These caves were deeper than most humans would go in the alps caves, but not so deep a human couldn’t come here. Then again, getting here was a process that was so dubious, it was no surprise no human had come here. Luckily, no one here was exactly entirely human. This went for both sides of the parties that were soon to meet. The supernatural meeting between he who’s always been in the cave and they who visit him from outside was about to take place… but there was some walking to do first.
The ground was pitch black, the environment almost entirely lightless. Even walking around in these caves was a challenge because of it. Unless you had your own light guiding the way, steps had to be made carefully to prevent walking into jagged rocks. The majority of the cave was boring, but as they got closer to their target, things would slowly get more magical.
The first sign of there being so much magic were the bats. Sleeping balls of fluff and leather rested by the cave’s ceiling, a soft glow emanating from under their wings. When one of the bats would open their wings, it would show a beautiful patterns of softly glowing colours. These bats had become magical due to the overabundant energies deeper in the cave. Their presence caused a soft blue outline to shin ein patterns against the ceiling, and created just enough light for that same outline to appear on the rocks in the environment. The outline of the rocks created a sight before one that looked like it was taken straight from a cyberpunk drawing, of various small glowing outlines against a velvet black backdrop of darkness.
The light deeper in the cave was stronger. At first, the scout’s footsteps was met with nothing but hard ground, but eventually, they would find the ground moving with their feet. No longer just stone or hardened dirt, but softened ground. As they stepped further, they would find that the softened ground was even mushy, and eventually, one of their footsteps would cause small speckles of glowing light under their feet. This glowing light would ripple and move outwards over the ground and walls, magically charged plants releasing their energy in a soft glow.
The rippling was just the beginning. Deeper in the cave, the air was positively thrumming with energy. The scouts were barraged with a sense of colours and light. Leaves and mushroom adorned the cave’s walls, their glow lighting up the interior and causing even the scout’s bodies to light up with various pastel lights and colours. This life was nourished on pure magic alone, and as a flower sprouted, it opened up to reveal a butterfly, glowing orange. The butterfly flapped its wings and flew by before dispersing into sheer magical energy it was made of.
The cave around them seemed to almost shift due to the way life changed at a moment’s notice. The mana coalesced into willow-like leaves, which had to be brushed aside to continue onward. As the leaves tickled and slid over their skin, they could feel the very essence of mana in the air, parts of the leaves once more fading into the ephemeral substance and shaping into something else. The light further in the tunnel was even brighter, lighting up parts of the cave ahead of the scouts as if the daylight shone over there.
Yet they were certain that they were deep enough that there couldn’t actually be any daylight coming into these subterranean spaces.
Shul had been back home to Akt'Anir during the new years, and back then he had been accepted back to the community pretty quickly, all his old friends had been welcoming. So during this second time things had gone through pretty smoothly, though naturally Aranea had gotten some looks. The members of the community weren't aggressive or suspicious, but they could be...stubborn. So Shul had proven himself useful in acting as the bridge.