The group immediately started to move along the maintenance tunnel, not wanting to see how long the spying ivy could hold up whatever the creature that was following them. The tunnel ahead was much like the tunnels they had been in before, well-lit and with little water.
They walked at the best pace that Silt could manage. She was still weakened from earlier, but she was also stubborn enough not to want to slow them down. After about ten minutes walk, Jake sense something.
At the same time, Drak spoke up. “I can hear water,” he commented.
“I can feel it,” Jake agreed. “There’s a lot of water up ahead.”
“Well, there’s no branching in the tunnel, so that’s where we are going,” Silt observed, gesturing ahead.
A few minutes later, the sound of running water started to get louder and they found themselves in a strange room. It was clearly purposefully made to drain water from the areas of the city above. But it was also very magic dense and that was causing some weirdness.
The main waterfall reached from the ceiling and fell into a dark hole. There were no helpful lights down there and it was impossible to see how deep it was. The water was strong and steady.
There were also a number of other, smaller streams of water. Some of these were doing the usual thing of falling from the ceiling downwards. Others seemed to have managed to re-route themselves somehow and were running in a range of directions, including horizontally and diagonally.
“What is this place?” Ell asked, turning to view the whole room.
“Just another weird spot in this very strange place,” Silt said, seeming less impressed. “I told you these tunnels were unlike anywhere else you’ve been. No one knows who made them, so there’s no way to understand why they made them as they did.”
“There have to be some records somewhere,” Drak said, frowning.
“Not that anyone I’ve heard about has ever found,” Silt replied. “And I’ve done quite a lot of research on this place. That’s why I decided the risk-to-reward ratio wasn’t worth coming back down here. Until you idiots dragged me down here.”
Jake didn’t reply to that, well aware that Silt had decided to come along by her own choice. He glanced at Drak, who just gave a little shrug.
“Next question: how do we get out of here?” Ell asked, still slowly turning to study the whole room.
The other three turned their attention to studying the room to see where there was an exit. After a few minutes, Drak called out and headed to the wall where the largest waterfalls were located.
“There’s a ladder here,” he said, gesturing to it. It looked to be made from iron and sturdy, despite the constant fall of water it received.
“I can’t see any other exits,” Jake confirmed from the other side of the chamber.
“Nothing here either,” Drak confirmed as he examined the area around the strange smaller waterfalls.
“Then the ladder it is,” Silt confirmed. She was standing watch near the entrance of the chamber, still aware that whatever was following them was likely still on their trail.
Drak crossed to where Ell stood, pulling himself up onto the first rung. There was a slight creak of metal that hadn’t held weight for a while but seemed solid. He climbed up another rung, then another and the ladder held.
“Looks good,” he confirmed. “I’ll go up first.”
“No, I’ll go up first, then Jake,” Silt said. “Ell next and Drak bring up the rear. Watch your footholds and handholds. It will probably be a bit treacherous.”
Jake heard Drak mutter something ahead and smiled to himself, knowing the dragonkin was probably slightly irritated by the bossy half-elf but was actually being restrained for once and not saying anything.
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Silt started her climb, with Jake following him. Each of them continued to climb at a steady pace. They realised there were actually multiple starting ladders and stopping at random intervals on the wall. The ladder's rungs were a little slippery but not as bad as Silt had feared.
Abruptly, Drak gave a shout and dodged to his right, almost swinging off the ladder. He managed to grab another ladder that started just below where he was climbing.
Something was pushing through the steady stream of water, something that was dark in colour with a profile like a giant snake.
“Hydra!” Ell shouted. “Be careful; they have a nasty bite!”
Jake stopped, realising his friend had also stopped climbing.
“I know,” Drak said through gritted teeth. “Damn thing bit me before I even saw it.” As Drak looked down at his side and I could see the large chunk missing from his side.
The hydra’s head snaked into the tunnel, blood dripping from the corner of its mouth where it had bitten Drak. The creature had quite a square head and plenty of sharp teeth. It hesitated momentarily, staring at Drak as he tried to get a better hold of the ladder.
Then another head extended from the side of the first, fixing its glare on Silt at the top of the ladder. Another, then another and within a few moments, seven heads were studying the group, almost motionless.
“Run!” Slit shouted and with a flash of light, she shot to a different ladder, just dodging one of the hydra’s heads.
Another one opened its mouth and shot a geyser of black and green acid at Ell, who, with panic, launched himself up with some type of wind spell before another head slammed into him, sending him into the upper cave entrance with the cracking of bone.
Jake hopped to another ladder, moving the water off the ladders to keep better hold as he couldn’t really do anything to stop it. One of the heads turned to him, mouth agape and dripping acid from it. He reached out to the acid and could feel this would cost him a lot. But he did this by taking control of the acid with a tier 2 spell and shooting it into the creature's eye, which only pissed it off as the acid dripped from it with little effect.
But that little distraction allowed Silt to dodge another attack and fire some type of tier 4 cast! The spell had flaming chains rap around the hydra’s head and moved to the same cave that Ell got hit into.
The roar of the hydra was deafening as, all of a sudden, a blast of water shot down at Silt before she could get into the cave. This sent her flying down, but with what must have been a massive force of will, Drak grabbed her from the air.
But whatever he did to save Silt, it must have cost him greatly as it seemed like some light within him had been nearly extinguished and he could barely hold on to the ladder with Silt.
“Damn the matted hair of Serliny,” Jake swore at the hydra, Drak, Silt, and everything else that got him to this point. He put his hand into his pocket and pulled out a brown glowing crystal that was brimming with power. “And damn me for waiting to use this.”
As he pushed his essence into the prismatic crystal, it shattered and for a moment that felt like an eternity, nothing happened. Then he saw something. Golden eyes that looked all around with an inner brown that had the soul of the true essence of the earth in them.
“The First Law Of The Earth Is.” The voice in the vision said that turned into his voice.
“IS THAT OF THE BEGINNING!” he shouted as he felt the essence of earth fill his body. He commanded all of the stones in the tunnel to attack the hydra.
With the strength of the earth essence filling him, he moved to pick up Silt and Drak. But even with all of the stone attacking the hydra it wasn’t laying down to die but fighting back. That’s when he knew that the hydra was going easy against them.
Rivers of acid were shooting out of the hydra faster than anything he had seen in his life even as its body moved with strength and power that was breaking the stone blocks, spikes, and spears that were launched at it.
The noise of the battle of the hydra and the earth was becoming deafening as he pulled Drak and Silt into the topmost cave. But all of the power from the prismatic crystal that made him feel like a god was barely doing anything to the hydra. He rushed over to the now unconscious Ell and could feel the earth essence leaving his body, realising he had probably about a minute left of this enhanced state.
Jake knew he needed to get them all to safety and feeling confident, he went to lift Ell but hesitated. He decided to use the last of the power to grab a stone slab to lift them all further into the cave and away from the hydra. He managed to get the slab to lift up into the cavern and was about to move the others onto it when he felt the last of the power dissipate.
With what little essence he had, he used the weight reducing potion on all four of them, moving them onto the slab and back into the cavern. Hopefully, far enough back to be out of the reach of the hydra.
Then he collapsed, breathless and utterly exhausted. He was severely dehydrated from the essence use and could barely lift a finger.
“What happened?” Silt asked, pushing herself up a little with one arm.
“I used the prismatic crystal from the beetle,” Jake said, his voice hardly above a whisper.
“Did you kill it?” she asked.
“No but I think it decided we weren’t worth the trouble. I threw an entire cave at it and it didn’t really blink,” he replied. “Or at last, I hope it decided we weren’t worth the trouble. I have nothing left,” he admitted and promptly passed out.