PreCursive
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Chapter 103 - Cold and Dark
🕑 Added 2023-11-08 18:00:03 +0000 UTCIt didn’t take me long to get ready for the fight. I’d had my leather armor set aside in my bunk, ready for this moment for a while now, just ready to rush into it. I didn’t quite need to rush, but I did hurry. This was the armor that I’d used in the escape from Addersfield, if not improved a little bit. Far better than the everyday leathers I’d slapped together for everyday use. They even had a few enchantments on them.
Nothing major, not like the armor that Sylvia had. Just some durability enchants, really. I’d done them myself. I didn’t take the cloak, though. Honestly, it just seemed like a bad idea to take that when I’d shortly be needing to take a dive in the ocean, from what Grey had told me. If I needed any kind of concealment, my Thorn Cloak would work better anyway.
I also took a few wax sealed potion bottles with me in a sack. I’d brewed these with Grey a few days ago. They were mostly healing potions, as we had no idea what kind of shape the prisoners would be in. We couldn’t expect Aurum to do all of the work, after all. Even though, you know, that was why we had brought him. There were a few odds and ends in the sack as well.
Finally, I grabbed my most recent creation, other than the strangely non-functional gun. A second collapsible spear. The first had mostly been a prototype, and had honestly been a bit fragile and finicky. This one was better constructed, and had a more robust design. Unlike my first, I wasn’t afraid this was going to fail after a jaunt through the sea water. Still, I took both that I had with me. I just sheathed my old one at the small of my back. I wasn’t intending to dual-wield them or anything, I didn’t have that kind of coordination.
Yet.
Honestly, I just wanted the backup.
When I was done with my preparations, I exited the cargo hold and headed up to the main deck. There, I found my companions standing around while Bella directed the crew with the preparations for the lifeboat. The sight of my friends gave me a moments pause. It had been a while since I had seen everyone dressed for battle. From Azarus’s full armor, to Sylvia’s enchanted leathers, to Venix’s robe. Hell, Grey was even wearing the black and silver outfit I’d seen him wear back on the march into Hollow Hill. He even had the sword he had told me was too strong for him in his weakened state, although he wasn’t carrying the staff. It was belted at his waist, radiating a subtle power. Aurum wasn’t much different, though. It seemed like he was always wearing his robes, although he was clutching his staff a bit nervously.
It seemed like they had finished prepping the boat as I joined the group. At Grey’s instruction, we all started piling into the boat that we would be using. The other one that the Thorny Reef had would be used by the crew to sneak onto the island for sabotage. As I was climbing into the boat, I had to catch Fade before he lept into the boat with us.
"Sorry, little guy," I told my pup with an apologetic tone. "You can't come with me, this time. I don't think you'd make it on the swim. You'll have to stay on the ship."
Fade huffed at my words, but still backed down. As he turned around to leave, I swear I could see a scheming look in his wolven eye. Which was ridiculous, right?
Right?
Bella shouted over to her crew from her position on the lifeboat next to me. “Curly!” She shouted. Curloch, who was standing not far from the railing of the ship, looked up. “Yer in charge! Give the bastards no quarter!”
Curloch gave a bellowing laugh at his Captains words, and gave a lazy salute. “Aye aye, Captain! Send those beasties to the hells fer me!”
Bella laughed in return, before gesturing to the crew. At her order, they dutifully began to lower the lifeboat onto the open ocean. Before long, the lifeboat had hit the water with an oddly dull plopping noise. Without even being asked, Venix grabbed both the left and the right oars on the boat with two of his arms and began to row us away from the Reef.
As we began to leave the ship behind, I saw the crew fully lower the sails and then begin to lower the mast as well. Without both of those, the profile of the Reef was much smaller and stealthier, which made sense to me. I watched as large oars sprouted from the sides of the brigantine, and started to row it away from us. Both of our groups had one ultimate destination.
The island of Caer Drarrow.
……………………………………..
The ride towards the island was oddly tense. I think most of us were psyching ourselves up for the possibility of a long day of tense battle. Hell, I know I was. The plan might not have been for us to fight our way through the prison and slaughter everyone we came across, but we still had to fight and kill a herd of Neptaurians and their Prime. We’d have to go through them before we even got into the prison.
The only people who didn’t look like they were mentally preparing themselves for battle were Bella and Venix. Bella just looked eager, while Venix was as stoic as usual. Strangely, I took a little comfort from my Antium companions steadfastness.
As we approached the island, the structure of the prison itself revealed itself to my eyes. If I could describe it in one word, I’d say ominous. It was built entirely of a pitch-black rock quarried into massive stones that shined in the fading sunlight. The actual construction itself was purely utilitarian, with not acknowledgment of aesthetics at all. Frankly, it almost reminded me of communist block architecture from back home. It was just one massive black cube, with openings in the walls for barred windows. There were five towers on the prison that I could see. One at each of the four sharp corners, with one larger tower in the center. I know it was silly, but it felt like the structure was judging us somehow on our approach, and we were found wanting.
Well fuck you too, you monument to misery. I was going to plunder your halls, soon enough.
It took us maybe half an hour for the rocky cliffs of the island to begin looming over us. Grey examined the rocky walls in front of us with narrowed eyes, before directing Venix to continue rowing farther up along them.
“Stop,” Grey said suddenly, causing Venix to cease rowing. He looked up and down the cliff face before nodding to himself. I looked as well, but I didn’t see anything special about the walls. The only thing I saw was the massive fortification of the prison looming over us. “Yes, this is it. Directly below this cliff face is the cavern.” He turned to face the group. “Into the water, now. It’s time for a brief jaunt beneath the waves.”
One by one, most of us did as he said, hopping off the side of the boat to swim in place in the water. The only two that didn’t were Sylvia and Aurum, which…made sense, now that I thought it. They were pure metal, and weren’t likely to float like Pete could. That guy was made of porous stone after all. Sylvia folded her arms, seeming like she was waiting for something, while Aurum smiled nervously at us.
Grey looked at the rest of us, swimming in the water next to us. “I will be ferrying our Sculpted companions. Make sure you follow us closely, else you become lost in the deep.” At that, he took a deep breath and clasped his hands in front of him, visibly concentrating on something. Seconds later, a visible bubble of air began to expand from his form, causing him to bob to the surface. The old man was now standing in a large bubble of air, seemingly strong enough to hold his weight and big enough for a few more people.
Entirely unconcerned, Sylvia hopped off of the boat and passed through the bubble without popping it. Once inside, she took a position next to her Father, and laid a hand on his shoulder. Aurum visibly took a deep, extraneous breath to calm his nonexistent nerves, and then followed suit and jumped off of the boat. He passed through the bubble as well, to stand on Grey’s other side. Once both Sculpted were standing in the bubble, Grey let out the breath he had been holding. The bubble stabilized to my eyes, even if it didn’t freeze or anything. From his position inside the weird bubble, Grey nodded at those of us swimming outside of it, before making a downwards gesture with his hand.
The bubble began to sink beneath the waves.
Those of us still on the surface look at each other for a moment in bafflement.
Bella grumbled. “Man couldn’t do that fer the rest of us?” She sighed before taking a deep breath, and diving.
Yeah, no kidding.
I followed her lead, and dove beneath the water. Azarus and Venix followed suit.
……………………………………..
Grey may have told us that the waters near Caer Drarrow were shallow, but they didn’t seem shallow to me. All around me the water was dark, and seemingly endlessly deep. If I was by myself, I don’t think I could have navigated this.
Luckily, I wasn’t.
Ahead of us, Grey had ignited a magical light of some kind in his moving bubble. Thank God, or else I couldn’t see an inch in front of my face. Even beyond the reach of his silvery light, all I could see was dark water.
Odd.
It wasn’t even fully night yet, on the surface.
Still, I and my group were able to follow Grey’s bubble on the short swim beneath the surface. It wasn’t long before he led us to a yawning mouth in the rock face, that must lead to the prison interior somehow. We passed through it no problem, although I almost wished I hadn’t. The minute that I passed through the underwater portal, the water changed.
The temperature plummeted, and the darkness around us grew pitch black.
The water hadn’t exactly been warm before, but now it was downright arctic. Even underwater as I was, it felt like the breath I was holding in my lungs could freeze solid any second. God, I could see small chunks of ice floating passed my eyes. That was almost the only thing I could see. Where before the waters were unnaturally dark, now it was like a veil of darkness had descended on the world. I couldn’t even see my fellow swimmers anymore.
I needed to get out of this water, and soon. Or else I felt like I was going to freeze to death.
Grey’s bubble was the only source of light in this darkness, and it had started moving upwards once we had passed through the entrance. I swam harder, and even managed to pass by Grey in my urgency.
I didn’t even see the surface of the water, before I breeched it along with the other swimmers. I was so stunned by hitting the surface that I involuntarily let out my breath, before taking in a shuddering new one.
I immediately regretted it.
The air in the cavern around me felt like it was even colder than the water I was swimming in. The breath I had taken in felt like glass running through my lungs it was so sharp.
To my side, Grey’s bubble hurtled out of the water like it had been shot from a cannon. It had visibly frozen over, obscuring those within. Thankfully, I could still see the light blaring out from the bubble, frosted as it was. The light from the bubble illuminated a rocky shore, moments before it impacted it. The bubble shattered with a sound akin to broken glass, as it hit the stone.
I didn’t see the impact though. I had immediately started swimming for the stony shore the moment the light had lit it up. I had to get out of this water.
When I reached the shore, I hung on to it sluggishly, almost too weak to pull myself out of the water. The cold was sapping my strength at an alarming rate. In a haze, I activated Sylvan Vigor at full power. Finally, with the strength granted from my skill, I managed to crawl onto the shore. I flopped onto, rolling onto my back with closed eyes, trying to catch my breath.
When I opened them again, I felt that breath freeze inside me. It wasn’t just the cold that was doing it, this time.
Although the ceiling was obscured in darkness, I could still see lights twinkling above me like malicious yellow stars. Only, they weren’t actually stars.
They were eyes.
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