Chapter 638: Trickery
Mason soon understood why Lilith had called this place a ‘swamp’. It stunk like rot and waste. The floor was wet, shallow mud, the ‘walls’ more like densely packed thorn bushes. But there was nothing natural about any of it.
Mason’s arrows would cost mana, and his passive boost wasn’t active. He clenched his teeth and walked on, not sure if he should summon Streak or Stag.
Figuring it was a ‘planar’ area, he settled on the Stag and mentally clicked. It came back with some kind of red error. He narrowed his eyes and clicked again, and felt the beast’s stubborn resistance through their bond. He remembered it had told him it wouldn’t enter the Whispering Wood for any reason, and shook his head before trying Streak.
The wolf materialized with what looked like an undead giant’s femur in its mouth. It dropped it and met his eyes with a happy growl, looking around and sniffing with excitement.
“This place is really gross and dangerous and you don’t just go around eating whatever you find. Is that clear?”
He sighed because the answer was ‘I understood, but I probably won’t do what you say’. The wolf’s vastly superior sense of smell also started to filter information into Mason’s brain, and made him frown.
There were living creatures in here. Possibly fey creatures. The hag had talked about slave collars, and he had a feeling nothing would from the fey would be here ‘willingly.’
He also remembered Lilith had asked for the hag’s son to die, and he was getting the feeling he’d be more comfortable with that than originally anticipated. Seemed like a dungeon ‘optional’, if he could find it.
“If it has a collar on its neck, don’t just kill it,” he said to Streak, this time with more command. The wolf growled its understanding, and he willed it to lead him towards the scent.
They squished and stepped their way through the muddy ground, vast senses tuned for any change. Mason could hear things moving through the floor and roof. Streak could smell other less savory things than fey creatures.
Neither were surprised when the ceiling eventually broke open. Some kind of dark brown worm came twisting out, mandible-like jaw reaching for Streak.
The wolf bit one side of the thing’s jaw and yanked. In a few seconds it had the worm’s long, disgusting body pulled out to drop and splatter on the floor. Mason crossed in a blur and slashed off its head with his longer Claw.
“I mean…yeah it stinks.” He gave the wolf a shrug. “But it didn’t explode or anything. Not so bad.”
The wolf huffed and snorted, leaving the corpse untouched. Mason felt his eyebrows raise. When Streak didn’t try and eat you, you were truly fucking disgusting. He did his best to step around the worm, but they only got a few paces before the roof noises turned into a constant stream.
The dirt above them started to tremble, then drop dust. Mason sighed before the first worm ripped through another hole, swinging around blindly with its spike-covered maw.
“Yeah,” he muttered as more started to drop. “I deserved it.”
They rushed and started biting and hacking. Streak complained and sometimes spit after a deep bite, doing his best to just use his also obviously upgraded claws. Mason whirled through the corridor making new worm segments as the creatures showed themselves.
“The floor,” he called, feeling it moving now too. “Get ready.”
Streak whined and leapt forward as they both decided ‘get the fuck out of here’ seemed like the right strategy. Holes ripped open beneath and above them, more and more of the slimy creatures swinging and biting at anything they could reach, including each other.
Man and wolf slashed and ran through the worm gauntlet a long ways before Mason decided something was wrong. They’d gone a considerably distance way with no change, and something about the constantly shifting mud gave him pause.
It was bubbling and moving, and it stunk just like the worms. Not close. Exactly. He was also feeling a stronger and stronger density of the stink. Like it was physically entering his skin and lungs.
Somehow, the corridor was repeating itself. And building some kind of miasma. The mud was regenerating the worms, re-growing them. And every death was building poison or something in the air.
In other words, it was some kind of trap. He stopped and stared at the bramble-like walls.
“No,” he said as Streak quirked his head and realized the plan, spitting out worm flesh. “It’s not going to be pleasant.”
He turned and slashed at the brambles hopelessly, then just smashed straight into it.
Barbs sharp as knives scratched and pierced. He kept his head down to protect his face, moving step after step into the thorns. His resistances started to flare, warning about a ‘magic bleed’ and ‘essence drain’ and something about ‘mana burn’.
Apex Predator changed his affinity to elemental, which seemed to help. Pain raked his skin anywhere he wasn’t covered by armor or tattoo. But it was just pain. And Mason was very used to pain.
Streak followed behind him, the bramble wall breaking and snapping apart as he pushed through. Despite the growing agony, he heard something moving in the brambles, too. Chittering voices of excitement. Predators that smelled his dripping blood.
Transformation was already hardening his flesh. He kept his Sleeve-armored arms up, growling as something caught under his armpit and tore flesh. Foot after foot he pushed into the wall, not waiting for whatever creatures were coming.
He heard them rushing and yipping in surprise, trying to catch him. How they could move in the thorns he had no idea, but they were still coming. The first got in his path and he heard a whistling sound as it shot something like a blow dart.
More thorns struck his chest, his poison resistance going wild.
They didn’t matter. He couldn’t fight in this. He pushed faster and harder, tearing skin and flesh with his own power as he sprinted through something like a car wash made of knives.
He finally burst through into more swamp with a roar, the hag cackling somewhere distant, laughter echoing in his ears. But he could hear the concern. The anxiety. The forced mockery that hid disbelief that he’d done what he did.
He glanced at a dozen pathways and saw no immediate danger, spinning and summoning his bow.
He loosed a Power Shot right over Streak’s head, cycling fire arrows as he scanned the brambles with his Mark. He saw small, bark-skinned creatures hopping through the brambles and loosing quills at the wolf. They were fast and small and hard to see. Mason hit three in less than a second.
Five more died before the rest shrieked and fled. He stood there dripping blood, skin healing as he clenched his jaw and waited for anything else to show itself. His mana had taken a hit, maybe twenty per cent. And he knew he might need it to blast that hag when it turned into mist again.
“Yeah,” he growled as Streak shook off some brambles and came out grumbling. “Now I’m angry, too.”
They took a moment to sniff and look down the pathways, but nothing seemed any better or worse than anything else.
“Left in a maze,” he said, “always left.”
He followed the wall at a jog, Claws back at the ready, hearing strange noises that he began to suspect were made by the hag’s magic to screw with him. The smells were wrong, too, as if changing with a strong wind, moving from the swampy rot to something more pleasant.
It seemed very likely she was trying to trick him—to lure him in a specific direction. Of course she might also assume he’d suspect a trap and then turn away. It was a bit like playing rock paper scissors. The question was—how stupid did she think he was?
Pretty stupid, he decided. She stole from a half-god. She probably thinks everyone is stupid compared to her.
He saw no reason to change that belief. In fact, he decided she might even lead him to the optional. Some kind of trap that might mean he’d get to tangle with her ‘son’. No reason to waste the opportunity while he was here.
He turned and followed the ‘pleasant’ scent, avoiding the corridors with ‘movement’ sounds, pretending to try and keep hidden as he chased. She was watching him, that was clear. He moved with a slight limp and occasionally winced in pain, trying to look drained from the brambles.
“We need to get out of here soon,” he said to Streak, making the wolf look at him like ‘What?’. “We need to hurry. Follow me, and be careful.”
He barreled down the hall, following the hag’s laughably obvious path.
“We’re close,” he said, as the scent got better and better. “The hag’s lair must be near.”
The narrow corridor of mud suddenly dropped into a pit. With his inhuman reflexes, Mason was able to look down and decide whether or not to fall even as he stepped into it. He caught himself on the edge, looking down into a clustered floor of oily spikes.
He crawled up and wiped his forehead like he’d barely managed it, crossing and taking deep breaths.
“You see?” he said as the wolf leapt across. “Traps. We must be close.”
Streak was literally ignoring him now, a slow unfiltered procession of ‘why are humans so stupid’, usually followed by ‘oh what’s that smell?.’
Mason wasn’t exactly surprised when the corridor opened up to a large cavern, or when the entrance behind him made a squishing sound and vanished like a closing sphincter. The hag laughed as something very large moved in the dark.
“Crush the dog!” she shrieked, voice carrying around the open walls. “I want the man alive. But he doesn’t need his legs, darling. You can have those.”
What looked like a massive boulder uncurled across the open circle of muddy ground. A giant half made of rock, half dark green flesh stood with a series of cracks and pops from its spine. It looked somewhere between a troll and a hill. With long, wicked claws. And teeth nearly a foot long.
“Crush dooog,” it repeated. “Eat leeegs.”
“No, it’s not fair,” Mason agreed as the wolf looked at him. “But it’s not like I got off Scot free, is it?”
He smiled and activated Aspect of the Cheetah. Then he charged straight for the giant’s knees.