Awakening

"Ah, no," Tural said with a breezy smile, "The last thing I remember is being at the hermitage, getting ready for the evening meal," he spread his hands, "And now I am here,"

He chuckled, "The dream works in mysterious ways, one never knows where they will find themselves next," he took a few steps forward, "Shall we explore?"

"Ah...."

Patience began and then remembered that followers of the Dreamer tend to the be the most calm people to exist. To the point where it might annoy other people, and she forgot this. Sighing, and realizing it would do no good to get riled up at his words she nodded.

"I suppose we do not have much of a choice in that matter, now... that dark room," Patience began, "I know elves can see in dim lightening, and so can I? I'm afraid I'm not as familiar with your kind, would you be able to navigate in low light?"

"I will be fine, thank you," Tural said, his hands clasped gently in front of him. He smiled at her, his white-gray eyes heavy-lidded and he swayed just a touch.

Thanks for the non-answer, Faena thought to herself. But it didn't quite surprise her; weren't all Dreamer followers nuts?

"I don't suppose you know whether anyone else is here," she said to Tural as she led them out into the hallway. "Since you didn't go far from the two of us."

For that matter, she didn't know exactly which room Patience had woken in ... how far from her own cell had it been?

Dismissing the question as irrelevant at this point, she headed towards the darkened room.

Patience followed Faena, but kept an eye out for anything that might seem off. She still wasn't sure what to expect, this situation was just very strange. Also despite being able to see in low lightening, she wasn't that comfortable in heading to a dark room, especially in a place she didn't know.

As Faena went out into the hallway, she would be able to see that giant crystals blocked the way left portion of the hall. Crystals has large a fully-grown orc branched outward, like a crystalized bramble. It was impassable. If she turned right, the hallway continued on. There appeared to be a small stairwell on the left-hand side and another dark room on her left. The only light in the hallway was tiny flecks of crystal that sprouted on the ground, like an infection of bumps or warts.

Directly in front of Faena, was the darkened room that Tural mentioned.

The dark room across the hallway had once been another cellblock. Three of the cellblocks on the left-hand side were in fully in-tact. Towards the back, They did not have doors or bars and completely stripped bare of any signs of life. Small flecks of crystals grew from the floor and low on the walls, but not large enough to give significant light.


There was small flecks of rubble and cracks on back walls of the cells, as if something tried to push through.

On the right side, only the first cell block remained.

If Faena and the others were to venture further in, they would see that the floor and wall had collapsed, causing a gigantic hole that spilled down and out, but it would require closer inspection to see what was it was. There seemed to be more of the blue-white light from the crystals coming from far away from the gigantic fissure opening.


"Where shall we go?" Tural asked as he slowly followed the women out, "I have seen no other living creatures, but the two of you since I have awoken,"

Faena ventured slowly into the room and thanked her Darkvision that she was able to see the hole in the floor before she fell through it. She knelt next to it for a closer look and saw that the cracked fissure sloped down about 30-40 feet. There was a lot of debris below, but she could see enough that she could tell there was a large, natural-looking chamber down there, larger than the cell block in which they had found themselves.

She didn't see any signs of life down there, but her instincts were telling her not to go that way. They were already below ground, clearly; to go deeper was counter-intuitive to what logic told her would be the way out: upwards. Besides that, she knew from experience that there was no way to climb down there safely without equipment, which she didn't have. Rope, sure; but no pitons. It wasn't enough.

Still, her instincts had led her wrong before, and she had never seen anything like this before. And maybe one of the others had climbing equipment.

"What do you think?" she asked Patience without looking at her. "I would say go up, not down, but I don't like being underground in the first place. Maybe you can think more clearly than me. Still, I don't have the climbing equipment we would need to get down there safely."

Patience nodded at this, she didn't even have rope herself so climbing would be a death wish waiting to happen. She could see the hole, but didn't investigate it like Faena did.

"There's the stairwell," Patience murmured as she pointed down where the hallway continued on, "It might lead up? It's too far to tell from here, that being said, if it doesn't lead up, we'll have no choice but to go down."

Honestly, she couldn't tell if they were truly underground or in a cave or where they were exactly. It was such a strange place.

Faena retreated to the hallway where the stairwell was located and saw that it went down, not up as she had hoped. She hesitated in the hallway and took one more look around, hoping desperately that there would be another direction to go - and she had to do a double take to make sure that she was seeing correctly when she spotted a second stairway further up the hall.

Please, let that stairway lead up, she thought to herself, her heart pounding as adrenaline was released into her body.

"There's another stairway there," she told the others, pointing with one gloved hand. "This one goes down, I think we should check the other one."

If they both went down, they would have to do some more thinking. But if this one led upwards ... well, she could hope.

Patience went along further down the hallway with the others. Unlike the first stairwell, it was on the right instead of the left, and it too led down.

"This one also goes down," the tiefling commented, "But it's on the right side, so it probably leads to two different areas."

And without any idea of where they were going, either direction was going to be a guess.

"Not that, that's helpful, flipping a coin would be more useful at this point."

Faena reached into her pocket and pulled out her only coin.

"Heads, this stairwell, tails, the one back by the hole in the floor," she suggested. She balanced the coin on the side of her curled finger, slipped her thumb until one edge of it, and flicked it up into the air. Deftly, she catches it and slaps it to the back of her opposite hand.

"Tails," she announced, looking at Patience. "Back to the other stairwell, I suppose."

She gestured for Patience or Tural to lead the way back again.

"I guess so," Patience agreed and led the way back to the other stairs.

When they reached the first stairwell, she couldn't help but think how good it was none of them needed a light. Once the others had caught up (which didn't take long at all, in fact she was sure the others were faster than her), Patience put a hand on her mace and took a breath.

"I guess I'll go down first..." she commented making sure her shield and mace was ready.

She was the more heavily armored of the three of them, and she carefully went down the stairs.

Once Patience had made it to the bottom of stairs, she rounded a small alcove into large rock chamber. It became apparent that this was the natural chamber that the fissure from the second cellblock led into. The giant debris pile was to 500 feet to Patience's left. There were more crystals at the bottom of the debris pile and many along the southern wall, that led into a small opening into what might be another chamber.

The opening would only comfortably fit one person at a time.

It appeared that there had once been some kind of door or other structure near the alcove, but it had been removed, rock nails and all.

There was evidence of giant rats, with the smell of their feces and some sign of an old nest near the debris pile. Though it was difficult to say how long it had been, as there wasn't much in the way of weather or wind in this place.

Patience wrinkled her nose at the smell. Stepping aside so the others could come down the stairs she spoke up to them as they came down.

"There looks like an opening of some sort, but not sure where it leads. We would have to go through one at a time though it's small. Careful, it looks like giant rats might be infesting the area."

Who knew how long these creatures had been living here. It was weird, it was like they were in ruins, as if no one else had been here, which couldn't be true. Someone had taken them here.

Faena was right behind Patience as they came down the stairs, and now she stepped forward, drawing her swords as she did so. She was determined to survive this, and she wasn't going to let some giant rats take a bite out of her if she could help it. She was going to be prepared if any showed up.

"This chamber is enormous," she said, casting her eyes about them. "Should we check it out before deciding to go the most obvious direction? Maybe there will be something that tells us where we are or how we got here."

She was especially stumped on her own behalf. She didn't sleep, couldn't be put to sleep ... so how had she become so dead to the world that she didn't know where she was or how she had come to be here?

A look around, with attention mainly on the missing door, Patience didn't see anything of anything of interest.

"Minus the rat nest, it seems pretty abandoned," Patience commented.

Faena took a moment to ascertain that it was indeed nothing but rock and crystal in the debris pile before she nodded her agreement with Patience's diagnosis.

"Then onward we go," she shrugged.

At least she hadn't seen any rats.

"You would think that there would be something to give a clue of some kind as to where we are," she couldn't help commenting as she made her way towards the narrow doorway. There, she paused. It was a narrow opening, and she didn't want to be taken by surprise.

She peered through it.

There was a tunnel on the other side of the door, winding, as if made by running water. The left side of it was lit with fist-sized crystals, wall and floor alike. Blades in hand, she pressed forward. Coming around a corner, she came into a second chamber, smaller than the first: to her left was a larger opening, brightly lit by crystals; to her right was another small chamber, lit and visibly navigable; but directly ahead of her, so far oblivious to her presence, was what seemed to be a carrion crawler. But there was something wrong with it - it had crystals growing out of its back!

She froze, hoping that it still wouldn't notice her. Could she sneak past it to the room on the right, that looked much easier to navigate?

But first she had to warn Patience and Tural. Silently, she held her left hand out to her side, blocking them from going past her, though they could still look over her arm.

Patience peered over Faena's arm and frowned. It was the most bizarre (and disgusting thing) she had ever seen. It looked as if the crystals were growing out of the creature, creating bloody open wounds where the crystal had pierced its skin. Whatever it was, it was hampered by those crystals.

She tapped Faena's shoulder and motioned with a finger to her lips and pointed to the two openings. They could follow Faena to wherever she decided to go. They couldn't discuss this, it was best to not make noise. Still, she noted her observations for later.

Faena had grown up learning stealth in the forests where the slightest rustle of a leaf could get you killed, so sneaking silently behind the feasting Carrion Crawler was no trouble for her. In seconds, she was in the next chamber, safe and sound.

Patience and Tural tried to follow after Faena, but they were not nearly as successful.

Patience's foot caught on a piece of crystal and she fell to a the stone floor in a clatter. Panicked, she reached out and tried to grab at something ot steady herself, but she only managed to grab Tural and bring him down as well. The two fell to the floor in a loud, metallic clank courtesy of her chain mail and chain mail.

The two laid prone on the ground and stared in horror as the Carrion Crawler stopped eating, whatever it was that was eating.

The Carrion Crawler hissed and slowly pushed itself up several feet into the air and twisted it's bleeding husk towards Tural and Patience. It hissed, low, and the flecks of crystals on it's pincers clacked together, making it so the creature couldn't quite close it's jaws all the way.

"Oh, this will be unpleasant," Tural said, most of his face smooshed against the floor.

Patience quickly scrambled to her feet and held out her shield. It was far enough away that she knew she wouldn't be able to make the first move. Instead of moving towards it, she stood her ground against the creature. It was more frightening now that she could clearly see the crystals that had grown around it's face.

The blood just made it look more horrifying. It was only as she was staring at it did she remember that a spell could cover the distance that she could not.

She whispered under her breath in elvish and a flame like radiance descended upon the creature, but despite the fact it was hampered by crystals the spell was too slow and missed the creature completely. Patience cursed under her breath at that.

The creature hissed and scuttled towards Patience and Tural, but the crystals caused the creature to move slowly, achingly. It became apparent that there were crystals in the creatures joints, maybe even on the inside of it's carapace. The creature only made it about 15 feet before it slowed, tired, more of it's blood dripping down it's sides and face.

It clacked it's pincers at them, dared them to come closer.

Faena was already moving, hands tightening around her dual blades. She swung at the grotesque and bloodied creature, but, her vision temporarily hindered by the light of the tiefling's spell, her first strike missed completely.

Her follow-up hit, however, struck home: with a loud battle-cry, she thrust her second shortsword into the tormented creature's bloody mass. Her aim was true, and it pierced between the carapace and the softness of its body, sinking in to the hilt. Blood spattered her face and arms, but she barely felt it: her focus was on the creature alone.

Tural pushed himself up off of the ground and reached into his pack and pulled out a finely made dart. The fletching on the shaft was made from bright black feathers. The tip was serrated and seemed to be made of an elven metal that shimmered in the low blue-white light.

He rushed forward towards the creature until he was well within 15 feet of it. He reared back and threw the dart, straight and true, into the creature's face. It stuck into the side of it's mouth, next to a pincer and into an already open, bloody wound.

"One more blow," the monk said, quietly and stood raised his arms in defense.

The crawler screeched and thrashed, bits of it's carapace flew off from where Faena had pierced the creature's side.

Patience moved forward to meet the creature the rest of the way and swung her mace at it. It hit the crystals but didn't hit the creature itself. In a weird, demented sort of way the crystals that had caused this creature so much suffering also acted as an armor for it.

Despite this she did not move back instead she stood her ground as her role of a protector dictated of her to do so. Protecting her travel partners if she could.