Jackal Among Snakes

At an unspecified time, Argrave found himself in an unspecified place. Considering he’d jumped into a pit, that was the intended outcome. But this was a little different than falling, he could tell—rather, it was like he fell out of the world they’d been standing atop rather than falling into it. He’d found a tiny crack in the firmament and slipped through like water.

“Parasite.”

Argrave couldn’t look around, not really. But he heard a voice. It came from somewhere in the direction of everything all at once. Or perhaps it was just behind him. The two weren’t mutually exclusive.

Though he tried to speak, he didn’t have a mouth anymore. He didn’t really have anything anymore. It couldn’t be some delusion, either—the Ravenstone was meant to protect him from all mental interference, all the machinations of the psychic and the divine. Yet somehow, the question he’d been intending to ask emerged from somewhere.

“Who’s talking?” Argrave’s tone was a strange combination of the voice he’d become and the voice he’d once had. “What is this?”

“Couldn’t leave well enough alone. Now you come picking at the bone.”

Argrave remained rational enough in this strange trance to puzzle out that whatever he was conversing with was directly related to Sandelabara. And if he hadn’t died following the psychopathic Alchemist into an untested pit, there was knowledge to gain from this encounter. “What exactly am I parasitizing?”

“You’re the first to arrive. Move quickly. If you cannot, more than your light alone shall be snuffed out. It would be better to accept a parasite than fall into a abyssal chasm.”

#####

Argrave once again found himself in a specified place at a specified time—namely, falling through the same pit that he’d jumped into moments ago. The wind magic that the Alchemist had cast to shield his body lowered him gently with his will, and finally, this vast pit began to open up into something grander. He looked around at the others floating about him frantically, but could tell at once that this experience was his alone.

“Anneliese,” he called out. “Look at me closely. Do you see anything off with your [Truesight]?”

Anneliese watched him as she descended, catching his unease. She did study him closely, but then shook her head. “What happened? You look pale.”

“Got a message. Just a message, I think,” Argrave looked down below, where the Alchemist continued to descend. “I’ll… I can’t even describe it with words,” he managed, shaking his head. “But there’s something here. Called me a parasite, yet urged me to hurry all the same.”

“Gerechtigkeit?” Master Castro questioned, listening closely as they descended.

“I know what he sounds like, and that wasn’t it. There was always something vaguely mortal about Gerechtigkeit, but this… not a chance,” Argrave shook his head. “I’d only be speculating if I guessed further. That something, whatever it is, knows we’re here. And I’m not entirely sure what that means for us. Considering I’m whole and healthy, maybe it’s nothing more than empty words.”

Without much to go on, all speculation ceased as the widening opening became a vast cavern and stunned them all into quiet observation. Argrave could see isolated pockets of magma still persisting in the drained chamber, but other than that, this vast place had been completely purged of all molten rock. As in the magma moat where the dwarves persisted, miles away magma slowly encroached back to fill this empty cavity. It would take days before it came close enough to threaten them, yet still it came.

This place looked like nothing more than a vast and empty cavern, drained as it was. Argrave couldn’t yet see the floor. Persisting heat warped the air, but Argrave felt no discomfort, likely due to the Alchemist’s intervention. Now, that same spellcaster cast a grand spell that illuminated the entire cavern. Everyone’s eyes were drawn to the same thing. And Argrave was certain most of them thought the same thing: Sandelabara.

Argrave saw a huge crater in the cavern. Looking at it from above, suspending by the Alchemist’s magic, it looked like a portal into another world. An idyllic world, seemingly painted into the floor. Argrave saw a distant city past the grasslands. It could be likened to a portal into one of the gods’ realms—a split in this reality through which the divine and mortal both could travel. Yet there was something off about it. Lingering pools of magma dripped into it, yet the moment they passed the boundary, they vanished as though they never were.

As they descended further, Argrave saw the scene more clearly. It was still as a painting. It looked like a lovely coastal city. Argrave could see seagulls, even, and trees flowing with the light sea winds. But something about the way the seagulls moved was… off, and the trees were odd in much the same way. Argrave couldn’t put his finger on it.

“What are you seeing? Anything unusual, anyone?” Argrave asked, the question largely for Anneliese and the Alchemist.

Silence reigned for a long few moments as they steadily descended.

“…I can’t see anything off,” Anneliese begrudgingly admitted when no one else refused to speak.

Stolen ; please report.

“I cannot even tell that it’s a portal,” said the Alchemist. “It’s as though whatever is there occurred naturally.”

Their party slowly descended to the portrait-like scene in the crater. It was vastly disorienting to have one world spread out before you on its side, obeying different gravity entirely. It was like two forms of reality existed. Only the Alchemist was brave enough to approach, and he slowly put his hand out.

Argrave watched as his hand passed the barrier. The Alchemis moved his hand about, then pulled it free, closely scrutinizing his fingers with several dozen eyes. He reported to them calmly, “Gravity changes. And the air pressure, the temperature… it’s impossible to tell this is a portal, and indeed I’m not sure it is one. I sense not magic nor divinity. But it’s certainly a different location.” The Alchemist reached within himself, then pulled free the vial. Argrave could see its dark malignance swirling about like a tempest. “And it’s certainly our objective.”

“So… who goes fir—” Melanie began, cutting herself off when the Alchemist hovered into Sandelabara. Even Argrave’s jaw clenched when he saw the way the light fell upon the giant, as though he’d just walked out beneath the sun.

The Alchemist looked back at them, then stuck his hand out. It reemerged from the portrait-like scene. Soon after, the rest of him came, and he exited calmly. “It seems safe.”

“Very empirical,” Argrave noted, looking at Anneliese to stress caution. But the curiosity had set in on her face, and he knew then that their fate was sealed.

Soon after the Alchemist, all of them went through. Anneliese led the advance, then Argrave. As the giant had said, as soon as they passed the imperceivable threshold, it was as though they moved into another place entirely. A new gravity, new suns, new winds, new temperatures… Argrave judged by the two stars in the sky that this must be somewhere in the world they currently resided, but he could recognize nothing about the city, the countryside, or even the sea. Looking back, Argrave could see the lava cavern still persisting. Now, though, it appeared on its side.

“Let us advance,” dictated the Alchemist, then set off floating wrapped in magic. “Do not touch anything carelessly, even the ground.”

Argrave looked around the verdant countryside for a moment. The bright blue ocean stretched ahead without an end. He could see farms in the distance near the outskirt of the city. The structures weren’t quite primitive, but they lacked the uniformity of something built by magic. They looked to be made of stone, and solely by hand. The style was blocky and rigid—function over form, put simply. And as they proceeded, the strangeness of this land made itself all the more evident.

The seagulls flying above the ocean… they teleported from place to place in their flight path. There were so many it was impossible to determine any reason to it all, but Argrave thought he noticed patterns. The trees, too, though few, snapped from place to place as the wind blew through them. They were teleporting just the same as the seagulls, though to a lesser intensity. It almost seemed like they were skipping.

“I see someone,” declared Orion, watching a tree. “A woman. She’s holding a baby.”

Everyone focused where he did. Argrave could barely see it at first, but as they floated near, he spotted her too. She wore a plain brown dress and a cowl, and rocked the baby. They headed her way as quickly as they could. Her movements were jerky, too, and Argrave thought he might be able to study this phenomenon more closely. Yet then… her head turned as she noticed them. She saw them, and her head pulled back in alarm. She opened her mouth to speak…

And then her head was turned again, and she rocked the baby.

Everyone froze in the air, yet the Alchemist proceeded. She turned her head again as his huge body cast a shadow over her… and like it never moved, her whole body shifted back.

“She’s returning to the same point,” Argrave realized. “Back where she started.” He looked back at the seagulls, and finally found some reason in the madness. Every time they teleported, they returned back to where they began their flight.

Argrave heard a scream, then looked back to see the woman crawling away from the Alchemist with her legs while shielding her baby. She returned once again, screamed once again, crawled once again… and this cycle repeated as he watched, standing above her. Looping infinitely, trapped in time.

Their party came to join the Alchemist as he observed, watching in abject caution. Their arrival made her only more afraid—Argrave supposed from her perspective, a group of freaks came to stand over her as she rocked her baby. Argrave saw things for a picnic—a basket, some food. Beyond the looping time, it all seemed rather ordinary.

“Every five seconds, she returns,” the Alchemist observed. “Five and one twelfth seconds, exactly.”

Anneliese floated near, barely suspended above the woman. She was greeted by a scream. “Can we communicate, do you think?”

Onychinusa scoffed. “Five seconds? What could you get from that?”

Anneliese hesitantly touched the woman’s leg when she returned once, then narrowly avoided a surprised kick. Anneliese floated above the tree, studying the realm around them.

The Alchemist, on her next cycle, ruthlessly slammed his obsidian staff down, killing the woman and her baby instantly.

“What the fuck?!” Argrave shouted.

Then… she returned. She saw them, she screamed, and she backed away, the same as ever. The Alchemist slowly pulled away his staff, studying it. “No blood, no gore. But her reappearance forcibly relocated the staff. Curious.”

“There are non-sentient things you might test that on,” Argrave reminded him, then shook his head with an alarmed sigh.

As everyone looked all around in stunned silence at this place trapped in time, Anneliese hovered back down and tried to communicate. It was pointless—five seconds wasn’t enough to say anything, let alone get a proper and coherent response from a woman frightened by their sudden appearance.

“I can’t make sense of this,” Argrave floated high up into the sky, studying the area. Everything moved for only five seconds before returning to where it came. The smoke from distant chimneys, the tides against the coast, the horses on the meadow, the birds in the sky—they were trapped in a loop, ignorant and immortal.

“Yet we have to,” the Alchemist reminded him. “We know what to be cautious of. Now, let us find where Gerechtigkeit’s energy resonates strongest.”