Celestine glanced around at the various signs of battle. Well, truthfully there weren’t so many signs of battle as they were signs of slaughter. At least, that’s what she thought of it personally, but it was kinda hard to tell with her untrained eye.

“That is a spell of great interest,” Cel commented as Joen explained a pretty cool spell concept to her. “I am actually having the magic of illusions myself, but I did not do an invention of a clever spell like that.” From what she’d seen of the spell system, it was very modular. Spells consisted not of larger, complete spells (aside from the beginner ones), but smaller components, which fit together like the cogs of a machine.

“I am liking the system of casting of the spells,” Celestine continued, exploring the menu further to try and find out how Joen had made such a cool spell. “It is of great uniqueness, how you can do a crafting of a spell which is of your’s and your’s alone. I wish I had enough of the skills to be using these greater ones,” she admitted, glancing at the top-tier spell components with a twinkle in her eye. “Right now, I do not think I am even of enough energy to be doing the casting of one.”

Figuring she’d dreamily poured over her future prospects enough, Cel ran up to Joen as he pointed something out to her on the nearby minecart. “It is a very large scratching of the minecart,” she pondered, glancing at the bloodstain as well. That - on the other hand - looked to be a totally normal size, though it was not the most normal shape… not that she’d seen enough to compare. “I am thinking you are of correction,” she agreed, nodding her head slightly.

Celly’s ears twitched, as she picked up a distant sound echoing from deep into one of the side tunnels. There was also a high pitched squeaking - or perhaps ringing - that she was picking up. She’d originally thought it was just her imagination: it was so high pitched it didn’t even sound like a proper tone. It was then that she remembered something: cats were able to pick up sounds that were of a much higher pitch than humans were normally able to hear. Was it possible they translated that into the game ears? Then…

“I am thinking it is the sounding of a bat,” she guessed, tilting her ears forward to try and filter in more of the sound. It was unnerving, being able to hear sounds that weren’t even physically possible in reality otherwise. She nodded as Joen suggested the path from which the sound was coming. “Okay. We will do the direction of the bat soundings,” she agreed, following just behind him.

 

Step by step drew the duo ever closer to the heart of the mountain, with every step the vast cave system became less and less of a mystery. Joen loved this, no he lived for this, this was exactly the reason he began to play this game in the first place. The excitement of the unknown, the danger that could be waiting for them around every corner. Having seen the scene of slaughter back at the mining camp had set Joen on edge, he could almost feel the adrenaline racing through his veins.

Joen came to a sudden halt, tilting his head and strained his hearing as if it would allow him to hear better to do so. He could have sworn that he had heard something in the stillness, something different from the leathery wings he had heard earlier. Joen was grateful for the light that was cast about from the large fireball that he had conjured, it made traveling through the cave easier but it also alerted every creature within the cave to their presence long before they actually arrived.

Joen continued to stand there listening for the sound that he could have sworn he heard, and then there is was again, it sounded like some form of chittering. Turning his head Joen narrowed his eyes and looked down one of the caverns that they had decided not to go down, that was where the sound was coming from and that was when he noticed something. From in the darkness Joen could detect movement before a long and hair leg extended out from the darkness of the cavern and into the light created by the miniature sun above.

Another leg emerged from the darkness before the face of the most enormous arachnid that Joen had ever seen came into view, the sound that he had heard came from its fangs clattering together. Quickly Joen retreated across the open space of the mining camp away from the spider before turning to look at his companion "Okay, this thing is gross", turning his attention back to the spider Joen narrowed his eyes before sighing slightly "looks like another fight for us". Lifting his arms Joen prepared himself for what was about to come "Damen nal ta!", Joen shouted out the magical incantation for a spell from his Hydromancy spellbook, the Water Slicer spell. Moving his hand a arc of water followed its travel through the air before slicing through the front right leg of the arachnid, severing it completely "Haha take that you filthy spider"

 

Celestine bumped straight into Joen as he suddenly stopped with no warning. It was a tame bump: easy to shake off. What was he doing? Some sort of tracker thing? She had thought he was a magician, not a hunter. That was the benefit of having the cat ears, she supposed. She could tilt them, and flop them, and reposition them, all without even moving the rest of her head. She could also pet them - though it wasn’t as satisfying petting yourself - ...but that was a thought for another day.

She stood there and waited… and waited, as second after second ticked by. “Umm…” she started to hum quietly, expecting some sort of response. It was then that she started to pick it up too: a soft sort of clicking, or maybe chittering was a better word for it. She glanced down the tunnel at the source, noticing nothing until a hideous, dark appendage crawled into view. Blech.

The one leg led to another until she was finally able to see the whole things: a massive spider creature crawling its way towards them. “Eww eww EWW,” she shouted, backing away from it! Just imagining herself getting tangled up in a massive web and slowly devoured was by far the most disgusting, vile and horrifying way of dying she could imagine. Even if the pain was lessened by the system to a little stinging, the experience of it would easily make up for the lack of pain.

“How can you be so calm!?” She glanced over at Joen with a mix of admiration and astonishment. Sure he’d agreed it was gross, but that hardly covered it. How could he just stand there and casually drop a ‘time for another fight’ like it was nothing?! It was as her voice echoed back to her through the deep caverns that she’d realized something: she’d dropped her accent… just for a moment. “W-well we will just have to be doing a fight then,” she relented, trying to cover for her earlier mistake.

Celestine backed away as the beast began to charge for them, taking the complete loss of a leg as a pretty obvious sign of aggression. As she did so, she began to chant the most damaging spell she’d memorized, admittedly at the cost of a little homework. “Lightning Bolt!” It was the same old spell she’d used before, and - though it easily connected with the beast to send a jolt through its body, it was just barely enough to slow the thing down.

“AAAHHHHHH!” Seeing her spell completely fail to do any major damage to the oncoming storm of nasty arachnid legs, Celestine finally broke down into a shriek of terror and bolted at full speed down the tunnel. With her acrobatics, she was able to tear down the cave without too much difficulty, though it seemed - in her terror - she’d abandoned Joen for the time being to fight the thing alone.

 

Joen turned his attention away from the monstrosity of nature and placed it upon his Felic companion and chuckled slightly at her amazement and questioning of how he managed to stay calm in the face of that monster. However it was her question that made him notice something, her accent was gone, so it wasn't a real accent something she probably did as a character portrayal then. Joen couldn't really blame her, it was a role-playing game after all so he couldn't fault anyone for anything that they did to portray their character.

Now wasn't exactly the time for that as he turned his attention back to the gigantic arachnid once again, Joen chuckled softly as he looked at the seven legged spider. The amusement of seeing the single solidarity stump of a leg kept causing Joen to chuckle, although he had to admit he wondered how he wasn't terrified in the face of this abomination. Instead of terror or panic, he felt wonder and amazement over how an insect could grow to be so large. A lightning bolt arced through the air and collided with the spider, damage that the arachnid seemed to simply shrug off as if it was nothing.

Apparently watching the arachnid completely brush off her spell as if it was nothing more than an annoyance was the final straw for his companion, it frayed her nerves passed the breaking point. With a scream that followed her down the corridor she sprinted away from the arachnid and Joen, leaving him to deal with the creature alone. A dry chuckle left his mouth as he focused on the task at hand and balled his hands into a fast as he readied himself.

Joen back-stepped in time with the arachnids advances upon him keeping his distance from the creature, Joen had learned early on that a magic user shouldn't engage in close combat. Narrowing his eyes Joen broght his hands up and aimed them at the arachnid in-front of him "Kiranann miopiar du!", once the last syllable of the magical invocation was spoken the water between his hands froze and condensed itself into the shape of a spike before flying through the air and embedding itself in the right eye-socket of the arachnid, a trick that seemed to work really well on the frog.

As the spike of ice found its mark the giant arachnid let out a pained roar of rage and charged the Yladian Sorcerer, its pincers attempting to clamp down upon him. Joen however raised his hands and grabbed them as the arachnid lifted him off the ground and pinned him against the wall causing Joen to grunt slightly as his back was slammed into the damp stony wall. As Joen looked the arachnid in its once good eye he grinned slightly, even in that precarious situation he managed to keep his calm, "Vimi ya aran tasarak!" taking a deep breathe in Jeon exhaled a stream of fire directly into the arachnids face, the flames eating through its flesh. With a pained screech the arachnid released Joen and retreated across the cavern shaking its head the best it could in an attempt to put of the fires that remained lit upon its face.

As the arachnid retreated Joen dropped to his feet and then advanced upon the creature, he was determined that it wouldn't leave the cavern alive. If he let the abomination survive there would always be the chance that it would return and attack them later when their guards were lowered at a later date. "Ithikitalkus maldifidii miopiar!" lifting his arms up once again a large stream of flames washed over the body of the arachnid, its screams of pain and rage echoing down all of the corridors before its body fell to the ground, smoke rising from its crispy as the flames died away. Joen looked at the crisp carcass of the arachnid and chuckled slightly his breathe coming raggedly and heavy, a few beads of sweat rolling down his forehead "Well that was fun" turning away from the corpse Joen looked down the corridor his companion had sprinted down "I suppose I should catch up with her haha" and with that he set off down the corridor.

95 HP

MAX HP

65 EN

MAX EN

 

Celestine continued to run and run, farther and farther down the tunnel. It became increasingly dark with the lack of Joen’s sun spell, and the only light to be seen was her tiny little illusory flame. Luckily, it did a good enough job of holding back the blackness as she tore her way into it. It wasn’t like she could get any more panicked than she already was… probably. After several seconds of bolting away from the horrific creature, Cell finally burst back into the large mining camp area, panting.

She stole a glance back down the cave. There was a very distant, flickering light far down the tunnel, hinting that Joen was still doing battle with the beast. Sheepishly, she fidgeted there, feeling relatively safe from the large distance. There was just one problem: he was down there fighting on his own, and she’d bolted. Left him alone to fight it. In essence: she’d just played the traitor and abandoned him.

…

Then again, not all protagonists were heroes, were they? She could name plenty of protagonists she loved that would abandon a friend in a heartbeat. Villains and scum - sure - but still protagonists, and still very interesting. No, abandoning him wasn’t something to feel guilty over… not unless it made her more interesting anyway. She would just… kinda… wait here. In the safety.

Wandering over to the toppled minecart, Celestine brushed some of the dirt and grime off of the side, hopping up onto the side, taking a seat. She stared at the tunnel entrance, occasionally glancing around to make sure there were no spiders sneaking up on her from another tunnel. She idly swung her legs back and forth, waiting for Joen to come and get her… if he even survived.

 

Joen slowly made his way through the corridor that his companion had bolted down in her terror, his mind raced with all the things he was going to do to her once he finally caught up to her. His anger slowly started to die off as he thought about it, she was a girl after all and he didn't know many girls who liked even your normal tiny spiders, how long she had been able to stand in front of a massive arachnid that stood taller than both of them was actually rather impressive now that he thought about it. His Greater Illumination spell banishing every shadow from the corridor as he made his way along it length.

It only took Joen a couple of minutes before he came across another large open cavern, looking around at the abandoned equipment as well as seeing the occasional ragged and torn tent only led him to the conclusion that this was another part of the former mining operation that had at one point been inside of this cave system. Looking down Joen finally noticed that how damaged and tattered his robes had become as they now revealed the chiseled muscular flesh beneath, it also appeared that some of the arachnids venom had been secreted upon his robe and ate away at it in an acidic fashion. Groaning slightly he tilted his head back and looked up at the ceiling of the cave and shook his head "Infernal cave, this had become way more difficult that I originally had imagined it to be".

Turning his attention back to the scene around him his eyes landed upon the Felis female who had abandoned him to battle the arachnid alone, she was sitting upon the side of one of the mining carts swinging her legs idly without a care in the world, anger flashed up within his stomach once again before dying down once more, it wouldn't do for him to get into a fight with his companion in the middle of this cave after all, strolling up to her slowly he chuckled slightly looking at her "Well I didn't eat that one haha"

 

Celestine turned attention back to the cave as she began to hear footsteps approaching again. By the way they sounded and the lack of creepy crawly sounds, she guessed it was - in fact - Joen having come back victorious. She sighed in relief. “Did you do the spider a death,” she asked, hopping back down from the minecart. Celly didn’t look half as guilty for running as perhaps she should’ve. It was more like she had just been waiting for the conclusion, and was glad he’d survived.

“You are not looking of the best health,” she commented, noticing the venom ‘stains’ - if they could be called that - that had eroded away parts of his clothing. She knew she should have felt worse, looking at his battered state, but she just… didn’t. Instead, she was just really glad she didn’t have to fight that vile beast herself. “Uuummm…” she started, not sure quite how to form the right words, “it looks like you did a good fighting.”

She smiled back as his anger seemed to fade. This was a very nice companion to have: one who didn’t mind taking a fight on himself. “I would be a little worried if you did an eating of that thing,” she offered, shuddering at the mere thought of him chomping on a massive spider leg. It was a vile thought, and one she never wanted to have shoved her in mind again.

“Well...” she started, looking to relax the tension between them. “Let us be doing a travel down another tunnel then. I am thinking this is a good direction,” she suggested, pointing down the opposite tunnel. From the anxious way she was glancing down the tunnel Joen had come from, it looked like she was trying to get as far away from ‘the spider tunnel’ as possible.

 

Joen dropped down onto the mining cart next to the Felis and closed his eyes slightly, a small yawns escaping his mouth as he looked at his companion. Chuckling he shook his head at how she seemed to be completely unapologetic about leaving him behind to fight that spider, although he had to admit fighting that creature had given him so many ideas for his book. The fight with the spider had taken quite a bit out of him using three spells in rapid succession like that, while he was getting a better handle on the spell casting system with every spell that he used he was still limited in how many he could use by the amount of Energy that he had, sitting there he begun to wonder if there was anyway to increase that.

Joen sat there for a minute allowing himself to rest after his solo battle with the spider when a small smile spread across his face and an idea came to mind. Looking up at his companion Joen snapped his finger and uttered a single word "Sular", this single word acted as a magical invocation for a very weak Pyromancy spell known as Spark, all Spark did was just that which was cause a small spark of a fire that lasted only a fraction of a second. This spark flashed to life at the tip of the females feline tail, it wasn't large enough to cause her any real damage but only make a sensation like that of getting pinched rather hard and leaving behind the smell of burning hair, chuckling Joen looked at her "That was for leaving me behind".

Now that he had gotten that out of the way he slowly rose back up to his feet and stretched slightly looking down the corridor that she had suggested "Well I suppose that way is as good as any other way, lets just hope there aren't anymore of those spiders in here". Looking down the tunnel he gave a small nod before setting out into the dark unknown, well it wasn't really the dark unknown thanks to his Greater Illumination spell but what laid down its path remained a mystery all the same. Step by step drove the duo of adventures away from the smoking corpse of the spider but there was a new sound upon the air, it sounded like small scurrying footsteps and high pitched voices, turning his head Joen looked back at his companion and sighed "There sure is a shit ton of things living in this cave. I can see why the mining company decided to abandon its camp here, nothing is worth constantly fighting every three steps"

 

Celly jumped a bit as Joen dropped down beside her onto the mining cart. She relaxed again though, as she realized he was yawning. Oh good, maybe he was just a generally calm guy like that. Still, he was so close with all that spider goo on his clothes… it was so nasty, and knowing where it came from just made it worse. She shimmied over a bit further, trying to avoid getting it rubbed on her. Finally, she just couldn’t take sitting next to him anymore and stood up, backing away a little bit.

She watched him, casually at first, but then a little impatiently as time went on. How long was he going to sit there? And what was with the smile… it was just creepy. She tried to ignore it and focus on something else as he rested there, but her mind was jostled back with the snap of his finger and the minor incantation. What was that supposed to d-- actually… what was that strange warm sensation? It was a warm stinging coming from… her tail maybe? One of the three cat part she wasn’t used to having. Turning around, her eyes caught it immediately: a little flame on her tail.

“Eep!”

Grabbing her tail, she shook it around, fanning out the flames with a violent swing. Once it was finally down to a smokey little smoldering, she whipped around, hands on her hips, and glared back at Joen. “You could have done a follow of me if you were of worry,” she accused, growling! It was actually a cat-like thing to do. How ironic. The way he was smirking there after singeing her precious tail was honestly starting to get on her nerves at this point. It wasn’t cute after having scorched her tail fur: it was just rude.

Sighing, she finally let it go, following after him. It was hard to stay mad when he had technically just fought back a massive spider for her and was actively dealing with the dark. “Yes, I am doing a hope for that too,” she answered him on the spider issue. “I am really of hating the spiders. They are the opposite of the cuteness. Nasty, crawly, creepy, blech.” Every so often, Celestine would pivot to check behind her, just to make sure nothing nasty was following along. Seeing a spider down the cave was bad enough, but to be snuck up by one was far, far worse.

Then, her ears picked up a new sound ahead with a cute little wiggle. It almost sounded like a series of whispering voices, actually no: that was exactly what it sounded like. Ignoring her companion’s comment, she pushed forward father into the cave and barely caught a quick flash of red dart behind a rock. Boosting forward with a quick, magically enhanced burst of wind, she grabbed what felt like a rubbery string and hoisted a larger object up along with it: it was a small red creature, with horns, piercing yellow eyes, and a little pitchfork. What she’d grabbed was its forked tail.

“EEEeeeee!” Celestine’s face put on a blissful smile, and she immediately grabbing the rest of the small, devilish creature in her arms, squeezing it tight in a hug. It was a frantic, obsessive, firm hug that might have resembled a grapple more than a cuddle if she didn’t proceed to start rubbing her cheek on its face.

“Do a look, Joen! Is he not of the adorableness?” She glanced in his direction, holding the imp up by her shoulder. It was at this point that the imp regained its bearings from the stunning cuddlefest and began to show its true nature, drawing the pitchfork back to try and stab it directly in Celly’s face. Unfortunately for her, she didn’t even realize, as she was too busy paying attention to Joen.

 

As the duo delved deeper into the cave system Joen began to notice something, with every step he seemed to loose more and more of his sense of direction, he couldn't tell if he was going north or south anymore. Allowing his eyes to stray from the path ahead of them to the walls of the cave noticing something, and what he discovered caused his eyes to widen slightly. Running all along the walls of the cave were veins of silver ore "So that's what they were mining down here, silver huh". Joen brought his attention back to the task at hand just as his companion pushed ahead of him, at first he thought she had been injured by something when she let out a squeal before he noticed that it was one of delight.

Spinning around he noticed that she now had a rather hideous creature grasped tightly within her clutches, it was deminitive in stature but had all of the physical characteristics of a demon. It was an imp that she was clutching like a schoolgirl with a new plushie toy, at her question he promptly shook his head in a negative "No, that thing is hideous". Watching the creature closely Joens eyes widened slightly as he noticed that the devilish dwarf was getting ready to strike her directly in the face with its pitchfork, he knew that if he was to prevent this from happening he was going to have to act quickly "Miopiar igira", Joen quickly spit out the magical invocation needed for one of his Hydromancy spells. The water molecules in the air surrounded the little beast instantly froze trapping the creature and its weapon in a small layer of ice, the point of its pitchfork less than an inch from her right eye.

Noticing that his companion was no longer in harms way a sigh could not only heard but could physically leaving his body, his shoulders slumped and his muscles visibly relaxed "oh crap that was close". Turning his attention back to the little beast that was now frozen solid Joen began to wonder something "was this what drove the miner from this cave, or was it that spider?". Hearing a sound come from behind them caused Joen to slowly turn around only to groan slightly as he was confronted with the sight of about another dozen imps in the corridor behind them "well it looks like he had friends"

 

“What do you mean he is of hideousness,” Celestine asked, clearly not seeing eye-to-eye. “It is like a person of littleness! Is that not right, little gu— eep!” She turned her head to finally notice the jabbing attack too late. Luckily, Joen was right in time to freeze the creature in his tracks, saving her eye from a painful poking.

“Hey! That was not of cuteness,” she scolded the imp. “You are of the dead to me, little creature. Not even your size of smallness can make you be of cuteness when you are doing a stab of my eye.” Angrily, she threw the frozen imp on the ground, where it ‘clunked’ there like an ice cube. To really drive the point home, she gave it a swift kick down the tunnel, which it bounced about from rock to rock.

It was then - at this point - that she noticed a few things about the cave. Firstly: the walls were now lined with pretty streaks of a lighter color: she figured that meant some kinda ore. Second, there was an army of imps behind Joen. The second bit was obviously a little more important to be noticing, but the silver was still a cool bit. Too bad she couldn’t just yank a chunk out of the wall: with their luck, they’d need it when then started running into werewolves.

“You stupid abominations of the cuteness,” she shouted at the remaining imps behind Joen! “How dare you waste your smallness with the behavior of the uglies!” They glanced back at the strange girl with confused looks that quickly turned to devilish grins. Naive girls like this were always the funnest to pick on, but there was something about her that made them anxious. A fire burning inside.

Whipping out her menu, she cranked the ‘MP Assignment’ slider on her Aeromancy mastery all the way to the right and hit ‘assign.’ Her menu was instantly bombarded by a flurry of congratulating messages as she shifted through her spell list. It didn’t take her long to find the right one, chanting the necessary incantation right away.

“Chaaaaain LIGHTNING!”

She held out two fingers like a gun, which began to spark violently. A second later, and a powerful shot of electricity blasted from them, delivering a devastating shock to everything on that side of the cave in a bright flash of white… including Joen. On the bright side, with their incredibly low HP, it managed to completely fry all but two of the imps. Just like before, Celestine glanced over at the target of her friendly fire without that much remorse. This time though, it was for a different reason.

“I am guessing now we are of evenness,” she excused, giving her tail a sassy swish. Truthfully, in terms of raw power, it was nowhere near a fair exchange. Perhaps her tail was just sensitive. “Do not do the burning of my tail again, please.” Truth be told, hitting him was a total accident, but he had it coming anyway, so she’d just accept it and move on down the darn cave.

 

Joen stood there and narrowed his eyes as he looked at the small army of miniature devil creature, a small sigh escaped his lips as he shook his head. Even in the real world he absolutely hated Imps, they were always depicted as hideous little creature with horrible temperaments and boy the did the creators of Terrasphere Online get that part right. Joen listened as his companion began to yell at the little creatures because of the actions of their friend, although he supposed he would be rather upset also if something had tried to stab him in the eye.

What he wasn't ready for was the massive electrical jolt the poured through his body however, every muscle in his body locked up and flexed. As the electrical current ripped through his body he convulsed slightly before dropping to his knees when the current finally ceased. Smoke rose from from his body as he looked down at his now almost completely destroyed robes and groaned slightly, hearing a sound he lifted his head and noticed that two of the imps hadn't been killed by the massive electrical current that had ravaged his body and dispatched the other imps. Reaching into the destroyed folds of his left robe sleeve he pulled out a wand, it had been crafted from ash-wood with a bone core, a wand that he had crafted himself. Pointing the wand at the remaining two imps he gave it a small flick and a large fireball shot from its tips and reduced the last to remaining imps to nothing more than smoking skeletal remains.

Raising to his feet Joen turned his head and looked at his companion slightly before coughing up a small amount of smoke and shook his head "I would have to say on pure power of the spells used, we are far from even but if we start fighting here we will never make it out of this blasted cave" turning his attention away from her he looked further down the caves tunnel "I hope this damn thing ends soon"

 

Celestine nodded at Joen’s offer of peace. At least that’s what it sounded like. “Yes, this is a cave of great bigness,” she remarked, glancing down into the spooky darkness that lay beyond the comforting light of Joen’s little sun. “But I would like to be seeing the ending of it though,” she admitted, once again continuing on down the tunnel. “Maybe there is a treasure of many shinies.”

The next few minutes were just more and more uneventful tunnels. Occasionally, the monotony of blank, grey walls would be broken up with an abandoned minecart or a broken pickaxe, but mostly it was just nothing. Celestine yawned. She stole a look at Joen. He looked so into this whole adventuring deal. A whole lot more than she did. At this point, she just wanted to explore something grander than a dark cave, but really, everyone had to start somewhere.

“Hey, Joen,” she called over to him, “What kind of the stories do you like to do the writing of anyway? Ya know, like... the characters. Are they of the plucky, quirky kind, or are they of the more quiet and sensitive kind, or… what kind of persons do they do the focusing on?” The question seemed very honest like she very much wanted to know, but like there was something more to it. As if she wasn’t only asking out of curiosity, but for a much deeper and personal reason.

“What do you think makes the characters be of more interest,” she continued to ask? “Why do people do the liking of them more than the real people?” She paused a moment, letting the silence sink in. After a moment, she paled a little, looking down at the cavern floor. What a stupidly awkward thing to say. “Or maybe not… liking better than the real peoples, but… um… I am not sure. They are of more excitement I guess?”

 

As the duo made their way even deeper into the bowels of the cave Joen had to admit that after coming this far he would regret not seeing this task through to the end. He was thankful for the spell that he had cast to illuminate their path, this far underground he could only imagine how all encompassing the dark would be should its fire go out, with all the creatures that they duo had already come across Joen didn't relish the idea of trying to make his way in the dark. He had to admit that his companion had a point, perhaps at the end of all of this there would be a treasure that made it all worth it, one could only hope.

For the first time the duo of adventures had a small peace, the next several minutes were completely uneventful something that Joen was every thankful for. Up until this point it seemed that the two of them would be constantly fighting one kind of beast or another all the way to the end of this cave without a break. Here and there they would come across more signs that a mining operation had once been within the walls of this cave, a broken pick ax here, an abandoned mining cart there but for the most part the cave was completely empty. Joens eyes twinkled and sparkled with the excitement of the adventure, the thrills that he had been experiencing were exactly the reason he had chosen to enter this virtual world.

Joen looked over at his companion when she spoke to him, a soft chuckle escaping his lips as he looked up towards the ceiling of the cave "I write fantasy novels, A Dragons Breathe, The Song of the Fire Knight, The Dreams of the Arch-mage, every book is made up of dozens of characters, each one completely unique. Its not just the characters that keep someone to continue reading, but its the world that you transport them to. A good book allows you to escape your reality and live the adventures of another world at least that is my belief." turning his head back he looked at his companion and smiled slightly "But with the invention of VRMMORPGs I think books will become a thing of the past, who wants to read about another world in a book when you can put on a headset and go and explore another world yourself?"

 

“Well I would,” Celly answered Joen with a shrug. “I am still doing a liking of this Terrasphere, but it doesn’t do a replace of the book. Not to me.” She paused a moment. Not just the characters… but the world they’re placed in. Did that sound right? She wasn’t sure, but here she was, hearing it from an actual author. The only big question remained: how could she take such a profound truth and apply it to herself? It sounded kind of impossible. After all: she couldn’t control or create the entire world around her. No; whatever she needed to do, she needed to do it on her own.

“Maybe it is in how fast they are when you do a compare to this world,” she pondered. “You can do a skip to all the parts of interest… as a writer of the books. And for the characters to really pop, they need to do a suffer. That sounds like a great pain to be having that is better to do a read of than to do an experience of. Am I making any of the senses?” She paused to look to Joen for confirmation.

“I am sorry. I was not meaning to do a long think out loud like that. My thinkings just got a bit carried away from myself,” she excused, shaking her head and giving her cheeks a few soft slaps with her hands. “Anyway, this cave cannot be doing a continue for much longer, yes? We should be near of the end, and then we will be to the next part of interest in our story.” She ran ahead a few steps and spun to give Joen a little wink, before turning forward again to press on.

As Celestine did turn around again, however, she found the ground underneath her to suddenly be… well… ‘not there’. Flailing back to avoid a terrible topple forwards, she ended up falling back onto the rocky ground, breathing heavily as she gazed ahead. It was a massive cave opening that the smaller tunnel had led into. More importantly, the tunnel had led into it in the form of a massive cliff, as they were at least 20 feet up from the ground of the opening.

Thanks to Joen’s illumination spell, the bottom of the opening shimmered with the golden yellow color, making it abundantly clear that this was some kind of underground lake - or at the very least - a large pond. From the ripples, they could tell that there was some kind of flow to it. It just wasn't too obvious where they were coming from. Drops of water? Fishies underneath? Water inflow?

“Whew… I know I did the saying that sufferings make the characters of more interest, but...” she trailed off. The thought really didn’t need to be completed for it to be downright obvious. “Oh, by the way, I need to be doing a read of one of your books one of the times,” she mentioned, almost completely ignoring the near-death situation she was in a moment ago. “Anyway, what are we to be doing about the cave of many waters…?”

She gazed directly down off the cliff. It looked curved enough to be climbable if either of them wished to risk it. On the other hand, the cave walls also looked shiny and wet - and thus - probably slippery as well. At the bottom, there did appear to be a bank of solid ground the two of them could stand on. The problem was simply getting there...