We cleaned ourselves off and headed into the new cavern. The moment we stepped past, the air temperature rose sharply, and we all began to sweat. I looked around at all the mist and scowled. "It's like a sauna," Snow said a few seconds later. May nodded while Meera and I looked between them, confused. I asked about it, but they both waved it off, promising to tell us later.

The mist was thick, bringing our visibility down to only a few feet. Strangely there was still light coming from somewhere. Instead of the usual greenish light cast by the glowing moss, it was a white light slightly tinted with blue. The stone floor ended four feet from the door, and tall grass began waving in an unfelt breeze. May frowned as she watched the grass. "I'm not too fond of this anything could be hiding in there, and Meera said she could smell animals in here. I think we should skirt around the grass. For now, and stay against the wall as long as possible."

I watched the excited Meera and less excited Snow for a long moment in worry, but I can't think of a safer place for them than with us. Anything could find Fluffy's cave, and I don't trust the metal puppet not to come back to life if I left them here at the entrance. Snow must just have noticed my worried expression because she gave me a reassuring smile telling me she would stay back and look after Meera. I grinned at the thought, wondering who would be protecting who in the case of something attacking them.

Keeping the cavern wall to our left, it took us several hours to circumnavigate the entire room. We didn't find anything on the outskirts, and when we found ourselves back at the now-closed door, we might have panicked—just a little. During our tour of the cavern, we heard the sound of snuffling in the grass from time to time, but nothing we could ever see.

Shrugging, I asked the girls to stand back a bit while I examined the grass, promising not to leave their sight. I had to physically touch the grass before getting a good idea of its properties because something in the stone beneath us wouldn't allow my earth qi to pass through. I didn't particularly like it since it had become a habit to keep a tendril in the ground to feel any significant vibrations. Not a bad warning system in case of an attack by a big beastie.

When I touched the grass, I couldn't find anything extraordinary except that It could grow underground without sunlight. Other than that, it was typical prairie grass tough with a somewhat sugary flavor. I tried sending out my air qi to get a look further in, but like my earth qi, something possibly the mist was blocking it from leaving my body. I thought about having May try using her fire qi to burn some of the fog away, but it didn't feel like boiling like a crab plus, I have no idea if this cavern was ventilated. We may only have so much oxygen available to us.

I waved the others over. "Well, no choice but to push to the center. Everyone stays close. Meera stay by Snow; May watch our backs. I don't think I need to say this, but weapons ready at all times. That includes you, Meera." Meera nodded. I could see she was nervous as she made a long knife appear. May got from that caravan we sold the horses to. I placed my hand on her head. "Hey, don't worry. After all, we have possibly the strongest five-year-old in the empire here, who or what would dare get in our way?" As Meera stood straighter, a pleased look on her face, I pressed an ironwood seed to her chest, letting it grow around her upper body. I didn't bother with May or Snow. They couldn't afford the loss of movement that the armor would provide. I wonder what people would say if they saw me using a seed that costs nearly ten gold pieces as temporary armor?

We made our slow way toward the center for fifteen minutes before an earsplitting squeal tore through the air. I could see the grass moving from my vantage as if something large was sprinting through it in a direct course for our party. I got ready, placing myself in front of Meera. Just as a massive boar with twelve-inch long tusks came charging right into me. I backed up two steps when it hit as I dropped my staff and instead grabbed it by a tusk. I could see confusion in its angry black eyes when it failed to gore me.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

I was not too worried about the boar breaking from my grasp. It was quite a bit weaker than me. But I did get a surprise when its skin took on a rocky texture like mine when I used my earth qi to reinforce my body. It took its tiny brain several minutes to figure out I completely overpowered it, and it stopped moving. May came forward, looking at the grey rocky skin with interest. "Huh, I didn't think any evolved beasties came down from the Thousand Teeth mountain range. I wonder how this guy got in here?" I rolled my eyes at her question, still holding the brute down. Obviously, someone put it here. I was, of course, wise enough to keep my remark to myself.

Meera, half-hidden behind Snow with her arms wrapped around her leg, scrunched up her nose. "The piggy stinks really bad." I laughed as I released my grip, watching as the boar turned and sprinted off as fast as its hooves would let it.

May gave me a strange look, one eyebrow raised in question. I shrugged. "My gut is saying not to kill anything in here." May nodded and relaxed, returning to her position in the rear. Snow looked confused, but I didn't feel like explaining, so I winked at her and began moving toward the center again. After a while, we ran across a snake. It had red scales, was around twenty feet long, and as thick around as my waist. This one I had trouble not killing outright as it went directly for Meera. Somehow I held back on my attack, and instead of crushing its head, I only knocked it out, possibly blinding it in one eye.

Several hours later, I had to stop our group and admit that I was utterly lost. I thought I had been doing a relatively good job of keeping us in a straight line, but we should have reached the center long ago. It was strange; I could feel something was messing with my sense of direction when we stopped. I tried to shake it off, but the feeling wouldn't go away until Meera, who had been staring at my shoulder for some reason, held out her arms to me, wanting to be picked up. I obliged, and the moment I did, her hands darted out, and a small mouse was trying to wriggle free.

Meera looked the mouse in the eyes and said. "I'm the only one who can ride on Papa." Then she dropped the mouse to the ground, where it watched us for a moment before it grinned and scampered into the grass almost too fast for me to see. Interestingly I could feel small puffs of air qi being pushed from the tiny creature's feet. I will have to keep that in mind to experiment with later. After the mouse vanished into the grass, the muddled feeling in my head faded. I looked around, finding grass trampled flat in a circle about fifty yards across and to our left, a clear path where we must have entered.

We each spent a bit of time congratulating Meera on finding the mischievous mouse and decided this was a good place to camp. That's when I noticed Meera still had the ironwood chest plate on. Meera, how do you still have the wood armor? It should have fallen apart long ago. She shrugged before pulling it over her head and placing it in my waiting hand. I immediately felt that it was saturated in Meera's qi. Meera had, against my wishes, bound herself to the element of water, and that water qi was flowing through the chest piece keeping it alive. Neat, how did you think to try that? I asked curiously.

Meera, who had skipped over to help Snow with our dinner, looked over curiously. "What?" I explained what I meant, and she made an oh sound before replying. "The woman trapped inside the jade hair stick asked me to try." After thinking for a second, she nodded then turned back to hand a carrot to Snow, Who was also watching Meera with a look of alarm. May, had been taking out camping supplies from her ring, crouched down, looking Meera over from head to toe.

I froze. I had forgotten all about the creepy hair stick that tried to connect to my qi a few weeks back in the jewelry shop. "Sweety, how did you get that hair stick, and where is it now?" I don't even remember anything about it after I cut the connection that day. I joined May and crouched down in front of Meera. Meera tried to avert her eyes, but she was currently surrounded, so instead, she looked at the floor. I placed a finger on her chin, lifting her head so I could look her in the eye. "Sweety, your not in trouble, but I would like you to explain how you got that hair stick. Then you will have to tell us everything that woman has tried to get you to do."