Serak Palace loomed ominously in front of Ronfar, Mauri, Boomer, the water drakes and the handful of soldiers who accompanied them. The night was strangely quiet. The huge metal doors leading inside were open.
The journey to the sacred palace had been relatively uneventful. A few wandering packs of Grousers were the only opposition they encountered before they stood in the presence of Serak.
"Onward!" the captain of the soldiers announced.
Inside they found a few bodies. Apparently not all of the priests had made it out alive when the monsters attacked. Mauri looked away as she saw a headless corpse. Ronfar comforted her as the guards investigated the vestibule.
In fifteen minutes, the first floor of the shrine had been explored fully... except for the sanctuary that led to Ruby's Dragon cave. The door appeared to be both locked and barricaded. There were also faint sounds of cracking and digging coming from one of the doors leading deeper into Serak Palace.
The party regrouped.
"First we'd better get into the sanctum... both the cave and the crest are important. If the monsters are after anything it would surely be either of those," Ronfar spoke. The others agreed.
The soldiers began to pound on the door to break it down.
On the other side of the blocked portal, a vile group of creatures was assembled. At the sound of the guards' efforts, they all stood still...
...even the Flash Lords that were making a veritable ladder of themselves in order to reach the Red Dragon Crest. The powerful item had been hung above the doorway to the Dragon cave in the midst of runes and strange markings (to both conceal it and protect the cave entrance). The Lords were currently just trying to reach it WAY above their heads.
An orange robed priest's head snapped toward the buckling door. He motioned to the Grousers and Arrow Fish on the sides of the chamber to get ready.
With a mighty charge, the soldiers bowled through the door and fell into a heap in the next room. Mauri and Ronfar quickly followed them in, the latter with his mace-like rod at the ready. The animals were last to enter.
The pile of armored guards was swiftly attacked by arrows launched from the floating fish enemies and the spiked tongues of the Grousers. Those that weren't injured charged toward the sniping creatures and engaged them in combat. The drakes began to spit streams of powerful water to deflect many of the launched arrows. Boomer's 'wings' flew off his body and sliced through several Grousers.
Ronfar promptly began to heal the hurt soldiers as Mauri unleashed a few fire spells at the creatures who attacked them directly. Then she saw the priest and the Flash Lord 'ladder' who were about to rip the crest off the wall.
Her love saw them too. The former priest of Althena quickly scanned around the room to count the current denizens. Based on the large number of nasties around, he cast a Destiny Roulette.
Ronfar's luck proved uncanny as usual. Not only the stack of boulders crush an enemy rather than an ally, but it happened to select one of the Lords at the bottom of the chain. Nearly three-quarters of the Flash Lords became a messy spot on the palace floor.
The member of the Cult of Zophar was furious... until the impact of the boulder caused the already hanging crest to tumble off the wall into his hands. He grinned evilly and checked the room. His minions were being defeated by the constantly healed soldiers of Raculi.
The priest smirked and began to chant. When he finished, he mumbled to himself.
"Let's see how they do against this dependable guardian."
Ronfar charged toward the priest as he and the remaining Flash Lords turned tail and ran into the dragon cave. He then skidded to a halt as a huge, familiar shape appeared in front of him.
A Corpse Crusher.
The beast immediately tried to slam Ronfar into paste with its arms. The gambler luckily hopped to the side as the soldiers started to stab the Crusher from the sides.
"Ronfar! Duck!" Mauri shouted from the other end of the room as she also finished chanting. A small orb of fire flew out of her hands and raised up near the ceiling of the chamber. The room flashed with red light and the orb was no longer there. In its place floated a large Firebird. The phoenix's claws flew rapidly at both Ronfar and the Crusher.
Again, Ronfar escaped injury as the claws darted upwards and held one set of vines in the beast's 'hand'. In addition to keeping it from throwing the snake-like vine at one of his allies, the blazing claws lit the arm on fire.
The Corpse Crusher roared and flailed both arms around wildly, knocking all of the guards away from its punctured and burning form. The horns on its head began to wiggle faster... a sure sign that a Nightmare was about to be released.
Mauri reacted without delay. She commanded the Firebird to raise its wings. In the next five seconds a storm of small meteors slammed into the ugly monster. Its claws finished torching one set of vines and flew to the Crusher’s other arm... too late...
The vines flew directly at Mauri and wrapped around her form, squeezing and crushing her.
"Mauri!!! Quick, get a blade over here! We need to cut her out of it!" Ronfar yelled. Boomer quickly flew to his side. The two of them ran to the trapped beast-girl and worked to get the compressing green limb off of her. The guards that were still able to stand attacked the Crusher again, but were batted away by its flaming limbs.
Ronfar didn’t see that the Corpse Crusher was now sucking in small specks of red energy.
The cult priest and his entourage ran through the Red Dragon cave, seeking another way out.
They were not more than two hundred feet (and several rooms of lava) from the doorway into Serak when an angry female voice stopped them.
"Running around MY cave... and stealing MY crest! You guys are about to have a bad day!"
A pink-haired woman in a red dress was glaring at them. At her side was what looked like a whip of some sort... but it was currently burning brightly.
"Or should I just say... GOOD NIGHT!!" Ruby yelled as the enemies tried to cast spells. Her flame whip flew in a wide arc.
The priest and Lords screamed in agony as they burned. The humanoid Red Dragon grabbed the crest and looked at the scorched forms. Then she changed into 'dragon cat' form and flew back toward the palace.
"Guess I'm going to need to clean up later."
Unlike her lover, Mauri DID notice the Crusher preparing to fire a Pulsinator directly at them. Still in great pain as the vines slowly were cut off of her, she looked at the Firebird.
The phoenix soared directly at the monster and exploded, canceling the attack. The soldiers and serpents tried to charge the Crusher one more time and were successful. Within moments, the burning beast crumpled on the floor.
Ronfar finished removing the constricting vines and hugged Mauri.
"Ow! Haven't I been hugged enough already?" she said, grinning slightly as Ronfar healed her.
The soldiers checked each other. There were a few serious injuries, but nothing a little magic and a good night's sleep could cure. Boomer and the drakes were untouched. They were too small to be hit normally.
The palace was quiet except for two sounds now. The faint cracking that they heard before had slowed a bit... and the sound of rapidly flapping wings coming toward the party from the dragon cave.
Those who were fit to keep fighting readied themselves... but soon relaxed as they saw a small pink cat with wings and a bow on her head emerge from the doorway. She had the Red Dragon crest between her paws.
The boomerang lizard's expression was one of amazement.
Ronfar looked at both the cat and the lizard and thought to himself, "Look... two flying freaks."
"Ah... I see you cleared out the rest of these pests," the floating cat said as it emerged.
"Ruby! Thank the Goddess that you got the crest back," Ronfar spoke.
The dragon cat flew over and settled on the gamblin' priest's shoulder.
"Of course... it's MY cave after all. I have to keep it from being 'infested'," she giggled and dropped the crest into Ronfar's possession. "You better hold onto this for now in case more of them come looking for it here."
The dragon cat looked at the four strange animals.
"Who are your new pets, Ronfar?"
Boomer growled.
The brown-haired man replied, "Um... not exactly sure. We found 'em in the fields around town helping a kid. They seemed friendly enough and wanted to come along."
Ruby flew down to the floor and looked at the lizards. "Hm... first that little dragon, then the monster attacks and now strange animals. I'd like to know just what the heck is happening all over Lunar now."
"What dragon?" Mauri quested.
Ruby took to the air. "I'll tell you about it later. First we'd better see if anything else needs to be 'cleaned' outta here."
Ronfar and Mauri began to cast healing litanies on the more injured guards as the others began to investigate the rest of the palace with Ruby, Boomer and the drakes.
They returned in about twenty minutes. Their armor and weary expressions showed that there had a few battles in that time.
Ruby reported that in the rear of one of the lower floors of Serak palace there were a number of Necromancers, Arrow Fish and Necro Knights... apparently trying to break through several walls. Aided by the fiery breath of the Red Dragon and the attacks of the quartet of lizards, the soldiers made short work of the surprised invaders.
"But what could they be looking for?" Mauri quested.
Ruby replied, "Other than my cave and the crest, I don't know of anything else either in or under this place that could be important to them."
"Hm... if there IS something hidden then we'd better not let them get it," Ronfar noted. Then, to the captain of the guards: "Better get some guards here to watch in shifts... and a repair crew of some sort. We'd best not it make it easy for the monsters to uncover whatever they were digging for."
"Yes sir."
Ronfar, Mauri, Ruby, Boomer and the water serpents headed back to Raculi with a small detachment of guards. It had been a relatively long night for all of them.
Ronfar and the beast-girl reported the events to the town's authorities and walked home to sleep, still in possession of the Red Dragon crest. They found the 'zoo' had taken up residence in one room and were already out cold. They shrugged and shared the other room (which, of course, was not a bad thing).
As midnight approached, Alisia started to yawn. Leo was walking in front of her, sword at the ready, and Whisp was before him, acting like a makeshift torch.
"Are we almost through, Leo?" she asked, stretching her arms above her. Her legs ached a bit.
"Almost, Alisia. If I have been counting the number of caverns we've passed through correctly, then this is the last one. Afterwards all we'll have to pass through is a single clearing and we're out."
The forest hadn't been nearly as dangerous as Alisia expected it to be. They occasionally had to deal with an Albino Baboon or two (which were too stupid to try and talk with Alisia) and a group of goblins. Both encounters proved simple.
As they neared the cavern exit, a horrible scream pierced the air. Low gruff voices could be heard nearby.
"W... what was that?!" Alisia exclaimed in alarm.
"I don't know," Leo responded sternly. "I fear we are about to find out though... because it came from the direction ahead of us."
Alisia sighed and manifested LightningFang.
Another shriek was emitted as the trio entered into the last clearing of the Forest of Illusion. Before them was a strange sight. Another horde of goblins were literally crawling atop another form... that of a light blue skinned woman. It appeared that both her short hair and her entire skimpy outfit were made completely of small leaves. A pink blossom stuck out of the top of her head. Emerald-colored vines were wrapped around her arms and waist... some of which were showing signs of being cut and dripping forth a similarly colored liquid.
The goblins, some with blades or clubs or torches, were muttering as they attacked the creature. The trio heard gurgling lines like: "'Cause of you we only had half of our buddies to trash that town! It's your fault, plant-witch!"
As Alisia watched this spectacle, something inside was urging her to do something.
"That's a Plantella! They're powerful plant spirits which are very wild and dangerous to be around at any time," Leo reported.
The goblins jabbed the Plantella with the torches again. She screamed in pain and thrashed her arms about. The vines knocked over a few goblins, grabbed them and began to choke them. More of the ugly creatures cut their comrades out of the strangling grips and kept slamming the Plantella with their clubs.
Whisp was also staring quite intently on the attack, occasionally glancing at Alisia.
"We'd best not get involved... its a mindless battle of beasts," Leo added.
The girl looked at him, still feeling that strange urge.
"You heard what they said. She killed half of the force that was to attack Dalton... indirectly helping us!"
Leo gave her an inquisitive look. "Huh? That may be true, but the creature didn't plan on aiding us when it attacked them... it was most likely just hungry. What? Do you plan on helping that thing?"
Alisia watched as the goblins trapped the Plantella inside a ring of burning torches. She yelled and tried to keep away from the flames that were spreading on the ground toward her. Her vines latched onto several nearby trees and shook them hard. A small downpour of thorns rained on and impaled several of the attackers. The plant woman wailed in pain as the rising flames began to burn her outstretched vines and she quickly retracted them.
The thunder mage looked at the beast-knight and exclaimed, "Yes!"
She ran toward the ring of torch bearing goblins, accompanied by Whisp with a look of determination on his face. Alisia immediately began to zap and shock the nearest goblins.
Leo was surprised as she ran off.
"Wha? Wait... its dangerous! Oh hell..."
He ran after her, rapier first.
The Plantella continued to cry out in pain... and then noticed the red-haired sorceress running around the circle of goblins, slicing a few and hurling bolts of lightning at others. She knelt on the dirt floor, still cringing from the approaching flames with her eyes shut tightly.
Alisia tore into the vile little creatures with an amazing fury. As she polished off another one who tried to bat her head with its club, strange words came into her mind. She mumbled them to herself and realized that she had just learned a new spell. It seemed strange that the dragon gods that she prayed to back on Earth would be able to teach her more at this distance... but she didn't care. Alisia said a brief prayer and a 'thank you' to them and chanted her new spell as Leo joined the fight with an Earth Fang spell. A set of stone jaws burst from the ground and crushed the life out several of the nasty little buggers.
The thunder mage's spell finished with a yell of "TandleLash!" Alisia felt a strange tingling in her free hand. With a flash, a long whip made of electricity appeared in her open palm. She gripped it and smirked.
As Alisia began 'whipping tail', Whisp had soared over to the flames surrounding Plantella. He immediately started to absorb as much of the blaze as he could... growing bigger with every gulp of flame...
The goblins were panicked by now. Those who had encountered the duo of Leo and Alisia before had long since ran away. Those that stayed were pierced by blades and tasted the sting of the girl's new lash.
It was over in a few minutes. Alisia coiled up the electric lash and it vanished. LightningFang was still in her other hand as she turned to look for Whisp and the plant spirit. Leo's silver sharion remained out though, as he checked the charred and oozing corpses of the goblins for survivors. A smell like barbecued chicken filled the air, rising off the more heavily electrocuted dwarves.
Alisia and Leo found Whisp near the Plantella, who had opened her eyes and stood up to survey the aftermath.
Whisp was currently quite gorged after absorbing all the flames. He resembled a giant ball of calm yellow fire, nearly as tall as Leo's shoulders. He blinked as they approached and a small puff of smoke came out of where his 'mouth' would be.
Alisia giggled, "Did you have enough to eat?" She turned to Leo. "Any bodies of water close by that he could empty the flames into?"
Leo, slightly stunned by the sight of the FAT fire elemental, nodded.
"A little to the west, just over those trees, should be the sea."
Whisp nodded slowly, blew another puff of smoke (which actually was a 'burp' for him), and sluggishly rose above the tree tops. The giant flaming ball then moved toward the waters nearby.
Alisia turned to face the strange plant creature.
Plantella stared straight into her eyes... and suddenly knelt down with a look of what could be considered respect at the young woman.
Alisia dissipated LightningFang and walked closer.
What are you doing, Dragoon?! Don't get near that thing!" Leo shouted.
The mage turned her head.
"Don't worry... she seems kinda thankful I think. I'm going to try and talk with her. Oh, put away your sword too... weapons may make her nervous."
Leo shook his head in disbelief as a faint sound of steam erupting came from the west. He put his blade away and watched Alisia approach the plant woman.
"Are you okay?" Alisia whispered.
The response came in a sad tone, "I fine."
Alisia nodded. "Is there somewhere safe we can sleep for the night?"
"Here you sleep. I keep you safe," Plantella paused and whispered as well, "Are you nature guardian?"
Alisia was puzzled and shook her head. "Not that I know of... I'm just a traveler. Why do you ask?"
The plant spirit responded, "No one else ever help me or plants... you remove burning pain from me and forest."
The mage didn't exactly understand.
"The fire? It's gone... I couldn't let the goblins harm you... you indirectly helped us first. Thank you for the safety tonight."
Plantella nodded and stood back up, her hair blossom no longer drooping.
Whisp, now tiny-sized, returned to Leo's side and emitted a slight crackle of sound like a sigh. Leo watched as Alisia finished talking and walked back toward him.
"She's said we can stay here tonight and she'll watch over us. I told her Whisp isn't dangerous either."
"Are you sure we can trust this beast?" Leo quested.
Alisia nodded, "She seems very grateful... she even called me a guardian of nature or something. Ever hear of anything like that?"
Leo shook his head.
"Anyway, it seems safe. By the way, she does speak our normal language... it wasn't necessary for only me to speak with her," Alisia noted.
Leo looked with amazement at the electric mage, then at Plantella. His expression lightened a bit as the plant spirit smiled at him. With a short bow, he spoke.
"Many thanks for your kindness, m'lady."
Plantella nodded as Alisia giggled a little.
The trio settled down and had a small snack. Plantella had a little of their food, but later went over to the goblin bodies to either clean up or perhaps have a little more to eat.
The words of the plant woman echoed in Alisia's mind as she lay down to sleep on her pack. Whisp was already 'snoring' when Plantella covered both Alisia and Leo with giant leaves... makeshift blankets.
Leo only wondered how far away the Destiny could be... and the White Dragon crest located in his former captain's chambers.
In the skies over the mountains north of Takkar, numerous dark shapes were flying toward the northwest. Many were carrying large boxes or crates. A large number, however, groaned as they struggled to keep a huge black shape in the air.
The small shape in the lead, which had larger wings than the rest of the flyers, thought to itself.
"Under the cover of night we'll move most of the findings... the ground forces have already moved except for those at the outpost who'll make sure that anyone who happens upon the site will not keep their discovery for long..."
The figure laughed evilly.