Chapter 16 The Cursed Dungeon Pt2

I took a deep breath and turned the corner. It slopped down at a sharp angle and disappeared under the water.

"Great, the passage is flooded." I spoke up.

"I can take care of this, unless you want to try your fire on it and turn it into steam. I don't know if it's water or not. Also we could try swimming through it and hope we don't drown or have to fight underwater." Kuro said to me.

"Do not be a smart ass, you are better then that I think. Go ahead and clear the path if you can." I replied.

Kuro nodded and started to Hoover, as he approached the water you could see the koi swimming in the water. I put my sword in the same hand as my shield and focused on my hand creating fire. The fire was so bright that it seemed like the sun came out in the cave. I tried to lower down the brightness and I managed to get it to almost appear black with a red core. I didn't know it could look that way. My house name being called The black flame made more sense now.

"Are you sure you aren't human?" Asked Bolggor. " Only humans skiled in magic can create fireballs in their hand like that and certainty no noob could do what you are doing."

Sighing I replied, "I am very sure of my race. My house is called The Black Flame for a reason."

I tried to sound quite confident and assured in what I was saying to them. I missed how they both instantly turned to me with shocked expressions on their face. Apparently that meant something to them not that I was aware of.

"Ummm, Shi when we get done here I need to speak with you it will be important to your future." Bolggor spoke up.

Kuro made eye contact with me and nodded. He started moving his hands and I was watching the water refers when all of the sudden one of the fish turned and went after Kuro. I knew Bolggor was watching our backs so I moved up near Kuro and shot flame put at the Koi. I watched the flame fly out of my hand and then it went out right as it got closed to the Koi. Apparently I was too far away to use my fire. I was hoping for a stream of flame like a flame thrower not a small ball of flame. So I moved partially in front of Kuro and put my shield up. I couldnt hold back the Koi and grab my sword so again I made a flame and this time I managed to shove it into its mouth as it moved to lunge from the water again. I felt its teeth graze the palm of my hand as I pulled back from the flame.

Time seemed to stand still for a min or two when in fact maybe 10 secs had gone by. The koi started shrinking in out itself and the next thing I knew the Koi exploded and dried guts went all over the place. It looked like chunks of dried or jerkied fish was raining everywhere. Thank god it wasn't slimy and wet my flame dried it and cooked it from the inside out.

*Chime* New recipe has been made. The party can now make dried fish chunks at a camp. *Chime*

We all started laughing at that. Strangely that was just what we needed. The next 20 mins was strangely uneventful. Kuro moved the water out of the way, we avoided puddles and kept moving forward.

Finally we got to an area that had no water at all. I walked in first and lit up the room with my shield.

"How are you doing on time? This room looks like it could take some time here." Kuro asked me.

"That's right you have a time limit before you get your role and we need to sit down and talk after this. Here friend request me in case we can't talk after this." Bolggor said.

I checked my time and was shocked.

"I have 19 hours left. We have taken 4 hours so far. It feels like maybe an hour and half."

We all walked around the room, I noticed some symbols in the room on each of the walls. It has to be a hint or maybe a puzzle. I looked back at the tunnel we just came thru and noticed the watet filled right back in but something was keeping the water out of this room. I saw Koi swimming around in the water but when they approached the opening they quickly fled from it. I moved closer to the entrance and noticed runes of magic around the door frame.

"None of this makes sense to me, Bolggor have you seen anything like this room before?" Asked Kuro.

"I think this is a riddle room where we have to unlock the sequence in the proper order in order to move past this room. I don't know what anything says. We need someone adept at reading foreign languages. I didnt think it would have this layer of puzzle in a noob area such as beginner town." Replied Bolggor.

"Well then its a good thing that we have someone who can read this writing. Isn't that right Kuro?" I spoke up.

"You can read thus writing Kuro! That's great, wait you said this doesnt make any sense to you. Why wpuld you lie?" Bolggor asked while filled with confusion.

I started laughing.

"I didnt mean Kuro can read it, I am the one with the skill. He was just there when I got the skill. If it wouldn't of been for him, I wouldn't have this quest or the skill needed for this quest. He pretended not to understand English when I first met him and it convinced me to get the writing and language skill so I could understand him." I said while looking at Kuro.

Kuro just smiled at me. I was starting to wonder about him a bit. It was seeming odd that he got me the quest and the skill needed for the quest as well. Also he was the water user for this quest as well. It was like he was dropped into my lap for a reason that I cant figure out yet. When he was an NPC, I could see him having the purpose of giving out the quest and then accompaning us on the quest for the programmings sake but having him be an actual player changed things for me. Just who is Kuro and how did he know what I would need and what we have been facing so far.

So I started looking around at each wall, I was starting to piece together the story. It was a story of a young woman and a wood cutter near a water fall.

I thought through my Japanese stories and remembered a story my mother read to me when I was really young. I couldnt remember it but I knew i had the book in my bookcase in my room.

"I need to log out a sec to check a book, this area is secure and protected. So I will be right back." I spoke up.

I shifted my location here to make sure i came back to this exact spot and then selected the log out option. As things were going dark I heard Bolggor say, "We need to talk to her about her house and sharing that kind of information. That house..."

I sat up and took the visor off my head... What I just heard from Bolggor seemed very important. He knew something about my house... something that saud I should keep my house a secret from people. I will find out what that is when I am done here. I turned to look at Sam and found him slumped over. At first I thought he fell asleep but as I shifted and put my legs off the bed he jumped up and looked at me. Quickly he covered his hands over his face and turned around so his back was to me.

"Sam? Whats wrong Sam? Why were you or are you crying? Did something happen while I was in the game? Wait... where is Josh?" I asked concerned.

I looked under the bed but Josh wasn't there. I turned back to Sam.

"So you knew Josh was under your bed. He almost scared the crap out of me. We had a fight I guess you can say. We didnt agree on some very impoetant things and when I went to tell him exactly how I was feeling and what I truly thought I turned around and he had already left the room. He went right ok the window and hasn't been back since. I don't know what to do. I want to go after him as he was expecting me too but I had to keep you safe too. Wait why are you back so soon?" Sam said in short few word sentences in between his sniffles. Tears were still sreaming down his face.

I went over and hugged him. He held on to me and hugged me pretty right.

"Sam go after him now, I need to find a book in my collection and re-read a story to help me solve a riddle in the game to get past a room."

"I dont want to be gone to long, so I will stay here with you and help you search." Sam said to me calmer then before but still clearly still upset.

"Get out Sam and come back in an hour."

I started pushing him towards the window and opened it.

"Dont make me push you the rest of the way out too. I mean it go... remember you only have an hour so you better rush to find him. Go make up, just remember it has to be a quickie."

Sam's face turned beet red and he fled from my room while I laughed pretty hard at his embarrassment. Now to find that book I thought to myself. I moved over to my bookcase and startsd skimming the covers. I looked through it 3 times but no book caught my eye. I decided to pull out a few of the possible books. Japan tourist information, Japanese folklore, Ways of the Edo period and many more Japanese books littered my floor when I was done. My parents always wanted to take me to Japan but sadly it never came to pass. I got comfortable innthe corner of my room on the floor and started to open them up to look for the story of the woman, waterfall and the wood cutter. After about 25 mins I finally found the promising story. It read:

The Jōren Falls of Izu

At the Jōren Falls of Izu, Shizuoka Prefecture, allegedly lives the jorōgumo mistress of the waterfall. The local legend tells of a man who rested beside the waterfall basin when the jorōgumo tried to drag him into the waterfall by throwing webs around his leg. The man transferred the webbing around a tree stump, which was dragged into the falls instead of him.

After that, people of the village dared not venture close to the falls anymore. Then one day, a visiting woodcutter who was a stranger to this all tried to cut a tree and mistakenly dropped his favorite axe into the basin. As he tried to go down to fetch his axe back, a beautiful woman appeared and returned it to him. "You must never tell anyone what you saw here", she said. Initially he kept the secret, but as days went by, the need to spill the story burdened him. And finally at a banquet, while drunk, he told the whole story. Feeling unburdened and at peace, he went to sleep, but he never woke again. In another version, the woodcutter was pulled outside by an invisible string and his corpse was found floating the next day at the Jōren Falls.

In yet another version, the woodcutter fell in love with a woman he met at the waterfall. He visited her every day, but grew physically weaker each time. The oshō of a nearby temple suspected that the woodcutter was "taken in by the jorōgumo mistress of the waterfall", and accompanied him to chant a sutra. When a spider thread reached out to the woodcutter, the oshō let out a thunderous yell, and the thread disappeared. Now knowing that the woman was actually a jorōgumo, the woodcutter still persisted and tried to gain permission for marriage from the mountain's tengu. When the tengu denied him the woodcutter ran towards the waterfall, where he was entangled by spider threads and disappeared into the water never to be seen again.

Now what is the jorōgumo again. I pulled out the ancient beings of myth of Japan book and set upon trying to find out what the jorōgumo is exactly.

"Come on please be in here, I feel that this answer is going to be very important to our success of this quest." I spoke out loud while turning the pages slowly so I don't miss the information. "Yes I found what I was looking for. I am so happy. I cant wait to tell them the story and what the creature is."

The small section read:

Jorōgumo: It can shapeshift into a beautiful woman, it is depicted as a spider woman manipulating small fire-breathing spiders.

So I found what I was looking for and now know what the story could read though the different versions might mess me up. I decided to go back and re-read the story again to make sure I dont mess it up.

**Meanwhile while I am looking for my book Sam is running after Josh to try to find him after hours of him heading off whereever he went.**

"Josh are you here? Please be here!" Sam called out " I don't have much time to find you and we need to talk. Please if you are here dont play games with me."

Josh walked out of the barn and said, "I am here and I dont want to talk to you right now. You need to think things through. You just left Marie alone without protection to come after me. How long have you been gone from her side? What more danger are you going to put her at risk of? Did you know that man in black is here in this town. I saw him two hours ago heading towards the orphanage. Now go away and run back to Marie. I will come visit once I am ready to talk to you again. I need to be alone right now and think. You need to think as well about all of this. Now GO AWAY!!!"

I froze, that bad man was back in our town.

"Shit, I left her awake but against him she stands no chance. Josh come back with me to help me make sure she is okay, please come back. If she is ok you can go until you want to talk to me. I am asking for Marie here."

"Fine Sam I will come to check on her, lets go." Josh said and took off out of the barn at a full run.

I trailed behind a second before I caught up with him.

We started to get close to the orphanage when we both heard a bloodcurdling scream. Time seemed to freeze as we rushed towards her room. Please let us be in time, I, Sam prayed.