Xeron arrived at Tirera only about two or three days
after he had first received their message asking for his help. It was a small
town, nestled among the woodlands near the southeast of Albion. Upon arrival,
he found himself greeted by a tall man with red hair.
"Ah, hey there," said the man, smiling.
"You must be the man we hired to clear out the caves, right? Xeron, wasn't
it?"
"Yeah, that's me," said Xeron.
"I'm the mayor," said the man, introducing
himself. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Xeron." The two shook
hands, and headed off into the town.
"Now that you're here," said the mayor,
"I'll just go over again what it was that we hired you for. About a week
ago, I headed into the cave to the west to get some water from the spring
there, as I usually do. However, when I got there the place was infested with
these strange monsters. I've never seen anything like them before, and I have
no idea where they've come from all of a sudden; usually, that cave is empty.
"Anyway," he continued, "I tried fighting
them off, but my attacks aren't strong enough to hurt them, and there seems to
be no end to them. But from what I've heard about you, you should have a much
easier time taking care of them, right?"
"Probably," said Xeron. "I've never failed
before."
"Well, let's hope you don't break the habit of a
lifetime, then," said the mayor, smiling. "Once the monsters have
been driven out, and the cave is safe to enter again, you'll receive a handsome
reward from us all, for your efforts. In the meantime, feel free to rest up
here whenever you need to."
"Of course," said Xeron, nodding. "Thank
you."
"No, thank you,"
said the mayor. "You're really helping us out here, you know, getting rid
of all these monsters."
"Don't thank me just yet," said Xeron. "I only
just got here."
"Indeed," admitted the mayor, before coming to
a stop. "Well, I've got things to attend to elsewhere, so I'll be on my
way. Come see me once you've successfully cleared out the cave; my house is
right opposite the farm, over there." He pointed down a street leading
north. "You'll be able to find your way around town okay, won't you?"
"Yeah," said Xeron. "And the cave's to the
west, didn't you say?"
"Yeah, you can't miss it," said the mayor.
"Okay, I'll be seeing you then, Xeron. Good luck." With a quick wave,
the mayor headed off towards his house. Xeron, meanwhile, sought out the
nearest apothecary; if he was going to be fighting, he was going to need
supplies.
***
After stocking up on some healing potions, Xeron headed
west, following the signposts directing him to the cave. Just as the mayor had
said, he found it very easily; the entrance was just beyond the town, carved
into a small cliff face. The passage was easily big enough for him to walk
through, and was well-lit by torches on all sides. Readying his spear, Xeron
headed inside.
At first, the cave seemed fairly empty, except for a
couple of bats flying around harmlessly. However, after negotiating an S-bend a
short way in, Xeron found himself confronted by a group of creatures that even
he had never seen the likes of before. They resembled blobs of sky-blue slime,
about two feet high and three feet in diameter. They had no eyes, no ears, no
limbs or mouths, but they were quite clearly alive; they moved slowly towards
him, leaving gelatinous trails behind them, like slugs.
At first, Xeron was not sure quite how to fight them.
Would his spear have any effect on them? If it didn't, then there wasn't much
he could do. There was, of course, only one way to find out. Xeron jabbed his
spear at the nearest slime creature, plunging it in deeply; the creature let
out an unearthly shriek and seemed to melt, collapsing into a gooey puddle on
the floor of the cave.
The other slimes continued to home in on Xeron. One grew
a slimy appendage and swung at the bounty hunter; Xeron blocked it with his
spear and slew the creature. Another managed to land a blow on him, but his
armour easily deflected it away; Xeron slew that creature as well. Soon, all
the slimes had been vanquished, and Xeron was able to move further into the
cave.
In a small chamber jutting out from the main path, Xeron
was able to make out something glinting amongst the rocks. Heading over to
investigate, he found a small shard of blue-grey crystal. There did not seem to
be anything similar nearby, so its presence struck him as odd. Deciding there
had to be something special about the crystal shard, Xeron picked it up and
took it with him.
As he headed down to the next level of the cave, Xeron
soon saw the water spring that the mayor had mentioned. However, to Xeron's
surprise, the path to it had been cut off by what appeared to be a river of
magma. The mayor hadn't mentioned anything like that being present in the cave,
and it was highly improbable that he would not have noticed; Xeron thus assumed
that the strange creatures had stopped him from reaching this far in. Regaining
access to the spring no longer seemed like a possibility, but at the very
least, Xeron could still clear out the creatures.
After defeating another small group of slimes, Xeron
headed onwards towards the deepest part of the cave. Here, it opened up into a vast
magma chamber. The path jutted out some way into the molten sea like a strange
pier; standing near the end of it, silhouetted somewhat against the bright
lava, was an even stranger creature than the slimes.
The creature was eight feet tall and vaguely humanoid;
its arms were long, and it had a long, thick tail that dragged along the
ground. Like the slimes, it was entirely sky-blue with a slimy, gelatinous
appearance, but unlike the slimes, it had visible eyes, ears and a mouth.
Several short spikes jutted out of the top of its head, tinted gold at the top,
like some strange facsimile of a crown; a long jagged spear was clutched in one
of its slimy hands.
As it noticed Xeron, it let out a screeching cry. Its
tail suddenly broke off, splitting into several of the smaller slime creatures;
at this, Xeron realized that this larger creature was where the other creatures
were spawning from. If he defeated it, the cave would be clear once more.
As the army of smaller slimes gradually advanced on
Xeron, he readied his spear, then let out a cry of war and charged.
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