The Commander instructed us all to be familiar with the cavern layout, so Yoboc started taking us around. The top end is where the stream enters, as that is the higher point. The stream bubbles up from a crevice in a pool before flowing away. Yoboc went down to look, and it was about 4m deep before it got too narrow to pass.

  There are fish. The ones we have seen are small, and nobody knows what type they are. I caught one in my claws, and it wasn’t the nicest, but it was edible. It didn’t poison me, so that pleased the others. They were not happy I did that without testing for poison first, and I see they have a point. I can learn.

  The stream has some dark moss growing on the banks. It made the footing slippery. Yoboc scraped some off to try to identify it, but we had no resources or reference materials. He hoped to at least identify whether it was a moss or fungi and whether it was poisonous. He assumed it wasn’t as the fish seemed to eat it, and I had discovered that they weren’t poisonous. Plus the water was not toxic.

  The air flows through four other points, plus the stream's exit. One of those points is in the ceiling. Yoboc pointed to it, but with my weak light, I couldn’t see anything but darkness. It was only his combination of Darksight and Farsight that allowed him to see it. It was a crack in the ceiling running parallel to the support beams or ribs as they are becoming known.

  Another crack was in the wall opposite the entrance, and this one could have a dwarf squeeze through, but he had not gone further yet. He could only see about five meters before rocks blocked his view.

  The lower end of the cavern did curve away, but the view was mostly blocked by a large rock fall where two “ribs” had collapsed. At the top of this rockfall was an opening Yoboc could crawl through with some space to spare. He only went 10m before turning back.

  The stream exited the cavern opposite the rockfall in a worn cave. The water was moving slower at this point, and there was space to keep your heat out of the water as you crawled along in the freezing water.

  The final exit was larger at the end of the cavern. It followed the central rib, or spine, as it was being referred to. It was lower to the cavern floor here, and the cavern size had shrunk. The cave that followed the spine was tall enough for me to stand upright, and it curved upwards. This is the first one we will explore. Yoboc hoped to find a way to the crack in the ceiling or outside. We have mining equipment, and everybody has the mining skills, even if none of us have the class.

  Yoboc labelled the gaps as Ceiling, Crack, Rockfall, River, and Spine.

  “If this is a huge monster and that is the spine,” Goldie asked, “do you think the cave that follows the spine is the neck, and we will find a skull?”

  “Nah, lassie,” said Yoboc, “It will be the tail and the asshole.”

  “That would be more our luck,” she grumped, “we will be mining poop.”

  Winter started to settle in over the next couple of weeks. One storm followed another. The snow was deep outside, covering the buildings. The cookhouse lean to collapsed under the weight of the snow.

  When I was on patrol outside, my Nightsight and Clearsight were a great help. I mostly patrolled in my bear form as it was warmer outside and easier to fit in the dwarven-sized tunnels. I just had to avoid the traps. I had belts to carry stuff.

  We did try to let the snow cover and hide the evidence of the mining operation, so we patrolled in less obvious routes away from the main camp area. We don’t need to protect the buildings or anything. If they collapsed, they could be rebuilt. We were looking for monster signs and signs of scouts and others seeking this area for riches. We patrolled the ridges and places where we could see the surrounding area, especially the sea.

  Although the Ice shelf was well out from shore, it was still the easiest place for groups to travel. We were looking for signs of people and monsters moving about. We also watched the skies. Those Griffons are still just down the coast.

  Hiding the place itself is the object as it is very valuable. These dwarves found it, and they would not tell me how it was done. I am guessing at the Spiritual Signatures, which is the place it is putting out. I know Undoth was part of the original search group, but it is either a Prospector's secret or an artefact they had. It is probably both. The evidence of Rock Eater and its enchantments strongly leans toward an artefact being involved.

  The cavern was a different species of fish for us to guard. Rock Eater was the item that needed to be protected, but we didn’t know what we were protecting it from. A permanent guard post was constructed from the cavern wall near the tunnel, and a large light gem was installed in it. This was partly for my benefit but mostly to attract creatures that were attracted to light, and there were a few.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  We watched mostly from the hidden guard post, which was between the Rock Eater and the stream. The light still helped me, but I didn’t need to be up there and a target. We made Decoy Dave from rock and cast-off clothes. His job was to man the upper guard post. He was a solid guy.

  Once a day, one of us would go to the upper guard post and piss on Dave. This would then attract those who hunted by smell, and boy, did he start to smell. It stuffed my Olfactory up until I developed the ability to filter out smells. I think we might have overdone it when a large Salamander came sniffing around. This was about two meters long and had a poison bite. I was not on duty at the time, but I saw the corpse and helped harvest it.

  The Commander made us give Dave a wash and keep the smell to a reasonable level so we don’t attract attention outside the local area. I was given the job of monitoring Dave’s hygiene levels with my Olfactory. Dave never complained once. Goldie complained loudly and often at being restricted from pissing on men. We should have gone for a gender-neutral name.

  Rock Eater was cracked and broken, but it still needed some maintenance. It was also filled with Spiritual materials and would attract those who hunted for spirituality.

  As we stood watch, we would record what sort of creatures we saw and whether they were aggressive. The only creature that was attracted to the light was a white moth about the size of a double-hand span. They were harmful because they sucked spiritual energy from things, so we had to keep them off Rock Eater and clear the light, or they would suck out the energy faster. Rock Eater would need more maintenance, and the light gem would need replacing.

  They were not hard to kill, especially when they flocked to the light. The occasional one would land on Rock Eater and need clearing. They would appear at random about once a week. I levelled my Throw Weapons skill by bringing them down with some small throwing knives Goldie loaned me. This was good practice, and she said if I wanted to specialise the skill, I would need to focus on throwing one thing, like knives. She has a specialised axe-throwing skill. The general skill was fine for now.

  The Commander was making us get into a watch routine before he would allow any exploring. His Watch routine included continued weapons training and guard training. My Gurad class was levelling fast and that gave me more free attributes.

  Exploration was a secondary task as the summer would bring specialists. Once we were established and key traps were built, we would explore the nearby tunnels and set up warning traps. Yoboc, Goldie and I went to set traps and nets at each of the entrance points, but this was temporary. The Moths still got in, or maybe they bred here and ate the moss/fungi. They were still arguing whether it was a moss or a fungus.

  The biggest gap that we could not block was the ceiling, which was a worry. Maybe that is how the moths got in. We think the Salamander came in one of the land accesses, as the river would have negated the smell, but we are not sure. It had suction paws, so it could have come from the ceiling, for all we know.

  The biggest problem was protecting the Rock Eater from hungry Rock Elementals. They are attracted to Spiritual Energy and the Rock Eater was letting off a real smorgasbord of energy. The elementals stayed away when it was operating because it was eating rock. When it was stopped for maintenance, they didn’t have time to locate it, but now that it is still in the bottom of a cavern, they have the time.

  We extracted the Monster Core that was powering it, but it was still made from Spiritual materials that had to remain spiritual materials.

  It was masked to a certain degree by being surrounded by a lot of strong spiritual material in the cavern, including the ribs, scales, and whatever else was under the floor. So Rock Eater was not the most attractive source, but it still attracted some entities.

  We laid some more attractive diversions for them. The Light gem was embedded in the wall above Dave. We gave Dave a cloak of scales to further attract the elementals. We placed Spiritual minerals from the mine in a couple of places around Rock Eater to attract the elementals as well.

  The rest we had to watch and chase away or kill. Killing a rock elemental was difficult. None of us were Spiritually strong enough to fight it on the spiritual level, so we had to dig for its physical part. More often, this would make it run, and our goal was achieved. Eric was the first to kill one by getting its Gem and crushing it. He didn’t mean to crush the gem.

  “If you can keep the gem intact, they are valuable to jewellers and enchanters, as they have focused spiritual energy in them,” he said. “You have to get the gem out of the rock and then spiritually cut it from the elemental. Surrounding it with your Spiritual energy will do that, but just enclosing it in your fist is not enough. Some people swallow it and then poop it out. That is messy. I found keeping it in my mouth and keeping it covered in saliva for five minutes to be enough. The larger ones need longer.”

  So that was the aim. It was a race to catch them before they escaped and to see who could get the most. We ended up with an area of loose rock around the Rock Eater, and I got my own gem. This was also levelling my mining skills.

  With my rising level of Spiritual Sensing, I was starting to differentiate between different types of energy. When I compared this one to the light gem I had, I could tell they were different. This elemental gem felt like the ribs and scales of this place. The Elemental must have been hanging around here for a long time and not travelled, which makes sense. Why leave a good source of food?

  Yoboc let me come as he explored the spine tunnel. It was really the only one that would fit me without constantly widening. I had added height and weight from living with the dwarves.

  “Undoth is better at this,” Yoboc said. “He has better senses for underground.”

  I found it disappointing. I chipped some ore from the spine, which seemed to be the same as the ribs. There were smaller fissures opening into the main tunnel, and Yoboc couldn’t sense very far in. There were less elementals here. In the end, we set some traps and backed out. This would wait for the summer team.