Down in the V shaped cave of the mountain, well roots drew water from deep in the mountainside. The Jiao had plenty of space to expand its body, after the group was forced to be in the cave for months, the Jiao would need to be hibernating most of it..
The Twins often fought in the main room of the cavern, there was no worry about destroying the floor, it had been reinforced and bound with Ironwood roots. The Brothers learned very fast that they shouldn't use their Lightning on the floors, by using their power they were electrocuting themselves all during each bout.
Khan Ni wanted to have a better understanding of her craft, she was reading the Alchemy books in Wu Hai's collection. Her family had been herbalists and Wu Hai had a massive amount of resources. She was meticulous and methodical in her practice. Wu Hai shared his ingredients and slowly Khan Ni started to make new concoctions of her own.
The Cheng Brothers stank like their mounts. Having to spend a lot of time in close quarters, Wu Hai sent them to bathe in the back. He couldn't heat the water but they did have plenty of it. Soaking in the tub, the two men argued with each other when their feet met, so Wu Hai made everyone their own bathing spaces and let Mu keep the first bathtub after a game of 1,2,3.
֍ꟷꟷꟷꟷ֍
Weeks had passed in the Cave and while lazing about in his room, Zao Wu Hai channeled his water abilities in many ways. He tried using his imagination to find what to do, water balls, bubbles, barriers, mists and water guns. He even challenged Yu with wrestling a match a few times before bed. During one of their first battles he soaked the floor and made a lot of mud flow further into the cave. The battle was quick, both of the twins were always left defenseless.
It didn't take a lot of time for the days to pass and they had a lot of time to pass during the winter.
With Dinner made and nothing to keep anyone busy Wu Hai watched the group dispersing to do their own things, everyone kept true to their words and no one entered the area of the Orb.
Remaining inside the tomb of the Orb was a very good thing for the entire group. No one complained, everyone could feel themselves growing stronger.
Mu was unable to be an opponent for Wu Hai, he had already gone off to do other things and he had a lot more energy to spend than the rest. He decided to take a look in the cavern and followed it down quite far. Eventually Cheng Mu came to a room where the water pooled up from Wu Hai's many mudslides, there was mud all over the place and a pool of water sat on top of the sludge that had settled.
Below the water, a faint purple-gold glint could be seen twinkling in the dim light of the Glowflowers. A small corner of the gem-like surface stuck through the muck below, as if washed there many years ago.
Picking it up, Mu noticed immediately that he had seen something like it before. The small purple cube was just like one of the gygax that Wu Hai had in his possession. This one was different. It had the characters, words written on all six sides. The die showed different size words, it went from Tiny to Medium, Normal, Large, Massive and Enormous.
Mu played with it in his hand and then wondered how much booze Wu Hai would trade for it. Knowing of its importance Mu ran with all his might back to the group. Everyone had started to calm down when he showed back up, yelling.
"Mu, calm down," Wu Hai was attempting to meditate when the noise broke the silence. Khan Ni was studying and Cheng Yu was in still in the bath cleaning the funk from under his clothes.
"Look, Brother Wu, Look!" Pulling out the Die from his pocket, Cheng Mu handed the dripping purple Die over. Its golden luster was complimented by its deep shades of purple in the background.
"What's this?" Wu Hai studied the cube and fumbled with it in his fingers. "A Size Changing one?" 'What am I suppose to do with this, I already have problems throwing four dice, now I'll have 5 variables? What happens if I outgrow all my clothes? I've already lost a set.' Looking at his storage ring he was a little annoyed at his abilities. His mind raced with future headaches.
Wu Hai thought about it and decided he shouldn't use the fifth cube for now. They were still training and if he got too big underground it would be a major problem. Just becoming the Dragonkin twice already had put him an awkward mood, tearing his clothes was something he hadn't considered happening in the beginning.
"This is a huge help. Mu, Where did you find it?" Wu Hai tossed the die in his hand once and accepted it. Then he went through the Crusher's storage and handed a case of booze to Cheng Mu. The Fellowsbrew in his storage was not unlimited but he handed a whole case to Mu anyways.
"Brother Wu must have bought the store completely.." Khan Ni had brought her nose out from her book but it triggered Wu Hai to have a memory of something he had seen from the Weapons instructions. Inventory was one of the words that made an appearance. Even if the word was not that special, it held an extra meaning and he felt it, like the others, the words, experience point, Mana Pool and Health Bar were still a mystery. 'Maybe this is what is considered experience..' Wu Hai had some vague understandings about each of them but there was little he could do but speculate.
Having a fifth Die to throw into the mix would make the results very difficult to replicate. Even returning to a human form that was his same size would be a big problem. Mathematically speaking, he had a roughly 1 in 200 chance of rolling something specific. There were no duplicate choices on any of the gygax.
Some attractions existed for using the size die, if he could roll a small frame on a Demon or elemental his power would be immense and in a package he could handle. On the other hand, a really tiny human was also useful. He just didn't like being large, every time he changed into a large figure he felt cramped and bulky wouldn't begin to describe the Humongous chances.
Both of the brothers had given him a gygax, he could no longer contain himself. Wu Hai put on a loose robe and undergarment, Moved to the side of the cavern and dug a much bigger section for him to transform in. The other areas were already finished out nicely, he didn't have to worry about ruining the inside of the cave. If he did, it would be more annoyance than any of them wanted to deal with.
It took a whole day to make things feel like the cave and transformation room was finally safe to use. Acknowledging that he was about to try something to the rest of the group, he made sure they stood back at near the Entrance.
Grasping all five of the gygax, he threw them to a corner and waited.
'Ice, Metal, Elemental, Ring, Medium'
'Fire, Darkness, Demon, Explosion, Large'
'Wood, Metal, Vishnan, Shooting Star, Enormous'
'Ice, Darkness, Qilinkin, Wave, Large' Wu Hai was rolling but he was just kept getting larger.
"Agggh, Wu Hai when are you going to go small?" .., "We've seen a lot of different transformations" .., "but they just keep getting bigger!" Mu and Yu were getting better at their Twinspeak while they harassed Wu Hai during his attempts.
'Water, Soul, Dragonkin, Downpour, Tiny,' Wu Hai read them in his mind and felt graced with peace at last. "This has to be the most annoying thing I've ever had to accomplish." Wu Hai stared up in confusion while he thought more about the odds of getting what he wanted and the consequences of not.
Time was a virtue, one that was even on Wu Hai's side, for the moment.
֍ꟷꟷꟷꟷ֍