ChaoZ: A Royal pain in the elves.

"The spoilers said only one would die though, so the rest of us are safe."


"... I'll just go check out what that corridor leads to."

Before anyone could reply the assassin was gone. Only to return half a minute later.
"Found the stairs, was guarded but I took care of it."
"Lead the way then.."
Riaden was right, the stairs were just around the corner. And so were two high elven guards, both on the ground and not moving. "..are..are they dead?"
"No, I paralyzed them. They'll be back up in about two hours."

Jex's hand wrapped around his staff unconsciously. His mind telling him to be ready for the looming danger.

'One of you is going to die.'


It echoed in his head. He had played it off before but realized that spoilers may be annoying, but they did not lie. He looked at the group of outcasts, heroes, or villains, whichever you prefer, and thought to himself quietly. Who was going to die? Riaden, seemed like the unlikely target. A founder of ChaoZ, he was strong enough to handle himself. Az, the greatest alchemist he's met by far, and she was a genius. Rol, idiot. But idiots don't die. All that was left was himself and Ziome.

"Ziome."

He whispered to himself. He would not allow it. He shook his head and looked forward, he needed to focus. The spoilers are the least of his concern. Glancing at the two paralyzed guards and the stairwell leading deeper into the ruins he looked at Riaden, waiting for him to lead the way. He refused to leave Ziome's side.

"Alright, let's get going. I doubt the prince is gonna wait for us."
 Riaden nodded and led the group down the stairs. The floor before them was even more run down than the one above. Moist and fungus covered the walls. Even the floor showed signs of water damage. But the water itself was not there anymore. In the distance footsteps sounded.

Riaden paused for a moment. "..Soldiers patrolling these hallways. Quite a lot of them judging from these sounds. We need to be carefull. I'll go ahead to silence them. You stay here and try to avoid them. If they spot you try to take them out as silently as possible. They should not be allowed to alert the others."
He dashed off faster than the naked eye could see.

Not too long after that a soldier came up behind them and saw them. He ran back to alert the other guards. "Shit! Someone stop him! My fire spells are too noisy."

Jex followed closely behind Ziome as they descended deeper into the ruins. Clutching his newfound staff, every foreign sound made his finger twitch, flicking the staff suddenly. When they had come to a stop, Jex looked behind them as everyone listened to Riaden. Glancing at the crew, he heard the guard start running away.

"Sagitta Magica! Series Ventum!"

He shot out an arrow of wind that sped through the dusty air, aimed at the guard's back.

The arrow shot through the elf's back and his momentum caused him to slam face first into the wall. Dust flew up where he hit the ground. "Phew, that was close... We should probably hide him from the other guards."

Ziome remained silent. This place gave her the creeps.

"What if the wall had an alarm button guys? Should we check it out?"

The bounty hunter asked curiously, not even pretending he noticed the change in atmosphere that some of the other guild members were going through. 

"Or just, hope for the best?"

Jex looked at the guard, a trace of magic smoking from the end of his fingertips.

"Rol can hide the body, I imagine he's pretty good with it."


He started forward, creeping along the wall careful as to not make too much noise. He really didn't want to deal with the Elven Guards. He was not prepared to fight properly with only the daggers and the freshly bought staff. He patted his back, making sure the knives were still in there.

"Forward then?"

"If a place as old as this has an alarm button then I doubt it's still working."

Az nodded. "Yes Rol, you hide the body. Riaden told us to stay here but it's best to move on, just in case someone heard that. I'm sure Riaden can find us again wherever we go. Although I am not hundred percent sure he'll actually try. But meh."

The group moved forward slowly. Giving Rol time to hide the body. "Ugh, We really aren't suited for stealth missions like this."
"What's that smell?"
 Ziome said while pinching her nose. "Just the mold. This place can't be healthy to stay in. Riaden better come back soon."

Footsteps could be heard in front of the group. "More guards? dammit." The footsteps were getting louder, obviously someone was coming. "Maybe it's Riaden?"
"No, Riaden doesn't make that much noise while walking. Shit, nowhere to hide in this hallway."
Just then Three guards came around the corner. It wouldn't be long before they noticed the group.

"Rol can hide the body, Rol knows more about hiding bodies, Yeah, Rol. mrggh." Rol mumbled, looking for a place to hide the body, dragging it behind him. 


"Well I've yet to kill someone, experience my ass." He found a prime looking location and popped the flooring stones out, removing them with shadows. He placed the body in the spaces unoccupied by stone. The body fit, but the stones being placed back would have been an issue; had it not been for the old stones bottom half crumbling. The bounty hunter placed back stones, or half of them and filled in the cracks with shadows. The shadows would stabilize to the stones so they wouldn't move and wouldn't be inconspicuous unless someone tried to stick their fingers in the cracks. Stepping on the remade floor, Rol deduced it was 'good enough' and returned to the group. Upon coming closer to his guildmates, he heard 'shit, no place to hide in this hallway.'


"Fuck." Rol whispered to himself, looking around for something to hide behind. 

Jex readied himself as the guards came across, hand poised over his staff. He looked about and realized Az was indeed correct. There was no hiding. He moved his hand away from his staff and chanted,

"Silica Magica. Series Ventum."

He swung his hands forward, whipping at the air in front of him. The magic flickered from his fingertips and sped towards the guard creating tiny bullets of air. He knew his aim would be bad considering he had not mastered the spell yet so he shot 6 times at the general direction of the guard.

Two air bullets miss, Two hit one guard and take him down. One hits and takes down the other guard. The last one only grazes the third guard's arm. He panics and turns to run back. But suddenly something flashes by and the guard falls down.


"I told you to stay put."
Riaden says as he appears in front of the others.

"And then some dude saw us so we figured if we stayed it would happen again. But then we moved and it happened again anyways. Wooo."

Rol walked over to the fallen guards, looking them over. 

"How do we plan to hide these guys?"

Jex stumbled and walked forward, stretching his fingers.

"Now what?"

He glanced towards the 3 guards. If this was all that was in his way, there would be no problems keeping Ziome alive. But it made think about the Spoilers again. What were they saying? Who was gonna die?

"Whatever, I'll take care of the bodies. You guys go ahead. Head around that corner those three came from and keep going until the second door to the right. It's more of a hole than a door but it probably used to be one once. You then just keep going, lways turn right. The corridor spirals down slightly eventually you'll reach the stairs in the middle. I'll probably have caught up with you before then." Riaden turned and walked towards the bodies. "Oh and if you see a puddle of water, you went left somewhere and you need to tun back. But you're not that stupid, right?"


"Screw you Riaden. Anyway what if we are found by a guard again?"


"Won't happen, I already took care of the ones on this floor. There are probably more down stairs though. I heard a lot of noise coming from down there. So don't go down until I catch up."


"Fine.."


"He already took care of them? How fast is he even?"

The group follows Riaden's instructions and heads around the corner. After a while they see two doors to the right. The first one still looks like a door but the second one doesn't. Only the shape of the hole and the corridor behind it give any hint that it once was a door.
The group goes into the corridor. The corridor went down in a spiral just as he said. Only it was barely noticable. If he hadn't pointed it out before then nobody would have noticed. To the left they see corridors that are much steeper. Puddles can be seen in some of them. But there are none of those in front of the group.
"Seems like we're going the right way.. "
"The smell is getting worse too. Ugh."


"Just cover your mouth and you'll be fine. There's the stairs."
Riaden says as he pops up behind them. In front of them is indeed another set of stairs. Talking can be heard coming from the floor below but it's too muffled to understand any of it. "It seems our prince is down there."
"You can understand that gibberish?"
"You can't? Useless.."

"Riaden large set of skills is compensation for his lack of penis." The bounty hunter whispered, more of a reflex then to be mean. 

"But prince guy, let's get him.. Yeah?"

Ziome blushed and struggled to keep her laughter in at Rol's comment.
"Seriously Ziome? It wasn't that funny. Probably true but not that funny."
"I-I'm sorry mistress." She says quickly before covering her mouth to hide the giggles she can't contain.

Riaden grunts while slowly walking down the stairs. The others follow.
The next floor seems to be filled with high elven guards. Riaden signals the group to halt. "I can't take them all out without being noticed. We'll need to sneak around if we want to find the prince." He whispers.

He looks around for a while before pointing ahead. "A small hole in the wall over there. It seems like a secret passageway. Untouched, so the High elves either don't know about it or don't need it."
"That's a bit too small though."
Ziome had to hold herself in to not burst into laughter.
"What are you laughing for this time?.."
".. a bit.. too small." Ziome snickered lightly.
"Oh geez."
"...What are you, ten? Anyway if we're quick and quiet we can make it bigger  and fit inside. Hopefully-"
Ziome snerked again.
"Gods dammit keep quiet, if they hear us we're dead."
"I can't really blame her at this point.. "

"Oh man, if Ziome dies because of her laughing fit Jex is going to kill the fuck out of me."

He looked at the hole Riaden lead them to.

"And we make this larger how? Quietly at least, not sure how that'll work. I don't have quiet explosives."

Jex stumbled through the spiraling corridor, ears perked at every muffle and every sound, he wondered what had awaited the guild members at the bottom of the staircase. looked down at the steeper corridors and thought about what could possibly be at the bottom. Old canals? Bedrock? Seemingly unending mazes? Spiked ends? He shivered at the thought. Dead bodies. He followed close behind Ziome. 

The group stopped and he heard the mumbling, none of which made much sense to him. He shrugged and looked to Riaden. 

"I don't have a way to get in without alerting them either."

"I would just go on my own but if they find you sitting around it'll be bad for me too. Opening it with our hands would be the quietest way. This floor is crumbling apart already so it wouldn't be hard to dig in there. But then we'd be spotted before we even got started. I never should have brought you guys."



"Oh and you could get in there by yourself? Not even you could sneak around in here with this many guards."


"..."

Ziome finally managed to get her laughter under control. "..Maybe from above?"
"These are the only stairs. So no."
"Forget about stairs. If we mark the hole somehow so we can locate it from above.."
"..You mean we open up a hole in the floor above that secret hallway?.."
"Yes."
"That may work if we're quick enough."
"Ziome do we have any Mana markers?"
"Yes, mistress. We have two."
"Give Riaden one so he can mark the hole."

Ziome nodded and handed Riaden a small blue pellet. "Use this to draw an arrow on the ceiling above the hole." Riaden nodded and flashed to the wall. By the time the group noticed the blue glowing arrow on the ceilling, riaden was already back.
The group then went back upstairs and made their way to the arrow. The spiral hallways made tracking it down a bit hard but soon they saw a faint blue glow coming from one of the side corridors.
The arrow showed through the floor and showed them exactly where to open it.
"Now we just need a way to open the floor."
"Don't worry, me and Ziome know a way. Ziome, the second marker."
"Yes mistress." Ziome began drawing a circle where the arrow pointed.
She then drew a complicated symbol within the circle."Ready mistress."
Az nodded and stepped into the middle of the circle as Ziome stepped out of it. Az then put the tip of her sword (kai) in the middle of the circle and released some mana. The floor insude the circle turned liquid and Az started sinking into it.
"This.. isn't supposed to happen."
Az's face showed signs of distress.
"Mistress! Oh no!"


"Just kidding." Az laughed as she sunk away.
Ziome gave a snerk too. She was in on the joke apparently.
She then followed her mistress down the circle. While still snickering.
Riaden was not amused.

"What the fuck just happened?"

The bounty hunter was confused, he also wasn't paying any attention prior, so he that didn't help.

"Oh shit it's like quicksand but much more magical."

Rol started towards the circle.

"Down we go."

Jex followed behind the squad as they did whatever they did. When Az got worried, he put his hand on his staff, prepared to act.

"What."

He said, pronouncing his confusion. He then looked into the shifting ground and stared, poking into it with his staff.

"Do we just... Jump in?"

Riaden shrugged and followed the others down the uh floor.
They came out underneath the floor and right in the secret passage way. It was dark and the floor was wet. The elves talking echo'd through the walls but it was still not understandable. Once Jex had come through Az made another floating flame to light the way.

The way in front of them was filled with puddles. A few rats and other small vermin scattered away from the light. The path before them was narrow. Small cracks in the walls revealed a glimpse of what the elves were doing, not much. Most of them seemed to just be standing around or patrolling. Fortunatly it seemed the elves could not see the group walking through.Riaden took the lead again and used the sounds of the elves to navigate the passage ways.
"I really hope these aren't sewers."


After a while of walking Riadden stopped and pointed to one of the cracks in the wall. "I can hear the Prince, he's talking to some woman." He whispered.

"Is he seducing the woman? See, I pretend I now a thing or two about seducing a woman. But help would be appreciated."

Rol asked, quietly, but still loud enough the entire party could hear.

"Are you sure it's a woman? Maybe just a dude with a hella high voice?"

"I don't know, it's voice sounds like a woman. It's footsteps sound feminine. But for all I know it could be a talking cactus with womans boots on."

"How do footsteps sound feminine?.."


"A man walks differently than a woman. If you learn to use your ears properly you can get as much information from sounds as you can from visuals."


"... Shouldn't we listen in on them. That was the point of coming here, right?"


"Right."

Az, Ziome and Riaden approach the hole to hear better and possibly see something.

"If he is seducing her, you are peeking onthem and that makes you perverts. Ppppeeeerrrrvveerrttssss."

Rol whispered, but he was clearly disappointed. He wanted to see something.