[ ––––––––– ֎ ––––––––– ]

The group arrived at the most spacious chamber. Amidst mushrooms were lakes and pools of sewage that divided the land into individual islands and naturally separated part of a cave from dangers, by limiting the passage to two narrow roads. Olik ordered to set up a camp and transfer the gathered goods back to the boats. After the backpacks and crates were emptied, everyone resumed their usual tasks.

Fauna was rich in new species, there were octopus-like creatures with shells in the shape of a rounded tetrahedron. They were first spotted on edge of reservoirs, but lived mainly in sewage and feasted on smaller underwater creatures and algae. Deeper inside the waters lived orange creatures with a square body and four spiked tentacles, but they rarely surfaced, so their inspection was skipped.

The next new harmless animal was a flat, drop-shaped insect with near two-meter long antennae at a rounded section of its body. The entire top of its torso was protected by layered, body-wide plates of chitin. It was the only found species, but it didn't prevent adventurers from slaying it and gathering valuable substitute of standard armor.

Far on the horizon, adventurers could spot a nest made of silk and cobwebs, with large spherical dwellings. Outside of them were colossal cousins of black worms. They were over six meters long and their torsos had close to one meter in diameter, their wide mouths had twelve fangs, four of them formed pincers in the corner. It was decided to avoid encounters with these creatures, since they appeared extremely dangerous.

There were also standard creatures, like gigantic cousins of house centipede, normal black worms infected by mushrooms or crocodile-skin salamanders infested exclusively by white puffballs.

Noemi's group was now specifically fighting only the last enemy, since they were trying to reach and explore a zone exclusively surrounded by white puffballs of all sizes. During the combat, it turned out that destroying a puffball could have two results – either releasing a nausea-inducing gas or a swarm of aggressive flies. At some point, the mushrooms were so dense, that it was hard to move without accidentally piercing one of the fungi, but the party managed to cross the area thanks to the rogue.

They were now at a glade, where small and tall concave mushrooms grew. Clean water constantly dripped from the stalactites at the wet ceiling and overfilled caps of fungi. Sewage was also more transparent and appeared half as filthy as usual.

Under one of the tall mushrooms, Gathash discovered a second, rat corpse, it was entirely overgrown by thin and long parasitic liberty caps. Magotha called Olik's group.

“That's our cartographer.” - Frey informed as he removed a papyrus, scriber, vial of oil, and other tools. - “Here it is, a map and a notebook.”

Frey skimmed through the expedition journal.

“Okay, they've fully mapped slime nests to the left, and a part of the section in front of us...”

As Frey turned the page, one of the large puffballs behind him exploded in a cloud of green gas. Frey noticed it too late and breathed it in, became dizzy, vomited, and collapsed. A large creature emerged from behind him. It had camouflaged as a stack of puffballs that were growing on its back and it had no parts of the body other than torso and pointy arachnid legs.

Dan jumped into the fray right as one of the monster's legs was about to pierce Frey, and he cut the limb with a sideways swing, but man instantly felt nauseous too and dropped on his knee, supporting his weight with the zweihander.

More puffballs exploded and the knight instantly covered his mouth. Noemi followed by holding her breath and already jumped into the action with Dune Boars. The girl nimbly ducked to avoid one of the fast appendages, then jumped over the second. She was way faster than Gathash's team, who had trouble deflecting legs with shields, which got easily penetrated by attacks during normal blocks. The lizard girl aimed right at the center of the hybrid arachnid and pierced through the soft belly tissue. Green ooze spurted out, but one hit was not enough. A lot of puffballs burst again, obstructing the vision with a cloud of dark, green smoke. The monster leaped away and was nowhere to be seen.

Noemi overheard a scream of Magotha and moved right in its direction. The dark shadow of the beast towered over two barely visible silhouettes. Noemi prepared and tossed a javelin, wounding the creature just as it raised its body to stomp on her team. Ghatash used the moment of advantage and in a lethal attack, pierced the monster together with Treya.

Noemi and Ghatash didn't waste time and moved Frey and Dan out of the sporous fog. Magotha was bleeding from her arm, but she neglected the injury and called Olik to bring the alchemical supplies.

Dan recovered after the use of sobering salts, he had a mild cough but his condition was stable. On the other hand, Frey was still breathing but was too weak to move or communicate at all.

“What are we going to do now?” - Treya asked.

“Wait until I get a grasp of the situation.” - Olik opened a journal. - “The last dead man, Haliaes was his name. He noted down every bit of useful info, honorable death for a cartographer.” - It turned out that the other party got ambushed too, but they took unnecessary risks and were low in numbers. - “Treya and Hwargth, you'll replace Dune Boars. We're setting up a camp to heal up and return at the next opportunity. Scouts, you will check the other two passageways for dangers. Don't wander too far.”

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Noemi's party arrived at a lone tunnel overgrown by not just fungi, but also shrubs, grass, large leaves, and moss. Above them, at the ceiling, were hanging long, tube mushrooms that reached to Noemi's waist. The lizard girl decided to look at Arath's sketches of herbs once more, since flora seemed abundant in these and she wasn't wrong, there was everything that Dekhan wished to be found and way more.

What was uncanny about the place, was that none of the creatures was especially aggressive, but all of them either had their heads fully replaced by a cluster of mushrooms or a single large fungus, or their bodies were in its entirety composed of fungal matter. These animals usually rested in a single place, without even moving.

There were a few new species.

Translucent, weasel shaped creatures that rested in large groups under ferns, their larger, but rarer, cousins that looked like a deer with mushroom head. In both cases, the internal organs of both creatures were visible through the skin.

Floating balloons, similar to puffballs, with long tendrils hanging down their bodies. One had to be careful, since touching them caused severe pain, and standing longer could lead to paralysis.

Small creatures in the shape of three hands joint at wrists, with mushrooms at the junction.

Serpentine worms that looked just like intestines, covered in very small fungi.

In the middle of the largest animal group, was standing a male human silhouette with mushrooms attached to his skull and a cheek. It was one of the missing dune boars.

Treya approached carefully and looked the man straight in the eyes, but there was no reaction. - “We will have to let Ghatash know.”

“Let's not waste time and take him with us.” - Rogue suggested as he grabbed the immobile man by a hand.

In reaction, all animals around turned and directed their mushroom heads at the rogue.

“Crap!” - The rogue shouted. - “Nevermind! Get out of here, fast!”

The Dune Boar awakened and looked at Treya, then Noemi, and finally at the rogue and a mole. However, it was unautonomous and mechanical. There was no conscious contact and nothing dangerous happened.

“Wait!!! I know him.” - Treya came closer. - “Minakh? Are you there?”

Instead of answering, Minakh stared at Treya for a long time, then reached for a machete at his belt. All creatures around began to tremble uncontrollably. Treya reacted by jumping away.

One by one, animals started to come closer to the party, and so did Minakh.

“They're mimicking his actions.” - The rogue noticed. - “We've might have to get rid of him.”

“Forget it!”, “No!” - Noemi and Treya shouted almost simultaneously.

Floating critters were getting dangerously close to Hwargth. - “It's getting tight in here, decide something.”

“It's the mushrooms!” - Treya exclaimed. - “We need to remove them.”

Noemi understood and nodded to Treya, then leaped towards Minakh and dodged his machete, then grabbed him by the arm and pulled it towards her, while twisting his wrist. The machete fell to the ground. All animals started to attack.

Hwargth shot down as many paralyzing monsters as he could, while the rogue dealt with lesser creatures.

Treya cleaned the area next to Noemi with her pickaxe. Minakh struggled, so Noemi quickly shifted to face his back, grappled him, and applied full body lock. She was focused and trusted her teammates, so all her attention was on Minakh, not on the mayhem around her. Noemi used her weight to knock Minakh down, then pulled out her knife and cut the mushrooms off his scalp, there was severe bleeding.

In a moment, animals around stopped, then disoriented started either running in all directions or continued attacking on their own volition.

Noemi freed Minakh, but the man still had a blank stare. He faced Noemi and tried to punch her.

“Snap out of it!” - Noemi shouted and with all her might, slapped the warrior in his face.

It didn't help.

So she slapped him again on the other cheek, harder.

Minakh, with a dazed expression, checked his surroundings then looked at Noemi. His whole head was now drenched in blood, but regardless of that, he took his machete and joined the fight.

[ ––––––––– ֎ ––––––––– ]

“Minakh!?” - Magotha exclaimed with joy.

Minakh raised his hand to greet his comrades. He was tired but alive. His friends patted him on the back, while Magotha immediately rushed to tend his wounds.

Olik heated the soup and gave it to the warrior, together with a full waterskin.

“Haliaes didn't make it. We know about the ambush from his journal.” - Rat cartographer informed. - “What happened later?”

“We split. Ralsos ran to the right. Did you find him?”

“Sadly, no. What had happened to you?

“The beast blocked my escape route. I ran into floating orb monsters, they paralyzed me. I was trapped for over a day. I felt something climbing onto my head, then my consciousness faded.”

“Thanks, that helps.” - Olik reflected for a moment. - “Dan, are you feeling better?”

Dan nodded. It was clear that he's still weak, but he felt capable of fighting.

Olik decided. - “We found Minakh, so there's a chance to find Ralsos. Ghatash will go with you.”

[ ––––––––– ֎ ––––––––– ]

One could describe the last cavern as spacious and purple. It had a gloomy atmosphere, air was heavy and stale. Everything was purple, soil, grass, crystals, and large bioluminescent mushrooms. Other flora was kindred to that encountered at the bottom of the sea.

Creatures that lived in the zone were utterly pitch-black. There were blobs of tar, leeches, and tentacle creatures that resembled flat octopuses with a single purple eye on their torso.

A single, slow and peaceful giant roamed in the area, beast looked like a whale without fins and with four legs. Black smoke was secreted from its gills and every plant caught into it slowly decayed, just to be devoured later.

In the darkest corner of the cave, the party had found a lone, dry tree. Treya lifted a torch, exposing its surface, which was translucent and like that of glass but also covered by a few polypores. On the tree were growing black fruits, all infested by a variety of small mushrooms.

Treya looked at the trunk of a tree and in horror, dropped a torch.

Dim orange light exposed a sitting, male human torso merged with the tree by its back, with its bottom completely transmuted into some sort of thin tendrils or roots. The body was almost as glass and transparent as a tree, with mutated organs visible through the skin and no bones other than a spherical skull. There was an unusually high number of blood vessels and fluorescent, electric blue nerves, which through arms and root-like lower limbs, spread on the ground and entwined the bottom of the tree.

The victim had a deformed human face, one of his eyes was distorted into a mushroom-shaped excrescence. Similar outgrowths were present on the entirety of man's shoulders and fungi replaced his fingers.

“It must be Ralsos.” - Ghatash had a sour expression but remained serious and composed.

Treya gasped.

Ralsos opened what was left of his only eye. The man looked at the adventurers and whispered in a weak voice. - “Kill me, please.”

Ghatash, in full silence, pulled out his knife, but Noemi grabbed him by a shoulder and stopped him.

“It's wrong.” - She replied. - “There must be a way to rescue him, like we saved Minakh!”

“Minakh... is alive?”

“Yes.” - Noemi knelt next to the curse's victim.

“Thanks, gods...” - Ralsos forced a smile. - “...but there's no helping me, I'm in constant pain... let me go... ”

“Noemi, let me do this.” - Ghatash calmly requested.

“No!” - Noemi protested with tears in her eyes. - “That's too cruel! He does not deserve it!” - She turned to the victim. - “Ralsos, tell us what happened and we might find a solution! There must be a way to reverse it.”

Ralsos moved his head to look around. - “I was tired... it was safe here, I just fell asleep...”

“Noemi, you're in denial.” - Ghatash responded.

“You're not killing another person!” - Noemi stood up. - “I won't let you, my warrior codex forbids it!”

“You can't decide someone's else fate based on your traditions.” - Ghatash tried to reason with the lizard girl.

“Yet you decided mine!” - Noemi cried out. - “You ruled where and how I should fight!”

“That's different.” - Ghatash was taken aback, but remained calm.

“How is it different? Your knowledge can be matter of life and death in the labyrinth, yet your tribe selfishly refuses to share it, even If paid or pleaded! Do you have enough conscience to ask yourself how many adventurers could've died due to these actions?”

“I meant it in a different context, your codex shouldn't affect one's choice.”

“It does not!”

“His choice is death.”

“And your choice is to kill your brother. That's a cardinal transgression. As long as I'm a proud warrior, I won't let it happen.”

“Stop!” - Treya shouted and stopped the argument. - “Nobody cares about your codex and traditions. He's suffering.”

“Pain is temporary.” - Noemi hissed.

Treya was mad. She came close to Noemi and slapped her in the face. - “You speak about selfishness, yet you're the most selfish person here.”

The lizard girl felt nothing, not only due to her scales.

Hwargth interrupted before the matters got tense. - “Hold on, calm down!” - The mole focused his thoughts. - “Noemi, nobody agrees with you, it's stubborn to fight!”

Noemi just hissed aggressively and clutched her spear tighter.

Hwargth continued. - “I'll feed him a piece of bread drenched in lethal poison. That way nobody has to stain his hands with blood. It'll be purely his decision to swallow it.”

Codex never mentioned a case of suicide and Noemi was aware of that. The idea, however, left a bad taste in her mouth. - “Ralsos, don't do that. I'll do everything to help you!”

Ralsos was exhausted. - “No, Noemi... nobody can save me... don't you see? I'm past the point of no return. End it... please...”

Noemi was resigned, she stood aside, repeating. - “Fight, please. There always is hope. It'll be worth it at the end.”

Ralsos swallowed the bread, he writhed in pain until his heart stopped beating. After the death, the tree behind him wilted instantly.