I started a cycle of attacks that Iris and Khel would follow. Iris would attack, I would attack, Khel would attack, a small break, Iris would attack, I would attack, Khel would attack, and so on. Finally, after a few days of attacking relentlessly and starving, the stone broke, and we rushed through… only to be instantly attacked by a mob of creatures. I yelped as I fell back.

Iris instantly created a tiny forcefield to protect us, and the monsters banged on it with no success. “If I remember correctly, the monsters guarding the place are called sinkana, sapa, klimaka, tasodufi, sabuja, aguja, darila, skela, rupaka, and agyu,” I informed them.

The sabuja looked humanoid but had gray skin which glowed green. The sinkana had the legs and head of a lion, the body of a snake, and the wings of a falcon. The klimaka were large and bulky. They had scales as their skin and glowed an ominous purple. The skela were eagles with scales that glowed white. The darila looked like lions but they had wings and a frill around their neck instead of a mane.

Tasodufi were corpses and random things shot out from their skin. One time a toothbrush shot out; another time a bit of poison; then a jet of fire. The rupaka could change between human or animal forms. Some were sharks or lions, others were butterflies or mosquitos. The sapa looked like large snakes with wings. They occasionally shot fireballs at us but I stopped them with a forcefield. Aguja looked like ninjas and could breathe fire. The agyu looked like cannons and seemed like they had unlimited ammo and could shoot by themselves.

Khel came up with a plan and suggested, “How about I start with a Cold Wind and a Gale to push them back, and then you and Iris use Firestorm, pushing them back; then, you can use Hurricane to grab them together and then use Lightning Discharge to imprison them?”

“Good plan, Khel!” I rejoiced, then put the plan into motion with the words, “Khel, you’re up first!”

“Got it!” Khel confidently responded, then yelled, “YEET!” He spread his hand and sent a gust of Cold Wind, then combined it with a Gale, which blew back all of the monsters.

“All right Iris, use Firestorm!” I yelled as we cast Firestorm simultaneously. The Firestorm burned a lot of the monsters, and they huddled together in a retreat. Perfect. I cast Hurricane, spinning all of them together in a spiral, and then I cast Lightning Discharge, which, with the help of the water conductors, electrocuted all of the monsters, and when the Hurricane ended, the monsters were trapped inside of an electrical prison, and they couldn’t escape.

“Come on guys, let’s go! The monsters were probably guarding the diary.” I beckoned with my hand to come.

After we stepped across the field of dead bodies, we came across a narrow shaft that seemed to lead into a long, dark, tunnel. “I think we have to go in there.” My voice echoed down the tunnel.

“I guess…” Khel involuntarily shuddered, and I sent my Lightning Discharge down the tunnel. It sparked out of sight. Then, all of a sudden, the monsters broke out of the electric prison.

“AHHHH!!” I yelled, “The monsters broke out and are after us!” We started running down the tunnel, which then started curving.

Slowly, we eventually came to a ravine with water at the bottom, and the monsters were closing in.

Sighing, I informed Iris and Khel, “I think our only chance is to dive into the water, as we can’t fly across with the ceiling so low.” I gathered my diving pose, then dove in. But before I could go past the top edge, my head hit something hard. “Guys, I think there’s an invisible bridge here! Come on!”

We all sprinted over the bridge, and the monsters saw us cross, so they followed. But for some reason, the monsters fell through the bridge as if there was nothing there. The remaining monsters noticed, so they stopped trying to cross and instead waited for us to come back over.

A button on a pedestal was at the end of the bridge, so I pressed it, which constructed a wall. “Whoa, that’s huge!” Khel remarked.

After running some more, we finally saw the diary. It was sitting on a pedestal inside a glass casing. On it was a note in faded writing that read:

To whoever is reading this,

I am Tyronius Exypnos, and this book contains the whereabouts of my location. Hopefully, if you’re reading this, you are kind of mine. If you are not, continue at your peril. Anyways, open this book and you will discover where I disappeared to. Be warned… if you come here as an invader, you will most definitely perish.

Tyronius Exypnos