Ewtain watched as Vultressant extracted the essence of the Occultist. The process took several minutes, and the sounds of fighting had died shortly after the Wizard had begun the process. Ewtain could see nothing, but Vultressant was clearly straining to get the soul out. Finally, a small vial that glowed blue from the substance it contained appeared in his open palm, and he sat down, spent from the effort.
“Blue is better than green or red, right?” Ewtain asked Vultressant.
“Yes,” Vultressant gasped, “it goes ruby, emerald, then sapphire.”
“Nice. We need to stuff that into a sword.”
“We need to get out of this place first.”
Ewtain pointed to the glowing door a few feet away from them. “We can try this door or the passage to the south. One of them has to lead out of here.”
“That is assuming that we can get the door open,” Vultressant said, “but we need to check the stream. We might be able to leave the way that we came now, and the water is flowing from somewhere, so the opposite side might have an opening we can go through as well.”
“You think that the barrier is gone?”
Vultressant shrugged. “Maybe. The Occultist appears to be the leader, and he’s dead, so it stands to reason that the barrier was tied to him in some way. We need to check it out at any rate.”
The rest of the group approached, and Taloc gave them a report. “There’s a door a short way down that corridor at the other end of the cave.” Ewtain gave him an accusing look. “We didn’t open it,” Taloc said, raising his voice slightly. Ewtain didn’t know why the Ranger sounded annoyed; it had been a reasonable request, and he had been the one to brave the room first, after all. “The way we came is still blocked off, but the east end of the underground river has a pile of loose rocks that look like they can be removed, so I think that there must be a way out there.”
Ewtain looked at Vultressant, but he didn’t even look smug at the news. Maybe he was too tired for smugness, but that was normally his go-to move when proven right. “We got a door here, too,” he said, hooking a thumb to point behind him at the door.
“We’re going to rest up,” Taloc said. “I want us all at full health and full mana before we do anything else.”
“Agreed,” Isla said quickly. “Ewt, you almost died going after the Occultist on your own.”
“How many more of those clouds or rock falls could you guys have taken?” he asked.
“He’s right,” Vanya said. “I was nearly out of mana keeping everyone up, so we would have lost one or two of us if it had gone on much longer.”
Isla lost her steam at Vanya’s admission, and she walked over and hugged Ewtain. When she released him, he said, “I like that better than getting yelled at.” She rounded on him, and he immediately put up his hands in a defensive gesture.
“Sorry,” she said, “it’s just hard to tell when you’re being sincere.”
“Anyway, he was a bad dude,” Ewtain said, pointing a finger at the downed Occultist. “I think that he said something about eating babies, or maybe it was puppies. Something had to be done.”
“And there it is,” Isla said, shaking her head. “What was that, maybe 30 seconds?” she asked no one in particular while looking at an imaginary watch on her wrist.
“It’s true,” Ewtain said with a smile. “He was eyeing our Gnome here and licking his chops—probably mistaking Vult for a child. He said something about dipping Vult’s naughty bits into Szechuan sauce. I don’t know if he meant while it was still attached, or dismembered and deep-fried.” He looked up as if in contemplation and then shrugged. “Probably fried while still attached.”
“Szechuan sauce, huh?” Vanya asked, tapping her chin with her index finger. “Can you make that stuff, Ewt?” Maroftis barked out a loud laugh, and Vultressant immediately wandered off pretending to inspect the door.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“Why are you asking me?” he asked. “That’s pretty racist, although I can indeed make it, and it’s way better than that crap from McDonald’s.”
“Screw you,” Maroftis said. “That stuff is delicious.”
“I don’t know that I want to discuss the best dipping sauces,” Taloc said. “Barbecue is objectively the correct answer, by the way, but we need to decide which door to try first.”
Isla pointed to the glowing door. “Obvious magic door could be holding the fountain or might be a portal to some hell dimension. I say we check the regular door across the water first.”
“There appears to be a pattern to the lines on the door,” Vultressant said. “It looks like they might be a clue as to how to open it.”
“You sure?” Maroftis asked. “Like, is that just some shit Wizards know?”
“Does it tell you what might be behind the door?” Ewtain asked musingly. “The way that some of the glowing lines are placed, it looks like a horrible tentacle monster is just behind it.”
“One more reason to make some dipping sauce,” Maroftis said.
“Who are you kidding?” Isla asked. “You eat about everything raw and sauceless.”
Maroftis shrugged. “I vote for the squid.”
“There’s not a squid behind the door,” Vultressant said with a hint of annoyance in his voice.
“You don’t know!” Maroftis countered, emphasizing each word.
Vultressant looked as if he were about to speak before he sighed and resumed his inspection of the door. Vanya went to him and placed a consoling hand on his left shoulder. He covered her hand with his right, appreciating the gesture.
They rested for two hours before finally attempting to breach the door to the south. It opened easily to reveal a corridor, which they followed to a small room. It contained nothing noteworthy, but there was a soft glow from another room towards the east. That room contained what they had come for—a marble fountain positioned in the center.
“The first one in gets the first drink, right?” Ewtain asked after they entered the room.
“Go for it, man,” Taloc said.
Ewtain dipped a finger into the fountain and brought it to his nose to smell the liquid. It had no smell, so he cupped his hands and had a drink. The water tasted sweet, and while he felt no different, a new notification bubble appeared in his user interface. He absorbed the knowledge without even opening up the message. He had learned a new special move. It was called critical strike, and it allowed him to triple the damage of his next attack if it was successful, but it could be used only once per day. That was a hell of a cooldown, but triple damage was amazing. It might not be OP now, but once he was a higher level and had better attacks, watch out. “I learned a new special move,” he informed the party.
“What is it?” Isla, Taloc, and Maroftis said in unison.
“It’s called critical strike, and it triples the damage of my next attack.”
“Holy crap!” Maroftis said. “You combine that with another special move, and you could one-shot a monster.”
Ewtain nodded, appreciating the idea. “Yeah, but it only can be used once a day.”
“Still cool,” Maroftis said. “Okay, me next.”
Maroftis leaned over to go take a drink, but as he bent down, Wisp dove off of his shoulder and into the fountain. It emerged and flew back to its original perch. They all looked at it in shock as it began to transform. It doubled in size, and it looked sleeker than it had previously. Before, it had looked like a compact ball of reptile, but now it was much longer and only slightly wider. Its tail wrapped around Maroftis’ arm, and its snout stretched as well. It was still green, but it had changed from dark metallic green to a light kelly green.
They watched the transformation with fascination. Wisp looked around the room and opened its mouth. Taloc, Isla, and Vultressant each took a cautious step back, wary of what might come next. The Dracon tilted its head in a familiar, dog-like fashion they had seen many times before.
“What?” It asked in a deep voice. The word was in Common.
“Oh, snap!” Isla exclaimed. “Wisp can talk!” She no longer looked ill at ease, just amazed.
“Well, he’s not the size of a plane, but he did grow,” Maroftis said, and then looked at Wisp. “You’re a boy, right? You sound like a boy.”
The Dracon nodded. “I am male, yes.”
“Uh, do you think that I’m your parent?” Maroftis asked.
“Of course not,” Wisp said as if talking to a child. “Your race has long been the servants of the Dracons, so I knew that you would protect me. I have grown more quickly than I could have imagined. This is nice.”
Taloc barked a laugh. “So, he didn’t think that you were his mom; he thought that you were his bitch!”
Ewtain chuckled. “Well, that explains your instant devotion to the Dracon. Hey Wisp, I hope that there’s no hard feelings on the selling you off thing. We’re cool, right? Huh? Come on, man.” Wisp gave Ewtain a withering stare but finally nodded. “All right!” he said, pumping a fist toward the ceiling.
“This is all fascinating,” Vultressant said, “but there might be a time limit on that Font of Power. Oeister said that this type typically jumps a specified time after someone drinks it, so I’m taking a drink.”
As he spoke, the fountain began to shimmer. “Oh, crap!” Maroftis said. He dunked his face into the water below. The rest hurriedly took their drinks as well. The fountain remained for another minute, and then it started fading in and out as if it were the TARDIS traveling somewhere in time and space, only without the cool sound effect. When it finally departed, the soft light that it had been emitting remained as an afterimage in their eyes until that too faded away.