Dragon form would be easier. Trence-as-Whelp is significantly smaller than he is as a kid. Willis and Trence are about the same size. Trence goes first, then, as he has more hitpoints.
The crawl is very, very narrow, and Trence has to remove his armour halfway through. It's very nice that you can just equip/unequip things instead of having to actually put them on. At the narrowest point, you get stuck for a long five minutes. It takes some assistance from Willis to pull through, and you're about five minutes from going dragon to escape. The other two remain behind, with Willis getting pulled back by Sessha. If you have to, going dragon should let you by.. water and venom dragon are pretty skinny.
This new room is more stone and crystals, with the light coming from small pockmarks of metal nodes in the wall. It's not really bright, only bright in comparison to an absolutely dark cave. You call back and let them know you're fine, looking through tiny wall cracks and fissures, some dripping with water, all over the place. There's nothing nearly your size to get further, the biggest entrance by far being the one you came through.
You climb over a few more crystals, and duck under some blocky rooftops. Most of the room is only about four feet high, but there are some taller spaces here and there. In one of them you find a bit of broken machine, about the size of a housecat. It's self-contained, and you wonder if it's some kind of robot. In any case, it's broken, looks like it's been ripped open by brute force, something peeled the metal skin off the robot, taking advantage of a rust spot. Looking further, it must be pretty old, as the interior is all rusted out too, copper components turned black with age, green fuzz growing over aluminum ones, and steel bits all dark and flaky.
..Wait, only the outside part of it near the tear is all rusty. It should be rusty all over. Something did this to the poor robot. Something ate away at it with rust and then tore it apart like a lobster.
Looking further, there was some kind of magical mechanism near the front end. It's not really your field, but you think it involves Earth magic. Other than that, you can't figure out anything about it.
You call out to the others again, letting them know you found a broken robot. At least you know it wasn't a true robot, or the body would have disappeared, so it must be some kind of mechanism. You also tell them that you're going to cover up your glowstone again so you can look at the glowy metal nodules some more.
You do so. The black walls fill with faint light, showing up into a thin, fine tracing of lines between starlike points. It's all over everything, the walls, the floor, the cracks.. and yourself, your clothing and skin. For a moment, there's something.. but no, nothing happens. There is something in your memories about the light and darkness, but this isn't quite close enough to trigger anything.
As you are looking, you hear the howl again. This time it's LOUD. You equip your armour without thinking, turn around, and see.. nothing. It's dark, and there's just the specks and lines of light from whatever the strange metal is.
Author
Topic: Extinction (Read 256622 times)