Chapter 377: Enter the Chasm |
I opened a portal to Closetland for Tavio and crew to traverse, the Littans joining me in the underground. They found me sitting on the ground, staring at a series of gummies laid out on a cloth before me. I was meditating on their shapes, colors, and nature while establishing my Checkpoint, which had just finished.
“Howdy,” I said without taking my eyes off the edibles.
“Greetings,” said Tavio, voice weary. The tone was enough to prompt me to evaluate his soul a little more closely than normal, finding it turbulent and stormy. I glanced up to find him wearing a deep frown wedded to dead eyes, a haunted expression set amidst dull fur.
“You look like shit,” I said.
Tavio grunted, eyes moving to my gummies. “Anesis makes Wicked attacks. I would have been reduced to nothing if not for the grace of Sumrann. Instead, my maximum health was reduced to 1.”
“Well damn. That sounds awful. You going to be all right?”
“I am recovering, but my natural regen is not so grand as your own.” He took a breath and met my eyes again. “For the moment, I feel… lesser.”
A brief silence followed, broken by a man who I suspected had very little in the way of social skills.
“Are there two of you?” asked Sergeant Alanor, staring back at the portal like it had played a trick on him. He was the lightning mage I’d worked with during the Blade Weasel attacks. I was surprised to see him here, but looking at the rest of Team Pio, I realized they were down by two members.
“I see.” He turned from the portal and stepped closer, apparently willing to let that one go without further comment. “And what is with the candy?”
“They’re potion gummies,” I said. “Earlier, I ran low on mana and forgot I even had them, which could have been a huge error. Fortunately we weren’t punished for it, but I figure if I gaze at them enough I won’t forget again.”
“You forgot you had potions?” the man asked, now munching on a cookie. A few crumbs fell onto my cloth. “I didn’t think that was poss–”
“Enough, Sergeant,” said Captain Pio. Alanor swallowed and shut up immediately. The man might struggle with social cues, but he sure seemed to understand orders well enough.
“Where’s Cezil?” I asked, hoping she was here, just pretending to be a rock or something.
“She is missing,” said Pio. “Madel assures us she is still alive, so Alanor is a temporary addition to our group until she is found. Tavio is taking Guar’s role as tank until we find a more level-appropriate replacement.”
That made the mood even heavier and I didn’t want to let it linger for too long. Sadly, I wasn’t the best at navigating this type of thing. “Doubling down on mages?” I asked, looking between Alanor and Baltae. The normally gregarious dimensionalist was silent, face hidden behind his helm.
“While Sergeant Alanor is no infiltrator like Cezil,” said Pio, “he is a capable scout and sniper. It will change our team’s dynamic, but there is little overlap with Sergeant Baltae’s skillset.”
“Fair enough.” I stowed my gummies and stood, brushing a few of Alanor’s crumbs from my armor. “My party is pretty much ready to go. How are you all on resources?”
“As a group,” said Pio, “I will call it 50%. Enough to press onward.”
“You could hang back with Ishi’s group if you want.” I nodded to where Joma and Nottagator were keeping watch with Drift roaming about somewhere. “Two of Crowns plans to recover while playing portal security. They were scraping the bottom of the barrel and won’t be ready for another few hours at least.”
“We will be fine,” said Tavio. “The sooner we pursue, the less chance the United have to prepare or fortify their positions.”
I nodded and didn’t argue. They knew their own limits better than I did. As for Fortune’s Folly, our various recovery abilities had us all pretty much back to full despite there having been only an hour of downtime between now and our harried escape from the Labyrinth. The main thing holding us back from being in tip-top shape was gear related. We’d all taken some equipment damage, aside from Varrin who was rocking mostly Immutable items.
I was wearing several pieces of my old Verdantum armor where my Prismatite had been destroyed, and that wasn’t the kind of thing that was getting fixed in an hour. Instead, Grotto would stay behind in the Closet to smith up some replacements. This would also give us the opportunity to integrate the Heirloom affix into the new items, potentially making a set with my Clockwork Lifewarden staff.
The Core could borrow my Smithing skill, and while I could stay in touch with him via our psychic and soul connections, my Statecraft skill refused to see Smithing as a governance-related activity. Thus, I couldn’t use my inhabited Magisters to participate, but could still stay involved via my second instance of general-use focus. Regardless, it was a project of days or weeks, not hours.
Varrin, Nuralie, and Shog came through the portal separately over the next few minutes while I chatted with Tavio about what was in that scroll he handed to Filix Celeritia. The answer was essentially, “I do not know,” but could be assumed to have been some thinly veiled political threats.
“We are operating mostly on your word about the interference of House Heronwyte,” Tavio explained. “I doubt Her Majesty will be willing to take action based on this alone, but she will take the opportunity to place pressure on Hiward.” He sighed. “There is also the matter of Specialist Rufio and his alleged betrayal. General Tyvus will want to keep you on good terms while the investigation is underway.”
I thought that one over. “He can claim to have believed me all along if it turns out to be true, and has me close at hand in case I’m a dirty liar.”
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“I will not presume to know his inner thoughts, but yes, probably.”
Our chit chat was interrupted by Xim’s arrival. I gave her a few moments to check in with Baltae, then asked her about Interrex Tomomaru.
“General Olivia doesn’t seem worried about him, so he’s in our hospital for now,” she said with a shrug. “He’s regenerating, but it’s slower than I’ve ever seen.”
Tavio hesitated for a moment, then said, “Now that I am aware of who he truly is, I believe there are rumors of the man having more than a million health. His regeneration may not match.”
“Uhhhhhhh,” I trailed off dumbly. “How?”
“He shares a health pool with his iguana familiar,” said Xim. “Healing one healed the other from what I could tell.”
“That’s still a huge number, even for a combined health total.”
Nuralie chimed in. “Big things have big health pools. His iguana was as large as the Hierophant from what you’ve told us.”
“Right, but a million?”
“The Domininth I encountered during my dragon Dungeon had hundreds of thousands, even while injured.” Pause. “Perhaps you should find a way to become larger.”
“Huh,” I grunted. I squinted at the ground, musing over the potential ways for me to get huge. Etja was the last to arrive, and she was the only one of us looking fresh as spring flowers. She wore a bright smile, holding a lute in one pair of hands and something like a djembe in the other.
“I got a new Performance evolution!” she said, beginning to float around us in her excitement. “Arlo, name a song from Earth! Something Cloaky hasn’t played yet.”
“Uhhhhhh,” I trailed dumbly again, caught off guard. I didn’t want to drag our feet now that everyone who planned to press deeper into the Chasm was assembled. The mission was urgent, but I also knew Etja wouldn’t delay us with something like this without a good reason. I decided to play along. “Here We Are by Battle Beast?”
Etja gave me a peppy nod and closed her eyes for a few seconds. “Okay, this one isn’t too complicated. No orchestra, at least.”
The air shimmered around the mage as several more arms emerged from her, each a mana construct. A large upright bass appeared, her lute elongated and duplicated itself, and her drum grew, then split into a full stadium kit. Tactile illusions mixed with her real body and instruments until she was a full one-woman band. She began on the modified lutes, plucking the song’s opening riff with one while strumming the rhythm guitar line with the other. Her foot hit a steady rhythm on the kick drum, and when she began to sing, her voice was joined by a chorus of harmonies. She went hard on the toms, a hammer clanged, and the song really kicked into gear.
I had no idea why the female-led, 80’s-tinged Helsinki metal band was my knee jerk response, but the song I’d picked was fitting nonetheless. It should have been completely inappropriate for the mood, but Etja’s rendition fit perfectly regardless. Rather than hitting with immediate energy, it guided us out of the funk we’d fallen into, making sure we were all on board before headbutting us in the face repeatedly with infectious positivity.
Alanor was tapping a foot as he munched on some puffy grains, Pio stood a bit straighter, Madel looked over, breaking out of her catatonic gaze at nothing, Baltae took a deep, refreshing breath, and a fatigued smile broke onto Tavio’s face. Etja wasn’t playing an exact cover; the instrumentation had a heavy tilt towards acoustic flair rather than the hard-hitting electric distortion of the original, but the way she performed the up tempo banger was raising spirits, and that was some heavy lifting.
It also granted us all three stacks of Blessed, which was more than welcome. I’d gotten some of them replenished while fighting next to Xim but was still low from my fight against Savant’s former teammate, the mad haberdasher. Once the final note was played, all of the illusory equipment puffed away into mana mist. Etja bowed as Xim, Nuralie, and Alanor applauded.
“Now I feel like I need to do something big and heroic,” said Xim.
“How’s that even work?” I asked. “Or is the answer just ‘magic’?”
“The evo says it has to be a song my audience member has heard in its entirety,” Etja replied. “Well, it says ‘performance’, not song, but you get the idea. I learn the whole thing pretty much immediately.”
“Performance? So I could name a different kind of performance–like a play I’ve seen–and you’d learn all the lines?”
“Yep!”
I began running through the Broadway musicals I’d been to, then handed off planning out Closetland’s new entertainment industry to one of my other selves.
While Etja hadn’t instantly solved the grief being felt by the Littans, they now looked more like resolute avengers and less like people looking to cure their depression through murder. Except for Alanor. He looked the same, just with a goofy grin. Etja swept close to him and gestured to his bag of snacks, which he graciously held out for her to partake of.
I reoriented myself so that I was facing everyone. “Well,” I said, “we’re all here and as ready as we’re going to be. Should we expect any support from the heavy hitters in Litta?”
“No,” said Tavio. “General Tyvus has taken over the evaluation of the forest, and General Olivia is managing the army’s response while coordinating with the authorities in Tarras. I am told that any other powerhouses are indisposed, although I do not know the specifics.”
“Hmm, that’s unfortunate.”
“Speaking frankly, your party likely represents a greater force than either general alone, especially General Olivia.”
Alanor’s eyes widened a little at Tavio’s claim, but kept his silence. The man was good at following his orders.
“No more surprise Level 52s?” I asked.
“If there are, I do not know about them,” said Tavio. “For now, we are the entire pursuing force.”
“Right, then let’s get on with it.” We refreshed any buffs that had expired, and I signalled for everyone to move out, with Pio having her people follow my lead. I was mildly surprised Tavio wasn’t giving the orders for the Littans, but after a moment of thought it made sense. Pio was the party leader for her group and while Tavio outranked her, she would have a much better working understanding of how the team should function, even with the two replacements.
As for why she deferred to me, unlike the forest, Fortune’s Folly was no longer operating as a support group for an imperial mission. The matter of who should ultimately be in command of this expedition was debatable, but for now access to this place was controlled by me, meaning my opinion was that Closetland held authority by default. While I was sure some of the higher ups in Litta would disagree with that posture, I didn’t really care, and Tavio was willing to play ball for the moment.
We were still in the massive obelisk chamber where the series of wormholes had dropped us off. We made our way to the wide stairwell that had appeared earlier, where we found Drift crouching just out of sight a few steps down. The Ravvenblaq gave us a wave, although his easy smile was absent.
“Anything to report?” I asked.
“I didn’t stray far,” he replied, “but it keeps going down for as far as I can perceive.” He gestured at the walls, eyes still fixed on the dark below. “There’s mana weaves like these ones all over, but nothing else of note.”
I gave our other sensitive allies the opportunity to sniff around, Shog using his weird sensory tentacle, Alanor leaning in to take a peek while still snacking, and Nuralie disappearing to report back if she found anything of note. Nobody had much to add to what Drift had told us, so we started the trek down into the dark.