In a strange and unforgiving land where few had ever tread before, the landscape shifted with every step. One moment, hard rock shot into the sky in the form of a cold and unforgiving mountain; the next, sand threatened to swallow any foolish enough to dare traverse it. Dark forests abutted flaming expanses of magma. Calm lakes sat undisturbed beside frozen tundras. And those were perhaps the most simple of areas within this aberrant space.
Within minutes, one could pass through areas of blinding light, of shrouding shadow. Areas that dulled and baffled the mind and those that offered perfect clarity. Indeed, from a bird’s-eye view, the land below resembled nothing so much as a deific quilt, some deranged patchwork project of an equally deranged god.
As if in competition with its counterpart below, the sky, too, was a sight to behold. Devoid of any sun or moon or stars, it was an unending stretch of darkness, or at least it was to those unable to perceive more.
Floating high in the sky -- drifting about, intermingling, combining, and dividing at will -- was an astronomical amount of mana. Just as in the land below, the sky above was hardly uniform, every color of the rainbow represented dozens of times over. Whereas the earth was more fixed, however -- with rigid cutoff points where one patch met another -- the sky was far freer, the colors refusing to stay put as they diffused through one another. It was a sort of haphazard tie-dye that demanded attention at every moment.
It was beneath this shifting sky and atop this chaotic land that three figures sat in a triangle.
Huddled into a small recess of a rocky mountain, far more of an alcove than a proper cave, they were forced close together. A small metal badge lay between them, a gem at its center.
The first of the three was perhaps the simplest. Light skin poked out of fairly plain clothes, wavy auburn hair framing her face. If there was a single thing of note about her, however, it was her expression. Blank and dead eyes gazed directly forward as though unseeing, and she remained slouched over, perfectly still.
The second was pale to an unnatural degree, her hair following suit as its white locks fell down to her shoulders. Blue eyes so light they were almost clear sat stonily within her skull in what appeared to be a permanently hard expression. Despite the laxness of her company, her back remained ramrod straight as she sat, as seemed only fitting for the fine garments she wore.
The third, in many ways, was an opposite to the second. Skin and hair as dark as night matched an equally dark, form-fitting outfit. The somewhat gloomy atmosphere notwithstanding, she radiated a sense of mirth as she leaned back against the rocky wall, idly throwing a dagger from one hand to another.
It was this third figure that deigned to start the conversation.
“So, scale of one to ten, exactly how fucked are we?” Cal spun her dagger outwards, gesturing to Verin with it.
For her part, Verin was not overly amused. “I do not believe it is valuable to quantify our predicament in such a way. In sum, however, the teleportation ritual failed, neither the archmage nor his master are anywhere to be found, and Tess’s mind is still shattered. More so, all of our spatial storage and recall gems are inoperative, placing us squarely without sustenance. Then, perhaps most pressingly, we have already encountered a monster well above our levels that we were unable to scratch. Unless it was an anomaly or an apex predator, we may assume we are far too weak to survive in our current location.”
Spelled out in that fashion, their situation only seemed worse than it had moments prior. Realizing her words had likely put Calilah into a more somber mood, she allowed the girl some time to process it all, letting a heavy silenc-
“So, like, an eight? I feel like that’s solidly in ‘eight’ territory.” Cal flashed a cheeky grin to her noble companion.
Verin sighed. How had things ended up like this, exactly? Had there not been enough misfortune to go around? It was only a few days prior that Oachin and Nella had died in Sylum’s settlement dungeon. Emin had followed soon after, as had the son of one of the chamber heads, Warram. Tess’s mind had broken beyond the means of conventional healing. Chamber Heads Aren and Goss had fought in the streets. Emer’Thalis had endured a bloody and pointless war with one of the surrounding settlements.
From any angle she looked at it, the three of them were due a measure of good luck. Instead, they’d landed here.
“Perhaps an eight, yes,” she reluctantly conceded.
“Nice, I like the number eight. Good number. Anyway, are we done sitting here and brooding, or is one of you going to figure out how to use that thing?” Cal tilted her chin towards the gem-inlaid badge before them.
Verin began to protest that she had hardly been “brooding” before thinking better of it. Besides, that is the question, isn’t it? If there’s any path forward, the locator badge is likely a part of it.
She’d discovered the trinket while rifling through all her pockets for any possible recall devices she hadn’t tried already, and though it was the very device that had gotten them into this mess, she was relieved to have it.
“The archmage said the device would be able to locate his master and assist in breaking through spatial locks to get to him, yes?” If she recalled correctly, the actual teleportation ritual that had landed them here was mostly just to gather mana and funnel it into the gem.
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If that is the case, then perhaps if I…
Verin channeled a dash of mana into one of the recall gems in her jewelry, simultaneously reaching out to do the same to the badge. The plan had been for the device to cut through the spatial lock keeping them trapped, though that hope was quickly dashed.
You are in a spatial lock!
As much as she would have normally been discouraged, though, something else happened.
A tug.
A gentle nudge to both her hand and her mana, pulling her unmistakably in one direction.
She related her findings to Cal who took the news in stride.
“Its job is to find the archmage’s master, right? So maybe the ritual didn’t fail after all, and it just dropped us off a bit early. Which direction was it pulling you?”
Wordlessly, Verin pointed, Cal perking up as she followed her finger.
“Well, at least it’s down the mountain and not up, right? Come on, let’s go find a really old wizard guy.”
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Descending the mountain proved to be as nerve-wracking as it was blessedly uneventful, the latter of the two largely thanks to Cal. Overall, there was no shortage of nooks and crannies to hide in along the way. The trick, however, was to find them and reach them without being spotted by another gryphon or whatever else might lurk within the mountains.
It wasn’t an idle concern, either. On several occasions, gryphons did pass overhead, the occasional screech breaking the otherwise complete silence. Given how poorly they’d fared against the first one, Verin tensed up at each sighting.
Cal, however, seemed to have some form of shockingly good invisibility -- far better than what Tess had alluded to when she’d spoken of her adventures -- which made her ideally suited for scouting. Despite the need to rush from hiding spot to hiding spot, the going was slow, much of it spent waiting as Cal picked out new routes. Worse yet, when they were on the move, Verin often found herself winded, her low physical stats not well suited for the steep terrain.
Tess, for her part, allowed herself to be dragged along without complaint, never once out of breath even a little bit. It was at times like these that Verin cursed the world for only birthing her into an incredibly rich and powerful family instead of also making her a Protagonist. Fate, in many ways, was a cruel mistress.
Nevertheless, they progressed until at last the mountain loomed behind them. Replacing it was a sea of grass that spread out into the far distance.
“Now, I’d like to say ‘Good job team!’ and take a breather, but we should probably keep moving.” Cal didn’t so much as pause as she led them onwards.
“I must unfortunately agree.” Even with her body protesting, Verin didn’t dare suggest they stop. They’d only managed to survive their first gryphon encounter by running and hiding, and as much as Verin preferred the level surface of the plains, it provided no chance for either. She had few delusions about what would happen if they were caught out in the open.
In fact, she was dreading the next leg of their journey even more than the last for that very reason. If gryphons made the mountains their home, what manner of monster might live here? Something beneath the earth? Something small enough to hide in the grass or stealthy enough that they couldn’t see it from this distance?
As the trio moved deeper and deeper into the plains, however, it grew more and more clear what they were up against.
Namely, nothing.
No monsters. No traps. No signs of any form of life save for the grass itself. It would have been the greatest relief possible had it not also been slightly unnerving. Save for the occasional pause to reorient themselves with the locator badge, their walk onwards was uninterrupted.
Forward. Forward. Farther ahead until the mountains lay far behind them.
And then-
Tug.
“Pause.” Verin brought the group to a halt as the pull of the badge finally changed. “It appears to be pointing… lower. Perhaps there is some manner of hole or entrance nearby?” She certainly hoped so. None of the three had skill sets particularly suitable for digging.
With a shrug, Cal began to wander off. “I’ll take this direction. Race you to find it? We can say the loser owes the winner a favor.”
“I do not see a need for-”
Cal broke off into a light jog, her Dexterity evident as she left Verin far behind in only moments. The high noble stifled a grumble before ultimately turning around and searching in the other direction.
In this, she tried to use her magic to its greatest use. Icy blades shot out from her feet, reaping the grass wherever she went. In part, it helped her keep track of where she’d been, but it was mostly to aid her in finding anything the grass may have obscured. Periodically, she stabbed a blade into the ground as well on the off chance that it would crumble or feel different to her somehow.
It was the better part of an hour of this before she had to admit she wasn’t getting anywhere. Was there a tunnel system underground? Maybe one that they could have entered all the way back from the mountains? Or was the entrance simply not on her side?
Despite the bet (which naturally did not count in any case given her lack of agreement to it), Verin stopped her search, returning to their original starting point.
Only, is that truly where we began our search? She used Tess as her landmark given her stationary nature, but her mind must have been playing tricks on her.
Tess seemed to have shifted slightly.
And she’s sitting now. Did Calilah prompt her to do so? Verin couldn’t remember her friend doing just about anything of her own accord as of late.
It was nothing short of miraculous, then, when Tess began to move.
Even as Verin shouted for Cal to come back, Tess slowly leaned forward, extending a single arm out. She ran her hand through the grass until her palm rested against the earth. A brief flash of mana left her fingers, and as if waiting to reveal itself, a spell diagram flared into existence.
A moment later, the earth began to shake and pull itself apart. Where once there had been only grass and dirt, a perfectly circular hole soon took shape.
Finally catching up, Cal gave her expert opinion.
“Huh. Solid entrance. Nice and magic-y. Guess that means we both lost though, yeah? Think that means we owe Tess a favor now.”
Under the circumstances, Verin didn’t contest the point.
And so, with equal parts caution and anticipation, the three descended into the earth.