After but two days of travel, we finally arrived at the Swampcake Islands, and they certainly did not dissapoint. They were cakey, grimey, vile and everything in between, with a severe case of monster infestation in addition. I just hoped that the myths of a crypt being there were true.

  As we stepped off of the boat, the smell of something akin to a mix of bile and algae infiltrated my nose. I almost gagged at the sudden vile scent. Aiden looked no different.

  ‘Tha’ smell alone could kill a man! No wonder no one's cleared that crypt yet!’

  ‘For once, you absolute hunk of flesh, I completely and wholeheartedly agree.’ The smell was indeed foul.

  Suddenly, I stepped on a loose vine, and it struck at me! I barely managed to evade the strike before the sharp end skewered me like a human shish kebab.

  ‘WHOA!’ I called as I quickly retrieved my longsword and assumed a battle stance, with Aiden quickly following. Our equipment was about as bare-bones as it could get, with my longsword being made of common iron, not even steel. To be fair, most of our funds went toward the shining block of wood Aiden calls a ‘tower shield’, even though it looks nothing akin to one.

  ‘If you wanna ogle my shield, Luke, you might wanna wait ‘till you’re in a monster free zone!’ Aiden’s call smacked me right back to my senses. He was right, of course. This was no time for observation. This was the time for action.

  The clearly living vine struck at me once more, but this time I was ready and parried it skillfully with my longsword. We may have been lacking in many things, but skill was not one of them. Aiden immediately launched himself at the monster with his morningstar, landing a good hit in at its root, causing it to secrete some kind of green liquid which I assumed was its blood. I kept my distance, but hit a testing slash with my longsword resulting in the small chip in its side hooking on to the appendage.

  Taking the initiative, I yanked my arm back, effectively uprooting the creature. My sword did lose its grip, but the damage was done. The entire serrated appendage went flying off, finally killing the creature.

  ‘Damn, Luke! Didn’t know tha’ chip was actually useful fer somethin’!’ Aiden was breathing heavily, recovering after his devastating charge at the creature. His morningstar was covered in the same fluid as my longsword, presumably its sap.

  ‘But now it’s larger. And covered in plant goo to boot.’ I frowned. I wasn’t an expert, but I knew a thing or two about botany. And swamp creature sap was usually an extremely diluted acid. That wasn’t good, as it meant it could wear off my blade even faster.

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  ‘Yeah, man. Now ya can say tha’ yer blade is a sanitation hazard all on it’s own. Might inflict a lil’ poison damage if yer lucky.’ We both shared a laugh at that. It wasn’t often we were able to share a moment of lighthearted, humorous banter, so we made sure to get in whatever moments we could.

  ‘Onward?’ I asked after we recovered our lost stamina.

  ‘Sure.’

  And with that we marched on, making sure to avoid any vines that looked a little too alive. After we grew acclimated to the stink, the swamp was a lot more bearable. Although the mud was annoying, the place seemed… beautiful, in some dark, twisted way. It was lush and full of life… provided that life didn’t try to eat or sting me.

  ‘We’ve been walkin’ for hours, man.’ Aiden grumpily and tiredly commented. The sun was beginning to set and I was starting to feel that familiar ache in my knees, a signal from my legs to stop and rest.

  ‘I suppose. I’ll have a search around for any decent location for starting a fire and getting some sleep for the night.’ Aiden just tiredly nodded. Soon, we’d found a small clearing within the murky trees with some solid ground.

  ‘It ain’t much, but I guess it’ll have ta do.’ So, we set up a temporary encampment with a fire, some furs and a cauldron. We hastily made some stew and went to lie down in our two piles of furs, our poor excuses for beds, to eat it.

  ‘Is it just me, or is this soup a lil’... spicy?’ I frowned at Aiden’s comment. That could either mean very good news or very bad news. I quickly checked the ingredients we used for the stew.

  Chopped Sanila mountain root? No.

  Chunks of jerky rations? Definitely not.

  Mystery (very bland) spices from the merchant back at Seafield? Hopefully not.

  That left one ingredient. The verge leaf I put in. That shouldn’t be spicy either. Unless…

  ‘Hey, Aiden, did you accidentally cut the verge leaf too long again?’

  Verge leaf was a common sea plant usually found on wet seashores. The top part was a pretty flavourless but nutritional vegetable, but the bottom part was a disgustingly bitter, or sometimes spicy cut of the leaf. It was usually sheared off easily enough, but sometimes mistakes can happen.

  ‘Err…’ Aiden rubbed the back of his neck nervously. ‘Well, maybe…’

  ‘No wonder. Thank the gods it was spicy, otherwise the stew would’ve tasted horrendous.’

  ‘...My bad.’

  As I lied down in the furs, I tried to visualise a clear summary of our activities for the day. We got to the Swampcake Islands, fought that vine creature, and trekked quite a long while before coming to rest here. Tomorrow entailed a whole bunch more walking to get to the crypt, but hopefully we’ll find something good once we get there.

  I smiled. Tomorrow was to be a good day indeed.