Moving forward I'm forced to climb over the now dead DDL that Inv killed with the egg bomb… the thought of having to clean off any remnants of it left on me makes me shiver, but I quickly push down this thought. Food is more important right now.
Climbing over a couple more obstacles and some makeshift stairs I finally reach the wall…
'Welp… the only way is up now…' I let out a sigh while thinking about this. I much prefer traveling horizontally than vertically. Mostly due to gravity being a bitch to deal with.
Hugging against the wall I jump and kick off from it grabbing onto a pole that was above me. Pulling myself up and balancing on the pole I look down towards Inv.
"Don worry Joey! il b rigt behin u!" Before I can say anything to Inv he beats me to the punch. With his quick assurance I focus back on moving up.
'I shouldn't have to worry about Inv… he's probably much better than me at traversing any environment. Just gotta worry about him not accidently running into any protorot' While thinking this I start climbing up more poles.
Jump.
Pull.
Jump.
Pull.
Engrained with doing this action thousands upon thousands of times, I easily climb up the poles.
Steadying myself on the last pole I jump and pull myself over a ledge finding myself back on solid ground.
Making a bit of space I turn around and see Inv also pulling himself up over the ledge. Without thinking I reach a paw out towards Inv.
Half over the ledge Inv stops and looks up at me in confusion.
…
"Joey? Wut doin?" Inv asks in confusion.
"I… um, was going to pull you up?" I say back in slight embarrassment. I wasn't really thinking when I did this action, it only felt natural to help him up over the ledge.
But thinking further about it would it even help? I don't know if I would even have the strength to pull him up in any meaningful way…
Before I can pull my paw back, I see Inv start reaching his own paw out towards mine. Seeing this, even with what I just thought I still grab his paw and start pulling him up.
The reality is just as I suspected.
'Yup! Definitely heavy!' Using all my strength I pull helping him up on the solid surface.
Fully standing up, Inv looks at me with a sheepish smile.
"T-tank u" Inv thanks me, his face glowing a faint light red.
"Yeah, no problem" I let out a huff saying this while still trying to catch my breath. Even using all my strength just now I'm still sure Inv did most of the work pulling himself up.
'Am I seriously that weak compared to him?'
…
'Whatever… still got to touch him!' Thinking about the positives of my mediocre strength I start looking around.
If we were going to continue, we are going to need at least 2 more spears.
Still holding the spear that I used earlier against the lizards will get us past a certain part, but the next part will need 2 more.
…
'Only 1 spear…'
Seeing only 1 spear I let out a sigh. We're going to have to backtrack and find another spear which will waste even more time…
"Joey wut wong?" I hear Inv ask beside me.
Looking at him, I explain.
"We need another spear to climb up the wall Inv, with the spear I'm holding and the one over there, we still need one more to get past the annoying part"
I say annoying part, but the entire climb itself is annoying with all the protorot.
"U-umm… wut bout ta tunel wight dere?" Inv stutters while looking around and spots the tunnel somewhat above us pointing at it.
"Won't work, the exit is blocked off with protorot" I shake my head while saying this. Originally this would be the natural way of climbing up the wall but thanks to the fucked-up world were in, it's just not that easy.
"p-pwoto wot??" Inv asks with even more confusion, his head turning at a 90- oh wait, now it's a 120-degree angle.
Used to the weird quirk that is Inv's unnatural flexibility I just find it more endearing.
'And hot'
"You know the little blue orbs with the X mark on them that stick around all over the place? When you touch them it's almost impossible to escape from and it pulls you in an-" I stop myself from continuing. Reminding myself what dying to protorot is like makes me shiver. Besides, I think Inv can already understand.
"O-oh… dos…" Inv mutters out, his skin slightly turning brown.
Seeing his reaction, I can tell he also doesn't have the best of memories with protorot…
'Of course he wouldn't, its fucking rot. Who the hell would like rot?'
Not wanting to talk any further about the blue orbs of death. I start turning around to head back down to look for another spear but stop when I feel something on my shoulder. Feeling the tingling sensation that Inv's fur gives me, I turn around and see Inv looking at me with his paw on my shoulder.
"W-what's wrong Inv?" I ask Inv trying to not show any embarrassment by the sudden contact.
"Yu sai we onl ned tu clim up wit spere, wight??" hearing his question I slightly calm down by his seriousness.
"Yeah, we need at least 3 spears to stick into walls so we can climb up" I tell him, this is basically what I can remember when I climbed up the wall while playing the campaign. I could be wrong, but it wouldn't hurt to be more prepared to have 1 more spear than wasting time climbing up just to find we need another spear.
Hearing my answer, I see Inv ponder to himself for a moment.
'Uh oh' Seeing Inv think to himself, I fear that I'll see smoke coming out of his ears again.
Thankfully I'm proven wrong when I see a smile spread across his face.
"I hav ide Joey!!!"
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A/N: what could Inv's idea be....