Round 28

The air thickened with the stench of decay and corruption as creatures burst forth from beneath the road, their movements converging on the party's position exactly where Silra had calculated earlier. Jeane's eyes narrowed, her teal gaze locked onto the rusted key in her pocket, as she sensed the ancient power emanating from the earth. The scuttling sounds grew louder, the ground trembling beneath their feet.

Sister Hale's divine energy crackled with a fierce intensity, illuminating the dark shapes emerging from the shadows. Jeane's eyes flashed with warning as she felt the ancient wrongness pressing against her arcane defenses, whatever was emerging from beneath the road recognizing her power specifically and attempting to latch onto it according to the energy signatures she read across the earth.

Silra crouched low in the ash-choked road, her teal eyes tracking the precise movement of the creatures with practiced ease. She had calculated the timing patterns across wrongness signatures, confirming that this was no random chance event. The rusted key in Jeane's pocket suddenly felt like it was burning against her thigh as corruption intensified its attachment attempt.

As the creatures closed in, Silra began to unwind the rope coil, tracing each precise movement with a practiced hand. She cataloged threat vectors instantly, her mind racing with the implications of what she had sensed earlier. The rusted key's significance remained unclear, but Jeane's words echoed in her mind: "Whatever is emerging from beneath the road recognizes my power specifically and is actively attempting to latch according to what I'm reading across energy signatures."