Chapter 68 – The Mysterious Person
"Bad news."
The three Deviants stopped, staring at a large canyon.
"Put 'bad news' into that..."
The canyon was immense, with the bottom out of sight. There were several rope bridges, but all of them were broken and split in the middle. Their halves were visible on the other side of the canyon.
It looked as if the earth had been clawed and separated, and the worst part was that, wherever they looked, the canyon seemed endless with no hope of going around it. To the left, the canyon went deeper towards forests and even a mountain. To the right, the canyon extended so far that it reached the beach and closed off, not reaching the water.
Anna swallowed hard. "This is huge..." the small redhead said while Alice sighed.
"Maybe this thing cuts through the entire island..."
Luke agreed with Alice. "But there's a bridge right there."
Anna pointed to the only remaining rope bridge. Looking both ways, it was the only one left over the canyon with the bottom not visible. Luke could even see parts of open caves leading to a wall of the canyon on the other side, but lower down.
"I don't know about you guys, but there's no way I'm going on that rope bridge," Luke was the first to voice his opinion.
"I... think you might be right," Alice agreed, and the small redhead pulled her body back a bit while stretching her neck to peer down.
"What do we do then?" Anna asked nervously.
"We're on the island, so there has to be a way to get a mission. The Campaign Map needs to be cleared, so it would place us near the area where we could find the objective or a hint to start the main mission. At the same time, it would also keep an NPC nearby who could give us a clue to get out of here. So, we have no choice; we'll have to move forward."
Oh my god… I hope the robot blonde doesn't decide to cross that bridge.
Alice pondered and looked at Luke. "Luke, we might have to pass by your marine friends…"
Luke looked towards the beach and understood. "So, we'll have to go around this by the shallow sea..."
Anna swallowed hard.
"Don't worry, Litt-... I mean, Anna. I spent five days walking and survived. I don't know the criteria... maybe it has to do with the weight on the sand? Somehow that alerted the creature under the Veil? I don't know. But overall, it was okay."
I didn't mention that I swam on the sand floor with my intangibility, only that I fell into a giant sand crater formed when the creature pierced the Veil. But it'll be fine; I walked over death and didn't die. And the creature only went after the whale… as a bonus, it took the seagulls nearby.
The trio headed to the beach. They thought about going back and resting in the cave, but they would lose the day if they did that and didn't want to dampen their hopes. It would be hours of walking to return and then hours the next day to get to the beach; they needed a sense of progression. Taking advantage of being nearby was the best option to move forward.
"Let's stay away from the edge, in case any crazy skeleton decides to jump on us to push us over."
I don't want to repeat the beach encounter at the edge of a canyon.
Moving away from the edge, the group walked towards the beach through the forest.
After hours of walking, they reached the beach and stopped to eat. The immense shallow sea with its crystal-clear waters was beautiful. Its blue was vibrant like a jewel. Alice walked a bit until she stepped into the water and looked down at the sandy bottom beneath her feet.
"Scary, isn't it?" Luke said, approaching her.
"Once you know, definitely…"
"Welcome to the Veil," Luke whispered, mimicking her tone from when they crossed the black curtain.
"Was that a joke?" she said very seriously.
"There's no point in trying to tease me; I already know when you're pretending." Luke walked away, laughing, having discovered that she had a sense of humor.
The girl waited for Luke to turn around and let out a small smile.
They then walked to the edge of the canyon by the beach.
"This is going to be a problem," Anna said, observing the situation they were in.
"Put 'problem' into that."
After skirting the canyon fissure by the shallow sea, they realized that this side had no beach, giving way to a mountainous wall. This meant they had no way to return to the forest from this side of the canyon.
"I'd try to climb, but it's dangerous and, as we can see, there are several rough spots along the way," Luke said while observing.
"It's called a cliff, and yes, it's going to be dangerous. I just don't know how there's a cliff in a place without waves, but I'll just consider it a mountain," said Alice.
The mountain kept rising higher, making it impossible to enter the forest from that side.
"We only have one option…" Luke said, sighing.
"We'll have to go around this part of the island by the shallow sea and hope that somewhere we find another beach or a lower part to climb," Alice said, understanding.
"It's just problem after problem…"
"That's my line, Anna."
After the three sighed, they entered the shallow sea and began walking.
"Could we try crossing the entire island through the forest to see if the other side can be circumnavigated?" Anna asked.
"It would take too long to cross the forest, not to mention the dangers we'd face. It would take weeks to reach the beach on the other side… if there is one, and we might end up making the same decision," Luke agreed with Alice, and they started walking while talking about life. They needed to disconnect a bit from their worries, especially because they felt like they were walking on thin ice that could break at any moment, revealing a lair of dangerous creatures below them. Luke was used to walking in shallow waters, but the idea of stepping again on something that housed giant sea creatures... was not comforting for him.
They didn't see what I saw… I only told them that a giant creature pulled a whale and that I fell into the center of the crater where I could see it was big. I didn't even mention that I saw another much larger one… in fact, I saw several of those things. Even the fish in that place were gigantic… if they knew. Would they be walking on top of this?
Walking through the shallow sea along the edge of the island, they constantly looked, hoping to spot the end of the mountainous wall in search of another beach, but there was no sign. All they saw were mountains rising ahead or continuing in a straight line, becoming increasingly rough, offering few opportunities to climb.
The shallow sea seemed endless when they looked in other directions, and Luke knew very well the despair of walking in the middle of it, thinking they were in the middle of nowhere.
The good thing is there are no enemies here. We can walk peacefully in this place, the bad thing is having to sleep sitting up so as not to drown. Having two other people here will make it easier. Unlike me, who had to walk for days, barely sleeping, having one of them to stand guard means I can sleep peacefully. But the question is, do we want to sleep the first night? From what I see, we're a bit desperate to get back to solid ground.
As the trio walked, night began to fall. They paused for a moment to contemplate the sunset.
"It's beautiful, seen from here in the sea... it's simply incredible," Anna said, marveling at the orange light of the sun appearing to dip into the sea. The girls hadn't been able to admire it much on the first night when they were on the beach because of the skeletons, but there in the shallow sea, everything seemed peaceful. But... that's what they thought.
"What's that?" Anna pointed slightly to the side on the horizon.
"Is that a person?" Luke asked.
"It looks like it…" Alice tried to see.
"Guys! Did you forget about me?" Anna drew their attention, showing her bow.
"Oh, right! You can see far with that."
Anna grabbed her bow and looked through the sight.
"Strange, they're waving."