40.Exploration of the mine
Next to the entrance of the mine is a warehouse and a small hostel, the miners wait for the inspection to be able to return to work. Izel questioned the miners at the hostel, asking them if he had seen anything strange or new in the vicinity of the mine. The miners were simple men who didn't ask many questions, they didn't notice anything new apart from the bats which was more annoying than usual. Apart from that there was not much new, these men were not receptive to magic so they could not feel the elemental crystals for example. For this very reason the Duke had asked the association to send a wizard to examine this mine, the Duke sent this request for all these mines at a particular interval, approximately every five years.
During his inspection of the mine izel had to note all the things he noticed, like strange energy but especially things that should not be here. On the walls of the mine there was bio-luminescent moss growing on the mine walls, and because of its visibility was manageable for him. He had to go into the mine by himself, and Cuau and Necalli couldn't go in because they were too big for that. Izel had asked them to observe the area around the mine, to see if there were any strange things or monsters with affinity that should not be here. He especially asked Necalli to look for rare plants in the forest while he flew around looking for creatures.
For his inspection he was equipped with a sword because the mine is cramped to fight with the spear, the movement would have been too limited. Continuing on his way he found veins of minerals, minerals like copper or iron, nothing magical for the moment he continued to go deeper into the tunnels to find things. His helmet scanned the walls to find interesting veins of metals, elemental crystals. He also scanned the floor or ceiling to make sure he didn't miss anything, like interesting mushrooms or even useful plants. He found plants on the floor that were interesting, like a plant that produced a good smell, or another one that was a mushroom that was used for an eye potion. The data of each plant was displayed on the head-up display of his helmet, all the data he had added on his database in his chip was useful at a certain time.
Every interesting thing he picked up, he put it in his storage crystal. One cubic meter had increased to two square meters during the whole time he had the crystal, the energy infused into the tattoo every day gradually increased the space available. One thing he discovered some time ago was that he could store energy in the crystal to retrieve it later, this was very useful but he discovered that it was very reseminating. The mine was quite large according to reports, it went very deep underground. He would have thought that the mine would have been overloaded with dust but surprisingly this was not the case, the breathing was even quite easy. The further he went, the more bats he came across, this one was quite aggressive but his swordplay was not so bad to be hurt by it.
The bats were gray and produced very shrill sounds. The first time he heard them it surprised him, his headphones held most of it back and fortunately because of the intensity of the sound it would have done damage to his ear. It produced magic in the sound it produced, it was quite rare for creatures to have magic. He recovered bat bodies to see which ones were special with this creature, autopsied them to see where the magic came from. He didn't meet any new creature, rat skeletons could be found on the ground. Looking at the cave floor, there were bat droppings everywhere, the energy was also present in the droppings in smaller quantities. He took a small shovel and a bag out of his storage space to get some soil, he wanted to experiment with it to test if it would be a good fertilizer.
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The descent became less artificial over time, the luminescent foam was as much present, but it began to change color. It went from turquoise blue to green, the general atmosphere just changed with a different color. It recovers of course samples of the different moss, to show all the association has its return, but also to Otr may be that it would be useful for all its. The ambient magic of the mine was rather normal at this level, but the more it goes down the more the density of magic in the air increases. This should not be the case because the mine was marked "No magic", except for a wizard who was there to experiment or a leyline was open on the mine. If it was a sorcerer it could have been more dangerous, it could have been another reason but without seeing it he didn't know which one it was.
Fights were becoming more and more frequent, the bats were not the only ones to be fought. Big rats were also there, he attacked in groups so it was harder to defeat. Magic was becoming more and more used by izel, he sent mini lightning bolts on some, sword strikes on others. At each interval between two fights he recovered, the deeper he got into the mine, the more monsters were crossed in the long corridor. He said that he may have to go back and do some small hunting session in this mine. He had been in the mine for an hour and a half already and fatigue was becoming more and more present, the harvest of that hour was quite good. The information collected was not very important at the moment except that the energy in the air had become hotter and hotter. At the beginning it was hardly noticeable, but with every meter deeper the energy of the fire became more present, the creatures used more and more fire magic.
A fire toad was visible at the end of izel's vision, it didn't seem to be aggressive. The toad observed izel when he suddenly spat out a sticky substance on fire, izel reacted quite quickly but his leg was injured. While limping he threw a water needle spell in the toad's face, his eye was pierced by the needle and it didn't kill him but weakened him. A flash of lightning followed to finish him off, when he touched his skin, muscle spasm and smoke came out of the toad's body. Once it was well dead, izel decided to retrieve it to put it away. He had to go back to the hostel for today, heal his leg and rest until all hours for dinner with the miners.
After a good half hour the exit was visible, the fresh air outside did him good. He leaned against the wall to start taking care of his leg, the injury was not so serious a first degree burn but fortunately he had used his energy to protect it a minimum. He was able to walk to the hostel, he limped a little but it was bearable. He spread on the link of the companions that he was back, but that they were not obliged to do it as well.