Olea Munroe

I chose to hook into Selene, riding along on her senses as she dropped into the flowing water below.

The small river of water was flowing steadily and quickly through the caverns, drawn on by gravity and its own established momentum.

The cave network inside the hollow of the waterway was smoothed to fine perfection at the water level with small stalactites of many assorted colors that might have indicated something other than their age to someone more learned than me. Though you did not need to be well-studied to appreciate the many shades of blue, green, orange, and white that collared the small spires reaching downward.

I felt more than heard a splash through Selene’s body when Rocky landed nearby. It seemed that the Water Walk spell did work as I could see him drop into the water. The surface seemed to bend downward like a stretched trampoline before he could pierce the layer of tension. He continued to bob along with his stubby feet springing along on top of the water.

Selene flowed toward Rocky as he climbed to the edge of the small water ways edges. It seemed that there was a type of shelf running the length of the underground system. It was nearly as smooth as the submerged portions of the cavern, which made me think that it was underwater for some period of its existence, possibly the earlier weeks of spring.

Selene moved up to stand with Rocky on the shelf as they scanned the area. His head moving about slowly, along with most of his torso. He must have detected something as he began trotting off in an almost sliding stomp.

Selene followed the clomping steps of Rocky as they wandered down the narrow walk near the flowing water. Her own field of vision panning left and right while keeping the earth golem in sight. It was strange in that I could not detect her head moving as her vision did, she just shifted her view somehow to see through a different section of her form with a thought. Or so it seemed to me at the time.

Ahead of us on the shelf I could just now see the form of a creature that resembled a large centipede. It had a vast multitude of legs, and a thick rust-colored shell segmented down its body. I could also see a large spine extended from its posterior that looked like it would cause no small injury to the creature’s prey. Its head housed four small black orbs that served as the thing’s eyes and a pair of mandibles was currently busy snipping away at the remains of a rat-like creature.

It somehow sensed the presence of my summoned elementals and turned to greet them with a clacking of its creepy mouthparts. I guessed that the creature was probably close to two feet in length.

Rocky made the first move, having not stopped to observe the beast at all before attacking. Straight into the ring.

I watched as Rocky bowled into the creature and was quickly wrapped up as the thing seemed to flow over his small body, avoiding the stone fists and legs of my stalwart stone-man. It ran along his body jabbing with its steely knife of an appendage. I could not sense any real damage being done but knew that I might be missing something in the quick movement.

Selene moved in closer, and I saw her arms extending into small thick whips only moments before they shot out and struck the creature any time its body separate from Rocky, and a few times that it did not.

Rocky for his part was taking the abuse quite well and it was not long before he managed to snag a segment of the creature and secure it to the ground stopping most of the creature’s movement.

The beast proved to be quite slick though as it wormed its way free, losing a few legs in the process. It continued its assault on its dense attacker, occasionally being pinned down again only to free itself shortly after.

Selene continued her assault, though her senses had told me that she was planning something else. I could almost taste it.

Like, really. Moments after the beast regained its footing from another grapple with Rocky, I could taste something in Selene’s mouth, and then it happened.

A small jet of condensed water shot from her mouth and onto the face of the centipede. This was more than just water; it had a green-gray tint to it that made me think poison. Apparently, my elemental had some other skills up its sleeve.

The insect did not seem to recognize the poison as it clacked its mandibles and swung its tail, still trying to penetrate my earthen friends’ hard exterior. I would have doubted the effectiveness myself had I not noticed the discoloration that was spreading along the carapace of the centipede.

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As the small battle continued Selene delivered two more doses of poison to the creature, splashing some onto Rocky in the process. I never saw the poison bothering the tough little guy, and it took me a moment to realize that poison probably would not work on a creature made entirely of stone that possessed no circulatory system, at least for blood.

I would have made a note to study it later, but I did not think I would ever develop the desire to study elemental physiology. Okay, I knew I would never really commit to such lessons; maybe I could get cliff notes from Merry.

That seemed like a much better idea.

At that moment Rocky managed to get a good grip on the mandibles that had been striking relentlessly into his hardened body and began pulling them apart even as he rolled the creature under his body.

The tail began thwacking onto Rockys back hitting repeatedly until the spine at the end of the tail snapped away. This of course made the creature struggle even harder as it attempted to dislodge its stony attacker.

Selene stood back and watched as the mighty hero defeated the evil centipede by lifting its head and ramming it into the solid surface of the shelf underneath. This action, combined with the weakening of its exoskeleton from the liberal doses of what I knew to be a poison of some kind, made it a matter of time before the stalemate ended in a gooey mess.

The entire fight consisted of five minutes of wrestling with a glorified garden hose monstrosity and a creature that just refused to get tired, while the assassin waited for poison to kill the competition. Poor matchup for the agility-reliant centipede.

You have killed: Bronze Centipede [Level 11] 50 Experience Per level, Minus Ten Percent for Level Difference.

Experience Till Next Level: 1,615 remaining of 25,000.

One down, a few more to go.

The scene filled in some gaps as to how Selene had been killing things before, she had a partner. She was physically weak in her current state, but I assumed that would change as I leveled up. Being able to just poison a creature and wander off while it died, thus getting me some beautiful experience was a benefit to being made of water.

One had to wonder what was so special about the sand born salamander that had put a stop to it earlier. Either way I was tired of looking at the gunky remains of the ugly beast on the ground and I think Selene agreed as she motioned to Rocky, and they both headed off further into the watery tunnels.

Several small encounters occurred over the course of the next hour, small creatures all. A collection of spiders and other small cave vermin fell to my friends. I felt somewhat sorry for the snail before Rocky broke open its shell and revealed the small mammals in various states of decomposition tucked up into its shell. Appearances truly were deceiving when snails could become such vicious scavengers.

The experience offered was miniscule but did add up over time even as the penalty for killing creatures that were sometimes five levels below me took more than half the experience.

Yes, I felt like a true murder-hobo as the creatures of the cave fell before the dutiful duo of Rocky and Selene.

I had shifted my senses back to the cell for a few moments between bouts to make sure no one was keeping an eye on me or investigating why I would possibly be sitting against the wall unmoving. As I could only vaguely notice things that were happening to my physical form while sharing senses through this link, it all just felt so distant and unreal while piggybacking with Selene.

I only saw more guards walking to and from the tunnel, many more than were present before though none of them stopped to gawk at me in my dimly lit cell. They were all so confident that I would be going nowhere.

After all the slaughter I was not only a meager ten experience from reaching level thirteen. I was extremely excited to learn what the fuss about ranks was all about, and that might be why the deity of fate stepped in to present a chance at revenge for my friend.

We rounded a small curve in the tunnels as the water descended picking up speed as it went, creating sounds like distant thunder and I noticed that around the curve of the limestone walls was a steep drop into a darker tunnel as the water cascaded down a large collection of small falls each adding a depth of echoing reverberation to the sound in the cavern.

I had a thought then, it appeared that this entire section was most likely filled with water during peak levels of rain, the smooth ceiling above giving me some confidence in the idea.

All that aside, I did not fail to notice a bright shaft of light coming from another chute that led upward in the center of the larger shelf that probably served as a spillway or something similar when the water speed or volume picked up.

I saw a diverse collection of loose pebbles and scattered debris across the expanse created by the weather of the narrower walls at this portion of the cave system, countless years having carved away the rock to allow a clearer view of what was on the other side.

It was like an S-bend curve that wound its way through a flattened stretch of desert, the former walls now only visible as occasional shafts and pillars of stone reaching part way up to the ceiling.

Sitting in the center of the curving channel under the solitary shaft of filtered light was what I assumed to be the victor of Selene’s earlier fight.

The Sand-Borne Salamander.

I noticed that Selene had stopped moving as my point of view had not changed after several moments, and I felt the mental prodding that signaled her attempt at communicating intent toward me. I would have greatly appreciated a clearer bond with her, like the one I shared with Corvin, but her desire was clear; she wanted a rematch.

I gazed at the creature through her eyes, knowing I could just nudge them toward nailing that last little bit of experience I needed to rank up somewhere else. I could even see some bats on the ceiling and noticed a few exceptionally large spiders in webs near the walls. Not to mention that I saw another slow-moving snail not twenty feet away.

Somehow though, I sensed that Selene wanted to tackle this thing as we were. Sitting at the novice rank punching up at the next rank as we avenged her earlier nameless form. I really could not bring myself to deny her the chance to avenge her former vessels defeat.

I gritted my metaphysical teeth and shouted through the link one simple phrase, tried and true for many, many years back on earth.

“Round two, FIGHT!”