Levin and Rolwen were in an underground cavern, denied of their sense of sight by the darkness of the underworld and bound with their hands held behind their backs by cuffs made from a single piece of stone molded by the gnome magic.

“Man, earth magic is a total cheat.” Rolwen griped as he flexed his wrists and tested the strength of his bonds. They’d discovered from the three years they’d traveled with the Hidan that the physical strength they had in this world was easily enough to break stone, but the stuff the gnomes had shaped around their wrists had been reinforced somehow and was not so easy to break as the normal granite and limestone they’d dealt with before.

At the same time, both boys listened to the sound of Rolwen’s voice as it echoed off the cavern walls. While they couldn’t see anything, the cavern seemed around the size of an average room in a house… or, rather, probably a scaled down version as though it was designed for hobbits. Or, gnomes in this case. This worked out well considering they were actually shorter than the gnomes in their 5 year old bodies.

“Yeah, it is pretty strong.” A somewhat unfamiliar voice spoke up from the darkness in response to Rolwen’s comment, causing both boys to sit straight up.

“Hey! You’re the one who talked to us first, aren’t you?!” Rolwen demanded, looking vaguely toward the direction the voice had come from.

“Yeah.” The voice croaked with a ring of shame to it. “They… took me along with them because… because lord Nirjorn mentioned some revelation… uhh… lord Nirjorn is the high priest. He’s basically our leader.” The boy explained.

“Wait.” Levin spoke up here, “You’re from Earth, aren’t you?”

“Uhh… yeah, well, duh. I am speaking English, aren’t I?” The boy said.

“So, uhh… why are you working for the demons then?” Levin asked.

“Because he was born there! Right?” Rolwen cut in and answered before the boy could.

“Uhh… yeah.” The boy said. “I’m… a gnome, just like them… I mean, you should be able to tell that by how I look, right? I mean… oh, I’m sorry. I… kind of forgot, you can’t see in the dark, right?”

“We saw you above before this.” Rolwen said. “You looked a little like a grey elf, except with shorter ears.”

“You know about grey elves?!” The boy said in a surprised voice.

Levin and Rolwen were completely unable to see each other, but in that moment they could feel the subtle fluctuations in one another’s spirit energy as they both saw the same opportunity at the same time, and instantly knew what direction they had to go with this conversation and what things they had to avoid saying.

“Yeah, there were a few on the surface as well.” Rolwen said. “Probably nowhere near as much as you have down here, though. I hear the demons make a point of recruiting as many of them as they can get their hands on.”

“You mean enslaving.” Levin chipped in.

“Uhh… yeah.” The boy croaked in a tone that told them both their words had resonated with the boy. “Actually, I wouldn’t say the way gray elves are treated is really all that different from gnomes… or really, anyone else in the demon races. I mean, except for the really high position ones.”

Levin instantly felt thankful that his gamble had paid off on that one. It was three years ago that Eirlathion had told them about the dynamic between the gray races and the other races in the world, but the fact they’d fought a battle for the entire village’s survival over the mere fact that Asaren and Tiaren were there had ingrained the information in his mind forever. It was not hard at all from there to extrapolate a little and make it look like he knew a lot more about life among the demons than he actually did.

“So, you are saying that you are also a slave to the demons?” Rolwen probed.

“Something like that,” the boy said. “They… I… the truth is, I’m actually not the only person from Earth who was born down there. I have a friend, her name is Sam. They… took her, and so now I don’t have a choice but to do what they want me to do.”

“So, a hostage, huh?” Rolwen stated back, repeating the obvious just to keep the momentum of the conversation going. They were developing a good line of communication with this kid, and their training with Asaren said that if things go silent it will be more difficult to keep the conversation going than if they just keep things rolling.

“Yeah…” The boy said, but didn’t give them much more to work with. Not good. He was shutting down.

Levin searched hard for something else he could use to keep the boy talking. Maybe asking about this ‘Sam’ girl or how she was being kept? Should he ask if he likes her like a girlfriend? No. That would probably make him clam up even more. So how about... volunteering something personal? That could work.

“So, there were people from Earth underground with the demons too.” Levin said. “That would make you two… I think the the 16th and 17th we have heard about, if we don’t count the ones with the mages. They didn’t say exactly how many they’d found, but it sounded like it was more than three judging by how they were talking.” Levin said, deciding to go for a safe road of giving something that was likely to be interesting to the listener, but ultimately inconsequential to them.

“R… really?” The boy’s voice perked up. That had clearly gotten his attention. “So… does that number include you two? That means… there are at least 20 of us…”

Suddenly, there was a sound of shifting rocks, and the shuffling of feet as they scuffed against the rock floor, mixed in with some angry cursing in elven.

Around the same time, they heard a similar sound from a short distance behind the boy who had been talking to them. It suggested a second person aside from the boy who’d been in here all along.

[Wow, what happened to you?!] The voice of the already present observer asked.

[We tried to get the key. She escaped!] The new arrival cursed.

[Ahhh… yeah.] Another separate voice said, this one sounding like they were groggy from pain. [Pushed me into the path of an attack by Astur and Rudra. They tried to drop part of the wall on her, she avoided that too.]

[What?! What do you mean by the key escaped?] The one already present demanded.

[She somehow made a tree jump! And it carried her into the air!]

[A tree… jumped?] The first person asked in a bewildered voice.

[I will tell you everything. Kalag is not right since he took that hit to the head. He will replace you here, we need you above to help out.]

[Right.]

After this exchange, two sets of footsteps ran off toward the location where the sound of shifting rocks had come from before. The sound of retreating footsteps continued for a short time before they were drowned out by the grating sound of rocks shifting once again, and then the sound was cut off completely.

[Gaaaaaaa! Shit!] The voice of the new person here, Kalag according to the earlier conversation, groaned and cursed as the sound of his footsteps shuffled across the pitch-black underground chamber.

All of them were silent as it sounded like this Kalag was settling down into place somewhere along the wall toward the half-way point between the place he entered the room from and where they were tossed in the corner, and they got the very distinct sense he was looking in their general direction.

[So, you!] The man barked. [What have you been doing? Been talking with them like we said? Did you find out anything interesting?]

[Umm…! Uhh… well… no.] The boy said.

[Well then, keep talking you useless shit!] The man cursed and then started grumbling to himself about useless add-on kids being included in an important mission.

[Umm… uhh… yes!] The boy stammered, and then Levin and Rolwen were able to hear the sounds of scuffing ground and rustling clothes to inform them of the fact that the kid they were talking to had turned back around to look toward them.

“Umm… uhh… I’m sorry.” The boy stammered. “That’s… umm… that’s actually part of the thing I was talking about earlier. They want me to keep talking to you two, because… well, lord Nirjorn’s prediction. Apparently, the god we worship said I was somehow important for this mission, and it would have something to do with something I was going to say. So, that’s why…”

“What is it you were supposed to say, exactly?” Rolwen asked.

“I don’t know.” The boy said. “It was just… his exact words were that the intentions of Iuutel depend entirely on the words that I would say in the language of the world I come from, and therefore I must be taken along for this mission.”

“Is Iuutel the name of this god the demons worship?” Rolwen asked.

“Yeah…” The boy said.

Levin could feel Rolwen’s eyes on him after that, even through he was invisible in the darkness.

“Well, I guess that’s as clear as mud.” Rolwen said. “If it’s the prediction of a god, it could mean anything. Might not even be us he’s supposed to be talking to.”

“Yeah…” The boy said.

Just then, there was a far-off sound like breaking glass. This shattering sound just seemed to continue on and on, and then the earth around them started violently shaking.

“Jeez! What’s going on up there?!” Rolwen demanded rhetorically. “Asaren must be seriously giving them hell, it’s like the city is under bombardment! It’s like we’re in a world war 2 English air raid shelter.”

***

I knelt down, pressing my hand into the thick carpet of grass that my little seeds had bloomed into. It now covered everything in this city, from the stonework main streets to the tops of buildings. About the only thing that didn’t have grass growing on it was the wall, and that was only because the gnomes had made such a quick decision in shucking it off.

I sent out a pulse of mana wrapped in spirit energy, providing new and more detailed instructions to the nature spirits.

I stood the moment I sensed that the spirits had accepted my instructions and then kept moving. I had seen enough in that first probing attack to know that I didn’t want to take one of these gnomes on in a fight without a very immediate escape route on hand. This grass ought to weaken the earth mana they utilize, but I do not want to discover it was not enough after it’s already too late.

As I was on the move, I looked out across the city and admired my handiwork. Three large trees had now grown at the previous locations I’d given instruction to the nature spirits, and soon there would be a fourth.

In the distance, I saw one of the trees shake as something heavy hit it. The tree rocked, and then it immediately exploded into a wall of spikes. The leaves fell to the ground, forgotten about, and then the spikes began launching into the air at high speed. This continued until the majority of the tree had dissolved in this manner. At the top of their arc, all the wooden spikes sprouted dandelion fluff. Except that they did not have the height of the tree having previously jumped into the air itself, this was an almost perfect repeat of the scene from earlier.

I needed to keep propagating these things. The gnomes had already begun tearing up large swaths of ground just to get rid of this stuff. This told me it was a very serious inconvenience to them, and my best course of action was to keep the advantage this gave me.

There is more to it than that, though. I am still operating under the worst-case scenario that Levin and Rolwen have already been captured. If that’s the case, this is my best bet toward getting them back. And, if not, then it really wouldn’t give me a reason to change this course of action anyway. It would only remove one of my reasons for doing it. It also had the effect of keeping the attention off of mom and Eirlathion, an advantage that could not be under-sold. That’s not even counting the base effect of weakening their earth mana.

Assuming they do already have them though, they ought to be making their move soon.

Suddenly, I feel an immensely strong spirit energy signature. It’s beyond anything that I’ve felt from the fey previously, but… somehow, there is something strangely familiar about it. And, I can also sense that somehow the attention of this person is directly on me. They’ve spotted me somehow.

It is coming from on top of the wall. I look over to see where this is coming from, and… I see a rather strange sight. It looks like some kind of two-headed lion with wings. A bizarre chimera of a beast if I’ve ever saw one. But, I know instinctively that this is not the source of the spirit signature I felt before. Rather, it’s the rider on it’s back,

I was finally able to place why this spirit signature was familiar. Well then, this is interesting. We very well might be able to go on a direct offensive with this.