The Omen, page 10
part #5 of Eden's Gate Series
I shrugged as I stared at the narrow hall that the door opened to. “Possibly. But it’s better than falling into a hole.” I lifted my chin to the opened door in the wall. “Let’s move in and see if we can find a way to Jeremy and Sung.”
Chapter Eleven
2/4/0001
The ground gradually sloped downward as we continued further into the hall, and the ceiling grew lower until it was just a few inches above our heads. The stones of the wall, floor, and ceiling all looked wet, and when I rubbed my finger across one of them, my finger was covered in a dark green soot.
Squeak.
I tensed up at the sound, turned to Keysia, and she gave me a slight nod as I placed my hand on the hilt of my sword. There was nothing frightening about the squeak, but I had been in Eden’s Gate long enough to know that even a non-threatening noise often came with unpleasant surprises.
Ahead of us, the empty path ran into a wall where a left turn was the only way to continue. We approached the ninety-degree turn slowly, trying not to disturb whatever was around the corner, but the moment I took one step into the turn, a dog-sized creature scurried across the ground and lunged at me.
The creature was so fast that I had no time to inspect it or even process what exactly the being was. I took a reflexive step back and whipped my sword out of its sheath, swinging it down awkwardly.
By luck, I managed to hit the attacker, causing it to squeal, rear back, and quickly spring forward again. I dashed backwards to dodge the blow and felt my back slam hard into Keysia.
“Ow!” Keysia yelled at the impact.
I had no time to turn to see if she was okay as I swung my sword again at whatever was attacking.
A blur of brown and yellow dodged my attack, and my blade clanged as it hit the stone ground below. At the miss, the creature paused and gazed up at me. Finally, I got a quick look at what I was dealing with.
It seemed to be some sort of giant rat that had strange, fleshy, yellow bulbs protruding from its body in various places. They seemed unnatural, like cancerous or pus-filled infections sprouting from its body. Its rodent hair was matted and missing in some places, and its face was slightly deformed—drooping on one side and one eye nearly swollen shut.
“Careful Gunnar!” Keysia shouted.
The rat squeaked as it lunged at me again, not allowing me any time to inspect it.
My blade missed as I tried to intercept the attack, and the rat drove its sharp frontal fangs right through the leather of my lower leg.
“Ahhh!” I yelled and kicked my leg out, feeling the weight of the heavy rat keeping itself clamped on.
Thwack!
Keysia’s staff slammed into the rat, and I could feel the impact reverberate through the rat’s body and into my leg. Her staff had connected with one of the large bulbs that was growing out of the rat, causing it to pop, and a thick, yellow liquid splattered onto the ground and all over the rat’s body. A cloud of yellow mist started floating out from where the bulb had burst.
An intense, nauseating smell of rot filled the air. I felt a slight tightening in my chest.
The rat released its bite, scampered back a few steps and rattled its head as it screeched in pain.
I was thankful it had let go of its grip, yet surprised that I didn’t get a bleeding alert from the bite. I glanced up to see that the rat’s attack had garnished a little less than 10% of my health, so it seemed to have not penetrated me too deeply.
I reached my hand out and shot a Fireblast at the rat, and when the blast connected, the rat was thrown back several feet. All the fleshy bulbs on its body burst and spewed out liquid to the ground. Even more yellow particles drifted into the air.
The rat hissed and squeaked hysterically, either from the pain of the fire or the pain of the burst bubbles all over its body. It lay on the ground twitching with its mouth agape as if it knew it was at the end of its life. Not wanting to take any chances of it recovering, I ran forward and slammed my sword down hard, nearly splitting the rat’s skull in two. Blood spilled from its head, and its cries and movements stopped.
You have gained 1000 XP!
I inhaled deeply as I tried to catch my breath and instantly regretted it. My nostrils suddenly burned, and the air felt thick and gaseous. I snorted once then started coughing uncontrollably. My throat felt like it was swelling shut and catching fire at the same time.
Keysia started coughing right after me.
I grabbed the base of my throat and glanced at Keysia. Her eyes were wide, panicky, and we both leaned over and started making choking noises as we continued to struggle for air.
In the corner of my vision I saw that my health was slowly ticking down, and there was a flashing icon right below my status bars. It was a green, pixelated square with several small, black dots inside.
You are surrounded by noxious spores! Breathing noxious spores creates a disorienting and damage-over-time affect.
I coughed harder and spit phlegm out of my mouth.
“Ga—Gunnar…” Keysia stuttered between one of her coughs.
The singeing pain and trouble breathing was debilitating, and made it difficult to concentrate on my surroundings. My first thought was to run back towards where we came, but just past the dead rat, I could see that the hallway extended far, and I was pretty sure that the noxious spores were only affecting our general vicinity.
I spit again, trying to ignore the discomfort, jumped to my feet, and grabbed Keysia’s arm. I yanked her up without saying anything, trying my best to not inhale any more of the toxic air.
At first, Keysia pulled away as if she thought we were turning back, but I tilted my head in the opposite direction—past the rat, and further in to the temple.
“W—Wha—?” she struggled to ask before breaking into another fit of coughs.
I squeezed her arm harder and gave her a hard yank as I started running towards the rat. Keysia followed as she continued coughing, and we both ran past the dead animal. Twenty or so meters past the rat, the icon below my status bar disappeared. I let out a hard exhale then took another breath.
I spit and coughed again, but the burning feeling was quickly subsiding. “Are you okay?” I croaked.
Keysia leaned against the wall, grabbed her chest, and let out a few weak coughs as she nodded. “Yes… What was that?”
“Some sort of rat monster, I guess.”
“No, I mean… the air.”
I shook my head. “It must be some sort of poison that came from those bubbly things on its body.”
“It took away 10% of my health. We won’t make it far if there’s more of those…”
I glanced up to my health bar and saw that along with the bite, I had lost a little more than 20% of my health. “If we run into another, hold your breath once those… whatever those bubbly things on its body pops. It didn’t seem to cause damage until we breathed in the gas.”
“Alright,” Keysia said with a nod. She pulled herself straight, rubbed her hand across her throat again and winced. “We’ll have to kill and run past them quickly if there are any more.”
I nodded. “Let’s just hope there aren’t any others like it. We’ll assess things as we continue.”
It was doubtful if the rat had any loot, but if it did, I wasn’t about to walk back to find out. We turned towards the path ahead of us and continued our trek.
It was half a minute or so of more walking before another rat with strange bulbs on its body came scurrying down the hall towards us, and Keysia immediately unleashed a lightning attack on it. The rat shook violently, and after a few seconds, all the bulbs on its body burst and spilled liquid to the ground. Particles trickled into the air.
Keysia and I both took deep breaths of air and clamped our mouths shut before the particles could reach us.
When I held out my hand out and shot an Arcane Missile at the rat, it was knocked back a little, but just as soon as Keysia ended her shocking attack, the rat shook its head, screeched, and continued in our direction.
I shot a Fireblast before it could close in, which knocked the rat back hard and lit it on fire. The flames of the blast consumed it, and the rat simply screeched and twitched as it began burning to death.
I nodded towards Keysia, grabbed her hand, and we both ran through the toxic air and past the dying rat until I could see the noxious icon below my status bar disappear. We both exhaled and took deep breaths as the rat let out a sad, final whine behind us.
You have gained 1000 XP!
“My arcane magic isn’t all that effective,” I said as I leaned over breathing heavily, “but they seem vulnerable to fire.”
“My lightning attack seems to stun them, but they don’t take much damage from it.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, “and since it releases their poison into the air, I guess it’s best to use your lightning only if we need to stop them in their tracks.” I straightened my back, placed my hand on my hip and leaned my weight against the wall with my other hand.
Click!
I nearly lost my balance as the stone I leaned on quickly retracted deeper into the wall, and before I could regain my equilibrium, I heard a sharp popping noise. I screamed loudly as a piercing pain entered my thigh and the side of my neck.
“Gunnar!” Keysia yelled.
I reached for my neck first, and yanked a small, metal dart out of my skin, then looked down to see another dart sticking out of my thigh.
You have been poisoned and require medical attention. Poison is a weakening and damage-over-time effect.
“Ow! Motherfucker!” I grunted loudly as I pulled the other dart out of my thigh. I would’ve never expected there to be a trap triggered simply by pressing the wall.
“Are you okay?” Keysia asked as I flipped open my bag and went to reach for a cure potion.
Squeak.
My eyes snapped up at the interruption, and I looked ahead of us. I didn’t respond to Keysia, sensing an imminent danger.
Squeak, Squeak, Squeak.
I didn’t like the sounds we were hearing.
The hall we had been walking down was straight and long, but I could see that ahead of us was another sharp, left turn.
The squeaking multiplied, and within seconds, the ground and walls around us were trembling lightly.
“Keysia…” I said low as I put my hand on her shoulder.
“Gunnar…”
You have been poisoned and require medical attention. Poison is a weakening and damage-over-time effect.
I winced as the poison rattled through me and quickly switched my attention back to my cure potion, pulling it up and drinking it as fast as possible. My eyes grew wide as the liquid coursed down my throat. Coming around the corner was an entire horde of the strange, deformed rats, and they were running at us at an incredible speed.
“Holy shit…” I cursed as I pulled the potion from my lips and dropped the bottle to the ground. “My scream must have alerted them.”
“Run!” Keysia yelled and grabbed my hand.
“No…” I stood my ground and shook my head as I eyed the thirty or forty rats that were closing in on us. “They’re too fast. They’ll catch up to us before we make it out of here.”
I lifted my sword in front of me as I gauged the rats’ distance. “We’ve got ten or so seconds. Get ready to take a deep breath.”
“What? Fight them all? Their noxious sp—”
“Use your lightning,” I advised. “Trust me.”
Keysia took a step back. “But that—”
“Keysia,” I said sternly.
“Gun—“
“Now! Breathe!” I yelled. I took a huge gulp of air when the sea of brown and yellow deformities were just a few seconds away. I threw Keysia a rapid glance, and she gulped before turning back to the rats. I didn’t see her take a deep breath, but she pressed her lips together and held her hands out.
Lightning arched out of her fingertips and caught the closest rats, then spiderwebbed between the rest. They all shook wildly, the sounds of all their screams and squeaks echoing through the hall made my eardrums throb.
Fire Curtain, I thought, and cast a wall of fire across the shuddering rats. I tried my best to form a square of sorts to burn as many of the rats as possible, but only a single wall manifested, stretching across a third of them.
The screams of the affected rats intensified, and almost simultaneously, the yellowish bulbs on all the rat’s bodies all burst at once, spewing liquid in every direction and noxious particles into the air.
My chest tensed, and I felt an uncomfortable sensation in my throat. It was the first time since being in Eden’s Gate that I could remember holding my breath for any significant length of time—perhaps the only other similar instance being my panicked swim across Crystal River. It was only then that I noticed a thin, barely noticeable grey bar at the bottom of my vision. It wasn’t labeled, but the speed at which the bar depleted matched the increasing urgency I felt for air.
Fire Curtain had a cooldown period, so casting rapidfire Fire Curtains wasn’t an option. Instead, I thrust my hand out and cast a Fireblast into the bulk of the wave of rats.
Several bodies were thrown aside.
I looked to Keysia, and her eyes were wide. It looked like she was struggling to hold both her breath and the lightning spell at the same time.
Fireblast, I thought again, sending another ball of fire into the wave of rats.
More bodies went flying in the air.
The rats that had been burning from Fire Curtain were starting to fall over and die from our attacks, but it was hard to tell how injured the other rats were. The lightning that was arcing between them caused them to do nothing but shake and scream as their bizarre bulbs burst.
The air around was growing uncomfortably thick with the noxious spores, causing my eyes to water even, and I knew that taking a single breath might be enough to choke us out.
“Gu—“ I heard Keysia sputter. “Gu—”
Keysia’s spell ended, and she jumped back.
Fire Curtain, I thought, feeling that enough time had passed that I could cast the spell again. I focused the spell across as many unburned rats as possible and ran forward with my sword drawn.
The rats were mostly disoriented from our AoE [area-of-affect] spells, and the ones that recovered their senses were doing their best to avoid the fire. I swung my sword at one, splitting its back open.
You have gained 900 XP!
I turned and whipped my sword across two more, hitting the center of their bodies, cutting them and causing them to fly across the room.
You have gained 1700 XP!
I thrust my sword down at a rat that was running towards me, pinning it to the ground by its neck, then released another Fireblast at a group of three more that were nearby.
You have gained 2500 XP!
Thankfully, the rats seemed weakened enough that a single swing of my sword was taking each of them out. Keysia dashed beside me and swung her staff between two other rats, hitting each of them with two quick successive blows.
I released another Fireblast and swung my sword at one more rat, before I felt a strong pain in my chest, and the desperation for air was overwhelming. I looked down and noticed that the grey bar at the bottom of my vision was empty and had started to blink. At the top of my screen, my health was beginning to deplete. Along with the bite of the rat and the darts from earlier, I was at a little less than 60% of my health and losing what was remaining at roughly 1% per second.
Thwack. Thwack!
I clutched my chest and looked to Keysia and our surroundings. She jumped over a heap of sizzling rats and dashed to what seemed to be the last one that was still alive. The crippled, half-burned rat made a sad effort of lunging at her, but she twirled her staff in a circle and hit it with the tip, sending the rat flying against the wall.
You have gained 600 XP!
Alert: You are lacking Oxygen and losing health quickly!
Alert: You are lacking Oxygen and losing health quickly!
I ran for Keysia, who started clutching her chest as I approached. I could tell from her diminishing health bars that she was at the end of her air supply as well. I wanted to tell her to run, but saying anything would have risked me inhaling the thick noxious spores that were floating around us. Instead, I grabbed her and pointed ahead in the direction we had been heading.
When we started running, I noticed the stone I had leaned on earlier out of the corner of my eye. It was slightly off-colored—a little lighter and seemed much dryer than the rest of the moisture-covered wall. If not looking closely, someone might not be able to tell the subtle difference. There were a few other off-colored stones as well, and I wondered if they were also traps.
I clenched my teeth hard, trying to ignore the pain of not breathing, waiting for the Noxious Spores icon below my status bar to disappear. Killing so many rats at once had released enough toxins to fill a great length of the hall.
Keysia broke and took a gulp of air, then immediately started choking. Her health started dropping more rapidly, and she was running slower as she continued to cough. Thankfully, we were right before a ninety-degree turn, and when we rounded it, the noxious spores icon disappeared.
I inhaled, and while I didn’t receive a breath full of the noxious spores, not having breathed for a while caused me to reflexively take heaping gulps and ultimately coughed anyway.
Keysia fell to the ground and pressed her back against the stone as she continued coughing and trying to catch her breath.
“I told you…” I said as I let out a final cough and spit on the ground.
Keysia winced and rubbed her fingers across her throat. “Told me what?” she asked hoarsely.
A long, green, ropelike vine swung down from the ceiling and wrapped itself around Keysia’s neck. It quickly lifted her up to her tiptoes.
