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Chapter 97 - Swimming
🕑 Added 2024-07-29 17:00:03 +0000 UTCPulling her attention away from the water, Emily turns to her friends, meeting astonished and questioning gazes. Tom, Hester, and Juliana are all looking around in wonder, taking in the beautiful sight before them, while the other three look to Emily for confirmation.
“It’s incredible,” Juliana mutters quietly, staring out into the glistening crystalline lake.
“It is. But, is it the right place?” Dante asks.
“Yeah, look over there,” Emily responds, gesturing towards her bird lighting up the writing on the wall.
Dante squints, following her gesture and quickly spotting the faint red markings on the rock.
“Great! Now, how are you gonna find where the hole down there goes?”
“Is it actually still there?” Ivor signs before Emily can answer, asking a valid question.
“I don’t know,” she responds, looking back out over the lake. “I’ve detected movement about halfway down, and my scan is being distorted past that, so I can’t tell without getting closer. As for how I’ll find where it goes, that’s what this is for.”
She summons a simple-looking black and white metal ovoid, half the size of her forearm. The colours blend together in pretty, swirling patterns, with well-defined lines separating several sections on the back and sides, and several ridges protruding slightly.
“What is it?” Juliana asks curiously, finally done marvelling at the cavern around them.
“It’s a far better, long-range and submersible version of my boat,” Emily says with glee, pressing in a small panel close to the back and twisting it while glancing at its system window. “I call it a Depth Diver.”
¯¯¯¯¯
[Depth Diver]
[Rank:] E
[Description:] A water-based drone designed to transmit its location across long distances.
[Effect:] When activated, automatically drives to the lowest point possible in a body of water.
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The Depth Diver whirrs to life with a series of clicks. The body splits along the seams, elegantly butterflying open to reveal the complicated mechanisms inside. There’s a dense, wind-up gearbox fixed in the centre, with small propellers on the back and sides, covered by flaps that slide out of the way when needed. Each of the ridges jutting out of the side is spring-loaded and linked to the gearbox as switches to activate the propellers.
The nose of the Diver holds a purple crystal, and, in common fashion for Emily’s creations, the rest of the machine has a complicated magic circle woven into it, with some runes carefully placed on the moving parts, their motion accounted for to make sure the spell never breaks. Just in front of the crystal, filling a small gap between it and the outer shell, is a tiny disc of dense silver metal.
“Woah,” Tom exclaims, voicing a shared sentiment of wonder over the unintelligible mass of metal and magic. “How does it work?”
“I won’t bore you with the specifics,” Emily says reluctantly, holding back her desire to go on about her creation. “It’s very simple really. I just have to swim down to the hole and place this in before activating it. It’ll then go down as far as it can, hopefully reaching the end of The Waters, while transmitting its location to a linked receiver.”
She summons a small silver metal plate into her free hand. It’s covered in runes, with two crystals embedded in the surface, one wind and one space. She injects mana into it, and the plate lights up in sync with the space crystals in the Diver. The air above the tablet shivers, bending and twisting slightly as it takes on a purple hue. A shimmering image of two fist-sized dots, practically touching each other, forms from the wind.
Her friends start slightly at the change before leaning in to get a closer look.
“Is it showing the Diver’s location?” Juliana asks.
Emily says nothing and, instead, she quickly twists the release panel on the Diver, letting it pop back into place pulling the shell back in. She hands it to Tom and points along the lake’s edge.
“Walk away a bit please.”
He nods and jogs a short distance from them, stopping after ten metres and turning around to look back. Emily and the others watch the two dots separate, moving quickly at first before shrinking down and slowing as Tom comes to a halt.
“Cool,” Dante mutters.
“You like it?” Emily asks with a smug grin. “I’ll admit, it’s kind of unnecessary, since I can just read the data output manually, but it looks cool. I got the idea when looking at the runes for the mental interface of The Dome’s tokens.”
“It will let us see where we’re going as well,” Juliana says with a kind smile. “And if you enjoyed making it, I don’t think it’s unnecessary at all.”
“Thanks,” Emily says with a slight blush, gesturing for Tom to return.
She takes the Diver from him, sending it and the receiver tablet back into her storage.
“Now I just need to go down and set it off,” she says as she drops to the floor on the lake’s edge to start removing her boots.
“Wait, you’re going alone?” Tom questions disappointedly. “Can I come too?”
Emily looks up at him with a raised brow.
“I thought you’d be scared off by my mention of movement down there,” she says flashing him a teasing grin. “Not scared of fish eating your legs anymore?”
“You’ll be there, so I should be safe. Right?”
“It didn’t stop you worrying before,” Emily responds with a shrug, sending the Spitter and its spare ammo into her belt with her shoes.
“Actually,” Hester interjects. “I’m interested in coming too. You said there was strong mana leaking from that hole when you saw it last time, didn’t you? Is it the same elements as the cursed object you found?”
“I think so. Darkness, ice, and death, along with water in the case of the hole itself. Why? Are you interested in studying them?”
“Yes. Ice is the higher form of water, so I’d like to have a look at some raw, natural ice mana to see if I can gain any insights from it. The dense water mana will probably do me some good too.”
Emily nods, agreeing with her logic.
Exactly the same reason I looked at the darkness element imbued in the Mensacus. It’s a shame that didn’t work out. I still haven’t manifested all six common elements because of it, and that’s got to be a hidden achievement.
She turns to her other friends, gauging their reactions as she asks, “Who else wants to come?”
Dante grimaces, glancing disdainfully at the water as he responds, “No thanks. Fighting underwater is... unpleasant.”
“I’m alright thanks,” Enzo declines politely. “I’m not that bothered about seeing this hole, and I don’t fancy an underwater fight either.”
“No thanks. I’ll just slow you down,” Ivor signs, taking a seat on the ground happily.
Finally, Emily’s gaze falls on Juliana, who shivers slightly and quickly shakes her head.
“Nope! I’d rather stay on dry land please,” she says resolutely.
Emily raises a brow, a gentle smile warming her features.
“That’s fine, I’m not gonna force you.”
Juliana’s shoulders drop as she relaxes at the reassurance. Making a mental note to ask about her obvious fear of the water later, Emily turns back to the twins, both of whom are sat, with their shoes removed, beside Tom’s bag with his weapon harness draped over the top.
“Looks like it’s just us three. We may be down there for a little while. You both know how to breathe underwater, right?” she asks, fixing them with a deadpan stare.
“No, we don’t,” Tom answers with a suspicious glare. “But you don’t either.”
Emily’s expression cracks into a grin as she slowly, exaggeratedly, reaches down for her belt.
“Well, actually...” she says, trailing off as her hand vanishes into a dimensional pocket.
She pulls it out holding a metal face mask. It’s big enough to cover everything below the eyes, with a complicated pattern of scale-like fins covering the front. In the centre of each cheek is a magic crystal, water on the left, air on the right.
“I do!”
To Emily’s disappointment, Tom and Hester both release exasperated sighs.
“Have you been making that down here because I joked about breathing underwater?” Hester asks.
“Yep! You mentioned it and I realised underwater breathing would probably be really helpful for this expedition if we ever need to explore underwater. So I made these Gills.”
“She’s been making them while on watch,” Juliana adds proudly.
“Them?” Enzo picks up on her wording, and Emily silently pulls out two more Gills in response.
“It’s only natural I make enough for everyone here just in case,” she responds. “Though, I’ve only finished six of them so far.”
She hands the two face masks to the twins before rising from the ground with unnatural grace and stepping towards the water’s edge.
“Let’s get going.”
“Wait,” Tom says, scrambling to her side. “How do I use this?”
“Just place it over your mouth and nose. It will attach on its own and work automatically,” Emily says dismissively, pulling three light packs from her belt.
She places one against her shoulder, latching it to her body armour facing forward, and hands one to each of the twins to do the same.
“Just channel a bit of mana into that one to activate it,” Emily says, turning to give Juliana one last smile. “Back in a second.”
She raises her Gills to her face, pressing them into place, a small suction force holding it fast as the air crystal pulses, sending a wave of motion through the fins as she steps backwards. She drops off the edge and into the water below, plunging below the fog layer almost instantly.
Emily activates the light pack mounted to her shoulder as the twins break through the fog layer arriving next to her. The glow of her light pack illuminates their Gills, letting Emily watch the small fins on the front constantly adjusting, breathing in and out in time with their breaths.
They work perfectly!
With a self-satisfied grin concealed by the mask, she signs for them to follow and turns to swim deeper into the lake. She stays close to the steep bank, keeping one side covered as they descend, cautious of the creatures dwelling below.
Emily stares out into the murky darkness as they swim down, infra-sight activated and her water detection spell running at full strength, the small blue magic circle following in the small of her back, allowing her to track the movements below slightly better than her boat. She pinpoints the closest creatures, finding them to be a school of ten piranhas.
She holds her hands to her back, lit up by the twins’ light packs, as she keeps swimming towards the school of fish. She quickly weaves together a few gestures to inform Tom and Hester about the approaching fight and begins casting attack spells.
I somewhat agree with Dante here. I’m quite limited underwater as well. My physical prowess is practically useless, and I can’t use any of my guns effectively without wasting my special ammo. I can’t even use most of my lightning spells without extra resources to not fry the twins as well, not to mention boiling the water around us.
The piranhas notice them before the light of their packs reaches them, turning and quickly closing the distance. Emily halts her pointless thoughts and unleashes a barrage of spells on the fish.
Two glittering blue magic circles appear, bending strong currents around the school, knocking them off target and sending them tumbling in a vortex of motion, being dragged into the middle of the two opposing flows. Two more circles form in front of the others, releasing two arcing blades of water that quickly accelerate, pushed by the current, and slice through the group of fish.
Six of the fish are sliced in half, but the other four manage to push themselves out of the way of the blades in the last second before they hit. Four smaller blades of water shoot out from the fish gliding through the water towards the trio. Only two of the blades are on target, the other two having been displaced by the currents still relentlessly battering the piranhas. Hester casts a barrier a second before the blades reach them, a barely tangible ripple in the water around them forming into a protective bubble, smoothly dissipating the force of the attack.
Emily throws a thumbs up behind her back to Hester, approving of her choice to defend and leave offence to her. She dismisses the spells keeping the fish contained and forms four smaller magic circles around her in the blink of an eye. Four sleek teardrops of clear water bubble into being in the centre of the circles before rocketing forwards, smoothly cutting through the water and burrowing into the fish’s heads before they can react.
The bodies of the fish float to the surface as Hester cancels her spell, and they continue swimming into the darkness. They descend past another school of piranhas, dispatching them in much the same way, before the lakebed starts to level out, turning into a gradual decline heading further out into the water.
They swim along close to the bottom, just above the dense reeds and weeds that reach up a few metres from the dark rock beneath that was exposed on Emily’s last visit.
It looks like the Mensacus’ curse affected the plants around it too.
Emily’s water detection locates six lightning eels stalking towards them through the plant life, weaving fluidly through the vegetation while barely producing a quiver of motion, displaying their predatory nature.
Emily comes to a halt, gesturing for her friends to do the same, and telling Hester to prepare a defence spell. She complies as Emily conjures four more teardrop-shaped water bolts to unleash on the unsuspecting fish. The eels slither up from the reeds and enter the small field of light around the trio with crackling blue lightning building around their bodies in rings, connecting the glistening blue gems on the end of their spines.
Emily releases her water bolts at the same moment as the eels attack. Three streams of lightning connect the eels to the barrier Hester throws up, as three teardrops of water plant themselves in the heads of the attacking eels, extinguishing the streams almost instantly. However, the fourth teardrop flies off into the open water as the other three eels rocket forwards.
The three long bodies cut through the water swiftly, closing the distance to the barrier. The first two slam head first into the barrier, each releasing a strong burst of lightning that together break Hester’s defence. The third eel sails through the gap created, straight towards Emily’s chest. Emily watches the eel approach, her control core automatically turning on full assistive processing with her spare cores to slow time in her perception.
She pushes her hand up against the water’s resistance and snatches the eel. The moment her hand closes around it, the full force of its gathered lightning bursts, pouring into Emily’s arm. The twins both flinch, looking at Emily in concern as their processing catches up and they notice the crackling fish in her grip, but Emily scoffs at the attack. The crackling lightning flows through her arm, meeting the cold buzz of machina inside before being methodically taken apart.
Emily tightens her grip, crushing the life from the fish as she slips out of assistive processing and casts two more water bolts. The new spells finish off the last two eels quickly, and Hester swims forward to check on Emily in the aftermath of the fight.
She taps her on the shoulder, glancing towards the crushed eel still in Emily’s clutch, and her seemingly untouched hand around it.
“Are you okay?” she signs as Emily turns her head.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Emily responds, sending the corpse into her belt and freeing up her hand. “I’m very resistant to lightning.”
