In a moment where the lizard seemed distracted by chomping at an invisible Hasio, Tahir risked a glance back toward Murabi on the opposite end of the room. He currently ducked and dodged swipes from the lizard he fought, but Tahir could see bleeding cuts on its hide. Turning his attention back to the creature his party focused on, Tahir focused his aura as the lizard’s attention came back to him.
Practicing all of the results of their aura control training proved hard to do in the middle of a fight, but with the divine shield, he could afford to be a little more wasteful. That also assumed he just didn’t get hit. The lizard swiped at him with one of its claws, something that Tahir likely could have dodged, but decided to focus on deflecting instead. He focused his aura around his blade, imagining it tightly winding around it, with only the barest layer of separation between his aura and the weapon itself. With that, and an aura empowering him physically, he swung.
He grit his teeth as the claw went wide after colliding with his blade. He couldn’t compare it to Ester at all, but in the moment it definitely felt close. Still, using the momentary distraction, he rushed forward and carved across its side with the opportunity Tahir created. The lizard staggered back, with a sizable cut on its left flank. It looked like it would charge him again when it recovered, but it nearly toppled from another bombardment of magic from Meti, Theo, and the Winged Serpent. Seizing the opportunity, Tahir cast a spell to cause tremors in the earth around it. While it stumbled back, it couldn’t keep its balance and hit the ground hard. Seconds later, Tahir spotted two puncture wounds appear on its right side. It gave a pained and angry roar, swiping at the spot Hasio likely stood when he plunged his daggers into its side.
Another salvo of spells slammed into it while it tried to stand up. Its movements had slowed and it looked unsteady on its feet. Hasio must have used some serious and fast-acting poison. Still, with Tahir right in front of it, it tried to lunge for him with its jaws wide. Once again Tahir dodged to the side, but this time he went for its throat with an aura enhanced swing. After a spray of blood and a gurgle from the lizard, it collapsed, with Hasio reappearing and giving it one last stab for good measure.
Glancing over toward Murabi, Tahir could see that he’d already taken care of the other lizard, and watched their fight with interest. After confirming that it had died, Meti and Theo came to stand next to it with Tahir. “Rather tough hide on these creatures.” Meti noted. “Slightly resistant to magic as well, at least before it was cut open.”
“Can you make something out of them?” Tahir asked.
“Not quite my realm of expertise, working with armor like this. I’d normally say taking and selling the hide to someone who could work on it would be for the best, but we seem to have a limited time.” As she answered, another tremor rocked the ruin, and everyone looked up toward the ceiling. “The claws and teeth, however, can aid me in some other things, and they’ll be easy enough to remove while we recover.”
They rested and recovered their energies, with Meti taking as many teeth and claws as she could manage before everyone felt ready to go on to the next room.
They had their weapons and spells at the ready when they stepped into the ninth floor, but found it strangely empty. Even after they all stepped off of the teleportation circle, testing along the walls and the dirt in the floor. Similar to the last couple of floors, this one had a dirt floor and plant life along the walls, but Tahir could see room climbing all the way across the length of the walls and continuing down. Before they could get too far in, the tremorsense granted by the earth spirit alerted Tahir to the slightest shift of something just in front of him, and he held his blade out to stop anyone from moving past him.
“I feel something that I’m not seeing. Meti, can you help me clear out the magic in this area?” Tahir asked. Though he wasn’t sure, he had a feeling something wasn’t right here. They released mana into the area around them in an attempt to disrupt and dispel the magic. If there wasn’t anything, it would normally be a harmless gesture, but if there was, they would feel the magic trying to work against them to stay whole, and try it did. The magic in place resisted, and felt strong, but a concentrated effort from Tahir and Meti managed to dispel it.
Like pulling a curtain away, the true scene in the room revealed itself. Across the floor, they could see light green spikes jutting out of the dirt. They looked like plant-like teeth, each one longer than one of Tahir’s hands, and they all connected together with a thin leafy membrane. “A flytrap.” Meti said. “A couple of them in fact, and they’re somewhat large.” With the illusion covering them dispelled, the group could count about four, each of them large enough to swallow two or three people when they snapped shut. The area around the edges of the room seemed free of them, so after further feeling from Tahir, his tremorsense discovered nothing else.
After giving the okay, the group stuck to the edges, moving around the room to get to the teleportation circle on the opposite side. “Do you think we should, I don’t know, trigger them?” Theo asked.
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“That might cause more complications.” Murabi replied. “Better to leave it to the guards after we clear out the last floor. They might just attack if we trigger them without one of us being inside.” Shortly after he spoke another tremor rocked the room from outside, causing everyone to glance up toward the ceiling. The fighting still raged on outside, and Tahir would feel better about going into the next fight without any unnecessary duress caused by this room.
“Second room we’ve been to in this ruin that’s been more of a trap than a floor with enemies.” Tahir commented. “Is that just more of a thing with Aglo ruins?”
“Better than enemies all the way down when we can see the traps.” Meti answered. “This could also be a room with enemies, rather than a trap, or you could consider it both at the same time.” As they spoke, everyone stood on the next teleportation circle platform after crossing the room, and once Murabi confirmed everyone was alright, he activated the circle to send them down.
This room proved to be the largest room by far. Comparable to the room in the Vudranian ruin Tahir, Meti, and Theo went through, but circular instead of long. Vines covered nearly the entirety of the walls of this room, and dug into the dirt as many of them led to a cairn, a stack of stones in the center of the room. Even in the cairn itself, thin roots spread all throughout the stones, which otherwise looked very clean and gray, without any dirt or dust covering them at all. The air in the room felt oppressive, and the smell of death pervaded the space.
As they approached, weapons at the ready, Tahir heard the shuffling and cracking of dirt beneath their feet. In front of the cairn, the dirt shifted ever so slightly as something began to rise from below, unhindered by the earth. A thin, skeletal looking figure made of gnarled wood rose from the space in front of the cairn, standing nearly eight feet tall. Just looking at it caused Tahir’s breathing and pulse to quicken. He felt his hands shaking, his grip unsteady, and he found it hard to breathe.
“Cairn lord.” Murabi said quietly. A hiss from the Winged Serpent caused Tahir’s attention to lapse from the cairn lord, and he realized that it must have been releasing an aura of dread, similar to what Murabi did to keep monsters at bay during their journey from Balrech to Isanthyr. While Tahir took deep breaths to calm himself down, Murabi stepped forward. “Stay back.” He warned. “These things are pseudo-archfey. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say this entire ruin was built for sealing it.”
The Cairn lord raised a thin, hand-like branch toward them, and Tahir immediately felt a pulse from the cairn. Across the entire group, the Winged Serpents divine shields flared to life, blocking the dark fey’s magic. “Necromancy?” Meti asked. The shields reacted strongly to, and had a higher defense against dark magics, necromancy being among them. “Murabi’s right, we’ll be fine while the shields hold, but if we get close and it breaks it might just fully drain our life force.
“Hasio. Back me up. You’ll be fast enough to get back to Tahir’s snake if your shield drops. Everyone else, stay alive and take it down from afar.” Barely a second after he gave the order, Murabi rushed forward, sword mid swing, attempting to cut the cairn lord down. The fey seemed to expect it, as Murabi’s blade met massive roots that surged out of the ground. As the cairn lord stepped back, the stones from its cairn began to shake, before flying out and swirling around the cairn lord. The stones attached themselves to it and covered it like a suit of armor, and elsewhere in the room large roots rose out from the ground. Many of them converging on Murabi and an approaching Hasio, but plenty seemed to focus on Tahir, Meti, and Theo.
They reached and grabbed for them like the tentacles of a massive octopus, and they had to dodge out of the way to avoid being held in place for others that had sharp ends to spear them with. Tahir swung out at one that reached for him, and found that his aura covered blade cut through it without an issue. “Meti, help me cut the roots.” He called out, and Meti responded by creating the long, scythe blade made of magic at the end of her staff. “Theo, we’ll keep the roots away, just focus on hitting the cairn lord!”
Theo gave a nod, and began conjuring bolts of fire to throw. She had to keep moving to prevent roots sprouting from underneath her, but with Tahir and Meti nearby, she didn’t have to worry about taking care of any of them herself. Tahir thought about switching to his air spirit so he could avoid them faster, but he found that they could not restrict his movements very well even if a couple did grab him due to his enhanced weight. If several of them got to him then he’d likely still be fully restrained, but he could cut them away faster than they could attempt to stop his swings, and he could even deflect the sharp points of the spearing roots before hacking them off.
In his brief glances across this chamber, Tahir could see Murabi and Hasio chasing down the cairn lord, sparks flying as blades collided with stone armor, keeping it at bay, and dodging when it commanded thick roots to fly out of the ground to strike them, blasted them with necrotic energy. All the while, spiraling motes of flame from Theo threatened to burst across it, but many of which were dodged or blocked by roots. We can do this. He thought. We’re already pushing it back.
As the thought settled in his mind, he felt it replaced by another overwhelming sense of dread as he felt a rush of magic in the room. He risked a glance back toward the teleportation circle to find one of the wooden men. Barely able to stand, cracked open, with a dark miasma flowing from it.