What is this, a fortress of solitude? Celina thought. However, before coming to that conclusion, before the love for nature carried her away, Celina had her senses awakened. This place did not look naturally formed whatsoever. Obviously, dark magic was at play.
Celina took a step, glassy stones scrunched beneath her feet. She was inside a fantastical chamber where jagged shards of brilliant orange-colored crystals jut from all directions-from the walls, floor, and ceiling- towering around like gigantic teeth of a monster. They were long and ovoid, like eggs, and placed too close to one another. There were thousands and thousands of them, as orange as rays of the early morning sun, or otherwise as...the creatures besieging the country. Her insides pendulumed from awe to resentment.
Some of the towers were visibly giving off white plumes of condensation. Why was that? Why not all? What was the difference? What was happening here? There was so much confusion. Celina did not feel easy in her mind.
"Tyrell," she mind-connected. No response. "Tyrell? Can you hear me?"
Nothing.
She gritted her teeth. So much for asking her to stay connected. She knew that it was a terrible idea to come here all by herself. If dark magic was indeed at work, then what could she even do without knowing its distinctive quality? What was she supposed to do? Should she collect samples and head back to Tyrell through that very passage? No matter how much she loved the idea of hiking and caving, the thirty minutes journey through that enclosed space had been painful. The thought spurred a foreboding sensation and Celina needed to feel ready before she headed back.
She stood peering into the depths, the existence of the place rendering her a stuttering mess. Do something! She scolded herself. The need to do something more strident than just hand-wringing surged in her. She took a step towards one of the crystal towers and looked. Really looked. Examined. There was no smell, no clear indication of what these fumes were, but this swirling white smoke covered the tower's outline. Celina lifted her hand and reached for the significant solid portion of the tower. And she did only to find it bitterly cold. The contact gave her a nasty burn to her fingers and she immediately retracted. Then she checked the tower bereft of fumes. It wasn't as cold, just as she'd suspected. It almost seemed as though these towers going through a process. But how was she going to prove it? She took every question raging in her mind with more skepticism.
Boom!
Somewhere inside the chamber, something was broken, followed by the terrifying, unexpected screeching sound that slowly drifted away. The sound belonged to a creature flying off into the sky. Columns of freezing plumes streaked past her. Celina hissed with fright. What if this place was filled with creatures?
A thought occurred to her. The thought that could have sounded a bit farfetched a few days ago now seemed closer to ground reality. There was only one way to fact-check, no matter what level of destruction it may cause, she willed to proceed. She began concentrating hard on her stone. The cool, stale air that surrounded her came to life forming a pair of sharp airy spikes the length of a sword. She commanded her stone and with a single thrust, the tower impaled into two, the slice visible and the orange light put off. A strong current of smoke rushed out and then came a loud inhumane cry of pain and death, reaching impossibly high to earsplitting levels. And the smell was like rotten food and stinking bodies.
Celina stumbled back, fixing her stance. Her hands pressed tight against her ears and felt a pang of nostalgia. Quickly making up her mind, she repeated the same act. She sliced the towers and more towers. The brilliance of orange light slowly got diminished, shadows disappearing and darkness pervading. The loud cry filled in the chamber, the smell getting too strong. Apart from this, there were beating and screeching sounds. The amalgamation of sounds was an assault on her ears.
These ovoid towers weren't like eggs, they were eggs. This must be the place Shashi had been sowing, cultivating, and harvesting his clan. It must be another skilled dark magic Shashi must have inherited from Almourah, that was also well adapted to withstand their Formation.
"Constellia Formation!" She yelled.
Vrishabha appeared, her giant-like posture giving Celina a feeling of security. Celina ordered Vrishabha to go to the opposite side and start smashing every freaking tower.
Celina and her Constellia went on a rampage, although with careful precision. They sliced the towers and smashed them into the ground, sending icy splinters flying everywhere. A heavy mass of liquid fell on the floor from some of them, while from others the plumes whooshed through the air, creeping up throughout the chamber. The smell gathered and turned intolerable. The cries were deafening. The counterpressure on Celina's ears was too much to endure. Her head ached and tears shed. But Celina wouldn't stop. No time to worry about the pain. Just smash. Finish it off.
She was vigilant as well. What if somewhere in this mess Shashi had hidden the Shaatrumani or Pruthvi's Emerald? Or the baby?
Celina slammed against the side of the chamber and nearly stumbled. She frowned. There was the slow-moving stream flowing away to the unknown. She spotted a smaller creature, its eyes crushed drifting away with the gentle current of the stream.
Celina turned around and took a long breath. The chamber was L shaped and terrifyingly huge. She turned back to check. The portion of the chamber she had finished was covered with layers of ice debris, piles of the thick orange mass flowing into the stream, and the trail of her footprints amidst them. She resumed her attacks, deflecting her airy swordlike spikes. Then a sharp tug in her gut forced her to slow down. Celina gritted her teeth. Hunger pangs were beginning to strike and more than three-quarters of the chamber was left to destroy.
What if she used that Formation? Should she form a tornado belowground? Will this basement survive its intensity? What if the destruction pumped an alarming quality of devastation into the forest above? What about the poor trees, animals, and birds? Moreover, this could create bigger hurdles for her to find the gemstones. This newfound Formation of hers had the power to destroy a mountain. Hadn't she witnessed it before? Just one attack, her conscience insisted and the multiplication of Shashi's clan will cease forever and in turn cease causing more havoc.
The cries came soaring to her ears. The galloping thick plumes etched around her, threatening her, daring her.
Celina closed her eyes and thought through a new strategy. The intensity was dependent on the severity of her concentration, the whole basis of the Formation that it was. Being the master, she would decide its intensity. She could make it work, that much she knew but the lack of energy to pull it off bothered her. A full-blown catastrophic formation had always been easier to form rather than a bent one. Another hunger pang struck in her stomach. This was her cue. She closed her eyes, concentrating hard on her stone and creating a mental picture according to the Formation she wanted to perform.
A relatively small rope-like tornado swirled far away from her, the gust of which created a massive cloud of ice and smoke right below the roof of the chamber. Celina commanded her stone and with subtle swiftness, the tornado ripped through the towers ravaging as it went. The chamber sprang up in an almighty bang. To say that the cries of the unborn creatures and the shattering sounds of the towers were frightening was an understatement. Celina fell on her knees, having her hands clapped against her ears. She gasped and writhed, her face grimacing, her concentration dwindling. She looked up, forcing attention on her stone. The tornado growing and shrinking in size, stayed resilient to finish the task. Thicker smoke bellowed in waves as though wildfire. Celina coughed, feeling smoke filling in her lungs. Tears dripped. The pain was now so excruciating, she never had a hard time concentrating on her stone like today.
Banging on the floor and screaming with pain, Celina mustered up resilience and courage to stay put. A minute passed by and then another. The tornado was still there, she could feel its presence but the smoke obstructed her from discerning its magnitude. Perhaps I should leave, Celina thought, and come back later with my friends. It would be foolish to force herself more on this. The pressure was driving her into unconsciousness and she hated the idea of troubling her friends to come to her rescue.
The ground suddenly shook. There was an unpleasant rattle beneath her knees, as though hitting a speed breaker at a high rate speed. What the fresh hell was that? Celina was lost in her frazzled thoughts that it took her a few moments to realize the enormity happening at the canopy of the chamber. A new terror gripped her heart. The smoke twisting above turned much more violent and crude, blasting the roof of the basement. She gritted her teeth and cursed herself. Bad decision. She should have never used her Formation.
The stream then came to life forming a white-blue-green wave. With the height of this place, it rose and seeped towards her swiftly and unforgivingly, like a felling axe coming for a tree's trunk. It crashed against the remaining towers and collided with the remains, sweeping the contents, and washing away the chamber clean.
Celina was hungry, tired, and physically listless. She estimated the time required to run back to the hole she had come crawling in. Sadly, there was none. The water came threateningly towards her. The cries of the creatures echoed under the ferocity of the gale.
Celina sat there, head hung over and shoulders slumped down. She wasn't sorry but proud for putting down a barricade, stopping Shashi's clan from growing, and preventing the country suffer from more intimidation. She closed her eyes and smiled. What was the worst that could happen now anyway? At least she knew, she wasn't going to die.
Water came over, cold and powerful. Celina felt her lungs exploding. She was taken off and drifted away, getting thoroughly soaked and buffeted by the strong current of the wave. To her surprise, a feeling of relaxation swelled within her. It was like having a massage against her exhausted body. She refrained from trying to use her stone anymore. This feeling of relaxation felt...nice.
Celina may have hardly ever felt so tired. Was she reaching her limit? How much she wanted this to be over. This pressure, this strain, this tension. Shashi's death, oh the wait to see Shashi dead seemed to be prolonging ever and forever. Only she wished it was worth it.
It might have been an hour or two, or only nine minutes, she wouldn't know. But somebody was shaking her shoulders and giving her mouth-to-mouth. With a long deep gasp, Celina woke up at once, water rushing out from her lungs which she spat away. Dim light felt piercing into the dark interior.
Blurry that it was, she allowed her vision to set in. And Tyrell's worried face appeared. Water and blood dripped from his hair and down his chin and coating his neck red. He looked terribly beaten. Her heart sank.
Something very wrong had happened to him.
-x-