FINN MERTENS
I fell unconscious as the last flash of light escaped my vision followed by bouts of waking up and going back.
My eyes scanned around the dark cave every time it opened, the darkness however left me unable to see much.
Flashes of Jake and Huntress, then nothing at all, instead of crashing onto the floor or being crushed by debri, my eyes just shut.
I jolted up as a drop of liquid plopped on my forehead, I was inside the mountain, or Atleast I thought, I looked upwards but only see saw a small speck of light followed by an overpowering void of darkness.
The pungent smell of metal surrounded me while I sat in a small puddle of water or what I assumed and hoped was water.
How did I even manage to survive that fall? It shouldn't be possible by any means, something Isn't adding up.
I slowly got to my feet and began walking, trying to find the walls. A small bing from my arm switched my attention.
"Finn! Fi-Finn!", he bellowed, his screen slightly glitching out.
"Yeah BMO, im here".
"You guy-guys are currently in an area heavily affected by the meee-".
"The merge, my con-connection isn't g-g-gonna work a-as well".
"Alright what do I have to do?".
"Ju-Just find th-the re-st and escape, im tu-turning on t-the flashlight now".
With that BMO's face vanished from the small screen on my arm and the instead a bright flash of light illuminated my surroundings.
With my better vision i was able to confirm a few things, first off the source of the smell, the shallow lake of water in the cave was rather a lake of blood.
That of monsters with their carcasses laid out infront of me, some had their brains out from their skull, some had their bellies spilled out, some missed limbs and some had all of the three.
The grotesque maw infront of me couldn't be my first priority though, I need to find my teammates first.
So I began walking around the dark cave, passing through tunnels both small and large but I never really felt like I was getting anywhere with it.
As I stepped out a particularly thin tunnel, i heard a rising screech beside me, a monster, one resembling a wild ape. I swiftly motioned for my sword when I heard a sharp wisp followed by a small crunch then the same occurring two more times.
It had been shot and pasted on the wall by a set of green arrows, I looked over to see Huntress Wizard looking back at me, wide eyed, bow still in hand.
She eventually let out a deep sigh and said, "I'm glad you're okay".
She looked a bit tired, perhaps she fought a few monsters that were left alive??
"Me too, do you know where Jake and Sweetpea are??".
She shook her head and sat upon one of the monsters carcasses, "There's no reason we should survive that fall".
"Something Isn't right here".
"Yeah I figured as much", I replied before sitting next to her.
"But what being is strong enough to do that".
"Well, it wasn't really that hard".
The voice cut through the air, we both sprung up from the beasts body and looked into the darkness.
"Who's there?!", I questioned while looking over at Huntress.
Footsteps followed, shallow, like they had no weight under them. From the shadows a figure emerged or shoulf i say another shadow emerged.
It was as if the shadow of a man stood on its own just barely within the radius of my arm light, it lacked any noticeable features, everything from its hollow black skin to the shape.
"I can take you to my king, he's the one that kept you and your friends alive", it spoke.
"Where are they?!".
"They're already on their way to meet my king, come with me, I'll direct you two".
Me and Huntress looked at each other one more time before it spoke again, "Rest assured, we have no intention of fighting you. Our aim is the same as yours, to reverse the effects of the merge and kill Yaeger".
With one more glance at Huntress, I unsheathed my sword and followed the shadow man.
The tense atmosphere only made time feel slower as what was probably only a few minutes felt like hours, few monsters still alive were easily dispatched of by Huntress and I with the Shadow guy not even paying them any mind.
"Huntress, can you sense any magic from this guy??".
"No I can't, whatever he is, that seems to be his real state".
"We're here", the shadow man said while stopping abruptly at a muddy wall.
"Uhmm-", my upcoming question was quickly cut off by a small rumbling in the ground along with the wall splitting in half.
After it had completely split forming a space big enough, we walked through only to be greeted with hundreds of more shadow men.
The general darkness and figure made a chill run down my spine, however i was quickly relieved after seeing Jake and Sweet pea walking towards us.
"I'm glad you guys are safe", Jake said.
"Same, what has happened since y'all got here??".
"Nothing really, we've kinda just been standing around".
With my illuminated arm I could see this part of the cave fine, there was a giant chasm at the other side of the cave, it led to what looked like a particularly deep drop off, the shadow men stood idly, looking at each other or nothing at all.
Then I began feeling rumbling like the ground under my feet wanted to give way once more, the shadow men now began facing the large chasm and kneeling before it, like they were worshiping it.
Slowly but surely the rumbling became more and more intense until we could see it, a giant shadowman, this time though he had two giant eyes both individually longer than me, his expression was deadpan like he had seen everything twice before.
It scanned the room with its giant gaze then locked its attention onto us.
"Hello…Spawn of evil, Witch of the forest".
"Biological Anomaly".
"And finally…Child of the Comet".
"You are in the presence of the King of the Shadowmen".
End Of Chapter 21