Tenebris' novice level training went by fairly fast by everyone's standards. True to Sans' word, the very beginning of the training wound up giving Tenebris a 'bad time' due to how Sans did his training. However, because of how fast he picked up his lessons, Sans accidentally delved into some of the more intermediate lessons, though he wrote it off as an acceptable loss. One thing that Sans thought was interesting was the fact that Tenebris had some dark purple highlights in his hair. The dark haired boy confirmed that his hair used to be brown, not black with purple in it.
By the time they were done with the training, Tenebris had mastered shadow barrier manipulation. While he only needed refining in that area, true to Papyrus' word, he was able to develop two different barrier styles, depending on the situation. The barrier type he was using before were 'Filter-Type' barriers; They cannot block all damage from going through, but it can be cast as a passive enchantment. While it cannot outright deny attacks, it had a flat, one-time magic cost and lasted longer than the other type, which were called 'Deflection-type' barriers. These ones out-right prevented any attacks, and everything else, from getting through, making them the pinnacle of what Tenebris could manage. He had to sustain them if he wanted them to maintain, but he can place them anywhere he wanted.
He had picked up some new offensive capabilities as well. Because shadow magic worked more differently than the magic Sans was used to, they were able to procure some interesting results. Tenebris can turn his hands and fore-arms into shadow with each finger being razor sharp claws, summon shadow spikes around him, launch shadowy spears, and create pools of movement-slowing darkness. He upgraded his shadow bolts to being able to fire many of them at once in either a scatter-shot fashion or as a rapid fire stream. Creating big balls of shadow energy was also within his grasp now.
While the focus was on offense and defense, Sans also decided to sprinkle in some utility magic as well. At the moment he can enhance his jumping ability, enhance his strength to lift heavier things even though it does not increase striking power, and allowed Tenebris to develop his own way of teleporting. While he couldn't do long-range teleports like Sans, he was able to master short-range teleports he dubbed 'shadow steps' and can use them in rapid succession, though using too many at once can be taxing on his magic reserves.
Selendis, Frisk, and Papyrus all showed up to watch the training and all three were surprised at how well Tenebris retained the training in such a short amount of time. It only took a full day until he had finished his novice training, though Papyrus was panicking about something right at the end of it all.
Sans shook his head after his final training session with Tenebris. "wow, bud. you made this even more painless than i thought."
"I'm kinda amazed at how well I can retain information regarding magic." Tenebris shook his head. "As much as I want to know, we don't have the luxury of doing so."
"hey, don't worry about it. until you come back for your intermediate lessons, i'm going to try and dig up any information on shadow magic i can. don't expect too much though."
Tenebris smiled. "Thanks, Sans. Hopefully what you've taught me so far will be all I need, but you can never be too sure. For now, though, I should probably get going; Selendis might be getting impatient." All this got was a chuckle out of the skeleton.
When Tenebris reached the Snowdin Inn, Frisk and Selendis were already good to go and were talking with a very nervous Papyrus. Frisk noticed his approach and waved. "Tenny, you finished up?"
"Yeah, we should be good to go."
Selendis nodded. "Then we should go. Papyrus, didn't you promise us information on how to reach the surface?"
The skeleton snapped to attention. "OH, RIGHT! IF YOU REMEMBER WHERE WE HAD OUR BATTLE, CONTINUE FORWARD FROM THERE UNTIL YOU REACH THE END OF THE CAVERN. THEN, WHEN YOU REACH THE CAPITAL, CROSS THE BARRIER."
Selendis held up a hand. "Hold on, what's this barrier all about?"
"WELL, IT'S THE MAGICAL SEAL THAT'S TRAPPING US ALL UNDERGROUND. ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING CAN ENTER, BUT NOTHING CAN EXIT EXCEPT SOMEONE WITH A POWERFUL SOUL... LIKE YOU THREE! HENCE WHY THE KING WANTS TO ACQUIRE A HUMAN!"
Tenebris put a hand on his chin. "So we should be fine crossing the barrier. That leaves only one problem: the capital."
"AH, ALMOST FORGOT TO MENTION. TO REACH THE EXIT, YOU'LL HAVE TO PASS THROUGH THE KING'S CASTLE."
Frisk shivered. "Is that the only way?"
"SADLY YES. HOWEVER, THE KING OF ALL MONSTERS... WELL HE'S..." The humans expected him to say powerful, cruel, or ruthless, which is what Toriel painted him as. They almost fell forward when Papyrus said, "HE'S A BIG FUZZY PUSHOVER! EVERYBODY LOVES THAT GUY. I'M PRETTY SURE IF YOU JUST ASK HIM, HE'LL LEAD YOU STRAIGHT TO THE BARRIER HIMSELF!"
Selendis coughed a few times. "W-well, if you say so. We trust you, Papyrus."
"WHILE IT GOES WITHOUT SAYING, I'M VERY GLAD YOU DO. NOW I'LL LET YOU THREE CONTINUE ON, WHILE I HEAD HOME TO BE A COOL FRIEND!" Papyrus lets out a laugh that... sounded somewhat forced, but the humans didn't think anything of it. With a wave, he ran off.
Frisk nodded to the older humans. "No time like the present, I suppose." They nod at her before steeling themselves to continue the journey.
When they entered what looked like a new area, they all noticed that it was getting warmer. While it was still chilly enough to warrant some protection, it was pleasant rather than unbearable. A nearby monster told them about echo flowers and their properties before they saw Sans and greeting him. "finally heading into waterfall, eh?"
"Waterfall? Is that seriously the name of this place? What next, a hot area named Hotland?" Selendis deadpanned. When Sans started laughing, she facepalmed. "Who named these places?"
"the king, obviously. his knack for unoriginal and uncreative names is pretty well known."
Tenebris sighed before chuckling. "Sounds a bit like me. I do TRY to give meaningful names, but they could be classified as unoriginal as well."
Frisk giggled. "That's part of what makes you so endearing!" Tenebris blushed at this and ruffled her hair in response.
Selendis shook her head. "Anyways, thanks Sans. Be seeing you around."
When they reached a waterfall with a sign by a box hater, Tenebris decided to check behind a waterfall after dodging some boulders. This baffled Selendis. "What are you doing?"
"Checking behind the waterfall. If Okami as taught me anything, its that if there's a waterfall, go behind it. More than likely a secret or some goodies."
This got a loud facepalm out of her. "Stop projecting games into real life!"
Frisk tugged on her sister's coat. "If that wasn't true, then where did he go?"
Both of them stared at the cascading water until a voice rang out from behind it. "Hey girls, I got you a present!" Tenebris emerged with what looked like a dusty tutu that could fit anyone.
Selendis let out a loud squee before quickly covering her mouth. Frisk gave her an amused look. "I forgot. You like tutus a lot."
"U-um, not when I'M wearing them, though! In fact, I think you should wear it, Frisk!" Frisk sighed before nodding. Tenebris snapped back to attention; he had started blushing over how adorable that squee sounded.
Frisk got the tutu on under her sweater before deciding to take off her ribbon. This confused the older humans until she wanted to give it to Selendis. "You aren't wearing anything that can give you additional protection against magic attacks."
"Are you sure? Nothing's stopping you from wearing both the tutu and the ribbon." Upon seeing Frisk's stubborn look, Selendis sighed and accepted it. Tenebris was having an internal panic attack now; Frisk looked pretty cute wearing the ribbon, but Selendis somehow made it work even more. It took a lot of his willpower just to not start freaking out over it.
They continued until they entered a room with rather ominous lighting. All three of them felt a massive chill down their spines when they recognized an ominous presence in the room. Tenebris quickly whispered, "Quick, hide in that grass!" The sisters didn't even question it before diving into the grass. Peering through it, they saw an imposing figure completely garbed in armor.
What horrified them was when Papyrus suddenly joined it. "H... HI, UNDYNE! I'M HERE WITH THE REPORT I PROMISED YOU A WHILE AGO... UHHH... REGARDING THOSE HUMANS I CALLED YOU ABOUT AT THAT TIME..." The humans felt betrayed. Was Papyrus really scheming behind their backs the whole time?
"... HUH? DID I FIGHT THEM? Y-YES, OF COURSE. I FOUGHT THEM VALIANTLY!" There was another voice, but the humans couldn't make out any words. "... WHAT? DID I CAPTURE THEM..? W-W-WELL..." Papyrus sounded terrified. "NO. I TRIED VERY HARD, UNDYNE, BUT IN THE END... I FAILED." More murmuring. "W-WHAT? YOU'RE GOING TO TAKE THEIR SOULS YOURSELF?! B-BUT UNDYNE, YOU DON'T HAVE TO DESTROY THEM! YOU SEE..."
Frisk whispered, "I don't think Papyrus meant to sell us out there, now that he's trying to convince... this Undyne character to not pursue us."
Selendis nodded. "Maybe we shouldn't throw him under the bus so soon..."
"Quiet, or they'll hear us!" Tenebris hissed. The sisters clamped their mouths shut and he regretted being harsh.
When they zoned back onto Papyrus, they could here Undyne speaking to him in a somewhat harsh tone until Papyrus said with a somewhat defeated tone, "I UNDERSTAND. I'LL HELP YOU IN ANY WAY I CAN." Through the grass, they saw Papyrus walking away, dejected and torn.
Frisk waited a bit before moving. Selendis managed to pin her down, but the movement had caught Undyne's attention. The trio stood as still as they could, breathing shallow, shaky breaths as the monster summoned a magic spear. Tenebris slowly flared up his eye, prepared to create a diversion if needed. After looking around for a bit, Undyne dissipated the spear and vanished into the darkness.
Tenebris took a few shaky breaths before motioning the sisters to try moving again. Undyne never tried to ambush them as they exited the tall grass, which gave them all relief, but were still very shaken by the whole scenario.
Frisk almost screamed when a yellow monster shot out of the grass with them. "Yo... did you see the way she was staring at the three of you? That... was AWESOME! I'm sooo jealous that you had her attention. What'd you do to get such attention?" When the humans remained silent, unwilling to talk until they were out of the area, he passed if off. "Aw, whatever. C'mon! Let's go watch her beat up some bad guys!"
The kid ran off, though not before tripping on the way out. Tenebris managed to pull himself together and usher the sisters out of the room. "We'd best not stay in one location for too long..."
The trio was introduced to strange flowers called 'bridge flowers' that bloomed when four of them were in a row. The first room was straightforward, but the next room stumped them. They did run into a monster called Aaron, who not only had a thing for flexing, but kept hitting on Selendis, much to Tenebris' ire. He got the monster to leave her alone by starting a flexing contest, which ended in Aaron flexing himself out of the room.
When Frisk figured out the puzzle, they were startled by a ringing phone coming from Frisk's pocket. This confused Selendis. "When did you get a phone?"
"Toriel gave it to me. She said it was the only one she had outside of her own, so that's why neither of you got one. I thought nobody besides her knew the number, though..."
When she put it on speaker, they all jumped at Papyrus' voice. "HELLO! THIS IS PAPYRUS!"
Tenbris gasped a little. "Sweet mother of mercy, Papyrus, don't scare us like that!"
"AH, SORRY. I JUST WANTED TO TALK TO YOU THREE RIGHT NOW."
Frisk gave the phone a curious look. "How'd you get this number? I didn't give it out to anyone when I was in Snowdin."
"ACTUALLY, IT WAS EASY! I JUST DIALED EVERY NUMBER SEQUENTIALLY UNTIL I GOT YOURS!" That brought some humor back into the group as they chuckled.
Tenebris shook his head. "How long did that take you?"
"EH... ABOUT AN HOUR OR SO... GIVE OR TAKE TWO! AH, BEFORE I GET TOO SIDETRACKED..." He suddenly sounded kind of nervous. "WHAT ARE YOU THREE WEARING? I'M... ASKING FOR A FRIEND." This got horrified looks. Looks like Undyne was able to convince Papyrus to turn on them, albeit only indirectly. What shocked them was when he said, "SHE THOUGHT SHE SAW 'A TALL FEMALE' WEARING A RIBBON, A MALE WEARING A BANDANNA, AND A KID WEARING A DUSTY TUTU. IS ALL OF THAT TRUE?"
Tenebris whispered to the sisters, away from the phone. "What should we tell him? I don't wanna strain our relationship with him and Sans, but I don't fancy getting a spear to the face."
Slenedis sighed. "eloquently put as that was, I think we should... tell him that's correct, then switch what we're wearing... at least Frisk and I should. You should just take off the bandanna for now."
"It still feels like we're lying to him, though." Frisk whimpered.
Tenebris sighed as well. "I hate to say this, but I think Selendis has the right idea of it." Speaking loud enough for Papyrus to hear on the phone, he said, "That's correct, Papyrus."
"SO THAT'S INDEED ALL TRUE? GOT IT! WINK WINK! HAVE A NICE DAY!" Papyrus hung up.
Frisk groaned. "Now I have to take this tutu off? It was a pain to get on!"
"We have to. Actually... I'll give my bandanna to Frisk and I can wear the ribbon instead; I'll wear it on my arm." Tenebris motioned as he undid his bandanna.
Selendis nodded. "Papyrus might of heard my plan, so that's a good idea. Though... I just realized that I don't fancy wearing a tutu..."
"What? I thought you said you liked them. Time to put your money where your mouth is." Tenebris shot her a smile and Frisk giggled.
"I said I liked them when they're worn by other people, not when they're worn by me!" Selendis grumbles incoherently before telling Tenebris, "Turn around for a minute!"
He simply chuckles. "Yes, sir."
Clothing articles switched, Tenebris had to refrain from laughing at Selendis. On Frisk, the tutu looked adorably comedic. On Selendis, it looked funny, but in a graceful sort of way. Part of what helped him from laughing was him feeling like a sissy wearing a ribbon.
The next room was dubbed 'the wishing room' and the humans no longer felt scared. upon hearing some of the echo flowers in the room, they felt sad for the monsters; all they wanted was to see the real stars, yet the barrier outright prevented them that right.
What changed their mood from sad back to horrified was when they found ancient text reading the history between humans and monsters. Tenebris shook his head in disbelief. "I've heard about the Monster-Human War in fairy tales. Not only is it true, it was us humans who attacked them first..."
Selendis let out a sad sigh. "It just goes to show you: history is written by the victors and the other side never mattered."
Tenebris nodded, but couldn't help thinking to himself. Is it truly our right to survive down here when monsters are suffering this much?
They did glean more about human souls from this set of wall writings and how powerful they are. The way they made a monster with a human soul sound, it was almost like a bad thing; the drawing at the end didn't help that perspective.
After boarding a small raft to the other side of a river, they were suddenly met with ominous lighting again. Frisk whimpered. "I don't like this..."
Tenebris grunted. "Stay frosty. I don't like those pillars on the other side..."
They moved forward a bit until Selendis suddenly said, "WAIT!"
Frisk stopped. Right when she did, a teal spear struck the ground right before her, causing her to scream. Tenebris looked to the side and saw Undyne on the other side, which shot tension through his body. "Move, NOW!"
With Undyne summoning spears to throw at them, they began running across the room to escape her onslaught. Tenebris managed to put up his new barrier type to deflect spears, but that seemingly only annoyed the guard and made her summon spears from all different directions. He knew he couldn't make too many barriers, as it would tax his magic far too much to block so many projectiles.
He decided on an alternative: He created a shadow ball and tossed it onto the ground right before Undyne's path. It created a stretching pool of black energy that ensnared Undyne and caused her to move at a snails pace. He heard her growl in annoyance and started flinging a TON of spears at them as she tried to catch up.
Tenebris thought he couldn't take so many at once and yelled at the sisters, "You guys should start dodging. I can't block all of them!" Neither of them questioned as they started weaving in-between spears, though all three of them occasionally got unlucky.
They eventually powered through it all with some new injuries and dove into tall grass bushes similar to the ones that hid them when they first saw Undyne. They started crawling through it, but froze when they heard heavy footsteps behind them. As Undyne slowly approached, Tenebris once again prepped for a magic attack and hoped she didn't find any of them.
Selendis was the only one in position to really watch as Undyne slowly approached their location. When the guard suddenly brought her hand down, she had to refrain from squealing in fright, praying it wasn't Frisk or Tenebris.
Turns out that she grabbed the monster kid from earlier by the cheek. Undyne put him down with a sigh before going back. When the heavy footsteps were gone, the humans slowly made their way to the other side of the grass, breathing heavily from the running they just did.
The kid exited with them. "Yo... did you guys see that!? Undyne just... TOUCHED ME! I'm never washing my face ever again!" When the humans didn't respond he continued "Man, you guys must be feeling SO unlucky right now. Well don't worry! I'm sure we'll see her again!" He made the same exit as the first time.
Selendis finally found her voice. "As much as I applaud his enthusiasm, I'm not too keen on seeing her again..." She saw Frisk still shivering from her near-death experience and brought her in for a comforting hug.
Tenebris' mind was still reeling. He was wondering if novice training wasn't seriously enough for this area. He thought he would be capable enough with what training he had to get them at least to the next area, but it was starting to look like it wasn't enough. He forced those thoughts down for now; Frisk was scared and he needed to help comfort her.
They decided to rest near a table with crystalized cheese before continuing onward. The oppressive shadow of Undyne's presence continued to bear down on them, filling them with unease.
