Losing all control, I mindlessly amble towards the frothing, writhing waters, bend over, and immerse my arms up to my shoulders. The little creatures eagerly but inefficiently spin and twirl towards the offering of living matter, clinging tightly to my skin with tiny, sharpened teeth. Somehow it doesn’t hurt much, but even that slight pain brings me back to my senses. No! What am I doing? This isn’t safe.

  Rigidly shooting back up straight as an arrow, the little horrors remain happily latched onto my arms. Shocked and wide eyed, I desperately search around for help. The scattered mob of goblins are all slowly making their way back to my position. Ha’koff has completely submerged himself and is now entirely covered in the horrific wrigglers. So entranced by the whispers, he smoothly exits the pool and heads towards the newly opened portal ahead of me.

  Oh, no. Can’t let the team go alone, but what are these things doing to me? How bad is it? I want them all off, but how? They’re stuck on so tight that ripping them off will also tear off a considerable amount of flesh. All we can do is hope that there’s aid on the other side. Rushing over to join, I barely catch his back as he disappears through the shimmering door. Arriving on the other side, the rolling disorientation harshly addles my faculties. However, the sudden transition from wet, humid eeriness to musty, earthy dreariness is actually quite welcome. This is certainly a better place for our kind!

  Many, many other brothers were already present before our entrance, marching towards countless, unclear destinations snaking away from the collection of portals surrounding us. A cave? Is this a cave? Or no, an entire network of caves? There’s so many different paths away from here. Where are we? The mound is made of dirt and mud, not rock. Therefore, this definitely isn’t home.

  Little pangs of discomfort on my arms urgently bring me back to reality. The leash also tugs at my waist as Ha’koff mindlessly heads towards a strange, steaming pool of liquid on the other end of one of the tunnels. Wait, wait, wait. This isn’t good. There’s far too many unknowns!

  A moment later, more goblins awkwardly shuffle out of our portal, completely covered in more of the awful worms. Ah, good! More experimental subjects. They shall lead and prove that it’s safe before we follow. Tightening the leash, I keep Ha’koff close by as we trail the others at a careful distance.

  Up close, the murky pool overwhelmingly stinks like a dead big one. The leading goblins immediately submerge themselves, bodies bubbling and sizzling upon walking inside. How awful. What is this?

  Tightly securing Ha’koff to a random stalagmite, I carefully wander closer. The others have rapidly shrunk down into a thick goop by the time I get there. All the little worms have happily scattered away into the pool, abandoning the spent, sagging, tiny bodies that transported them there. After sniffing lightly at the surface, I briefly submerge a single fingertip.

  It hurts! It’s so much worse than that onyx adder’s blood. The brothers willingly walked into this? Songs be damned, I can’t allow Ha’koff to follow, but then what about the worms? Staring down at the little, wriggling attackers, a brief moment of weakness almost knocks me to the ground. Are they draining my blood? My energy? What is it of me that they’re consuming?

  In a fury, I rip off my pack, slam it on the ground, and burrow deeply into its contents. Bottles, bottles, bottles. One of these will have to do, but which one? My acid is weaker than the pool, but still far too dangerous for a little one’s skin. Poison? Maybe I could take being immersed in my poison, but Ha’koff certainly can’t. What then? What?

  Oh! This is perfect. Are we impure? Will you spit us out, you simple, stupid creatures?

  Scampering over to my safely secured teammate, the mindless Ha’koff futilely pulls against his leash, eternally heading towards the pool yet making no progress. I rapidly spin the leash around his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. A layer of protection, just in case. Then I douse his entire body in several bottles of the purge potion.

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  A moment passes, and nothing happens. Wait, wait, be patient. It needs time to work its magic. Have faith in your genius. When have you ever failed before? No, no, no, besides those times.

  Somehow, the whisper’s serenade fades from Ha’koff’s eyes and his movements appear more and more of his own will.

  He’s back! Glorious night, he’s truly back. The worms, they’re all weakly dropping onto the ground, uncomfortably writhing and indiscriminately spewing out all manner of fowl liquids. Kicking the tiny bodies into the pool, I hope that no one will gripe about the state in which we delivered them. That’s where they’re supposed to go, right? What’s a little worm puke added to the mix?

  Quickly, I douse my arms in the potion and then hold them over the pool. All my little passengers also choose to depart, heavily inebriated. It feels so good to be free. Who knows how much longer we could’ve withstood their constant assault.

  Shortening the leash, I tug the woozy Ha’koff closer to me to avoid any more mishaps. This acid would be an amazing resource to work with, but I’m afraid that there’s simply no good tools to harvest it in my possession. Could the potion bottles even hold it without melting? Sadly, I’ll just have to leave all of the precious resource here.

  About to walk away, it hits me. This isn’t the void, is it? Holding a hand up, I quickly pulse the space around me to check. Everything looks normal. This might actually work.

  Bending over the pool, I meticulously plan. Don’t want to submerge my hands, but how else can I complete the pocket around a glob of the acid? If I had any tools that could survive capturing or bottling it, then cleverness would be unnecessary. What else, what else, what else?

  A moment of intense thinking later, memories of my momentary forgotten teammate inspire me. A tether? No, no, not a tether. A tool. A tool made out of stable arcane energy. Like Linus’ knife. That probably won’t melt. Or at least, it won’t matter if it does. It only needs to last for the second or two that it takes me to wrap a pocket around its contents.

  Sitting down next to the pool, I close my eyes and focus. Reaching out with one hand, I extend a long, thick rod of stable energy towards the pool and then submerge the tip to test. My eyes clenched tightly, my focus projects out along the familiar energy and into the pool. It’s not reacting at all. The energy is truly stable. That’s actually odd. Isn’t the Alchemy song the act of mixing stable energy into your creations? Shouldn’t it react at least a bit? What’s the trick? No, no, not now. Focus, focus.

  Protruding the end of the rod into the shape of a cup, I allow the acid to fill before carefully lifting it up from the pool.

  However, I can feel the liquid slipping through it as if it’s not even there. Whoops, guess there’s more to this trick. If the stable energy can’t touch it, then can I simply transform a new energy that can? I’ll need to push on it a little bit. Only a little bit. Resubmerging the cup, I allow more energy to flow from core to cup and intensely focus on my intent.

  Yes! It’s barely holding, but this time it’s not immediately slipping through. However, I only need a little bit of time for this to work.

  Opening my eyes, I steel myself for the rest. Taking a moment to adjust to the act of maintaining all the different energies while splitting my attention, I push my focus to its limit. It’s considerably easier with this solid energy, unlike the loose, snake-like tethers. Confident in my success, I reach out with my other hand and wrap space tightly around the cup. With a flick of my fingers, I spin the seal closed while also allowing all the stable energy to dissipate. Deeply sighing, I weakly smile in a hearty congratulations to myself. It worked!