“That is… I love it!” Vekeus exclaimed. “That’s ingenious! But… I have questions. You… you don’t normally have that sort of power.”
Elkay-En sighed. His plan was genuinely a good one, and hopefully without any risk. But it did involve Elkay-En doing things he had not really practised much before.
A low growl echoed across the room. It was coming from the box. There was clearly something inside it. Something that wanted out.
“That is definitely some sort of monster…” Elkay-En muttered.
“What sort of monster though?”
“Why are you asking?”
Vekeus shrugged. “We need to know. In case it gets out. Because I’m certain that button is either super sensitive or not connected to anything. In fact, the box is probably on some sort of timer.”
“Why… why would it be on a timer?” Elkay-En was confused. “Isn’t the whole point of this that we have to choose to press the button and kill whatever is inside? Well… we have to remove it.”
More shrugs. “Well, yeah, but there are people watching us do this, wondering how we’re going to solve their puzzles. It wouldn’t be too unusual for them to booby-trap something or rig it so our decisions are taken away at some point, forcing us to have to think on our feet.”
“Good point…”
Elkay-En thought to himself briefly, then sighed and held out his hand. He concentrated on the palm of his hand and, after a few seconds, a strange lump of fleshy matter with little wings appeared.
“What is that?” Vekeus asked.
“Something I’ve been practising. If I am going to have stupid flesh manipulation powers, I might as well make something useful. This is a meat-sprite. It’ll glow red if it senses Corruption, blue if it senses time stuff and green if it senses Voidborn energies.”
“Is it alive?”
“No. Mindless flesh that I control.”
The little meat-sprite flapped its wings, then immediately floated over to the box. It buzzed around the box a few times then started glowing. Unusually, it was glowing red and green.
“So… Corrupted Voidborn…” Vekeus frowned.
“Seems like it. Could be worse though.”
“Oh, definitely. Corrupted Time Drakes are horrible. But I have to wonder though, was the Voidborn always here? Or was it captured and placed in this room for us to dispose of?”
“Why would they leave that to us?”
Elkay-En frowned some more. “Considering that Kayel and his team, they basically killed a Corrupted Voidborn who was huge enough to swallow a whole village… Surely the Decay Lords didn’t just have some gigantic but also Corrupted Voidborn on standby just to do that trial? I mean, it wasn’t a simulation, it was real, but an infected entity that large isn’t something you just keep around.”
“Are you suggesting that this Deathven guy no longer does actual trials but instead finds a job that needs doing and gives it to a bunch of confused Decaylings to see if they have value to his society?”
Elkay-En nodded. “Basically, yes. At least, for those who don’t live in Deathven sectors but live in external sects.”
“Huh… I guess that actually makes sense. Doubly so since the key thing this guy seems to want is the skill of improvisation and thinking fast.”
The box suddenly shuddered and shook, interrupting the conversation.
“I think your comment about a timer might be accurate…”
The box shook some more. It seemed to be holding, but whatever was inside was definitely getting angrier.
“We should get moving…” Elkay-En hesitantly stated.
“Agreed. So how do you want to do this?”
“Carefully.”
“And what do you want me to do?”
“Hold off until the last second… Although… you can just… make a new one, right?” Elkay-En asked.
“Yep!” Vekeus smiled. “Been meaning to for a while anyway.”
“Alright, good…”
Elkay-En straightened himself out, then approached the box. He raised both hands then pointed them at the bottom of the box.
“You alright?” Vekeus asked.
“Why are you asking?” Elkay-En tutted as he closed his eyes.
“You look a little pale.”
“I’m fine. I need to concentrate though. And you need to be quiet.”
Vekeus grunted. “I guess. Do you need me to stand anywhere?”
“Close by, but with plenty of space.”
“Alright.”
Elkay-En concentrated on the box again, mostly at the base. Nothing seemed to happen at first, but slowly, something red appeared at the bottom. That red splodge slowly began to grow, starting from the base, then heading to the edges, before starting to spread and cover the entire box.
The redness started to change. It became thicker, gunkier and more like a fleshy sludge. Before long, the entire box was covered, apart from the tiny area where the button was. But the sludge got even thicker. It turned from slime into a strange muscle mass.
“That’s kinda gross but also kinda cool…” Vekeus whispered.
“Fair.”
Elkay-En growled slightly as he changed his focus. The muscle mass started creeping underneath the box until it was fully surrounded.
“Ready?” Elkay-En grunted.
“Yeah.”
Elkay-En’s concentration shifted. He steadied himself, then pressed his hands together. As he did so, the mass of muscle and sinew clamped around the box and started crushing it down. Clearly, the monster inside the box didn’t like being crushed, so it started trying to break out. But also, it was being crushed but it wasn’t being killed. Being a Voidborn or a Corruption or both, it was resisting the pressure Elkay-En was creating. Didn’t matter though, because Elkay-En wasn’t trying to kill it. He was trying to make the box smaller.
And he was succeeding.
After not even a minute, the box had shrunk down, from 2.5m to about half a metre across. After a little more effort, the box was so small, it could easily be picked up by Vekeus. But Vekeus didn’t go near the box, not at first.
“Now!” Elkay-En suddenly shouted as he destroyed all the flesh and muscle, then rushed to the back wall.
Vekeus waved his hand and summoned his Voidborn ship, which now took up most of the room. Using his weak telekinesis, Vekeus opened the door of the ship, threw the box inside, then un-summoned his ship, teleporting it back to his back-up respawn area back at Savepoint.
“You think Arkay will be pissed at us, sending him a Corrupted Voidborn to deal with?” Elkay-En sighed as he tried to catch his breath.
“Nah. He’ll find it hilarious!” Vekeus grinned. “Anyway, we removed the thing. We did the job. We should be free to go now, right?”
Before Elkay-En could answer, everything suddenly went completely black, and a voice echoed from the darkness.
“We need to talk.”