Tale of Death

Chapter 26 - Bad Luck

With her mind set on continuing onwards with her journey— Shi walked forward in strides.

She had no idea where she was going, but she could not turn back now. She just kept walking forward, deciding to take the righter most tunnel once more since it had done her well so far. She did find this place after all.

The tunnel wasn't dark, thanks to the few mushrooms littering the walls and her enhanced eyesight, but she could tell it was getting a lot dimmer than it was before. The mushrooms got less prominent as she walked further, and if it wasn't for her enhanced sight, she wouldn't be able to see as well as she could.

As she walked further down the tunnel, it slowly went from being a slim one-person limited passageway to a large cavernous area— easily being able to fit multiple people within it. The plantlife also got more frequent, showing that the tunnel was probably close to the underground stream.

But as she continued onward, Shi noticed something strange about the ceiling. It seemed like there were holes in the ceiling, but they weren't the same size. They were all different sizes with some larger than others; none of them were close in size to Shi. At most, they were half her size.

Shi also noticed that there seemed to be an inconsistency between the size; they weren't at random. The smaller ones were closer to the floor while the larger ones were near the top. Shi didn't know what this could mean, but she also didn't want to find out, so she kept walking.

'Living things maybe? If it's an animal, it would be better to avoid it since I'm not sure i can fight something that large. Especially if there is multiply of whatever it is.' Shi thought to herself as she kept going down the tunnel.

"Hm... I wonder what it is." Shi said to herself as she walked along— while she didn't want to meet whatever it was, she was also somewhat curious about what could possibly be down here.

As she was thinking and walking along the tunnel pathway, she soon came across what seemed like another open chamber. This one wasn't nearly as large as the previous one, but it was big enough for Shi to move around within.

One thing that was different about this cave chamber and the other one was what littered it. Unlike the previous one, which was beautifully decorated with grass, this one was decorated with bones.

'What the-' She couldn't even finish thinking to herself as her surprised eyes gazed around the room.

Bones of all sizes and shapes littered the ground of the place; they didn't have a single piece of flesh on them, and no singes of organs lay on the floor. Showing two things to Shi.

This place had monsters in it— a lot of different kinds from the look of it. Ones that came in all shapes and sizes that she hadn't seen before.

But more importantly— whatever lived here was able to kill said monsters. It had to be strong too for it to be able to kill such a large number of monsters and collect their bones like this without worry. The scent alone would merely attract more monsters.

It wasn't entirely covered in bones though. It looked more like the bones were thrown in one side of the room to stay, while the other had grass and twigs that were collected in a form of a nest. This could only mean one thing.

'Crap it's a nest!' Shi thought as she turned and was about to run away from the room— not even bothering to go in it.

However, as she was turning, Shi heard something. A sound, unlike anything she had ever heard before in her life. It was like the crunching sound of bones being broken, followed closely by a loud gut-wrenching hiss— echoing in the enclosed chambers— making it seem only the more loud and terrifying.