Limestone Cave... RUN
Far into the past, the world was split between races and mythics… some of those myths used to be real beings to roam the ground for the common world back then… Now only a few really show themselves.
In present time,
‘Beast’ is the derogatory term humans used to categorise beings that looked monstrous to them regardless of whether they were intelligent or mindless creatures.
Some fear them for their looks and powers, some hunt them for the physical features like their horns, teeth, hide, claws or bones. But those who tried to assimilate them into the society… were defamed in front of the public as a regal punishment and set an example…
It always sent a message-
“We, humans, are not inferior and lowly to be sharing the same place as a shelter with them!”
In the past, most beasts were more civil and harmonious with each other while following the food chain…
—–
Something had happened in the past…
The Proensthra cave, also known as the cave of ‘Beginning and the end’ which was also the deepest cave, aging millions of years, was formed due to an event…
The pandemonium…
Anyone who ever tried entering the cave had to dig a way to enter one of the veins… the entrance dug by them would mysteriously be blocked by crystals in a day’s time.
—–
A being crashed into the planet…
That being was Asutora…
Only this is known about the beast in the recovered scripts…
—–
“Ting…, ting…, ting” the echoing sound of water dripping from the ceiling on the stalagmites constantly hit my ears, the sound was more metallic, water hammering the stalagmite, the limestone part of the cavern only amplified the sound into a sound of a distorted tune of a xylophone.
My legs moved closer to the bigger stalagmites, these were much thicker than what I had expected, my height was shorter than these stalagmites… this cave is tens of thousands of years old.
My arms gripped the stalagmites nearby to not lose my entire balance from slipping on the slimy, mineral-white ground.
The flickering vision was slowly getting steady, the flickering decreased from before, the place was chaotic and terrific… and those chill waves have gotten so frequent that I feel them each hour perhaps…
My ears heard a growling sound, coming from my stomach… I had been living on an empty stomach for the entire time.
My ears heard a thumping sound of moving rocks, a shiver ran down my spine, my eyes quickly looked for an easy path to walk on…faster…‘why’ because it means stalactites were going to fall! sooner or later…
I swiftly moved my legs, hooking the arch of my foot to a base of stalagmites and pushing my body away from it…reckless but worked… only if I knew where I would be thrown by this reckless move.
A thin stalactite fell from the ceiling falling into crevices making a shattering sound, stinging my ears with the glass-like shatter echoing and chiming around me, a reason I walked faster, recklessly… but now more stalactites started to fall in an escalating sequence.
Each shatter made that debilitating noise that stung my ears, I continued to run…, my eyes widened and trembled, a spike falling down on my head.
My arms instinctively moved into a cross to cover my head… expecting the stalactite to pierce the arm but… a shatter was heard from my arm, it was the shatter sound of that spike.
I looked up at my arms, a film of soft blue tint covering my arm, time ticked slowly, the arm had only gotten scraped, my legs quickly bolted to the other side, I was getting closer to escape this limestone cavity.
At the final step I leaped towards the safer ground, a rough dive…I covered my head with my arm…
my body somersaulted to a stop.
My arms leniently gripped the ground, spine came erect, backbone straightened… I came out alive…wind came out of my lungs, my eyes looked down to my hands, they were trembling, my body was shaking…
Ah I was too close to death from that stalactite…
That blue layer on my arm that moment… this tinted vision… it’s not a coincidence… is it magical energy?
. . . Yes definitely, this place was off from the very beginning, those soft glowing crystals, that cub, this vision, and the layer that came over my arm…
This world, I don’t belong to this world… my world was normal to me, without magic and beasts…
My goal from now on is dead set, to rise from the ‘Depths to the Surface World’!
.
.
.
—–
In that certain part of the cavern…
The silhouette of that ‘beast’, who had its head resting on the ground, had a smile of interest as visible in the crescent look of its solely visible eyes.
It still observed him, but now, it knew how to not cause unintended paranoia to ‘The Outsider’… while scanning the surroundings… even bypassing the seal’s restriction through loopholes…
Yet there remained a worry in its mind… stemming from a memory… of that distorting creature… far disturbing came…
–
The beast had woken up from its slumber, then it floated up, beyond the corona of its home star, to gaze towards where it should go…, it used erlis in its eyes… to enhance the distance it could peer through…
Planet Aftrode was a turquoise ice giant, with frozen water on its surface and rough atmosphere. It was the only planet the beast had not visited… the distance? 41 light years…
It relaxed its body and then launched explosively into outer space… for continuous hours it flew, also used space warping to cover distance faster, multiple times… while it had all its focus to reach that planet…
Suddenly an attack came from behind, with force so great, it slammed the ‘beast’ towards the planet, the impact was so great, its sense of balance destabilized, a ripple in space tore open, an eerie warp gate opened and swallowed the ‘beast’…
The other end of the warp gate transferred the ‘beast’ above the dense atmosphere of the ice giant… but its conserved momentum, its loss of sense of balance and gravity together forced its body to face the atmospheric entry heat…
‘SSSHRSTsT’… while some crackling of the plasma formed in the atmosphere.
And it crashed with a heavy thump and crackling sound.
‘THUMP!CRRRK-SCHYLL’
To survive the impact, the ‘beast’ had to use more than half its energy reserves… it failed in its attempt to gain balance and whilst it tried standing up, a ripple opened through which came the distorting creature….
That creature… even looking at it directly without any layered strong magical protection could corrupt the body and mind so badly that death was imminent…
.
.
The eyelids of the ‘beast’ lost the battle to stay up… it closed as the ‘beast’ lost consciousness… a purple miasmic curtain covered the beast.
It took away the control of the host’s will on its own body which the miasma had covered… and corrupted the essence of the ‘beast’ and mutated it.
The body now looked different, the scales got devastatingly sharp and distinct… horns grew on the edge, two by the side and one by the front of the head… the maw got larger.
The body was no longer looking the same…
Its essence… was not as pure…
THE ‘BEAST’ GOT CORRUPTED!!!
—
When the will of the ‘beast’ woke up… it found itself afloat, fighting the gods, with its corrupted form, against its will.
Looking at the ground below, deprived of hope… that it had now become a pawn for the distorting creature…
—–
The ‘beast’ after visiting the memories of its past, the cause of its imprisonment, decided to wait and observe the man.
The ‘beast’ sensed that now he would be coming across the gnomes.