35 – Descent

  “Remember to come tomorrow and bring more people and tools. So, we’ll have time to break stone into small pieces and make enough amulets,” Nura instructed the lads whom Velesaar had assigned to accompany them to the cave. “And bring torches. We'll do it all inside.”

  “Why can’t we do it all in the village?” Gaspard asked.

  “This stone is called the dawnstone because its magical properties manifest at dawn. But it only works once. Once it sees the sun, it loses magic. So, everything should be ready before dawn.”

  “And the torchlight won’t spoil it?”

  “No, the stone only reacts to sunlight.” She turned to the villagers. “Is everything clear?” They nodded. “Then go ahead. We’ll come out tomorrow and let in.”

  “And what if you never return?” one of them asked timidly, earning disapproving glances from his comrades.

  “We’ll return,” Elanil reassured him. The guys bowed and set off on their return journey, back to Biwa, which could even be seen from here.

  The sun was setting. Before them, illuminated by crimson rays, in the rock, yawned a narrow passage into the depths of an abandoned cave, where the dawnstone deposits and the promised danger awaited them.

  “Well, let’s go then,” Gaspard said cheerfully and was the first to disappear into the darkness of the entrance. Nura and Elanil followed.

  And so, they stepped inside. The meager spot of light that the cave’s entrance provided quickly faded, and they soon had an opportunity to test Gaspard’s [Illumination] ability for the first time. White reflections of its cold, scarcely flickering glow played across the damp stone vaults around them. The limestone walls of the cave were sloping, curving, polished by millennia of underground streams.

  Something resembling the architecture style of Antoni Gaudí, Elanil noted. She couldn’t help but smile, recalling from a previous life how one of her colleagues had been telling her about the great architect’s work with so much enthusiasm and persistence that she now realized who was responsible for the caves’ design. At least for this one.

  The first hall was essentially empty. Smooth, flat walls and ceiling. And the rusty remains of mining tools piled near the wall, hinting that the last time people here were long ago. It served as some kind of entrance camp before the prospectors ventured further. As Velesaar instructed them, the dawnstone deposits lay deeper.

  The air was chilly, filled with a damp smell and felt slightly stuffy. The path leading out of the first chamber was quite narrow. The three of them had to walk in single file, carefully watching where they placed their feet; the floor was uneven and slippery from the humidity.

  The cave was quiet, only distant dull thuds of water dripping from the ceiling in the hall that they left behind accompanied their progress like a metronome. Sometimes the ceiling in the passage dropped so low that they had to bend over. Sometimes the walls narrowed, forcing them to turn sideways. In these places, the eye could discern almost every grain of mica embedded in the rock, glinting here and there in the glow of Gaspard’s [Illumination], like a sparkler.

  The passage gradually widened, which meant they had reached the second chamber, according to the maps Velesaar had provided them with. Nevertheless, the gallery opened into a wide cavern quite unexpectedly for them.

  In the first chamber, the walls and the celling were polished by underground water. The entire ceiling was strewn with stalactites, dripping incessantly with collected dungeon dew that smashed with an amplified echo against the sharp points of the stalagmites directly below. Their grayish-white fangs glimmered in the light of Gaspard’s lantern. The cavern looked like the gaping maw of a huge, ancient, petrified monster.

  In the center was a large, round well, into which water flowed. As Velesaar remarked, this was a shortcut to the lower levels, but they might not want to use it. Instead, the party carefully skirted the abyss, staying close to the cavern wall so as not to accidentally slip on the smooth floor and roll into the mouth of the well.

  The path beyond was barely visible. It curved at the very beginning, and from a distance, it looked like a small depression in the wall. Only upon closer inspection did it become clear that it was a narrow gallery.

  “What danger do you think awaits us down there?” Nura whispered. As they walked along the narrow corridor, she took advantage of the cramped space, so the echo wouldn’t amplify even the softest whisper. Attracting the attention of this mysterious evil was not in anyone’s plans.

  “Since it instantly killed the last mining expedition, it must be dexterous,” Gaspard replied.

  “What kind of fast and deadly creature could live in the caves of this sleepy Valley?” Nura asked.

  “How should I know?” he grumbled. “I don’t have any more information than you do.”

  “You’ve been in these caves before. “Like the one where you found that thing with the yelling woman inside.”

  “First of all, I’ve never been in these caves. That was in Eastern Oakland. And second, it was a very small cave and much more, how can I say, friendly in appearance.”

  “Is that where you encountered the walking dead?” Elanil inquired. She remembered how Gaspard had mentioned that morning, while repelling the attack on the village, that this wasn’t the first time he’d fought the undead.

  “No, that was in the Eastern Approach. I’ll tell you later,” he waved his hand. “Anyway, all we know about this cave is what the last expedition’s record left in the entrance camp log book about an ominous rustle in the darkness. What could that be? Anything.”

  “I’ve heard legends of enormous worms living deep, deep underground,” Nura remarked. “They can gnaw their way through even the most solid granite.”

  “Isn’t our cave a bit too small for such creatures?” Gaspard chuckled quietly.

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  “Or it could be an ancient evil stirred by greedy miners. An embodiment of darkness, woven out of flame and shadow,” Elanil blurted out casually.

  Gaspard, walking ahead, stopped dead in his tracks so Nura bumped into him. He turned and looked at Elanil with a searching gaze. She immediately realized she shouldn’t have joked like that: he’d interpret it his own way.

  “Is there something you want to tell us?” he asked.

  “I read that in a book. About a fictional world,” she explained. Gaspard stood thoughtfully for a moment, then turned around and they continued on their way.

  “What was the story in that book?” Nura quietly asked after a while.

  “The party was crossing the mountains, through an abandoned underground kingdom. And on their way, they run into this creature. The wizard leading the party sacrificed himself; in a duel on a bridge over a bottomless abyss, they both fell.”

  “It’s good that we have a wizard with us,” Gaspard giggled quietly. “If anything happens, we’ll have someone to throw into—ouch! I was just kidding!” he complained as he immediately received a painful jab in the rib from Nura.

  “Gaspard, could you please extinguish your flame?” Elanil asked. She seemed to have noticed something flickering ahead. She assumed it would be best not to attract attention and to try to sneak unnoticed for as long as possible.

  “You mean the flame of my wit?” he turned around with a grin.

  “Turn off your ability, idiot,” Nura grumbled. “See, there’s a glow up ahead.”

  He obeyed, and pitch-black darkness fells over the passage, forcing them to feel their way forward. But now the glow ahead became even more distinct. Purple-green, its luminescence was steady, not what one would expect from a torch or lantern.

  “Just think, Mr. Keen Eye was the last one to notice that glow,” Nura giggled in the darkness. It seemed to be the first time the bard chose not to parry a stinging—yet fair—remark. She’d have to record that date in her logbook, she thought with a smile.

  Finally, they emerged into the next cavern and witnessed the source of the strange light. Mushrooms! Enormous, the size of a good tree, they towered here and there. Sometimes they stood alone, tall and straight as columns, giant milk cap mushrooms crowned with enormous caps. Sometimes they stood in clusters, tightly clinging to one another, their trunks twisted and growing from a single spot, with sharp, conical umbrellas like young death caps.

  A large beam had been dumped diagonally across the cavern. Was it a rock, or the massive, rotten trunk of a green giant? And if so, who had dragged it here and how? Enormous mushrooms also grew on this crossbeam, and in some places, the half-caps of large tinder fungi protruded from its sides.

  Almost every mushroom emitted a pale glow. Most of them were greenish. But there were ghostly white ones, too, and purple ones with a turquoise tint. Their trunks, gills, the tops of their caps: everything radiated an even, imperturbable fluorescence. The distinct aroma of mycelium hung in the damp air.

  It looked both beautiful and deeply unsettling, Elanil thought. Because neither Velesaar nor any of the previous miners who had ventured here mentioned the cave was planted with mushrooms. Or did they think giant bioluminescent fungi were so commonplace that they weren’t even worth mentioning? Very unlikely. Therefore, they most likely appeared after the last mining expedition vanished.

  “Get down! Quickly!” Gaspard hissed. Elanil immediately ducked and followed him and Nura behind a boulder lying near the cave entrance. She glanced at the bard and opened her mouth to ask, but he placed a finger to his lips—no sound.

  Then he lifted himself slightly to peer around the boulder and waved for Elanil and Nura to follow his example. Elanil looked in the direction Gaspard had pointed, but at first she saw nothing. Deep in the cave, everything was still the same as a moment before. Glowing mushrooms and nothing else.

  Then suddenly she noticed. The light from one of the large mushrooms dimmed briefly, then became visible again. Then, somewhere else, the same thing happened. A shadow glided silently along the cavern underground vaults, seemingly getting closer and closer to them. But Elanil heard nothing—no footsteps, no creaking, not a single rustle. It was as if it were a ghost.

  A chill ran through her. What if it really was a ghost? What if some cursed spirit haunted this dungeon and caused the prospectors’ deaths? Only enchanted weapons were good enough against ghosts. None of them had one. If it really was a ghost, then a very tough fight was awaiting them ahead.

  They continued watching the movements within the mushroom cavern. A fleeting shadow glided along the large, diagonal beam covered with mushrooms. The mushrooms again disappeared from view for a longer period. The more Elanil peered at the irregular patterns of this entity’s movements lurking in the cave’s darkness, the more it reminded her of something. Only she couldn’t yet figure out what.

  “It’s not a ghost,” Nura whispered. Either Elanil was indeed, as the orc put it, thinking too loudly, or she too assumed for a moment that this cave could be inhabited by ghosts. “It’s someone alive.”

  Suddenly, a silhouette appeared against the backdrop of a glowing mushroom relatively close to them, that large, tall milk mushroom, the size of a baobab. A rounded head growing directly from an equally round body; tall, thin limbs, and chelicerae, stretched out like pincers. A spider, Elanil realized.

  The spider looked impressively large. Apparently even bigger than the bombardier beetle—Elanil’s first foe. And likely far more menacing. Its venom was surely deadly, and its agility likely surpassed all the enemies Elanil had encountered so far. There was also its web. It was unknown how the spider could use it in combat. So, the smartest way would be to evade the arthropod.

  And as if the moment couldn’t have been better, the quest menu popped up in front of her.

  Quest: Abandoned cave: warm welcome

  Status: Acquired

  Description: Get past the spider in the mushroom cavern unnoticed or kill the arthropod

  Additional Information:

  Big black cave spider x 1

  Type: Creature

  Threat Level: Moderate

  Notable Traits: Venomous bite, Hunting web, Increased agility.

  Reward:

  XP (conditional)

  Loot (conditional)

  “Damn you!” Elanil thought angrily.

  Suddenly, a vile screech echoed through the cave.

  “Elanil!” Gaspard hissed.

  Only then did she realize she’d cursed out loud, not in her mind. The spider had spotted them. Shit! They had to fight. Nearby, Nura and Gaspard were already unsheathing their weapons.

  Elanil straightened up—what difference did it make now?—nocked an arrow and fired it at random at the dark silhouette. The spider twitched, screeching again.

  “Excellent,” Elanil thought. “At least it’s not as tough as a bombardier beetle. Or maybe I hit it in the eye. It does have a lot of them.” And she immediately sent a second arrow. It disappeared into the darkness, apparently doing no damage to the spider.

  Elanil took out the next arrow and without wasting any time fired it.

  [Knockback Arrow]

  The arrow shot forward. In the cave’s darkness, this ability looked even more impressive: sparkling with electrical discharges and illuminating the vaults and the walls, it resembled ball lightning.

  But then something unexpected happened. For the first time, Elanil witnessed her enemy dodge her projectiles aimed precisely at their target. The spider lightly bounced off the floor, lifting a few of its legs slightly, so the arrow flew past. The large mushroom behind it split in half lengthwise, like a tree struck by lightning.

  [Illumination]

  Gaspard’s ability sphere immediately soared to the cave ceiling and shone beneath it like a small moon, casting cold white light upon the underground forest of giant mushrooms.

  “Damn it!” Gaspard cursed. “Forgot to switch it to combat mode!”

  What happened next was so swift that Elanil barely registered the maneuver. The spider attacked with lightning speed, and in the blink of an eye, its chelicerae had already sunk into Gaspard’s neck.

  “Gaspard!” Elanil heard her own panicked scream coming from all sides. Reflected repeatedly from the cave’s vaults, it deafeningly echoed in her ears.

  With a furious roar, Nura landed both axes on the spider’s head. The monster shrieked and recoiled. The axes didn’t take its head off, but the creature certainly lost several eyes.

  Meanwhile, the bard’s body was slowly sinking to the floor. Elanil lunged for him, catching him in mid-air. Something truly terrible was happening.

  [Party Update: Gaspard is poisoned and will die in 2 minutes]