Blue had never met Fish before, but Astrid sure had a lot of good things to say about them. She and Fish had even started a whole new guild together, and Blue was totally not jealous about her choosing Fish over the ooze knight at all. It made sense anyways. The guild was about crafting new stuff, and Blue wasn't really good at that kind of thing anyways. They were much better as an assistant, passing Astrid her tools and carrying heavy parts around. They were the best assistant! They would have made a great guild founder! They've found so many things before! And now they were going to found one more thing. A Cephaloclops eye! A powerful crafting material that Astrid would love!

Blue stood at the beach, looking out over the water and waiting for the Fish to arrive. Seemed fitting they were meeting at the beach. It was where one would expect to find a fish, after all. They should come swimming up out of the water at any moment now. It was already the time they were supposed to be meeting to go on this mission together.

Blue folded their arms in front of them with a hint of impatience. Their metal armor clanked as they moved and its weight made them sink slightly more into the sand as the waves lapped at their legs. They were glad they'd had the armor made to be just fine in the water. The dark blue metal wasn't at risk of rusting, even in the salty seawater. Though, it did still stand out quite a bit on the beach. Maybe they should have shown up for the meeting in a swimsuit, but they wanted to make a good impression, and they thought their armor was the best looking thing they could possibly wear. It was made by Astrid.

SPOILER: Click to show

Quest Name: Dance with Death
Participants: Two or more
Location: Anywhere
Post Requirements: 8 posts per person, 250 words per post
Reward: +50 security to your home region, Choice of 1 Unique crafting material
Description: Charon is a dangerous place and is filled with more threats than one can keep track of. Natural disasters, savage monsters, and crazed cultists are just a few of the things trying to take your life on a daily basis, and sometimes, they succeed. Luckily, Charon is home to brave, powerful warriors who have earned their reputation, constantly putting their lives on the line for someone else. To complete this quest, all player characters participating in the topic must be knocked unconscious or killed at least once. The details of the quest can be entirely up to you, as long as each character suffers a devastating wound and is brought to the edge of death.

Fish had also heard a bit about Blue, more so about the armor that was made for him than the man himself. Though that was mostly because Fish was only interested in the crafting of the item, learning to care about other people was still a process for Fish. They were improving, but very, very slowly in that aspect.

They were set on collecting this eye because it could probably help create a lot of magical items back at the guild. Cephaloclops are powerful monsters with some potent magic, so Fish reasons they can distill a lot of uses out of even just one eye. The bird would want to collect all of them, but they will worry about collecting the ingredients after dispatching with the beast.

Unfortunately for Blue, Fish does not come from the water. In fact, Fish just seems to appear out of thin air next to Blue thanks to their silent approach.[1] Fish just stands next to Blue looking up at them for the moment, waiting on the knight to notice them. Why is he just staring at the water?

Fish shifts their gaze to join Blue in staring out at the water. Maybe he saw something out there and was trying to figure out what it is. Fish doesn't see anything for the moment.....maybe there's nothing out there. For the time though, they just stand next to the knight and watch the water trying to figure out what he sees. If Astrid said he could help, he must be a capable adventurer, maybe he has special eyes that can see into murky waters or a special sense for monsters. Fish is excited to see what this knight has spotted.

---

1. Silent Step

It was already hours after they were supposed to meet! (It was actually only about ten minutes after their scheduled meeting time, but to Blue it felt like hours.) There was still no sign of anyone emerging from the water. Where were they? Were they at the wrong place? Did the fish climb out of the water somewhere else and was now standing there waiting for Blue to arrive? Blue looked from side to side, expecting to see a figure walking down the beach to meet them, but suddenly spotted something else.

"Ah!" Blue let out a startled shout as they jumped a few feet to the side, away from the tiny figure that was silently standing next to them. They hadn't heard anything walk up to them and didn't see anyone emerge from the water. Was this Fish? Blue looked them up and down for a moment. No, that's not a fish, that's some kind of little bird thing! So who the heck was this and why were they just standing next to them, staring out at the water like some weirdo?

Blue stood up straight, planting their fists on their hips and trying to look like a dignified, composed, and noble knight. They spoke in a commanding voice, doing their best to sound like a knight should. Really, they were just doing an impersonation of Leandros.

"Hello! Wait, no... Greetings! Uh, nice to meet you... uhhhhh.... Bird? Are you also here to wait for Fish? _{Astrid didn't say anything about a bird...} I'm Wolfe. Nice to meet you. _{Ah, wait, I said that already.}"

"Fish is Fish." The combination of Fish signing that to Blue and the relatively unclear nature of that sentence doesn't immediately occur to Fish. It made sense to them, it's Blue's fault if they don't understand.

The bird does hop back to avoid the tide hitting their feet before coming back to Blue. There will be no surprise baths today, they took one last month it is fine. Fish looks back up to Blue.

"Astrid said Blue had something to do that Fish could help with. Explain." They tilt their head to the side to expectantly wait for Blue's reply. Being that they had Astrid as a mutual friend, Fish did not bother to stop and consider whether or not Blue knew sign language.

If all Blue understood was Fish wiggling their hands around, then this was going to be a long mission. Especially if it required going underwater. Chalk and slate isn't the easiest thing to do underwater and the sign language pamphlets wouldn't do well wet. Fish also wasn't entirely confident Blue would be able to pick up on the sign language quickly enough.

What would they do if this communication barrier stood between them? It wouldn't be good to just ignore it, but how much time do they waste figuring something out. Maybe just simplify things down to absolute basics? Or do they just agree to place their trust in each other and operate in relative silence. At least Blue could talk, Fish would have to find out how to compensate.

Blue stood, waiting for the bird to say anything, but all they did was start moving their hands around. Blue would have thought they were trying to cast a spell, but they couldn't sense any magic being manipulated by the bird. What were they doing? If they really were trying to cast a spell, then they weren't very good at it. The idea that these hand movements were actually an attempt to communicate didn't even enter the ooze's head.

Blue mirrored the bird standing in front of them, tilting their head to the side in confusion. They didn't even know who this bird is, and they weren't answering. They'd even tried to act cool and knightly, but it looked like that didn't work. Were they refusing to speak to Blue? Did they do something wrong? But they thought they had introduced themself so politely! Oh, of course!

Blue walked forward and reached a hand down, holding it expectantly in front of Fish for them to shake.

"Nice to meet you!" They repeated for the third time. "My name is Lord Geoffrey Wolfe, but you can call me Wolfe. What's your name?"

Of course, how could they forget, they needed to shake hands and say their full name and what the other person should call them! Every knight shakes hands with everyone they meet and has unnecessarily names. Probably. Was there anything else they were forgetting about that they should do when meeting someone? They weren't in their home, so they couldn't offer any food or drink.

Blue reached their other hand behind their back for a moment and retrieved a glass filled with a blue liquid that smelled like raspberry and static electricity.

"Would you like a drink?" They asked, trying to be polite, not realizing how strange it might be to not only pull a glass of some strange liquid out of seemingly nowhere, but to offer it to a stranger while standing on a beach.

It dawns on Fish that Astrid may have, in fact, forgot to let Blue know that Fish usually communicates through sign language. In a show of growth, they do not get frustrated and simply pull out a chalk and slate. As they scribble away it's clear that while Blue may not know sign language, Fish does not know social etiquette as they ignore the hand.

"Fish the Tinkerer." They hold the sign against their chest for Blue to read. And then it slowly dawns on Fish that Blue cannot read. OK, now Fish is getting a little bit frustrated.

They furrow their brow before opening their beak, "Fish is me, Astrid said to help with ingredient acquisition." The words are a mix of different voices, some maybe familiar some not. There are slight pauses between each one as Fish has to search their mind for another voice to mimic to get the right word to piece together their sentence.

This was why Fish hated having to rely on mimickry for conversation. It was fine if they were just playing back what someone else said, but talking to someone? Nightmare.

"Fish would like to get this over so Fish has to no longer do this." They did have high hopes for Blue thanks to Astrid's recommendation, but this definitely wasn't the most auspicious start to the partnership. The bird turns their attention back to the water to see what Blue was staring at again and see what he might know about the situation.

Blue pulled their hand back, their handshake ignored and their offered drink silently refused, it seemed. This bird wasn't very friendly. The chalk slate with words written on it didn't help. Blue really needed to learn how to read at some point, but it would be too strange to ask anyone other than Astrid or Cantio, people who knew the ooze's real identity, to teach them. They looked like a full grown adult, and they were a noble. How would someone react to learning they couldn't read?

Finally, the bird started to just speak! Now they could actually communicate! Why didn't they just speak in the first place? Their voice being an amalgamation of pieced together words spoken in different voices with mismatched cadences and tones didn't bother Blue at all. Their sense of normal was a bit skewed considering they themself were a slime whose brain was made of all the brains of all the different creatures they'd eaten fused together. Somehow, the discordant train of voices almost made more sense than normal.

"Oh! You're Fish? You look more like a bird, but okay. I dunno what an ingredient acquisition is, but Astrid said you were supposed to help with getting that shellfish pops eye, so let's go!" Blue replied eagerly.

Blue started walking toward the water, slowly submerging into the surf that broke on their armor. Blue looked back once they were about waist deep once they remembered something that might be important.

"Oh, can you breathe underwater? The silky cat lump is down there." Blue asked, pointing down into the ocean depths. "If you can't, I can help you!"

Fish chooses to limit their words as much as possible which is easier not said than done in this case. Little known fact is it is stressful on their strange little vocal chords to have to comport themselves like that. Fish just watches as the man wades into the water. Of course they have to go into the water.

"Fish cannot swim." Most birds were not very well known for their ability to swim. Fish had so many questions to ask, but how to ask them efficiently. If this was in some underwater system, then Fish could simply blink into the space.

This could not be a worse partnership and situation. They were not able to easily communicate and just getting to the location was going to be a problem. Fish looked around the shore, eventually spotting a rowboat. They point to the boat, then Blue, and make a rowing motion. If the knight can at least help in that sense, then Fish may be able to blink to wherever they need to go.

If not, they could figure out a solution from there, but they would cross that when they came to it. Actually Fish has an idea. They motion for Blue to come out of the water as they start drawing in the sand. Words might not be an option, but please let Blue understand pictographs.

Fish draws the boat, them on it, a shadow beneath the boat, Fish disappears, then reappears in the shadow. Fish adds in some words to fill the gaps, but the basic idea is if they can put a shadow over wherever they need to go then Fish can teleport into that shadow. It's hard to explain exactly without too many words, but they do their best to work with Blue to figure it out.

"What do you mean you can't swim? But your name is Fish!" Blue shouted out in equal parts surprise and exasperation. Why would you call yourself a fish when you can't even swim? That just made no sense. Blue gave themself the name Wolfe because they were a wolf when they first met Astrid, and they could turn into a wolf. It made sense! That wasn't even mentioning their real name literally just being their color and flavor. It was nothing but descriptions, but those descriptions were actually accurate.

Blue waded back up the shore, back toward Fish. They were met with drawings in the sand and more motions and gestures they didn't have the mental capacity to interpret. Blue looked over at the boat Fish pointed to and then back down at Fish with their hands on their waist.

"A boat? No, it's underwater. Under the water. Boats aren't supposed to go under the water. If a boat is under the water, it's a bad thing called sinking." Blue explained, shaking their head.

"But don't worry! I'm a real good swimmer. You can just hold onto me." They finished confidently, pointing a thumb at their chest.

Blue slime flowed from the gaps in their armor and coating their gauntlets and greaves, absorbing parts of the metal plate. From the elbow to their hands, and from their knees down, their muscular arms and legs were suddenly exposed. Translucent blue webbing formed between their fingers and their toes which elongated into flipper-like feet. Fins grew out of the backs of their calves and the sides of their arms. From their lower back, a blue scaled fish tail grew out as their black fur cloak was slurped into their back and absorbed.

"Now don't move." Blue told Fish as they put their hands together and then began to pull them apart, a transparent blue tinted bubble expanding between their hands. Once it was sufficiently large enough, they attempted to place it on Fish's head, providing the little bird with a bubble of fresh air to breathe underwater.

---

Space Pocket
Webbed Digits
Prehensile Tail
Breathe In, Breathe Out

Now Fish was getting frustrated. They wanted to avoid getting into the water as much as possible for many reasons. The top one being they can't swim and the second being how much of their equipment is sensitive to water. Smokepowders and alchemical ingredients don't do well with being water logged.

They do hop back and draw the crossbow as Blue attempts to put something over their head, "Do not touch."

Fish was growing suspicious that whoever Blue was, they had been taken over by some strange creature. It was hard to believe it was this impossible to communicate ideas between the two of them. Fish was very near their breaking point, they didn't often bail on jobs. In fact the only time it happened was breaking into Zarius' home, but that was a much different situation. This is just not working at all.

They turn and make their way to the rowboat, resolving to handle this on their own. Fish hops into the boat and grabs an oar using it to push themselves into the tide, stubbornly sticking to it despite the effort it takes for their tiny arms to make any sort of progress. Just need to get to the water.

Fish closes their eyes and focuses for a moment before a little shadow version of themselves pops into existence.[1] The clone helps push the boat from the outside and speed up the process a bit. Of course, just working with Blue would've been faster but Fish was frustrated and shutting down.

Eventually water hits the boat and they get into deep enough water that Fish can start rowing. They look over to Blue to see where they are going, ready to follow after.

---

1. Shadow Clone

Now Blue was getting frustrated. They were just trying to help Fish out and let them breathe underwater, but Fish was refusing to cooperate with them or communicate. They even pulled a crossbow on them! Why were they so fixated on that rowboat? The place they needed to go, where the cephaloclops was hiding, was underwater. Under the water. Boats aren't supposed to go under the water! If they do, there's been a problem.

Blue let out a frustrated sigh. They reabsorbed the bubble of air and walked over to help pull the boat that the tiny bird was struggling to push. Blue grabbed the front with one hand and easily dragged the boat across the sand and into the water, not even noticing the additional pushing from a second Fish.

This was throwing everything off. This was supposed to be easy. They could just move along the seabed and find the cave. It wasn't that hard to spot, according to the info they'd gotten on it. It was a big stone cave sticking out of the sand. But that was only when you were travelling along the bottom of the ocean. How were they supposed to find it in a boat, above the water? And Blue still didn't know how Fish thought this boat was going to get to the bottom of the ocean. How did Astrid become friends with Fish? Blue had never met anyone more frustrating to work with in their life!

Blue begrudgingly absorbed the rest of their armor and stood in a pair of swimming trunks. Their heavy metal armor would have helped them travel across the bottom of the ocean by keeping them weighed down, but now it would be a hindrance.

Two tentacles tipped with spiky pads grew from their lower back on either side of their fish tail and stuck to the front of the boat with two wet slaps, pulling it behind Blue as they walked deeper into the water until they began swimming just below the surface.

---

Bull's Strength
Space Pocket
Displacer Tails
Slimy Hands

Having absolutely no way to communicate between the two of them was a sure fire way to start this off on the wrong foot. Astrid probably should have thought of that, but she does have a lot on her plate at the moment. At least they are making some progress even if they are kind of not speaking.

They do their best to follow the waves and keep up with Blue from above. They were going to yell at Astrid about so much of this when they got back. And by yell Fish means wave their hands around very quickly. Perhaps the fervor might also cause them to hop in anger.

The few minutes of silence as they travel does give Fish time to calm themselves though. Fish shouldn't just expect everyone to understand their sign language....though not being able to read or even put together pictures was concerning. Like......incredibly concerning. It sets off alarm bells in Fish, but lucky for Blue given the communication barrier Fish feels it is pointless to ask about them.

Fish hops to their feet as it seems Blue has come to a stop. They lean over the boat and narrow their eyes to try and spot the entrance. It takes a moment but it looks like there is some sort of strange underwater grotto. Fish rocks the boat a moment to fill the bail bucket and create a puddle in the boat.

A ring starts to glow with a light purple aura as the puddle ripples a moment before Fish jumps in.^[1] They appear just on the otherside of the grotto entrance from another puddle. Whatever lived here seems to have created a barrier to give it a dry hide out, though it wasn't water tight. There were gaps at the edges something could squeeze through if need be. Or there was likely another water-based entrance nearby.

---

1. Eternity Ring to cast Puddle Portal

Blue stopped dragging the boat along behind them when they finally spotted the cave entrance from above. This looked like the right place, now the question was how was Fish going to get down there?

It didn't take long to get an answer. Blue thought the bird's whole plan was to just sink the boat they were in, as they rocked it from side to side and bailed water into the boat with the bucket. Well, that would probably get the boat down there just fine, but could Fish breathe underwater? Blue knew they couldn't swim even though their name was Fish, so them being able to breathe underwater seemed unlikely. Well, they could have a bubble of air ready for them.

Blue waited until the boat stopped rocking and peaked up over the side to see it was now empty except for a puddle of water at the bottom. Wait, where did they go? They didn't fall out of the boat, did they? Blue didn't hear or see them anywhere in the water! There was no way, right?

Looking around, Blue didn't see Fish anywhere, just a bunch of fish. They looked around until they sensed a jolt of magic from below. Swimming down to the cave entrance, Blue saw Fish standing inside, in a pocket of air sealed behind some kind of barrier. Blue poked the barrier to see it was completely solid. They swam down and under the barrier and up into the air pocket it formed in the cave.

"You didn't tell me you could teleport. Why didn't you just say that was your plan?" Blue asked as they climbed up onto the rocky floor.

With no water in the cave, buoyancy and swimming wasn't a problem anymore. Blue's arms and legs changed back to normal and their armor reemerged from them to cover their entire body. With an enemy as reportedly dangerous as the one they wee about to face, they wanted to go in with everything they could. Which begged a new question. Did they need to hide their more oozey abilities from Fish?

"So, uh, what did Astrid tell you about me?" Blue asked Fish a little hesitantly.

If Blue wasn't Astrid's friend, then Fish may have shot them on the spot for that first question. It is exactly what Fish had tried to tell them, but the communication barrier made it impossible. They weren't going to get mad, they weren't going to get mad.

They also knew they could just go totally silent. It was becoming apparent that Blue wasn't doing this intentionally, he just truly didn't know another way to communicate with Fish. Frustrating, but not intentional...better than Morrigan who can be intentionally frustrating.

"Short answers, mimicking hurts, Astrid said little." There are little pauses between the words and phrases. It was a little bit easier if they didn't have to string it all into a proper sentence.

They turn to focus on the task and try and find any sort of clue as to where this thing is. If it levitates, then it won't leave tracks which will make it difficult. Around the dry area they found themselves in were a number of tunnels, some of them waterlogged, some of them not. They were all weirdly uniform though meaning this thing likely carved them itself.

Air pockets means it does need to eventually come up to breathe....water tunnels are likely fed from the ocean so it can pop out and feed on....whatever it feeds on.

"Help locating, Fish sees nothing." They look up to Blue for his input. Fish is curious about the knight's skill set. If Astrid thought he could help, Fish wanted to know how.

Astrid said they were little? But she's smaller than them! Most of the time. Blue could be little sometimes, like when they turned into a spider or something, so she wasn't really lying. But is that all she told Fish about them? Nothing about being an ooze? They guessed that made sense. She didn't just go around giving away their secret to anyone she met, which was appreciated. Time to use their flawless skills of deception.

"Oh, okay. So she didn't say anything about my magic. Alright. I can use magic to change my body and ea- I mean, store things! Like my armor, when I was swimming here." Blue explained and held out an arm to demonstrate, reabsorbing their gauntlet and then reequipping it. "And I can use lightning magic, and uhh, slime magic. I'm really good at fighting. I'm super strong!" They added confidently, giving Fish a thumbs up. Yup, slime magic was totally a thing that made sense.

Blue was curious about what Fish could do during their upcoming battle with the cephaloclops. They were also curious just what Astrid liked about this bird that honestly wasn't very friendly judging by their experience so far. Blue began walking down one tunnel where they were pretty sure they could feel the occasional tingle of magic coming from.

"I think I can feel something this way. So, what can you do, besides teleport?" Blue asked quietly, glancing at Fish as they navigated the system of tunnels.

Bits of glowing crystal cave the rocky tunnels just a hint of illumination. From their even spacing and height along the walls, it was easy to surmise these crystals had been placed intentionally rather than naturally formed. The tunnels were surprisingly narrow. Only about twice as wide as Blue's shoulders. They'd heard the caphaloclops was supposed to be pretty big, so why did these tunnels feel more like they were sized for humans? Did it carve them itself, or did it just move into a already carved out home?

In the dry tunnels, there was no sign of any corals or plants that might suggest these had at one point been filled with water. Maybe it was just a smaller cephaloclops. Well, even if it was, Blue had no intention of not beating it. They were definitely getting that eye!

---

Expanded Mind