height of his palanquin to match where the other Gooeys sat.
“Please… Continue your quarrel with Mushroomhead, Gumbo.” Amelie’s words crossed the air, electric and decisive. “Or have you forgotten the original intentions of the Droplet Society?”
“No my princess,” Sage Gumbo eked out.
He spied something of a slight smirk form on Mushroomhead’s face — and Sage Gumbo’s pride burst forth like a dragon pouncing on its prey.
“Might I say that you show me some respect! These fools sought to do nothing about your situation,” Sage Gumbo stumbled out of his palanquin and rolled assertively across the table.
“Myself and The Droplet Society remained loyal to you day over day! These old Stagwarts are nothing but traitors…” His voice had grown shrill, and the finger he pointed at Amelie trembled.
“Speak not of traitors to me!” Amelie’s voice both boomed and pierced all in the same breath — her magical aura swirled and snaked around the room.
“Was it not your people who conferred with Asheron?” Amelie’s heels clicked like daggers on the floor as she suddenly stood, her pink dragonfly wings flared out.
Sage Gumbo backpedaled and cowered as her aura threatened to strike in his direction. Why was Amelie even here? She was supposed to be on bed rest!
“I heard your mutterings and confessions while you toiled away maintaining his seals, you foolish, absurd creature. You and your Droplet Society ilk are no longer welcome here. Goodbye!” Amelie’s words dripped with rage as her aura finally cracked toward him like a whip.
Sage Gumbo quickly retreated to his palanquin. He gazed upon the Princess as he drew his curtain. Her eyes may have been covered over with a healing mask, but he could feel the wrath in them growing with every moment.
Amelie was a Fae scarred by great tragedy, and wholly unwilling to let it go unpunished. Yet realizing that fact, Sage Gumbo could see she was showing him all the kindness she could muster — given what he had done to her.
Perhaps he had done a bad thing after all.
