395 CCCXCV. The Idol (1/2)
”Wait a minute... Karl, let's light our torches, too. We need as much visibility as possible to continue” the Shieldmaiden replied, pulling out the torch that was strapped into her belt and lighting it with the flint after a couple of attempts.
Karl, with his hands trembling with fear, put the mace and shield in place and awkwardly opened his bag, in which he grabbed the torch and hardly pulled it out, being wedged under some other junk.
Just then, a large insect came out of a hole in the wall behind him and flew away frightened, passing by his ear and emitting a loud hum, which frightened him so much that he shook his arms and lost his grip on the torch, which after falling to the ground, bounced and fell down the ravine, in the darkness.
A few seconds of silence followed that unfortunate event and Dag looked down, calculating the time of the torch's fall.
*toc*
”Fuck! My torch! That damn insect scared me, it's not poss...”
As Karl rattled over the incident, Gridd put her hand over his mouth, preventing him from continuing to make noise.
”About three seconds...” Dag said.
”The torch?” Gridd asked, curious to hear her brother's opinion.
”Yes... it took about three seconds to touch the bottom of the cave... considering its weight and the fact that it followed a vertical trajectory more or less in the center of the circumference of the tunnel, not touching the other side of the path, I would say that another twenty meters are missing, maximum thirty” he continued, trying to calculate the time in mind, using old reminiscences of mathematics and physics.
”Then let's move, there's no time to waste! Let's make sure there's no danger and let's warn everyone else!” she said, walking briskly and overtaking Karl, who when noticed he had fallen behind without a torch, hurried ahead and joined his companions.
In front of Dag, Thalos opened the line, continuing to descend and sniff the ground without stopping for even a second.
Through the nose and the developed senses of his wolf friend, Dag was sure that he would be able to locate any enemy in the cave.
As there was no suspicious smell, he continued to walk, and within minutes, moving along the circular walls of the vertical tunnel, he finally saw the end of the road downhill, which flattened.
When all three companions were at the bottom, Dag and Gridd began to move the torches around them, trying to assess the magnitude of that place.
”Do you hear something, buddy?” Dag asked to Thalos, who continued to sniff intermittently, alternating his nose and eyes to study the situation.
”Go get Karl's torch... it shouldn't be far away... look, it's an object like this” Dag continued, pointing his torch at Thalos, who after a few seconds understood the request and with his nose down to the rocky ground, walked into the darkness.