Saintess Summons Skeletons

As Henry had predicted, with his skills, finding Bookie and Pestle had been a mere formality. He had explained earlier how the blood sea cared not for speed but only for direction, this meant the group could cross gigantic distances in no time by simply properly changing course a few times.

Getting to Hangman’s fangs, the execution site he had mentioned earlier, was similarly quite simple. A storm slowed down on the group on the way, and sea creatures akin to the zombie basilisk of the first day attacked a handful of times, but the entire group reunited dealt with these issues with ease.

Stopping his rowboat between the pair of fang-like stone outcrops, Henry looked at them with nostalgia.

“There ya have it. I was almost scared I wouldn’t remember the way, but here we are. That fucker should be resting at the bottom of the sea. Now whether the grand inquisitor’s inheritance is there… For ya to find out.”

Sofia flew down to the rowboat while the others inspected the twin fangs. “Thank you, Henry. I suppose it’s time for us to find a way down. It would be helpful if you could stay but-”

“Tssk, I’ll wait here a day or two. Nothin’ much to do anyway. If ya’re not back out by then, I’ll assume ya died or found the damn thing. Happy?”

“Very much so, a great honor this pirate is doing us,” Sofia answered in a slightly mocking tone, “Ah, I really mean it, though, you were a great help. If we don’t come back up then… I wish you great eternity here, I guess?”

“A whole eternity? I’d swear ya’re cursin’ me. Don’t mention it, though, ya got what ya paid for. None more, none less.”

“Alright, alright.”

Sofia extended her hand first, and Henry shook it without hesitation, despite slightly shaking his skull in pretend disapproval.

As Henry pulled his hand back, Sofia raised a finger. “One last thing.”

“Hmm?”

“If we out there discover a way to break you off here somehow, would you want…”

“No thanks,” Henry stopped her, “I feel like… I’m still a bit young to die. Ah ah ah… Since that thing is bound to happen again. I’ll be fine here. Not to mention, there is hardly anything left for me outside. My body had long withered to nothingness, I’m sure. But thank ya for the thought. Now go. See ya never, matey.”

Sofia gave Henry a last nod as he sat back down in his rowboat, and flew out. She examined the twin fangs with the others, listening to the longing song of Henry’s violin.

After a short few minutes, the group met atop one of the fangs.

“No obvious way down,” Alith was first to say, “bet we could dig tho.”

Pareth simply nodded along, then gazes turned toward Pestle.

“Pesle not find. Only rock,” she admitted, scratching her skull.

“The birds didn’t find anything either…” Bookie added.

“Crowie?” Sofia asked.

Even the tiny crow shook his skull in defeat.

“Hmm… I don’t know about digging,” Sofia said, “Since the rocks aren’t already hollow, no one had done it before. Then either we have the wrong place, or it’s a bad strategy. There are two things that would stop me here. First of all if it’s underwater and not underground, digging through the rock would only be a partial solution, but more importantly I’m not sure how much I trust the thing not to collapse on us under the water pressure.”

“Well shit we better hope it’s the right place because we’ll be here forever otherwise. Do you know how many islands we ran by with Pareth?”

“I do think it is the right place, actually. The hint just fits very well. And the fact that nobody tried to dig at all is not even an issue with that theory. At the minimum two people have gotten this mirror, the thing is, they were Cecless, and an admin. The admin was likely Nex, since he was quite involved with researching the deep, and exploring places is his whole thing. Both of them are Dragons, so chances are… They could just dive down without a care in the world.”

“You think their scales would protect ‘em against the blood tendrils when the philosopher’s stone doesn’t? Quite the assumption to make. What about Sonia’s group, though? They gave you the hint so they probably got it themselves, no?”

Sofia shook her head, “Not necessarily. There isn’t much Sonia told us about their group members, but we do know that they have an expert in divination. The information could very well just come from them.”

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“Well, if we had your sis’ around, maybe she could go down, then, but that’s not advancing us much right now.”

“Heh. Honestly my first instinct was trying to blow it all up, bad idea all around, but you know… At times like this we need Mornn and her sword that splits the sea.”

“Have you checked how your summoned blood reacts to the water?” Alith asked.

“Now that you mention it, no… But…”

Just to be sure, Sofia walked to the edge overlooking the red sea, and summoned a large bubble of blood above the water.

“No reaction,” Alith noted, standing next to Sofia, “We might be onto something here.”

While Alith commented, Sofia’s brain was already in calculation mode.

“With my current regeneration… Considering the limitations here and my missing items… I can do about a hundred thousand liters a second.”

“Sof, that’s a crazy number. Sounds like enough, huh. We won’t see shit but I bet if the currents aren’t too strong we can go down in a big bubble of blood.”

Sofia nodded, “sounds like a plan. Summoning that much for that long and in a fixed shape is going to be a bit taxing but I should be able to. The issue is more that if anything attacks us down there… Yeah.”

“I can just screech a few times if need be? Won’t displace the blood and if it doesn’t work you can still scramble their bones if the sea creatures get too close.”

“Yeah that could work. I’m thinking… Maybe I should use the bone I have to make a sphere we can stand in? That way even if the blood fails we have a failsafe that’ll last a few seconds, I can also use it to shoot us back up to the surface.”

“Bone sphere surrounded by blood. My favorite kind of vehicle. You don’t have that much bone, though, and the sphere would need to be quite thick to withstand the pressure even if you’re maintaining it.”

Sofia shrugged, “It’ll be a bit cramped but what else can we do? Anyway, my mana senses are going to be terrible since I’ll have to maintain the blood flow, so I’ll be almost blind. So everyone… You’re on sensing duty.”

“Pesle very sense!”

It took Sofia some time before she could maintain a bubble of blood she was satisfied with. She never used [Summon blood] at such a high volume, and it would have to contend with the sea pressure and currents to keep the sea water away from the bone sphere. When she felt confident, the group entered the bone sphere and after it started being surrounded by a mind-boggling waterfall of blood, it slowly started its descent between the stone fangs.

Sofia sat at the center of the narrow flat floor inside the sphere, “Entering the water now.”

Everyone stayed silent, with full focus on their mana senses.

“The bubble is holding so far… Full submersion. Still good.”

Alith nodded and gave a report on her own side. “The water isn’t too easy to see through but since ambient mana is pretty normal around here, it’s still not too bad. Nothing nearby, so far. Not even a small fish.”

“All that mana and blood is bound to attract some nasty things, stay sharp.”

Controlling the speed of descent with her aura pulling down on the sphere, Sofia steadily dove deeper at a snail’s pace, making sure that their protective bubble of blood stayed whole.

A hundred meters, two, five, the underwater currents gave Sofia a few scares, washing away parts of the bubble for a moment before the constant supply she summoned filled the gaps, but no monsters ever came close.

Around what Sofia estimated to be more or less twelve hundred meters deep, Pestle warned her that she could feel the bottom.

“Good, no change, let’s go all the way down. Hmm? I feel bones, strange.”

“The ‘condemned’ guy?” Alith asked, “He should be here.”

“No… It’s like… Dust? I can feel the seafloor. The layer of dust above it rather. It’s at least… A full meter deep. Bone dust. I can’t… I can’t control it somehow, but it’s absolutely bone, we’re almost touching it, though the blood is washing it away.”

“Maybe that’s the final state of being consumed by the blood tendrils?” Alith guessed, “I can feel something up ahead, not sure what, though, I’d say pointy rocks, like mini fangs, not moving. Anyone got a better read?”

“Pesle is see! Not rock, it sword! Lot big sword!”

“Swords? They’re at least three meters tall…”

“I think it’s swords too,” Bookie chimed in.

“Well you both have a better mana sight than I do. Anything else? Sof?”

“No bones besides the dust, nothing moving. I still have to keep the flow of blood, so I can’t see much more. Which direction are the swords at exactly? I’ll move us there…”

“That way,” Alith said, pointing at the direction, “I’ll guide you between the swords, the others keep an eye on the wider surroundings and above.”

Under the other’s guidance, Sofia navigated through the field of swords.

Suddenly Pestle perked up. “Big arch! Very mana! Must gate! This way!”

But at nearly the same time, Bookie yelped, “Monster left!!!”, pointing at the direction Pareth was standing in, shrunk to his smallest size.

When it came close enough, even Sofia could feel the beast’s bones as it approached at high speed. The collision she braced herself for never came. With a bang, the sea creature crashed against Pareth’s shields of light, just outside of the blood bubble.

“Alith!”

With a shriek, the already stunned creature died, its body pushed away by the constant blood flow.

“Dead,” Sofia announced first, feeling the bones rise as her thrall and get instantly devoured by the tendrils of the blood sea. “Let’s move to that arch.”

Pestle had been right, it was a gate, Sofia’s blood disappeared as it crossed through the boundary.

Fearing that this might simply be the way out of the sanctuary, the group first explored the entire field of swords, coming to understand that the gate was at its center. There was nothing else.

Without further delay, the sphere crossed the boundary.