Chapter 372 - Two Against the World (Patreon)

Pudge awoke to the unpleasant feeling of being half-submerged in what he hoped was water. Fortunately, his head rested on something above the liquid, which had kept him from drowning. With a groan, he pushed himself upright and looked around.

“Finally awake?” asked Sasha, her voice cutting through his attempt to take stock of his situation. He turned around to see her sitting on some sort of rise – a tiny island amidst the ubiquitous water. “So sorry I couldn’t sit around and wait for you to save me like the delicate princess I am. But I guess you won’t complain too much since I kept you from drowning. You’re welcome, by the way.”

“What…where are we?” he asked, trying to ignore her snark. Ever since he’d tried to keep her from coming along, his few interactions with the other beastkin had been, at best, strained. It was better to simply ignore the tension and get down to the business of survival. The last thing Pudge remembered was fighting the strange statue-ghouls, and then the ground had disappeared from beneath his very feet.

“I don’t know,” she said as she stood. The ambient light was dim and tinted red, but Sasha was close enough that he could see that her lower legs were riddled with riddled with bite marks. She pointed to her right, adding, “But I think the way out is that way. There’s a problem with that, though.”

“What kind of problem?”

“The…uh…well, it’s not water, but…anyway, it gets deeper in that direction,” she said. “I saw a tunnel, but I couldn’t get close enough to see where it leads. As far as I can tell, it’s the only way to go, though.”

Pudge stood and got a wave of dizziness for his trouble. He nearly stumbled back to his knees, but after taking a deep breath, he managed to right himself. Still, he was unsteady as he looked around. They were in a large, half-flooded chamber, though aside from the presence of a few island-like protrusions, he couldn’t get much more information than that.

So, he carefully knelt down and rested his hand on the spot where his head had rested, and the moment he felt the fleshy texture, he felt a shiver run up his spine. That’s when he noticed the slight, rhythmic pulse flowing through the bit of slimy flesh.

“What is this?” he asked. “Is it alive?”

“I don’t know. My inspection skill doesn’t work on it, though,” she said. “So, probably not. I did identify our neighbors, though.”

“Neighbors?”

“The things in the deeper waters,” she said. “They’re called blood eels, which is…well, it’s definitely disturbing, I’ll tell you that.”

Blood eels. That meant that the liquid probably wasn’t water after all. That shouldn’t have been terribly surprising, given the thick, viscous texture of the substance, but it still sent another shiver up Pudge’s spine.

“Can you make a light?” he asked. He knew that she could. During the journey they’d undertaken together, she’d done so on more than one occasion. Usually, she refrained because, if nothing else, a light in the middle of the wilderness tended to attract all the wrong sorts of attention. That was still probably the case in their current situation, but Pudge was willing to chance it because, unlike in the wilds, their new environment seemed to restrict his ability to see in the dark.

“I don’t think that’s wise,” Sasha said.

“Why?”

“Because I tried it a couple of hours ago,” she answered. “It didn’t go well. I think it’s better if we just…well, we can find that tunnel easily enough without light.”

“What happened?”

“These…things. I don’t know what they were called, but they swooped in from above and drained the mana out of my light,” she said. “I let it go before they finished, but…I don’t know. I think that if I’d have been any slower, they would have turned on me.”

“We could fight them.”

“No. We can’t. I couldn’t even inspect them. They were like living shadows, except I’m not all that sure about the living part. I don’t know, Pudge. I think…I think it’s just better if we try not to draw their attention.”

Pudge nodded.

Sasha sighed and shook her head. “What do you want to do?” she asked. “I don’t think I can survive the blood eels, and I don’t have a spell to –”

“How deep is it?” Pudge asked.

“I don’t know. Four feet?  Maybe five? It was up to my chest before I turned back, but I think it was starting to level out,” she answered. “But it doesn’t matter. There are too many of those things in there.”

“I will carry you,” Pudge said.

“What? That’s not –”

“I can use [Concealed Steps]. They will not know I’m there.”

“Does it even work in…water?” she asked. They both knew it wasn’t water, but it was both easier and less disturbing to refer to it as such rather than admit that they were standing in a giant pool of blood. Or some other bodily fluid.

“I don’t know,” Pudge admitted. “I think so.”

“And if it doesn’t work?” she asked. “Those things will tear you to pieces.”

Pudge shook his head and said, “We can’t stay here. I have more endurance than you. This is the best idea.”

Part of him wanted to explore the rest of the fleshy chamber, but if Sasha said there was only one way out, then he trusted her assessment. More, he didn’t like the sound of the shadows that had swooped in to absorb the mana from Sasha’s spell. How long was it until they found the pair of beastkin? And what would happen when they did? Pudge couldn’t be sure, but he suspected that his skills would fall short when trying to combat such a foe. In fact, from what she’d described, they didn’t even sound like monsters so much as some environmental effect.

After a few more objections, Sasha finally agreed to Pudge’s plan. Neither of them were particularly happy about it – Pudge because he truly didn’t think he’d make it through unscathed and Sasha because she was once again dependent on him to save her – but it was the best plan either of them could come up with.

However, just before they reached the point where the floor – which was decidedly squishier than any floor had a right to be – Sasha said, “I think I have an idea.”

Then, she went on to describe what she had in mind. When she finished, Pudge asked, “Can you do it?”

“What? You’re not going to try to save me from myself?” she asked petulantly.

“Sasha, I –”

“No. Sorry. That was unfair,” she said, shaking her head. “I just…I just get so frustrated with you sometimes. I know none of it’s malicious, but I don’t need to be put in a box, Pudge. I don’t need you to take care of me.”

That was decidedly untrue. Pudge had lost count of the number of times he’d saved her during their trek through the swamp.

“We take care of one another,” he said.

“It seems like it’s tilted in your direction, though.”

“I wouldn’t be here without you,” Pudge said. “That’s all that matters. We are…we are a team. Partners. I trust you.”

“Do you?” she asked, looking up at him.

“More than I can say,” Pudge answered. The only person he trusted more was Zeke, though he didn’t say as much. Sasha was his friend, but she hadn’t quite reached the level of family. However, she didn’t need to have that pointed out to her.

He stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her. For a long moment, they both lost themselves in the embrace. But then, Sasha said, “This is really gross. You know that, don’t you? We’re both covered in that…water.”

“I don’t care,” Pudge said, refusing to let her go. Not for a long while, at least. When he finally did release her, he said, “I’m sorry. I just…I just don’t like the way things have been for the last few days.”

“Me neither,” she said, pushing her hair back. Then, she said, “We need to do this. I’m sure the others are wondering where we are.”

Pudge nodded, and over the next few minutes, Sasha went through the process of casting a spell. He couldn’t really track what she was doing, but he did feel that part of it involved gathering mana. As Sasha waved her hands in the air, muttering something under her breath, Pudge kept an eye on the black abyss above them. He didn’t think he could fight whatever the shadows actually were, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t try. After all, regardless of what he told Sasha, he considered it his duty to protect her.

Finally, after a few long minutes, Sasha said, “Get ready.”

Pudge did, stepping close to her. Then, once he was in position, she released her spell. Instantly, a globe of light erupted into being, illuminating the entire chamber. And what Pudge saw was horrifying.

His suspicions about the liquid were accurate – not surprising, given the names of the eels living within it – but what truly disgusted him was the fact that the entire chamber – from the pillars and walls to the subtle rises like the one upon which he’d awoken – were made of gooey flesh.

Sasha jerked her arm forward, and the globe of light sailed through the air and across the pool of blood. Instantly, a horde of slithery shapes burst from the surface as they tried to bite the ball of light. But it was incorporeal, so their efforts were for naught. Meanwhile, black tendrils snaked out from the ceiling and wrapped themselves around the spell. Immediately, it dimmed.

That was the signal.

Pudge grabbed Sasha in his arms, and she climbed atop his shoulders. Once she was in position, he embraced [Concealed Steps], enhancing the skill with his Will. Then, he strode forward. At first, the decline was barely noticeable, but after twenty feet or so, it experienced a precipitous drop, and before Pudge knew it, he was up to his waist. Still, he pushed forward.

At the same time, the globe of light came to a stop more than a hundred feet away. When it did, it was swarmed by the eels and the shadowy tentacles alike. With every step Pudge took, the light dimmed further until, at last, it petered out. He’d only made it halfway to the tunnel by that point.

Then, everything went dark.

Pudge continued on, trusting his skill and path to keep him concealed. However, when he felt something brush against his leg, he very nearly lost his grip. Sasha obviously felt the tension, and her fingers dug into his scalp. But still, one glacial step after another, Pudge continued on until, at last, he felt the ground sloping upward.

The tunnel entrance loomed before him like a gaping maw as he continued forward. Soon, he’d climbed high enough that the water only came to his knees. Then, his calves. He’d reached the point where it was down to his ankles when everything went wrong.

He didn’t make any undue noise, and his skill didn’t fail. Instead, it was mere happenstance that did him in when he accidentally trod on one of the slimy heels. It reacted instantly, slithering out from underfoot and letting out a burbling screech that got the attention of everything in the fleshy chamber. Before Pudge could take another step, one of the eels launched itself from the water and latched onto his thigh.

Then another after that. And still another. In less than a second, he had a dozen eels latched onto him. That’s when he felt his life force – the very vitality that kept him alive – being sucked out of him.

For a moment, Pudge reacted on instinct and tried to rip the eels away. And it worked well enough; they weren’t particularly strong. However, for every eel he tossed aside, another took its place. And the act of ripping them free inevitably took chunks of his flesh with them.

“Run!” Sasha screeched, dragging a particularly energetic eel from her own leg.

Pudge didn’t need to be told twice, and he dashed forward. Doing so canceled [Concealed Steps], but by that point, it wasn’t doing much good anyway.

Or so he’d thought.

The moment the skill dropped, the blood-like water churned, and hundreds of eels burst forth. By the time he reached the tunnel, they had become a slithering wall of slimy flesh and snapping jaws. Pudge tossed Sasha into the tunnel before diving in after her. It was just in time, too, because the wave of eels crashed into the mouth of the tunnel only a moment later.

But fortunately, the tunnel was steeply sloped, and when Pudge rolled to a stop, he looked back to see that the eels had come up a few feet short. Nearly a hundred of them flopped around on the dry, if gooey, land, clearly incapable of surviving for long outside the bloody water.

Panicked, Pudge spun around, searching for Sasha. He found her a second later only a few feet away. Quickly, he clamored in her direction, and when he reached her, he shouted, “Are you hurt?”

She rolled over and answered, “I…I think I’m okay. Just a little…I think you were right. I’m really not built for this kind of thing.”

Then, she collapsed backwards, adding, “This is really gross. Like, I didn’t think it could get worse after the swamp, but this…this is definitely worse.”

“We made it, though,” Pudge said.

Even as he did, darkness began to creep around the edges of his vision. He tried to use the borrowed version of Zeke’s skill, [Cambion’s Awakening], but it was useless. Wherever they were, it was completely cut off from any source of earth mana. Vaguely, he was aware of Sasha shouting his name, but it felt like she was screaming at him from miles away.

Gradually, he sank into unconsciousness. But even then, he was satisfied with his actions. So long as Sasha survived, he would be happy.

Finally, the darkness closed in.

The last thing he remembered was Sasha leaning over him, her expression panicked.