B6 Chapter 690: Cliffs and Treasures, pt. 1 (Patreon)

A towering wall of rose crystal erupted from the sands, looming like a vertical mountain over the surrounding jungle. Sunlight bathed its face, fracturing on natural facets to scatter and sparkle, throwing speckles of light onto the long stretch of sand that separated the jungle giants from the base of the cliff. It was almost as if the plateau was so imposing that the massive trees were afraid to stand in its shadow. 

From atop a branch at the edge of the tree line, Kaius craned his neck to stare up at the distant summits. He could see hints of green up there. Just a few leaves as the sprawling canopy above peaked over the edge. He struggled to wrap his head around the immensity of it all — from this far, the distant behemoths looked like little more than saplings. Honestly, he was surprised there weren’t clouds brushing up against the plateau, considering it looked like it was a league or more of jagged verticality.

It would be an utterly vicious climb. Broad, flat facets provided little in the way of handholds for dozens of strides at a time, capped by spider-webbing facets and cracks that were hair thin and looked liable to spill blood if they were gripped without care. Hells, he wasn’t even sure if they’d be able to chip away at the surface to create their own handholds. That pink crystal was an essence-rich material — it could be tough enough that it would be faster to leap from crack to crack.

The only saving grace were the shallow ledges and honeycomb caves that dotted its surface — places for them to rest and plot a route.

Or places for creatures to hide. Kaius hadn’t seen any yet, though — compared to the howling life of the jungle, the cliff was deader than a grave. 

“Yeah, I have no idea how I’m supposed to climb that. Quickly, at least — I can hold my weight pretty comfortably on the tips of my claws, but they’re not fingers.”

“We could figure it out,” Ianmus replied. “There’s enough facets that I’m sure we could plot a route between the larger ledges and caves on the way up.”

“That would still take hours. Plus, I’ll spend the entire time scrabbling at pink glass looking like a fool.”

“There’s always rope!” Kaius said chipperly. “Nothing wrong with hauling you up from cave to cave like some sort of cow.”

Porkchop gave him a flat look. “Let's try literally everything else first.”

“Can any of you spot the cave we’re looking for?” Ianmus asked, shading his eyes to scan the side of the cliffs. “I know we’re roughly in the right spot, but they all look pretty dead and empty.”

“Not yet,” Kaius replied, eying the scattered openings. It wasn’t quite a honeycomb, but there were still far more of the things than he’d hoped. It would make it much harder to spot the one they were looking for.

“It shouldn’t be too hard,” Kenva said. “We drifted a little left on our journey over, so we should find it if we circle the cliffs to the right. The scout said the glow of the treasures were faintly visible from the tree line, and there was supposed to be some distinct chipping on the cave’s mouth.”

“No doubt from whatever horror is laying in wait to rend us limb from limb,” Ianmus grumbled. “I’m not against fighting for our prize — but a small cave half a league in the sky is not exactly my idea of the perfect battleground.”

Kaius clapped him on the shoulder. “That is in fact the job, my friend.”

“What if we don’t find the glow, though? Something might have gotten to the treasures first — even the beast that’s sitting on them.”

Kaius shrugged. If it was gone, it was gone — it would be a disappointing find, but that was life. They had other things to fill their time before the Proving.

“If we don’t spot it in the next day or two, we’ll move on.”

“Let’s just get moving,” Ianmus said.

With the swathe of open sands separating the trees from the cliffs, they had little reason to stay confined to the jungle canopy — and the Pegleg would let them cover far more ground besides. 

Retreating to the trunk of the closest tree, they scrambled down — and Kaius set foot on solid ground for the first time in weeks. As solid as soft, pink sand could be, at least.

He paused for a moment, swaying slightly as the dunes roiled and swelled with the gentle motion of water. After getting used to the ever-shifting footing of branches swaying in the wind, his balance felt a little off. 

Shaking off the disorientation, he summoned the Pegleg — its spear-like legs sinking slightly into the sand as it settled down and opened its hatch.

Kenva burst into motion, clearing the stairs in a single leap to hurl herself at the curved couch. She hit it face down, groaning in delight. “By all the glorious gifts of the heavens, I've missed this.”

Kaius laughed as he stepped inside, Porkchop squeezing in behind him. “Come on, we should head up top. We need to scout the cliffs, and this place is still too dangerous for us to lounge around inside anyway.”

“Bastard,” Kenva grumbled, but she pushed herself to her feet anyway.

Making their way to the deck, they took their seats, and the Pegleg broke into a skittering run as it skirted the shaded edge of the treeline. Bit by bit, they made their way around the plateau, keeping their eyes peeled for their target. Even if they had drifted a bit, it wouldn’t have been by much with Kenva keeping their heading, so he expected that they’d find the cave soon enough. 

Kaius guided the Pegleg to stay well clear from the open sands. So far, they hadn’t seen any threats — but they’d be fully exposed out in the open. With the jungle trunks close by, they’d be able to flee easily if some horror erupted from a cave mouth.

As the hours started to bleed, a gnawing tension wound in Kaius’s belly. He still hadn’t seen anything living on the cliffs.

“Spotted anything alive out there?” Kaius asked, searching the shadowed nooks.

“Nope. A little concerning.”

Kaius nodded. There really should have been something  — even just birds nesting on the cliffs or in the caves themselves. It would have been perfect shelter from the predators in the jungle.

The only reason he could think of was that there was something worse in the cliffs themselves, but he’d seen no sign of that either! Not even any tracks! Compared to the ocean of life behind them, the cliff was deader than the desert sands it rose out of.

They kept moving, until an hour later Kenva suddenly snapped out a hand, pointing far up the cliff to their right.

“There!”

A cave sat about two thirds of the way up the cliff, shining with a distinct glow of essence. It even had the chipped opening — like the edges of the cave had been knapped like a piece of flint. 

“It’s damn high…” Kaius said. Most of a league, at the very least. Reaching it would be like summiting a small mountain, except climbing straight up. It wouldn’t be too great of an issue for him, he had the stats to scramble up quickly, and both Ianmus and Kenva could use their movement Skills easily enough. Porkchop, though, would struggle. 

“We might need to split up?” Kenva suggested.

“Against an unknown threat that’s already taken out a seasoned delver team who made it this deep into the Shardworld? Is that wise?” Ianmus asked.

Probably not, but Kaius couldn’t find a reason to disagree with Kenva. There was no way they could fight the creature in the cave, and once Porkchop was up there, the only fast way for him to get down was to jump. He and Kenva were mobile — they might be able to bait the creature onto the sands below, or at least escape if it was beyond them.

“We’ll try to think of something,” he said. “Lets pull up by the base of a nearby tree, and we can see if we can get an eye on what we’re dealing with.”

“Want me to fly up and check for myself? I can stay far away from the cliff — but I'll be able to peak inside and see if anything is inside.”

“You can make it that high?” Kaius asked.

“I’ll need to recover my resources afterwards, but yeah, it’ll be fine.”

As soon as Kaius nodded, Kenva took off in a gust of wind and swirling leaves. She shot high in the sky while they made their way to the nearest tree. Unsummoning the Pegleg, they settled in to wait.

Kenva came back a few minutes later, popping back into existence to hit the sand hard. Beaming wildly, she looked like she’d found a mountain of gold. Which she might well have, considering what they were after.

“Anything?” Ianmus asked.

“No sign of a creature, but there’s definitely treasures. Twelve of them! They’re big crystals, growing out of the side of the cave in a cluster — utterly packed with energy too. A lot more than we’ve seen so far.”

Sparks shot down Kaius’s spine, excitement drawing a grin. It seemed that Grandmaster Olmos had pulled through for them. Even with the man’s cut, that was enough for just over two stones for each of them.

“Do we grab them now?” Porkchop asked. “The cave’s empty, right?”

Kaius shook his head. “We wait at least an hour. The creature might be off hunting, or it could be lying in wait — it took the delvers who first found this by surprise, after all.”

Porkchop let out a rolling groan.

“We need time to plan, anyways,” Kaius said. “We should probably split up like Kenva suggested earlier. If you and Ianmus wait down here, Kenva and I can reach the cave quickly and snatch the Treasures. If Kenva’s attacked, I’ll cover her while she gets airborn, then follow.”

“Trying to engage it on the sands?”

“Or even better, the trees,” Kaius said. “We’re more than used to fighting in the branches above, and there's a chance a creature that makes its home in the cliff won't be as comfortable. If it flounders on the sands, we’ll hit it there.”

“And if it doesn’t follow?”

Kaius shrugged. “We’re here for the treasures. There’s plenty of experience for us to find elsewhere. If it ends up blocking us from those, we can just have Ianmus lob Halos into the cave until it gets mad enough to make us stop.”

Ianmus’s magic might damage their Treasures — but if it was a choice between that and abandoning them entirely, Kaius knew which he would choose.

“I still don't love the idea of splitting up, but nothing better is coming to me,” Ianmus said, leaning back on a nearby root.

“Great! Let’s settle in, then.”

Kaius took a seat on the sands, resting his back against a mossy root as he kept his eyes on the cliff face above. There was a creature somewhere — they just had to find it.