The sea floor below cracked open, and seemed to grow wider and wider. Surely enough, it swallowed them all, and with shocking haste pulled all of them down, down, and further down. If the pressure of the water was bad before, it was now infinitely worse. Simon, Mina, Dianna, even Lawrence were all crushed against the bottom of the sea floor in this great chasm, where no light reached. Simon felt the air being pushed out from his lungs, and worse that the little air left inside was about to cause his lungs to burst.
Simon reached for his halberd, to try and finish the job, but couldn’t even bring his arm off the ground. Through the darkness, Simon was barely able to perceive the blood pouring out from Finn’s wounds. Finn was locked in what seemed to be a meditative posture, placing his hands together to form a hand sign as he remained kneeling on the ground. It seemed as though Finn was trying to run out the clock, hoping that the four of them would die before he did- or at least, that if he would die, he’d bring the four of them with him.
Dianna’s elven vision pierced the darkness, allowing her to pinpoint the location of Finn. She reached out for a dagger, and thanked Deruthmoryx for her spell holding and allowing her to retain some amount of mobility this far underwater. Even with her body partially melded into ether-matter, she could still feel the weight of the ocean above her, threatening to crush what part of her was still corporeal.
With great effort, taking what felt like years, Dianna crawled forwards towards Finn, dragging her body behind her. She prayed that her friends- though she couldn’t believe she was calling them that- would survive long enough for her to reach Finn. She knew that in waters this deep, there would be no way for her to swing her dagger with enough force to wound Finn. But she didn’t need to wound him- she just needed to deliver even the tiniest of blows. Anything would do.
Dianna at long last reached Finn, who seemed to be oblivious to her presence. It seemed as if the spell he was casting required his total concentration to maintain- which worked in her favor. She raised her dagger up, and pressed it against the Morro’s chest. She pulled herself forward with her other hand, until at last the dagger broke the skin.
Dianna casts Myriad Judgement
A supreme spell and a personal gift from Deruthmoryx to his followers. Causes an attack to be multiplied, based on the number of sins the target has committed, as well as based on the severity of those sins. The definition of these sins is held by Deruthmoryx.
Hundreds upon hundreds of spectral daggers appeared all across Finn’s body, leaving no room for an onlooker to perceive the man beneath them all. They floated narrowly off of the surface of his skin, and at once they all descended into his flesh.
Finn’s eyes opened with a shock as he felt countless pains bury into him. He opened his mouth, but could not speak through the countless blades that now pierced his throat. He briefly floated upwards, and at that moment the rest of the heroes felt the weight lift off their bodies.
A red splinter of a crystal appeared in front of Finn’s throat, though there was not much of his throat left for it to point at. It was a thin, and perfectly symmetrical shape, as though it were crafted by a meticulous artisan. Finn shook his head violently as he looked upon it, a great deal of fear showing in his eyes. At once, the crystal stabbed into his throat, and he exploded. In that same moment, the spell vanished, and the four were hurtled away from Finn’s once-body, now a pile of gore, as it splattered across the ground.
“Everyone okay?” Lawrence coughed as he cracked his back.
Mina coughed up a volume of water. “Could be better. Very wet. Very hurt.”
Dianna ended the Slipstream, and felt the water in her lungs slip out of her body as the spell ended. “Better than I thought I’d be. We have Simon to thank for that.”
Simon threw up blood and water onto the ground, then rolled over onto his back.
“Oh, shit, are you okay?!” Mina ran over to Simon’s side. He was bleeding profusely from his eye socket, and from his mouth, and from between he plates of his chestplate on both sides of his body.
“Can you heal him?” Dianna asked as she walked over.
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“Not enough,” she shook her head. “And I need herbs to do it.”
“How useful,” Dianna sighed.
Dianna casts Restoration
A basic spell that heals a creature. Cannot regenerate lost body parts, or heal broken bones, or mend damaged organs, but can mend flesh and stitch together wounds.
Simon coughed to consciousness. He gagged, and almost threw up again.
“What’s wrong?” Mina asked, resting her hand on his shoulder.
“Armor… bent… crushing…” Simon answered painfully.
The other three immediately set to work, ripping the dented armor off of him. Once it was off, he breathed deeply. The leather gambison he wore beneath his armor was torn where the worm had bitten him, exposing his now-healed skin below. The bruises beneath his skin that seemed to be expanding as the other three watched told them all they needed- he was bleeding internally.
“We need to get you to a cleric, immediately!” Mina cried.
“Not yet,” Simon shook his head. “Let’s finish up here first. I can do that much.”
Simon scanned around, looking for something, and the others could not tell what.
“Aha!” He said, and crawled over towards the pile of Finn’s gore. He reached into it, and withdrew Finn’s intact head. “Come on,” he said with a smile.
The assembled upper-level pirates parted fearfully as the four heroes strode out from the door to Finn’s quarters, which they had crushed open. They cowered at the sight of their once-great captain’s severed head, and Simon was ensuring that they all saw it. They all stepped out into the center of the pirate camp.
“Where the FUCK is Rufus?!” Simon shouted, causing a twinge of pain to shoot up his side as he felt his wounds aggravate.
The assembled pirates murmured amongst themselves, afraid to step forward. After a time, another voice bellowed in reply.
“Right ‘ere! Who’s askin’?!” Another Morro man, though this one significantly less muscular, stepped forward into the center. “This had better be damn important- oh… oh… my… gods…”
“Heard you’re the man to talk to about bismuth?” Simon mocked with a smile.
Simon, Mina, Lawrence and Dianna gained 500 Experience.
The maw of a great cave stood before the four heroes. Simon stood at the front of them, adorned with a new eyepatch and clad once again in his family’s plate mail, reforged for him by the blacksmiths of Ad Limosa. It had been a long week since they sieged the Red Swans, but not an uneventful one. For days after their battle, they were celebrated, even going as far as a parade in the streets in their honor. Simon could not participate in any of these festivities, however, as he was forced to remain in the custody of the local church of Malivectus, god of battle, to rest and recover as their clerics healed him. Though they could do nothing about his lost eye, they had managed to salvage his organs from the state they were in, saving his life. But Simon needed not worry- the other three celebrated more than enough for him. Lawrence spent his days chasing tail from all manner of species- and failing. Mina ate her fill of the greatest meals the chefs of Ad Limosa could prepare, and then some. And Dianna… some say they saw her smile. But now, their celebrations had ended. The time had come for them to finish what they started- to retrieve this almighty artifact, whatever it was.
The four descended into the bowels of the earth, lit only by a small oil lantern that Simon carried. Deeper and deeper they traveled, until at last their progress was blocked by a great wall of bismuth crystals.
“Uh… now what?” Mina asked.
“So help me if we did all of that just for regular bismuth…” Lawrence wound up his arm as if he were about to punch something.
“I think I know what we’re supposed to do here,” Simon smiled. He stepped back, then charged at the wall and launched himself into a diving kick. The brittle crystal readily gave way beneath his force, shattering to reveal a vast chamber on the other side.
“Told ya,” Simon laughed as he dusted himself off.
Within this chamber was a vast crystal of bismuth. The chamber itself was a round hollow, which seemed to be nearly a hundred feet tall and fifty feet in diameter. The bismuth crystal, for scale, filled half of this chamber. The four could not make out an artifact of any kind either near or within the crystal, but that was of no worry. They would simply approach it and investigate. Approach it, and-
A sharp whistle rung out through the chamber, echoing and echoing into a myriad of pitched notes. The four turned around, towards the entrance of the chamber.
Standing there, proudly and menacingly, was a tall human man. Though he was less muscular than Simon, he carried himself with the same gravitas as him. A pair of swords rested on either side of his waist, and most notably was his lack of a shirt- instead, the only thing he wore on his upper body was a long coat, splattered with numerous blotches of different colors of blood. The yellow blood of undead, the blue blood of monster kin, the green blood of the plantfolk, and most predominantly the red blood of humanoids. He smirked devilishly at the four heroes.
Behind him stood a woman, who was much shorter than him, though still and adult. Her height betrayed her halfling lineage. She was clad in the robes of a high-ranking scholar, the kind that would advise a noble or perhaps even royalty. The hood of her cloak masked her face. She smiled timidly.
“Found ya,” the man sneered.