The Dreamers emerged from the eddy of black ink, skidding lightly to stabilise their sway. Exhausted, they each crouched down into arbitrary sections of the cold, hard floor of the cave to catch their breaths.
Then, a silence.
'We’re back to...wherever this is.' Scribe softly thrashed his knuckles against the unstirred wall as he relaxed the muscles in his arms, too fatigued to care about the weak sting of it. 'Why? Why are we back here? After that fight?'
'It was mayhem. Nevertheless, we survived.' Globe sighed, with one hand nursing his forehead. 'The Depth Lurker was hellishly difficult to deal with, on top of the fact that we weren't well rested because of the anxiety of waiting after the last dungeon we scoured - everything was just a nightmare.'
'What we need now is proper rest. We aren’t going to be getting anything productive done if we keep stretching ourselves too thin.' Lantern commented.
Sariel felt a tick of irritation at hearing her voice. Everyone who didn't end up joining her new Coalition was snubbed out of the resources they rightfully earned. An air of dissatisfaction emanated from everyone standing beside Sariel, whilst those nearby Lantern pretended to be unbothered. After all, why would they be? They had just gotten a score of additional loot. Loot meant survival.
Around transcendence 27 was the widely agreed upon transcendence level upon which you could easily survive on Otherside for the rest of your life. There were a plethora of long term residents on Otherside, and those reaching transcendence 27 were strong enough to eliminate all threats to them on the overworld of the Otherside; that is to say, if they avoided dungeons, the ocean and their own stupidity, it was quite easy to live. Therefore, every single Dreamer hoped to reach transcendence 27, as that would be when their life would truly be safe.
Speaking of transcendence, Sariel attempted to pull up his stat screen again, not having failed to notice the 'Revelation' message the System had prompted him with earlier. However, it wasn't present any longer. What on earth did that mean? Well, there wasn't a point lingering on it for too long.
Everyone shared the same opinion that replenishing their energy was the best course of action. Some Dreamers simply passed out immediately; Chains and Blade, absolutely exhausted from their battle, collapsed on the floor with no further questions being required, and most everyone else also lay down to rest. But something was off.
It was the soft tapping of liquid falling and the faintest reverberation of rock splitting that immediately sent Sariel into sharp consternation. He lurched upwards, alerting everyone.
A worried expression painted itself across Paw’s face. 'Flower? What’s wrong-'
'Wait.' Sariel shushed her and looked around. He scanned around for the source of the slightest echo. Another split resonated within the cave - this time, louder. Much, much louder.
'What the… there’s something coming from above..!'
Sariel dove forward to drag the resting Chains and Blade away from the middle of the platform, where a massive stalactite smashed down below. The crushing sound of stone on stone jolted both of the Dreamers in his hands awake, and they jumped upwards to scan the area.
Everyone collectively exhaled out a sigh of relief that it wasn’t a sentient enemy, but they still scattered, leaving behind small puddles of water in their tracks. They all sprinted to the edges of the platform, warily watching the roof above.
'Don’t let your guards down, everyone!' Lantern warned. 'This could be the cause of an enemy attack!'
A while later, nothing seemed to happen. It was deemed to be a minor issue, allowing everyone to heave a sigh of relief.. That was, of course, before the first droplet of water hit the floor.
Sariel had figured it out just as the sound of the water falling reverberated throughout the area. It turned out that a large chunk of eroded rock gave way and couldn’t support the ocean above it, thus leading to the crash of the stalactite. But what was even more threatening was something that seemed incredibly innocent at first.
The water.
Drops turned to a stream all too quickly. It rushed to waterlog the surface of the platform and what was a shallow pool before was quickly spreading throughout the platform, slowly raising the water level to the soles of the Dreamers. It showed no signs of stopping, the water rising up piecemeal with every passing second.
With the ceiling gap’s rim fraying, the sharply moulded rocks that hung from around them gradually started to fall. Everyone was trying their best to avoid the cluster of crumbling rubble that soared from above and the fact that they were in the thick of a massive outflow didn’t help at all.
A falling piece of rock instantaneously aimed for his head. He reflexively threw his chains towards the stone to avoid it from landing a lethal blow. They coiled around the rubble just in time for Sariel to pull at it, using it as a propeller for him to launch himself into the air.
The chains leaped again, landing on a larger stalagmite for Sariel to stand on as it crashed into the still-rising water level. With that being one of the last falling rocks to hit the ground, the number of stalagmites slipping out slowly decreased. With his feet on somewhat of a steady grounding, Sariel hummed, observing the scene in attempts to find solutions to this situation.
The falling of the stones thankfully didn't open up any further gaps in the roof; or rather, the ocean floor. The problem of the single stream of water flowing down was still present, however, and this was by far the most sinister threat.
'Well, everyone, start hauling this rubble!' Lantern called out, setting an example by forming her Omni into gauntlets and pushing a giant slab of stone into the depths of water around the platform. 'Does anyone have any sort of water dispelling Aspect?'
Sariel scavenged his attributes for anything that could repel or just completely eliminate water at a large scale. Then, a precipitous acknowledgement struck his skull. If he used Infusion, he could evaporate the water with its flame. Infusion set fire to your body to heal it and cleanse its impurities, and using it as a fire had never been a thought before. But, why not?
Sariel tested it by casting Infusion, which evaporated the water pooling around his feet. He raised his voice so the others could hear him over the rushing water. 'Infusion evaporates the water. Anyone has it as well?.'
'I have Infusion. I could evaporate the water.'
Another voice answered his own. It was Pane, who was raising her hand ardently. Rosary mused over this and nodded.
'Alright then. Could we assign Pane to start the evaporation process?' She suggested. She turned towards Sariel and explained, 'Flower, you should conserve your energy and save your Aspect for later. We need your support in case it escalates. Additionally, if Pane gets too tired, you can take her place.'
'Good idea.' Lantern agreed. 'While Pane works, we need to take this time to rest. We’re all exhausted and an ocean welling up in this cave isn’t going to do anything to help us.'
Thus, everyone settled on sleeping whilst leaning on the walls or floating on the fallen rubble as Pane endured the drudgery of holding off the dripping water. Silence rolled throughout the cave, save for the hiss of embers from Pane’s Aspect. Time poured away. Sariel felt the allure of slumber tug him in. He let it.
-
Sariel woke to something shuffling towards him. It sounded like quiet footsteps, sure-footed and ominous. Once they were close enough to assure Sariel that there was indeed a person approaching him, he shot up. He flitted to the side in an instant to avoid any endeavours to ambush him.
His eyes raised slightly as he stared at the culprit, Lantern, who was startling at the unexpected movement.
'What are you doing, Lantern?' He addressed her warily.
'Tch. You aren’t supposed to wake up!' She hissed quietly so as to not alert the others. Lunging at Sariel, she raised her arms to unleash her Aspect. 'Hailstorm!' She whispered, regaining her cold acumen.
A shard of ice nicked his forearm, sending him barrelling to the side. A shout from him erupted as he attempted to wake the other Dreamers. Lantern's dark eyes burned in fury as cool air engulfed him as he felt the side of his body lag a little more than usual.
'Shackles of Rosbane!'
The chill slowing his body dissipated, white wisps extracting themselves from his body to form a metal sphere to weigh him down. It was clear Lantern showed no signs of ceasing her attacks, so Sariel finally decided to return the favour. He narrowly dodged her assault due to the chain at his leg. slowness. He took a deep breath, sending a chain to her chest, and she responded by launching two shards of ice back at him.
He moved forward and absorbed the shards of ice, much to Lantern's surprise. He formed his Omni into a greatsword as he advanced, bringing it down on Lantern. Her eyes glinted coldly as she summoned her Omni. The sharp swish of the Omni dagger against the wind desperately attempted to block the path of the greatsword, sending a sonorous clang across the platform.
With Sariel's shout, Pane finally snapped away from her daze; she had fallen asleep standing, neglecting the water level slowly rising. She looked down at the liquid and back at the two fighting, and screamed out loud to wake everyone up. She reconcentrated on clearing out the water as it had reached knee level, nearly threatening to drown the Dreamers that were sleeping in a sitting position. The sight of Lantern's Omni dagger blocking Sariel was the first thing they saw, sending alarm bells ringing furiously in their heads.
'Lantern!' Rosary, who got up and started jogging towards the two, yelled. King flashed forward, forming his gauntlets as he blinked in front of Sariel to send a punch towards Lantern.
Lantern turned her head around to see the Dreamers waking up. Sariel could see her cold eyes flashing quickly, before her mind landed on the excuse she chose to use.
'He assaulted me in my sleep!'
She drew in her arms back above her head, her Omni morphing. A gigantic axe amalgamated between her whitened knuckles - Sariel knew to avoid it, jumping high in the air. Slamming it down, Lantern bounced upwards with the sheer force of impact. A disastrous tremor rang across the cave, causing the other Dreamers to stumble.
Sariel, mid-air, hurled himself into a backflip to land behind Lantern. 'Absolute lies, and you know it!' A Deep Breath finally triggered, dragging Lantern back with the chains, hot pain smearing across her back. Howling, Lantern ripped her great axe from the crackling ground and swung it strong as she twisted her body to follow Sariel. It whorled into his afterimage and hacked itself onto the stone wall. Sariel staggered up from the ground he ducked himself on to avoid the massive weapon that had swerved his way.
A terrible rumble devoured the cave’s walls as Pane yelped - a thick delta plummeting to the shaking floor. She pushed her hands towards the growing flowing stream of water, desperately strengthening her Aspect.
'Can you guys tone down the, you know, demolition of this cave we’re trapped in?!' She screamed as the cave wept more water into the platform.
'Concurred!' Scribe rose his hand to swiftly create a barrier to stop the fight, and then drew more barriers to box the two in separate boxes.
'You have to believe me!' Lantern pleaded desperately. 'I was trying to defend myself, and he attempted to turn you all against me!'
Sariel sighed. 'She attempted to cleave me in half in my sleep, and I fought back.'
Butterfly frowned. 'Well, start telling your story. And fast.'
