Chương 262: Chapter 252 - Interlude 25.2 - A new adventure

2 - A new adventure In the warm embrace of the small area, they spent the next few minutes just resting and trying to process the last hour or so of happenings. Clarissa sometimes wondered if other people also had the same amount of monster encounters, random boss spawns, and beehives happen to them when they went on their quest. She had no idea how Katie found three of them, all highly intelligent and extremely angry for some unfathomable reason.

However, that didn't prevent the slightly younger – though definitely crazier – girl from trying to talk the bees out of attacking their party. Then her 'cat' decided that a bee would be a perfect snack… And once again, they had to run for their lives as the bees summoned their queen, who began chasing them with honey-based magic. Very sticky and powerful… Reaching up into her hair, she felt the remnants of one of the queen's attacks and she made a disgusting face while casting the Clean spell.

She wasn't as proficient as Sam with the spell, but at least this much wasn't something she wouldn't be able to accomplish. Looking at the others, Clarissa let out a sigh, then stood up from where she was resting. She was the leader of the team, she was the one who was riding herd over these crazy cats and 'cats' thus it was up to her to make sure they achieved their goals.

"Right. Let's fan out and look over the site. We're looking for nuns with blood fetish so the ritual should be connected to that…" she called out and the rest of the team, amidst some groaning, also stood up to help with the search. They went methodically through the entire area, examined all sides of all the fallen stone pieces, looking for signs, symbols, clearly written step-by-step instructions, or anything that would hint at what they would need to do to continue with this accursed step.

'It's so much easier when Sam is here… he always knows what to do…' Clarissa grumbled as she once again took out her notes.

"Water bathed in the blood of an innocent… what the hell does that mean?" she asked out loud.

"Well, if we are looking for people who hate blood mages," Isabella spoke up just as she was on her stomach, looking under some fallen column.

"That means that to them, an innocent person is someone who hasn't touched blood magic." Clarissa thought about it for a moment, then nodded. That made perfect sense.

"Who here hasn't touched any blood magic?" Both Katie and Dan raised their hand. Isabella, however, looked away.

"When I met Sam, I already had the Life of Blood skill…" Clarissa looked back at the other two and eyed them for a second, then nodded toward Dan.

"Your blood will do…" Dan blinked while Katie pouted.

"I don't know if I'm happy or oddly insulted…" Dan mumbled as Katie stalked to Isabella's side. Clarissa didn't care. She didn't want to try to taint the ritual with whatever that woman had going on. With her luck, the moment the ritual started, it would rip a portal into a dimension that would drive all of them mad. She reached into her inventory and took out a medieval cup.

"Take some water and mix…" she looked down at her instructions.

"…nine drops of blood with nine drops of water." As Dan stepped forward and sterilized a small knife with his fire magic, Clarissa was distracted by an exclamation.

"Found it!" came from Isabella, who was behind some ruins holding up (struggling a little under the weight) a small and weathered stone pedestal that kinda looked like a birdbath. Katie rushed over and the two of them carried the pedestal over to the circular stone floor – cracked and missing some pieces – and placed it into the middle, fitting perfectly into the small indentation that was there.

They had to clean out the moss and other detritus, but a minute later, the pedestal-slash-birdbath was standing proudly in the middle of the area. While it showed its age, all around the base of the pedestal they could see the same symbol, half a stylized heart with three drops of blood falling from it, and inside the birdbath had some runes around the edge that looked slightly shiny to Clarissa's eyes as the sun bathed the clearing in light.

Dan stepped forward with the cup of blood and water in his hands as she absentmindedly cast a heal on his hand. She opened the instructions and continued to read.

"The mead of queens, sustainer of armies of spring…" she read out loud, taking a few seconds to parse the meaning while inwardly grumbling at Sam's need for dramatics.

"Honey. Fucking fantastic…" There was a throat cleared, and she saw a hand holding a bottle filled with golden-colored honey. Clarissa looked up at Katie, who was holding the bottle with a guilty look on her face while refusing to meet her eyes.

"So that's why the bees were so angry…" she said flatly. Then she pointed at the cup.

"Nine drops into that." With some finesse, they managed that. Then Clarissa took the cup and poured the small amount of liquid into the birdbath.

"… and finally, a breath of life, wonders of mana and life," she read out loud. Thankfully, there were two words next to that in brackets. Healing Magic She reached out with her hand and cast her oldest healing magic, one that she was immensely familiar with, using mana control taught by Sam to focus all the magic on the brownish liquid in the birdbath.

As soon as her mana touched the stone and liquid, the runes lit up as she began, and the mana in the air started to move, like a sluggish bear waking up after hibernation. Then they all watched as the liquid in the bowl turned a solid gold color before being absorbed by the pedestal, causing the symbols on the base to light up with the same color. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Then a rumbling sound and they all instinctively jumped back as the circular stone platform they were standing on began to sink into the ground piece by piece, creating a circular staircase leading down. The only challenge in the tunnel that was opened up was that there were no light sources to illuminate the way. They spent a few minutes stumbling around before she remembered that they all had a skill that could provide light. Hell, one of them was a fire mage!

Just as Clarissa began to grumble, the stairs behind them began to also grind against the stone wall as they began to rise back into their original state, leaving them in complete darkness, only illuminated by a hastily conjured light ball. They looked at each other and as one turned in the only direction and began to walk. However, Clarissa found it rather eerie how no matter where she looked, she always saw Puffball's cat's eyes watching them with interest and humor. At least she hoped it was Puffball…

They had been walking for half an hour or so – time was really hard to keep track of inside a tight and dark corridor – when Clarissa felt the ground rumble a little. At first, she chalked it up to her imagination, but then Isabella spoke up.

"Did you guys hear it?" she asked, her voice worried. Clarissa reached out with her mana sense but the solid stone walls and ground surrounding them didn't allow her to sense far enough to find whatever was causing the rumble.

"Anybody see or hear anything?" she asked instead, hoping the others were more successful. Dan shook his head, Katie grumbled something petulant and Isabella answered.

"No. Just the rumble… is that…scratching?" Clarissa began to listen, but before she could make out the sound Isabella mentioned, the wall next to them suddenly broke, showering them with stone, earth, dust, and everything in between as two giant pincers reached through the created breach, grabbed Katie – who began to whoop in joy – and dragged her in with a quick movement. Then, as she froze at the sight of the giant hairy spider, Dan began to set everything on fire.

"I FUCKING HATE SPIDERS!"

"MORE FIREPOWER!"

"I'M DOING AS MUCH AS I CAN, WOMAN!"

"HAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAAAAA!"

"SOMEBODY TELL ME THERE ARE NO MORE OF THESE MONSTERS!"

"HONK!" The entire area was in chaos. After Katie was grabbed and in turn tried to shishkebab the offending spider, the team soon moved into the corridors built by the spiders and other assorted monsters. They fought worms, beetles, blind lizards with acid spit, plants that reached down from the ceiling and tried to choke them to death and so much more.

Currently, they were fighting in a cavern that may have been at one time something like a birthing cavern, but after they arrived, it turned into a fiery pit of hell after Dan was surprised by a normal-sized (and normally behaving) spider falling on his shoulder. The scream that left the man's lips was enough to act as a taunt skill and gather all nearby monsters. Took them some minutes, but they were finally resting in the middle on a fine layer of ash and who knows what.

Katie and Isabella were collecting the loot while she was sitting and regenerating her mana while reading a new skill she got. [You gained the skill Nightingale's Sight!] [Nightingale's Sight: Level 0/100 (0%) (Passive) Dedication to the noble art of healing has given you the experience to keep track of the wounded and to always know who needs your services. Gives you a better understanding of the wounds suffered by those around you, both allies and enemies. When healing the most wounded target around you, the healing is increased by 1% per skill level. When used at the same time as??? Increases defense during battle.] Nightingale sounded familiar to her, but she didn't know what the skill was referencing exactly. Though, because that effect sounded nice, she planned to do thorough research into the topic. However, the best thing the skill did was to upgrade her HUD, allowing her to see more information about her teammates.

Including their health and mana points, and the current list of buffs and debuffs in a very organized way. She had ways to acquire all that information thanks to her skills, but Nightingale's Sight consolidated all that information into one easily digested set. A few minutes later she saw her mana was full and turned to the others.

"Ready to move on?" Getting affirmative replies from the others and an armload of assorted looted items from the girls, she stood up, dusted her robe, and began walking in the only direction they could go with a tired sigh. The final boss was a giant plant monster, using spores and pollen to create zombified abominations that did their best to either consume them or based on some of the debuffs she had to clear off the team, assimilate them into the collective consciousness.

Dan's fire bathed the cavern, while Katie and Isabella bounced from wall to wall, dicing up the approaching monsters and bulging vines that evoked horrifying images. Meanwhile, Clarissa stood at the back and used her new skill to expertly maneuver the battlefield and keep her teammates topped up and clean of the gunk being spewed everywhere.

The final strike into a venomous green bulb was delivered by Isabella who snuck around the fighting monsters as Katie wrestled with several giant vines doing their best to crush her while Dan protected them with walls of fire and rains of plasma spears from the thralls of the monster. Clarissa saw everything seize, then fall to the ground limply, the monsters following the flora, behaving like puppets whose strings had been cut.

Silence fell on the group as they stared at the withering dead boss monster, followed by a chime of notification. [Congratulations! You and your team killed the Sporemaw!] [You've leveled up!] Grinning, she approached the others for a high-five. She loved winning a fight without letting anyone die. The one who got the closest to death was Katie, but the crazy girl actually requested that as she needed to lose health points to use the most potent berserker skills.

"Hey! I found a great skill!" Katie called out as she retrieved a gunk-covered skill book from the remains of the monster. Clarissa walked over and took a look. [Berserkbloom: Release pollens that induce a berserk state in anyone it touches.] She doubted it would be a useful skill, but then Puffball landed from somewhere between them, looked at the skillbook, tapped it once with his soft paws, and sauntered away as they watched the book change from its electric green color into dark green color so dark it was almost black. [Abyssalbloom: Release motes of abyssal energy that will induce madness in anyone it touches.]"Sweet!"

"That did not make it better..."

"I weep for the future…"

"Meow…" After the boss battle, they returned to the original corridor, thankfully without being beset by hordes of monsters, and continued their journey, hopefully, to find the nuns they were looking for at the end. Thankfully, they only had to walk for some time before they reached the end with an old staircase leading upwards. After another few minutes of trudging upwards, they were greeted by a stone door opening up automatically as they emerged from underground in a lush garden.

As they climbed out, covered in gunk, soot, dust, and everything else that the clean spells couldn't remove, they looked around in wonder, taking in the beautiful vista. Their wondering was interrupted by a gentle voice.

"Welcome, guests, to the Garden of New Life!" Turning around, Clarissa saw a middle-aged woman, covered from head to toe in a nun's habit in the color of fresh blood, with a familiar symbol, half a stylized heart with three drops of blood falling from it. The drops looked like they had just fallen from a wound, glistening with life and vigor.

"Greetings!" she returned the greeting with a small bow. According to Sam, they were peaceful but crazy.

"Is this the Church of the First Drop?"

"Indeed, honored guest. Be welcome to the first and last Church of the First Drop!" the nun exclaimed with great excitement, raising both arms upwards in celebration. Then she looked directly into Clarissa's eyes.

"Has the time come for the Great Cleansing?"