41 – Obscure Chasm

In the distance, there they saw it. The entrance to the tunnel system of the Chasm. A gaping hole in the land, a steep and dark plunge that the road took prior to meeting the actual Chasm. It curved, now going along the length of the canyon instead of towards it, inching ever close to it at a steady rate while also descending into the depths. It was dark, and damp, and the silence there was interrupted by strange eerie sounds and the clang of pickaxes in the distance. On the walls were torches and little glowing crystals that lit the main tunnel, left there by the miners who came and went, and who the two teams sometimes met working on their stone and chipping away at the walls where colored veins of ore shone and revealed themselves, but there was still a quality to the darkness that transcended even these miser attempts at cutting through it. It just crept back. Even Ishrin’s magic vision was somewhat limited in range, although it reached much further than normal sight.

The tunnel bifurcated and bifurcated again, soon becoming a system of confusing geometry and unknown size. Ishrin knew the way, having been given a map and instructions from the duke, but he didn’t like the idea of using an ancient and probably outdated map to navigate this place. In fact, it looked like the place had changed since the age when the map was drawn, and more than once did the improvised team find itself stuck at a dead end. He eventually decided to stop for a moment to cast a ritual to help them navigate the maze of tunnels, and while Sir Westys and his team grumbled when he told them they would stop for a moment, they obeyed.

Ritual Successful: Water Compass. The way is marked, follow the needle.

Both Melina and Lisette immediately recognized the ritual Ishrin used. It was the same one he had used to find the circle of statues in the forest next to Noctis, that eventually led them to the mountain realm. Melina accepted the cylinder of water, just like last time, with a smile on her lips and went to the front to lead the team in the unknown darkness. They now walked with purpose despite never having been here before, and the fact began to upset Sir Westys, who was also growing increasingly restless from all the strange sounds and calls of unknown creatures that felt like they lurked in the darkness just a few paces beyond where they could see.

“You will let us fight the monsters and only intervene if necessary.” The boy told Ishrin, and it was clear that he was trying to be brave.

Ishrin nodded. “Of course! We are your escorts!”

The first monster, a weak Tier 4 one, appeared not long after they began to follow the directions of the water compass. Ishrin tracked it through the darkness, ready in case the others didn’t spot it. Soon after both Melina and Lisette also turned their heads to track it even thought their eyes could not see it yet. Eventually, as it got closer, Sir Westys noticed its presence too.

“Monster. Coming from there!” he said. “Tom, go the front, like we said.”

The boy did so and waited with almost shaking arms the arrival of the unknown creature. From behind, both Rory and Morin were getting ready to each to do their jobs of caster and healer, and Sir Westys brandished his sword. It began to glow with power.

Finally the creature leapt out of the darkness. It was like a rabid dog, covered in sleek translucent skin that made all its organs visible, the veins that carried its alien blood as well as its powerful muscles. It jumped on them with its claws stretched out, but it was met with Tom’s large shield and stopped dead in its tracks. The boy quickly stepped away to let the others attack, and while a ray of healing energy hit him, from beside him Rory unleashed his magic bolts to pepper the creature. Last to arrive was Sir Westys, who hit the creature with his sword many times, slashing at its limbs and its body before eventually plunging the blade right between its eyes. He twisted the sword once, and the glow of magic intensified as energy was drained from the monster and flowed into the sword.

“Good job!” Ishrin said.

Sir Westys shrugged. “This was just a weak monster. It was too easy.”

Ishrin said nothing in response, only raising one eyebrow as he looked at Melina, who also shrugged in response. Kids, he thought, and left it at that. The boy was clearly upset about something, but at least he knew how to handle monsters.

The parties continued deeper in the tunnel system of the Chasm. As they ventured further, they encountered more and more powerful monsters for Sir Westys’ team to fight. They seemed to hold their own at the beginning, but before long it became clear that they were beginning to struggle. Meanwhile Ishrin was growing ever more distracted, and in the last fight he almost didn’t manage to save one of Sir Westys’ teammates from danger in time with how busy his mind had gotten. He masked it as a lesson for the boy, Rory, to be more careful, but in truth he caught the large creature with his telekinesis at the very last second because he was distracted. The monster, that looked like a boar with glowing tusks and yellow fur, dangled in the air a few inches from the boy’s head for a moment, and then was dropped to the ground unceremoniously.

“You are distracted.” Lisette said.

“Yeah, thank you for pointing that out.” Ishrin said.

“No problem. You need to pay more attention.”

Ishrin nodded. He took a deep breath, remembering that it was him who told Lisette about pointing out somebody’s mistakes and flaws. And of course, she was pointing out his now, no matter how obvious.

Regardless, she was right. His head was not in the game today, right when he needed it to. He tried to shake off the distraction, to focus his mind on the present. Yet, he soon came to realize that the deeper he went, the more the feeling at the root of his distraction grew stronger. It was the same one he told Melina about, just a thousandfold. It was like Liù was somewhere there, in the darkness, and he could feel her but not see her. He even thought to call out to her, before realizing how silly that idea was. She was not here, and it was all a figment of his own imagination.

It was only when a monster literally jumped on him before being obliterated by a rage-filled Lisette who then proceeded to eliminate the rest of its pack that Ishrin was forced to deal with it.

“What the fuck is wrong with you? You are supposed to escort us, and yet we are taking hits left and right while you daydream!” Sir Westys said, yelling.

“You do not have the right to lecture him.” Lisette snapped. However, she then turned to Ishrin and looked him dead in the eye. “Ishrin, I think that something is indeed wrong with you.

He agreed with that assessment. “Let’s make camp.” He said. “I’ll sort it out.”

“You better.” The boy spat, and went to sit with his teammates.

A couple were wounded, and the thing was that Ishrin really didn’t see it happen with how dazed and confused he was, his mind too busy searching for his dead pixie to register the events of the real world. The boy didn’t seem to care that his friends were hurt, instead forcing the healer to mend his superficial wounds and then his armor, all the while complaining. Ishrin began to think, among the many thoughts his mind was flooded with, that maybe the boy was a bit of a spoiled brat.

“What’s going on with you?” A worried Melina said, as she came to sit next to him by the fire.

Lisette, seeing this, scooted over to him and he felt the warmth of their bodies on both sides spread through him. It was very pleasant, and sweet, although he felt a bit uncomfortable. He felt like he didn’t deserve it.

“It’s that feeling, again. Like Liù is here.” He said.

“Oh,” Melina said, and took his hand.

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“I need to investigate it. It’s getting bad.”

“Yeah, it is.” Melina nodded.

“You are behaving very strangely indeed.” Lisette added, and to his surprise Ishrin felt that his other hand was warm and looking down he saw that she was squeezing it.

“I got an idea I want to try.” He said after a moment of silence. “You two go check with the boy’s team, yeah? They look wounded.”

As the girls left, Ishrin overheard Melina ask Lisette what she thought about her own fighting style, if there was something she could improve about it. He could see what she was doing: she was testing the waters to see if Lisette respected her enough to point out her flaws. Of course she did, he thought, but he was a bit worried nonetheless and the worry only went away when Lisette started pointing out flaw after flaw in Melina’s fighting style. She had… strong opinions, and sometimes what she thought was right was more like her own view on the matter, but regardless Melina was ecstatic, overjoyed to learn that she too occupied that sweet spot in Lisette’s only apparently cold heart.

Ishrin smiled inwardly. That girl was infatuated, it was more than obvious to his eyes, and yet he wondered how long it would take before he was going to see some development in the matter. Melina was looking very shy for a first move, at least for now, and Lisette… he wondered if Lisette knew, or what it would take for her to begin asking herself some questions.

Clearing his mind from the gossip, he eventually took out a great tome from his inventory. It materialized in the air and the hefty book hit the floor with a slam. On its cover was written: “Non-dual meditation, basics.”

Ishrin took a deep breath, opened the first page and began to read.

After an hour, Melina went to wake up the meditating Ishrin and told him that the other team was getting restless.

“How are you? Did it work?” she asked.

“A bit better. It seems to be working but… It’s not like I can expect big changes after only one hour. In fact, I’m surprised I even went this far.”

The changes were subtle at first, but with more sessions he managed to squeeze between fights Ishrin noticed that he was beginning to direct his focus better, and he was more vigilant and more aware of what happened in and to his own mind. This didn’t solve the issue of the feeling, but he felt that soon he was surely going to be able to at least pinpoint where it was coming from and why, as opposed to just feeling it everywhere around him.

The team arrived to a section of the tunnels that was different from the rest, with the walls polished and straight, leading into rooms that were barred with thick doors as opposed to the natural-looking open spaces of before. Traps littered the walls, floor and ceiling, clearly visible to Ishrin’s magic vision. However, he was too busy with his meditation, too intent on figuring out what was going on and clinging to the faint hope that maybe, just maybe, his pixie was still alive, and he didn’t really feel like dropping the task to deal with the traps.

“I’ll cast a ritual to protect us from the traps. Come here.” He said.

“I will not let you use your obscure sorcery on me and my team!” Sir Westys protested.

Ishrin paused. “Come on. It’s full of traps and I can’t be bothered—”

“Then we will deal with them! My team is more than capable.” The boy said.

Ishrin paused. “I will regret this, but fine. You do you. Lisette, Melina, come here.”

Ritual Successful: Oblatus’ Reactive Shielding for Dungeons and Explorations. You are now protected from all traps!

***

“This isn’t fair!” Sir Westys yelled.

He was at the far end of the corridor, painstakingly disarming and weaving through the traps with his team. Meanwhile Ishrin and his companions had simply walked in the middle of the corridor, triggering every single trap in their way. The boy had watched with wide eyes as poison darts bounced off of their body, pitfalls failed to entrap them, flames did not burn them, acid slid off of their skin, and giant spikes bent and twisted as they failed to puncture their skin. He realized that maybe he made a mistake when he refused Ishrin’s ritual, but his pride didn’t allow him to admit it out loud.

“You will never learn how to actually put in the work!” he said while trying to slither around the pressure sensitive parts of the floor. “There will come a day when your rituals will be useless, and then—”

Suddenly a loud clang, and the horrifying scream of metal being bent and twisted. Sir Westys turned around slowly, carefully, and his eyes followed the scream that had filled the air of the tight tunnel. His teammates were also stunned, all of them looking at the figure of Tom. There was a giant spike jutting out of a wall, where there were supposed to be no traps and the path was supposed to be safe. It had sprung out in an instant at incredible speed, hitting the boy and piercing his shield, his armor and… not his flesh? There was no blood dribbling out of the torn metal, and Tom was stunned; not in pain or immobilized by a wound, but in shock.

On the other end of the room Ishrin was holding out a hand, palm open. He lazily moved his arm, and the spike began to shake, forcing itself back in the wall against the mechanisms that had pushed it out. It was yanked back in, with a violence that was so great that the whole wall was damaged and cracks spread from where the spike now laid crooked and misshapen. He had been ready to react at a moment notice all this time, Sir Westys thought, even though he didn’t look like it! His opinion of the man changed in that very instant.

Ishrin didn’t look very happy though. “So, how about you let the fucking grown-ups decide how to handle the expedition?” his voice was angry, and even Sir Westys who didn’t know him could tell that something had angered him way beyond normal and that now was not the time for a rebuttal. He swallowed his pride and listened. “I let you play around, to gain field experience, you know? That’s quite enough now. Get your arrogant asses sorted, I’m coming, and you are going to get this ritual applied to you.”

Any goodwill that the boy could have harbored towards Ishrin vanished in a moment. He gripped his sword tight, until his knuckles were devoid of blood almost, and tried to calm himself. Not yet. Not yet.

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