"Wait."

Tanyan held up a hand, and the party came to a standstill. Taniel looked back at them with a frown.

"What?"

"There's a group ahead in the next cavern, non-human. Maybe ten or twenty. Small, can't really tell other than that. A little too small to be Ralfots, but maybe Elnats."

Elania wanted to know exactly what type of skill or magic the monk was using to see ahead. If he was able to know what was around them, why hadn't he spotted the Manzitore or the Razorscale before they attacked?

"Should we go around then?" She didn't know what to expect, but avoiding more fights was high on her list of things to accomplish. Ralfots and Elnats didn’t sound dangerous, but she’d noticed how often predators went after them.

Tanyan and Taniel looked at her with a frown. There had been an uneasy peace bridged in the group, but it felt like it was razor-thin, and she had thought about going off on her own rather than stay with them.

Taniel shook his head, "No, that won't be possible. We'd have to backtrack almost to the previous Waystation, and the other route probably would be worse. It goes through a swamp-type biome that has a lot of Razorscale nests. We're right on the edge of it as-is."

Tanyan nodded and looked between her and Taniel up toward the direction of the big cavern ahead, "I think you and Elania should scout it out ahead of the rest of us. It's a big cavern, so there is a good chance we could find a way through without meeting them. The biggest danger would be if they ambushed us at the entrance. Herrik and Berrick aren’t going to do well in a fight."

‘That’s for sure.’ Elania frowned, her immediate thought about the novices was uncharitable, but accurate.

She didn't want to go with Taniel, and from the look he gave her, he wasn't excited by the thought either. "Tanyan, shouldn't you and Taniel go scout, or you and me? You can sense them, so I think that would be invaluable?"

"It doesn't work that way. I can't do it repeatedly, and it becomes hazier the closer to whatever it is I am trying to sense. Once in the cavern I'd only be able to sense that they were there, not any sort of location. Someone needs to stay with the novices, also."

'Maybe they don't want to leave me with the two dolts.'

Herrik was okay, she thought, even if he was a bit skittish. Berrick, however, she would have been happy to strangle after the barrier incident. She would have preferred being locked up in a room with Taniel than have to deal with the novice who even now was still jumping at every little shadow.

"Fine, I'll go with Taniel. If he thinks he can keep up."

"I'm going to be the one leading, what do you mean keep up? Aren't you the one who has no experience?"

"I seem to remember the score being 0 to 2 so far. Maybe I should take Tanyan since he hasn't been knocked out by an inexperienced girl twice already?"

Elania thought she might have gone a little too far when his eyebrow twitched, and he spun on a heel, heading up the path to the next cavern. Tanyan was watching her with a frown, but she just shrugged and followed after Taniel.

The thought of having to go back and go through a nest of Razorscales made her unhappy. They had to make it past whatever was up ahead because she was pretty sure that if the Razorscales came after them, she might be the only one to escape, and then she'd be lost and have no idea how to get to Neftasu.

A dozen small-sized humanoids didn't sound very good either, but maybe they wouldn't' be hostile? The only thing that came to mind was something like the demon who had ambushed her and tried to eat her, only for her to absorb him instead.

That made her think about the Karma she had got when she had killed it. She'd killed a lot of things since, but her Karma hadn't changed since. It didn't move when she killed the other demon, either. What was up with that?

"Pay attention."

She looked up to Taniel, holding up a hand for her to stop. They'd reached the tunnel to the next chamber. It wasn't as massive as some others, but it was pretty large, which suggested that the layout around the corner would be pretty open.

That meant they'd need to be careful instead of happily walking out in the open for whatever was in there to see. Right.

"We'll stay close to this side of the wall. Depending on what cover there is, we might switch or have to go prone."

All of that seemed reasonable to Elania, and she honestly didn't have any experience with this, other than her [Stealth] skill, so she hoped that would help a bit.

"Alright." She nodded and followed his lead. When she accidentally disturbed a rock on the wall that sent a shower of dirt falling on the ground, Taniel stopped to glare at her. She could only offer an apologetic shrug. 'One with the ninja, Elania!'

She managed to avoid further mishaps as they moved through the tunnel; about halfway through, Taniel gestured to the other side, and they switched to it. When they were closer to the edge, she saw why. There were ruins in the cavern. Massive ruins.

The chamber had just started to come into view, but there was a wall that managed to cut off the view of the rest of the cavern. A massive stairway traveled parallel with the wall to grant access to the top of it.

When they reached the end of the tunnel, Taniel peeked around the corner before disappearing around it. When she looked around the edge, she saw he had moved toward the broken ruins of a tower that was little more than a circle of stone now.

That wasn't what had her staring in awe, though.

They were near the top of the cavern, but the wall was bigger than she could have imagined. The wall itself was a massive ramp that lead down into the rest of the cavern, splitting it in half. The massive, crumbled gatehouses dotted it at regular intervals, and one had nearly fallen in on itself and off into the lake below.

'You could fit Pittsburgh's rush hour traffic on that.'

A massive waterfall was spraying through an arch to the lower side of the cavern, and formed an enormous lake that took up a considerable portion of the cavern. Elania hurried to catch up, and when she did, she tugged on Taniel's sleeve.

"What the fuck is all of this? Why didn't you mention it? What is that wall?"

He looked a bit taken aback, before looking away and scanning the stonework across from the tower.

"It's a Nevedun ruin. They are all over this area, it was built by a large Dwerven civilization a long time ago. Just the stonework left, though you'll find a lot of Dwerves in Neftasu in the Artisan's district."

Dwerves? Dwarves? The way he pronounced, it was funny, and she felt herself mouthing the word. Nevedun. Dwerves. Artisan's district. Right. She filed away the information for later. That wasn't as important as figuring out about the group supposed to be in here with them. The cavern was massive, but the wall acted as a choke point.

"Why didn't you mention any of this before? Don't you think you should tell me if there is going to be a massive fucking wall? Where do we have to go anyways?"

"Opposite end of the wall, upper section. Last time we just went over the top, but there is another ramp halfway through that leads to the same plateau with our exit on it. The wall all the way would be faster, but I think we might want to take the other way as it has more cover and isn't as obvious."

"We should get the others,” Elania looked back the way they had come, before looking back at the wall that went on far enough to disappear into the haze, “by the time we scouted that far ahead, we'll be way too far to support each other."

"The biggest concern was getting ambushed as soon as we came though. I'll go scout the top of the wall, you go call the others up." He turned away and started looking out at the wall immediately.

Elania frowned and stared at his back as she bit her lip. She didn't like being bossed around, and he had just assumed she would do as she was told, but in the end, she turned around and headed back to the others.

Without the need for stealth, it didn't take as long, and when Tanyan and the two novices were in sight, she waved them forward to join her.

"Why didn't you tell me there was a huge wall?" She repeated the question unhappily to Tanyan, who thought for a moment before answering.

"They are pretty common in the region around Neftasu. It was the center of a whole civilization. The city is built on top of the old capital of the Dwerves. It even has one of the Deep Dungeons."

"Right, what about the Monster Core? You mentioned they come from monsters or animals that are influenced by a Dungeon,” She sighed as her mind started to turn in a myriad array of directions at once, each one forming another question, “What's a Dungeon exactly? Are they built or naturally occuring? Monster spawner machines? Big Boss at the end?"

By now, Tanyan took her questioning in stride and simply answered as best he could.

"New Dungeons form naturally, but it is a rare occurrence. More often a new one will form where a old one was destroyed. The Dwerves built a massive complex on top of the dungeon inside their capital, turning it into a sort of training grounds. Somehow that dungeon expanded on their work and it isn't really known how deep it goes--- or where the core of it is. Monsters, especially the lower tiers of demons will form in them, so exploring them isn't exactly safe. Gathering Cores is probably the only reason anyone bothers with it now."

"Great, so add ‘Dungeon Core’ to the world. The Dungeons don't talk and go crazy while trying to murder you, do they?"

"Dungeon core, what?" That did get her a look of confusion from Tanyan, and she sighed.

"Nevermind. Do they talk?"

"No? What? How could a dungeon talk? Maybe an intelligent monster will infest one and turn it into a nest, but generally mercenaries are hired to clear those out."

The 'Mercenary' guild sounded like the place to be if you wanted to be an Adventurer. Elania didn't point that out, though, considering that Adventurers seemed to have a bad rap, according to Tanyan. Well, whatever they named themselves, it didn't really change their function? She'd have to see for herself, of course, but it sounded like it would be an excellent place to start if she wanted--- needed employment. Although if a demon like her could work without being attached to someone was another question.

It would have to wait, though.

"Where is Taniel?" Tanyan asked. They had reached the other side, and everything looked the same as before, but the other monk had disappeared. Elania scanned the background, but she didn't see him anywhere either.

"He said he would go ahead and scout out the wall." Elania offered.

"We better stick together; I don't think it would be a good idea to get split up more."

Elania glanced back at the novices. They were staying together a bit behind Tanyan and her. One thing she had noticed was that Tanyan and Taniel didn't talk much to the novices. She had been thinking of them as all being close together after Maurice dying had hit Taniel pretty hard. The last two days and the incident with the barrier had her rethinking that.

With the dwindling of the party, the extra burden of carrying the extra baskets of moss had fallen on the novices. She realized that while they weren't struggling with the extra bulk yet, they did look like they had been through a heavy workout already.

Elania thought she could help them carry a bit but decided to wait until after finding Taniel. If she needed to fight, it would be better if she wasn't saddled with anything extra.

They crossed the open area between the cave entrance and the wall without issue and reached the steps. The massive stonework towered above her, and she had to bend her head back to see the top. The stone had splotches of moss and fungus growing on it in a spotty patchwork of greens, blues, and vivid violets.

The steps were worn in places, a few having cracked or had chunks taken out of them. The center was in the best shape, the edge opposite the wall in the worst, so the group stayed away from the edge as they began the climb upward.

Elania decided to count steps as they climbed. 6.. 12.. 18.. 24.. 28..

The novices were slowing down as they ascended, but she didn't want to wait, excited by the prospect of seeing everything from the top of the wall. 48..60..62..64..68..

She reached the top at seventy-three, which put her somewhere around five or six stories up, and she wasn't even out of breath. Even with everything that had happened so far, that was a bit surprising.

'Never would have made it up that without breaking a little sweat on Earth!'

On Earth. She frowned as she looked down off the wall to the now-familiar cavern landscape below. The floating jellies were casting a strange light over the field of multi-hued fungi in the distance, and she wondered when she had accepted all of this as her new normal.

If she had been given a choice, she would have jumped at the chance to come visit and see such wondrous colors and scenery in person. It was the fighting, killing, and demon bit that held her back from thoroughly enjoying the lights.

What was she even planning to do? Make it to Neftasu? She didn't think she would have it easy there because of her 'race' and how everyone had reacted just to the sight of her. Demon markets and most of her race weren't even intelligent until humans or 'sapient' races enslaved them. Not to mention that the ones like her didn't have a good reputation because everyone thought they ate a village's worth of people.

So, travel to the surface? That was her first thought upon leaving the cultist's den, but would she be treated any better there? If the monks and paladin were anything to go by, she'd have better luck trying to make a deal with the dramatic cultist leader.

She sighed; really, she didn't have enough information to make detailed plans. She'd have to play everything by ear until she had a solid understanding of the world... the people... and her place in it.

"Elania? Elania!"

Eyes widening, she turned to see Tanyan waving her to follow. She'd been lost in thought, looking out at the scenery, and hadn't noticed the others catch up.

"Sorry."

"It is a pretty sight, isn't it?"

"I've never seen anything like it before."

"Well, I think you'll like Neftasu. Let's keep looking for Taniel?"

She nodded. "You don't think he fell off and into the lake, do you?"

For a second, he looked at her with a horrified expression which turned into a frown, "No, if he did, I imagine we'd already be hearing the shouting."

One of the novices looked over the edge toward the lake to check upon hearing her thoughts, and almost lost his balance. Tanyan reached out and pulled him back while steadying the man. "Careful, we don't need someone to actually fall down there, that'd be a nightmare."

'Not to mention they'd probably be dead as soon as they hit the water, even if they did miss the rocks at the base of the wall.'

She didn't say it, though. She felt a little bad for how much trauma the novices had been through so far.

The party continued down the wall and their destination. Elania was beginning to feel a bit of concern the further they got. Why had Taniel not waited at the top of the wall, and why had he gone so far ahead?

Something didn't feel right to Elania, and she noticed Tanyan was periodically looking over his shoulder and scanning the area. 'I'm not the only one who noticed.'

One of the massive gatehouses situated on the wall began to loom over them, and Elania thought she saw a shadow move inside the structure.

"Tanyan."

"I know, I saw it too."