Emily kicks away from the shore, swimming through the glittering blue water and watg with begrudging wonder as the fog just below swirls around her, reag out of the water in creeping tendrils as she disturbs the surface. She swims out thly the tre of the ke, casting infra-sight and cheg below for enemies.
She treads water for a few seds, gng around for a hint of warm colour uhe water but finding nothing.
Here goes.
Taking a deep breath, she releases infra-sight and plunges down, desding below the thin yer of fog aering the darkness below. She casts light as she swims, creating a white orb that pushes back against the darkness surrounding her, but struggles to have much effect, even with the extra mana Emily pours into the spell. After a few seds, she gives up and accepts only having a few metres of visibility.
She desds lower and lower, and the temperature of the water drops from refreshing to bone-chilling as she nears the bottom. She pauses as the kebed es into view, decorated by dull white bones.
I think I found Rocco’s teammates.
She swims down to the bones, iing the mismatched limbs scattered about. She tries to move on, but out of the er of her eye, she spots a flicker of movement, so she pauses and looks around. Seeing nothing, she quickly casts infra-sight again, cheg for a warm-blooded enemy but finding nothing.
Weird, I definitely saw something move.
She turns to leave, but once again sees motion out of the er of her eye. This time, she’s certain one of the skeletons was moving.
They are dead. Right?
She goes back to i a few bones. But, even with a full magical s, she doesn’t find anything. She feels pressure build in her chest from the ck of breath, so she shakes the distra away and turns to tinue.
Moving on, she follows a natural depression towards the lowest point of the ke. On the way, she finds a few human skulls resting on the bed, staring up at the world above that they’ll never see again. Darkness fills their eye sockets unnaturally and, even when Emily aims her light in, the darkness gs, as if fused to the bones.
The further she follows the kebed down, the more the water around her, within her small haven of light, shifts from dark blue to a faint red. And the further she desds, the more certain she is that the skulls are watg her. The mounting pressure in her chest builds, so Emily makes a split-sed decision after spotting motion at the edge of her vision again.
I ’t go further. I o surface.
She turns upwards, making a break for the surface. As she rises through the dark water, the chill seeping through to her bones slowly fades and, when she surfaces, gasping for breath, the chill has all but vanished.
“That water’s deep. Maybe I should take a break and try again tomorrow,” she mutters before freezing, breaking her rhythm and almost sinking uhe water again.
Why did I give up so quickly? And why am I suddenly happy to hang around in this cave? I’m following the same path as Oscar.
The thought worries Emily, bringing a scowl to her face as she gazes down into the depths below.
I should definitely be able to hold my breath for longer. And why did I keep seeing motion? I o it to going further and ignore all distras.
“Hey, Emily. You okay?” Dante shouts at her from the shore.
“Yeah, just catg my breath!” she yells back, keeping her eyes oer as she steels her resolve.
She reaches uhe water, taking The Clock out of its poud holding it firmly in her hand. Taking a deep breath and calming her heart, she gives The Cloe st squeeze for reassurance before diving back down into the water.
She slowly kicks down through the darkness, desding into the uling unknown below. Once again, as she approaches the bottom of the ke, she starts seeing flickers of motion at the edge of her vision. Ign them, she ploughs onwards, reag the point where the water shifts to red.
The pressure in her chest starts growing again, as if she o breath, but she reises it as false and pushes through. Soon, she reaches the deepest point in the ke and sees a small, head-sized pitch-bck hole surrounded by thick, swirling red.
How ominous.
She approaches the hole, attempting, unsuccessfully, to shine light into it.
Damn. I ’t see in, but I feel it alright. It’s powerful. That’s got to be the source of the curse. All these bones and blood just scream cursed.
She hovers over the hole for a few seds, the pressure in her chest hurting, and a small voi the back of her mind screaming for her to turn back.
Ah, what the hell. If I lose my arm I just reset.
She shoves her arm into the hole, reag down until her shoulder presses against the kebed, but she still doesn’t find ao it. She grasps around in the dark, searg for any signs of the curse’s source. Then just as she’s about to listen to the void pull out, something presses into her palm. A frigid chill bites her hand, and a system notification appears in her vision.
ˉˉˉˉˉ
Mental attack spell detected!
Resisting…
Mental attack successfully resisted!
_____
Thought so. It ts as a mental attao wonder I wasn’t affected as much as the others.
She tightens her grip on The Clock, just in case the attack gets worse, and pulls her arm out of the hole. She gets an odd feeling of weakness as she pulls it out, as if the unknown object is sappirength.
Freeing it from the oppressive darkness, she opens her hand and gazes at her find. It’s a rge, two-inch-long jagged white tooth with tiny bd red els of cracks running its length. The tooth seems to ooze malevolent i, sending Emily’s instincts into overdrive aing a chill so cold she starts to shiver.
The bloody water around her seems drawn towards the fang, slowly ging the tre point of its swirling motion to her palm. The voi the back of her mind starts tellio let go and leave, but she ig. She shuts her hand tight and, with no reasoo stay, swims for the surface, leaving behind the bloody water that tries to follow.
After breaking the surfad gasping in fresh air, Emily treads water in pd raises the tooth out of the water to get a better look. The moment she opens her hand again, the shadows on the ceilio stretch towards her, trying to recim the strange object. With a frown, she calls out to the system in her mind, pulling up an information window.
ˉˉˉˉˉ
[Mensacus]
[Rank:] D
[Stats:] -4 int
[Description:] A shard of the abyss given form, imbued with the curse of hunger.
[Effect:] verts death into corrupted mana that drives nearby anisms to the depths of hunger.
_____
Jackpot! It really was the source of the curse. I’m taking this for myself! They don’t know anything about it. If I hide it, they’ll never know.
She stares at the system window with a satisfied grin that slowly fades into a slight scowl.
Hmm, minus intelligeno wonder holding it makes me feel weaker. How am I supposed to sneak it out of here if it makes it harder to fight. I guess I probably make do with weaker spells. As long as we don’t run into ahird circle beast, I’ll be fihe main problem will be the mental influe’s starting to annoy me, and they’ll struggle to fun if it follows us.
She reaches up with her other hand, rubbing her head as the small voi the back of her mind still screams for her to release the Mensacus.
I need some way of sealing this if I’m gonna take it back. There’s some bck iron in our spatial stes which may help if leaking corrupted mana is the issue, but I o get it there unnoticed.
She csps the Mensacus between both hands and forms a bubble of mana around it. The chill reduces slightly, and Emily feels the draining feeling of weakness reduce but not disappear. The voice gets a bit quieter, so she g her attributes to check.
ˉˉˉˉˉ
[Attributes:] Strength 12 (13), Dexterity 34 (35), Agility 26 (27), Vitality 13 (16), Intelligence 60 (58)
_____
The reduced values as a result of her damaged gear makes her frown, but the redu in intelligence is promising.
Good, it’s half the expected redu. Hopefully the others won’t feel it now.
She shrinks the bubble of mana as small as possible, moving the Mensacus to one hand and swimming back towards her groupmates. Emily arrives at the shore and pulls herself onto dry nd again as Ivor questions her.
“Did you find anything?”
“Yeah. There was a strange skull at the bottom of the ke leaking bck mana. I destroyed it, so hopefully that will stop the groglers,” Emily lies.
“Well done,” Ivns as Oscar walks up behind him.
“We’ve finished gathering everything valuable on this side, so we’re going to move on,” he announces. “I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not set up camp o the mad writing on the wall.”
Emily raises a brow at his disfort.
“Fair point. What’s the pn from now on by the way?” she probes.
“I swear you’ve asked me this already,” he responds with a smirk. “We’re going to set up camp here for the night and head baorrow.”
“Good. I ’t believe you wao stay here for a week.”
“What do you mean? I never said that. Why would I want to stay here for a week,” Oscar says fusedly, gng at the bodies surrounding the ke. “This pce gives me the creeps.”
Huh. He doesn’t seem to remember what he said uhe curse’s influence.
Oscar turns and moves away, direg members of the group to head around the ke to tiheir harvest while Emily puts her shoes and robes ba, drying herself with a quick cast of se. She uses one core to maintain the mana barrier around the Mensacus the whole time, slowly draining her mana.
She joins the rest of the group, helping them gather resources while kig every grogler corpse into the ke to erase the gruesome dispy. As she pces crystals into the ste bags, she takes out and pockets a cw of bck iron.
Eventually, the light fades from the cavern and they set up the sound barrier and their sleeping bags, settling down for the night. Emily sits alone in the dark usiheion to monitor the breathing of her groupmates. It’s an hour before the st of them fall asleep.
Finally.
She stands up, walking away from the barrier and sitting down thirty metres away from the group, just to be safe. She pces the Mensacus dowo her. The moment her hand leaves the mana bubble, it bursts, releasing the fang’s malevolent aura into the cavern. However, at the same time, she feels her strength return to normal, her mana flowing smoothly and unhindered.
Iing.
She tests l her hand back down towards the cursed tooth, finding her intelligence redug whenever she gets within a few inches of it.
The debuff applies while I’m close to it, not just when I’m toug it.
Noting the oddity, she takes out the bck iron. Casting burning hands, she heats the four inch long her palms and starts moulding it into shape, fttening it. She dismisses the spell and picks up the Mensacus, pces it in the tre of the ft pte, as burning hands. Gently, she presses the metal closed around the tooth, melting it together and sealing the cursed object away.
The moment the st gap is closed, the chill from the Mensacus reduces to a bearable irritant. The voi her head vanishes, freeing her from the worst of the burden on her mind.
With a g her attributes, Emily he partial success.
ˉˉˉˉˉ
[Attributes:] Strength 12 (16), Dexterity 34 (35), Agility 26 (28), Vitality 13 (16), Intelligence 60 (59)
_____
It’s not perfect, but it should hold until I get bad research proper seals.
She happily drops the partially-sealed cursed tooth into a pou her belt aurns to her watch. Time slips by, and soon Ivor relieves Emily of her duty, so she colpses on top of a sleeping bag to rest.
As she lies still, about to enter meditation, a question creeps into her mind.
Where did the Mensacus e from?
Her eyes snap open, and she turns her head towards the ke, sitting beyond her vision in the surrounding darkness.
Where did that hole lead?
She opens her system notifications again, reading over the cursed tooth’s description.
A shard of the abyss given form. The abyss?
She looks back further through her notifications, at the quest she received upon arrival at The Crystal Waters.
ˉˉˉˉˉ
[The Abyss: Everything Flows To]
[Rank:] D
[Description:] You’ve reached the magical underbelly of The Gde, The Crystal Waters. Now discover where The Waters end.
Requirements:
-Find the destination of The Crystal Waters' flow (Not plete)
Rewards:
-Skill: Flow (passive)
_____
Does that mean that hole leads where I o go? It’s too small for me to swim through. I’ll have to try running deeper into the tunnels aloomorrow. But if I ’t reach it now, I know the Mensacus is reted to it somehow, so, maybe if I study it, I’ll get some ideas about what this Abyss is in advance.
Emily shuts her eyes and rexes, growied for the return to i, and falling into steady meditation.
