13 Black Smoke (1)

As the team ran past the four deceased members of Team C, the time they had before the dungeon shift was starting to creep up in the back of their minds. The risks of staying in the dungeon now consisted of the fog monster in the darkness, whatever was torturing Kara, and now the looming fact of the tunnel possibly collapsing on their heads.

Galahad asked while somewhat wheezing during their run. "What exactly is the plan? The light crystals aren't popping up ahead and pretty soon we will be running in the dark."

Rosetta found herself able to talk again without sounding too panicky. "For now, keep your guard up and watch for whatever took her. That black fog was moving around like it wanted something, so I am willing to bet that the monster attacking her is the one causing all this interference and that fog."

All weapons were unsheathed and everyone tensed at the idea of being attacked any moment.

Eventually they headed into the darkest section of the tunnel and found it opened up to something very unexpected. There were no more light crystals ahead because the tunnel connected to the entrance of the biggest cavern they had ever seen.

The goblin cavern from a few days ago was quite big, but this cavern was at least four times the size. The muddy walls stretched endlessly to the dome-shaped ceiling. The temperature dropped a few degrees and froze the moisture of everyone's breath.

"This place is fucking huge." Whispered Mycroft, everyone silently nodded in agreement.

An overview of the cavern floor was very quick, the unnaturally smoothed ground floor was hiding no secrets on the surface. In the center of the cavern was the only item in the massive arena sized space. A four-foot tall stone altar, sitting on top of the altar's pedestal was something too small for them to identify from such a distance.

No one was in the cavern, but the sounds of screaming had just come from inside up until a few seconds ago. The sound had simply stopped by the time they had arrived.

Before anyone could step inside, Rosetta tilted her head to the side and knelt down quickly while motioned everyone to get down. Another entrance that was fifty-yards to their right was pouring out the same black smoke from before.

A raspy and dry voice suddenly echoed out of the tunnel, cackling at something it just said. Soon two shadows grew into the cavern from the light of the crystals. Out stepped two monsters that couldn't be anymore different from each other if they tried.

One had the resemblance to a thin old man with little tufts of white hair sticking out aimlessly from his oak colored head. He matched his aged appearance by hunching over a staff jaggedly made of some kind of black iron.

The brown bark and moss that grew out his body might have made him look like a male dryad, but the insect like wings growing out of his back were the key identifier to his actual species. He was a Spriggan, a corrupted fairy race originally from the surface that attacked and manipulated living creatures it deemed worthless with dark magic, that included humans.

They were so rare to witness, that no one had ever found a solid range of what the average level was for such a monster, because that required them to defeat one.

The other monster was purely a physical type monster with little magic control and even less vocabulary. It was very human with its pink skin tone and hairless flesh. The only oddity was the lack of a head with a smooth piece of skin replacing where the neck would start from the chest. The giant humanoid had eyes and a mouth resting in the center of its abnormally broad chest. A Blemmyae, the headless man slayers that would be level eighty at a minimum.

Everyone was tensed at the intelligent monster and higher level monster, it wasn't the first time the team had seen such dangerous creatures, but an unusual characteristic was causing them to tense back up again.

The black smoke they had been watching for was emanating from the spriggan and blemmyae, rising off of their heads and shoulders like a form of poisonous steam. This was something they had never seen in monsters before, it only made matters worse since they appeared to be very intelligent and well aware of what this strange cavern was meant for.

Beneath the bigger monster's arm; it adjusted the large, heavily stained cloth sack that was tied shut. The sack leaked a suspiciously large amount of fluid that looked like blood and maybe urine from various points.

"It's such a shame," Continued the old spriggan. "I would have thought that a thousand years worth of development would have refined their souls to something with actual power, hmm? What do you think Zeriphyle?"

The giant beast only grunted in agreement, the unconscious adventurer under his arm was the second promising one amongst the seven they slaughtered just a few moments ago.

"Doesn't matter I guess, the formation will carry out our distribution once we feed it the last bit of power." It heinously cackled to itself with glee, the insect wings on its back was buzzing in excitement. It sounded like a child on it's birthday, happier than can be with an clear hint of insanity.

It's disregard for the lives it took was appalling to all of them. Everyone's hands were squeezing the hilts hard enough to make their knuckles turn white, causing their blades to tremble while expressing their rage.

Heath was about run out after them, but Rosetta stopped him from charging ahead. "Look who is under the blemmyae, its must be Kara." She whispered to him.

Sure enough the monster tossed the unconscious female concealed in the bag at the front of the altar with very little regards about the oddly bent arm that dangled out of the hole in the top. She managed to run away from the monsters, but was eventually captured by the two demons.

Trista turned to Rosetta and pleaded, "Please tell me you have a plan, we can't just leave her trapped here, they are going to kill her."

Before comforting Trista, Rosetta was interrupted by Galahad. He looked across the cavern and spoke with unwavering determination. "I have part of a plan ready, but none of you are going to like it."