Crucial Timing

Devotion winced and covered his head as the Frostbite Spider lunged. It was coming too fast to cast anything, so he figured he'd at least try to cover his head. The Frostbite Spider raised its sharp appendage and stabbed at Devotion, ready to kill.

Devotion winced as the body of the Frostbite Spider impacted him, and nearly blacked out.

"That's it. This is how I die. To a random spider in a cave. Damn it, what a waste!" Devotion thought to himself. "Strange. Getting stabbed doesn't hurt as much as I thought it would. Victor was lying! In fact, I don't feel like I've even been hit in the chest!" There was something wrong about this way of dying.

He was quickly proven right. Devotion opened his eyes, and saw that the Frostbite Spider had indeed landed on top of him. However, it had missed with its stab, instead tackling Devotion to the ground.

Devotion took the opportunity to summon an Ice Knife and plunge it into the Frostbite Spider's abdomen. The blade sunk in, and cyan blue blood oozed out the wound.

"I swear to god, if that didn't kill it..." Devotion swore under his breath.

"It didn't." Alex said calmly behind him.

Devotion quickly kicked the Frostbite Spider off of him, scurrying away and tossing a Fire Bolt at it. The ball of flame hit the spider and combusted, but the spider did not react.

"It was already dead before you did that. Good to make sure, I guess." Alex explained in her deadpan voice, seeing Devotion's look of astonishment.

"My god, you could have just said that." Devotion retorted. "What killed it? It looked like it was about to gut me a second ago."

"Your guess is as good as mine. Just dropped dead right before it hit you. Only think that knocked you over was the momentum it had from running."

"I'm not sure if I'm relieved that some invisible force instantly killed it, or terrified by the fact that there is something invisible in here strong enough to instantly kill it." Devotion thought out loud. "Let's wake Victor up and get the hell out of here before we find out."

"Agreed." Alex said, already walking towards the unconscious Victor. She tried to nudge him awake for a few moments, but to no avail. "Don't worry, he's alive, just exhausted. I'm going to have to carry him. I'm trusting you to cover our ass if something else comes for us." Alex said, pulling Victor's limp arms over her shoulders and hoisting him off the ground. "God, this kid needs to eat more. He weighs next to nothing."

"I mean, shouldn't be that shocking. Look at the kid. I owe him big time for that strategy. Bought us enough time for whatever the hell to take care of the problem." Devotion sighed in relief. "Speaking of which, let's get the hell out of here before we find out what did that."

"Agreed." Alex started to trudge towards the door.

"Ysmir! Let's get out of here." Devotion called. He hoped Ysmir was ok. There was no telling what could be in here. He waited a moment, but Ysmir did not come.

"Take Victor out of here, I'm going to go find Ysmir." Devotion instructed Alex.

"You're really devoted to that fox. Maybe your name means something." Alex said as she made her way to the ladder.

"Maybe it does." Devotion replied, heading down the tunnel. He didn't bother to mention that he picked it himself, with no real thought behind it. Wasn't the best way to name things, but it had worked for him and Ysmir.

Devotion walked down the dark tunnel that Ysmir had run into, squinting as it got darker and darker. It seemed to stretch on forever, until he saw a light at the end. Devotion summoned the staff form of Ghostwhisper from his Astral Space, clutching it tightly. He was almost completely exhausted of Qi, and one more encounter could be the end for him. He prayed whatever being had slain the Frostbite Spider was not out for him.

Devotion carefully stepped towards that light, listening for any movement. He could hear nothing, so he opted to take a risk and call out. "Ysmir?"

He heard movement after calling out, a bit of a dragging sound. It stopped him in his tracks. What could possibly be dragging? Devotion hurried down the tunnel. Ysmir could be in trouble, so there was no sense worrying.

Devotion reached that light, and barged into the room, ready to fight. However, what he saw was quite different from what he expected. Instead of a deadly creature ripping Ysmir apart, he instead saw Ysmir trying to drag the body of a man, his blood staining its fur.

"Holy fuck, Ysmir. What the hell happened?" Ysmir stopped dragging and looked up at Devotion. It walked over to him, jumping up on his shoulders again. Devotion suddenly remembered something. That voice booming in the hall had said that it was soul linked with the Frostbite Spider. If one died, the other would too.

"So you ran in here to kill the easier target and left us to stall for you? You could have told me first, I almost died in there!" Devotion exclaimed. However, he had to admit, while he looked mad, he was actually quite proud of the fox. It had saved all of their lives. If Ysmir could shrug, it would have. "Never mind, I forgot you still can't talk. Thanks for the save. Now, where the hell are we?" Devotion thought aloud, finally surveying his surroundings.

Shock ran up Devotion's spine as he took in the room. It was nearly pitch dark, save a small light in the corner. There was only one door, the one he came through, and a simple desk and chair on the other wall. In short, it was identical to the room he saw in his dream the night before.

"This look familiar to you, Ysmir?" Devotion asked. Ysmir just stared at the desk. Devotion walked forward, and just like the dream, there was an invisible barrier blocked him from the desk.

"Ysmir, could you-" Before he could even ask, Ysmir jumped from Devotion's shoulders and walked past the barrier, just like before. It went to the desk, opened the right drawer, and pulled out that same sheet of paper. "So you do remember that." Devotion spoke to himself. Ysmir turned and winked, hopping off the desk and strutting back over to Devotion.

The purple fox jumped back to his shoulders, letting him take the sheet of paper. Devotion took the time to examine it. It was impossibly old, so old that Ysmir handling the paper should have destroyed it. However, it seemed to be protected in some way.

The page was yellowed with age, and on it were strange diagrams. They depicted all sorts of beasts, some that Devotion recognized, and some that were alien. The diagrams were labelled, but in a strange language that Devotion had never seen. There was something vaguely familiar to Devotion about this piece of paper, but he couldn't quite think of what. He decided to stow it away for now, hidden in his robe. Whatever this paper was, it might be valuable.

"Ysmir, could you go and grab all the papers on the desk? We might be able to turn it in and still get the mission rewards." Ysmir pouted, having finally gotten comfortable on Devotion's shoulders, and did as it was instructed. Devotion took a second to overlook all the papers that the man had left on the desk. There were various recreations of the drawings on that old page, as well as new ones. It seems this "professor" was trying to figure out what the page meant. The research also branched into other various topics, but Devotion didn't have time to really read it all.

Devotion stored all the research in his interspatial ring, took one look at the dead man to memorize his face, then headed down the tunnel. He had a lot to think about, after everything that had happened today.

Something about that page was familiar.