"NO!!" Eve exclaimed, refusing his proposal. Josh looked utterly defeated by her response. "Shhhh, keep it down, Eve; they might hear you," Josh reminded her. Eve's eyes were full of murderous rage at the thought that he would suggest such a thing. Him? Bait? Yeah, right. He might as well hand himself over to the mirrored on a giant plate with some wine on the side.
"And here I thought poets were supposed to be smart, not suicidal," Eve said. "I mean, have you seen how powerless you are in this place? Ever since we got here, you have done nothing other than get your arse handed to you. So, no, we will not be using you as bait. In fact, I do believe you should leave the thinking to me, now, okay?" The last part hinted that she was mad, and Josh could only nod under her murderous gaze.
"Good, now let's get some rest. But remember, do not fall asleep," Eve said, with that, she turned away, leaving her back to face him. Josh regretted dragging her with him to this place, but what's done is done. There was no need to beat himself up about it for now. He just had to rest and think about getting a way out.
For a few hours, they lay in complete silence, listening to the soft noise of the wind. Josh began recapping all of the things they had discovered on this journey. The dimensional pocket's landscape was beautiful. It had towering mountains that seemed to reach the shattered sky, a dead forest full of gigantic trees, a pool of fire located not too far away from where they were currently, and the terrain was rocky and mountainous. But the beauty of the natural landscape was not what he admired; instead, it was the ruins. The crumbling infrastructure of an ancient civilization that lived here. At first, he had assumed that it was the mirrored, but judging by the fact that all of the ruins they found were gigantic in size, it revealed the true nature of the original inhabitants of this looping dimensional pocket. But also, Eve's earlier deduction that they had not yet entered the mirror realm cemented the former.
"Hey, Eve, about the cathedral ruins in the north, don't they seem similar to the ones back home?" he asked. Long silence followed. For a moment, he thought she had fallen asleep until she answered, "Let it go, Josh. Anyway, I have a plan." They both sat up, and Eve began explaining the details of her plan to Josh. Josh's frown slowly deepened as she explained, but Evelyn continued with her explanations despite Josh's obvious dislike of the plan. After the explanations, she remained quiet, giving Josh time to process everything clearly.
"Fine, then we will do it your way. As much as I would like for us to avoid that, it seems like it is inevitable," Josh said. Eve nodded. Josh got up and stretched his body; his wounds had mostly healed by now. Looking at the direction of the hanging tree, he sighed. Even from a great distance, he could see some of the mirrored approaching their location. Here, his words held no meaning; here, his poems were lifeless. The spirit here was corrupt; it was slowly corroding his soul. But he could not tell Eve that, after all, the poor girl still thought of him as empowered.
But in the end, he came to a conclusion that, in order to get out of here, he had to get serious and reveal a portion of his true strengths. "Shall we?" Eve nodded, and they both leapt off the giant tree. Eve's landing was graceful, whereas Josh's landing was more impactful. The faint red glow of this world of everlasting night made for a beautiful scenery. From his backpack, Josh pulled out a scary-looking mask and two bracelets. Quickly equipping them, Evelyn gave him a side-eye but asked no questions.
Josh's thunderous landing seemed to have caught the attention of the enemy that was already approaching their location. The mirrored approached them with murderous frenzy. Eve swiftly retrieved a small pouch from her belt. She dipped her hand into the pouch and pulled out a handful of seeds. The seeds were a deeply earthly brown. Her eyes scanned the immediate area, and with one swoop motion, she scattered the seeds on the ground in front of them. Band gracefully performed a beautiful series of carefully coordinated hand gestures, then added an incantation at the end. "Vim mutuo," she whispered, her voice barely audible. "Ex seminibus destructionis. Surge!" The air around them seemed to vibrate as her words manifested into reality. Josh watched in awe as he saw the little seeds begin to tremble. The ground around them began to crack, and suddenly, thick vine-like tendrils burst forth from the ground. Some wrapped around Eve's arms and legs, and the rest began charging towards the direction of the mirrored at a shockingly high speed. Whilst doubling in size, the vines tore at the mirrored at such a speed that even they could not fathom what was happening. Soon, the whole terrain had changed; the scope of Eve's spell was very large. In fact, Josh guessed that if they were in their world, this spell would lay waste to an entire city. [Not bad.] Josh and Eve followed the spell's trail of destruction; the spell had destroyed many of the landmarks they had committed to memory.
Its path of destruction stopped a short distance away from the hanging tree. Thanks to Eve carrying them with a vine all the way here, otherwise they wouldn't have made it in such a short span of time. Not too far away from them was the hanging tree. Its massive branches twisted and gnarled with age; the tree seemed...wrong, its presence unsettling and unnatural. Its thick, ropy vines swayed gently in the faint breeze. Hundreds of giant hanging ropes hung from the tree, and surrounding the tree was a lake of crystal bones where the mirrored were slowly emerging from.
"Is it me, or have they multiplied in numbers?" Behind the mask, Josh drew in a cold breath. He threw a quick glance towards Eve, and he could see the exhaustion on her face. The current spell was too taxing, meaning they had to finish this quickly. [Well, act one is complete, I guess it's my turn.] "Cover me." Josh did not wait for Eve to respond before turning into a blur and appearing right before the enemy. Caught by surprise, the mirrored tried to react, but it was already too late as Josh sent a fist directly to the creature's head, exploding it on the spot.
Eve's eyes widened in shock before quickly retracting her gaze away from Josh as she also had her own fair share of troubles. The mirrored had already started closing in on them from all sides. Although these lower-ranked mirrored were not much of a threat individually, in numbers, it was a different story. One wrong move could prove fatal. Both Josh and Eve noticed something about the mirrored; it seemed as if this dimension was restricting their transformations. Although lower-ranked mirrored did not possess any trait capabilities, their transformations boosted their physical abilities by a very large margin.
It was a boon for them because it made killing them easier, but there was also the lake, which seemed to spawn mirrored endlessly. Josh's mask and bracelets were both rare artifacts foreign to his homeland. He had been gifted with these artifacts on one of his travels, and they had been with him for many years. The mystical symbols on them glowed with a faint blue light as Josh kept drawing strength from them.
Josh showcased a great degree of fighting prowess as he tore through the horde of mirrored with relative ease, but after a long while, he started to feel the pressure, and the mirrored started tagging him. On the other hand, Eve's destructive prowess had decreased by half; her skin had turned a shade of red, both from the mental exhaustion and the drain from the spell. The number of enemies did not decrease or increase, staying at a steady equilibrium. For every enemy they killed, another one emerged from the lake, keeping the numbers pretty much the same.
[If this keeps up, I might be forced to use that... For Pete's sake, what the hell is going on?!] Josh dodged a claw to the head, but in doing so, he left himself open, leaving room for the other mirrored to take a swipe at him. In the nick of time, he managed to shift his body, avoiding being hit at a vital spot. In the end, he only got clawed in the abdomen. Ignoring the searing pain, Josh kicked one in the face and used the momentum to create a safe distance between him and the abominable creatures.
"How hard could it be to reach that damned tree!" Josh glared at the tree in anger, and there it was, rooted in front of them, but how could they reach it with this horde of endless abominations attacking them from all directions? He was sure that today he had spilled more mirrored blood than he had ever done in his whole entire life. Sparing his hands a quick look, he frowned. There was blood on his hands, but it was dry. Before he could process it, the mirrored were on him once again.
[Something is off-] Eve's voice disrupted his thoughts. "JOSH!" He evaded a few attacks before turning to look at her. "TREE!...ILLUSION!!" was all he could make out before the noise from the horde drowned out the whole battlefield.