“Will!” Parv splutters out, and tries not to flail too much as Strife takes hold of him – he had actually been loosing his battle to stay afloat, and is grateful for the help. He crawls up onto the path with one arm, the other hugging his stomach as he coughs and catches his breath. “W-Will, where did you come from? I’ve been trying to find a way out of here for—” He shakes his head, eyes bewildered. “—I don’t know how long.” He doesn’t see or hear the glittering mass that addresses Will.
He coughs again, then levers himself up and turns around to sit properly, still breathing hard. His eyes widen, then he frowns when he sees the drifting indistinct red creature – the Not-Strife —coming toward them. “Oh, bugger off.” He flicks one hand at it. “If I had my sword you’d be done in already! Come on, Will.” He stands and takes Strife’s hand to help him up and gestures to the path. “Let’s find a way out!”
He starts up the path, still holding onto Will’s hand as if he’ll fall behind if Parv doesn’t. About halfway along, when he does let go there’s a moment where their respective skin seems to have melted together, stringy and stretching between them painlessly as Parvis, apparently oblivious, moves away. The illusion disappears, but there is now a pattern of tiny green lights along Parv’s palm.
The top of the path ends at a wall. Parv kicks it. “Oh, very funny. Well, I’m not going back down!” He looks over the side of the path, which is now open onto the pit where, above them, is one of the red spider webs. Far, far below is the lake of blood. It doesn’t seem like they had walked that far up, but there it was.
Parv turns back to the wall. There is now a roughly-hewn hole in it that’s tall enough and wide enough to walk through, the equivalent of a two-by-two mineshaft. He glances inside. “I see light through here! And it’s yellow, not red! I’m so sick of red. Let’s check it out!”
He grabs Will’s other hand with his not-glowy hand and pulls him along. After a few dozen steps the tunnel narrows to one-by-one width and Parv lets go of Will with the same result to their hands as before.
If Will were to look behind them, he would see the Not-Strife steadily drifting along, red eyes tilted in glee as it blocks any chance of backtracking. There are now small green shards dancing in the miasma of its body.
Ｓ ｔ ｒ ｉ ｆ ｅ
Ｄｏ ｙｏｕ ｅｖｅｎ ｋｎｏｗ ｗｈａｔ ｙｏｕ ｈａｖｅ ｄｏｎｅ ｔｏ ｈｉｍ?
Ｉ ｔ ｉ ｓ ｄ ｅ ｌ ｉ ｇ ｈ ｔ ｆ ｕ ｌ
Near the end of the tunnel it gets even narrower, the walls rougher. The back of Parv’s shirt tears as he squeezes through sideways, and one arm and cheek get scratched by the stone, which absorbs the blood left behind. Once out, he rubs at the cut on his face as he looks around. The green glittering from his hand settles into the spot.
Ｓ ｔ ｒ ｉ ｆ ｅ
Ｆ ｒ ｏ ｍ ｔ ｈ ｅ ｉ ｎ ｓ ｉ ｄ ｅ ｏ ｕ ｔ
There’s a ledge circling another pool, the yellow light being emitted by oddly-colored lava that laps at the edge. Could be lava, could be liquid glowstone. Either way, Parv mumbles, “Probably shouldn’t try to swim in there.” He looks up, glad to see that there aren’t any spider webs. There are, however, a dizzying number of small caves and trails, some with haphazard wooden struts holding up the openings and lit by a handful of scattered torches. “This reminds me of the time I got lost in an abandoned mine. I found my way out eventually, I mean it took a while and all, but I can’t remember what the trick was… Any ideas, Will?”
Thick blood that has a greenish sheen wells up from the cut on his back, soaking into the frayed edges of the rip in his shirt.
Ｈ ｅ ｗ ｉ ｌ ｌ ｂ ｅ ｄ ｅ ｖ ｏ ｕ ｒ ｅ ｄ.
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