Love Poison No Cure Needed

Lovely and leaving 3.11

Sorrel hadn’t thought it was technically possible to stumble while swimming but Sephy performed a credible impersonation. However, there wasn’t actually enough room for a fur seal sized dragon to spin around in the coral and so she managed to smack her tail into one of the walls. Thankfully the coral was old and reinforced from growing in the mana ocean thus it only dented and didn’t break.

Sorrel shook his head as he righted his familiar. Uncle Christian had managed to dodge the flailing dragon and waited just down the corridor. The eel had not fared so well having been clipped by a wing it had requited off one coral wall and around a corner. 

Both eels evidently decided that it didn’t want a repeat visit. The one Christian had flicked away fled while the one that got caught by Sephy gave a visual of what it looked like to stagger while swimming as it left.

Uncle Christian clicked and chirped at Sorrel in the unique tweet of the vocal water creatures and then waved a hand for Sorrel to follow him. Sephy returned and adjusted her size to be a bit smaller before fluttering her wings for Sorrel to grasp. Sorrel reached out and grabbed the ridge of the wings and then relaxed his body as Sephy took off.

Uncle Christian moved through the maze with the ease of familiarity quickly bringing them out through what was obviously the main entrance of the maze. The interior of the maze had been dark as the depth prevented light from filtering down. Thus, to Sorrel’s human sight it was just vague twisted shapes and to his nature sight it was more of a white skeleton web.

So really neither version gave the sights justice. However, outside the maze exit that Uncle Christian led the way to be a different story entirely. Sorrel figured it had to be the main entrance no way an expanse of light bell see grass would remain untouched unless it was deliberate.

The bell-shaped flowers on the ends of each strand of grass gave off a soft lavender light that created a field across the sea floor. Sorrel turned back to stare at the towering maze of peach coloured coral covered with rioting orange anemone and teeming with fish in every size and colour imaginable. Sorrel realised then that he had not been able to use his sight properly from among the coral as its very nature prevented him from precisely identifying what was happening in and around it.

Lesson learned. He would not be very combat effective under the water. At least not if he was trying to actively hunt something. From the growing weight of his hair and flourishing flowers he could see appearing on his branches he doubted that anything hostile would be able to get close enough to do even superficial damage before it was skewered by his rioting branches.

Uncle Christian continued across the field of light while he angled up ass he swam. Sephy had paused with Sorrel to look around at the spectacular sight but reacted quickly to continue chasing after the siren.

When he breached the surface of the water Sorrel automatically gasped for breath and wiped at his eyes as he floated on the surface atop Sephy’s back.

*Nice to know that the practice wasn’t for nothing. Though it's not convincing when you have been wandering around on the bottom of an ocean in pressures humans can’t withstand for several hours. * Sephy commented tartly.

“Has it been that long?” Sorrel wondered. The winced at disapproving look Sephy gave him.

“It’s fine, time is difficult to track down there, when you have no means.” Uncle Christian interrupted as he glanced away from where he was shifting a series of crystals atop the protrusion of a large rock.

“Yeah, see.” Sorrel belatedly looked at his fit bit and winced at the very dead device. “My watch is even broken. Now I’ll need to get a new one.” Sorrel poked his tongue out at Sephy who shook her head in return.

*I think that will be the least of your problems when we get back. Though so far as the investigation goes Ned will be the one to take the beating. Good job on knocking the humans out with something they’d recognise. * Sephy commented.

Sorrel smiled and then twisted his head to look in the opposite direction. He’d realised that Uncle Christian was setting up a transport gate, but something was calling from behind them. As Sorrel sensed the building power of the gate, he watched a whale the size of a large passenger plane surface in the water in the distance.

Sephy twitched her tail as she watched the whale when it rolled in the water and shifted course towards them.

“Uncle Christian are the giant whales her people?” Sorrel asked.

“No, they are purply beasts, they never sort the different states and so are like a normal cat in the human world.” Uncle Christian didn’t look up as he spoke.

“Uh huh, just bigger. So, what do they eat?” Sorrel wondered as he pulled his branches back and tried to reform the look of hair.

“Hmmm, anything. We just keep out of there way. But don’t worry they don’t come out much,” Uncle Christian replied.

“right.” Sorrel confirmed that the whale was still heading directly towards them and then decided that she didn’t want to test how broad the menu of anything actually was.

“I know that I can’t keep them all, but I would have preferred a proper pruning,” Sorrel muttered to himself as he pulled his just plaited hair around. It was now three times its prior length and the flowers were so thick he couldn’t see the strands. “Sephy can’t you cut this for me. Right here.” Sorrel pointed to his plait at the point an inch past its previous length even as he started plucking the flowers from the portion closest to his head.

*Sure? * Sephy swept his tail up and sliced neatly through the bundle. Once Sorrel had devested his hair of all his flowers he set them to drift around the area as he pulled strands from the rope of his severed hair. In minutes the flowers and strands took on a deep purple and a cage of branches formed around them.

When the whale reached the outer edge of flowers it opened its mouth and inhaled the first batch before diving under the surface and smacking the cage with its tail.

“There done,” Uncle Christian spoke as the portal opened while the cage shook and the intense purple of the flowers faded before the cage restabilised.

“Great lets go.” Sorrel exclaimed as Sephy turned about and raced towards the glowing gate.

“What’s the…. Oh…” Uncle Christian started to ask a question but cut himself off as the whale leapt from the water in a show of ability that belied its size and preceded to fall towards the cage. Sephy launched herself out of the water and through the portal with Sorrel on her back and her tail wrapped around Uncle Christian’s waist just as the whale made contact with the cage which held for a moment and then shattered.