Backlebutt's body was nearly numb with cold by the time he reached the point where the river transitioned from the dim tunnel to the comparatively brightly lit, frankly enormous cavern. Despite that, he felt much recovered from his previous rigors. Compared to the arduous run, it hadn’t been difficult at all to haul himself along the wall; the entire thing was riddled with cracks, seams, and ridges that made it easy to find handholds.

Shivering with cold, he took in the room. It was very different from everything he’d seen so far. He wondered for a moment if he’d somehow found himself in a part of the Tunnels he wasn’t supposed to be in due to his little detour, or even the wrong level of the Descent—but no, the system would surely have updated him with a notification had the latter been the case. The fact that the area was lit, apparently with magic, also spoke to Backlebutt having found his way back to one of the intended paths.

There was that, and also the presence of another one of those cursed red-eyed things. Cassowaries. He could see it off in the distance across the river, probably not a threat for now. It wasn’t even facing his direction. Still, he made sure to disturb the water as little possible to avoid drawing its attention.

The river spread out as it entered the room, simultaneously growing shallower. Backlebutt found that he could finally touch the pebbly river bottom. This afforded him the opportunity to stand higher and get a good look at the ground level of the cavern, which had previously been hidden from him by the lip of the riverbank.

It was wide, flat, and flooded. That fairly well summed it up. Rocks and the odd ridge of ground rose up above the level of the water occasionally, but that was it. It almost seemed like a waste of a room. Aside from the lone cassowary, there weren’t even—

One of the ridges peeking above the water moved.

Backlebutt’s skin prickled. Things lurked in the shallow water over there. He immediately grew more wary of the water surrounding himself, scanning it suspiciously for any movement or dark shapes. There were none. But then, the water wasn’t perfectly clear. There might be one even now creeping toward him, readying to take a bite out of him.

Don’t be paranoid. You haven't seen a single one in the river so far.

Even telling himself that, Backlebutt found himself suddenly much less concerned about the cassowary noticing him and much more concerned with rapidly moving to the one bit of dry land he could see on his side of the river, a small strip of pebbly shore butting up against the wall.

He could also see, perhaps a couple stride up, a small ledge that poked below what looked to be a hollow recess in the wall—a small cave. Eyeing it, he thought he might be able to haul himself up there.

Might be a good place to rest and dry out.

He needed a long term plan, however. Can’t huddle up there forev—aagh!

Something was suddenly squeezing his leg with crushing force. He screamed in pain as it pulled him toward the center of the river, ripping his foot out from under him and causing him to pitch into the knee-deep water.

At first he tried to struggle backward in a tug of war with the unseen creature, but it became painfully obvious that that was a battle he was not going to win. The beast was immensely strong, as evidenced by the incredible pressure he felt around his leg. Instead, he drew a final deep breath before giving up, allowing himself to be towed into deeper waters.

He wasn’t ready to give up entirely, however. He tried for a swing at the creature with the hammer. The water resisted him, robbing his blow of any power. Quickly switching tactics, Backlebutt reached for his knife, tucked into a sheath behind his back. He began stabbing, unable to see the creature and aiming by feel.

He felt resistance several times, meaning he’d connected, but none of the hits seemed to have any effect on the creature. Either it was heavily armored or simply didn’t care, willing to take a few wounds in exchange for a meal. Rather than react, it was placidly waiting for him to run out of air.

This is useless.

He needed to do better than stabbing blindly. And he needed to free his leg; the pain was growing unbearable.

Switching his hold on the knife so that the handle was trapped between his thumb and his palm, he started feeling around at the limb gripping his leg, probing for weakness.

He expected some kind of a claw, but was surprised to realize that his fingers were encountering rows of what felt like...teeth?

Gods. Its mouth must be…

Huge. Its snout was monstrously long, perhaps the length from his wrist to his elbow.

As horrifying as that was, it meant an opportunity for Backlebutt. Where there was a mouth, there was also typically a brain nearby. He wasn’t aware of any creatures that could survive with several inches of steel embedded in their brains.

The mouth was obviously open, given that its jaws were crushing his leg. That meant he could technically reach up inside it with his knife and potentially reach the brain that way—but if the beast suddenly grew less placid, it might loosen its grip on his leg and instead mangle his hand, which he definitely didn’t want. He and Milo would make a fine pair then, in the increasingly unlikely scenario that they both lived to be reunited.

Instead, his fingers scrambled all over what he assumed was its head, searching for recognizable features. After several seconds, he was pretty sure he’d found the face. It was several more before he found a squishier, circular area that he believed to be one of its eyes. Strangely, the monster simply let him poke around. It didn’t seem to care a whit, even when he poked into the squishy slot with two of his fingers together.

Maybe not its eye then. He couldn’t imagine it would be so blasé were that the case. Still, no bone there. Might be able to do some damage.

He had to try it. The breath of air he’d taken was starting to seem like a distant memory, and Backlebutt felt his lungs convulsing as he continued to deny it another.

Taking a better grip on his knife, he poked the head a couple of times until he found the soft spot with his blade and promptly plunged it in. In a very welcome surprise, a kill notification immediately displayed in his vision.

-

Congratulations! You have slain a level 3 Juvenile Zombodile. You have gained 30 experience.

-

Backlebutt felt the pressure around his leg lessen, but the mouth was still stuck. He quickly pried it apart, freeing his foot before bringing his head and chest back up out of the water. Not hesitating for a moment, he started once more toward the small piece of shore, limping badly.

He made it this time, but not before hearing a familiar shriek behind him.

-

You hear the cassowary’s cry, and you know fear.

-

He snorted. Backlebutt did feel a spike of fear...but also irritation. He prided himself on being able to think calmly and rationally in most any situation. The fact that this beast could instill a sense of panic in him by simply screaming sparked an anger that helped ward off the worst of the effect.

Even so, he found himself glancing warily around, telling himself it was only sensible—which is when he saw the other zombodiles. Alerted by the cassowary, or possibly by his battle with the supposed juvenile, they had started heading his way in a mass exodus from the main part of the room.

He watched as several of the enormous, ruggedly scaled creatures slipped over the edge of the bank down into the river and began gliding lazily through the water toward him. Besides being truly monstrous, they looked...horribly diseased.

He’d never gotten a look at the young one, but every single one of the adults he could see looked like it was rotting alive, flesh sloughing off to the point that there was bone exposed in some places.

Backlebutt tore his eyes away from the sight, turning back to face the little cave up in the wall. He needed to be up there now.

He quickly tucked his knife back away in its sheath. He set the hammer on the ledge, which was only slightly above eye level, before scrambling up without too much difficulty despite his leg. Once there, he was greeted by an unsettling sight. Someone was already up here.

That someone was long dead, nothing more than bones and a few crusty pieces of equipment, but that made it worse if anything. Turning around to see the approaching zombodiles, he felt pretty sure he had a good idea how the person had gotten that way.

***

Backlebutt stared dully off into space, mostly naked. His leg, bloody, toothmarked, and purple with horrible bruising, throbbed painfully. He’d grown used to it.

Eventually, he glanced down at the tightly packed row of zombodiles. They waited for him in the shallow water directly adjacent to the bit of shore underneath him. It had been hours now.

He’d been hopeful at first, devising a complicated plan to kill the beasts one by one with his dagger combined with Perfect Shot. He would have had to make something to tie to the hilt of the knife so that he could retrieve it safely after each throw. He wasn’t sure if Perfect Shot could account for how the weight of the tether would affect the throw; it probably depended on whether the rope was considered a part of the weapon or not.

But then all of the fleshungry skeleroos had shown up, along with the cassowary he’d encountered before his initial plunge into the river. They waited for him now, each one of them with their attention trained on him in a display of perfect patience. He couldn’t believe how incredibly dogged they’d been in their pursuit.

One of the cassowaries screamed. Again.

-

You hear the cassowary’s cry, and you know fear.

-

He was so weary of that message.

Backlebutt closed his eyes, breathing deeply until the effect faded. Once his heart rate returned to normal, he reopened them with a sigh.

He was going to die here.

He’d had that thought several times today, but never accompanied with the sense of utter inevitability he felt now.

How long should he wait? Was it more cowardly to end it himself, or to hold on until he was dying of thirst, feverish and weak from his wounds?

Does it matter? He sighed again. He was doing that a lot lately.

A movement caught his eye, well beyond the group of skeleroos waiting on the far shoreline.

It was a cassowary.

Inexplicably, it had rolled out of one of the two entrances to the cavern. It thrashed for a few moments, squawking, before quieting down. It seemed to be in bad shape, unable to stand.

...?

The skeleroos and cassowaries trained on Backlebutt turned around to regard the strange occurrence. A few of the skeleroos hopped over to the archway, peering through it. Apparently finding nothing of interest, they hopped back and resumed their vigil.

Backlebutt could only look on in confusion. What was that? Some sort of freak accident? Did it fall off a cliff or something?

The only other possibility that came to mind was that Milo had made it this far and was somehow responsible for the incident. The skeleroos’ behavior didn’t seem to support that, however.

Of course, it was possible that it was Milo, and he had perished shortly after sending the cassowary tumbling. That would neatly explain everything, though Backlebutt sincerely hoped it wasn’t the case.

He looked uncertainly at the archway, waiting to see if anything else would happen. Not for the first time, he wished he had a better vantage point. All he could see was the inside edge of the far arch.

Backlebutt estimated ten minutes had passed before he finally gave up looking, though he still glanced up frequently long after that.

Almost an hour later, Backlebutt had pretty much given up on anything coming of the strange phenomenon. He was checking on the status of his clothing again—they were refusing to dry out in the cavern’s damp, still air—when something made him glance up once more. It took a moment for his brain to agree with what his eyes were telling him.

It was Milo.

The odd man was alive and well, though Backlebutt wasn’t sure how long that would remain the case. He was currently tiptoeing out from the arch toward the injured cassowary, holding a rock a bit smaller than a person’s head between his stump and his right hand.

He’s going to kill it, Backlebutt realized. What is he thinking? Did he not look around, see all of the other monsters? Or does he think they won’t notice?

Backlebutt tensed as Milo raised the rock high overhead. He had to do something, or this was going to end in disaster. He scrambled to his feet. Some of the creatures below quirked heads to the side, apparently curious about his actions. That was good.

When Milo brought the rock down, Backlebutt yelled at the top of his lungs in an attempt to mask the sound of the impact and keep all the monsters' attention.

It seemed to work; none of the creatures facing him turned around. Milo, looked up, obviously startled. When he saw Backlebutt, he smiled wide and stuck up his thumb.

And then the injured cassowary, apparently still alive, screamed.

-

You hear the cassowary’s cry, and you know fear.

-

No...no!

Backlebutt watched in dismay as Milo stumbled away from the cassowary, slipping and falling down in the ankle-deep water. The man shot a frightened glance at all of the other monsters in the room, then scrambled to his feet and dashed through the archway and out of sight. Every skeleroo and able-bodied cassowary in the room rushed after him.

Backlebutt didn’t want to believe what he was seeing. There was no way Milo would escape with his life.

To think he made it all this way, only to fail here.