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Gaius had ceased his yelling as the others started showing their guild emblems. If they had given in, there wasn't much point in trying to argue it. Although, Ander did bring up a good point. How was the man going to see their guild emblems from up there? This was a problem. A problem that could be solved! Rushing over, Gaius grabbed Veilen and lifted him up. "Can you see it now?" he called out, but received no response. Setting Veilen down, he turned to look at Ra. "I need help to throw him. If we throw him high enough, they're bound to see the guild emblem!" Gaius explained. Together, he and Ra grabbed Veilen and hurled him up into the air as high as they were able.

Skadi used Quick Blitz


At the mention of Thea and Yana, Alastor tensed up and for a moment he stopped healing. Yana dead, he half expected. He always knew the girl's destructive tendencies would get the better of her, but Thea being alive was a shock. He had assumed her dead, and now he found out that not only was she alive, but she was captured? He resumed the healing, trying to remain as visually unsettled as he could muster. Once the healing was done, he stepped back. If Thea was indeed captured, he knew exactly who would've captured her. Sapphire Eclipse had her.

"If that guild has her, taking her back would not be simple. You have seen their power firsthand, and you have also seen Thea's. We need Thea if we are to accomplish our goal, but I doubt they would give up a captive so easily. A guild is the thing keeping her captive, it will take a stronger guild than that to get her back and crush them once and for all" Alastor said, his voice showcasing no emotion. "We must gather allies, Orpheus. We will see who will join our cause, and who will not. Those who accept will fight for us, those who deny will be killed and using your particular talents will serve us. We will cut a bloody swath through all that stand in our path, killing any and all that oppose us for all time" the magician stated, a grim tone to his voice.

If he was going to start a guild, he could not bear the emblem of another. Gritting his teeth, he lifted up the sleeve of his left arm and put his right hand above the guild symbol that was there. His hand began glowing a dark red as it began radiating intense heat. He placed the hand using fire magic over the top of it and began his work. The heat was intense, but Alastor remained strong, gritting his teeth through the pain. Halfway through the process, he could no longer remain quiet, and with tears from the pain welling up he began yelling out, swearing profusely until at last the guild emblem was no longer on his skin. It had taken extraordinary control just to burn away the top layer of the skin so that his arm would still be able to be used. It hurt a lot, but there was no indication he had ever been part of Magus Ascension.

His job done, he turned to Orpheus. "I may have failed to kill Sapphire Eclipse when I was assigned, but now that I know their strengths and weaknesses, they don't stand a chance. When Ezekiel sent that boy to deliver a message, he challenged the guild, and ultimately it proved to be his downfall. We lost the battle, and they believe they have won, but I promise you this, Orpheus: It will be us that are the victors of this war" Alastor said, his face deadly serious.​

Skadi cast aero on mouse army member 10

After stealing boats, nearly throwing each other overboard on the boat, and walking through a dangerous forest, their biggest obstacle was now a rather dickish gatekeeper. Taking a deep breath, Gaius prepared to respond. "Maybe if you wanted to be notified, you wouldn't put yourself on a cursed island in the middle of freakin' nowhere! Or maybe you could, I don't know, make a ****in' bridge or something! Or you could try this new invention, it's called postal! Yeah I hear it works great, you could get a postcode and send it to us with your address, and then we could mail you a letter! So I guess we'll see you in a few weeks, and then you can get this curse lifted, that sounds great right? But do you want to get a letter, or do you actually want somebody to do your job?! Open the bloody gate and let us in, this is your damn notification!" Gaius yelled, raising his voice as loud as he was able to in an effort to get the point across.

Skadi wasn't quite sure what had just happened. One minute she'd been walking, the next she had found herself to be the size of a mouse. Apparently, she'd been shrunk by some rat wearing a crown or something. Well, this was a first. The ice mage had seen a lot of things, but a talking mouse was not one of them. To make things more confusing, the broken nutcracker from before was fighting the mouse king, while they were engaged in combat with his soldiers. Skadi had never been one to like rodents, they didn't scare her but she certainly wasn't fond of them. Brandishing her mage's staff, she brought it forward and channeled her magical energy into it. From the tip of the staff a fierce gust surged towards the mice, attempting to raise them into the air as it did damage. Talking nutcrackers, talking mice...what was next, talking owls?

Skadi used Aero!


Caleb was still pretty annoyed at the fact he hadn't been able to stay and defend. However, all thoughts of that vanished as the princess and one of the Pegasi began conversing. He nearly fell off of his own mount from the shock, but managed to hang on. He listened to the responses though, not liking the sounds of Wenlock any more than he had when he'd first appeared. It only made it harder not to try to go back, but the warrior remained strong, turning his attention to some of the questions that were on his mind. The moment Brietta mentioned that she would answer any questions they had though, he couldn't help himself.
"What are you?"
"Why are you pink and the others aren't?"
"Can the others talk?"
"Why did we run instead of taking advantage of the fact Johanna made us stone proof?"
"We have ranged magic, why wouldn't that have worked?"
"Whose bright idea was it to give the man a magic sceptre with the power to turn people to stone?"
"Do you have any other powers?"
"Can't we just go back to the guild and get other people to help? I'm sure somebody has magic on the same level as Johanna, maybe the S class wizards can actually do something"
"Why can't Annika just say she'll marry him? It's not really binding until the ceremony, but even if its official, there is such thing as divorce, and this way we save everyone without a hassle"
"Why does the princess look so much like plastic?"

Once he had finished, he stopped and simply waited for the response, still shocked about the talking horse but more shocked about how many questions he'd had.

Caleb used interrogate!​

Spoiler: Saint Dane...and obligatory reaction to Samsara

As Dane entered the Great Forest, he was immediately overcome with a feeling of disgust. There were so many woodland creatures around. They were defenceless, and that was appealing, but they were all alive. They didn't seem particularly happy; apparently after 300 years, they still couldn't get over the death of just one deer, and that was just kind of sad. I mean, it was just a single death, it wasn't that much. So, Dane decided to actually be a good guy. He'd do his part to help out the woodland creatures in getting over the death of the prince several hundred years ago.

Walking forward a bit, he'd only just stepped away from the dark corridor when a small bird flew down in front of him. It was a black and white bird, specifically a magpie; a bird that had never before been seen in a forest such as that. Driving something extinct, that should help them get over it, he thought to himself. The bird chirped happily to Dane, and that just wasn't on, so immediately the man's scythe went into action. The scythe hit the bird and grabbed it out of the air, before slamming it into the ground and killing it immediately.

Now he had a new problem though. There was something dead in his way. Usually when something got in his way, he killed it, but if it was already dead what was he to do? He couldn't simply move around it, that would be straying from his original path and everyone knew that ended up getting you lost, and he couldn't walk over it; what if he misjudged the distance and got corpse on his shoe? That would be just disgusting. A smirk came over his face as he remembered Alissia's reaction to Dain's dead body. That was the answer. Immediately, he snapped his fingers. "Meatshield, Samantha, whatever the hell your name is now, I want all these woodland creatures around here dead. Slave, something appears to have died in front of me. Clean it up now!" he demanded.


Juliet had charged after Dane, but she wasn't stupid. She knew that if she tried to attack the man outright, things wouldn't go well. She wasn't sure of his combat capability, but he wouldn't be so outgoing and confident if he wasn't at least a little good. The girl that questioned her mothering ability and well, magical ability, was interesting and yet annoying. "Mother was of light, father was of dark. Best of both worlds, and my daughter here got the same thing as me. Keep your mothering advice to yourself, I'm not in much of a mood to deal with it. If I didn't think it was safe, she wouldn't be here" was all she said, trying to focus on keeping an eye on Dane.

Spoiler: The Hunt for a God

"Your carelessness is forgiven, timelord. Don't make a habit of it though, if you ain't careful in the arena you'll get dragged off to a horrible exercise filled with destroying barrels, ruining urns, and doing jumping jacks on the hydra's back" Hunter said, making it exceptionally clear what they the consequences of going AFK were before walking through the dark corridor.

As Hunter arrived on the steps of Olympus Colosseum, he looked at the area above. This was his chance to prove how awesome he was, to show everyone else he wasn't all talk. If he went there and won in any of the arena battles, he'd get a crapload of crowns, a new job, and bragging rights. He took a step forward, but froze. He didn't have the Umbrella, that was with Beuce. What would he do if he couldn't win with an umbrella? Win regularly? Screw that, he had to defeat them in increments of 1 hp; no more, no less!

Turning around, Hunter walked down the steps and towards the underworld. He made his way over to the entrance to the caverns, and turned around to look at the party. For a group with autofollow turned on, they sure were slow. "Screw finding the hero. Lets become heroes ourselves and beat the shit out of the goddess. All we have to do is beat a god and we become one, pretty sure that's how it works right? So, lets go find....lets find Hercules. Some people have beaten regular Hercules before, but how many do you think have beaten zombie Hercules? If we go find him and throw all our potions at him, he'll die, zombie status is OP. So, hurry the hell up so we can become gods before dinner" Hunter said, explaining in a logic that seldom few could follow. He began to start walking again, but stopped shortly. "GINGER, YOU TAKE POINT. WE NEED...UH...you know what screw it, take point so I have something interesting to look at, I can't be bothered thinkin' of an excuse" he called out.

​

Caleb hadn't been sure what to do during the entire situation. He hadn't been sure whether to attack Wenlock or try to help the others escape, and because of that people had been turned to stone. An entire kingdom, Johanna, and there would be more to come if they didn't escape soon. And once again, I couldn't save them. What kind of guardian can't protect people? A horrible one, that's what. Maybe I still can though, he thought to himself.

He took a few steps forward, making sure to avoid stepping onto the ice rink as he did so. Unsheathing his blade, he glanced quickly to his side. "Thomas, people seem to think you're an idiot, but I disagree. There is a method to your madness, I think, and you seem to be a very courageous guy. Now is your chance to prove people wrong. I couldn't save Levi from Ezekiel, I couldn't save Johanna or those other people here, but there's still hope for you. Get everyone out of here, get them as far away as possible" he called out to Thomas. This is where things got interesting. He had to buy time, more importantly he had to draw Wenlock's fire away from the others. He raced over towards Wenlock, running as fast as he was able.However, he'd only gotten a couple of steps before he felt someone grab the back of his shirt and hoist him up onto the pegasus.

"No, you don't understand! I have to do something!" Caleb shouted down from on top of the pegasus. He would have continued, but the look on Lucia's face told him that he wasn't going to be allowed to try. He considered leaping off of the pegasus and trying to attack again, but it was pointless now; if he drew Wenlock's fire now, everyone else would have a good chance of being hit aswell. With a huge sigh, the guardian hung his head in shame, defeated.


Skadi hadn't said a whole lot during dinner. Things seemed to be awkward between her and the rest of the group after she'd openly defended both Ezekiel and Thea, but she didn't regret it. She'd done what she thought was right and she stood by it. After dinner, she hadn't gotten much sleep. There was a lot on her mind. Memories of what Yana did to her still lingered, as well as the look on Levi's face before he, well, lost his face and everything else. The girl shuddered. She'd never forget that.

She was brought back to her senses by the sounds of clanging downstairs. While it didn't sound like anything unusual, it would certainly make it harder to get to sleep than it already was. Standing up and letting out a yawn, the ice mage decided to follow Alessia's idea and investigate. "I have no idea what that sound was, it was probably nothing. Still, we won't be getting anymore sleep while it's going" she said. Taking a step forward, she turned around to look behind her. "So, what're you waiting for? Lets go beat up whoever's stopping us from sleeping" she suggested. Did she actually say that? She hung around Gaius far too much, she'd have to work on that.


Alastor sat up. He was outside of a strange building, but what had happened? A few moments later, his memory fixed itself. Ezekiel, the war, the attack on Sapphire Eclipse. Everything returned. He had failed Magus Ascension. However, more importantly, he found himself wondering what had happened to the others. Slowly the man shakily got to his feet and began the long walk towards what had once been the guild hall of Magus Ascension.

What he found was not what he had expected. Damage could be seen all around the guild hall, in fact he was somewhat surprised that the place was still standing. As he walked, he became aware of his foot standing in something soft. How unusual. Looking down, he appeared to have stood in a pile of sand. No, not sand, it was far too dark. Ash. He'd stood in a pile of ash. "Well, I did warn them about Ezekiel" he said. Disrespectfully, he decided he didn't want the ash around, so he kicked it a few times and pushed the majority of it to the entrance, causing it to be scattered to the wind.

He proceeded to search the majority of the guild hall. He spent quite a while looking, but to no avail. Everyone was gone. He'd never cared much for Yana, her methods were far too unpredictable to rely on, and Orpheus was useful but a little sadistic as well as overconfident, so he had gotten them into more than one problem there. Then there was Thea. The little girl with so much power, but no control over it. She was naive, but if she got serious about things then her enemies often struggled. She was his favourite though. Thea reminded him very much of the way Alastor's own younger sister was before her death. A look of anger overtook Alastor's usually calm face. He'd lost them all, and there was no chance of getting any of them back.

Although, maybe not all. As he entered the next room, he saw a familiar person laying on the ground, body burned quite severely but still showing signs of life. The rising chest was slow, but it was there. Walking over and crouching on the ground, Alastor held his hands over the body and allowed healing magic to course through Orpheus' veins. Just what had happened here?

Burns...had Yana done this? Had Thea? No, both of them were too loyal to Ezekiel to ever betray him. If Orpheus was back, that meant either he'd succeeded, in which case the Sapphire Eclipse guild hall wouldn't have been there, or he'd failed. That would explain it. Like Alastor, he too had failed. Magus Ascension had fallen, Ezekiel was presumably dead, and there was nobody else around to carry it on. And yet, Alastor hadn't given up. They'd taken what little joy the magician had left in his life. He would return, and this time there would be no holding back. He would have to build up a force of his own, but he would get his revenge. First the guild emblem needed to go, then he would have to make a start. For they had taken his little sister, and he would not rest until each of them lay dead. He spoke gently to the man on the ground before him, watching the healing magic working.

"Orpheus, you will not die here. I have need of you yet, necromancer. You should be thrilled, for I'm going to give you something you no doubt desire; the chance to create as many corpses as you wish, starting with Sapphire Eclipse"


​

Glen had said nothing the entire trip thus far. He'd never gotten along particularly well with strangers, being naturally shy, so starting a conversation was exceptionally difficult for the boy. However, the magicbands and lanyards had sparked his interest. Visually they looked pretty standard, but if they were anywhere near as good as claimed, they would surely be something valuable to have. Reaching forward ever so casually, he grabbed a red lanyard and a red magicband+. "Hey, my name's Glen. Any of you been to the park before?" he asked, suspecting the answer was probably 'no' but deciding to ask anyway.

Skadi simply hugged Thea back as the girl cried into her. "Things will be fine now, don't worry. Nobody hates you here. Here at Sapphire Eclipse, the past no longer hurts. It doesn't hurt because we're all fighting for a better future, one where nobody has to cry again" the ice mage said. It was surprising really. In the span of about ten minutes, Skadi had learned more about Thea than she did than any of the others, except for Gaius, Caleb and Silvia. She sat there for a moment more, just enjoying the peacefulness that it brought and wanting to reassure the young girl before her. Ezekiel had done some terrible things to be sure, and there was no doubt he had gotten what he deserved, but if he had taken care of this child as he had, brought her back from the brink of despair when so many would have abandoned her, maybe there was some good inside of him. Maybe.​

As Thea explained her situation, Skadi felt a crushing wave of guilty overcome her. This was her fault that the girl was crying, by trying to help she may have actually made things worse. She couldn't give up though, if she did she may never overcome this and would have lost a friend before she'd really made one. The smile on the girl's face faded away quickly as she shifted herself around on the ground so rather than sitting in front of Thea she sat next to her. "You know, I never really knew my parents that well" she said.

"My folks were always busy. Constantly working, never having time for their only daughter. But, even through all that, I still loved them. I cared about them more than anything, and to this day I still miss them. A horrible woman came after my family. Why us I'll never know, maybe it was chance, maybe she had some sort of vendetta I never knew about. This woman destroyed my house, left it burning with everything and everyone inside. A young Skadi Wynter left a loving, happy family, and came back to nothing but a pile of ashes. They couldn't save a single thing. All I had left were the clothes on my back" Skadi explained, a single tear going down her cheek as she spoke. She turned her head and looked straight at Thea.

"That woman's name was Yana Aegrum. She took everything from me, and all because she just plain wanted to. There are horrible people in this world, Thea, and I can tell you're not one of them. I already grew up as a sad, depressed child, I don't want you to go through that too. I'm not going to let another person suffer the same way I did. I don't care if there are bad people in your guild, I don't care that Evanora would prefer we wait, I'm going to get your dollies back the moment I can. That's a promise" the ice mage said, a forced grin appearing on her face as she spoke. She had to be strong for others aswell, not just herself.​

Well, Mickey had done it again. He'd sent them off on another wild music chase. This mouse...clearly his interests were...unconventional. Were they going to regain consciousness tied between two brooms clothed in nothing but music sheets? Maybe it was best if they just gave up immediately, left the world with their pride intact, and picked up some random rock for a keychain on the way out. Wait, he didn't have the munny for Knockout Punch, he wasn't allowed to get a Rocky keychain yet. Well, maybe if he had some epic training montage he could qualify. He'd have to work on that, and there was no time like the present. Hell, he even had background music and a heap of targets right in front of him!

He was in the midst of his thoughts when one of the hippos bumped into him. "Hey, watch where you're going!" he shouted. This hippo had crossed the line, so it was time to kick ass and chew bubblegum; he was all out of gum. "BEUCE! CAST THUNDER ON ME!" he yelled. Summoning his keyblade, he stood with his arm raised in an incredibly dramatic and heroic pose. "I have the pow-" he started, before the lightning connected and he found himself partially electrocuted. Once the shock had worn off, and he had shown himself out for that horrible pun but quickly returned, he felt much stronger....stronger than Karina even. Okay, maybe not stronger, but just as strong, and that was scary enough. With a brutish cry, Glen punched the hippo in the face before him, shattering any bones in its skull, before bringing his keyblade sword thing straight through the hippo.

The creature before him exploded into darkness, and for a brief moment Glen stood there confused. Hippos weren't meant to explode into darkness, what was going on? It finally clicked just a minute later. It had darker skin, and its dancing was terrible. He'd just slain Obama. Wait no, this Hippo had been a follower, not a leader. Heartless it was then. He'd accidentally slain a heartless. "Guys, I got one!" he called out.

4/12

Skadi sat down on the ground in front of Thea now. "You remind me of what my friend Gaius was like as a kid, kind of. See, he's always been real sure of himself, convinced he's the strongest guy around. He was even like that as a kid, but he was convinced he was so strong that people should keep away from him. He always thought that he'd hurt people by accident, that he was so good at fighting he would do it accidentally or something. He practiced every day and night, and I've never once heard of him losing control" Skadi Wynter explained, recounting the story.

"Magic is kind of tough to control sometimes. If you can't think straight, you can't do it properly, and it'll get out of control. The trick is though, that you remember why you're using it. If you're using it for fun, remember the fun times you've had with it and you'll be okay, if you're using it to protect people, then think of all the happy times you've had with the people you wanna protect. You seem like a smart girl, I'm sure you'll get the hang of it, and even if you don't then you'll have people to help you out with it" Skadi said, doing her best to calm the little girl down.

She thought for a moment. The dolls were at Magus Asension, and people probably didn't want her going back there..but they'd defeated the guild members and their master, what would be the harm of it? "Tell you what. Right after this mission, Thea, We'll go and take you dress shopping, just for a bit of fun. Then after we've done that, we'll go to Magus Ascension and get your dollies, then get mine and we can play with them together. And along the way, I'll help you learn to control your magic. We'll work on it together, and I'll help you be so strong that even Evanora will be impressed. Sound fun?" Skadi asked, giving a friendly smile at the end of her statement, as well as holding out her hand to the girl.​

Gaius leaned against the side of the boat as Dale began his huge response. After he was done, Gaius wasn't even riled up. The guy was clearly covering something, and he made it sound like he wasn't really annoyed but it was damn obvious he was. "Eh, you're pretty predictable man, insult your ego and you feel the need to defend yourself. You say you ain't pissed but if you weren't you would've just let it slide. What do you think is worse, the new guy that claims he is great but has recently joined going down twice and having the strength to get up again, or the guy who has been part of the guild for presumably years, always gives off this attitude he's better than everyone else, but gets downed once and feels the need to inflate his own ego? Or maybe what's worst about it is the fact that the guy that's meant to be the leader of this mission, the mature one, feels the need to prove he's better than me? Afraid I'm gonna kick your ass and make ya look bad or somethin? You need to chill out man" Gaius said calmly. He wasn't trying to provoke Dale, he was just trying to figure out why Dale had a need to make himself seem like the best thing ever. He'd maintained a calm demeanour throughout his response, and he didn't even turn to look at the ice mage, instead simply watching the waves as they made their way to the island.


Caleb shrugged his shoulders at Lucia's question. "Hasn't really been much of a reason to say anything. People seem opinionated enough to keep things flowing, so there isn't a point to it unless they try something that'll screw things over horribly. Most people seem to be in favour of helping the princess learn magic, helping her make her decision, but I don't think that's what we should be doing. It should be her own choice, not influenced by anybody, but she still has to respect her parents' wishes. Personally, I think we should have just stayed out of the thing altogether" Caleb responded.


Skadi giggled a little bit herself at Thea's response. The girl was so cute, so innocent, how had she gotten tangled up with Ezekiel? "That is a very pretty dress, and I would love to play dollies with you sometime. I used to play with them all the time when I was a little girl myself. I had all kinds, but I have no idea where they would be now. Buuuut, you know what I can do? I use ice magic, and I learned how to make things with it" Skadi began, focusing just a little more on the nutcracker and finishing a near-perfect replica. She sat it gently on the ground next to her. "So, if you want, I could probably make you some pretty ice sculptures for the houses of your dollies. Do you think they would like that?" she asked with a smile.​

Spoiler: Hunter

As Hunter read Crybex's post, he saw that he had imagined burning Hunter's flesh. "You sir, are ridiculously disgusting. Some kind of twisted freak, but in an awesome way. Are you sure we're not related?" the man asked. He then decided that some form of acknowledgement of Lucien's post was in order. "I call dibs on kicking some godly ass in that coliseum place!" he declared, officially signing up for Olympus Coliseum.

Spoiler: Audrey, Juliet, and Dane

Audrey simply nodded as Alissia said she was going to postpone the story. There would be time later, she was sure of it. Or at least she hoped so, she was really interested in what would happen. Once she arrived in the room, she raced forward and hugged Juliet tightly. "Don't leave me with that man, don't do it. He's horrible, don't leave me alone" she said, sobbing against her mother's leg.


"What man?" Juliet asked, hugging her daughter back but wanting to know what happened. She was worried that Audrey was as emotional as she was; if a cheerful and happy kid like her could be brought to tears so easily, something bad had happened, she was sure of it.
With a shaking hand, Audrey raised her little arm and pointed straight at Dane.


Dane wasn't surprised the little girl had ratted him out, kind of. Kids were horrible at keeping secrets, especially the really juicy ones. "You know what, I've had a long day. Beating people up, repelling goddesses, murdering allies, it really takes a toll on a guy. So, I'm just going to avoid this confrontation, can't be bothered to have a verbal argument with a woman. Later" Dane said, clearly not caring for the opinions of others. Opening a dark corridor, he turned to look at the others there. "Hey, Slave, hurry up. We haven't got all day, sad world to see and all. And....okay, I forgot what your actual name is, but if you want to learn how to be evil and yet retain that awesome flair, you know where to find me" he said, talking to Alissia and Samsara respectively, before walking through the dark corridor to The Great Forest.

Juliet wasn't going to let up so easily. "Audrey, maybe you should go with your father on this one" she asked, but Audrey shook her head in refusal. "Fine, but stay close to me. We'll make this man say sorry and mummy will fix things" Juliet said reassuringly. She walked through the dark corridor with Audrey following her, going after Dane. If this man had made Audrey cry, Juliet wanted to know why, and she would beat the ever loving crap out of him if she had to in order to find out.

Spoiler: Caleb

Caleb felt exceptionally uncomfortable as Juliet and Audrey left. He had wanted to say something, but how could he? He owed Dane for getting them out of there, and as much as it tore him up inside he would have to find some way to repay the debt. He'd probably end up regretting it, but he was a man of honour, and though Dane certainly didn't fight with honour, Caleb still needed to repay him. And yet, his only daughter was crying, and because of his honour he couldn't go and hug her, he couldn't go tell her everything would be okay. What kind of father was he? A bad one, that's what. "I'm going to Cite des Cloches" he said simply in a firm voice, making his decision.

Spoiler: Gexln

"You think I'm going to lose to him? Is that it? I took down Chaos, I defeated the trial of the x-blade, and I've fought far more people and creatures than you know, and you think I'm going to be beaten? I'm not going to lose to him, I'm going to watch the life drain out of his body. I don't need help, I can do this alone" Gexln stated, backing away from Ananta. He accepted the bag of crystals, and was about to leave when he heard Sapphire's voice, as well as saw the creature she had created.

"Great, she gave me a bunny. A godamn bunny" he grumbled. "May as well give you a name. I'll call you Liam, I guess. You'd better hope you're as strong as I was told, or else you're going to have to find yourself a new master" Gexln stated, not believing that the rabbit was as powerful as Sapphire claimed. He turned and opened a dark corridor, before turning to address the spirit that had appeared. "Look, I'm not sure if you heard, but she gave me what I needed, I don't need to kill her, so piss off and go back to being dead" he said in a harsh tone. He wasn't in the mood for lectures or being told what to do. He turned and looked at Xero, but said nothing. No amount of words would change her mind, he knew her far too well to believe anything different. He would just have to cope with it. Stepping through the dark corridor he moved on, leaving the world behind as he began searching for Dane once more.

Both accepted.
Also, there's now a map made by Cstar!

Spoiler: Map

That's the Happy Mountains in the top left, and Moredoor on the right. If there are any questions, feel free to ask

And there it was. The display of rank, the threat. Vex had seen it all before, plenty of times. Being a mercenary, Vex had had more than one encounter with guards and officials, and they always worked the same way. They'd come in and act somewhat friendly with you, then gloat about their rank a bit, and finally treat you like scum because of your rank. Vex's ranking worked a bit differently. He didn't give a crap where you were born, or who your family was, all that mattered to him was strength. The weak would die out, the strong would survive. And he wasn't weak, so there was no way he was bowing down to Precious.

Standing up, he grabbed his battleaxe and stood as tall as he was able, stepping right in front of Precious. "I don't give a damn who you are. You come in here accusin' me of something I know nothing about, you fuck over my drinking, and then you threaten me and Xera" Vex growled. He heard the bartender call out that there was no fighting in the bar, that if they wanted to fight they could take it outside. Far too annoyed to reason with, Vex grabbed his empty glass and hurled it at the bartender, causing it to shatter against the man's head and knock him out cold. Turning his attention back to Precious, he cleared his throat, and then raised his axe. "Now, are we going to stand around all day, or are we going to fight?"

Oscar waited for Samuel to make his move. He knew his little brother well, and figured he had some sort of plan. That was the way they worked. Samuel had great intellect, and Oscar was the front lines, something he was used to. As he saw the light, he knew it wouldn't be long. He held up 5 fingers and counted down. The moment the last one went down, he burst through the door with his blade ready. Sure enough, the men lay on the ground, seeming to be injured but still very much alive. Damn Samuel, you're one smart kid, Oscar thought to himself. Running through the hotel, he encountered a couple of guards, but they were pushovers; not particularly well trained. Pushing past them, he continued on until he got out of the building. He looked around quickly for Samuel until he saw him. "Come on, lets get out of here" was all he said, before taking off towards the northern exit of the town.

As Caleb went to go and ask the guards, Gaius heard a voice asking a question. He looked to his side to see a man asking him if he was here to see the king. "Yeah, I need to ask him about somethin' important, you here to see him too?" the red headed boy asked. He didn't want to have to explain his situation to this stranger, it wasn't something he liked talking about, but he felt like he should talk to him at least while Caleb got entry to the castle.​

Sounds fun, actually gives me a reason to edit! I'll edit this post with my submission when it's done, just giving you a show of interest.

Spoiler: Gexln's post

"You're just as much of an annoying bitch as you were three hundred years ago" Gexln spat as the chains were put around him. He tried to break them, but she was telling the truth; he couldn't use his darkness to escape from them. After a minute of trying again, he gave up, and allowed himself to be lead to the cell.

Alone he sat in the cell, bound in chains and convinced he was unable to do anything about it. He didn't look up as Xero approached the bars that were on the outside of his cell, simply sitting there. He knew it was her though; if he hadn't been able to smell it, he still would've known just from knowing her so well for over three hundred years. "Xero, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I've been like this lately, I'm sorry I've been avoiding you, I'm sorry that I've been telling you to go back home, and I'm sorry that it's not going to stop. I couldn't stop it if I tried, don't you see that? The darkness inside of me has been growing stronger, it has been since the day I lost my heart. I can't fight it anymore, it's gotten far too powerful. I'm not going to let you get hurt because of me, and I'm not going to let you get involved with this war because of me either. This isn't your fight, it's mine, and I'd appreciate it if you stopped trying" he stated.

At that moment, an idea formed in his head. "After all this time, you would think she would know I'm a keyblade wielder" he said, summoning the keyblade in his hand. He couldn't move his arms, he couldn't move his hands very much either, but he could still get out. After concentrating, a beam of light shot from the weapon, firing up at the roof above. The beam hit the roof and dispersed into small fragments of light, falling onto Gexln and unlocking the chains that bound him, indicated by them falling off him onto the ground with a loud noise. He then looked up at Xero, and that was a big mistake. He could see the tears welling up in her eyes, the sorrow she must be feeling. He sighed. "You've got two minutes, then I'm out of here" he said.

The next two minutes were incredibly painful. He did his best not to listen to the words of Xero, for he knew that if he did he would be overwhelmed with guilt and there was a chance he'd cave in. He couldn't have that, too much was at stake. Once the two minutes were passed, he turned and looked at her once more. The look in his eyes was similar to Xero's, but mixed in with the sadness was anger. "I'm sorry, Xero. I love you, but i'm not losing you too" he stated, before opening up a dark corridor and escaping.

He found Darkness' Sorrow simply enough, in an area with a lot of other weapons. The people guarding it were easy enough to dispatch; they weren't badly trained, he just had a lot of experience. He stopped as he picked up his weapon. "Sapphire, I know you can hear me. This is going to be the last time I talk to you. What I'm about to do could very well start a war, so the people can't know I have contact with you. If they ask, you haven't heard from me since I left Riel, got it? You took my son's heart, and I'm never going to forgive you for that, but I'm sorry for the way things have been. I'm pretty messed up right now in case you can't tell, and it pisses me off even more that I let myself hurt one of the few friends I've actually cared about whether they live or not. R was right to make you the goddess. You've made plenty of mistakes, but your heart's in the right place. I know you can watch me, so if you're ever looking for me and all you find is a corpse, take care of my family. They deserve better" Gexln stated, a tone of regret in his voice as he spoke.

He opened another dark corridor and went to where Ananta was. "Keyblade wielders don't do so well in prisons" was all he said as he emerged from it. He gripped Darkness' Sorrow tightly as he raised it slightly. "Ananta, you have to give me those crystals. A man by the name Dane Erapper destroyed my homeworld. He enjoys killing more than even Xindai did, I think, and if you don't give me what I asked for, then there will be no stopping him. You'll have a hell of a lot more than 6 Crystallian corpses. Hand me them, and I can stop him" the Wanderer of the dark said in a very serious voice.

"Dane's dedicated a lot of his life to fucking mine over. He killed my homeworld, he introduced my body to darkness, and he's been pushing me to become like him ever since. There isn't much left to take from me, all I can think of is Lexcifur, Juliet, and Xero. If you're any kind of friend to her, or if you ever were to me, then you will give me those crystals. As annoying as you are, I never intended on murdering you, but if you won't let me stop Dane, I won't have a choice. If I have to choose between your life or hers, then my choice is pretty clear to me" Gexln stated, deadly serious as he raised his sword. He didn't want to have to kill Ananta. He'd never liked her, but she had helped him out a long time ago, and was arguably a key person in helping defeat The Agents, but if she didn't co-operate he didn't have any other option.

Spoiler: Dane and Hunter

"My name is Dane. Dane Erapper, though to be honest I'm getting kinda sick of people asking who I am, so if you forget it then you can forget learnin' anything. I was born like this, kinda. I hate long stories, so I'll just sum it up for ya real quick. Think of the most horrible mother you can think of, now multiply that by about ten. You're getting pretty close to what she was like. Something happened, and I became just like you see right now" Dane stated simply. He glanced in the direction of Anadi. "Neat trick, but only an idiot would fall for that" he said, not having much interest remaining in the conversation.

"Hey guys! We got a new party member!" Hunter yelled out. He turned to look at Crybex. "Just practicin' for when we find the hero, defeat the goddess, and everybody wants to be around me. They already do but hey, it'll be more public so more groupies, and all adventuring heroes need groupies" Hunter explained. He looked at the spider that had been tortured and killed. "Now, don't get me wrong, I love ya attitude. You've got the makings of a great psycopath, but you're doin' it all wrong. Lasers are cheatin'. It could look beyond awesome, but nothing beats a good cut with a sword, you're just bein' a pansy if you have to stand back and fight" the red haired man said.

Spoiler: Audrey

Audrey was enjoying the story, but it came to an end far too quickly. She wanted to know about the princess, why wouldn't people stop fighting just long enough to hear about the princess? A look of worry came on her face as Alissia told her they'd meet up with her dad. She hadn't been apart from her parents before, it was a bit of a scary thought. She was always running off on her own, but her parents had always been far behind. She followed Alissia though, and got into the gummi ship. She trusted Alissia enough to get her back safely, but she was still worried about whether Caleb would be okay. "C-can you tell me more about the princess in the story?" she asked, needing something to take her mind off of things as they travelled back.

​

Dale seemed pretty pissed off. Gaius had no idea what the big deal was, it was just one boat. He hadn't even gotten to steal the others yet, but even if he had Dale would've been rich from the jewels they would've made, he was looking at this all wrong. And then he just wouldn't shut up about how illegal it was and how he would go and do the mission alone? This guy was special, and not in a good way. "Of course he wouldn't tell us it was S-class. Everybody would've come here and filled up the mission in no time, and then he wouldn't have had us. He wanted the best of the best" the fire mage said. He turned and gave a slightly cocky grin in Dale's direction. "There's no shame in bein' afraid man. Everyone gets scared of somethin' once in a while. After you got your ass kicked by Ezekiel something bad, you probably saw how well we did against him and decided maybe we'd be better at doing the job than you, and that's okay. There ain't nothing wrong with asking for help once in a while" Gaius said. He was genuinely trying to help, but at the same time he couldn't help but poke a little fun at him. What was the worst that could happen? Dale was an ice mage, Gaius was a fire mage, what was he gonna do...freeze fire? Pfft, like that could happen.


Caleb had remained silent the entire time, not feeling the need to speak. However, upon being accused of being some kind of creeper, he could remain silent no longer. "Your majesty, I regret to inform you of this but that man that escorted your daughter back, the one that goes by the name of Thomas, he spent the majority of the time staring at her behind the entire walk back. If you are worried about any men taking advantage of your princess, there's where I would be making sure of first" Caleb stated, completely framing Thomas. He chose not to follow the princess back towards her room, deciding that it would be best to let her make her own decision.

As everyone walked past to go ice skating though, Caleb decided to follow. He wasn't sure what they were up to, but he was sure the king wouldn't like it. Eventually he arrived at the place that everyone was ice skating, to see the princess and another man skating together. What surprised him wasn't that though, but the fact that Johanna had asked Thomas to go ice skating. Surely Thomas would say no wouldn't he? Dawn was standing right there, and those two had seemed to be getting along fairly well before the mission, was he just going to throw that away? But once again, Caleb said nothing. It wasn't his place to say so, and even if it was he wasn't exactly keen to help Thomas at that point. Remaining silent, the man sat down at the side without any ice skates and simply waited.


Skadi hadn't really said anything, because she wasn't sure what to say. She'd felt extremely uncomfortable standing there as Alessia had told the story. While the new girl hadn't gone over her backstory or anything, it wasn't hard to put things together. Ezekiel had a fire mage, a little girl, and now they had a little girl that was giving off an ever-so-slight heat aura. Was Alessia forgetful, stupid, or just inconsiderate? Skadi hadn't expected her to talk about things that way. Ezekiel had been horrific, but he'd been the girl's guild master, so there was probably some kind of bond there, and even if there wasn't...was it really right to talk about her previous guild in front of her like she wasn't even there?

"Alessia, I don't think you're telling the story right. Magus Ascension did some terrible things, but I don't know that they did them for the wrong reasons. Ezekiel spoke of becoming stronger, is that such a terrible goal? Maybe he wanted to protect his guild members, or maybe he wanted to give them someone to look up to. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, he just went the wrong way about it. And as for the members themselves, I didn't really see any of them myself aside from Yana but..despite attacking us, were they not defending themselves? There are two sides to every story, Alessia, try to look at things from both perspectives" Skadi said. She wasn't trying to offend Alessia, and she genuinely hoped she didn't, but it felt wrong to simply stand there and be quiet while the little girl was there. She couldn't even imagine how she'd feel if someone made it sound like Sapphire Eclipse was a horrifyingly evil guild, and she didn't want to think about it.

Turning to Thea now, Skadi crouched down until she was at the girl's height. "Hey there, my name is Skadi Wynter, what's yours?. Welcome to Sapphire Eclipse, I hope you enjoy yourself here" she said, greeting the girl. That wouldn't be enough though, not to counteract the damage Alessia may have caused. "You know, that's a very pretty dress you have there. It looks very soft, and it seems to suit you very well. Do you like dresses?" Skadi asked, trying her best to make the girl feel welcomed and as though she could open it up. She grabbed the nutcracker as she talked to Thea, studying it for a short time and then slowly starting to create a replica of it made of ice. It would take some time, but she was confident she could do it.​