The Underworld is a series of colossal caverns that could contain whole kingdoms, alongside even larger caverns that did contain kingdoms. It is seen by those on the surface as a dangerous wasteland filled with monsters, a hazardous place where none dare to enter. This isn't an inaccurate judgment either; from underground jungles with ancient beasts to forests of giant mushrooms, many of the biomes in the Underworld are unusual and dangerous.

Through one of these mushroom forests wandered a lanky explorer, he wore a tall black hat that sat between two long and sharp ears covered in white fur. This explorer looked around, his face also covered in white fur, with two large yellow eyes that were surrounded by rings of black fur. His nose was spade-shaped and rested above a wide and toothy smile. In one hand he held an ebony staff which he leaned on and the other hand he held a map. This wayward explorer’s name was Twist.

“Fascinating, the mushrooms here seem to be getting smaller!” he said to himself, his voice deep and eloquent. He looked around fascinated as he stood on top of a mushroom bigger than a house.

“What makes the mushrooms farther down bigger I wonder? Could the soil deeper down be more fertile, perhaps some lingering magic within those caverns? I seem to to be talking with myself again! All things worth looking into later, but for now… Onwards!”

Twist put away his map into his tall black hat, then he suddenly spread his arms and out unfurled two great leathery wings, he leapt from the giant mushroom and glided to a much taller stringier mushroom. He latched onto it with his sharp hands and feet, then climbed the mushroom to its top where it nearly touched the roof of the great cavern. Twist looked around to get a lay of the land, needing no torch nor lantern thanks to the abundance of glowing mushrooms that spread throughout the area. Amongst the towering mushrooms were many strange giant insects that looked like combinations of dragonflies and hornets.

“Let me see… Where is my next passage?” Twist thought to himself. He reached into his hat and pulled out thin circular glass lens, like a monocle but with many little levers on the side. Twist looked through this device, then after tapping one of the little levers, could see up clearly what was almost a mile away through the monocle.

“Ah ha! Over there is where I need to!” he thought, chuckling jovially. What he saw so far off was between a few mushrooms, a carved entryway with with a great stone door. Twist once again unfurled his wings and glided gracefully to his destination, getting lower and lower. Eventually he glided above a large mushroom that was covered in red and white stripes, unlike the others it seemed to move slightly as if it were breathing… Suddenly, the cap of this mushroom opened and out darted a long lashing whip-like tongue that grabbed Twist by his leg!

“Ahh! What an unusual predator! This must be one of those Faux Fungalin I read of!” Twist laughed as he was dragged towards the creature’s gaping maw. In the blink of an eye, he was snapped up, the beast licked the lips of its strange x-shaped mouth. Twist’s muffled voice said something inside of the faux fungalin, then there was silence.

Then the beast quivered, then it began to swell. It let out confused mumbling sounds as it inflated like a balloon. In a few seconds, the mushroom mimic was twice its size and perfectly circular.

Inside the beast Twist rose up, the creature now stretched enough to where he had enough room to stand, and he took care to avoid stepping in the creature’s stomach acid that slowly filled its stomach. On his ebony staff was a violet orb that now shined brightly as it worked its magic, for Twist was a mage and the one responsible for inflating the beast. There are many elements that mages can call upon to cast spells, among all the elements Twist specialized in Air. He had cast a spell to gather all the air the creature was breathing.

Twist then raised the sharp bottom end of his staff and poked the inside flesh of the faux fungalin.

POP!

The beast burst into a million pieces, bits of it were scattered everywhere. Twist left the corpse and shook off the blood and slime that coated him.

“Sorry about that my fascinating fake fungus” he said sincerely apologetically “But I have more important things to attend to than being eaten by a random beast in the Underworld.”

Then he had a thought.

Twist reached into his hat and pulled out a metal poker that was longer than his hat. He poked the remains of the creature and took off some of its meat which he bit into without hesitation.

“Hmm!” he thought approvingly “It tastes disgusting! How fascinating!”

He spat out the creature’s meat and put away his poker back into his hat, then out of his hat he got out a thick book and piece of charcoal with a tip sharpened to a point. He began to write in the book the appearance of the beast he encountered and how it tasted. As he did this, a swarm of insects the size of cats suddenly erupted from the ground and began to eat the remains of the mushroom imposter. They looked like scarabs with especially large eyes that glittered like faceted gems.

Twist looked at the beetles fascinated and wrote even more down in his journal. One of the giant beetles crawled towards Twis and observed him, tilting its head in curiosity. Twist smiled and slowly extended his hand, stopping short of the bug’s face, the bug then nudged his hand and Twist happily scratched it between its diamond-like eyes. The creature chittered in approval, then after being pet for a half a minute it turned back to eat the meat its fellow giant beetles were consuming.

“Such amazing beasts here in this neck of the Underworld” Twist thought to himself “Ahh it is a shame I have no time to research them, but my mission is more important.”

Twist then put away his journal and reached into a pocket on his tunic. He pulled out two rocks, Twist then raised his hand and tilted it. One of the rocks fell out of the palm of his hand and hit the ground with a small clatter.

The other rock stood there in his sideways palm, not moving in the slightest. Twist then moved his hand away, the rock floated in midair.

Twist looked at this grimly, then nodded. He took both the pebbles and put them back in this cloak.

“I must continue on” he thought. He faced the large stone door before him, on it was a carving that looked like an eye. Twist reached into his hat and pulled out a piece of paper with writing on it, he brought it before the eye engraving and it glowed. There was a rumble and the door rose, allowing Twist to enter and go up the stairs within.

Past this passage was a spiraling staircase that went straight upward, there were many of these stairways scattered throughout the Underworld created by its races to make vertical travel much easier.

The staircase led Twist to the Gray Vale, an especially expansive cave the width of a great desert. Within its cold rock environment lie frigid lakes that hold unnatural life, and the only source of light were huge masses of glowing lichen on the roof of the Gray Vale that casted everything in a dull grey light. Littered across this flat landscape one could see littered about distorted and grim beasts, the glow of the lichen making them look even more alien. Some were colossal slug-like aberrations that though frightening to gaze upon were not aggressive and only fed on the bacteria of the stone with their long string-like tentacles, but others were gorilla-like horrors with large maniacal eyes, curled horns on their heads, and black feathers that spanned their back and arms. They made horrible cackling sounds and sucked on the bones of their prey.

Though even these brutal creatures gave a wide berth to something much larger and terrible than them. A huge machine taller than a castle with a form like that of a horrible metal salamander, its skin made of brass with sturdy legs, joints that made loud scraping sounds as they moved, and wide clawed feet that shook the earth with each step. Out of its back came colossal pipes that constantly spat smoke and on its sides were bronze horns that stuck out like tall sideways trees. Its bulky, heavy head had one large clear eye and a mouth that was closed tightly. As this behemoth made its way through the Gray Vale, nearby a pack of the horned brutish beasts slowly walked away from it with their huge eyes filled with fear.

One of these beasts though watched the behemoth in anger, it suddenly gave a war cry and ran to the behemoth with its arms raised ready to pummel one of the behemoth’s feet. Before the beast even got close though, one of the bronze horns on the behemoth’s side shifted so that the sharp point faced the grey creature, then it shot out a thin stream of flame that engulfed the beast. In less than a second only ashes were left, the other creatures looked at where their companion had stood for a moment and then continued to make way away from the behemoth, whining pathetically.

Not far away from this event was a small dome-like building, out of which walked Twist who gasped as he saw the giant machine, looking at it closely in both wonder and trepidation.

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“An unusual monster… If it is indeed a living thing,” Twist mused to himself. He continued to watch the great Brass Behemoth march its way through the Gray Vale, when he noticed something strange happening on its back at the base of the pipe-like flanges that spat out smoke. He got out the small monocle once again and put up to one of his yellow eyes. Looking at the behemoth’s form up close, he could see bumps on its metallic form, zooming closer he could see these were tightened screws.

“It must be a constructed thing” he thought, then he rose his gaze to take a closer look at what was happening on the back of the behemoth.

On the back of the beast were numerous cloaked individuals, their robes black and their faces covered by blank masks. They had their hands full with an intruder, they were attacking with their sharp clawed hands a short man with a barrel chest wearing a heavy coat.

Twist looked at this fighter closely... Ahh, not a barrel chest, simply a feminine one. This fighter the cloaked figures were attacking was a woman. They tried to take their target down with numbers, but ended up being pummeled by hard fists and powerful stout legs that had the strength of hammers. One robed individual was grabbed by the neck and thrown off the side of the behemoth. Twist watched the cloaked assailant fall, when they hit the ground pieces of them flew everywhere. Twist gasped as he realized there was no blood, the fluid that splashed across the ground was pure black and Twist saw gears and cogs scatter alongside the limbs.

“By Chaelum, what is going on here?” he gasped under his breath.

Twist looked back to the top of the behemoth and looked closely at the fighter. He could see on her arms were the broken remains of shackles. Twist’s eyes flashed, and this was not an expression. His big yellow eyes literally flashed a brief but bright light.

Twist reached into this cloak and brought out his ebony staff.

“Arise air and wind of this cold cave! Be the strength behind my wings so brave!” he shouted with authority.

Suddenly there was a great gust of wind that went upward, Twist then spread his wings and the wind caught them, sending Twist upward. He glided in the direction of the great brass beast. As Twist got closer, he noticed the short attacker was still dealing with the various masked folks who were now coming out in greater droves. The short fellow now had her hands full taking them on, the masked attackers marched ceaselessly and moved their limbs in a most exacting way.

“What on Fiahn are such beings doing here on that metal monster?” Twist thought to himself as he glided to his destination “With a prisoner no less?”

The great bat continued his way, deep in thought; what he failed to realize that he had undersold the height he needed to get onto the behemoth. Whilst he still he got his target, Twist was coming in too low to get on its back where all the commotion was. He was high enough to get to one of the behemoth’s legs, however since he was so deep in thought…

“Or could this truly be a beast that is alive? I have never heard of a machine this large that also moved. Perhaps it is a dragon? Some sort of mutant elephant? I have heard tell of giant mammals on the surface… Hmmm no I think my theory of it being artificial is the more lik-“

CLANG!

Twist flew head first into a leg of the behemoth.

There were two cloaked figures on the back of the behemoth who heard this noise, unlike the other cloaked folks their robes were dark blue and they had no masks on, showing their pale human faces. One had a mustache and the other was pudgier with a round face. They also kept a far distance from the stout person making scrap metal of the assailants.

“Take care of the half-dwarf” the mustached man whispered to his companion, “I’ll check out what that sound was”

“Oh sure, you check out the noise that was probably just another one of those giant sugar glider-things thinking the leg is one of those giant underground trees and ramming its head in, whilst me and the clankers deal with this bulky amazon with fists like steel!” the round-faced man hissed back.

“Quit your complaining! There is no way one jerk is that tough, just help the the clankers and-”

As if on cue, another one of the aforementioned “clankers” was thrown off the behemoth and fell to its destruction via impact with the cavern’s floor from almost 200 feet in the air.

“Alright you big baby, we’ll both go.”

On the huge legs of the behemoth were numerous round windows called portholes. One of these portholes opened, and one of the robed men peaked out and looked down. He saw Twist hanging onto the leg, who then looked up in surprise.

“See? I told you it was another one of those giant sugar gliders” the mustached man said.

“They are called Shadow Gliders” the other robed man replied from inside the leg.

“Who calls them that?”

“Well I did.” he replied, bringing his round face out the window to look at Twist too

“And besides, this thing clearly ain’t one of them, it is way too well dressed.”

“Oh now you are an expert in sugar glider fashion?” the mustached man grumbled, putting his head into one of his hands.

“I told you, they are called Shadow Gliders!”

“Actually my name is Twist and I am noctav” Twist happily explained.

“See? Twist agrees with me, he ain’t a shadow…” the round-faced man began, before stopping in astonishment.

The two workers did a double take and looked down to the creature that had spoken to them, but now found him gone.

“Where did it go?” the mustached man asked.

“Probably just flew off to lay its eggs somewhere else,” the round-faced man replied.

“Shadow gliders don’t lay eggs!”

“Maybe noctav do.”

“That was too close” Twist thought to himself, having quickly clambered to the other side of the leg “I need to be more careful on what discussions I join in on.”

Twist continued to sidle to the side to further make sure he could not be spotted.

“This beast’s skin is so smooth, it is like metal… What am I saying? It IS metal. And I am pretty sure those are gears and steam I hear inside this leg.”

Twist then made his way upwards, his clawed hands and feet allowing him to go up even the most smooth surface of the behemoth’s hull.

It was an arduous climb, but he he eventually reached a small balcony that jutted out near where the behemoth’s lower leg connected to its ankle. He climbed onto it and took a good look around the platform.

“Yep, this whole thing is some sort of colossal automaton! Incredible! The House Of Gears would love to examine this… But first things first” he thought.

Twist turned back towards the behemoth’s back where the fighting continued, there the short person had fought off the new crowd of attackers but was clearly getting slower.

“I better hurry, they may need my help!” Twist thought to himself with determination.

Twist turned to the door balcony wall, there was a metal door there with a small window. Twist turned the small brass knob, but the door would not budge. He examined it and noticed there was no keyhole within it.

“I could sneak in… No, too risky. I should just keep climbing” Twist thought, he grappled to the leg walls to the side of the balcony and he kept up his climbing.

“It does make me wonder though what all these folk are doing down here in the first place? You don’t end up this deep in the Underworld by accident that is for sure”

As Twist made his way up the leg, the short fighter was continuing to beat the snot out of the various attackers.

“Ya metalmen may know how to keep this overgrown wind-up toy goin’, but ya don’t know squat about fightin’!” the fighter panted, winded but still going strong.

“Listen, just calm down, we really don’t want trouble” someone said smoothly.

The fighter’s freckled face was red in anger and peaked beneath her messy brown hair, this fierce face turned to the scowl at the source of this smooth voice; a tall man covered head to toe in shining silver armor, a sharp helmet covered his head, and a wavy longsword in his left hand.

“They just require you and your brother’s assistance in a matter deep below, Miss Tenacia” he said in his deep relaxed voice.

“No way, no how! You think we are goin’ to work with masked clowns who kidnapped us?!” the fighter called Tenacia growled back, her voice gruff and a bit raspy.

“I agree, these folk are rather strange and extreme in their methods… But it would be best to play along with them” the man replied.

“You only say that ‘cause they are payin’ you, you half-baked adventurer!” Tenacia snapped.

The knight chuckled “Fair enough! Either way, I must ask you to calm down or I will have to take things into my own hands.” He grasped the hilt of his large sword with both hands in emphasis “I have a job to do after all.”

Tenacia looked at him confidently “Bring it on milkdrinker! I don’t need a weapon to break yours!”

The knight smiled behind his helmet and said “Ignite.”

As soon as the knight had said “ignite”, his sword burst into flame. He then slashed it in midair.

Tenacia was going to scoff at this shortsighted miss, but quickly realized all the fire on the sword was sent flying through the air! She gasped and pressed herself to the ground, the flames of the sword flying over her and singing the edges of her short hair and the collar of her coat.

“Not a bad move! I thought I had you there when you paused so much in dodging” the man with the large sword laughed.

Tenacia wiped the sweat off of her face “Won’t lie, That sword of yours is amazin’, but like I said I can take ya!”

The knight observed his combatant more closely as she got up. He was aware who this fighter was, she was half-human and half-dwarf. As a result, she were just barely five feet in height, but extremely durable and incredibly strong. Her fists, already hardened from metalworking, might as well be iron clubs, but worse were her powerful thick legs which could easily break his neck if he wasn’t wearing armor. Even with armor, one kick would send him reeling. The knight was glad Tenacia's war hammer had been taken away.

The knight tried to think of how to fight, whilst making sure he didn’t hurt her, then realized a figure had risen behind the fighter. This figure was incredibly tall and nearly as wide.

“High Priest Karogoz sir!” the knight said to the newcomer. “I assure you, I will have this woman contained shortly!”

The robed goliath loomed upon the short fighter and let out a loud deep laugh. Inside the dark hood was an unnaturally pale face, almost as white as snow with various purple blotches across it. His eyes were dark and sunken with fierce red pupils and his sneering teeth were yellow. The fighter turned towards the new assailant, their bright blue eyes flashing and their strong arms ready to punch some more lights out.

“Y’want some too?! I’ve got enough fire in me to keep goin’ till the cows come home!” the half-dwarf shouted.

The robed one quickly got out a large steel staff and pointed it at Tenacia, in his other hand he held a bottle which he quickly popped the top off of.

The robed man splashed Tenacia with the water from the bottle, as she glared at him he said with a loud and hollow voice:

“With bitterest ice and cold from the depths of these lands, freeze this pathetic child of earth in place where she stands!”

The water on the fighter quickly froze into ice and spread across their body, to their horror they were completely and literally frozen in place.

“You danced well woman, but now Winter has come!” the robed man said in a deep growling rumble, walking grimly towards the now captive fighter.