Chapter 895 (1/2)

Despite Randidly’s misgivings about simply following the servants of the Toad Lord down into an underwater base, there was no vicious ambush waiting for him beneath the surface of the water. Just a long causeway of shells embedded into the settling mud that stretched off into the depths of the lagoon.

In addition, it looked rather well maintained. Rather bemused, Randidly gathered some algae and plant matter from the surrounding water and attached it to himself to form a rather effortless propulsion system. Because he created thrust by rupturing the cell wall of his algae, he had to continually replace it. But within such a lagoon… continually gathering the requisite plant matter was extremely simple.

Which gave Randidly time to consider his surrounding.

When Shual had said that others had attempted to reproduce what happened in these “Deep Cities” to no success, Randidly hadn’t quite understood the difficulty. Because he had just been picturing barebones buildings that frogs swam into and out of with impunity.

As Randidly and his guides drew deeper into the lagoon, that wasn’t what he saw. Instead, each building maintained a bubble of air within that allowed people to behave as though they were on land, even underneath thirty meters of water. These bubbles were often wider than they were tall and included dirt and mud to create a walkable surface within.

Strange, semi-living vines snaked up from the buildings to lily pads that Randidly could sense above, allowing recycling of the air within. Honestly, it was a pretty impressive engineering feat, even if it was slightly ungainly to look at. Yet even so, the strange bubbles filled the underwater world with color and life.

Shual’s second statement also came true; the buildings that dotted the Deep Sea were beautiful.

Randidly floated forward through the water without apparent effort and he studied the city. If he believed that he had witnessed the suburbs on the shore of the lagoon he was dearly mistaken. The trickle of people he had seen back out on land was barely a drop in the bucket that was this city. Under the water, people were buzzing back and forth, flitting quickly with powerful strokes of their legs through the water.

More than that… the group of them was approaching a blimp-like bubble of algae that held within it a living and breathing… park. It was rather dim down here, and the entrance seemed to be a complicated series of sequestered bubble spaces, but within there were trees and paths and… playground equipment.

Small Frogpeople hopped gleefully in play, unaware that a powerful being from a rival world was floating down past them in order to speak with their leader. The whole thing set Randidly’s teeth on edge somehow. He didn’t like this side of things. It was easy enough to focus on a powerful enemy that was taking advantage of you. But to fight against a populace that was largely innocent...

Strangely, his Crown pulsed, calming him down immediately. Such was his Path. There was no point in quibbling with himself about it.

As the neared the city proper, there were even more of these strange bubble spaces. Most were arranged in elaborate chains that extended upward, almost like a strange underwater equivalent of apartment buildings. And at their base, strangely luminescent choral twisted upward, varying between shades of red, dark orange, and green.

Without light from the surface, the choral slowly grew more bright by contrast. Proceeding deeper took them further away from the light above, but it also adjusted their eyes to the alien light emanating from below.

Likely due to the constant cloud cover above, the Deep City was awash with shadow. This deep place was a domain of shade. And surrounded by the strange semi-darkness, Randidly felt his mood shifting to something more focused. Was bringing him deep into the Toad Lord’s territory supposed to cow him?

Am I supposed to be impressed? Randidly thought sourly as his guards continued to slowly swim forward. They displayed none of the speed that he had seen some other Frogpeople possess, especially when an individual was in their path and recognized the armor worn by these guards.

It seemed that this Toad Lord was not a kind ruler.

Unfortunately, the one problem with being underwater was the fact that he really didn’t have any way to communicate. At least communicate non-aggressively. So he couldn’t make conversation and he couldn’t urge the Frogpeople forward. Randidly simply had to endure the slow speed and allow the guards to lead him as they wished.

After almost fifteen minutes, they arrived at a large dome that stood in the center of the bubble chains. Whereas the other bubbles were semi-translucent, allowing some vision of what was within, this dome was completely opaque. Algae grew thickly along the surface, granting a strange fuzziness to the extremely large building.

Just as soon as Randidly paused to study the dome in front of them, the guards moved. With a sudden burst of speed, they surged downward to a tunnel that led beneath the dome. They hadn’t even gestured or indicated that Randidly was to wait here. They had simply bolted.

Randidly’s eyes narrowed. I knew they were moving slowly to show off.

But if they also didn’t tell him to stay, he could casually ignore their attempt to ditch him and have plausible deniability about it later. Grinning, Randidly swept up handfuls of the thick algae covering the dome and used it to torpedo himself downward after the guards, into the tunnel.

Within, they were in almost complete darkness. The two guards continued to accelerate, and Randidly chuckled to himself. His little micro-organisms redoubled their efforts, and soon he was effortlessly keeping pace with the frogs. However, they seemed completely oblivious as they swam through the darkness. Likely they didn’t possess anything like his auxiliary Perception abilities.

Eventually, the tunnel turned upward. And they emerged into the air. Randidly came up slowly and suspiciously, not daring to take in a breath until he could ascertain the area was safe. Not that poison was really that much of a concern, but still. Traveled from air to water was when he felt the most vulnerable.

Certainly, the interior of the dome was at least well lit. There was even a strange apparatus installed on the ceiling that provided a light source that felt an awful lot like sunlight. But the area was still annoyingly swampy to Randidly’s eye.

At least it’s out of the rain, Randidly thought dourly.

Apparently, his ascent to the surface of the water was so well controlled that the two guards still hadn’t noticed his presence as they leapt out of the water. Immediately, they saluted toward a large weeping willow-esque tree that dominated the nearby area and said. “Sire! The Demon waits outside for your pleasure-”

“Fools,”