บท 788: Stairway to Heavanpire

Hurtelt swallows his saliva at the scene, cold sweat dripping down his back as he cautiously examines the creatures currently present... Other than the people drinking blood under the obalisk which he assumes are Higher Vampires, there are small groups of Plumards on the walls, crawling out of small holes, flying across the room, and entering another...

The only exit he could see is a spiraling staircase that follows along the walls, ascending to a place out of his vision, "All of you stay very, very quiet." he whispers into the ear of Zudite who's immediately behind him, them doing the same like you would in Chinese Whispers.

Fortunately, it doesn't seem like the hallway they'd exited from had high traffic, the other hallways which seemed to contain replacement slaves for those stuck in cages should they die. Hurtelt's ears prick up when he hears the two Higher Vampires discussing something...

"Mabon, you hear what Vasile is on about lately?" one of the two vampires with pale skin and black hair asks the other.

They shake their head, "Depends, you talking about Lord Roisin threatening to kick him out? Or that Mortal he's obsessing about."

"The mortal... Vasile talks to himself you know? Like a madman, he speaks of the Mortal like they're not from this world. But that's wrong isn't it, his mind must be rotting."

"Don't let yourself get heard saying such things, they won't kill you, it wouldn't be the first time one of us was torn apart and scattered for uttering such things." he says under his voice, though Hurtelt could still pick it up.

They continue talking as Hurtelt ignores the rest of their conversation, trying to think of a way to get through all of the Vampires and up the stairs...

Hurtelt "Psst, Zudite? You know any illusionary spells?" he quietly asks.

Zudite "Hm, I do... What do you want me to do?"

Hurtelt "There's a hallway directly opposite the one we came out from about 15 fathoms in-front of us... I need you to make an injured man run into it, once you've done that we'll need to move fast... Tell the others." he states, Zudite nodding and relaying the plan to Etredi, Dythi, and Tildanird.

A few moments later a loud shout draws the attention from the two conversing Higher Vampires, they look over and spot a bloody naked man sprinting into the hallway at breakneck speeds.

"Seems we've got another runner..." one of the mutters blandly.

The other growls, "You'd think these cages would be enough to hold them, Lord Roisin should massacre the incompetents that created them."

"Should we go after them? We got punished when we ignored it last time, the mortal wandered into some Fleders and got torn to pieces, damn fools went into a bloodlust and had to be put down."

They stand and reluctantly start heading over, disappearing into red mist which flies into the hallway the illusion had run.

Hurtelt quickly taps Zudite and starts moving towards the stairs, Etredi almost tumbles to the floor after missing a step, but is caught and stabilised by Tildanird who'd been keeping an ear out for her.

The stairway is incredibly long, spanning the room multiple times and ascending at a slight incline, making it long then it really had to be... Hurtelt imagines it was made like this to be aesthetically pleasing instead practical use, this wouldn't surprise him consider all the other things he'd seen down here.

They skim the wall as they walk, making sure to keep low in-case any Vampires come and start looking around, or god forbid, find the dead Plumards they'd dispatched earlier.

Hurtet freezes mid-step as he hears someone heading down the stairs, whatever it was must be heavy as the staircase reverberated with every step... He quickly turns and looks at Zudite, whispering "Something's coming, we need to hide."

Zudite "Ah, but we're on a staircase, there's nowhere to go." he quickly whispers back.

Hurtelt's eyes dart around in search of something that could hide them, there's a cage holding a corpse hanging quite close to the staircase, but it wouldn't hold everyone, and an intelligent person would immediately be able to tell they weren't a prisoner... There! One of the holes the Plumards were using to travel around the place... He ducks low and crawls into it, finding it to be a tight fit but doable regardless.

The others slowly follow him, Zudite, Etredi, Dythi... But as soon as it comes to Tildanird, they realise he's far too big to fit inside.

Hurtelt "Quick, the cage... Zudite, can you unlock it?"

Zudite shakes his head, "No... I'd need to be able to see the lock to do anything, even then it'd be difficult." they quickly say, the steps getting closer and closer.

Hurtelt "It looks rusty, try and tear the door open, quick!" he says.

Tildanird nods, cautiously walking up and feeling around for a while before eventually grabbing the cage to pull it closer to the staircase, taking a firm grip on the door and trying to open it. His muscles strain and veins bulge and become visible as he tries his best to open it...

*CLANK!*

It finally breaks open, and luckily the sound of the lock breaking was somewhat suppressed by the shouts of pain and terror by the slaves in the other cages.

Tildanird climbs inside and sits down in a posture that masks his skin as much as possible, the cage dangles slightly away from the staircase, causing him to get goosebumps from the fear of falling, but he manages to retain his composure just as a creature appears at the top of the stairs.

It had green warty skin with spines on its hunched back, strong looking limbs with long claws attached at the ends of them, it's head had two large fanged sproutings from its mouth and two bulbous growths protruding from its skull.

Hurtelt "A Garkain... Keep quiet, it isn't all that smart but it might be able to smell or hear us." he says, the others falling into silence.