Walking deeper into the cave, Hera and the group talked about the last fight, their voices echoing in the tunnel.
"Your tail is more useful than I expected," Helena was looking at Hera's tail.
"I know. I keep getting surprised with what it can do. I hoped it would be a good attack, but not that it would be strong enough to kill two monsters with a single swing," Hera said with a smile, but when noticing the stare, she started to feel embarrassed, "Hum… can you stop? I don't know why, but having you look at my tail like that is making me feel weird."
"Oh, sorry. I guess this is kind of like staring at your butt…" Helena backed away.
"I think your skin is sturdier too. I don't think I would be able to handle that bite like you did," Blue changed topics.
"To be fair, the Naga scales skill was rank 6 already. I think I could've stopped that bite even before the transformation. But I agree that it does feel better right now," Hera smiled and pulled her tail, warping around her waist like a belt.
"Hera. I'll be in my axe form. This place is getting a bit too cramped for me," Livy told everyone before changing shapes. Unfortunately, the cave's ceiling was starting to get low, and a 3-meter-tall dragon wouldn't have enough space to move around freely.
"Don't you want to stay in your sea serpent form?" Hera suggested.
'I'm still big when I'm like that. If something happens, I might take up too much space. It's also easier to move as a weapon,' Livy explained.
"Really? Do you all feel like that?" Hera turned to Lurize and Nimbus, who were at the back of the group, making sure nothing was coming to ambush them from behind.
"To me, the form I'm more comfortable being is this one," Nimbus replied.
"Mine is the beetle form. Maybe because I'm part spirit," Lurize added.
"Do you think this has something to do with how they were created? Or is it just personal preference?" Helena asked.
Hera thought for a moment, "I think it's just personal preference. The only one who actually has a reason for it is Lurize. Since he was a beetle before meeting me. I'll probably have a better answer in the future. When I have more titled blades."
"Right, you can have more of them," Blue sighed, "How many can you have in total? You know what, don't tell me. I'm going to get jealous."
"You are getting jealous? You can make clouds. Stop a storm and destroy an entire dungeon made out of clouds in a few minutes. Not to mention fly, and I'm pretty sure you'll eventually be able to make a cloud mecha. Lena and I don't have a legacy, and you are the one jealous?" Bonnie huffed.
"Well…. Yeah," Blue looked away.
"I'm not doing this on purpose, even though I want to change the subject, but are you all seeing that?" Legan pointed forward, where a light seemed to be peeking from the corner of the tunnel.
"I am," Hera nodded, "Lurize, do you remember this place?"
"Not quite, but it is familiar."
They continued walking for a few moments before reaching a lake with a single large rock in the center. On the ceiling of the cave, directly above the water, was a long opening leading to the outside. It was close to noon, and the sun was starting to shine like a spotlight on that small island.
"Careful, this water doesn't seem safe for drinking," Hera said.
"Really?" Alex turned to the explorer.
"Yeah, there is no vegetation around it. There is no current, so the lake has been here for a while. Also, we can't see any markings from the rabbits. If they lived in this cave but refused to come this deep, there must be a reason for that," Hera explained.
"Also…" Helena created a light and made it get closer to the water, "Is it just me, or are the stones much lighter in the lake?"
"That's true. This whole part of the cave seems to be in a lighter shade," Alex looked around, noticing how the farther things got from the lake, the darker the stone became.
"Could this be because of the acid?" Lurize asked.
"What acid? The one Scryotra sprayed on us?" Hera turned to the Royal Tutor.
"Yes. We are always going off the assumption that what you did in the vision is not the same thing as what actually happened. But if we think about it. A Naga would have a much better reason to sacrifice themselves to warn their people of an attack than you did," Lurize reached out to touch the water. Since he was made out of metal, if this really was acid, it shouldn't deal that much damage to his armor, "It must be very diluted, but I can still feel something happening."
"Then do you think this hole is the hole Hera helped Mr. Beetle escape from?" Blue asked.
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Hera looked up, "You know… maybe. I mean, if the acid was strong enough, the vapors could corrode the path. Then rain came from the other side, and through the course of thousands of years, it became this."
"Although I don't think my presence in the vision was supposed to happen," Lurize crossed his arms in deep thought.
"Even if you were not there, the gap in the cave would still be. Sure, you might have helped increase the size of that gap, but smoke wouldn't care about it," Hera patted him on the back.
"Does that help us in some way?" Legan asked.
Hera shook her head, "Not really. It's just interesting to see how the world changed from what we saw. But there is more to this tunnel. But it also proves that the monster I saw in my vision was a real thing," she moved one of her lights to the opposite side of the lake, "There is also that tunnel. It wasn't in the vision. So it's either something made by someone, another result of the acid, or a cave-in that resulted in opening a new path."
"Let's keep it going then. If this was a path made by the Naga, there had to be a reason for it," Legal smiled and walked around the lake, followed by everyone else.
As Helena passed in front of the large rock, she noticed something in the corner of her eye. There was another opening in the wall of the cave. However, instead of just a single opening, it was a set of eleven, "Hang on a moment, everyone."
The mage looked back at the center of the lake, noticing how the top of that large rock was oddly reflective. Using her light spells, she twisted the light coming from the opening in the ceiling to hit that spot. Doing that created several beams of light coming out of that stone. Moving the light around, she aimed the new lights at the openings. Unfortunately, nothing seemed to happen.
Wanting to support her friend, Hera asked, "Can you hold that for a moment?"
"Just hold it? Yeah, it's not that hard," Helena still had her hands out, controlling the light.
"Nimbus. Can you fly up the hole and see where the light is going?"
"I think I can do that with the magnet," Nimbus nodded.
"All yours," Hera flipped the lid on Yarnball, and the magnet flew towards him. She also passed her tablet to him so he could take pictures of the actual place.
The Sentinel caught it and jumped, flying up through the opening and looking around. After a few minutes, he returned with a sad expression, "Sorry. I couldn't see where the light was getting out to. Even taking Hera's position as a reference."
"That's ok. Maybe it was one of those things where I saw a pattern because I looked for it."
"Or maybe it's like the opposite," Alex suggested.
"Like when the sun is in the right spot, the light comes from it and hits the rock?" Blue asked.
"Or the moon," Alex added.
"That's fair. I supposed we could set up some cameras here to watch this place later. There is no need for us to be here ourselves," Helena dropped the spell, "Sorry for the delay, everyone. I just thought I had found something."
"No worries. This is what we are here to do," Hera smiled and continued to walk towards the rest of the tunnel.
"Hera, may I ask a question?" Legan approached the Empress.
"Of course."
"Is what Helena did a good or a bad thing?"
"You mean trying to see if anything was hidden in there?"
"Yeah."
"A little bit of both. On one hand, doing that might trigger a trap or something dangerous. On the other, if you ignore all the weird things you see, the odds of you finding something unique or interesting will be a lot lower. It's all about how confident you are in dealing with whatever the MAZE is going to throw at you. In our case, we are at a much higher level; we have titles, legacies, and powerful items on our side. So here, we are confident we can overcome most things," Hera explained.
"So it all boils down to experience?" Legan asked.
Hera chuckled, "Pretty much everything does. Don't worry, you'll get there."
They continued walking for a few more minutes until they arrived at the other end of this passage. It led them to a thick part of the jungle that was oddly quiet. Understanding that this might mean something dangerous was around, everyone moved closer and got ready for a fight. Even Livy returned to her bipedal form to be able to fight better. Slowly walking, surrounded by large trees and vines, even the sound of the wind seemed to vanish. The shadows surrounding them looked darker as if the sun was unable to reach them properly.
"I have a weird feeling about this place. I can't wrap my finger around it," Lurize said, but Hera could feel his uneasiness. It wasn't as if there was something wrong, only as if he wasn't welcome here.
More time passed while they were tense about the situation when Hera noticed something strange. A few of the vines and leaves in the area seemed to be dangling from the air itself. While focusing on that, she took a step to the left and bumped into something. Yet, there was nothing there. It was a similar feeling to hitting one of the invisible walls, but unlike the formation that delimited the size of a room, this was bumpy and filled with flaws. The invisible walls were perfectly flat. Taking one step forward, she understood what was happening. She had just bumped into bones. An old black exoskeleton from a gigantic creature. Now that she was no longer in front of it, she could see the remains of Scryotra scattered around the area. The vines she saw dangling from the air were attached to more of the bones. The problem was that this version of the monster was much bigger than she saw in her vision. The previous version of this creature was large enough to climb over mountains, but each of the apparent legs she could see was bigger than any of the surrounding mountains. Wanting to be sure, Hera used [Observe], which retained its rank despite no longer having the red sight option since she had a specific skill for that now.
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Scryotra's Bone
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"Is this that monster?" Blue asked.
"Yeah, but it's bigger than I remembered. I think…" Hera turned around, feeling something approaching. She looked under the creature and saw a tiny black serpent hidden between the bushes. Instinctively, she triggered her [Observe] again.
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Stealth Spirit - Level 18
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"Oh shit," Hera gasped and looked up, "I guess this makes sense."
"What?" Helena asked
"This place is home to stealth spirits. Probably because of the bones."
"That tracks. If this thing is powerful enough to still hide itself, even after so long, then it does make sense that spirits could be around," Helena nodded.
"This also means we don't have to worry about that giant monster, right?" Legan turned to Hera.
"I think so, but let's keep looking around. I'm sure we can find something interesting here."