The next morning, Gaia woke up early and walked around her room for a bit. She bumped into things as she was moving much faster than usual and wasn’t used to it yet. She had talked to Griff and Fergus about how to practice, and they all decided to walk and run together every morning so she could get used to the speed and how to maneuver so she could stop before walking or running into things. It took a few days for her to adjust, and they were all finally taking a request together again. They were only going to take one for the first few days and then get back into their usual rhythm.
Before they left, they checked their levels, and Gaia was level thirty-four while the guys were level thirty-six. After that they left to go to the Hunter’s League, and they went up to the desk with Freya behind it.
“Ah. Nice, you’re here. Wait, Gaia!” She squealed before running around to hug Gaia.
“Good to see you Freya.” She replied while hugging the tall elf woman.
“I heard you were hurt. I didn’t think you’d be back up and hunting already.” Freya said.
“Yeah. Probably only one today. Gonna get used to hunting with the new leg and speed.” She stated.
“Okay. Be careful though. Don’t get hurt again.” Freya said as she went back behind the desk.
“I’ll do my best.” She replied.
“Good. Here are the requests you can choose today.” Freya said as she pushed a couple papers forward.
Fergus read them aloud for everyone to hear. One was for an elemental. It was in the plains and was an earth elemental known as an Earth golem. They were slow but sturdy and strong. They would constantly regenerate any wounds as long as they were in contact with the ground and could only be destroyed by destroying a core that was hidden somewhere within their body. This particular monster was around level thirty-five according to the report.
The other was for a group of Blue caps. They were small creatures that were around a foot tall at most. They seemed to be similar to the garden gnomes Gaia knew from earth but actual living creatures. They had large blue hats that covered their eyes and had a small nose poking out from under the cap with bushy beards. They were extremely vicious, however. They roamed in packs of up to twenty and tricked people into getting closer with their cutesy visage before ruthlessly murdering and consuming their victims.
The group discussed it for a while before deciding to take the Earth Golem request. It was in the plains area to the west in between Boundary and the farming villages. It had been attacking the farmers as they brought their crops to the city. It was about to cause a slight food shortage due to the farmers inability to travel safely. They quickly headed out of the city to the west. Gaia was still slower than the rest of the party when they ran so she climbed onto her chair on Malachite’s back. The party took off along the road to the farming villages.
The villages were about three hours from the city by wagon and they came across the golem around two hours out. They stopped and Griff gawked at the golems size. It was roughly forty feet tall and made from stone and hardened earth. Every step it took made the ground shake slightly. Gaia got a bit closer so she could analyze it through her Mana Influence’s field.
Name – Earth Elemental Golem
Level – 37
She ran back to the party. She relayed its level, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief at the information. It was as the request said and not like all the requests they’d had since the start of the Mana Torrent. They took a few deep breathes before taking their shield formation and starting the battle.
Malachite was up front and Gaia not far behind as they ran towards the golem. Fergus was firing arrows trying to see how they did against the sturdy earth and stones that it was made of. Gaia already had her Mana Influence out and making some webs. Malachite was launching water shots at the elemental while Liv did the same with poison shots. She was, as usual, on Gaia’s back. Shadow was running between everyone keeping an eye out to guard them when she could.
Griff launched a couple mana shots at it as the party ran. When they were finally close enough Gaia tried to wrap her webs around it which didn’t do much aside from trying to poison it. Liv focused on firing poison at it while Malachite was charging and hitting it with shell bashes. Fergus’ arrows were pretty much bouncing off the elemental’s stone form, even his arrows imbued with wind mana didn’t do much. Griff was pummeling golems right leg and parts of it were crumbling. The same went for the left leg where Malachite was ramming it with his shell.
Gaia’s poison wasn’t doing anything to the creature, as rocks couldn’t be poisoned. She tried her vines which didn’t do much as she had the same problem, the elemental didn’t have blood. Instead, she tried to take a hit with her barrier which was a hard feat as the elemental was extremely strong. She would have to wait for the monster's massive arm to plunge down towards her until she could hear the wind whistling, then dodge causing the attacks shockwave to hit her barrier that hit it with radiation.
The only reason she could do this was her new speed from the brace and leg. The additions doubled her reflex stat allowing her to move twice as fast as before. Thankfully, her idea worked, and the elemental was hit with radiation. She continued this while Malachite and Griff landed hit after hit into its legs. Fergus was starting to deal some damage as he aimed for cracks that appeared from the blunt force strikes Griff and Malachite were hitting it with. Shadow was blocking any attacks when others couldn’t dodge.
It was still rapidly regenerating from being in contact with the ground, but they were dealing damage slightly quicker than it could heal. After an hour of fighting Fergus caught a glimpse of the golem’s core. It was in the lower left area of its torso section. He quickly fired an arrow that pierced it just before it could rebuild the stone that guarded that section.
Once its core was pierced the golem quickly shattered and fell apart. Gaia managed to dodge some of the rocks that fell from the noise alone, but Malachite picked her up and they escaped the landslide as it turned into a pile of rocks and dirt. Fergus went and dugout the core. Then he destroyed it while everyone else rested.
This was when Gaia finally realized something. The cores they used for money were actually the monsters cores. The cores were all small but she remembered being told that loot abilities gave cores that were all the same size, no matter the monsters size. This made her feel stupid but she wondered if the cores could be identified but ended up putting the idea aside for future discussion.
Most of the damage had been dealt by Malachite and Griff who were the ones that had the greatest impact. They had just sat down to rest when Gaia heard something from behind them. It sounded like quiet high-pitched voices and laughing. She let the other two know and they looked over before she heard them getting to their feet and preparing to fight. She was about to ask why when Griff spoke.
“Seems like we’re doing both requests anyway. Blue caps are coming towards us. Shield formation, Gaia activate your Mana Influence.” He said quickly.
She jumped up and turned in the direction of the noise and spread her Mana Influence out. She quickly noticed they were about fifty feet away and her field started poisoning them immediately. It seemed they were very susceptible to poison. She used her webs along with Liv and they bound up all but two that had suddenly burst forward.
The two ran at the party but Fergus killed one that went towards Griff while the other jumped at him. Griff tried to grab it in mid-air but just missed it. The Blue Cap suddenly split down the middle vertically, it opened into a massive razor tooth filled maw. There were multiple rows of sharpened teeth the front set being just two massive flat teeth and used for crushing. Fergus quickly used his Vine bow and smashed it into the creature’s side causing it to go flying where Griff caught it. He then swiftly crushed it in his fist.
The other Blue caps died soon after as they were very weak, but used numbers to devour their victims within minutes. They also seemed extremely weak to poison which was in the party’s favor. They soon were traveling back to the city with Gaia once again on Malachite’s shell with the others running in front. When they arrived at the Hunter’s League they went straight to Freya’s desk.
“We finished the Earth elemental request. We also finished the Blue cap request by accident.” Griff stated.
Freya just stared at them for a bit before sighing. “Of course you did. What happened?” She asked.
“We finished the golem fight, and the Blue caps pretty much just came straight to us.” Gaia replied.
“Yep.” Fergus added.
Freya checked the request, and it did show as complete. She did cast some kind of spell as Gaia felt the mana change slightly after Freya had said a couple words. It was apparently a kind of truth spell. After they told her again, they were the ones to kill them they were given their rewards and headed out.
The group made their way back to the inn, but Gaia stopped by Will and Summers shop. They told her they thought they had it figured out and that it should be ready in about six days. They’d already made the blindfold and now just needed to enchant it which would take a while to get correctly. She thanked the couple and went back to the inn.
That night they talked for a while and decided to change Gaia’s Mana Influence as they called it to her Mana Field. After that they relaxed for the night while Fergus told another story from his childhood. It mainly consisted of him attempting to sneak out of the mansion and getting caught. The servants turned a blind eye to him as he tried to escape through a window. He was and still is a very bad liar which caused his escape plans to go awry most of the time. The only time Gaia had been told he succeeded was when Titania had helped him or snuck out with him.
The group had some good laughs as the story he currently told ended with him falling into a hedge just outside the building, which he got stuck upside down in, for about an hour until one of the gardeners found him. They laughed for a while after he finished, told each other goodnight and went to bed. The next morning Gaia woke up to Shadow growling in the direction of her door Malachite likewise was sending her warnings through their bond.
She quickly went to the wall that she shared with Griff and Fergus and banged on it to wake them up. She heard them shuffling and yell from behind the wall.
“What’s wrong?” Fergus yelled worriedly.
“Don’t fully know. Shadow is growling at my door and Malachite is sending warnings. I’m gonna put up my Mana Field.” She stated and did so.
What she could feel was a vertical mass of mana in an undulating oblong shape. It was a portal that had been created in her doorway. She was really starting to wonder if she was just highly unlucky. What were the odds a portal would spawn in the doorway of her room? Worse yet it felt like a high-level stone rank portal almost to bronze rank. It was a portal she couldn’t deal with. She was thinking when she heard Griff and Fergus’ muffled questions.
“It’s a portal. It spawned in the doorway to my room. I’m kinda stuck. It’s at least high-level stone rank almost to bronze I think.” She yelled.
She heard a muffled discussion before Griff spoke. “We’re going to get Titania and her party. Wait there.” He said.
She waited for around half an hour before she heard hurried footsteps coming closer. They stopped at her door before going into the guy's room and she heard Titania.
“You said there’s a portal in your doorway?” Titania asked.
“Yeah. I can feel the condensed mana that creates it.” She replied.
“Alright. Well, the issue is we can’t see one. We opened your door with the owner's crystal and can’t see anything amiss. Can you get around it or is it encompassing the entire doorway?”
“I think it encompasses the doorway or at least the area just inside it so I can’t leave using it. Do you think you can enter it?” Gaia asked.
“Maybe. Either way we don’t know how it will act after entering or completing it. It would be best if we could get you out, but inns are sturdier than most other buildings. They have enchantments to protect the patrons' rooms so not even an adamantine rank Hunter could break it. If we go in, I think you should as well. The room can probably withstand something happening but you, not so much.” Titania explained through the wall.
“So, basically, I should enter the portal because we don’t know if it could explode or something and I’ll likely have a higher rate of survival if I enter it? Great. Not like I have a choice, right? Then just tell me when I guess.” Gaia yelled back.
After a few minutes Titania told her go in and she listened along with Malachite, Liv, and Shadow. They all ran in together as Titania’s party did the same. Fergus and Griff stayed behind at Titania’s instruction as it would already be hard enough to find and protect Gaia alone. What Titania hadn’t told Gaia was that she would likely end up somewhere complete different from them to start.
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As she pushed through the portal which once again felt like pushing through jelly, her foot landed on nothing, and she fell about fifteen feet into a ball pit. She was disoriented from falling and didn’t know what was going on until she felt the hundreds of small plastic balls surrounding her in the pit. When she touched the bottom of the pit, she realized it was only about three feet deep. It reminded her of the old ball pits from carnivals and fast-food restaurants when she was little.
It brought a wave of nostalgia until she remembered she was in a portal. When she checked around herself, she realized she was alone. Her bonds had ended up somewhere else from her. She could feel the bonds there, so she knew they weren’t hurt or worse. She pushed out her Mana Field and once again could “see” everything. She was in some kind of massive ball pit it was large enough for her to not see the edges, but she could feel every individual plastic ball within the range of her field.
She could also feel a gaze but didn’t know what it was, so she ignored it. She decided to walk forward until she found a wall and after a minute found one. It extended well beyond her Mana Field, so it was at least more than fifty feet tall. She followed it to her left keeping it within her range of “vision” and came across a corner. She had decided to follow it as long as she could.
As Gaia made her way through the maze, Shadow was running around playing with all the plastic “toys” she had around her. She had seen some kind of person in the distance but when she ran towards them it disappeared around a corner and when she reached it, the person was gone. She was sad her playmate had disappeared and instead rolled around and ran through the ball pit until she smelled a familiar scent and sprinted off following her nose.
As Gaia walked through the odd ball pit hallways as she came to realize she continuously felt an odd gaze and it seemed to be more than one now that she thought about it. Whatever it was, it was staying out of her Mana Fields range, so it didn’t want to attack her. It might just follow people to keep an eye on them to allow monsters to attack.
She didn’t feel any maliciousness from the gazes, so they didn’t seem to want to hurt her. She once again ignored the weird gazes since they didn’t approach or give off any intent to harm. She wandered the hallways for at least a few hours, getting very tired of wading through the hip high plastic balls that seemed to be everywhere. She heard something following her and assumed it was whatever the gazes were from.
After a while she heard something moving extremely quickly in her direction. She heard the plastic balls moving and shifting from something larger than her running through it and soon heard a familiar voice in her head.
“Mama!” Shadow called through their bond as she pounced on Gaia and licked her face.
Gaia hugged her bond once she got back on her feet. She’d been worried about them ever since she realized they got separated. Now that she’d found one, she was less worried about the others, but she figured Liv would be fine since she could climb the walls.
“Have you seen anyone else yet?” Gaia asked.
“Nope. Just Mama.” She replied.
“Ok. Shall we continue looking for them? I think they should be alright, but I do want them near me.” Gaia asked.
“Yeah. Let’s go!” Shadow replied as she jumped up and ran around Gaia before running forward a bit.
Gaia tried to keep up, but Shadow was just too fast, and she eventually had to get her to slow down. They slowed to a jog for Gaia and came across a few intersections in which Shadow chose one and she followed while trying to keep track of the turns they’d made. Gaia could feel Liv’s bond getting stronger the closer they got and had Shadow go in that direction.
Liv had found herself under a pile of odd balls after she’d passed through the portal. She’d immediately scurried up one of the walls as she didn’t like the fact the numerous balls were continuous from what she could see. Her vision was a bit more advanced than Gaia’s Mana Field. They were very similar, but Liv could tell exactly where everything was even without the high mana density. She used her vision to stay high on the walls where the odd humanoid being couldn’t reach her. She stayed up there until she felt Gaia’s mana getting closer and dropped down when Gaia was underneath her.
Malachite had also ended up alone upon entering the portal. This was his first time ever being alone. He was extremely scared even though he knew he could probably protect himself. He’d always had Gaia or one of the other party members with him. He was used to following orders or just being by someone. He looked around when he landed on the ground and grew to his actual size of about eight feet long and six feet tall. When he turned, he saw someone and immediately ran towards them.
He was much faster than the creature had expected, and he got an actual look at the monster. It was around five and a half feet tall and wore some kind of odd one-piece outfit. It had a human-like face with weird white and red paint on it with a tiny hat on top of its head. It had very little hair that looked like a rainbow, and the outfit was bright yellow. Its shoes were enormous and were bright red.
When he looked closer, he noticed there were hundreds of slits all over its body. A moment after he stared at it, all the slits opened into piercing eyes with dark red irises and black sclera. When it opened its mouth, he heard a goofy laugh escape from it as its jaw unhinged like a snake, revealing thousands of serrated teeth that rotated, and it lunged towards him. He immediately started running in the opposite direction as fast as he could. After around thirty minutes of running, he had lost the creatures pursuit, but he continued frantically running full speed until he ran into Gaia who had already found Shadow and Liv.
Gaia saw Malachite running full speed in her direction and could feel the fear through their bond. As soon as he stopped in front of her, she immediately hugged him, and he shrunk to be able to fit in her hand as he shook from fright. She comforted him as he cried through their bond. She didn’t ask what caused him to be so scared as she didn’t want him to relive whatever it was.
They continued walking through the halls which was becoming very monotonous. Everywhere they went were just endless halls of small plastic balls that reached up to her waist. The smell was annoying as it just smelled like plastic and the sounds of them sifting through the sea of of plastic was starting to grate on her ears. She started to distract her mind by focusing on the gazes she felt from behind her.
They had increased as she found her bonds and now could feel about twenty gazes on them. There was still one that stood out as it was the one that had the oddest feeling coming from it. She couldn’t place it but it almost seemed like curiosity. She could have been wrong, but they still never put forth any hostility. It was definitely odd as she’d been followed ever since she’d arrived, but nothing had happened. She wasn’t going to complain though and just continued on their search for Flora.
Titania had arrived by herself, which she’d expected but immediately noticed something stalking her whenever she moved. She could hear something moving through the countless halls behind her. She never got a good look at the creature but had discovered it was around six feet tall and was shaped like a human. She never felt afraid of the creature as it didn’t seem hostile, but it did make the hairs on the back of her neck rise. She started running through the halls looking for her companions or Gaia. After around thirty minutes of running, she came across John but saw the odd figure in between them. She immediately ran up to it as she called out to him.
She reached the figure within a few seconds and had just realized it was some kind of painted humanoid as the hundreds of eyes opened. She stopped in horror for a moment as it quickly turned around unhinged its massive jaw and lunged at her. She was a bit slow to get away as she had been startled by its sudden change and its mouth wrapped around her side. She felt the pain as her skin and muscle were almost blended from the rotation of its numerous teeth. John had swiftly run up and cleaved the monster’s head off and the mouth detached from her.
She slowly got up with John’s help and tied a bandage around her mangled side as they made their way through the maze. They could feel the gazes of the monsters that followed them but after the last experience they decided to ignore them and just search for their companions. It took them a few hours to find Francois and Jess who had both fared better as they didn’t get close enough for the monsters to become enraged. After they regrouped, Flora began the search for Gaia and for whatever the core of the portal was.
Gaia and her bonds had been walking around the maze for around seven hours before they ever ran into anything aside from the monsters that followed them. They came across a massive area. It was extremely large area and took them nearly an hour to travel around the outer edge. There were four halls branching out from it, one in the middle of each wall. When she moved closer in, she felt something in the center of it but after getting the slightest glimpse of the things strength she immediately backed up to the wall and stayed there. Whatever was in the center of the room was bronze rank or at least extremely close to it.
As Gaia wandered through the ball pit halls something was following her. It was getting increasingly frustrated by the odd humanoid it followed. She should have been afraid of it, but instead she continued like it didn’t exist. Its entire existence was to cause fear in which it could feed on, but the frustrating humanoid acted like she couldn’t see it which was obviously impossible.
She’d even looked it in the eyes with her piercing purple irises but had no reaction. It caused the monster to feel something it didn’t understand. It didn’t want to approach the odd existence it followed, but that was its purpose, that’s how it survived. It fed off the fear it instilled in others. As it continued to follow her more of its brethren joined, and the humanoid in front of it had come across some odd creatures. It now had three creatures with it. One that had shrunk down into her hands was radiating a massive amount of fear, but it was slowly giving off less and less. Another had noticed it but completely ignored it like the girl it climbed on. Another was giving off the feeling of happiness and joy as it played with the numerous balls that lined the hallways. This being it followed had a calming effect on the creatures around it. The human was the bane of its kind!
The monster quickly became more and more enraged, but its brethren seemed to not have noticed the human's odd ability. Was it the only one that could see it? Was the human it followed even real? It followed behind the human as it began to question its existence until the human entered the center of the maze.
Gaia and her bonds stayed at the edge of the massive room and waited for Flora to arrive. They weren’t sure what was in the center of the room, but she knew it was strong and would likely kill her easily if she tried to fight it. They waited for a few hours before she heard Titania’s voice from across the room.
“I hope we find them soon. I’m starting to become worried after fighting some of those things. At least it looks like we’ve found the center.” Titania said.
“Yeah. I hope she didn’t try to fight one of those. Also, what’s in the middle of the room? It looks like some kind of massive stone.” Francois said.
“Hey. We’re on the other side here! We’ve been staying along the edge of the room.” Gaia called out.
Flora quickly ran around to them and breathed a sigh of relief on seeing they were all alright but started panicking when they didn’t see Malachite.
“Where’s Malachite? Did you find him? I’m pretty sure you brought him in too, right?” John asked worriedly.
“He’s fine. He’s right here.” She replied as she pulled Malachite out of one her pockets.
The group once again breathed easily realizing everyone was alright. Gaia asked them about how the portal was for them so far and was surprised when they said something attacked them. Nothing had attacked her, but she’d felt something following her since she first arrived. She explained this and they agreed that they only seemed to attack when someone got too close.
The entire group rested there for a bit to catch their breath as Flora had pretty much been going nonstop since they first arrived looking for each other and trying to find Gaia’s group. They rested for about an hour while Jess healed Titania a bit more. Gaia would have helped but was worried her poison-based healing would be more harmful than helpful. By the end of the rest Titania was almost fully healed, thankfully she had been the only one to get a wound as bad as that. After seeing it the first time the group was prepared after that and no one else got hurt. Now it was time to fight whatever the portals boss was.