(Skyseas of Gensokyo) Nazrin Quest (Part 4)

[DracoOmega]

>Dive, and it we can orient ourselves properly, continue downriver.

>You dive beneath the water's surface, then use the feel of the current against you to orient yourself downriver and keep swimming. Vaguely, you hear the youkai seem to say something else, but you can't make out the words with a couple feet of water between you. Then you hear what you think are running footsteps from the same direction.
>You hear a light splash above you. Then a few moments later you hear another and feel something brush against the back of your leg. If it was a tether, it failed to stick. You keep on moving.
>The footsteps nearly keep pace with you for a few more seconds, then seem to stop altogether.

[Hello Purvis]

>Keep going. Push our breath-holding a bit further than usual before coming up for more, then dive again.

[DracoOmega]

>Keep going. Push our breath-holding a bit further than usual before coming up for more, then dive again.

>You press forward, holding your breath past the point of distinct discomfort. You hear some more vague sounds above the water, but not distinct enough to resolve them. The seconds pass slowly as your lungs strain for breath. Finally, you decide that you've pushed it far enough and surface for air.
>The moment your head breaks the surface of the water, you feel a light impact against the side of it, followed by a sharp jerk in that direction. You narrowly avoid taking in a breath full of water as your mouth splashes below the water's edge once more.

[Hello Purvis]

>What direction is it pulling?
>Try to regain our balance and slash this tether too.

[DracoOmega]

>What direction is it pulling?
>Try to regain our balance and slash this tether too.

>To your left.
>You try to right yourself, but can't exert enough force to resist the pull without something solid to brace yourself against. Instead, you bring the sword up and sweep along your upper left, leaving a generous distance to avoid cutting yourself. You feel the tension against your head go slack, but another tether immediately sticks to your exposed sword arm.

[Hello Purvis]

Welp.

>Have we gotten a decent breath, at least?

[DracoOmega]

>Have we gotten a decent breath, at least?

>You only had time for a quick gulp of air before you had to close your mouth again to avoid the water. Enough to submerge for a couple moments, but not long.

[Hello Purvis]

>Swim toward the direction we're being tugged toward, long enough to get a good breath, then dive while she has to recover the slack, switch the sword to our other hand and try to sever the line while underwater. Hopefully the sharpness will overcome water resistance.

[DracoOmega]

>Swim toward the direction we're being tugged toward, long enough to get a good breath, then dive while she has to recover the slack, switch the sword to our other hand and try to sever the line while underwater. Hopefully the sharpness will overcome water resistance.

>You bank towards your left, keeping your head up long enough to get a solid breath, then you dive. As you move to switch the sword to your other hand, you feel a tug forcing your right arm backwards. You pull against the force and shift your right hand back towards it. Then the force suddenly changes directions and your arm jerks in the opposite direction. You... think you may just have narrowly avoided slashing yourself with it...

[Hello Purvis]

Welp.

>Get our left hand over there to get the sword already, move into the line to get some slack if we need to.

[DracoOmega]

>Get our left hand over there to get the sword already, move into the line to get some slack if we need to.

>You quickly get the fingers of your left hand around those of your right and grip tight before you cause any damage to yourself. You carefully transfer the hilt of the sword from one to the other, just as as your right arm gets yanked away again.

[Hello Purvis]

>Slash that strand and get out of here!

[DracoOmega]

>Slash that strand and get out of here!

>You slash at the strand, feeling the water resisting the sword's arc just a little. And... you miss. You're not certain whether the youkai is attempting to pull the tether away from your blade or if you simply mis-guessed the positioning. It would be ever so nice if you weren't doing all this blind...
>You try to pull your left arm close to your body and take another swipe. You feel a change in resistance partway through the attack, and the tension against your arm goes slack. If anything, the water gives more opposition to your blade than the tether did. Released, you surge onward, another pair of splashes ineffectually hitting the water above you.
>You can hear the youkai chasing after you, but she seems to be falling behind again.

[Hello Purvis]

>Does she seem to be chasing us from shore or the walls? Or do we hear her via cursing?
>Keep going underwater, until we can't stands it no more. When we have to surface for air, do out best not to expose our arms to the air.

[DracoOmega]

>Does she seem to be chasing us from shore or the walls? Or do we hear her via cursing?
>Keep going underwater, until we can't stands it no more. When we have to surface for air, do out best not to expose our arms to the air.

>You think she's running, given what sounds like footsteps. Distances are very hard to tell precisely when underwater. Otherwise, she sounds silent.
>You keep swimming underwater, hearing the youkai steadily falling behind. When your lungs start to reach their breaking point, you surface for another breath, taking care to keep your arms beneath the surface. You submerge again without hearing or feeling any attacks directed against you.
>You can feel the current of the river taking on a pronounced curvature. It takes a few moments for you to notice, but you think the youkai has stopped running directly after you and is instead running in some other direction.

[Hello Purvis]

>Take a moment to listen; can we hear her at all?

[DracoOmega]

>Take a moment to listen; can we hear her at all?

>You can still hear running, but it doesn't sound like it's getting obviously closer. In fact, it's possible it may be moving further away, but you're not quite certain; she's definitely not running in the opposite direction, at any rate.

[Hello Purvis]

>Stay on the surface and try to figure out where she is going.

[DracoOmega]

>Stay on the surface and try to figure out where she is going.

>You surface so that you can better observe the youkai's movement. While you can definitely articulate the position of her footsteps more distinctly, you are hampered by having no real idea of the layout of the cavern you're in, save for the rough course of the river. The youkai is certainly not directly approaching your position, nor is she fleeing along the way you came. Her course sounds very roughly perpendicular to these. It... may be a similar direction to where the river feels like it's starting to curve towards, although you can only sense the flow locally, and even then only approximately.

[Hello Purvis]

>Try to get an estimate of how far she is from us, should the river pull a U-turn, so we know when to dive again. Also try to note roughly where she stops, should she stop.

[DracoOmega]

>Try to get an estimate of how far she is from us, should the river pull a U-turn, so we know when to dive again. Also try to note roughly where she stops, should she stop.

>You continue swimming at the river's surface, monitoring the youkai's trail as best you can. While you can't tell whether the river is doing a full u-turn, it does continue to curve sideways. The footsteps shift from behind you to somewhere vaguely ahead of you. Their position has grown much harder to pinpoint. You think she must be in a tunnel of some sort and the sound you are hearing is it echoing out of wherever this tunnel connects with the river. At the least, this implies she probably can't see you from where she is at the moment.
>The current takes a sharp turn in the opposite direction and the footsteps fall further away again, though they do not stop or slow. You scrape your side along a rock as you round the corner. It feels as though the current is growing stronger again.

[Hello Purvis]

>Opposite direction in that it made an S-Turn or a U-Turn?
>Take a moment to try to work the pain out from the scrape.

[DracoOmega]

>Opposite direction in that it made an S-Turn or a U-Turn?
>Take a moment to try to work the pain out from the scrape.

>Something approximating an S-turn, in any case. Given that you're only estimating this from the feel of the current around you, there's a good chance you're not heading in quit the same direction you started in.
>You tread water for a moment and let yourself wince at the scrape, but as far as today's injuries have gone, it's fairly ignorable. The youkai's footsteps continue to grow more distant.

[Hello Purvis]

>Go with the flow for now, let our ears do the seeing.
>Can we tell, based on the water noises, how close the walls are on either side?

[DracoOmega]

>Go with the flow for now, let our ears do the seeing.
>Can we tell, based on the water noises, how close the walls are on either side?

>You continue to travel along with the current as it winds one way and then another. You have another close brush or two with either rocks in the stream or the cavern walls themselves, but sustain nothing more serious than minor scrapes. The footsteps are starting to get distant enough now that you're having a hard time tracking them at all. They're somewhere distantly off to one side, you think. Possibly ahead, as well, although you feel like you've changed direction often enough that you can't quite be sure.
>You think it may be varying as you progress, but sounds narrower here than it has for a while. If you had to guess, you might say it fluctuates between 10 and 15 feet wide.

[Hello Purvis]

>Let the tide carry us, keep out sword arm as well below water as we can. Try to feel ahead with the other when we can and not upset ourselves.
>Keep an ear open for odd sounds, and for the area to open up again.

[DracoOmega]

>Let the tide carry us, keep out sword arm as well below water as we can. Try to feel ahead with the other when we can and not upset ourselves.
>Keep an ear open for odd sounds, and for the area to open up again.

>You let yourself flow with the current, keeping the sword below water and feeling ahead with your other hand as best you can. This does help avoid any more painful brushes against the terrain, though slows your progress considerably. The footsteps soon become vague and indistinct and then essentially disappear altogether.
>You keep your ears out as you continue along the river, your course turning one way and then another. Every now and again you think you may hear some sound in the distance, but they're too vague to be certain and certainly too indistinct to place more accurately than 'somewhere a fair distance away from you'. You hear no signs of movement near you, no cries of other spiders or footsteps, just the sound of the river flowing onward.
>After a little time, you believe you hear the river widening again, though still not expansively so.

[Hello Purvis]

>Does it seem to be slowing or getting less rough?

[DracoOmega]

>Does it seem to be slowing or getting less rough?

>A little, you think.

[Hello Purvis]

>Switch the sword back to our dominant hand, and resume swimming. Listen for anything else unusual and try to minimize our sword hand's exposure.