As
the midday sun reached its mark, the group finally reached a rock that seemed
to be propped next to the stone wall of a mountain, which was placed so well
that even Riku thought nobody could move it.
But when the troop leader walked up to it and said some strange words in
an ancient language, the rock suddenly disappeared into thin air and revealed a
passageway leading into the mountain.
With that, the troop leader stepped back and motioned Link, Riku, and
their two companions to enter. They each
grabbed their own packs from the soldiers that insisted that they carry them
for the few going inside to save their strength, and ventured inside. As soon as they were all in, the troop leader
explained to them,
“Now your journey
begins. We pray for your success and
good fortune. We will return to the
village, but will hide away the entrance to this cave until one of you touches
the stone from the inside. There will be
provisions for you in a bush over yonder if you make it out alive and need provisions
for the trip back. If you do not come
back alive, then a hero’s funeral shall be held for you in our village. Good luck, and may the power of the goddesses
be yours in your quest.” With that said,
he re-stated the spell and the stone appeared in front of the door again. With that, darkness fell around the
group. The mage casted an illumination
spell and filled the room with a blazing light.
He formed the spell into a small sphere and placed it on a stick so that
the mage could focus on attack magic rather than the illumination spell the
whole time. With the light to help the
party now, they could see their surroundings a lot easier than before. They were in a slightly squeezed corridor
that could have two people wide but not much more. The hallway was as tall as a pear tree and
was easy for a person to bonk his head on.
The group proceeded forward down the corridor until they reached a fork
in the road. Riku groand a little bit,
then turned to the group.
“Okay, since it seems we
need to split up, who should go with whom?”
Before they could determine this however, the mage walked up to the
fork, and tapped his staff on the ground causing two different glowing magical
mice to scurry down the two different hallways with the greatest of speed.
“Seeker magic. Allows me to scout the road ahead and scan
for traps and monsters. Now I must have
absolute concentration to make sure that I am able to see where these passages
lead and if I need to split the magic in case there are more forks after this
one, so please don’t talk to me directly, but you are free to talk amongst
yourselves.” Riku nodded his head and
sat down behind him and faced the other members of the group. They didn’t say anything for a few minutes,
then Link piped up and asked the warrior from the town,
“So… My name is Link. What’s yours?” The warrior was surprised by this at first,
but smiled and said,
“My name is Thrito, and
the mage over there is my brother Traito.
We are not related by blood, for my parents died of disease about a
century ago. I was still very young when
this happened, so I was adopted by a new young family in our town back then,
and they welcomed me like I was already a part of the family. I was reluctant at first because I had just
lost my real parents and was not wanting another family after that ordeal. Alongside that, I was the only child in that
family. My new adopted parents were
unable to have children due to the rules about childbirth for half-elves in
Malendor, which is where my step-parents escaped from initially. Then a few months after living with my new
parents, they decided to adopt two other children into the family. One was Traito, who is with us now, and
Daramich, who left years ago, but I will get to that later on. Traito was about my age, but Daramich was a
well thirty years older than me. They
had the same background as I did. Their
parents fell to disease, and didn’t have a family any more. So we all had something in common, which
helped us become brothers in a way. We
would do things together such as explore the forests surrounding our small
village, we would go off with the soldiers in training, and we would always sit
in our family wardrobe and dream of what it would be like to explore the world
beyond the boundaries of our village. So
we made a promise that when we were old enough, we would find a way to see the
world together and see the lands that our adopted parents grew up in. Despite the fact that the two of them didn’t
have fond memories of that place, they still respected it as their
homeland.” Riku turned his head towards
Thrito and said,
“They did have feelings
for their homeland…Did something happen to them?” Thrito fell silent for a second, and a few
tears formed in his eyes. Link placed
his hand on Thrito’s shoulder to let him know that he didn’t have to continue,
but Thrito cleared his throat and continued his story.
“To answer your question
sir, yes, something did happen to our adopted parents. Around fifty years ago, our parents went into
the mountains to try and find some rare plants that could cure the disease that
had begun to plague our town at the time.
While they were gone however, a hurricane rolled in and hit the
mountains worse than it did most years.
After the storms subsided we tried to find our parents, and succeeded in
finding our father in critical condition, holding our mother dead in his
arms. They tried to find shelter in a
nearby cavern, but it happened to be unstable, and it began to collapse. As they tried to escape the falling rubble, a
rock fell and crushed her head. Our
father, so overcome by grief, once he got outside the cave fell to his knees
and didn’t move an inch until we found him after the storm. I will never forget what I saw. He seemed more like a shell of the man he
once was as he had been beaten by the wind, rain, and falling tree limbs and
branches. He was bleeding from his head,
had lost sight in his left eye, and had twisted his left ankle about 180
degrees. The healing mages did their
best for him, but his condition was too critical. He died a few days later, and never said a
word. Me and my brothers grieved. Even though he wasn’t really our father by
birth, he had become a father to all three of us. It hit Daramich harder than it did the rest
of us. Almost all his life, he had been
bounced around from foster home to foster home, and began thinking that his
life on the streets was all that was left for him. Then our parents took him in, and he found a
new purpose in life. He found me and
Traito, and a new dream of seeing the world.
Ten years after that, he decided that he wanted to leave the village and
explore the world. Since me and Traito
still had ties to this village, we decided to stay here and live in the
village. So before Daramich left, the three
of us made a promise.” Thrito held up
his wrist to reveal a woven band with a greenish color. “We all took a piece of our mothers old
headband and made it into three different bands to put on our wrist. We promised that one day, these three pieces would
meet again, and that we would all see the world together when that
happened. Since then, the last we saw
Daramich was he was beginning his journey to the northern shores to go off as a
ship hand. From that point on, we don’t
know what has happened to him or where he is in the world. So we have been preparing ourselves, honing
our skills in the town’s army, and saving up whatever currency we could achieve
in order to travel the world and find our brother. Until then, we will serve this village with
our lives.” Riku was astounded with his
story. He was about to say something
when he saw that Link had dozed off yet again.
He punched him in the shoulder to wake him up.
“NO TEACHER! I WASN’T
SLEEPING IN CLASS!” As Link got his
bearings back, he apologized for yelling so loud. Thrito then asked for the story of Link and
Riku, and Riku told him everything they knew so far. As soon as Riku finished telling him their
story, Traito finished concentrating and told them what he found.
“The passage takes several
turns left and right splitting every hundred yards or so. I did find the correct path to go
however. I let the magic seekers create
a path of light on the ground for us to follow.
At the end of this maze is a large open room with a tree in the center. Behind it is the gate. Off to the left I saw the original blocked
entrance and giant roots all over the floor.
I didn’t see anything else, so I can assume that we are good to go. And since I am the only one who can see this
pathway, I ask you to please follow me.”
“Uh, Traito, I told them
our story, and they told me theirs. So
you can trust them and call them by their real names.”
“You TOLD THEM?! Thrito, we don’t even know who these people
are! How could you trust them with such
a great secret?!”
“Because they gave me
theirs too.” Traito seemed to consider
this, but then turned around and motioned them to follow him. They started walking down the different
passages and strange turns, with no sign of natural light anywhere in
sight. Every corner they turned they
hoped would lead them to the place Traito spoke of earlier, but it never
came. As they were walking, Link noticed
Riku was working on something in a little test tube while they walked down the
corridors. He tapped Riku on the shoulder
to get his attention.
“Don’t ask. I’ll tell you later. Right now, I need the utmost concentration.” Link understood and kept walking. Suddenly, they heard random noises coming
from farther back in the tunnels. Link
turned around to suddenly see several skeletons rushing towards them with
rusted swords. Link screamed a little
bit and drew his sword and put his shield on his arm. He was about to rush into them when Traito
casted a spell causing the skeletons to fall to the ground. But as soon as he did this, the light from
the illumination spell dimmed. More
skeletons started to rush towards them and Traito began to cast the spell
again, but Riku grabbed his arm to keep it from casting it.
“If you keep doing this,
then we will be without light and be overwhelmed by this enemy. Listen to me; did you see a secret room or
hidden passage where we can hide in this labyrinth?” Traito pondered this for a minute while Link
and Thrito took their weapons and started to fight off the skeletons. After a few waves worth of pondering, Traito
motioned them to follow him. Thrito and
Riku took point while Link guarded the back with Traito telling them which
direction to turn at each fork. They did
this for about three forks, but on their way to the fourth fork, Traito yelled,
“Thrito! Strike this wall with your sword!”
“What?”
“Trust me brother!” Thrito whacked the wall with all his might,
nearly breaking his sword, revealing a hidden door handle that could only be
revealed by a great force. Sort of like
when a bag of air is squeezed to inflate a balloon. Traito opened the door and ushered everybody
inside quickly. As soon as they were all
inside, they shut the door and Traito casted a sealing spell using up the last
of his magic causing them to lose lighting altogether. Riku fumbled through his pack to find some
flint and a piece of wood and lit a torch.
Thrito then took out a bag of herbs from his back pocket and offered
them to Traito. Traito gladly accepted
them and popped a few herbs.
“So…What does that do
exactly?” asked Riku. Thrito spoke up
and said,
“These herbs are made from
special plants that are grown by soldiers in their gardens. They are herbs that help replenish strength
and magical mending during battle. Not
all of these herbs are instantaneous though.
Some herbs replenish everything in a moment allowing the eater to
continue the battle midway through at full strength, but these herbs take a
long time to grow. The ones in my pocket
are common herbs that replenish everything twice as fast. So when a normal mage could take two days to
regain all his magical mending, an herb could replenish it in one.”
“So how long will it take
this herb to replenish your magic mending Traito?”
“About three hours.”
“Very well then. We’ll break out the provisions here and get
ourselves ready for whatever lies ahead of us where the gate lies. Traito, does this room lead anywhere? Or are we trapped in here until you regain
your magical mending?”
“If I remember right,
there is a ladder in the back of this room that leads to a large hidden room
that leads to the garden.”
“Why is there a place like
that in here?”
“This building was built
long ago supposedly by the goddesses, but at first, it was just simply the main
room with the tree and the gate. As our
people discovered it, they built more and more rooms into the mountain as a
means of living quarters for our towns long stays for our rituals in front of
the gate. Alongside that, they built a
garden for those who wished to spend time in isolation from our village to try
and re-center themselves would always have a nice quiet place for them to do
some simple gardening to help calm the mind.”
“So why is there a
labyrinth that stretches for odd infinitum in this place as well?”
“Several years ago
somebody stumbled upon a trap door hidden within the gardens that lead to a
room similar to this one. There they
discovered this labyrinth and used the same magic I used to find a possible
exit or secret chamber we didn’t know about.
The vastness of this labyrinth is so vast that not even we know how far
it stretches. For all we know, it could
stretch on forever. As if it was meant
to imprison someone or used as a torture chamber. We found a passage that ran next to the main
room and created a wall to make sure that we could use this labyrinth in case
if somebody discovered us and we needed a place to hide. When we discovered the opening on the
mountainside, we then used it as an emergency entrance to seal the entrance to
the garden and the labyrinth when the archeologists discovered the main
room. And when we needed to know how
much the archeologists possibly knew about the existence of our village, we
would have spies hiding in the garden listening in through magic spells. After we forever sealed the main entrance to
the main room, we made it a habit to use this side entrance to make sure that
we could perform our rituals. Every time
we would use the magic spell to help us find the way through the maze to the
main room.”
“Why didn’t anybody try to
make a map or set of directions to reach the main room through this
labyrinth? It seems like that would make
the most sense.”
“Sadly, it’s not that
simple. You see, every time we enter
this labyrinth, it seems like it changes every single time. Long ago we would try to make maps and
directions to reach the main room, but every time we came back, the directions
would just simply get us lost so we stopped trying to make maps and relied
solely on our magic to make our way to the main room. However, now that we have access to the
garden, reaching the main room should be quite simple. Follow me.”
With that, he stood up and fumbled around in the back corner until he
found the hidden ladder and propped it up to the trap door, and made his way
up.
“Hey, can somebody pass me
the torch please?” Riku handed him the
torch through the open trap door, and then Traito told them the coast was
clear. Riku went up first followed by
Thrito, then Link in suit. What he saw
next surprised him. As his head poked
through the hole in the floor, he saw Traito placing the torch over something
that looked like a trough. As the torch
touched it, a streak of flame went down in a straight line and around the
room. It was a giant holder for oil to
illuminate the room in case magic was unavailable. Link wondered why there was no natural light
from the sun, but then he looked up and realized there was no celling to begin
with. And what he saw was that the stars
were already out in force, and he realized that they were in the tunnel for
longer than he thought. Traito sat down
on a nearby stool and said,
“We’ll make camp here
tonight and wait until the morning to enter the main room.” With that, he took some of the vegetables
that were still fresh and started a small fire in the fire pit that the people would
use for cooking and started making a stew with the vegetables he could
find. As soon as he finished, they all
ate and got the sleeping gear out for the night. Riku volunteered for the first watch just in
case the monsters found a way into the garden.
As everybody else fell asleep, Riku pulled out his vial that he was
working on earlier, and took out another vial that glowed a golden color, and
poured it into the other vial. When that
vial began to slowly glow gold as well, he began to stir with a tiny little
rod. He did this long into the night
until it was Link’s turn to take watch.
“My lord, a report from your
troops looking for the Guardians.”
“Tell me what they have
found Elitran.”
“One of the Guardians in
Unto has fallen out of sight and we are still trying to find her. As far as we know, she is hidden deep within
the maze below the city.”
“They had better not fail
me for their sake. Continue with your
report.”
“A squad of undead seekers
encountered a group of warriors and a mage within the cursed labyrinth my lord.” Demise shuddered a little when he heard this.
“Who was the Guardian in
that group.”
“We don’t know my
lord. We do know that the mage is about
five feet tall with black hair, then one of the warriors has brown hair and
seems to work for the hidden village of half-elves. The other seems to be of Galorian descent
with blond hair and wields a sword and shield.
The third is about six feet tall with silver hair and has the strength
of a thousand men.” Demise suddenly started
laughing in loud guffaws. Elitran was
slightly confused but did not interrupt his master.
“So, the one with spine to
face me is trying to find a way to stop me.
Very well. He doesn’t pose a
threat. The Gatekeeper there knows his
duty. However, the Guardian in Unto
worries me. Are you sure you cannot
destroy this specific gate, Elitran?”
“Yes my lord. Even with the magic you gave me, I could not
destroy it. Could it possibly be the door my lord?”
“If it is, then I cannot
allow the Guardian to find it. Take our
forces hidden in the labyrinth and make sure that they make their way to
Unto. I don’t care how they get
there. They have permission to destroy
everything in their path.”
“The order shall be given
my lord.”
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