A fence rose out of the ocean floor near the black, underwater forest, white like the sand making up the island. It stretched from the island Garath had just activated to the shore. He watched as it continued growing up and away from the twisted black forest, eventually reaching the water’s surface.
*Mission accomplished,* Garath announced over the Raid com. *Let’s meet back at the island and take it from there. Auto, can we hitch a ride?*
Alice and Garath each took one side of Auto’s Orctapus form and held tight as the Chimerist returned to the surface, oddly gaining more upward momentum from the water jet that shot out from a hole near his tail than he did from the powerful whoosh of his tail itself. It took some semblance of self-control, but Garath resisted the urge to make a joke about the fart-propeller.
Once back at the water’s surface, Garath felt the same light-heartedness as he watched Daisy and Athios play tag with a few of the native orcas. He waited for them to finish before calling the group together to discuss their next steps. They agreed to activate the other island close to the shore before moving in a clockwise rotation to hit the rest, as Alice had suggested. There was a short discussion concerning how to travel from one island to the next, whether shifting to and from flight capable forms would be worth the time it saved, but Alice informed them that orcas were among the fastest marine mammals and could swim at speeds of nearly 30 mph. Garath remained in Octopus form to conserve a shift, and along with Alice, hitched a ride on Auto as the Dungeon Party took off toward the next island.
The native orca pod followed closely as they swam west from the first island. Skimming the surface, the Party moved at a pretty good pace but they did deplete their Stamina much faster in Orca form than they would in a flying form - forcing the Party to slow to an easier pace once to recuperate. The second island wasn’t far from the first and they made it there in about twenty minutes.
When they reached the second island, Garath detached himself from his Chimerist mount to go ashore and have a look around. It was pretty neat, Garath thought to himself, that he could breathe for a short period of time outside of water in his Octopus form by processing the water still held within his body. On top of that, a small amount of oxygen was even being absorbed through his skin, a completely foreign and unexplainable experience. He wouldn’t be able to stay out of the water for long, but he could make it a few minutes. As it turned out though, he only needed about 15 seconds to find out that there was nothing at all to see or do on this second island either, so he did the awkward octopus-out-of-water crawl back to his Party.
*You guys can wait for us here,* Garath told everyone. *Auto will take me down and I’ll activate this island, then we’ll head back up.*
With that, Garath latched himself back onto the back of the Orctapus and Auto dove toward the ocean floor. The trip was much easier this time around for Garath, and not only because he was just a passenger. The changes in pressure as they went deeper were noticeable to him in his Octopus form, but only peripherally. He felt the pressure increasing, but because of the octopus’ unique body make-up, it just didn’t really matter. The bottom of this second white column looked very much like the first. The black forest of leafless trees must have stretched the entire length of their swim from the first pillar too, Garath noticed. And, just like the first column, a microwave-sized chamber was covered by an identical gate system where the column met the floor.
This time Garath got through the process of opening the gate and activating its portion of the weir with much less effort. Using the key he’d found in the first chamber, Garath reached in with one tentacle, found the lock mechanism, and sprang the gate without ever having to squeeze his body through the bars. He received and dismissed a prompt informing him that two of the six White Isles had been activated. He watched for a moment as a fence identical to the first rose from the ocean floor. After that, he latched back onto Auto and headed for the surface.
Garath let the Party know they had succeeded in activating the second island, and they all set off heading south with the native pod of orcas jumping and playing close behind them. From island to island the Party went, stopping to activate the underwater chamber of each and taking a second to make sure they weren’t missing anything on top of the island itself before moving on to the next. The third island and fourth islands were a good distance to the south and it took the Party about a half hour and a handful of rest periods to make their way there. With Garath riding Auto like a wild hog-monkey, the Necrologist and the Chimerist made their way to the ocean floor once again.
The scene of twisted black trees and a white column with a small chamber at its base was starting to get familiar and Garath felt himself growing more comfortable in the Octopus form. Unfortunately, without a doubt in his mind this time, there was definitely movement happening between the charcoal black trunks of the underwater forest. With the limited light that made it that far below the water’s surface though, all he could make out were
