Fighting acid

After opening his eye Falko realized that his view didn’t change. He heard how Ulf sighed and then he said:

“Falko it seems your left eye is destroyed. Your skin melding ability will most likely not work, so you have to wait till we reach a place where we can buy you a magic eye as replacement. I will make you a rough eye patch. I have a few pieces of leather which I use to repair my armor. Wait a moment, it shouldn’t take long to make a makeshift eye patch. Also I think you need a new helm.”

I looked at my helm and Ulf was right, the left side of the helm was nearly gone. For now it is ok, but I should try to get a new one if possible.

It didn’t take long and Falko was wearing a makeshift leather eye patch over his left eye.

During Sylvan’s absence Ulf hunted and Falko tried to get used to his new field of view. Three uneventful days went by and on the evening of the fourth day, Sylvan finally returned. During a meal Sylvan said what he found out.

“My friend didn’t know much, but he said, he never heard or saw anything like it. He could only give me some suggestions.”

According to Sylvans friend we should try to stop it from using acid. Because it only used his mouth like thing on his torso we should be able to stop it. We could resin to stop it from using his acid, the only problem is, how do we get the resin over his mouth like thing. Besides we should attack it from behind, as it not only has one tentacle less there, it also wouldn`t be able to use the acid.

It sounded feasible and we only needed a way to get the resin on it, after all. to get enough resin shouldn’t be the problem as we have a nature spirit called Sylvan with us. We decided that we think about it overnight and maybe one of us then has an idea.

On the next day they set out to follow the violet blood tracks that remained after the fight. During the time as Sylvan was away, they followed it for some time, till they saw it ending near a cave. So now it was not hard to find that place again.

They had two things to stop the acid attacks. One was bottle full of resin, but they only had one bottle and as plan b they had small balls of resin that are covered with leaves. These balls where hard to handle and they decided that only Sylvan would use them as he could remove the resin easy from his hands. If the hands of Ulf and Falko were to be covered with resin, then they had a harder time fighting and Sylvan is a forest spirit, so it doesn’t matter to him. As Ulf was proficient in using throwing knives, he would use the bottle of resin.

The arrived at the cave and entered. Falko was in the front with a torch, behind and some to the side was Ulf and behind him was Sylvan. They walked about half an hour before the cave opened up. They now stood at the entrance to a high and wide area and they could also see some light in the distance.

They carefully approached the light, as soon as they saw some details, they stopped and looked around.

It seems a house was built into the rock and inside a living beings and light. On one side of the house was a small stream of water that came out of the cave wall.

They moved closer, trying to get a look inside through the windows.

Inside they saw the thing with its tentacles, they also saw a smaller figure. The smaller being had only a mouth and a nose, but no eyes. It was gray in color and was hairless, not even on its head. Before it was table with a mirror and different crystals, there it was doing something, while the tentacle thing sat in a corner.

Falko signed Ulf and Sylvan to throw the resin at the tentacle thing though the window while he was going to the door. Ulf and Sylvan used their hand to count form three to one and then Ulf threw the bottle and Sylvan some resin balls. Falko opened the door and dashed to the small gray being and cut its head off clean. Falko looked at the tentacle thing and saw that the mouth under his front tentacles was covered in resin. The thing became wild and madly sprinted towards Falko. He evaded and jumped through the door and he was outside again. The thing smashed into wall and then it turned and followed Falko outside.

Before it arrived in front of Falko, roots came out of the ground, trying to bind the thing. At the same time Ulf got behind it, because of the tentacle on its back he couldn`t deliver a killing blow, but he was able to cut off the back tentacles. The thing seemed unable to cope with the situation. It tried to turn, to face Ulf while using two tentacles to attack Falko. Falko blocked them and because of the roots it was not able to turn fast. Sylvan poured more magic into the roots and they became bigger and grew thorns. Ulf and Falko attacked it at the same time while the thorny roots entangled it. Falko split its head with his bardiche and Ulf cut deep into its back with his twin dagger. Dead it fell to the ground.

“Falko and Ulf thank you both, it don`t think I would be able to kill it alone, especially as there was another being with it that we didn’t expected.”

I answered, “I think this tentacles thing was really dangerous because of its acid and only because we had some kind of plan to stop it from using it were we able to kill it so easy. Also I think we should look through the house, maybe we find a clue about them. Sylvan you should especially look at the table with the crystals and the mirror, they maybe magic related.”

Together we searched the house. We didn’t find much in it, only some dried meat, a small bed, most likely for the small gray being and a room that was covered in hay, it looked like the tentacle thing slept there. Sylvan then looked at the table with the crystals and the mirror while Ulf and I looked at the dead gray being.

Ulf has never seen something like it and later Sylvan said the same thing. One thing we noticed was that it had seven instead of five finger on each hand.

Sylvan was only able to tell that the crystal and the mirror are both filled with magic, but not more. He said he wanted to show them to his friend and that he would be able to tell.

In the end we couldn’t figure out where they came from or what they wanted.

Ulf and I wanted to stay for the day and continue our travel on the next day. When we were back at the place we stayed the last few days, we told Sylvan about it. He then said:

“Again thank you for your help. Before you go tomorrow speak to me, I want to give you something that is maybe able to help on your journey. OK, let’s eat and drink tonight to say farewell.”

He then vanished in the forest and shortly after came back with wood for the fire, meat to eat and wine to drink.

Together we ate, drank and talked deep into the night.

Ulf and I found a new friend. At the next morning, before Sylvan came back, I talked to Ulf.

“Ulf you could stay here with Sylvan, I don’t think the Purity Cult will be able to find you here.”

After some thinking Ulf replied:

“I said that I will help you find out more about Cil and I will do so. Maybe if I need a save place I could return here, but for now I will travel together with you.”

I smiled and said my thanks.

Shortly after that Sylvan arrived.

“It is time so say farewell and save travels.”

The he gave each of us an orb out of wood.

“I know that you both can’t use magic, so I made these for you.”

He then explained how they work to us.

Inside of the orb is a stored magic spell. On the orb from Ulf was the symbol of a bush and with it he cloud entangle someone with thorny roots. On my orb was a tree surrounded by water and with it I could turn the ground into a swamp. Each had a command word which is needed to activate them. For mine it was ‘Palus’ and for Ulf’s it was ‘Spineus’. He also told us that each can be used six times and that as long as three uses are left you could learn the spell, but for that, you had to know how and that he could not teach us or if we are even able to learn them.

We both thanked Sylvan for his gifts and then we said our farewells and parted.