"You can thank me later, for now let's get out of here." Kanina hurried Arath who was sitting in a pool of blood and scattered rocks.
Arath nodded reluctantly and gathered himself, altough still in a bit of shock, he managed to pull himself down to earth by pinching his arm.
'What to do? We have what we needed but that was way too easy, something is wrong, it must be.' His heart started to panic as he looked around, trying to spot any danger.
The ice, that was supposed to block bats' escape route, broke and fell off from the rocks above crashing on a sharper part of the wall. The group could barely hear it through the deafening sound of the waterfall but still, a shiver went down their spine. This could be them, if they slipped or stopped paying attention for mere few seconds. Just the sheer pressure of the water was enough to turn them into minced meat, not even mentioning the rocks that would make sure even their own mother couldn't recognise their faces.
"Where are they? These bloody bastards are hiding somewhere, that I am sure of." Arath's face suddenly had a frightened expression.
"What are you talking about? Are you alright? Do you need a break?" Kanina asked worriedly.
In that same moment the ground around her started to shake and she quickly got down in order not to lose balance. Everyone followed her footsteps, only their leader with a bitter smile of a madman on his face approached body of the deceased beast and hid it in his pack.
"Have you gone mad? Get down here." Ben shouted trying to reach Arath and bring him back to his senses but suddenly a certain detail gave the man quite a chock. "Huh? What is that?"
Arath's forehead was vaguely split into two and right in the middle of it something was moving. In the dark corridor it was barely noticable, but it was almost as if a creature had just made it's house in his forehead.
"Get your stuff, climb the stairs for twenty meters and jump. No questions, we have no time." He ordered after a while and without even a second of hesitation took the lead.
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Arath had no idea what was going on, but he was certain of one - bloodworms were just seconds away and in no way could the team wash their equipment and run away. This time the small beasts couldn't be numbered in hundreds or thousands, the sheer amount of bloodthirsty monsters could make one's head dizzy.
For some reason right after the fight with the bloodbat Arath suddenly had the feeling of his skin being ripped off, and although it only lasted for a few seconds it was more than enough to make him lose sanity for the time being. The crazyness did not stop there, his entire field of view was filled with unsightly, distgusting worms feeding on each other and laying their eggs in a blood-like substance left behind by them. He tried to push himself away with his hands but when he reached out he felt out of the place. Literally. He could feel his body with his sense of touch but all he could see were the disgusting creatures moving towards a certain direction. He tried to look around and discovered that he could float around the scene before him at will.
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'What the hell?' The sense of confusion was so overwhelming he could feel his brain frying. 'Oh, I remember something like that. I could see some danger beforehand few times already, but this is so different. I wonder if I could return to normal if I tried, or is it something I have no control over?'
With all strength he had, both physical and mental, he managed to move away after a dozen or so tries. To his surprise, he was floating and obstacles meant almost nothing to his new form, though, as soon as he flew into rocks his sight turned pitch black. After a while he seemed to have left the realm of shadows and his real body was standing right next to him, it was a surreal experience, to be able to watch himself like this.
'Wait a second. If this phenomenon is taking place now, doesn't that mean there is some kind of danger? The only times this happened was when some kind of enemy was around or something like that. Wait...' Hair on his arms stood up as if it was an army that just saw their general and his entire body started to shiver and sweat as he understood what this situation meant. Primal fear and panic won the battle against rationality and suddenly his vision came back to normal.
"Where are they? These bloody bastards are hiding somewhere, that I am sure of." Steam exited through his ears as his brain tried to comprehend how deep was the shit he found himself in.
When he focused his enhanced senses trying to find the impending disaster. He could vaguely hear someone talking beside him but gave little thought to it.
'Found you, fuckers.' He whispered as the ground beneath his feet started to shake. Hundred meters beneath them, the colony was rushing towards the smell of blood that he and himself gave off after fighting blood bats.
Almost instinctively, Arath picked up the body of the blood bat, threw it into his bag and gave it his all to once again separate from the body. Surprisingly, it was not hard at all. Following his previous experiences he focused his magic power on his forehead and just like that became the Wandering Eye, as he decided to call it.
'Is there any way of escape?' Was what he thought, but nothing was coming to his mind. 'Fuck, Arath, think.'
As he searched for any route of escape, one very irresponsible and dangerous way presented itself before his Wandering Eye. Fifteen meters below the stairs, a family of fungus made their claims. A grey-green, glowy mushroom spread out for over ten meters on the same formation on which the ice shattered. Thanks to this rock, mushrooms avoided the powerful water current and could almost peacefully grow. It was a wild and incredibly stupid option, but there were no other available. It was said that this specific type of fungus released a cloud of sprouts upon any kind of impact, these sprouts could potentially mask the smell and hide their location, at least for a while.
Because of this seemingly trivial information, Arath could feel nothing but deep gratefulness towards the person that wrote the journal which was now going to save his life. At least that was the plan. If it doesn't work then no one will be able to appreciate the writers effort, will they? So, long story short - it had better work out.
Without any more time remaining, he made his decision and announced it to the team. They all seemed shocked, a question mark could be almost visible on their faces, but it was too late, Arath jumped into the unkown, his eyes tighly shut and heart beating unnaturaly fast.
One by one they were slowly embraced by darkness, only a single stature was remaining on the edge. Before long it was momentarily devoured by wild hordes of ferocious little beasts, not leaving a single bone to be found.