Chapter 5: What the Jungle Hides

Admiral lunges through the portal (he has to lunge head first since the its only a few feet across). As he makes a gentle feline landing on wide roots just beyond, he sees the small boggle briefly on the same wide root. It immediately gasps at Admiral's appearance, looks at a base of wide roots in the center floor of this new cavity, and suddenly teleports to the base. Without hesitation the creature jumps into a large pool of water.



As Admiral observes in a low crouch, the twisting sensation of the portal still tingling through his limbs, his keen Rakasta eyes quickly adjust to the deep blue light of the vast underground cavity.

The air is cool and thick with the damp scent of earth and old roots. The ceiling above arches like the inside of some ancient, slumbering beast, its surface veined with massive roots that glow with the now familiar bioluminescent blue light. They pulse gently, like something dreaming, half-aware.

Directly ahead, his gaze settles on the centerpiece of the chamber: an enormous gnarled root structure that spills from ceiling to floor like a petrified waterfall. The roots spread outward into a shallow, glassy pool that covers most of the cavern floor, its surface reflecting the soft, eerie glow above.

The small boggle paddles awkwardly through the water — squat, with rubbery limbs and skin like wet leather. Its wide, lidless eyes glance back over a shoulder as it swims with urgency with a look that hopes it’s just escaped.

On the far side of the chamber, partially hidden among hanging roots, Admiral spots another portal. Small and dark, its edges glisten with the same oily sheen as those in the corridor above. There is also a portal visible between roots on the ceiling, as well as two others on the right and left walls of the massive cavity. It is logical to assume there is a portal below, under the water.

The cavity feels alive. Root systems shift slightly above and below, responding not with hostility, but with awareness. This place is no passive structure — it is part of something deeper. Something old.

Crouched on the root near the portal, Admiral glances around the chamber and, spotting the boggle in the water, narrows his eyes and vanishes again. He reappears at the base of the central root structure, looming over the boggle in the water.

"Vanish again and I’ll cleave you to the brisket next time I catch you, you miserable toad," he snarls, putting on his ‘captain’ voice and leveling his sword at the creature’s throat.

The boggle freezes mid-paddle, its wide, bulbous eyes going impossibly round...the kind of wide that says it hadn’t expected its pursuer to also know how to vanish and reappear.

It yelps with a gurgling, high-pitched noise that’s both a croak and whimper. It flails in the shallow water. Its knobby fingers splash uselessly before it scrambles backward through the muck, never taking its eyes off the gleaming edge of Admiral’s blade. Slime trails behind it in streaks as it tries to climb up a twisted root, slips, then curls into a crouch just above the waterline.

"No vanish! No vanish!" it wheezes, clutching its dripping hands to its chest.

Its wide mouth quivers with every word, and one of its knees bounces uncontrollably in shallow tremors. The boggle's oily skin seems to thin in fear, the glow from the roots painting it in sickly blue as it cowers beneath Admiral’s shadow, utterly cowed by the Rakasta’s snarl and steel.

"Good," says Admiral, crouching down closer to the boggles level. "You’re smarter than you look. If you cooperate, you have nothing to be afraid of. Now, tell me, what is the fastest way to the antler tree?"

The slimy fey looks somewhat relieved but also apprehensive.

"This." it says putting its hand on a thick glowing root. "This is tree."

Pointing to the center of the now calm pool, it continues, "Portals make jump big. Bigger roots. Trunk closer."

It looks back at Admiral with a hopeful look...a look asking to be released.

"Oh, I see!" says Admiral, eyes widening as he looks all around at the roots covering the walls and ceiling of the cavity and then down at the one beneath his feet. "That’s very helpful! Thank you." He withdraws his sword and waves a hand, indicating that the boggle is free to go. "Well, go on and get out of here then. I won’t hurt you."

The boggle stands stunned for a moment, its oversized mouth parted in cautious uncertainty.

Then it skitters back a step, eyeing Admiral’s sword arm to be sure his gesture of mercy wasn’t a trick. When it’s sure, it croaks again, this time almost gratefully, and clambers down the root like a lizard, landing in the water with a wet plop, leaving an oily smear in its path.

It paddles in frantic strokes across the pool, half-darting, half-floundering, propelled more by panic than grace. It's awkward strokes get it to about the center of the pool and then, just before ducking under the pool's surface, it glances back once. Its round, glossy eyes glimmer with something like...cautious gratitude... or maybe just relief.



Then it dives and is gone with a soft squelch, leaving behind only some slick bubbles and the ripple of disturbed water.

Once the boggle is gone, Admiral misty steps back over to the portal he came through and climbs through it. On the other side, he looks up at the portal that should take him back to the first cavity where he left Regan and Cordey and, resigning himself to the fact that he’s probably going to end up falling on his face thanks to the topsy-turvy gravity, misty steps through it.

Admiral braces himself and Misty Steps into the portal.

The disorienting shift in gravity hits instantly. One moment his boots are on solid root, the next he’s plunging headfirst through the aperture like a cork from a bottle. He twists mid-air on instinct, but the change in orientation scrambles his balance, and there isn’t enough room to land cleanly.

Below him (or perhaps above depending on how one choses to define direction in this circumstance) Cordey and Regan are awkwardly balancing on the root platform just beneath the portal. Or rather, Regan is climbing onto Cordey.

He's half-perched on Cordey's shoulders all armored up, one gauntleted hand gripping a root nearby, the other pressing into the side of his head for balance.

"You’re taller. Hold still," he growls, armored boots scrabbling for purchase.

Cordey stumbles, clearly straining under the weight. "You’re in full armor!"

He has just enough time to protest before Admiral comes barreling through the portal with all the grace of a falling chandelier.

The Rakasta’s arrival is sudden, weighty, and entirely unavoidable.

Cordey lets out a grunt as Admiral crashes into his shoulder, and the whole precarious arrangement collapses. Regan grunts...more in irritation than pain...as the weight of two grown warriors pulls him backward. Armor clangs. Roots creak, sending a ripple of root movement through the cavity.

They all go down in a tangled heap, a mess of limbs, steel, and fur.

Regan hits the root platform first with a clang, Admiral partially sprawled across his chest. Cordey tumbles to the side, wincing as he lands hard on his hip, groaning and rolling to his back.

Regan stares up at the portal above, flat on his back, wheezing. "You landed on me," he mutters, more offended than hurt. Regan’s voice drifts up from below, dry as ever. "I swear, if you ever fall on me again, I'm shaving your tail in your sleep."

Cordey props himself up on an elbow, rubbing the back of his head, and holding back a chuckle as not to futher offend the knight. "Didn’t realize it was raining Rakasta today…"

Cordey sits up, eyes scanning Admiral. "You good, Captain?"

Admiral springs to his feet and offers Regan and Cordey a hand each to help them up. "Never better! I had a very helpful chat with a boggle and I think I can lead us to the antler tree through these portals." He waves a hand at the portal in the ceiling that he just fell through. "Apparently, these roots belong to the antler tree so, as you get closer to the trunk, the roots get bigger. So all we’ve got to do is follow the roots, you see?"

Regan adjusts his tassets and regains his composure. "Well that's promising," he concurs. He then looks up at the portal that Admiral just 'fell' through and asks, "But how are we all going to get through these portals?"

Meanwhile Rowan and Tasya's face can be seen peering from beyond the portal that leads back to the root passage on the surface.

Admiral gestures for Tasya and Rowan and the others to come in and join them in the cavity.

"Hmm… That’s a good point," he says to Regan. "I can take someone with me when I turn to mist like I’ve been doing, but that seems slow. And a bit tricky. The room on the other side of that portal is upside down, relative to this one, so when I jump through… Well, you saw for yourself how that went." He scratches his ear and looks up at the portal. "Maybe we just need to make the climb a little easier. Do you have any rope?"

It doesn't take long for the on-lookers to alert the rest and soon the full lot carefully navigates across roots onto the platform next to Admiral, Regan, and Cordey.

...

When all know the situation, Rowan offers, "Oh yes, rope. For sure. I wouldn't leave Khyree's shipwreck without some. As an engineer I've learned, it always comes in handy. Here you go." He rustles out a coil from his bag.

Khyree scoffs at the mention of her shipwreck.

"Thanks!" Admiral ties one end of the rope around one of the sturdier looking roots that make up the platform they’re all gathered on and then, looping the coil of rope over his shoulder, solicits another boost from Cordey to get up to the portal on the ceiling. He tosses the rope in ahead of himself and says, "I’m going to go secure the other end. I’ll tug on the rope three times when it’s ready. Careful you don’t fall when you cross through the portal—the change in gravity is a little weird…"

With that, he climbs through the portal and misty steps down to the ground like he did when he confronted the boggle earlier. He ties the rope off to another root and then gives it three quick tugs.

Admiral manages to navigate the, now familiar, gravity change and secures the rope in the other cavity. After three tugs the others start to make their way into the much larger cavity. Only Mischa and the boy nearly lose their grip after they climb through the portal and opposite gravity takes hold of them. But they recover without incident. Soon all make it into the larger cavity (that's about 100 ft wide).

There's a portal on the cavity floor.
There's a portal on the ceiling (the one from which everyone just climbed)
There's a portal in wall (where Admiral previous saw the boggle appear)
There's a portal on the opposing wall (the one Admiral followed the boggle through)

The roots were pretty big in that cavern full of water that Admiral followed the boggle into, but he has a quick peek into the other two portals (the ones on the floor and opposing wall) just to make sure they’re headed in the right direction.

The Opposing Portal View

Admiral peeks through the aperture in the opposing wall (the same portal the boggle first emerged from). As his eyes adjust, he sees a dim gloomy glade. Thick, thorn-covered trees encircle the clearing like sentinels, their spiny limbs woven so tightly overhead they form a dome of twisted bark and shadow.

The space isn't large, maybe thirty feet across, but what draws his attention is the pool at its center. It's not water, but something thicker, darker. A slick, oily liquid ripples sluggishly in the middle, its surface reflecting no light. A small crumpled, burlap robe lies at the edge of the pool. A few fat bubbles burble to the surface with a wet glurp.

From this vantage—perched high, as though viewing from a limb on a tree at the glade’s edge—Admiral can see subtle trails pressed into the thorny ground, as though small feet, as small as boggle feet, have circled the pool over and over again.

The Floor Portal View

Turning to the portal in the floor, Admiral crouches low and peers through.

Another root-cavity sprawls beyond—roughly spherical like the others, but unmistakably deeper. This cavity doesn't appear to be any larger than the first one Admiral misty stepped into, perhaps even smaller. The blue bioluminescence that clings to the roots here is fainter than before, casting a dim, ghostly pallor over the rough soil walls. The roots themselves are thinner, less twisted...almost delicate. Like veins in a fading leaf.

Crawling steadily across the arch of the cavity’s interior is a fire beetle the size of a hound. Its shell gleams with thick, chitinous ridges, and its many legs move against the roots as it scuttles along. As it nears a dark tunnel at the cavity’s edge—a natural opening maybe four feet wide—its abdomen suddenly flares, casting the chamber in pulsing red light. Its wings unfurl in a crackle of motion and it lifts, fluttering heavily toward the tunnel.

Other oil-rimmed portals mark the cavity's curves—placed in patterns Admiral is beginning to recognize. Their positions mirror those of the previous chambers. Admiral cannot tell if he is peering up into this cavity, down into it, or otherwise, as the beetle's movement offered no clue on that front...

Admiral watches the beetle disappear into the tunnel and then pulls his head out of the portal and looks around at the others. "If we weren’t in such a hurry, I’d be keen to explore this place. There’s all kinds of weird stuff in here!" he says, shaking his head. "But I’ll try to keep focused. I think we need to go through that portal over there next." He points to the portal on the wall that he previously followed the boggle through.

Mischa, resting a hand on the boy's shoulder to help keep him calm, looks past a tangle of roots toward the portal Admiral points at and suggests, "We'll have to navigate these roots carefully with the child, not too fast." She glances both at Admiral and Tasya and adds, "Not all of us are experienced leaping around tent ropes and ship rigging."