Deep underground, far from the reach of sunlight, lay the nation of Sarfeed. Home to the serpentine Yig, creatures that are born of both man and snake in all myriad of forms that may take, the people of Sarfeed are religious fanatics. One catch: the Yig have forgotten their deities long ago. Instead, the Yig now form cults and sects, where they worship anything and everything worthy of reverence. To some, the fickle and haphazard desire of the Yig to put their faith in something greater is viewed as a critical weakness and a dependency, while others commend the Yig in finding faith in anything.

At the heart of one such sect, a great temple lay. Carved into the cave's stone, a massive cathedral far greater than what any small collection of Yig should be capable of. And at the heart of that temple...

"Intruders!" the serpentine man hissed, rearing back its long neck and bellowing into the air. "Summon the-"

A spinning sawblade sliced the snake's head clean off. A fountain of blood poured from the stump as its head fell down to the ground with a thud.

"How generous of you," Remus cooed, the portal into her extradimensional space from which the projectile had flown closing slowly, "giving me such an easy target."

Novos walked up behind her, casting the entrails and severed limbs that blanketed his shoulders off.

"How many more?" he chuckled. "I'm outta spells, by the way."

"Here," Remus handed him a potion, azure in color with golden flecks suspended within. Novos snatched it from her hands, and quaffed it without a second thought. "I'd assume there are somewhere between fifteen and thirty guards remaining."

"Can't believe those four chucklefucks just had to find a hole in a ground, but OUR piece was turned into a stupid fucking religion for these snake dipshits." Novos coughed as he finished the potion.

"Drink too quickly?" Remus cooed.

"No, I just hate how these things taste. Can't live without 'em, though."

"Certainly not, with how quickly you burn through your spells."

"What can I say?"

Remus shook her head with a smile.

Novos slumped down against the massive pair of double doors, carved straight from the cavern walls. Each door measured an indomitable thirty feet in height, and ten feet in width, and Novos could not even begin to guess how thick they were. These doors clearly guarded something of great import- likely, he thought, exactly what they had come for. The only problem now was opening them.

Novos had pushed and pushed against the left door with all his might, but even with his body enforced by magic he could not bring the doors to budge even one inch. Remus stood idly by as he exhausted himself, knowing fully well that she was essentially useless against this obstacle.

"Remus," Novos wheezed at last, "please tell me you have bombs."

"There are at least five reasons that is a bad idea," Remus replied coldly.

"Then are we just gonna go home and fuck this whole thing?!" Novos threw his hands in the air as he slouched further down. "Fuck no! We already had to run away from those other four like a couple of bitches, and now you're telling me we have to tuck tail and split from this too?!"

"Calm down," Remus reassured him, "you're overreacting."

"Then what's your plan?" Novos crossed his arms with a huff.

"Well, do you really think that as few Yig as we have seen would be capable of opening a door like this?" Remus squatted down next to Novos. "I believe it's likely that they have some kind of method for opening this door, rather than brute force."

Novos turned his head to the side, deep in thought. "Yeah..." he mumbled, "yeah!" he shouted. "Of course! Those shrimp-ass snakes could never open a door like this! Let's go find the... whatever opens the door!" Novos hopped to his feet, and dashed out of the room.

Remus shook her head with a smile.

"Please don't hurt me!" the elderly Yig cowered from upon his stone bed.

"You look important," Novos sneered with his swords pointed at the woman's throat. "Tell us how to open the big door."

"The door has been sealed since time immemorial! I can not!"

"How long?" Remus asked.

"About thirty years."

"That's it?" Novos laughed. "You have the memory of a goldfish."

"We just say it to sound impressive..." the woman seemed on the verge of tears.

"It should be no problem to open the door, then," Remus cooed.

"It is my one duty to ensure no soul ever crosses that threshold!" the woman shouted as if possessed. "That door must never be opened."

Novos pressed the cold of his blades against her throat. "Open it."

Charisma Check: 19

Novos and Remus fail.

"I refuse!"

Novos sliced one of the woman's arms off. "Wrong answer," he menaced.

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Charisma Check: 10

Novos and Remus pass.

"Okay..." the woman winced, then waved her one remaining hand, and a thunderous rumble gripped the temple. It shook the temple to its very core, so thoroughly that Remus almost feared the whole temple would collapse and that the woman had tricked them. Then, at last, it stopped.

"Yippee!" Novos cheered and then stabbed the woman in the heart. He sprinted off back in the direction of the large door.

Remus shook her head with a smile.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Novos stared down the opposite side of a door. Before him was a bottomless expanse, a vast pit straight down that was nearly as wide as the doors were tall. Along the sides of the pit, a staircase was carved, spiraling downwards into pitch-black abyss.

"Please tell me you can cast Feather Fall," Novos turned around to face Remus with puppy-dog eyes.

"I cannot," Remus shook her head.

"Guhhhhhhhhh," Novos groaned as he stepped onto the staircase and began his way down, holding his groan for as long as his lungs would allow- which was a very long time. His voice echoed throughout the cavern, creating a monotonous and piercing noise that threatened to drive a sane soul to madness.

But Remus simply shook her head with a smile.

The path down was long, nearly an uninterrupted hour of downward spiral- very relatable- and was so long and boring that Novos even relieved himself at one point during the descent. An hour of mind-numbing walking, where one could never let their balance fail on risk of plummeting to the abyss below. At long, long last, the duo arrived at the bottom of the stairs. A vast, circular chamber, obtuse and unrefined in construction, as if hastily carved into the stone, unfolded below them. But Novos and Remus paid it no mind, instantly collapsing down onto the stone floor, Novos slumping agianst the wall much as he had against the door hours prior, and Remus hitting the ground fully prone face-first, her short stature leaving her far more exhausted than him.

"I never want to do that again," Novos whined.

"Then I won't remind you we have to climb back up," Remus mocked, her voice muffled by the stone.

"You are the worst. The absolute worst. I hate you."

"Hey," a voice echoed through the dark. Alerted to the possibility of combat, Novos and Remus jumped to attention.

Piercing through the darkness, a pair of burning orange eyes bore down upon the duo. With the sound of a great movement, obscured by darkness, an enormous serpent slithered forward, its crimson scales barely visible through the darkness. The eyes rose higher and higher into the darkness, until they towered down. Remus withdrew a lantern from her pocket space, and lit it, revealing the massive head of the hooded cobra, bearing down upon them.

"Did one of you do this?" the tip of the snake's tail pointed at the scalp of the snake, where a puddle of urine proudly gleamed.

Novos slowly raised his finger to point at Remus.

"Don't even think about it," she snapped.

Novos slowly lowered his finger.

The serpent's tail flattened the ground where Novos was standing.

A portal opened next to Remus, and Novos fell out of it in a crumpled mess, completely unharmed but very disoriented. Novos slowly straightened himself as he rose to his feet.

"Thank you," Novos whimpered.

"Don't mention it," Remus shook her head with a smile.

Novos climbed out of the serpent's stomach, covered in bite marks and acid burns. The mangled remains of the serpentine guardian lay at his feet, sliced laterally into three ribbons of flesh and bone. Remus handed him a two potions: one, seemingly filled with blood; and another, filled with a dull green liquid and what appeared to be plant matter. Novos drank them both without a second thought. He spat out the green one.

"What the fuck was that?" he blurted out.

"A stamina potion," Remus answered. "They don't taste great."

"What do I need a stamina potion for?" Novos chortled and flexed.

"You've been fighting and moving for almost six hours. Take a breather."

"But the artifact is right here!" Novos dashed towards a nearby corridor, opposite where the stairway made contact with the ground level. He ran down the corridor, completely ignoring that Remus was the one carrying the lantern. Remus sighed, and jogged after him.

With some luck, the corridor was very short, and ended in an equally large chamber. This corridor was vast, rough, and unrefined, as if the Yig had left it wholly untouched from its natural state. Concerningly, it heavily resembled the chamber where Novos and Remus had clashed with the other four, and where the ship they never learned the name of was found dormant. As the pair approached the center of the great cavern, the light of Remus' lantern began to reflect across the iridescent rainbow colors of a bed of bismuth crystals, though this bed was far smaller than the bed upon which the Zailiens had rested. Roughly the size of a human, the bed cradled what appeared to be a small metal boat, roughly the size of a rowboat.

"What is this, some kind of consolation prize?" Novos approached the bed of crystals and kicked it in anger.

"Not even going to inspect it first?" Remus mused.

Novos pretended to scrutinize the boat, before throwing his hands up in the air.

"It's literally just a rowboat made of metal. Those four got a whole whale, and we got a fucking rowboat!"

Remus approached the boat, and allowed her lantern's light to fully engulf it, leaving no shadows but those cast by the occasional flicker of the flame within.

Intelligence Check: 25

Remus passes.

What struck her first about the shape of the boat's hull was how unrefined it was. It did not appear to be sculpted or forged by intelligent hands, but rather that it had formed on its own by natural causes. There were places where the metal seemed to have rolled over itself as a liquid, giving the appearance of cooled lava more than a boat. Within the boat were two seats, one behind the other, and she knew already where she was sitting once Novos got over his disappointment.

Perception Check: 15

Remus passes.

At the heart of the boat, between the two seats, Remus took note of a strange object, which appeared to be akin to a square coin, pointing straight up out of the bottom of the boat. She reached down, and attempted to pick it up, only for it to refuse to budge. She pulled it, and came to realize it was attached to the boat. She gave it another pull, then attempted to wiggle it, then at last tried twisting it.

With a loud roar, light filled the room. Remus leapt backwards, and Novos drew his swords. The two watched with a mix of confusion and awe as the bottom of the boat seemed to illuminate with a pinkish-purple light, an as it began to slowly float off of the ground. Up it floated until it was about a foot off the ground, at which point it settled to a casual hover.

"No fucking way..." Novos said, awestruck. "No fucking way! Some kind of craft... that hovers! It's like..."

"A flying carriage," Remus nodded along.

"Hell yeah it is!" Novos sheathed his swords and ran for the front seat. "You're in the back!" he shouted to Remus.

Remus nodded to herself, happy she was right.

Novos hopped into the front seat, and immediately gripped the single stick at the front of the boat, which Remus had carelessly missed. He grabbed it, and shifted it to the left. It swung in that direction, and nearly hit Remus in the head.

"Watch it!" she shouted.

"Sorry, I got no idea what any of this does!" Novos was far too elated to care. "You don't wanna get hit? Climb in!"

Remus shook her head with a smile.

The duo shot up the center of the spiral staircase, and out the doors, the absurd hardness of whatever metal or whatever magical reinforcement allowing them to barrel through each and every obstacle in their way with ease. Up and around they went, sometimes taking care to drive over a Yig they'd killed previously who happened to be in their way, before at last exiting the temple. But they did not stop there. Once on the open stretches of cave that had been made into Yig cities, they were able to find exactly how fast their new joyride could possibly go. At the mind-boggling speed of sixty miles per hour, the two of them shot past all the Yig of the city outside the temple, all the way up the winding cavern system and out onto the surface, paying no mind to any Yig that happened to be in their way.

"I love this thing," Novos beamed once they had made contact with sunlight again, reaching down to pick some shards of bone and guts out of his lap.

Remus nodded her head with a smile.