Sam flopped to the ground, riding out the last few twitches on his limbs. He was willing to risk a targeted at his legs in a moment, but he was eyeing the innerved vine. It would be uncomfortable, but the Druid had a good idea of how his own regeneration would patch him up. If he didn't need to put his finger on the scale and suffer for it, why would he?

While Samuel used the trickle of mana at his disposal to maneuver the innerved vine into a strange harness around his body, April checked on the two chained Tendrils. The Death one had fainted at some point during the engagement, but the Fire one was staring at the peacekeeper with wide eyes of burning red.

"H-help?" The man stuttered.

"Your time has yet to come," April confirmed, bypassing any attempt to pick the locks on the chains and attacking the stone that they were bolted to directly. All the weakened Tendril could do was cover his face as rock chips rained down on him. It wasn't long before he was holding up the length of chain by his wrist. "We will see about freeing you further when the sun shines above."

"That was just extra," Samuel sent her, rising to unsteady feet with the help of his vine. Some liberal use of allowed him to 'lock' the plant muscles in place to conserve his energy while still remaining on his feet.

"Their complexion is unnatural," April replied, ignoring Sam's jab. "They have been here for many days."

"How long have you two been here?" Sam asked. He focused his eyes on the freed Tendril, moving forward slowly. The more he relaxed the 'muscle' that controlled the vine the more natural the process. By the time he reached the three, the Death Tendril was free and his movement only looked slightly unnerving. He repeated his question, drawing the man's eyes from where he'd been watching April.

"W-we've b-been here for weeks," the Tendril answered. "The f-furnace is new."

At their confusion, he pointed to the strange distillery contraption. "But there's no fire?"

"It's within," the man added, shivering. "They forced me to power it every night. Or... what I assumed was night. A second group comes and tends to the furnace."

Instantly, both Samuel and April tensed. If there was a second team--which they'd suspected for an operation like this-- they could be responding at any time. Not for the first time, he wished that the Implants had a time feature. As soon as I make a trip to the Bunker I am going to correct that. If Ron can get a better map, then I can get some damn time zones if I am going to be spending time underground. In Florida, of all places too! Nevermind that right now, focus!

"We better get out of here then," Sam said, casting around for anything that might provide clues.

"The demon kept a log of production," the Fire Tendril said, reading Sam's roving gaze. "They always took the stuff they worked on with them when the groups swapped."

"You are very cooperative," April said, crouching to be at eye level with the Tendril still slumped against the wall. Her eyes pinned the man to the wall, a faint purple mist casting a haze over her features as the man scurried further back.

"Please! I didn't want to be here! I didn't even want to become a Tendril in the first place; this shit is the worst!" The man shook his head. Sam noticed him position himself between the Dreg Warriors and the still unconscious Death Tendril. That's either good for him, or bad for us.

Hoping to answer his own evaluation, Sam placed a calming hand on April. "Okay. Why are you trying to cover the girl?"

"She--"

A hoarse cough had the Fire Tendril spun around and tending to the woman. After a few more coughs, and a fearful glance at the club poised on Sam's hands, the girl spoke. "He's my brother. We are orphans that got snagged. Tucker, stop acting suspicious. She's one of the Zebelos peacekeepers."

While the girl had coughed up a lung between the first and last word, the message had an immediate effect on the Fire Tendril, Tucker. Sam didn't know it was possible for someone to simultaneously become more scared and relaxed at the same time. It was a strange dichotomy. Nevertheless, Tucker started to blab even as he hovered over his sister. The girl looked miserable. The Druid hadn't noticed the bucket set beside her when he'd done the scan of the room, but it was clear that she wasn't immune to the effects of her mana even if the contents looked sparse. Sam's gloves creaked as he clenched his hand around his Femur Club. With deliberate motions, he sheathed the weapon along his spine after making sure it was touching the small of his back.

"Let's get what we can," Sam said, hobbling over to the distillery. "Give them a minute but go ahead and dissociate the Tendrils."

"I can't--" April cut herself off, remembering she was no longer the same as she'd once been. The Sixth Threshold was no longer a potential death sentence. While it wasn't 'safe' she knew now that there was more beyond and she repeated her own words to herself. "Your time is not yet come."

Sam shaped his bubble into a half dome facing the direction of their opponents as he drilled with every bit of his senses into the distillery. Hidden behind it had been a small alcove formed entirely of mana-made stone where a rusty filing cabinet and desk took up the bulk of the space. Sam sat heavily on the surface of the desk and delegated the task of riffling to his . He didn't ignore how odd it was to use magical plants to ransack an office, but it hardly bothered him the moment he remembered who the owners were-- had been.

Two ledgers, covered in abbreviations likely to obfuscate their information, were stashed within the filing cabinet. In addition to that and a ridiculous amount of office supplies for a one-desk operation, Samuel found a sack the size of his head filled with Infusions. Most were Q1, but there were a handful of higher Level ones. The most curious thing was how varied they all were, which implied they weren't sourcing these from a single Dungeon, or at least the most varied Dungeon Sam had heard about, which hinted at combat teams or somewhere they were trading for these.

At the discovery of the Infusions, Sam remembered the ones that had been slotted into the sieve. With his gathered loot safely stashed in his bag, and a glance to check on the Tendril siblings, Sam retrieved the Infusions in the platform. He used his vine once again to grab it, and he was happy he had as the same cancerous growths warped the plant the longer it was within the water. If anything, that was concerning on its own. He turned one of the high level Infusions with the point of his vine, confirming his suspicions as he compared them to the ones already in his bag.

"Don't like this in the least," Sam mumbled, squinting at the water below him and shuffling to investigate the furnace quickly. He was about done with the nonsense the Aberrants were cooking up. After removing the metal lid just to the side of the distillery, a shimmering burst of heat smacked him across the face. While it wasn't a terribly big fall, Sam had no desire to get anywhere close to the corrupted pool of water. With an exertion of his mana, the innerved vine branched and wrapped around the stone outcropping where the sieve was, catching him. The lowered down perspective left him facing the current of warmth exiting the furnace and his eyes widened as the Implant recognized the abomination of bloody red embers and iridescent shards.

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That message unfortunately didn't last long because the sieve had landed within the opening when the vine holding it had prioritized Samuel's fall. Thanks to his enhanced senses Samuel got the distinct displeasure of watching the low integrity Infusions tumble down like rain, each striking the corrupted one and causing it to spark. After the third, coincidentally a Fire Infusion, something changed.

"Shit! Run! Out!" Sam said, his body catching up with his thoughts. His vine snapped him back to the stone and he forced his feet to move with a targeted pulse of . The vine flexed, slowing the Druid's momentum enough that the swing down to the ground didn't snap his ankles in his weakened state.

"Samuel?" April questioned as he hobbled away from the distillery. He had a hand clasped around his satchel while the other had retrieved his club to use as a cane.

"It burns," Tucker said, glancing at the furnace with vacant eyes. While his entire body had gone slack, his sister tried to slap some sense into him.

"The man told you to move! What are you doing Tucker!?" The Death Tendril's voice cracked with each failed attempt to pull her brother. Fire kindled in his eyes.

Sam had seen just about enough. "I'll heal you later."

Without stopping, he conked the man on the temple and he toppled like a house of cards. With a silent look to April even as he continued to hobble forward, Sam eyed the distillery. He hoped he was overthinking things, but that hope was quickly dashed. A pinging pop echoed in the chamber as the metal of the distillery warped enough to release a rivet that shot off into the water. Like a starting pistol, that got the rest of the group moving and past him in moments.

April slowed when she saw the Druid getting left behind, but he urged her forward. The demoness was straining hauling the still-chained Tendril even with his sister's help, waiting for him would objectively cost them more time. Not that he didn't want the help, but Samuel had no intention of losing any of them.

Just before he was able to make it to the crevice, an explosion rocked the entire cavern. The shockwave flung Samuel against the side of the cavern, knocking the wind from his lungs and leaving him gasping to take a breath. He was sure he would have been more than a little concussed if it hadn't been for his Traits. A cry of pain zeroed his mind and Sam wormed his way towards the crevice. The young Death Tendril was pinned where a section of the crevice had collapsed. April was wailing on the stone above her, breaking it one chunk at a time.

"The explosion passed," Sam slurred through the comm-plant. Okay, maybe not totally unconcussed.

April looked up, the tension around her eyes lessening imperceptibly only for them to widen a second later when she looked past Samuel. "The water level is rising!"

Spinning around just fast enough to avoid whiplash, Samuel took in the disaster that had occurred behind him. The luckiest bit of it had been that he hadn't been impaled by the shrapnel bomb the distillery had turned into. Arm-long shards were embedded into the sides of the cavern radially from the mushroomed metal bowl that had once contained the corrupted Infusion. That was where the luck ended, as the shards the shrapnel that had struck the ceiling of the cavern was letting in trickles of water and the platform where the Infusion sieve had been had collapsed right into the pool. The pool that apparently had nowhere to drain anymore and was rising inch by inch.

Nope. So much nope. Samuel glanced at his mana pool, wincing at the meager 40% he'd recovered thanks to having to rely on the vine harness. It will have to do.

With a wash of calm, Samuel stepped into the crevice while sprinkling acorns behind him. The seeds exploded, some reaching forward to inch the debris off the Death Tendril and the others working to seal the chamber behind them and plunging the four of them into darkness until April opened her lantern.

"Hurry," Sam said, crouching to crawl under the small gap April and his vines had created to join the others beyond. He laughed to himself at the idea of Ron's giant self joining them on this mission until he remembered the man could have just shaped the crevice to fit him. It was a good reminder of how versatile their squad was, and why he hated splitting the party even with the necessity of the situation.

Once he got to the other side, Sam took stock of the situation. The Fire Tendril was leaning against the far tunnel wall, rubbing at the knot the Druid had given him, but he looked mostly put together again. Gonna have some questions there, for sure. The girls were dusting each other off and besides a bleeding bruise on the Death Tendril's arm they appeared well enough. Before he could say anything, a rumble shook the tunnel hard enough to shower the group in loose pebbles.

Fearing the worst, Sam reached back towards the vines he'd used to block the crevice. The connection was quickly growing muted. "Shit, the water is coming up faster. I don't know how long the vines will hold with that weird growth effect."

"Let us avoid the Reaper's scythe," April said, nudging the young Tendril forward in the direction they knew the Jade Lounge. Gosh, that feels like it happened days ago... With a glance at the Fire Tendril, the man was on his feet and fussing over his sister as if he hadn't just been in a trance.

Sam kept his connection to the vines as long as he could, but even with the range he'd managed to cultivate for his Skill he lost them soon. There was an oppressive silence made even more so by the fact the only other sounds were the shuffling of feet and panting breaths. At one point, Tucker summoned a globe of fire that he sent forwards and backwards to illuminate beyond the bubble the slime lanterns made. When the one behind them sputtered, immediately followed by a rush of wind and a quiet roar, Sam knew the water was through.

"Go, go!" The Druid shouted, wincing as he jogged on his unsteady legs. They weren't far from the archway he'd made on the way down. He'd meant it for defense should something attack them in the barren tunnel, but he wasn't going to scoff at using it like a bulkhead... except it was too far. The flame behind them got snuffed and the wind whipped Sam's blonde locks all over the place. "April! Carry me!"

Despite the situation, and the level of stoicism he knew was baked into the woman, she missed a step. As a testament of the trust that had been built between them, however, the woman sprinted back before throwing the Druid over her shoulder like a sack of potatoes. As he flopped, Sam dumped every last one of his acorns on the ground. roared into existence even as he spoke to April through the comm-plant. "I need you to use that spore attack. Fill the gaps in the wood to make a better seal."

"I have never used my Gift like that," she questioned, channeling her purple mana regardless.

"I'll build up the mass, but fungi are better at fine growth than trees. See if you can absorb the water to fuel it too."

With that, the two of them grew quiet as April drowned the path behind them with mana and Sam strained to drill into the stone with his bark. The water grew close enough to be seen in the lantern light by the time Samuel was able to close the iris of wood. The strain was immediate, and he funneled more mana into the wood to double down on its grip. A carpet of moss and oyster mushrooms practically flashed into being on the surface of his seal, but Sam let them take some of the energy until their mycelium reached to the other side. For a tense minute, they moved further and further away as the water continued to flow and fill the other side but their plug held.

Just to be safe, when they reached the grown archway he'd made Sam also sealed that one and the one closer to the surface he'd made when he'd been probing the tunnel. The four of them climbed the ladder to arrive back at the Jade Lounge, finding it half full of Cloth Muscle members and a confused Devon. At the sight of reinforcements, April and Samuel dropped into a heap. Neither bothered to untangle themselves from the other even when the elf raised a questioning eyebrow higher than the Druid thought that muscle could go. Thankfully, the Tendril siblings drew enough attention that the Dreg Warriors could take a moment to be.

"This has many implications," April finally said.

"Yep," Sam sighed. "No keeping things under wraps anymore. Only a matter of time before things get real tangled up here."

April's silence spoke volumes. Sam didn't know if that was weird, or if he was just happy to be around someone that didn't feel the need to fill the air with words every two seconds. Despite the carnage and implications, Sam couldn't help but quirk a smile. They'd made it. The elf fussing over their charges and the journals they'd recovered could handle things for a minute. No wonder Ronan likes to fall asleep after taking a beating...