Linedwell made his way through the woods at a comfortable pace, making sure that he followed the path he'd made explicitly in order to not waste any time finding his way back through these woods because he got lost. As he continued to walk through the brush, he could hear the sounds of two men having a conversation. Always being cautious, Linedwell began to slow his pace and creep a bit as he continued on, in order to not make as much noise and bring attention to himself.

Linedwell passed through a bit of brush and a tree and behind it he could see two men at the entrance of the caverns. He could only sigh as he realized this. It had been quite a while since he'd seen other human beings, and by the look of these two men, it seemed that they were treasure hunters...and if they were scouting out this cavern then it seemed they'd be in for a rude awakening when it came to what was actually hidden down there.

Linedwell was torn between acting and warning these fools about the idiotic decision they were about to make, while his other half was currently thinking of ways to flip this entire situation to his advantage. Even though Linedwell came prepared to deal with whatever was down there, he'd never actually explored deep into these caverns, and he wouldn't exactly know what to expect when going down there in order to face these beasts.

After a few moments of thought, Linedwell had come to the conclusion that he'd warn the duo about the dangers of the cavern before they ended up in a bad way. This was out of the norm for Linedwell, especially when he felt he could flip the situation in his favor, but today he decided that he'd gain more out of his experience if he were to jump into that cavern without knowing the threats that were waiting for him. In a way, it symbolized the experiences he'd have in the Grand Line. He wasn't sure at all what waited for him there, yet, he'd need to be prepared for the dangers that would await them and need to have the strength to match those challenges.

With all of this thought through, Linedwell turned his attention back to the caverns entrance in order to warn the two treasure hunters of the mistake they'd almost made.

"Hey, you gu-..."

As he realized the two men were no longer present at the entrance of the cavern and that he could see that the hole into the caverns had a small dip in it, attesting to the fact that someone or something had just entered the caverns he found himself shaking his head. The first time in which he'd decided to go out of his way to help people, he ended up dropping the ball completely. Moving from his position behind the bush, Linedwell began to walk towards the entrance of the cavern.

The closer he got to the cavern entrance, the more he could hear the sounds of movement below. With how large the inside of the cavern was, the sounds the two explorers were making below were giving off echos, allowing Linedwell to hear them from up above. Kneeling down a bit, Linedwell began to listen in from up above as well as peeking in on them to see how far below they'd made it.

When Linedwell first found this cavern, he'd falling into it on accident; allowing him to bypass the long climbing descent that these two explorers were currently going through. Looking at it now, Linedwell hadn't noticed how much of a drop he'd taken when falling into this place the first time. It was lucky that he'd even been able to survive that fall, let alone the snakes he had to deal with afterwards. With this in mind, Linedwell began to wonder if he'd actually been able to defeat all the snakes in the cavern below, or if he'd simply killed a small fraction of them and there were more he wasn't aware of. If this was the case, then it was likely that the explorers would meet an early death if those snakes were still around to cause them trouble. If this did happen, however, then it would at least allow Linedwell to get the drop on his when he did finally enter the cavern himself. Knowing what threats would be present down there would be a huge help.

Linedwell began to slowly descend into the caverns; making sure that he didn't create too much noise and alert the explorers to his presence. If he did so he'd lose the perk he had of allowing them to move further through the caverns and draw out whatever the real threat was. After a while of climbing, Linedwell finally reached the ground level in time enough that the explorers weren't too far away from his position, allowing Linedwell to catch up with the duo while still maintaining a bit of distance from the pair. The initial section of the cavern was the area in which Linedwell had faced off with multiple snakes. He'd failed to clean up at all after the fight, and at this point the carcasses of the dead snakes had been left to rot in this place. Given the cool nature of the caverns, there wasn't any heat that would aid in the decomposition of the carcasses, so the smell of death still lingered here, but it appeared that the deaths happened at a much more recent time compared to when they were actually killed.

The explorers made note of this in what appeared to be notebooks and continued on their way; and Linedwell made sure to follow as they went further and further into the caverns. The longer they walked, the more Linedwell noticed that the pair would stop occasionally and jot down notes in their notebooks. They were beginning to appear to be more interested in learning about this place than they were about finding any sort of treasure, and soon Linedwell's initial perception about these two began to change.

The trip through the caverns was beginning to take far longer than Linedwell thought it would take. At this point he found himself no longer being on the lookout for threats in this cavern, but now he was more curious about what these two explorers were jotting down in their notes. It seemed to him that everything about this place appeared to be interesting to these two, and Linedwell began to wish he held their optimisms about this place. No matter how he looked at this place, he could only think about how dark and gloomy it seemed. There were no redeeming qualities about this place to him, but apparently, this was different for these two men.

As they continued on, there were a few things that started to show up that immediately began to put Linedwell on edge. The first sign of something foul was the random blood stains they'd find every now and then. Normally this wouldn't have been so out of place on an island such as this one, but given the fact they hadn't seen anything in these caverns so far that indicated life, this was a huge sign that something violent had transpired here, and the further they continued to go past that they began to find the remains of what appeared to be human. From Linedwell's distance away from the duo, he could even tell that the two men were beginning to become a bit spooked. One of the men even expressing that maybe it wasn't too smart to remain down there.

Since Linedwell had slowly been becoming a bit more attached to these individuals as time progressed, he was starting to feel as though he should reveal himself to these men and tell them to leave - but before he could do that a group of ghastly creatures immediately burst out of the ground and were now hanging in the air above the two, preparing to strike. With his right hand clutching Treachery's hilt, he quickly unsheathed it and let loose a highly compressed blade of air in the direction of the hideous beasts, cutting them all in half before rushing forward after activated Satori and killing the rest that were beginning to sprout out of the ground like weeds.

With the sudden violence, Linedwell hadn't realized he'd given himself away and the two explorers were now aware of him. It wasn't until they yelled out to him asking who he was that he realized this.

"Just get out of here! Head back for the entrance, I'll cover you!"

Linedwell had become so much a part of the group in his mind that he didn't realize how familiar with this group that he was being. The group didn't exactly decide to stick around and question it though, and with Linedwell's urging they had already begun to rush towards the exit, only to notice that another group of these monsters were beginning to cut the two off. Stepping off of his left foot, Linedwell dash towards the two men, pushing them out of the way before killing the two beasts that had appeared behind them.

NPCs Remaining: 5x T0 Ghouls, 5x T1 Alghouls, 2x T3 Graveirs

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With the two opponents taken down and the explorers protected Linedwell was starting to feel as though he'd accomplished a lot...that is, until a group of new opponents began to burst out of the ground and advance towards the trio. Linedwell wasn't sure what these "animals" were, but they were some of the most hideous creatures he'd ever seen. The teeth they sported seemed to be the type that gave indication that they fed on other creatures, and the blood that appeared to cover their hands, arms, and cover their mouths gave the impression that they'd just recently had a meal. Whatever these creatures were, they appeared to be a prime candidate for whatever had been killing the beasts and creatures above ground.  

Not wanting to become their next meal, Linedwell began to urge the two explorers to continue to head for the while the remaining group of opponents headed for them. Linedwell kept his attention on the group in front of him, holding them off from the explorers. Deciding to deal with the group quickly instead of waiting for them to come after him, Linedwell dashed forward and began to slice through as many of the creatures as possible, killing most of them with one hit but a few seemed to be stronger than others. With Trechery's ability active, however, this task proved to become a bit easier though and soon he was able to kill the remaining opponents without too much of a problem.

NPCs Remaining: 2x T3 Graveirs

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With the opponents downed, the explorers stopped their run and began to congratulate Linedwell on his win against the beasts, and almost instantly after a large rumble began to shake the ground, before the rumble turned into what felt like an immense earthquake before a blast of pure energy slammed into Linedwell, sending him flying through one of the the walls of the cavern and into one of the other cave systems. Linedwell attempted to stand, but as he did this only caused him to fall to his knees. He had never in his life felt a strike as strong as the one that hit him, and he knew immediately that this had to be another one of these disgusting creatures, but this time a far stronger one. He had underestimated his opponents and now he was paying the price, yet he couldn’t help but feel like this had been a cheap shot. He hadn't even seen his opponent yet, and he was already being beaten down before he could react. If his opponent had more attacks like these, Linedwell would have to do his best to avoid everything that his opponent dished out. More attacks like these would certainly knock him out in no time. Linedwell attempted to stand once more, but it only caused him to go into a coughing fit which produced blood.

Right now, all Linedwell could do was lay on the ground and hope he could recover enough in time before his opponent made an appearance, and as he started to hear footsteps from nearby, this wish seemingly went unfulfilled. The sound of the beasts heavy footsteps as they neared closer and closer were highly intimidating, and it even caused the ground to shake a bit with each heavy stomp. Right now, all Linedwell could do was feign unconsciousness and hope that his opponent didn’t have any more plans with him until he had recovered enough to stand. His body was still racked with the pain of the last attack though, so the amount of time he needed to recover from the attack he took from these beasts he wasn’t exactly sure of. All he knew is that it would need to be soon.

The two beasts slowly continued their walk up towards Linedwell’s body, and as they finally arrived they simply stood above Linedwell in silence. This awkward silence continued for quite a bit…unless you count the heavy breathing and salivating which made things all the more awkward. It seemed as though these two beasts were waiting for something. As if they could tell that Linedwell was not truly unconscious and they just waited until Linedwell finally decided to give up this ruse. Or maybe, they were merely admiring the kill they made so easily. Either way, it wasn’t lending Linedwell any tactical advantages. If he moved at all, they would notice the movement, and no doubt react just as quickly as he had done before.

Linedwell was a bit ashamed of the fact that he was laying there on the ground, acting as if he were unconscious in order to get a bit more rest, but in this situation he truly had no choice. He wasn’t exactly sure what these beasts had planned, but as he lay there, he began to activate his Zantō Gari technique just in case, covering his blade in the blood that had begun to pool under him. While Linedwell contemplated all of the possibilities of what could happen, it appeared the beast to his left had already decided on an action to take against Mr.Rainrex. With almost no hesitation whatsoever, the beast sent a sharp and swift kick into Linedwell’s side. Though Linedwell could have attempted to suffer through the pain and attempt to act as though he were still unconscious, it would have required acting that would have been on par with the acting skills required to win an Oscar…if anyone in South Blue even knew what an Oscar was…because of this, Linedwell wasn’t prepared when it came down to it, and he let out a cry of pain that let his opponent know that he was awake.

As his opponent’s foot made impact with his side, he reacted to the pain, but he also reacted by grabbing hold of the leg of his attacker. Moving quickly after this, Linedwell turned, tugging his opponents leg as strongly as he could and sent him flying across the cave towards the other beast. While his opponent careened through the air, Linedwell picked himself up and chased after him. Catching up to him in a mere instant, Linedwell began to assail his opponents with slash after slash after slash, employing both the speed of Satori and Zanto, sending them flying through a nearby wall. With his opponents downed, finished them off by blasting them point blank with his Shihogiri technique, which seemed to kill them almost instantly. With the fight done, Linedwell found himself being propped up by the two explorers. They thanked Linedwell for his assistance and escorted Linedwell out of the cavern, since he was far too injured to make it back on his own.  

-Exit-

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