The Grand Weave

I didn't spend too long in the safe area. If the time dilation was more substantial, I might have risked getting some sleep, but I knew Teddy and the others would worry about me. And needlessly worrying them was pointless. They were trying to help me, after all.

So, I got up and had Chomperz store away the camping gear I pulled out. Erebus was still resting on my head, so I returned him to my soulspace. His company was different compared to the other two, but it was still nice.

At one point, I decided to have a small competition with the little guy and pulled two blocks of wood from my inventory. They were emergency firewood blocks that I didn't truly have a use for, so I had no problem with using them for fun.

The challenge was simple: we would compete and see who could carve the best design. Since the blocks were about the size of a pringles can, it wasn't too daunting of a task.

Of course, my little knife could not compete with Erebus' razor-sharp legs. It made me realize how well in control the spider was, considering he never managed to cut me despite all the times he crawled on me. It was good to know he cared enough to be gentle, especially since he cut through the wood like it was butter.

I tried my best for a solid ten seconds before I had to shake my head and give it to the little guy. Even before he was finished, I could already tell he won, hands down. And when he did finish sculpting the wood like an artist during mania, I shivered.

It was a very detailed work of art, but that was the problem. He had sliced the wood block to something comfortably fitting in my hand. And on the top of the wood, wreathed in a crown of wooden bones, was a lifelike recreation of the Dread Guardian.

The three-eyed skull was sitting atop the hand of a giant skeleton surrounded by a dozen faces of skeletal monsters and beasts. He even went so far as to etch some of the runes that decorated the pillars of the summoning circle.

The wooden statue made me wince in the darkened temple room, with empty stairs leading upwards and downwards with unnatural gloom. It brought back a deluge of memories I preferred keeping hidden and buried. And I could almost feel phantom pain along my arms and legs just by looking at it.

For his part, Erebus proudly displayed his masterpiece, and I had to mentally squeeze the soul link to prevent my discomfort from bleeding through. Instead, I cheered the little guy on and praised his work before I had Chomperz store it away. After that, I was content to sit silently and rest my eyes.

But now that my rest was over, it was time to explore the second floor. If things got crazy, I would retreat and leave the dungeon. Now that my self-imposed challenge was finished, I was perfectly willing to bring Arturous with me and wreck some shit.

So I picked up my spear and summoned Zharia and Áine. They took up their usual positions, and we descended the stairs. The way down was shorter than the stairwell in the Burning Lake dungeon, so we reached the second floor rather quickly.

It looked mostly the same. The hallway was gloomy and lit by bright torches positioned every thirty meters. Water was about ankle high, and the same dark stone material that the first floor was made of was used on the second floor.

"What do you think, girls? More fish?" I asked while tapping my spear against the stone floor. It felt normal, so I stopped and hefted up my weapon.

"I hope so!" Zharia chirped.

"Yes," Áine whispered.

I let out an exaggerated sigh and started walking. Hopefully, the entire floor wasn't just a carbon copy of the same thing.

I was getting tired of fighting undead fish.

It was the exact same fucking thing. Long labyrinthian hallways were filled with an increasing level of water. And to make it worse, the actual cherry on top was the damn fish.

There was an increased number of them. Oh, so many of them. Instead of coming in pairs or trios like the first floor, they would be floating together in a school of five at minimum.

It drove us insane, not just me but also Zharia. At first, she kept her extreme dislike for the fish burning nice and strong, but after the fourth encounter, that rage dwindled to a tiny flame. It was hard to stay endlessly angry when every fight was the same.

By now, I could rush in and take two down quickly, followed by Zharia stalling the rest. I then race to my third monster while she renders the other fish useless as the strands they controlled become wet ash.

After that, finishing the rest and ending the fight was simple. We were an efficient team, applying continuous pressure on the crippled monsters. I could see why they counted as tier ones. While the phasing ability and the potential for multiple attacks from different fronts were initially scary, it was relatively simple the moment you disabled their strands.

It wasn't so easy that I came away from these encounters completely unscathed. In truth, during my initial blitz at the start of the fight, I usually got an injury or two from the second ghostfish while I was busy disabling the first. But, with Áine being the ever-vigilant guardian that she was, I was never worried. Any wound could be healed quickly, and even when I told her to hang back and wait, I could rely on the knowledge that she could fix me up when I was done.

All in all, the delve wasn't too horrible of a time. At least the second-floor ghostfish preferred attacking with super strands rather than multiples. It made destroying the strands harder, but it was also easier to kill its wielder after the initial volley.

So slowly but confidently, we made our way deeper into the dungeon. During the seventh and final encounter, something went wrong. Very wrong.

It started out normal enough. The dungeon must have thought a bit of spice was needed for our bland delve and decided to spawn in six ghostfish. The extra fish was a little concerning, but none of us were worried.

The usual tactic of us rushing in went smoothly. Zharia flew slightly ahead of me and was the first to make contact by unleashing a torrent of flames as wide as she could make it. A few of the strands that weren't pulled back immediately were turned to ash, and I lunged forward, hooking my spear into the spine of a ghostfish.

I continued my momentum by swinging the spear to the left and knocking the monster attached to my weapon into another, stunning them while giving me time to race forward. After I was within grabbing distance, I yanked back my spear and grasped the tail of the first monster. The skull came loose with a bit of spine attached.

Tossing it to the side, I had to quickly duck out of the way of a few strands shooting from below my neck. One scraped along the collar of my leather tunic, but that was it for damage. The usual grasp and pull silenced the second monster.

Easy work. Two down, four left.

During the dozen seconds it took me to take down the first two monsters, Zharia's golden flames lit up the hallway in its familiar glow. They were easy to ignore with my nightvision, and how often I was used to seeing it. However, I should have paid more attention to my surroundings.

It wasn't entirely our fault; the extra ghostfish was the first time we encountered a group larger than five since coming to the second floor. And all that confidence in our strategy and battle prowess meant nothing in the face of a sneak attack.

Right as I tossed away the remains of the second ghostfish, I heard a mental scream resound in my head. It was high-pitched and filled with agony. The sudden and overwhelming surprise of the situation made me freeze in place. That was when another wave of pain filtered through my soul link, and I clutched my head.

With near bloodshot eyes, something I noticed as I looked away from the water, I turned and saw Zharia fall into the water below.

Before she disappeared below the knee-high water, I saw that her wings on both sides had been sheared off, her tiny body dripping glowing, golden blood that faded away when it exited her body.

Time froze at that moment, and all I could focus on was the painful chirps that blasted inside my head and rippled through my soul. After her body became unseeable underneath the water, I lost all control.

I wasn't sure what happened, but pure rage, the kind that burned like lava and shifted my vision red, was all I could feel. It consumed my thoughts and replaced them with a single narrow focus. I wanted to kill.

It didn't matter what they did to try and stop me. I launched myself out of the water, charging them in blind fury.

Rip and tear, bite and pull, smash, burn, Smash, SMASH!

When I finally regained control of myself, I collapsed to my knees and let the water cover my head. I felt weak and exhausted, very exhausted. It was a bone-deep fatigue that made my muscles spasm even as I tried desperately to hold myself up.

On my head, I could feel cooling waves of energy penetrate my scalp and trickle down the rest of my body. It was pleasant and relaxing, but it was merely an afterthought, like a buzz in the back of my head that I could ignore in favour of regaining clarity.

As I gazed down, I noticed the water below me bubbling. My initial reaction was to panic, but I began to feel calm as I didn't see the ghostfish's humanoid skull appear from the gloom. I observed bubbles forming around my arms, and when I reflexively flexed my mana, a small burst of golden fire shot out between my fingers.

I continued to stare before light tapping started pelting the back of my head. With my brain fog mostly cleared, I finally pushed up and leaned back. My head breached the surface, and I inhaled the coppery air. Áine landed on my forehead before she collapsed.

Carefully, I picked up the delicate fairy with my right hand, being mindful of my sharp nails. Upon examination, I noticed her breathing was uneven, and her chest was rising and falling rapidly. I closed my eyes and checked her mana pool through our soul link, only to find it completely depleted. Concerned, I looked within my soulspace and discovered that my reserves were frighteningly low as well.

Standing up, I looked around and found scattered remains of the dungeon monsters bobbing along the water. There were more fragments than whole pieces; dozens and dozens of fragments surrounded each piece of bone. And every bone piece bigger than my finger had cracks and deep grooves scratched into it.

Beyond the ghostfish's scattered remains, the torch's flicker on the wall reflected on the water's surface, and I looked down. The water was tinted a light pink hue, spreading outwards for several feet. And I finally understood why I felt like shit.

Áine must have done everything she could to stabilize me, which meant she drew from my mana pool after depleting hers. That, combined with my activation of Spirit Lord's Invocation at some point, was enough of a mana sink that my physical status made sense. Strangely, though, I didn't feel cold.

Mana fatigue at this stage was usually enough to feel like I was drowned in a sea of freezing water, but I felt no absence of heat. I just felt tired and empty. Drained of all my energy, I wanted nothing more than to lie down and float in the water.

Instead of standing like an idiot in a potentially dangerous hallway inside a dungeon, I looked around for my spear before heading back toward the stairwell. I needed to get out of the dungeon before it decided to respawn the monsters back on the first floor.

I had to reluctantly return Áine to my soulspace. A part of me wanted the company. But I ignored that selfish thought and continued my long trek back. Zharia was my next concern, and I received no response when I tried to probe our link.

I wasn't even sure why I had used my skill, but the only thing that came to mind was it would have put Zharia in stasis. She couldn't truly be hurt, not as far as I knew. As a spirit, most of her body was mana-based, and as a familiar, she kept her soul inside my soulspace. This allowed her to use my mana as an anchor to the physical world. Any damage received was temporary.

That didn't stop the pain, though. Her body was connected and very real. And when I thought back to what happened, during the moment I felt her scream blanket my thoughts, I started to seethe. The anger quickly sputtered and died much like the flames along my fingers. There wasn't enough juice in the tank to run hot. My body was a sputtering engine running on empty with nothing but the dregs of spite and determination to keep me going.

Slowly, I made my way to the stairwell and into the safe area. I desperately wanted to stop and rest, but if I sat down, I wouldn't be getting back up. I had to leave, or I was going to be staying the rest of the day inside the dungeon.

When I finally made it near the entrance to the portal back, my body felt somewhat better but still exhausted. Luckily, the dungeon granted me mercy and only respawned a single pair of ghostfish near the exit. By then, my mana pool had mostly recovered, and I brute forced my way through.

Zharia would have been proud if she had been conscious at the time. I banged my spear on the wall as loudly as possible to attract the monsters' attention before tucking it under my arm. With both hands raised, I loosened the dam and poured as much mana through my channels as possible without injuring myself.

The flesh strands that came racing out of the gloom were erased, and the golden flames bit into the monsters' bones. Loud cracks and popping sounds echoed inside the hallway as my arms became flamethrowers.

When I finally lowered them, I could see the charred and blackened pile of bones sinking into the water. That managed to bring a smile to my face, even if I felt it was a waste not to loot the corpses. Loot was nice, but so was freedom and a nice long nap on the beach.

Maybe Arturous is up for another cuddle session. I thought idly as I dragged my feet past the burnt remains.

Pushing through the portal and letting the spatial energy embrace me without resistance, I closed my eyes and waited. It felt like an eternity as the portal took its sweet time transporting me back to Inoria. My thoughts kept straying to funny images of a giant bear in a swimsuit when the portal released its hold and spat me onto the temple floor.

There was a clambering noise in front of me, so I cracked open an eye with a look of annoyance plastered on my face.

Teddy and Celanae were there, along with Elder Aimon, who was staring at me with a deep frown. Teddy rushed over and activated his Aura of Restful Sanctuary. The golden light that radiated off the man was warm.

"Cyrus, what happened?" Teddy asked. Celanae stayed back, but the look of concern was evident on her face.

I patted Teddy's shoulders before squeezing my way past and stretching my arms out. After a quick twist of my torso, a loud series of pops sounded out, and I sighed, relieved. Now that I was safe, I undid my skill and focused on my connection with Zharia.

The feathers along my arms receded, and my halo of fire winked out. Soon, motes of light started to coalesce, and Zharia's physical form took shape. A new wave of pain punched my brain, and I grabbed her injured form with lightning reflexes. I undid the summoning skill and returned her to my chest.

With her body gone, a single drop of golden blood flashed dimly on my finger before fading away. With gritted teeth, I looked up and clenched my fist. Anger had surged briefly, but it died within a heartbeat.

Turning to the other people in the room, I attempted to smile but gave up as it felt like too much effort. Instead, I dawned a sad smirk and waved my hand. "Too much fun in the dungeon. I'm going to go pass out on the beach with Arturous. Taa-taa!"

With that, I made my way down the hallway and up the temple stairs. The others could be heard whispering fiercely behind me, but I didn't care to try and make out what they were saying. They could interrogate me after a nice, long nap.