D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

Chapter 1932: Chapter 1932 A Questionable Escape Route

--- Kat ---

When Kat had fully recovered they began a slow investigation of the room. Lily wasn’t close to full up on mana... but the risk was deemed worth it. They’d be waiting for a while longer still and worries about the primordial waking back up just from sitting around were too great to justify waiting for Lily as well.

The walls and ceiling were interesting sure... but they lacked any obvious exits. Less obvious ones hadn’t been found either. The walls weren’t all that intricately carved and while they weren’t quite willing to spend forever poking around for secret exits they did make a few attempts. Most of which involved feeling around at roughly shoulder height for some sort of seem, button, or handle allowing for them to open a hidden door.

Lily checked large sections of the ceiling as well. Spreading her shadows amongst the ceiling as best she could, Lily looked for any cracks she could access. If she did find some there would’ve been a vote on how risky it was to pry them open and if it was worth it... but there didn’t seem to be any. Lily had managed to cover a good chunk of the ceiling but she still couldn’t extend her shadows too close to the chains.

Kat got closer after Lily’s first pass over the ceiling. Kat mostly focused on looking in and around the bits the chains connected to... but none of them seemed fit for someone to sneak through. Even Lily’s Memphis form was too large for the gaps she could spot. Well... without removing the chains anyway, and nobody wanted to deal with the risk that might bring. It wasn’t even suggested.

It was a full thirty minutes of investigation, and it really was getting later then they’d wanted. It was probably around nine or ten at night and Hedera had wanted to be asleep, or at least relaxing, long before that. So the girls met up near the blocked exit... and stared at each other for a bit. Eventually, Kat spoke up first. ”Ok, so I see only two ways out of here. Which one do we think is best?”

”Two?” asked Hedera.

”Two,” confirmed Kat.

Hedera considered it for a few moments before paling. ”Wait... surely that’s not your second exit?” mumbled Hedera as she glanced over towards where the primordial was. Kat nodded. ”Really?”

Kat shrugged, ”Look, the water has to flow somewhere right? I’ve got no idea where... but presumably it counts as a second exit. I also managed to spot that the thing isn’t even bolted down. You’d just need to twist and lift. Technically less disruptive then clearing out the stair rubble,”

Hedera shivered, ”Yeah and I can agree that Thyme probably provided it as a way for people to get out if they can’t fly... and they don’t want to like... break the wall to climb up but... it just feels so wrong. I’m also not sure how safe it would be to swim in that water...”

Kat shrugged, ”I suppose then the question is what’s less risky? What’s more likely to trigger things.”

”How should I know?” Hedera countered. ”It’s not like I can guess at Thyme’s thought process. There’s nothing really indicating what’s better and honestly, I’d say we’d be safe going either. Well... safe from the primordial reactivating. Still not sure swimming in the water its letting off is a good idea...”

Kat nodded, ”I’m not sure it’s entirely safe either but the way I see it? That exit is also more likely to have some loot along the way. Backtracking isn’t going to get us anything...”

”Is that what this is about?” asked Hedera.

Kat shrugged and gestured at the nearby doorway. ”This is what caused all of our problems down here. I’m not sure if crossing it again is going to set things off. Especially because we spent close to thirty minutes waiting for me to recover... and then another thirty minutes looking around. If it was going to reset... well I’d suspect it to happen either right now, or in a day.”

”I hate that you’re making sense,” grumbled Hedera. ”I... I don’t really know enough about primordials to say if the water is safe. Or... well no. What I know says it shouldn’t be safe but they also aren’t meant to be something you can trap either so...”

Kat shrugged and Lily transformed to lean against the wall. ”I think we could go and debate this forever. I think we decide by first, checking if Hedera is even willing to RISK swimming in that stuff, and if she’s not? We just go back the way we came. If it triggers a fight... well hopefully with more practice it won’t take quite so long.”

”And if I am?” asked Hedera.

”Then we flip a coin for it probably. I don’t think either Kat or I care about the treasure that might be there enough. I’d guess it’s a key or a chest. Maybe both... but that’s just a guess. There’s no proof. Plus, it might send us out of the dome to somewhere we’ve never been. This place is already hard enough to travel through, I’d hate to be completely lost on top of that,” explained Lily.

Hedera sighed and looked over at the running water. ”Give me just a moment I guess...” Hedera walked over to the primordial, slowly, and shivering all the way. She then bent down and lightly ran a finger through the water before flinching back and making her way to Kat and Lily once again, still shaking.

”Nope,” said Hedera firmly. ”It’s too cold. Even if it’s not a trap I don’t want to deal with that. Jut a finger and I could already feel my whole hand freezing...” Hedera held out the hand in question and she was right. It was bright red despite the fact Hedera had only dipped a finger in the water. Plus, when she showed off opening and closing her hand, there was a notable stutter as if she was trying to close a rusty robot hand or something.

”Ooh, that is not good,” stated Kat. ”Are you even going to be alright?”

Hedera nodded as she placed her hand down her armour using the hole around her neck, wincing at the chill. ”Yeah, I can already feel it going away. It’s not fun but it’s not going to kill me.”

With that established Kat carefully made her way to the door. She sucked in a deep breath and carefully moved across the threshold before glancing back immediately. The primordial didn’t so much as twitch. With that established, Lily and Hedera stepped through as well and got to work moving aside the rubble. Kat and Hedera were primarily focused on making a hole, while Lily shovelled the debris out into the main room.

It seemed that there was quite a bit of it stacked up into the staircase shaft and trying to make that hole was taking a bit of effort. Every time Kat shifted something to the side, a small avalanche of wood and stone would pour out of the gap for a while. Eventually, they needed to push aside some particularly large or sturdy piece and then another river of crap would flow out.

What the three weren’t really thinking about... was that by working in just one spot they were causing all of the debris caught above them to slide down to fill the space. They were needing to clear out essentially everything above them instead of just a small bit that could fit them. Perhaps if they’d focused on that they could’ve focused on firming up the support around a slowly growing hole for them to escape through?

Regardless, they’d committed to this course of action and it wasn’t too bad. Lily eventually swapped to a sort of shadow slide that let her avoid a lot of the word. She was careful not to trap them at all, nor send anything flying towards the primordial. There was plenty of space so taking that into account wasn’t too hard.

Once all the debris was out of the way though? It was a completely straight shot. Not awkward crawling, Kat was able to fly them both up and out of the place without issue. The doors upstairs did seem to have shut themselves but the locks didn’t magically re apply themselves and Lily was able to sneak a shadow hand under the door to open them back up without breaking anything. Once on the other side though...

”Should we put the locks back?” asked Kat.

”Yeah obviously,” said Hedera. ”We don’t want other people getting in...”

”Right but you got in pretty easily didn’t you?” retorted Kat as Hedera nodded. ”Right... well... what if we leave it unlocked with the implication that somebody already went down and got whatever loot there was inside?”

Hedera scratched at her chin. ”Alright. I don’t love it... but the enchantments on these locks were shit and I’m certain there’s contestants out there that can lockpick them just like I did. It’s... I don’t like that pretending there’s nothing left down there is probably the best way to go about this.”