Qube’s healing mana punched into the approaching creature. The terrible beast that had been barrelling towards Qube didn’t stop, but its tentacle legs locked up, causing it to skid along its path, directly behind the block of stone Qube was standing next to. Thinking quickly, Qube hauled herself up on top of the waist-height block and peered over the other side where the chimera had glided to.

It had slid into the wall face first, and was now totally frozen in place. As Qube watched, it started trembling. Its fins shook, and its tentacles started wildly waving around until it tipped itself over and started rolling along the wall, face still jammed up against the stone.

As its face scraped against the wall, it gave a small whimpering noise and Qube’s heart nearly broke. Gathering her courage, she dropped down off her block, and gently pulled the monster away. Though there were no cuts, or blood, she still cast [Lesser Heal], just in case.

“Hey,” she said softly. “Hey, I’m sorry. You… you were just patrolling, weren’t you? Going from block to block? Is this your home? Are you protecting it?”

The creature looked at her with its flat, doll-like eyes. The [Lesser Heal], though weaker than a full [Heal], appeared to have stopped its rolling. It gently bonked into her leg, then looked up at her and blinked. It tilted its head, regarding her carefully, before backing up and bonking her again.

Seemingly satisfied by that exchange, it resumed its patrolling of the room, darting from the back of one block to another, its little octopus legs slorp-slorp-slorp-ing as it dashed between the open spaces.

Qube climbed up onto one of the blocks and watched it. After a few more mad dashes, it peeked out from behind one of the blocks and blinked at her.

“Hello?” Qube said. Startled, it ran behind another block and hid. From her vantage point, Qube couldn’t see any exits, or nests. Was there some kind of hidden exit from this room? How was this creature supposed to eat? From the brief summaries she’d managed to skim through in the library, both sharks and octopuses needed to eat food. What, then, was it eating?

“Are you hungry?” she asked it, making sure to keep her voice quiet so she didn’t spook it. Opening up her backpack, she saw some clam shells that she hadn’t handed over to the Chosen One yet. She gingerly took them out, and offered them to the monster. It looked at her, then at the clam shells, then back to her. After a moment, it wriggled forward slightly. Qube stretched her hand out encouragingly but, as soon as she moved, it hurriedly retreated again.

She pouted slightly, before quietly climbing down off the block and placing the clam shells on the floor. She slid them along the ground towards the block the beast was hiding behind. After a few moments, she saw its snout poking out from behind the stone, its tiny nostrils flaring as it sniffed at the offering.

With terrifying speed it lunged towards the clam shells, its fang-filled mouth quickly chomping through the small pile. Once it had finished, it looked over at where Qube was standing and violently wagged its tail, causing its whole back half to wobble. Having consumed (and politely thanked her for) the gift, it resumed its patrol, darting from block to block, its uneven octopus tentacles causing it to leave sucker marks in squiggly lines behind it.

“Hey, cutie,” Qube said, trying not to scare it. It paused in its patrol, and did a little tentacle dance as it reoriented itself so it was facing her. “So you can understand me!” She gave a little crow of triumph, making it rapidly scoot backwards. “Sorry, sorry,” she whispered. “Do you have a name?”

The monster looked at her, then down at its own feet. After a beat, it continued its squiggly patrol. It was at that point that the grates in the ceiling opened, and water started flooding the room.

“Chosen One?” Qube called. “Chosen One! I’m over here!” But there was no answer, and the water continued to rise. As the water sloshed over the squiggling sharktopus, its movements became less jerky and it started to speed up. “Chosen One!”

Qube was starting to get worried. She wasn’t sure if the Chosen One would be able to see or hear her under all the water. Maybe he wouldn’t come into this room? Maybe he wouldn’t be able to spot her, and she would be trapped under the water, unable to swim up.

A blunt, rough nose bonked into her, jolting her out of her spiraling thoughts. Her companion’s little round button eyes seemed strangely compassionate as it stared at her.

“May I?” Qube asked, reaching towards her new friend. “I can’t swim.” Its gills flapped, and it tucked itself under her arm, letting her grip its dorsal fin.

Which is how the breathless Chosen One found his childhood companion, clinging to the side of a giant sharktopus, happily floating together in an unexplored room.

In an instant his Sacred Sword and shield were in his hands, ready to attack.

“Hello, Chosen One!” Qube chirruped happily. “This is my new friend, Squiggles!”

The Chosen One paused. The newly-named Squiggles continued its patrol of the room, oblivious to the fact that its home was being graced with the presence of the Saviour of All Human and Human-Adjacent Beings.

“What?” the Chosen One panted. “You’re — oh. Of course. You’re invisible to it. Okay. Okay. You’re ok.” With a breathy laugh he flopped onto his back, heedless of the water that was just reaching the lip of the doorframe and starting to spill into the corridor. Further down the corridor, Qube could hear the rest of the party splashing towards them.

“Wait a minute.” The Chosen One abruptly sat upright. “I could have just reloaded a Save Point.” After a second he flopped back down, covering his eyes with his forearm. “This whole thing is way too realistic. It might actually send me insane.”

The other party members appeared, weapons drawn as they spotted Squiggles.

“Hi!” Qube said, waving with her free hand. “Don’t worry, she’s perfectly harmless! She likes clam shells.”

Sewer Bard stopped, puzzled, and Sexy Screamy Spider Lady hesitated for a second before raising her crossbow. Definitely Bad Guy, however, was already casting.

“[Stop],” Chosen One said from his damp repose. “No killing the abomination.”

“She’s not an abomination!” Qube protested as she gently steered Squiggles towards her friends. “I think she’s a baby Deep One who got lost. See, she’s so much smaller than the other ones we’ve seen.”

Squiggles slorped out of the water and stood over the Chosen One, drool dripping from her open mouth.

“[By the Words] what the [fiddle], get that [fiddling] thing away from me!” the Chosen One jackknifed off the ground, shield in hand. His eyes were huge as he looked between Qube and Squiggles.

“Squiggles, no!” Qube gently scolded the giant sharktopus. “No drooling on people! It’s not nice.” Squiggles, chastened, snapped her mouth shut and gave the Chosen One an apologetic look. For some reason, the Chosen One was not swayed by the sharktopus’ attempts to make her small, black eye circles into puppy dog eyes.

“What…” Sewer Bard trailed off as Qube looked at him. “Fair Healer, that is a dangerous beast. The only reason you are still alive is no doubt because of your curse.”

Definitely Bad Guy nodded. “The Evil Emperor’s protection of you continues to pay dividends,” he said, giving Qube a strangely-meaningful smile. Qube, not wanting to appear rude, returned a cautious smile. Definitely Bad Guy’s look of approval deepened.

“Squiggles can see me, though,” Qube clarified. “I tried [Lesser Shield] but, well, she was moving rather fast and I may have been a little intimidated. And I may have used [Heal]. And I gave her some food; the poor thing was starving. So she absolutely knows I’m here. Still, as you can see, she’s perfectly safe!”

The Chosen One was giving her a very curious look.

“Well, time to continue,” Qube said, patting Squiggles on her head. “There’s a lever in between those blocks, Chosen One. I think it’s a puzzle! But of course I wouldn’t dream of doing a puzzle without you.”

That and she had been preoccupied with the whole not dying thing. The Chosen One, however, was standing at the edge of Squiggles’ room, looking into the watery depths. He glanced over his shoulder at the beast.

“Are you gonna aggro the second I walk into that room?” He asked her. Squiggles looked back at him innocently. The Chosen One shifted his gaze to Qube. “Precisely how upset would you be if your pet tried to eat me and I had to kill it?” he asked.

“Very,” Qube replied immediately.

The Chosen One frowned. “Okay, new plan. You go down there and do the puzzle. Your monster mate here hopefully doesn’t aggro. We move on, no one tries to eat each other, everyone’s happy. Sounds good?”

“I would be honoured to assist in solving any puzzles,” Sewer Bard said in his deepest baritone. The other two nodded before the Chosen One cut them off.

“Nah, you guys might trip its flags too. I don’t want to have to try and recreate whatever cluster[fiddle] led to this. Especially not blind to how it happened in the first place.”

The party stood around as various party members tried to think if there was a way to say that they had no idea what he was saying without revealing their ignorance to the others. Meanwhile, the Chosen One was prodding Qube towards the room.

“Come on, less talking, more doing,” he urged. “I wanna get back to a Save Point so we don’t lose any of this glorious madness.”

“I’m going, Chosen One; stop poking me!” Qube muttered as she jumped into the room and promptly sank.

After that, it was a simple case of following the Chosen One’s shouted instructions, and ignoring her other party members’ frequently redundant ‘advice’. After she’d pulled the switch, drained the water, and moved all the blocks into their various respective floor grooves, a section of the wall suddenly disappeared, revealing a small alcove.

The Chosen One was practically vibrating from his post up in the corridor.

“That’s treasure,” he said, with total conviction. “Get the loot. Get the loot!”

Qube suppressed the urge to roll her eyes at his enthusiasm as she stepped into the alcove. Of course she would gather any treasure for him. She just didn’t understand why he always went so wide-eyed for loot. He already had more than most would see in a lifetime. Why was he still so obsessed with it?

The alcove’s light was a cool, ethereal blue, thoughtfully provided by the glowing mushrooms growing around the small room. Qube would have been totally blind without them, so she was grateful that everywhere in this Temple had at least some low level of lighting.

She filed that thought away for her TIMES research. Could the Temple be trying to accommodate them? Could it want the spells to be Bestowed on people? Maybe there would be some way of getting the Temples to not give them so many tests, but instead lead them directly to the guardians.

Then her gaze caught on the weathered wooden sea chest, covered in barnacles. Pushing up the heavy lid, Qube was momentarily engulfed in a warm glow, before a strange weapon appeared, hovering just above the now-open chest. It looked like a spear, encased in a strange wooden holder with a loop of rope hanging off of it. Something about it was strangely alluring.

She grabbed the weapon and pulled it towards herself. There was a tug of resistance, before the weapon birthed a twin, leaving the parent weapon in place. Frowning, Qube pulled the weapon’s leather strap over her head to free up her hands. She reached out and grabbed the parent weapon.

Another tug of resistance, before the parent weapon spawned another child. Qube eyed the weapon in her hands, then looked back at the original weapon, still floating in place.

“Hmmm,” she said, and reached out again.