It wasn’t easy to get to the a library of Rempegana. The tuhat they found retty, yes, but it also featured a lot of danger! Danger in this case, was no different from a textbook barricade, as no one would willingly engulf themselves ier darkhat the tunnel featured.
Apart from this path being poorly illumihere were other issues to it as well. Some kind of creatures lived here, and this part retty predictable, however, these creatures were especially dangerous because they had a geic advahey were mammals!
After the team swam about teers forward, something sast them, right withiunnel! Aside from the initial scare of being spooked in the dark, Timothy also picked up on a very importaail.
“Was that a fug foot I saw?” He asked, and their guide just nodded.
That’s how they discovered that they were entering mammaliaory. With that said, what was to follow was bound to be a challenge, because even though Tim and his team were smart-ish, they were still fish right now, they felt crippled in parison. Mammals had a greater advantage when it came to intelligence, in other words, they were much harder to kill, so the team was about to face a true challenge. e to think of it, it may be the best idea to avoid fighting all together.
“You saw a foot back there, well, you saw a very fast molten dwarf.” Arvena started expining things, it was best to shed more details about the matter. “They’re not goblins, and they’re our a enemy, actually. It was them who forced our aors to go and live topside, but now these stupid dwarves are livihe library only. Their choices are very offeo my people, I mean, why start a whole fug quest to begin with, if you don’t care for your enemy’s territory? They killed my aors in spite, in cold blood!”
Arvena was whispering, for the sake of avoiding grabbing any unnecessary attention, she didn’t want to alert the enemy. However, it was still very apparent iohat she assionate about this matter, she was angry!
“Only one known species of dwarves iirety of Valporovus, and they’re known for running us out of our homes! So unlucky… some god must have punished us!” She mumbled to herself.
Anyway, si arent that these dwarves were really cozy here, this meant that it was especially difficult to ehe library. The molten dwarves had everoyed portions of the architectural wonders here, to make their own lives easier, and this made them all the more dangerous because they knew every inch of this area by heart, they knew what they were doing! They were invasive, yet grand enemies, so it was uo cross them.
At some point along the way, the team started sed-guessing this little mission, due to various reasons. It was really dangerous for them to be here, as a start, and in the occasion of a battle, Timothy didn’t really feel fortable with killing other, intelligent creatures. It seemed wrong to him, and rightfully so.
Tim would kill a thousand fish if he had to, any day, as they were like savages, but it didn’t feel morally right to kill a mammal, not at all. These dwarves were very damn close to being human as well, which made killing them even more morally difficult!
“How many of them do we have to kill?” He asked, as they swam further within the dark tunnel. “They’re dwarves, sure whatever, but it still feels wrong to kill intelligent life. e on, they’re basically mini humans!”
“Humans?! That’s insane of you to say! So you want tain with the dwarves, then, is that it? That’s rich!” She tered.
Before he was about to answer, a sharp tone echoed from within the darker areas of the tunnel. It mahteeam quite a bit.
“Bargain?” It parroted.
“Yes, bargain!” Tim was quick to answer, as he uood that they had a good, and surely sudden opportunity here.
He followed along, “You’re not animals, so we don’t want to kill any of you little bastards! e on now, please let us ehe library in peace.”
“Ok,” It answered, shortly.
Moments ter, a mere, bearded dwarf swam in front of them, peacefully. It didn’t seem like he wao attack, which was advantageous, but as far as details were ed, Tim and his friends finally uood why these things were called molten dwarves!
The dwarf’s face was really red, as if he had a rash of some sort, and his skin seemed pretty tough too. Great portions of his skin was coated with iron, perhaps naturally, so one could say that he was resistant to most kinds of attacks. It would be stupid to attack them to begin with, it was obvious now, and Arvena hadn’t told them this when she brought them down here. She brought them down here in order to fight anything that moved, and this part was a bit suspicious of her, but the team didn’t have time to ask her any of such questiht now, no.
Tim, instead greeted the red-bearded fellow, he said. “Hello! you uand me?”
“Yes, I uand you, or I uand some fish, especially when they have a goblin at like you do.” He answered, “I am Araduli Grimfoot.”
“Oh,” Tim’s smile stretched out, he was surprised. “I’m Timothy Lake.”
“That’s a funny name,” Araduli added, and then he asked. “You wao see the library? I take you there, us dwarves rarely use it anyway. There are too many useless scrolls there, they’re about mana mostly, so we don’t really hem.”
“Useless?!” Arvena interrupted them, she got steaming mad right that instant, not that she hadn’t beey mad already.
Then, she scolded. “You’ve been gatekeeping knowledge that’s thousands of years old, it’s precious to us, you bastard! Don’t say anything stupid like that ever again, because I’m trying my best not to kill you, you red faced demon!”
Araduli looked at the tiny damselfish, and then he said. “You, kill me? I trust that there is iron in your veins then, if you’re so fident about killing me, but ye may be your misdoing. You goblins mainly e here to fight us, and that’s about it, you never asked us if you ehe library. If you asked, we would’ve let you.”
Araduli could’ve said something stupid right then and there, but he avoided it. Instead, he praised the little damselfish, and then he embraced logical reasoning too, which mao deescate the situation quite a bit. He made a smart move, because Arvena was basically an over-powered ser pointer in this bodily form. She was tiny, but super dangerous, and she would’ve attacked if she had enough pretext to do so! A dire battle was avoided.
Timothy was especially thankful that those hostile tensions suddenly died down. He didn’t want to kill any dwarves, and he wanted access to the library too, so this was a win-win situation really. He felt jolly!
The team romised safe passage to the library, so they took that offer, regardless of the perplexing uone of that iation session. This was a good opportunity for them to learn about mana.
Arvena was their biggest security threat along the way, because she noticed how a lot of these aunnels had beeroyed, in order to fit the needs of the dwarves, which was very offeo her. This pce used to have other useful rooms before, huge air-filled caverns even, it didn’t feature just the library like it did now. Plenty of important pces seemed to have been locked away because of the rubble, possibly forever, so Arvena was not happy!
Thankfully though, they made it to the library in one piece. The other dwarves did not bother them at all, so their passage here was more than safe, if not peaceful.
At some point, they had to shapeshift into goblins, because the library was not submerged uer. Parts wouldn’t st long under such ditions, not nearly!
Ohey shapeshifted, Araduli mao get some clothes for them, because he couldn’t have guests walk around naked. He couldn’t walk around naked either.
Araduli was only a little bit taller than Skendus too, so it didn’t take much effort to find spare clothes for his guests, clothes that fit. The team was equipped with what the dwarves called eel leather, and this was quite fortable on their skin, it felt like silk. It was unknown how they extracted leather from an eel, but in this case, it was best not to ask any questions.
Anyway, when they ehe library ter on, the team met with a huge drop of elevation, a pit! The entrance was very close to the library’s ceiling, and the twenty-meter pit below them featured this circur wall, with plenty of scrolls stashed away inside of those walls!
This was a beautiful, big, and single room, but with the clear ck of dders, it may be difficult to find important scrolls here, without the team falling to their death. What was to follow, was bound to be a challenge!
