Volcanic Marshes [3]

https://discord.gg/ZrWk2jqjbV

AN: This mini-arc is a bit slow and boring, but once he gets back to Grigori I'll get to all the interesting stuff so bare with me please!

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I decided that I would abstain from interaction—I didn't have any method to judge it's strength so this time it was better safe than sorry. Luckily it didn't seem to sense my presence, either that or it chose to ignore it so I should be good to go.

Although after approximately five steps something odd occurred—the flowers near my feet began...trembling? The way they were suddenly swaying back and forth despite the lack of wind was un-nerving.

I looked around trying to locate the source of it but it was to no avail, perhaps there was something underground? I tried peering through the fractures in the surface but there were no notable changes, my [Flame Shake] is still deactivated so that can't be the cause.

That was until my gaze landed on the hog-like creature once again—it was staring right at me. It wasn't grunting, glaring nor charging...just...staring.

Slowly it began to make it's way towards me, although I found it's behavior rather eerie, it wasn't displaying any clear signs of aggression. I decided just to stay put as I didn't know whether running might agitate it in some way, for now I was just going to avoid any erratic gestures.

As it got closer I did my best to calm myself—but it's intimidating appearance didn't help. I was making direct contact with it's blood-red eyes, it's pupils were slit as if it was a reptile of some sort.

It got close to me and began nudging at my backpack, was there something I had it wanted? But what could it b- Ah! The Sap! I took out one of the vials I had filled and held it out, the hog began poking it with it's nose, it seems my hunch was correct.

It's passive behavior quelled my unease.

I still had two more vials in my backpack so as long as I kept at least one I didn't mind giving a few, especially if it would prevent whatever this creature was from turning me into mush. I opened the vial and the hog opened it's mouth as I poured the liquid in.

So there are species that can actually consume the liquid—although there were no immediate changes so for what purpose I don't know, still the more information I gather the better.

It seemed it was satisfied with just one as it proceeded to walk away shortly after, but I still have no explanation for the rustling of the flowers earlier, could it be that the flora alerted the hog about my presence? Can the plant and animal life connect with one another? But what would be the point of that, normally in such relationships both parties offer something to the other, and whilst I was in the forest there wasn't a speck of animal life.

Though if I want answers I suppose I need to continue to observe the area.

The hog came to an abrupt stop and looked back at me—did it want more or something? It grunted and pointed it's snout straight ahead, did it want me to follow it?

So far it hasn't shown any hostility so I don't see any harm in it, and I still have my evacuation scroll if shit really hits the fan.

After about half an hour of walking my feet landed at the entrance of a cave, I guess this is where it dwells. Normal hogs create dens for shelter by cutting long grass and crawling under it to create a sort of canopy, then again, this thing is clearly not a normal hog, and neither is the terrain, so a different habitat shouldn't be all that unusual.

It led me in—I lit a small ghostly flame on the tip of my finger to illuminate my surroundings, and what I came across stunned me. There was a mountain of random objects, most of them seemed to be odd trinkets, like pocket watches, scraps of metal and whatnot.

It started scurrying through the pile before grabbing what seemed to be a corpse? More specifically, the corpse of a snake, it was about three meters in length and jet-black in color. Truthfully its appearance was quite enamoring, a shame that I can't study it in action.

It brought it towards me and placed it at my feet, was it paying me back for the sap? Hold on—this thing understands the concept of trade? Albeit not on an advanced level, but the fact that it grasps the idea of exchanging one thing for another...shocking.

It made me wonder if others came here often to trade with it—or if it trades amongst other species, what I can confirm however, is the life here is much more intelligent that I had assumed.

The snake had a rough texture, it had round pupils and as I caressed it head I noticed the presence of a hood—a cobra of sorts I guess. Despite being dead, I might still come across something interesting if I dissect it back at Grigori, into the pack it goes.

I wonder how long it's been dead though—the corpse doesn't seem to be rotting, but it should be a native species so perhaps the terrain itself is preventing that? Who knows.

The hog doesn't seem to be all that unfamiliar with trading considering the plethora of items it has on it, I wonder if it's the only species that does so. I didn't want to bother it anymore so I just left the cave, I wonder if Azazel already knows about this or not.

I considered offering it another vial but there wasn't anything really eye-catching in the pile so I abstained. Although I'm definitely taking a mental note of this location, who knows maybe some other day it might have something of value.

The more I explore this place the more questions I incur—and the more answers I lack, I suppose that's just a part of field work.

The cave was embedded into the site of a mountain—but it wasn't a volcanic one so that's a bummer.

...

After yet again more trekking I had finally arrived at one of the volcanic mountains, it had the appearance of a destructive volcano which confused me yet again as those normally form at divergent plate boundaries—and as I said earlier, the underworld is one giant plate.

My confusion was quickly replaced by excitement as my [Flame Shake] was growing even faster than before, just as I had expected.

Just like most of the rock and vegetation around here there was Magma glowing from within the rock, but there was one key difference. It was much—much darker than in the other areas, I suppose the concentration of it around here is much higher.

There were tors present on the mountain which are a result of a chemical form of weathering known as spheroidal weathering, but that requires the presence of rainfall and so far I have encountered no wet terrain.

And rain requires evaporation to occur from a water source and so far I have seen nothing of the sort—god damn this ecosystem is weird.

I picked up a pebble and threw it as hard as I could against one of the nearby boulders. I repeated the process about five times until I finally achieved my desired result. The magma glowing from within began to seep out from the crack I made.

I took out another vial and collected the substance, I wanted to know the difference between the sap in the trees, and the magma in the terrain, if there even was one to begin with.

When I get back to Grigori I'm going have quite the sum of things to do—but it's nice to have something to keep me occupied so who am I to complain? Although they'll obviously be secondary in terms of priority as I need to carry out my Fallen Angel conversion and artificial organ creation first.

Though I have to wonder if what I've been calling "magma" all this time is really what it seems, when I picked up the pebble the temperature was only moderate, but if what's inside is magma it should be scalding, of course I already considered that it might be something else from the beginning, but now that I've actually collected the substance I have to wonder.

The rock that makes up the structure of the volcano has a clear crystalline structure and the formation of tors normally occur in rock less resistant to weathering and erosion—which points to this being intrusive igneous rock, but then again, this is the Underworld. Both the magma and the rock will have to remain a mystery to me for now.

This is why I want to isolate myself inside a lab...questions are good and all—but too many are just a headache.

I conjured a sphere of ghostly flames from my palm and observed that it was about ten times stronger than when I first embarked on this expedition, hence whilst I'm here I might as well take advantage of the passive benefits.

Scourging through my backpack I had about a week of rations on me, I'll have to deal with Valia's expectations eventually so might as well get on with it.

It was time for some training.

I picked up an array of pebbles, rocks and other small objects from the ground and placed them about twenty feet away from where I stood. The first thing I wanted to train was my aim.

I molded my flames into an arrow—it wasn't necessary for me to adopt this shape when it came to using projectile attacks. But Sacred Gears work according to one's will—so having something I associate with the concept of "ranged" makes it easier.

I started by creating three of them—and fired them at the targets.

Three consecutive shots...three consecutive misses. I suppose that's why I'm training isn't it?

Perhaps I was being too overzealous by using three at once, this time I only created a singular arrow.

I shot—a near miss. It seems it's harder to control my flames the further away they are from my body, and also the speed of the arrow makes it difficult to make it turn before it goes past the pebble.

However—I'm not going to reduce the speed of it, what's the point of having an attack that an opponent can dodge with minimal effort? It's just a waste of stamina.

Though is this really the right way to use my Gear? This time I completely ignored the concept of "aiming" my arrows and simply thought of hitting the pebble itself. I should be able to just "will" it to hit the pebble if I'm correct.

And I couldn't be more incorrect—it just went completely of course, worth a try though. During this week I'm going to focus on my aim, and control—there's no need to work explicitly on raw power as that's just going to improve passively.

And so I continued.

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AN: Shorter chapter than usual I know, though I've already accomplished what I've wanted to do with this mini-arc so why prolong it?

I know I said uploads should be more frequent, but I need to go back to my biology notes for a bit so the whole artificial organ thing actually makes sense.