A corpse is a corpse is a corpse. In their own way, they all look the same. Previously, like broken dolls; nowadays, more like discarded meat. Useful, but ultimately empty. Inert. Wasted.
The ground is strangely dry beneath them, an open throat and pierced heart surprisingly bloodless, and it takes a bit of time to examine the surroundings and notice the slightly reddish hue to the stone beneath the body. Even sniffing it directly, she can’t smell any Qi from it, drunk deep along with the former cultivator’s lifeblood and body heat. There’s signs of a fight, slight alterations to the terrain as if earth was summoned and reluctant to move, signs of claw marks on the walls…
But also shallow. Too shallow for anyone at the level of the tournament, considering the toughness of the stone (not much higher than regular granite). She presses her eyes close, pupils alien and wide to drink in every possible detail, and watches the marks shivering, ever so slightly, as they heal back over.
Concerning. But not as much as the body.
There’s no spatial treasure, rings, or weapons on the body, but the robes, while stained, are intact. The face, frozen in slack-jawed surprise and fear, is unfamiliar. One of the fighters from the Stone Divers sect, if the robes are any indication, but not a standout.
Of course the sects would be the first to draw or lose blood.
She’s not sure how deep the plot to coordinate between the sects runs, but its clearly not something everyone knows about. Jin Rou and Rei Ji certainly seemed determined in their own ways, but not very close either. Whatever old blood festers between the sects, it runs deep, more likely than not tied to the myths and histories they prattled on about. Whatever happened here, it’s clear neither his own sect or the members of the Unearthly Depths offered much help, or opted to take the body with them.
The scents here begin to disperse, and leave her with an interesting question. The scent of the Witch pervades the atmosphere here as much as everywhere else, and while there are sparks of whatever conflict happened here, they’re already faded by the hungry stone all around. While its clear that several of the nearby paths were chosen, with some footprints leading back out into the Crag proper, she can’t tell who went where.
Well. Mostly. There are two directions that appeal.
Towards the direction of a smaller tunnel, the Qi of her beetle-companion drifts, still connected to its master. Into that tunnel, she picks up hints of scent that are mostly familiar, but also notes that only three sets of footprints seem to have gone in that direction. Likely no sect-group members in that direction, but not enough sets of feet to be her allies, not if they stuck together. Which, knowing Kaena, maybe they didn’t, dividing for appearance and best odds of survival. Maybe. Option one, small tunnel.
In the other direction, a larger tunnel opens like a gaping maw, seven sets of feet (and several animal prints) traveling down it. Considering safety in numbers, Kaena is at least somewhat likely to be among them, and there’s a chance Jin Rou or Rei Ji are with that group, having stayed behind to defend, and might offer some information. But then again… some of the elders that made it probably went that way too. So… option two. Beside that, five more sets of feet into a curved but almost as large opening, and another two who headed back out to the Crag.
The Flesh tells her those two are already dead.
She tilts her head at that, and stops to examine.
The thought feels obvious, but the proof of it is hardly clear. It takes a little bit to click together the pieces consciously.
First: these tunnels are alive. There is something beneath the city of Cragend, perhaps beneath the true Crag entirely, and it both feeds on all within it and can heal damage to itself.
Second: the Qi pressure remains immensely powerful, enough that it nearly drowns out her senses. For someone with true Qi sense and a body designed to intake and exhale Qi, it’s likely stressful in the extreme to simply be down here. Despite their more cramped quarters, the Qi flows through the tunnels, while it just sits, heavy and alien, in the central Crag.
Thirdly; she is not where she should be. She knows how fast she can move. Her body, instinctively, knows at least somewhat how much running equates to how much distance. And from the rapidly-healing lactic acid and energy usage she’s experienced, she should, at bare minimum, be well past the edge of the city proper and into the Crag. She can travel a hundred miles in an hour casually, and she ran at a decent clip for a lot more than an hour just to reach here. Either there’s another miles-deep rock canyon conveniently placed at the same point in space and time as the Crag- or this place can influence its interior. Goes back to point one, the tunnels being alive, and the Witch being able to sense things through her Qi.
The “escape” priority is a bit challenged by some of these revelations. Still, she can see the point about the two cultivators in the “Crag” now; between the isolation, the Qi pressure, and the fact this place seems to be actively warping its dimensions, it (or the Witch) are likely trying to herd them into the tunnels. Those two, whoever they may have been, probably didn’t fare too well so isolated and out in the open.
So. Follow one of the larger groups, or towards the insect and away from any sect politics or crowds of people she most likely (definitely) attacked during the chaos at the arena?
When put like that, the solution seems simple.
She considers taking a bite of the body, but… between the draining effect of her surroundings and her recent meal, she’s not really hungry. Eating now would be an indulgence, and she doesn’t really have time for it.
Well. Then again… the more fuel, the better, and there’s probably a bit of Qi still in there.
The Flesh, of course, vehemently agrees.
She takes what she needs to know the body is empty of all but the smallest scraps of Qi (two bites), and, on the buzzing and clicking of her new traveling companion, makes sure she gives it some scraps as well. If she were whole, the munching and chewing sounds against her ear may have been grating, but separate and accepting of new experience as she is, it’s… fine. The beetle clicks and flutters its wings, and she takes it as gratitude before covering the body back up and heading out.
Smaller tunnel it is. Anyone at all that she could find would mean more information, and smaller groups mean less conflict (or an easier-won battle, if need be). And… well, it wouldn’t hurt to reunite her newest companion with its master, perhaps. That, plus the chance that the others took a risk to avoid the sect politics or anti-Imperial sentiment, it’s as good a shot as any.
She takes off down the tunnel, newly-healed flesh Changing to further enhance the padding on her limbs and make her movement near-silent, even in the tunnel’s echoing confines.
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These tunnels are almost identical to the one she found the bug in, except that they actually do branch out. Whatever the little divot in the wall was, it seems to perhaps act as a lure into more complex paths, because she finds no less than three new tunnels which appear, all three of them leading down at sharper angles than the main tunnel. Her quarry stayed true, and on the one occasion where the path forked, chose left, at a slight incline up.
She knows, in her gut, it was the wrong choice. And she begins to worry.
If these tunnels are alive and somehow under the control of the Witch, she doubts the old monster would make such obvious hints about the right path. For all her eccentricity, she hasn’t struck Raika as foolish or incompetent. On the contrary; in their very few moments of interaction, she’s been… alarmingly insightful.
The feeling of being in something’s gullet comes back, nice and tight around her neck.
But fear is for the Flesh or the inner self, and the mask simply follows the chosen path.
Not long after, she begins to hear sound.
Outside of her own body and the echoes of the Crag, it’s been startlingly silent in the depths. The occasional shifting of unknown figures deep down some of the tunnels she passed, sure, but otherwise near dead silence. She actually has to stop and listen for a little bit to make sure she recognizes what she’s hearing.
Footprints, and human speech.
She doesn’t have much Qi, not nearly enough to fuel anything proper, but she uses a solid piece of what she has to alter her joints, moving her body upright and unfolding her head to reveal the new face she grew. It’s not much, her whole body is still in that same altered warform and she has two new arms literally holding a bundle of person that is sleeping Taran… but it’s better than crawling out of the dark on all fours, probably.
She also retracts some of the padding on her feet, letting her footsteps carry faintly.
Almost instantly the voices from ahead stop, and, trying not to scare them even more, she keeps moving, just so it doesn’t seem like she stopped when they did. As she walks, and senses a slight stirring of Qi from up ahead, she lightly taps on the wall next to her.
Tap tap-tap tap tap…
From a ways down, a response. Tap tap.
Good enough, and a decent start to avoiding immediate violence.
The steps ahead resume, moving a bit faster but not in a panic, and she smells little on the wind beyond abyssal waters. The steps stop again not long after, though the echo… shifts.
Do or die.
She reconnects her perspective to human facial muscles and prepares to greet and be greeted, as she comes over a crest in the hill of the tunnel and turns into-
It’s a cavern. Not a massive one, but big, maybe fifty feet high and a two hundred wide, with a small encampment at its center. There’s signs that they’ve been resting here, or perhaps set down their supplies in a hurry on hearing her behind them, and the space has a very small amount of light emitted by a cluster of glowing fireflies.
In the cavern is the insectile cultivator, stance firm, an audible buzzing sound heralding him and coming from around and beneath his robes and hands, the scent of clear skies and crawling, healthy fields surrounded by that of clicking mandibles. Beside him, standing mostly together, are two more familiar forms one tall and slim, the other short and with three-fingered hands, with a complex set of formulae partially sketched out by arcane limbs behind them-
“Raika!” Yun Ka says with a massive smile. Raika flinches at how loud the sound is, but then has to suppress any other reaction as the skinny researcher and her dozen metallic contraptions launch themselves bodily at her and almost trigger a fight or flight reflex.
“Oh you’re alive! Totally alive! Oh that’s so excellent, I thought my great-uncle once-removed had killed you, or definitely that you’d died when we had to head out and couldn’t find you, but clearly you’re not dead! Or a wraith! Probably. I don’t think I could hug a wraith, though maybe with my mechandrites I could, but you definitely have at least one heartbeat ongoing so that’s a good sign. How did you find us? How are you holding up under-”
“Yun Ka,” Raika says, trying to make her inflection as human as possible and only mostly succeeding; “I’m alright. Alive. But please. Introduce me to your… new friend. Before your traveling companion gets themself killed, hmm?”
Yun Ka blinks, turning back to the others, and then actually laughs in relief. “Well, you already know one! Shapefixit, you don’t have to hide behind me, it’s Raika!”
Peeking out from behind the formational circle, Shapefixit raises a hand in what… might be called a wave. Raika finds herself surprised to see that she isn’t wearing the heavy robes and hood that have so characterized her appearance in the Imperial seating, but is further surprised to see her so… hesitant. Shapefixit’s eyes are much larger than a human’s, her ears long enough to droop down over her shoulders, but they stand at attention, back and away from Raika. The scent comes through not long after- fear.
“And this here is Shi Cho! Shi Cho, this is Raika, she’s an ally, she was fighting the tiger and my uncle.”
“And a lot of us,” says the insect-based cultivator. “Did you perhaps come to finish the job, then? I do not like to judge by appearance, but I have rarely seen one that evokes a monster more than yours.”
“Raika’s not a monster!” Yun Ka says, a look of outrage briefly flickering over her. “She’s clearly classifiable as at least sentient, though sapience tests may need revisiting. And her cultivation method, while certainly outside the norm, fits none of the official moral or technical definitions for monstrosity classification and-”
“May I see my beetle, please?” Shi Cho asks.
His stance has eased up, if only a little. He looks right at home in the caves, shockingly pale with a crop of incredibly black hair, his eyes a pale grey, but he holds a strength in his frame that is mirrored in his stance. The flickering, fluttering things about him hum in unison as he speaks, as if trying to imitate the words, a weird little tic that Raika finds surprisingly comforting, in a way. It at least sounds more distinct than most voices she hears.
She nods, and shifts some of her armor, letting the pseudo-cave she made for the beetle unfurl back into the shape of a complete shoulder and pulling the beetle up to the open air. Immediately it buzzes, a deeper noise than before, and takes off, its wings large enough to make a bass hum through the air as it flings itself back at the insect cultivator.
He catches it on an open palm, and immediately starts lightly petting its shell.
“Thank you,” he says. “I had thought this one lost with the others. I couldn’t call most of them back, and they didn’t have much fuel when they left. It is good to see one of the hive returned.”
He seems to think for a moment, before shrugging. “As your friend the honorable Yun Ka said, I am Shi Cho. It is nice to meet you properly, honorable Raika. I am both happy and disappointed we never got a proper match.”
She grins at him, getting it mostly right. “It’s not often one wishes for a fight they would lose,” she challenges, checking his reaction.
He puts his hands out in another shrug. “Perhaps. Plenty have thought the same of me. I tend to find that being creative and having the right tools makes up for a lot.”
Yun Ka perks up at the mention of tools, perhaps glimpsing some in the bundle in Raika’s arms. “Oh! Oh, Throne, is that Taran? I was wondering if they turned out alright. They’re rather energy-intensive, even for a gestalt, and they have been pushing themselves lately. Let me check him over, please.”
Raika nods, opening her secondary arms and happy to get Taran some assistance from someone who knows what she’s doing. Immediately, the mechanical limbs pluck him up, keeping him in his curled-up posture and holding him in the air as dozens of lenses and a fresh tablet to write on materialize out of the many mechanical pockets Yun Ka carries. She seems to pretty much instantly dismiss most of the rest of the ongoing situation.
“I don’t think it serves any of us to fight here,” Raika says. “Not with these tunnels.”
“She has a point,” Yun Ka chirps.
Shi Cho shakes his head, but she turns to look over at Shapefixit as she says it. There is a hint of recognition there, a slight clicking noise from the diminutive fighter… and her stances relaxes, just a bit.
“How long have we been down here?” Raika asks. “Since the collapse. The space down here is… bigger than it should be.”
“Truer words are rarely spoken,” Shi Cho chuckles. “You don’t know either, then? How this place works?”
She shrugs, a weird movement involving too many joints. “Only just woke up recently. Chased after the group for… maybe ten hours?”
She sees Shi Cho blink, and Yun Ka tilts her head away from examining Taran to look up at Raika.
“I find that highly unlikely. We left the collapse-site behind after the first day passed with no sign of rescue. Unless you suddenly traveled almost ten times your fastest recorded speed, that shouldn’t be possible. We’ve been down here nearly four days.”