After Sarah and Andrew had eaten, they decided to go to Tobias’ cave together. Sarah had her vision of Dr. Becker to discuss, and Andrew wanted to talk to both of them about the situation with Alex.
"You could have let me have some more mushrooms, though." Sarah grumbled sourly while walking over to Tobias’ detached cave.
Andrew didn’t even bother to answer, and he walked silently next to her. As she didn’t get any reaction out of him, she pushed him into a puddle of muddy water and ran away while laughing.
Of course, Andrew had no chance of catching up with her, so Sarah had to wait for a few minutes in front of Tobias’ cave for Andrew to arrive.
Dripping wet, he trotted over with an annoyed look on his face. He opened his mouth to say something, but then shook his head and went inside the cave.
Feeling refreshed, Sarah followed him inside. Tobias’ cave must have been the best-lit cave in their entire camp. Dozens of torches were fastened to the walls deeper inside and illuminated the workspace of their self-proclaimed genius. Sarah thought that he was probably right about that, but she would never admit it out loud.
The room they went into was extremely messy. All sorts of things were strewn about on the ground. Rocks, plants, animal parts, and lots of other things in all the variations one could imagine. Tobias himself was sitting underneath a torch with a large slab of tree bark in his hand. And he was scribbling something on it.
"Tobias?" Andrew asked the focused man, but he got no answer. "Tobias?" he tried again, this time a bit louder. But still, no reaction. Before Andrew could say anything more, Sarah had already opened her mouth.
"Wow, look at all this stuff! Would make awesome firewood!"
"What do you want?" came the immediate reaction of the scrawny man. He looked up at them with disdain in his eyes. "I am in the middle of transcribing the information about our people. I have no time to talk."
"You are what?" asked Andrew with a perplexed face.
Tobias looked at him with pity in his eyes. He started speaking extremely slowly and loudly, as if he were talking to a confused and deaf person. "I am writing down the status screens of our people. We will be able to make better use of our work allocation like this."
Andrew now looked even more annoyed than before. Sarah was slightly sorry now for pushing him into the water. Although… no, not really.
"Stop talking to me like that. Or I’ll lower the number of torches and resources you get allocated." Andrew threatened Tobias with annoyance in his voice.
"What can I do for you?" Tobias asked in a friendly voice and sprang to his feet with a smile on his face.
Sarah and Andrew simultaneously closed their eyes in frustration. This man was just insufferable.
Sarah was content for Andrew to lead the exhausting conversation with the man, so he started talking again. "We’re here to talk to you about important matters, so focus. First of all, do you already have the status of Alex transcribed? We could use some information about him."
Tobias thought for a moment and then answered. "Alex’ status isn’t transcribed yet, but I can do it now if you want. If you need information about other people, I’ll have all one hundred eleven statuses transcribed this evening."
Andrew nodded, and Tobias took a new tree bark into his hand and started scratching away. Sarah, on the other hand, was a little confused. "Aren’t we one hundred and twelve people by now?"
Tobias’ hand stopped scratching on the tree bark. He looked up at her with an irritated look on his face. "Yes… yes, we are one hundred and twelve people. But I thought I looked at every status screen. Why did I think that?"
He sank into deep contemplation but shrugged his shoulders soon after. "Well, that’s not important now. I’ll transcribe Alex's status."
Sarah was even more puzzled right now. She also felt that it wasn’t that important, but something bugged her in the back of her mind. The Tobias she knew would never be content with a realization like this.
No, wait, it is important. Which status haven’t you seen?" She asked the man, and he looked up at her with confusion in his eyes.
"I.. uh…" he stuttered and held his head. "Is this really important? I think we can talk about it some other time."
Sarah had enough, so she grabbed the scrawny man by his shoulders and shook him. Something wasn’t right here. "Which status is missing?" she shouted at him, and he looked at her with a pained expression.
"It… I think… Denise’s status is missing." He told her with a face that looked like he was in pain. And then he lost consciousness.
Sarah was shocked by Tobias suddenly going limp in her hands, and she gently laid him down on the ground. "Andrew, what’s going on here?" She asked and looked to her left, only to see that Andrew was already gone. He was walking towards the exit of the cave, as if everything were alright.
Sarah ran over and grabbed him. "What is going on with you?" She more or less screamed into his ear, and he looked at her with an angry glint in his eyes.
Stolen novel; please report.
"I have important things to do. So I would appreciate it if you kept your lunacy to yourself for a moment." He spat out and freed his shoulder.
"Tobias just lost consciousness after telling us that Denise’s status is missing! Something is really wrong around here! Don’t you see that?" She shouted, but Andrew just looked at her with disdain in his eyes.
"Don’t scream like that. I will leave now." He told her and just walked away.
Sarah stood in the now silent cave and felt a slight fear bubble up inside of her. "What the fuck is going on here?" she asked herself.
The fear subsided as fast as it came and was replaced by a feeling of calmness. Something inside her told her that all of this was actually no problem. That she was making unnecessary trouble.
"Oh hell no." She growled in anger. "I will not let this be done with me."
Sarah pushed away the foreign emotions and thoughts inside of her and let the burning fury deep inside her very being wash through her mind. She intuitively infused this sensation with her magic power, and a burning sensation flooded her body.
The system prompt only motivated her to drive this even further. Suddenly, she noticed something inside of herself. Deep, deep inside her soul and mind, hidden behind her own self. There was something that shouldn’t be there. With all of her willpower, she ferociously burned it away, and she felt a sharp pain inside of her very being.
But it was successful. The foreign thing inside of her was no more.
Soul Purge (Unique): Channel rampaging Magic Power and Mental Energy to purge any foreign influence in your soul. Warning: May cause damage to the soul.> Sarah looked at the system prompt with a mix of joy and murderous intent. This bitch had gone too far. She had somehow implanted something inside of her soul without her even noticing it. Thinking back, she had probably already implanted it when they met. And it has been a long time since then. Sarah felt a cold feeling wash over her body, and her neck hair stood on end. What if Denise had already affected the whole camp? Andrew and Tobias were obviously under her influence. Alex most likely too. Even though her very being felt injured and she was insanely exhausted and dizzy from the purge, she had to act immediately. "Shit!" Sarah cursed under her breath and started running. She knew of one person who may be able to heal something like this in other people. Melissa. She was usually located in the nursery cave, so that’s where Sarah was going to go now. She was in such a hurry that she noticed the attack a step too late. Alex jumped down from a tree onto her back, and she gracelessly fell to the ground. At the same time she heard multiple heavy footsteps coming closer to her. She wanted to stand up and fight back, but all of her limbs and even her head and tail were pressed down into the mud by heavy weights. She roared in anger and started thrashing about with all of her might. But it was no use. Even though she had monstrous strength, she felt at least six hands holding each of her limbs. She heard the shouting of many different men and realized that Denise must have noticed somehow that she had purged her influence. The only option left for Sarah was to use her mental skills. She pushed out as much magic power as she could through her horns, but there wasn’t all that much left due to her action before. She felt the grips on her body loosen and already wanted to try another escape when she heard an angry voice. "Oh no, you won’t!" Sarah felt her mental power being pushed back inside her own head. She tried to fight back, but it felt like something snapped inside her head, and an immense headache overcame her. Sarah was lifted up on her feet and saw the heavily sweating and panting Denise standing in front of her. She could barely stand on her own two feet, and another guy helped her stand. Denise started smiling with a malicious glint in her eyes. "You shouldn’t have slapped me." She just told her breathlessly and nodded to the other men. She felt like she was in a cocoon of bodies, so many people were around her and holding her body still. But she felt so dizzy right now that she couldn’t have fought back even if she wanted to. They walked very slowly, so it took quite some time for them to move forward. Sarah tried her best to regain focus during this awkward march. "I’d say a punishment is in order." Sarah heard the quiet and gentle voice of Denise in front of her. Her head had started to clear up a little by now, and she noticed that they were walking down one of the tunnels they hadn’t explored yet. It was the one with an insane amount of ambient magic power. "I will rip you apart." Sarah growled, but she couldn’t help but feel helpless. She didn’t even dare use her acid breath because Bertrand was walking in front of her. This stupid giant. Denise laughed with her pearly voice but didn’t say anything else. The ambient magic power got denser the further down the tunnel they went. It had started to become visible to the naked eye by now. Multicolored strands of energy were swirling through the air in complex patterns. Sarah would have been amazed by the beauty of it, but the situation made it impossible. After some more walking, they finally reached their destination. Sarah’s heart felt like it sank to the bottom of the floor. They came into a wide cave where the magic power was wildly flowing through the air. And it was coming from a spatial rip in the air. Pretty similar like the one she had used to leave the spatial error. But this one seemed somehow different. It seemed more... orderly. Like there was a pattern to the swirling energy. And in front of it stood another man, carrying the unconscious Melissa over his shoulder. Denise turned around and gave her a gentle smile. "I guess we came to the same conclusion. It is goodbye now, my dear. May you have a miserable end." Sarah couldn’t comprehend what had happened in the last few minutes and just stared at the hateful woman with fury in her eyes. "Why?" she asked with a growl that sounded more like the voice of a ferocious animal than that of a human. The men forcefully turned Sarah’s head down while pressing her mouth shut, and Denise stepped in front of her. "Because I can." She just answered and smiled brightly. Sarah also smiled. And forcefully opened her mouth a little. With a swishing sound, a little bit of acid flowed out of the small slit and coated Denise’s face with it. Denise stumbled back with a guttural scream. "My eyes! MY EYES!" "Throw her in the rip!" She heard Alex scream behind her, and she was dragged to the spatial fluctuation. She wildly thrashed about with her arms and legs, and the men had a hard time holding her still. Just as she managed to free one of her arms, she saw Melissa getting thrown inside the rip. As soon as her body came into contact with it, it disappeared without a trace. "You BASTARDS!" Sarah roared and threw more of them off of her. But she was already too close to the rip. She felt a mighty punch in her back, and she flew forward, together with one unfortunate man who was still holding one of her legs. The last thing she saw of the cave was the unconscious Denise getting carried away hurriedly by Alex and Bertrand.