Falling was only a problem if you couldn’t fly, as Cass was finding. She had fully expected the stomach twisting drop of the floor falling out from beneath her and nauseating free fall to follow. Earth, human Cass certainly would have felt it. She’d gone on a drop tower once at an amusement park and that had been one time too many for her tastes.

Slyphid Cass had no problem with the sensation of dropping like a stone. Her body was entirely unconcerned, as her mind acknowledged falling into the dark chasm was less than ideal. But slyphid Cass also understood that a simple Wind Step should fix the issue.

Except, Kohen’s mage was clasping onto her arm for dear life, screaming bloody murder into Cass’s ear. And Wind Step didn’t work if someone else held her in place.

“Let go!” Cass shook her arm, to no avail.

The mage kept screaming and, if anything, gripping tighter.

The wind whooshed around them as they fell, rubble and stone in the air all around them. It called for her. Cass wanted to join it. Every fiber of her being wanted to pull away into the wind. Yet, this person gripped her tight.

“Save me!” they screamed, pulling Cass even tighter, burying their face in Cass’s chest.

There was no removing them.

Cass had no idea how far down they would fall. Or how well slyphid bodies handled sudden impact with solid stone. She was willing to bet the answer was ‘poorly’. Slyphids were meant for zipping over the ground, not collisions with it.

But did she have another option? She tried to Wind Step again. Her body didn’t so much as shimmer. She could feel the mage’s hands holding her in place. At least the Focus for Wind Stepping hadn’t been consumed by the failed attempts.

Focus: 251/369

Above, she could feel Salos panicking and their bond weakening with distance.

She could feel the ground approaching swiftly, even though she couldn’t see it through the inky blackness of the chasm.

If she couldn’t Wind Step, what else could she do? A parachute would help, but she didn’t have one of those either.

She shook her head. This wasn’t Earth. She didn’t need an Earth suggestion. She needed a video game idea. Something that magic could accomplish.

How did one avoid fall damage in games?

Land in water? No way to know what was below her, no way to know if the world’s physics were quite that forgiving, no way to put enough water down there, regardless.

Double jump near the bottom to reset momentum? A little too video gamey.

Kill an enemy on the landing, assassin style? Again, no way to know if there was an enemy down there. Also, no way to know if the world’s physics were quite that skewed. Maybe if she had a specific skill for it.

No, there had to be something a little more reasonable that she could actually try. Something she could do with Elemental Manipulation.

Something with air. Could she use the surrounding air to slow her fall?

It was worth a try.

She closed her eyes, feeling the air screaming past her. Her Focus grabbed onto it, pulling on the tendrils racing around her, marshaling them back beneath her.

She imagined a cushion beneath her. She imagined sinking through it slowly. But she couldn’t make it thick enough quickly enough. She blew through the cushioned space before it had slowed her much and, once through, she was quick to pick up speed again.

Focus: 167/369

Cass winced. That had worked, kind of. She’d slowed them. But they’d already hit terminal velocity again. And it had chunked her Focus.

This wasn’t how air liked to move. It tolerated being compressed into blades or walls, but both were over a small area and for a short time. Forcing a denser area beneath her and keeping it that way for the duration of her fall was too much for Cass.

And yet, Cass knew this was possible. Air kept airplanes up. Lifted air balloons. Allowed air hockey pucks to float just off the table.

She didn’t need to fly or even to hover, she just needed the air to take the worst of the momentum from her.

So how did all those things work? Surface area, for one. All those things had a much wider area for the air to work on.

Cass angled her body, like a skydiver, stretching her arms and legs out flat as much as her still screaming passenger would allow.

“Spread out!” Cass yelled at the mage. “We need to increase our surface area!”

They screamed into Cass’s chest, pulling even tighter.

Cass sighed and went back to ignoring them.

Area increased as best as she could, what else?

The hot air balloon was the simplest but also the least applicable idea. Hot air rises. Enough hot air could lift a balloon into the sky. But Cass didn’t have a balloon to fill and changing the temperature of something via Elemental Manipulation was one of the least energy efficient things she could try.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

What about airplanes? They generated lift through the shape of their wings. Something about the air passing under the wings faster than the air over the wings, creating a pressure difference, forcing the whole plane up. She didn’t know if that was right or not, but either way, she didn’t have a wing to test that with.

That left air hockey pucks. They floated over the table because of the table. Hundreds to thousands of holes blew a stream of air up, creating a surface of air the plastic puck could sit on.

Could Cass do that? The air wasn’t any denser over the air hockey table, yet the puck still floated. It was just blowing air upward. Could she pull enough up fast enough?

Cass tried it. She grabbed as much as her Will could hold, yanking as hard as she could upward. The gust buffeted her. For a second, her fall slowed.

And then they were falling again.

Focus: 153/369

That was better, much better. The air wanted to move. It took far less Focus to make it rush toward her than it had to bunch it up. The only question now was could she do this long enough to keep them from splatting into the fast-approaching, very solid floor beneath them?

The timing was important. If she started Elemental Manipulation too soon, she’d run out of Focus before landing and they’d just pick up speed again. Too late and she wouldn’t slow them enough before they crashed.

At 14 Focus per second, with her remaining Focus, that meant something like 10 seconds of air? And it would leave her with just about nothing there at the bottom.

She’d deal with whatever was down there with whatever was left.

The ground was fast approaching. Atmospheric Sense could feel a draft floating over it. It was now or never.

Elemental Manipulation!

The air gusted past her. It fluttered through her robes. Her braid whipped behind her. Her heart raced. Her body slowed. Her Focus dropped.

Focus: 139/369

Focus: 125/369

They were still speeding toward the ground. Had she waited too long to start? She thought it would slow her more than this.

Focus: 111/369

Focus: 97/369

She was slowing down. Would it be enough? It had to, right?

Focus: 83/369

Focus: 69/369

They slammed into the ground, fast enough to knock the wind from Cass’s lungs, but not so fast they splatted into the stone.

The mage groaned beneath Cass, their own fault for holding Cass so close.

Cass pushed herself up. A headache was filling in behind her eyes—too much Focus spent all at once—but she was otherwise unharmed by the fall.

It was pitch black. Around her, she could hear the slam of rubble landing around them and could feel the displacement of the air as they landed. Luckily, her slowing their fall meant most of the big pieces were already grounded and not careening toward her head.

Nothing else was moving around them.

“Ow…” The mage groaned as they sat up. There were some patting noises. “I’m alive.” The words came out in a shocked whisper. Then louder, “I’m alive!”

“You’re welcome.” Cass didn’t quite keep the bite out of her voice.

“Oh…” the mage said slowly. “You’re alive too.”

“No thanks to you.”

“No thanks…” they repeated slowly. “Oh! Oh… Um. S-sorry?”

Cass would have stared in disbelief if she could see them. But it was too dark, so she settled for a belabored sigh.

Are you alive? Salos’s voice whispered, his voice faint and spotty.

Yeah. Cass sent back. How are things up there?

Your friend and … guard are alive. … … her brother and most … … team. Salos’s voice cut in and out.

What?

Your friend and her guard are alive, Salos repeated slowly and with focused intent.

I got that. What was the rest of it?

Should … back to …?

Stay with Alyx. You can lead her to me, can’t you?

I am … back to ….

Cass couldn’t tell what he was trying to say. She could only hope he could hear her better.

Lead Alyx and Marco to me. I’ll try to find my way back to you.

“Um… Where are we?” the mage said, bringing Cass’s attention back to their immediate predicament. There voice was a tentative squeak.

“Bottom of the chasm?” Cass said, but it was actually a good question. Was this chasm floor a part of the second floor, or was this part of a much, much lower floor?

“Is anyone else down here?” the mage yelled. “Lord Kohen? Sir Tiador? Sir Daidyn? Anyone?”

Cass didn’t feel any breaths around them. If anyone else had fallen, they hadn’t survived the fall. “I don’t think so.”

The upside was that also meant there were no monsters around them.

Unless the monsters here didn’t need to breathe. That gave Cass a moment’s pause.

They were undead constructs, weren’t they? Did they breathe? She hadn’t been paying attention to that earlier. Hadn’t thought to make a note one way or the other.

They probably didn’t? Neither the undead nor golems usually breathed in the stories. Why would a combination of the two be different?

For all she knew, they were surrounded.

Did undead constructs need light to see? Did they see at all or use some other sense for navigation? Like Mana Sense or—

Mana Sense. Right. Cass could use that to check. They might not breathe, but things powered by magic and souls should definitely glow.

Cass flared Mana Sense.

Lights appeared along the walls. Most were completely still, but all of them brightening. As if they were gathering power.

A light pricked on in the dark, visible in Cass’s ordinary vision. It was dim, like a star in a light polluted sky, and right about the same place the nearest mana source was glowing from.

“This was a mistake. I never should have come,” the mage moaned, either oblivious or unconcerned with the light.

Cass ignored them, focusing on the light. What was it? Her hand slipped into her Bag and withdrew her flashlight.

Was this wise? Pointing her flashlight at whatever it was? She clicked it on, the beam cutting a swath of light in the dark.

It reflected off a metal crocodile skull, the first of four jewels in its snout glowing.

Dreadiron Crocodile

Lvl 25

[A guard of the Vaisom Catacombs. These large lizard-like constructs are known to cling to walls and ceilings. They possess powerful lightning magic and delight in blasting their prey from the shroud of darkness.]

The second gem on the crocodile’s snout began to glow.

Oh.

“That’s—” the mage stuttered beside Cass.

“We need to go,” Cass said.

More lights flickered on from the dark.

“Are those all—?”

“Definitely, time to go!”