D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

— Lily —

Lily carefully made her way deeper into the facility, towards more than a few of those sounds. Lily didn’t know that this was the smartest idea but at this point there was too many weird things going on. Lily NEEDED some sort of indication o what was going on here so that she could be ready for… whatever it was.

Lily moved past more broken glass and metal frames. Shelves that no longer held anything useful just dust. Lily finally managed to find something intact, and it was… water? Lily held her lantern up to the large tank that seemed to be filled with a blue liquid. It wasn’t quite the right colour to be water, but Lily had no idea what else it could be. It somehow bubbled despite the fact that there wasn’t anything else in the tank that could produce the bubbles in question. It simply… did.

Lily glanced around her, lantern moving along the floor looking for more signs of passage and finding none. Except… no that wasn’t quite true. The floor in this area she was standing was filled with dust. Which, now that she thought about it was somewhat odd. For all that this area had been broken down into pieces, with glass shards covering the ground… now that she was looking at this area? It was EXCEPTIONALLY dusty.

Which just made it stand out in contrast to everything else. It wasn’t that there had been no dust in those areas, but here? It was thick. Lily left visible pawprints on the floor when she walked. There was… something weird about this tank. Lily carefully moved the light around, letting it shine on the liquid… and yet it didn’t react. Lily considered it could be a slime for a moment…

But it didn’t react to her light at all. It didn’t seem to be trying to grab her… and looking at the top it didn’t seem thick enough to be slime? Lily tapped the edge of the container just to be sure, and it sent ripples across the entire thing… like a liquid. Lily frowned. There was still something odd here, but that reacted the same as water. It wasn’t much force and it still rippled naturally… but it was an oddly bright blue… maybe?

Lily glared at her sputtering lantern for a few seconds, wishing once again that she had managed to cast the spell more successfully. Sadly, it wasn’t really something she’d felt the need to practice when she had so many useful spells already and… well… Kat would usually be able to provide light without issue. The problem now, was the odd colouring important in some way? And what’s up with the dust.

Lily decided to investigate the dust a bit more first. Shifting her lantern around, Lily circled the area the dust had been left in. It was… annoyingly circular. It wasn’t perfect sure, and plenty of ’corners’ had been cut around the edges where something had clearly moved past on occasion, leaving a lighter area of dust in some places… but damn it really did look like a circle.

Checking the back made things even weirder. It didn’t continue to be circular… but it seemed like the ’area’ that wasn’t covered shrunk once you got behind the wall properly. It was still sort of spherical, but it raised more questions then she had before. Was the liquid important or not? It wasn’t a perfect circle around it… but the wall seemed to be the main cause of that distortion. It was oddly central… so was it anything special? It had to be right?

Lily moved back to the front and glared at the liquid for a few seconds, keeping her lantern raised so she could watch it in its entirety… and still nothing happened. Lily decided more direct measures were required. Reaching up with a second shadow hand, Lily raised it above the liquid, and waited. Lily study it for any sign that the liquid was flinching away, that it was actually a slime… and nothing.

Lily debated for a few seconds between slicing at it, or dipping a singular finger in. Lily continued to glare at the tank until she made her decision. A single, light tap from the shadow finger. Lily ensured the tap lasted barely a few seconds… but it was draining. As soon as the shadow touched the water Lily felt a pull on her mana reserves. Not much, not even enough to offset her natural recovery but it was enough to be noticed, mostly because the tip of the shadowy finger had essentially dissolved.

Lily pushed some extra mana into her shadows and then dipped a finger in again. The pull was more obvious once she knew what it was, and with the extra mana the shadow hand managed to stay together… but it was still somewhat worrying. What the heck WAS this stuff? It clearly absorbed mana… so why was it that whatever was cleaning stayed away? If it was an enchantment, was it smart enough for this? If it wasn’t an enchantment… then how did it know?

Lily wasn’t feeling any drain at all as soon as her finger left the liquid so how? Did being Rank 3 shield her from the weaker area version of the drain? And how did it drain her anyway? Once again, it looked and acted quite a lot like water. Though… it was still bubbling. Lily sniffed around, hoping that might give her some clue but there was no additional scents anywhere nearby. Tapping the side of the glass once again revealed nothing new.

Lily decided it was best to just leave this stuff here. Whatever it was, it didn’t seem to be able to hurt her if she didn’t interact with it. So… that’s what she was going to do. Just… leave it there. Lily took in a deep breath and headed further in… for a few steps before pausing.

*Wait… do I actually care? I have a malfunctioning light, a weird blew liquid and no understand of what sort of risks I might find deeper inside of here. I… hmm…* Lily let her mind wander backwards for a bit and she found… well it still hurt, and the bile rising in her throat was an indication she didn’t want to think about it long… except… it wasn’t so painful she immediately shoved it away. Lily shivered a bit before gently shifting her focus back to the present.

*That was… not ideal but certainly not the massive pain it was before. I don’t know if this really counts as ’dealing’ with the trauma but it’s certainly not as fresh as it was earlier. That or this place is creepy me out enough that past trauma seems small compared to my immediate problems.*

Just as Lily was debating if it was best to leave things as they were or not, a wet squelch rang out behind her. It was close, far too close, and without taking the time to figure out anything further Lily booked it. She wasn’t sure if it was actually dangerous, or even what it was… but if a random creepy noise right as she was thinking of leaving wasn’t a sign from higher powers, Lily wasn’t sure what else could be.

The trip backwards wasn’t too hard, and it was much faster. Dodging the holes wasn’t too bad. With her lantern out in front Lily was able to react to any obstacles that appeared without too much trouble. She found a few more lines of maybe water that were also leapt over. Perhaps they had more mana draining properties, perhaps they were water, perhaps they were something else. Lily was no longer investigating, it was officially, not her problem.

Eventually she’d rounded enough shelves that the glowing light of the exit was blatantly obvious. Keeping her lantern held high Lily sprinted for the door, leaping over the last few holes and skidding along the tiles as she exited the room. Lily’s shadows kept the lantern high up out of reach and in good condition…

Lily let out a long breath as she glanced back at the darkness before sharking her head. No sense thinking about it further. Perhaps she’d explore it later with Kat… or perhaps not. The next question she’d be thinking on would be if she should share her adventure with Kat or not.

Lily glanced up at her little lantern. It was still sputtering, and you could barely see the light it gave of now that she was out of the dark. It looked like it was on its last legs… just as it had since the start of the journey. Now that she was finished… now that she could dismiss it… Lily wasn’t sure if she wanted to. Granted, she didn’t need it, and the whole thing was just a temporary paper construct. All of the others had disappeared from the hall long ago when the mana in them ran out… but Lily did know how to make paper constructs permanent. It probably wouldn’t continue to light her way though. Hmmm…