When we returned with the alarm rune sheets of paper and my backpack, we found Elyra walking around in circles. She was so focused that she almost didn't notice our arrival, which made Vespera quite amused. We had felt that she was doing something, curiosity drifting through the bond, but we couldn't quite put a finger on what.
"Why are you rummaging around like that?" Vespera asked her in a teasing voice.
She was much better now. I have to give the angel credit, sending her with me to fetch our stuff from where we made camp had been the right thing to do. Although now, seeing her lift stones and wooden logs like a trash panda kinda shattered the illusion.
She was immediately aware of my thoughts and got up from inspecting a moss covered log to stare at me.
"You are thinking about strange things, Sol," she said.
"I'm definitely not thinking about trash pandas," I said with as straight a face as I could make.
Unfortunately, I wasn't very credible. She even had a smudge of dirt on her face, which she had tried to rub off with a finger and had only resulted in a dark line on her delicate features. She really did look like a cute little trash panda.
Of course, I had to explain to the girls what the little animals were and why they were ever present on all space stations no matter how remote. Some people found them cute, and the orbital station authorities hated them. Bringing them on a new station was like a rite of passage, and if the station was big enough and had enough spaces for them to hide… well, now you had a permanent new inhabitant on board.
Vespera giggled. "She really does look like one, doesn't she?"
Elyra wanted to argue but soon found herself smiling together with us. It had all been a ploy to get us to lower our defenses, however.
"Since you two are so keen on making fun of me," she began, and the threatening way she said it made our blood freeze. "Why don't you help me out?"
"Tell us what you're looking for, little panda, or we can't really do much," the demon said, still intent on teasing her.
"Actually," I argued. "Trash pandas are raccoons, not pandas."
Vespera looked at me like I was crazy. "Really? Then why call them pandas?"
Which made me wonder. If there were cats and gods here, why not raccoons and pandas? Or maybe there were, and the girls simply hadn't heard of them? I wanted to ask, but perhaps now was not the moment.
"I do not know exactly what it is that I am searching for," Elyra explained. "But I cannot shake the feeling that there is something here. Sol, you have massive Strength, help me lift this stone."
The demon beside me made a face, making sure only I could see her, before saying in a sweet voice: "what about me?"
"Keep watch. I think whatever I am sensing might also attract monsters."
The woman in question shrugged. "Fine by me. Have fun, Sol. I'll be keeping watch from… here. Yep, right here. Totally keeping watch and not lounging on this soft bed of moss."
"Vespera I swear—" Elyra began.
"No need to fuss, trash panda cat angel. Little, at that."
Elyra paused, quirking an eyebrow. "That seems like a bit much."
"No it's not. Now shush. I need to concentrate and stare at Sol while he lifts that boulder. Speaking of, Sol, isn't it hot? You could remove your shirt, you know? Like you did back in the city."
Elyra looked at her helplessly before sighing and shaking her head. "Hopeless woman," she muttered. Her cheeks betrayed her, though. They were slightly pink.
◈◈◈
"What's that?" I said.
The two girls approached me, looking downwards. "A hole," Vespera said. "With light at the bottom. Reminds anyone of anything?"
"Could it be…" Elyra began.
"…another couple of cute girls trapped underground?" the demon finished with a grin. "It might, which means that we are not going there."
The angel frowned. "Silly. It is not what I was thinking at all."
"No, no," I said, deciding to take a side that would probably curry little to no favor and cost me dearly. "You were totally thinking it."
She glared at me.
I put my hands up in surrender. "I agree with Vespera. The two of you are more than enough for me."
"Hey!" the demon complained.
Even the angel felt dangerous. "What do you mean by that, Sol?"
"Uh," I stammered, looking down into the hole again. "Jokes aside, the probability of trapped girls in any given hole should be vanishingly low. I only found you because the fickle gods that reincarnated me into this world wanted me to."
Elyra wasn't buying it. "The same gods might also have the power to manifest a strange sphere of demonic magic, make sure that one of your two girls senses it and, by pure chance, make it so it is the troublemaker of the two that does."
Vespera jabbed a finger towards her. "Nuh-uh. You were the one who insisted on looking around until you found the hole. You brought it upon yourself. Don't worry. I'm sure there will be no magical girls, and no sequences of numbers to be inputted into a magic circuit every 108 minutes."
"That was weirdly specific," I said, looking puzzled.
"It's just random lore I recalled," she said.
Maybe, but it did remind me of something.
She shrugged. "So, we going down or not?"
We did. We carefully lowered ourselves into the hole, mindful of any possible danger and of the fact that save for the slime cores we had farmed yesterday, we didn't have any others. Vespera wasn't too worried, arguing that anything that would get me to level up would also probably cough up a core or an alternate energy source for the System, while Elyra and I were more cautious. General levels could be gained by doing all sorts of things, and the cores we had on hand wouldn't be enough to unlock even a skill point.
"Ah, crawling through enclosed spaces," Vespera mused. "Reminds me of the good old times."
"At least you are clothed now," Elyra said.
"Good point, little raccoon. Perhaps I should dismiss my armor then?"
The angel did not bother to reply to that, having learned the lesson the hard way.
The descent was surprisingly easy for all three of us—me because of my stats making me stronger and more durable, and the girls because they each used their magic to help. Eventually the hole opened up into a small cavern, with mossy stone steps haphazardly set into the ground and little puddles of stagnant water fed by dripping stalactites on the ceiling. The source of the light we saw from the surface was easy to spot.
"Those glowing crystals, aren't they the same as the ones in the other cave?" Vespera mused, grabbing one from its stand on the wall and examining it.
The moment she detached it, however, it simply stopped glowing, plunging her corner of the cave into darkness.
"Good move, little troublemaker," I said with a snicker.
I saw red glowing eyes cut through the darkness to glare at me, and I opened my mouth to placate the angry demon. Before I could speak, I saw her turn around in a flash, eyes narrowing before they disappeared to peer into the darkness as if to try to pierce it.
"There's something," she said.
Elyra had already readied her own magic, creating a new source of light from her glowing halo. "I hear it too," she said.
I stood between the two but, like always, I was still unarmed. It was a very frustrating feeling, and there was nothing that I could use as a weapon lying around, not even a suitably shaped stone. Still, I removed my backpack and tried to take a fighting stance I hoped didn't look too ridiculous.
A beam of light. Elyra had seen something, and had preemptively struck it with her halo. The light blinded me for a moment, burning a straight line of pain through my vision. I knew it made contact with whatever monster was lurking in the darkness because I heard a screech and then Vespera took off, dashing in with claws of darkness extended to their full length. Another beam, afterimages showing movement. Vespera was incredibly quick, dashing in and out, slicing through the darkness as if it didn't even hinder her.
A third beam. This time, my eyes had grown somewhat accustomed to it. I saw the monster and recognized it, then the beam cut through its carapace and finally, Vespera's claws severed its head from its body.
You have defeated a level 21 [Skitterpede].
It was much bigger than the ones we fought in the other caves, and there was another. I heard the noise of many little chitinous legs against the stone. Elyra too. She swiveled around, scanning the darkness, seeing nothing. Her face was scrunched up in concentration, teeth bared in an almost animalistic sneer. Then we saw Vespera's red eyes flash, her dash and the screech of the monster. The demon had found her prey, but the angel didn't have her same ability to see in the dark.
"Use the beam, shoot it wide," I said.
My instructions weren't the most precise, but I tried to explain my reasoning through the bond. Elyra and I had experimented with her powers enough that I was sure she could do what I had in mind. Indeed, after a moment of hesitation, I saw light spring into being. No longer a beam of concentrated destruction, it was a cone of illumination that showed her exactly where the target was.
She concentrated, sweat beading her forehead as she tried to bend the magic to her will. In the blink of an eye, the cone of light vanished and the deadly beam returned, sniping the monster.
You have defeated a level 19 [Skitterpede].
Under Elyra's light, Vespera tried to find out if these monsters had cores. They didn't, just like the Skitterpedes of the other caves.
"See? Not everything we fight has—"
"Hush," Vespera said gravely. "I hear another. It must have heard us fight and…" her eyes flashed red again. "Shit, this one is big."