(c) 2007 - 2008 by LFox
A World Apart
Chapter 05: Discovering New Friends

Once again the gang appears in the middle of the busy streets of Ralion.

Nathan rubs the back of his head.  “So what are we doing today?”

“Well, I was thinking we go through another bandit hideout” says Elisha.

Jessica makes a weird face.  “Uhh, let’s not”

Nathan cups his chin in thought.  “Well we could always go into one of the dungeons with skeletons and wraiths.  Although, I’m not sure how you kill wraiths”

Elisha looks at him with a dreary expression.  “Ugh, if she complains about wearing stuff off the recently deceased how do you think she’ll react to wearing something from a bag of bones?”

Jessica glares at her.  “That’s completely different”

Elisha glares back at her.  “Different how?  That it’s been on a rotting corpse for weeks?”

Jessica quickly looks annoyed.  “That’s not what I meant”

Nathan without warning suddenly turns around and starts walking off.  Jessica and Elisha both stop in mid sentence of their arguments to turn and watch as he leaves.  After a moment they run after him and yell for him to stop.

“Hey where the hell are you doing?” asks Elisha.

“Away” replies Nathan coldly.

“Away where?”

Nathan stops and turns around to glare at the girls with a cold expression.  “Look I am sick and tired of you two bickering.  I hear it at school, while walking together and apparently even here.  I am just god damn sick of listening to it okay?  No matter what it is you two are always fighting and its driving me nuts.  If you want to fight all day you can do it without me around.  Elisha you need to grow a heart.  This place may be virtual but these people have thoughts, feelings and lives.  They’re not just pixels in a game”

Jessica smirks hearing him chew Elisha out but quickly stops as he points at finger at her.  “And YOU need to grow some guts.  You two dragged me to this place.  The idea is to kill bandits, skeletons and whatever the hell else there is to make money and collect items that you can wear.  That INCLUDES armor and clothing off the recently deceased or the long time dead get used to it or don't come here anymore”

Both the girls gaze down at the ground sadly feeling bad for how they’ve acted.  The pair of them look like five year olds that were just scolded by their parents for misbehaving.

Elisha rubs her arm nervously as she looks away from Nathan.  “I’m sorry, I’ll try to be more thoughtful”

Jessica looks up at him looking rather sad.  “I’m sorry too, your right and, I’m sorry”

“I understand if you want to leave”

Jessica nods.  “Yeah”

Nathan lets out a heavy sigh.  “I’ll stay under the condition you think about what I said and stop bickering”

Elisha looks at Jessica.  “If you want we can go through a dungeon with skeletons and wraiths”

Jessica shakes her head.  “No, no you were right.  It’s better if we go take care of some bandits they’ll have better stuff and more money.  Besides we don’t even know how to kill wraiths”

Suddenly the two guards from yesterday walk past them.  The younger guard notices them so quickly stops and smiles.  “Oh it’s you three again.  I heard you cleared the bandits out of Vena”

They turn and look at him.  Elisha cracks a smile.  “That’s right.  We were actually just talking about finding another group of bandits”

“Well in that case I got something you may be interested in.  One of our scouts came back a while ago saying there’s a bunch of bandits planning some attacks.  I don’t really know the specifics but if you want to get rid of them before those attacks happen it’d save us a world of trouble”

The elderly guard whacks him across the back of the head.  “Stop passing jobs off to adventurers.  Do you even want to keep your job?”

The younger guard rubs the back of his head.  “Owe, well we got enough to do already.  We still gotta check out those animal attacks and check over the town supplies”

Elisha chokes back a smile at their little display.  “Do you happen to know where those bandits are?”

The elderly guard groans and ruffles his hair.  “Well if you really want to go kill them their down south along the road at an old Elvin crypt called Nyth”

The younger guard smiles and holds up his finger as he begins to explain.  “Nyth is about a day or two walk from Ralion.  However it’s only a minute or two from the main road and unlike Vena it doesn’t have any skeletons or wraiths in the lower levels.  Because of this it tends to attract a lot more bandits than other ruins”

“Thanks, we’ll check it out” says Elisha.  With that the three of them walk off, Elisha puts a finger to her chin as she thinks.  “I suppose we need to have a gatekeeper teleport us out”

Nathan nods.  “Yeah, all these places are so far away”

Elisha sighs and shakes her head.  “It’s really going to put a damper on our earnings though”

Suddenly ahead of them on the street a young human woman in mage clothing starts yelling out.  “All teleporting 100 Ethian per person to any location within 4 days travel get it while it lasts.  Also heavy discounts on teleportation to all towns within 30 days travel”

The three of them look ahead at the young woman.  Standing in front of her is a group of adventurers of various races.  After only a few moments of talking the mage waves her hands and they disappear in a rush of white particles.

Nathan smiles and rubs the back of his head.  “Well I guess that solves our travel expense problem”

The three of them quickly rush over to the woman.  Jessica raises up her hand as she calls out.  “Hey us too”

The woman turns and looks at Jessica.  “Where do you want to go?”

“Nyth, it’s an Elvin crypt south of here”

The woman smiles.  “That’ll be 300 Ethian”

Elisha glares at the woman with icy eyes as she tries to work out whether their being swindled or not.  “If you don’t mind me asking why so cheap?”

“To be honest.  I’m just a little short on money for a staff.  I figured this would be the quickest way to earn the money I need.  You’d be surprised how many people are on the lookout for cheap travel”

Nathan nods at her reply.  “Sounds like a good idea”.  He reaches rummages through the bag on his side for a moment then hands her three large silver coins.  “Here you are”

The woman smiles brightly.  “Thank you”

The woman waves her hands and with a flash of white particles they disappear from the city.  Moments later they appear outside Nyth which looks almost identical to Vena on the outside.  Elisha promptly takes out her map and checks their location to ensure they arrived in the right place.

“We’re here” says Elisha.

With that Elisha puts away her map and heads down the staircase.  The three of them follow the stairs down to the bottom arriving in a massive hallway that’s structured the same as Vena.  As they turn the corner at the end of the hallway they come to a stop.  In from of them lying on the ground are three bodies that have been scorched beyond recognition.  Their skin is black, chipped and the only visible blood is small patches of red littered about their bodies.  The stench of burnt flesh fills the air and even a small mist of smoke can be seen rising up as the bodies are still warm.

Jessica holds her nose and waves a hand in front of her face.  “Ewe”

Elisha calmly bends down to inspect the bodies closer.  “It almost looks like they fought a volcano and lost”

“Fire magic right?” asks Nathan.

Elisha nods.  “Yeah that’s be my guess”.  Elisha unstraps the chest plate of one of the bodies.  As she pulls it away a rush of grey smoke flies up filling the air around them.  She quickly drops the chest plate and backs off waving her hand in the air to clear the smoke from her face.  “Forget this.  Anything on them can’t be of any value now”

“Let’s keep going” says Nathan.

Nathan and Elisha casually walk past the charred bodies.  Jessica on the other hand carefully steps around them while still holding her nose to avoid smelling the stench.  As they continue through the ruins they come to a long hallway.  In the middle they find four brilliant bluey white ice statues of bandits standing frozen in place in mid movement.  Around the statues the ground, walls and even the ceiling above is encased in heavy ice from the magic that was used to freeze them in place.

Jessica walks up to the statue of a female dark elf and looks over her face.  “Now ice magic?”

“Whoever passed through here is a high level mage their probably still in here though” says Elisha.

Jessica is about to turn to say something when the eyes of the ice statue shift to look at her closer.  Noticing the movement Jessica squeals out and quickly runs and hides behind Nathan for fright.

Nathan looks back behind him at her.  “Jess, you okay?”

Jessica points a finger out from behind him with a shaky hand.  “T-t-t-t-the e-e-eyes they, they moved”

Nathan turns to look at the ice statues seeming surprised.  Elisha calmly walks over to the frozen dark elf woman and looks over her face closely.  The eyes immediately shift to look at her.  Elisha reaches out a hand and taps the statue on the forehead lightly with her knuckle.

“Their still alive” says Elisha almost in disbelief.

“How the hell can they be alive?” asks Nathan.

Elisha shakes her head.  “I don’t know.  I guess they haven’t frozen long enough”

Elisha suddenly pushes the frozen dark elf woman over.  She falls to the ground and lands with a crystalline sound as her body shatters into thousands of pieces.

Jessica leans out to the side from behind Nathan to look over the shattered pieces.  “Why, why did you do that?  I thought you said they were alive”

Elisha turns to them.  “Well they are bandits.  Besides don’t you think it’s a bit more humane to kill them now then let them slowly die?”.  Nathan and Jessica look at each other in confusion then look back at Elisha.  “What?”

Nathan rubs the back of his head.  “Well, she is right”

Elisha and Nathan quickly go about the job of knocking over the other ice statues while Jessica stands idly by.  When their done they continue on their way down the hallway passing by several junctions and corners.  As they come to another T junction they move up to it and peer around the left side.

Down the corner floating about a foot above the floor is a beautiful Elf woman with long blond hair down to her shoulders and a set of crystal like blue eyes.  For her clothes she has an elegant white dress with gold patterns.  The main portion of the dress however only goes down to her waist before it splits into a front and back portion that hang down to her knees which effectively leaves her white silk panties quite visible from the side.  On her arms the bell sleeves continue all the way to her wrists, on her feet she has a set of white 4 inch high heels as well as a pair of white stockings that match her dress which continue all the way up to her thighs.

“She’s probably the mage who’s been leaving bodies around” says Elisha.

Nathan draws his sword.  “Let’s have our weapons ready just in case.  I have no intention of being caught off guard”

Elisha and Jessica nod in agreement.  With their weapons drawn they rush out to meet the elf mage.  She looks at them and seeing intent to kill she quickly shields her head with her hands and screams.  “Don’t hurt me”

The gang quickly comes to a stop in front of her and Nathan steps forward.  “Uh we weren’t planning to hurt you.  Sorry if we scared you.  We just wanted to make sure you’re not a bandit, you’re not right?”

Feeling relieved she unshields her head and sighs.  “N-no”

“What are you doing here?” asks Elisha.

“I was, I, I heard they were planning to attack some people so I came here to stop them”

“That’s what we heard” says Nathan.

Jessica smiles brightly.  “You wanta join us?  It’ll be a lot safer if we all go together”

The elf woman looks at them somewhat puzzled.  “Y-you sure?”.  The three of them nod and she smiles in return.  “Okay then”

Nathan motions a hand at himself.  “I’m Nathan.  This is Jessica and Elisha”.  He motions his hand at them in turn as he says their names.

The elf woman bows.  “Pleased to meet you, I’m Elwyn”

Elisha motions her hand down the hall.  “Let’s get going”

They all nod in agreement and head to the right on the T junction.  After a few moments Nathan is walking by Elwyn as she floats next to him.  A short distance behind them Jessica and Elisha are walking together.

“Man am I glad I met you” says Nathan.

Elwyn smiles.  “Why?”

Nathan motions his head to the side.  “Those two are always fighting.  I chewed them out this morning for it though.  So far they haven’t fought but I figure it’s only a matter of time.  If you’re around I can ignore it for the most part while I talk with you”

“Hmmm I see, aren’t they friends though?”

Nathan nods.  “Yeah of course they are.  They have been since they were kids but, I don’t know they always just end up fighting over nothing.  Either that or they pick on each other which leads to fighting”

Elwyn smiles and giggles.  “I guess that’s just how they get along”

Nathan shakes his head.  “Maybe it is.  So…you’re obviously a mage, what kind of magic do you know?”

“Quite a lot.  Fire, ice, electric, telekinesis, teleporting, shields and a couple of other things”

Nathan’s eyes widen in surprise.  “Wow, that must have taken a long time to learn all that”

Elwyn smiles.  “I guess”

After almost ten minutes of walking through the hallway while talking Jessica stops.  “Hey guys is it me or are we really not getting anywhere?”

The others suddenly stop and look at her.  They look behind them and to the front of them, neither shows any signs of ending anytime soon as they disappear into the distance.

Elwyn puts a finger to her chin in thought.  “Now that you mention it, we’ve been walking in this hallway for about ten minutes”

“And what’s this all mean?” asks Nathan.

“Magic, it must be a trap of some kind, right?” says Elisha confidently.

Elwyn nods.  “It’s a pretty basic spell but it can fool even the most skilled people”

“Can you dispel it?”

“I can try”.  Elwyn changes her stance in the air so she’s completely upright.  She motions her hands around in the air then looks behind them and in front seeing no change what so ever.  “The caster must be pretty skilled”

“Is there any way to get rid of it?” asks Elisha.

Elwyn thinks with a finger to her chin.  After a moment she smirks evilly.  She turns to the wall and draws her right hand back.  A ball of blue energy quickly forms in her hand with small sparks radiating around its surface.  After charging the ball of energy for a few moments she thrusts her hand forward.  The ball of energy is released in massive jet of blue energy that bursts from her hand and smashes into the wall making a huge hole.

Elwyn turns to them with a smile.  “Problem solved”

Nathan looks through the hole and lets out a low whistle.  “What was that?”

“Pure magicka.  I think you’ll agree it’s pretty nasty”

Jessica has somewhat of a pale look on her face.  “Y-yeah, no kidding”

Elisha walks over to the hole.  “Let’s go”.  With that she hops through.

As they head into the room they quickly find it’s a large burial room with graves all around on the walls.

“Looks like another room with graves” says Jessica.

Elwyn turns pale hearing her say that then glances behind them.  Around the massive hole, on the walls are split or half broken graves that were torn open or smashed from her energy beam.

“Uhhh, whoops, I wasn’t expecting this to be a burial room” says Elwyn.

“Well what’s done is done so don’t worry about it too much.  Let’s keep going” says Elisha.

As the gang continues on they pass through several twisting hallways and corridors.  Eventually they come to the end of a hall that opens into a large room.  Inside six bandits are sitting around talking, eating and drinking.  One is a female human mage, the leader is a female dark elf fighter and the remaining are two male human fighters and two dark elf female fighters.

Hearing the gang approach the mage turns around and stands up.  “Well I gotta say I’m impressed you made it past my endless corridor.  Not to mention all my golems”

Jessica looks at her confused.  “Golems?”.  She turns to Elisha who shrugs not know what she’s on about.

“You, didn’t go past them?”

Elwyn smiles slightly as she scratches her face with a finger.  “No, I kinda blew a hole in the wall”

The mage quickly turns red with embarrassment.  Behind her the other bandits start laughing like a pack of hyenas.

“Nice job on the defense Joan” says one of the female bandits.

The mage turns around and yells at them.  “SHUT UP”

The leader wipes away a tear of laughter.  “Don’t tell me you can’t even take care of a few adventurers”

The mage turns around with a pissed look and clenches her fist.  “One of these days I’m gonna kill that bitch”

“Since your all so busy fighting why don’t we come back later?” says Elisha.

The mage looks at them then smirks.  “What a good idea”

With that she motions her hands in the air causing the gang to disappear.  Moments later they reappear in a large square channel in the ruins that’s almost one hundred feet deep with heavy stone walls.  Lucky for them they appear only fifteen feet off the ground and fall for a short distance before landing hard on the ground.  Jessica and Nathan both reasonably well as they hit the ground with their backs which are further protected by their heavy armor.  Elwyn lands on top of Nathan with her breasts in his face.  Elisha is the worst of them all as she lands face first on the hard stone ground.

“Owe, that hurt” says Jessica.

Elisha pushes herself up from the ground as she groans in pain.  Her mouth is covered in blood and streams of blood are running out from her nose.  As she sits up she spits a mouthful of blood to the side then puts a hand over her mouth.

“What a rough landing” groans Elwyn.  She looks down and quickly realizes she’s smothering Nathan with her breasts.  She quickly pulls away from him and lands on the ground on her backside with a hand across her chest.  “S-sorry”

Nathan sits up slowly.  “It’s okay.  Everyone alright?”.  Jessica sits up then her and Nathan look around at each other.  Nathan quickly notices Elisha’s bloody hand and stands up.  “You okay?”

Elisha nods.  “Yeah, I’m fine”

Jessica looks around at the channel their in noticing several old bones and a couple tattered rags.  “What the hell happened?  Where are we?”

“She teleported us to another section of Nyth” says Elwyn.  She raises her hand slightly in the air.  “My fault, I should have kept a shield up to avoid that kind of thing”

“It was pretty unexpected so don’t feel too bad” says Nathan.

Elisha wipes the blood from her face and flexes her jaw briefly.  “Any idea where in Nyth she teleported us?”

Elwyn looks up at the towering walls around them.  “I’m not sure but I’d say this is somewhere far down in the lower levels”

“Anyone else notice the lack of doors?” says Jessica.

“Don’t worry I can lift us out with my magic”

Elisha gazes upwards and notices a flash of blue descending rapidly above them.  She quickly stands up to get a better look.  “What’s that?”

The others quickly look up and watch trying to figure out what it is.  After a moment Nathan’s eyes go wide and he runs over to Elisha knocking her out of the way.  Just as they glide away in the air several two foot long icicles land on the ground with enough force to break the stone floor.

As they land on the ground safe Elisha quickly turns to look at the icicles.  “Thanks”

“Uh guys, there’s a lot more” says Jessica.

They look up seeing the entire area overhead filled with dozens of icicles that are rapidly descending towards them.

Elwyn quickly stands and prepares her hands to cast a spell.  “Quick come here and I’ll raise a shield”

They quickly scramble over to Elwyn just barely avoiding being hit by several icicles as they reach her.  Elwyn quickly motions her hands to raise a powerful sphere magic shield around them.  As she finishes her hands come to rest spread out at her sides.  Moments after its raised icicles rain down hitting the barrier causing a blue ripple of energy to appear where they connect.  When they do connect they break or shatter before bouncing off to the side and landing on the ground.

“Is that mage doing this?” asks Jessica.

Elisha’s face quickly changes to look very annoyed.  “It has to be”

“Can you keep this shield up?” asks Nathan.

Elwyn’s hands shake slightly as she holds the shield and small beads of sweat appear around her forehead.  “I’m trying.  There’s just so many of them”

After several more moments the shower of icicles finally comes to a stop.  Elwyn folds over and lets out a heavy breath.  As she straightens up again Nathan puts a hand on her shoulder and looks at her face.

“You okay?” asks Nathan.

Elwyn nods.  “I’m fine, just a little tired from holding the shield through that”

Jessica suddenly squeals out in fright.

Nathan quickly turns to look at her.  “What’s wrong?”

Jessica points ahead of her where several icicles are melting down to a puddle and quickly forming together.  “We got a problem”

“Golems” says Elwyn.

They quickly ready their weapons and watch as all the other icicles melt down and pool together.  Once they’ve gotten enough volume they slowly stretch upwards while twisting and swaying.  After several moments the piles of liquid come to a stop at almost six feet tall.  From there they slowly morph until they turn into a set of four naked female elves made entirely of solid ice.

“How come they look like elves?” asks Jessica.

“The creator chooses their form” says Elwyn.

Nathan steps forward and slashes one of the golems several times across the belly, chest and face.  She glares at him angrily and tries to attack him.  Nathan quickly pulls his shield around and smashes her in the face with it knocking her to the ground.

“You’re not going to kill them by giving them a few scratches.  You have to smash them” says Elwyn.

The golem in front of Nathan gets back up and holds her hands out.  Ice seeps out of her hands and quickly forms to make a pair of thin ice swords in her hands.

“Oh just great” says Nathan.

As Nathan starts fighting with the golem Jessica picks one of her own and runs forward with her sword.  She puts all her force into striking down at the golems head but the golem merely holds it’s hands up catching her sword midstrike.

Jessica turns a little pale.  “No way”.  The golem smirks at her and almost immediately her sword starts to ice over.  “Hey, hey what are you doing?”

“Jess drop your sword” yells Elisha.

By then it’s already too late as Jessica’s hands start frosting over effectively molding them onto her sword handle.  “I can’t”

Elisha is about to run over to help when a golem suddenly rushes forward and throws a punch at her which she barely avoids.  Elwyn is quickly caught up in her own problems too as the remaining golem sets its sights on her.

“You bitch” growls Elisha.

Elisha kicks the golem in the side of the face sending it flying to the ground.  Seeing her chance she runs over to Jessica and tackles the golem away from her.  Despite losing the golem Jessica’s hands and sword remain encased in ice pretty much making it impossible for her to move them at all.

Meanwhile Elwyn straightens up and motions her hands in the air.  Just as the golem runs at her she puts her hands together in front of her causing a massive jet of fire to blast out from her hands.  The intense heat quickly causes the golem to start melting but even after its legs turn to liquid and its body loses its form Elwyn keeps the heat on until it literally evaporates into the air.

Jessica stands idly by watching as the others fight when suddenly the golem Elisha kicked in the face gets up and looks at her.  As it walks towards her Jessica watches fearfully.  “Oh crap” says Jessica.  Elwyn suddenly flies in front of her and hits the golem with an intense blast of heat.

While their busy Elisha’s sitting on the golem she knocked over and is hacking frantically at it’s face with her short sword.  “Die you stupid block of ice”

Nathan smashes the golem in front of him in the face with his shield several times.  With her momentarily stunned he strikes at her neck with his sword taking it clean off.  The golem’s body falls to the ground motionless and her head shatters as it hits the floor scattering shards of ice everywhere.

As the last of the golem Elwyn’s attacking evaporates she flies over to Jessica.  Elwyn quickly puts her hands over Jessica’s causing an orange and red glow to spread around their hands.  As she continues the ice quickly melts from Jessica’s hands and sword allowing her to move freely again.

“Thanks” says Jessica.  Back in action Jessica walks over to Elisha with her sword clutched tightly in her hands.  “MOVE”

Elisha looks up at her and quickly backs off.  Just as the golem tries to get up Jessica slams her sword down taking off the golems head.

“Looks like we got em” says Nathan.

“Taking off their head won’t kill them” says Elwyn.

He looks at her surprised.  “It what?”

The golem behind Nathan now fully regenerated suddenly gets up and rushes at him with its ice swords.  Just as it’s about to strike an arrow flies out from the side and smashes into the side of its head making it stumble to regain its footing.  Elwyn quickly pushes Nathan out of the way and blasts the golem with fire.

As the golem finishes evaporating Elwyn is about to head to the next one when Jessica suddenly yells out.  “INCOMING”

They all look up as hundreds of icicles descend towards them.  Knowing the drill they rush to Elwyn who quickly motions her hands and raises a shield.  The remaining golem quickly gets up as it finishes regenerating its body.  Just as its about to run at them to attack several dozen icicles rain down smashing into it and shattering it to pieces.  The icicles continue falling for several minutes building up in piles around the gang where the shield doesn’t reach.  Meanwhile Elwyn strains to keep the shield up, her hands shake horribly, sweat runs down her face and her breaths come in heavy pants.

“Isn’t this going to end?” asks Elwyn.  Just as the shield starts to flicker as Elwyn loses her power the rain of icicles ends.  With the danger over Elwyn immediately folds over and pants heavily for breath.  “That was almost too much”

While Elwyn tries to regain her breath the others look around, watching as thirty ice golems start forming together.

“We are so screwed” says Elisha.

Elwyn looks around at the ice golems and at the gang.  “I got an idea”

Elwyn suddenly rises up in the air upright with her head backwards and her hands stretched out at her sides.  Orangey red streaks of fire slowly rise up from the ground all over almost in slow motion.  Hovering a short distance off the ground orangey red bubbles form and float about.

After several moments of this display a column of fire erupts from the ground filling the entire channel their in right to the top.  The fire spins wildly around them burning the golems until they evaporate while at the same time leaving the gang completely unharmed.  As the last golem is vaporized the fire vanishes almost instantly.  Elwyn slowly lowers herself then collapses to the ground as she pants for breath.

“That was amazing” says Jessica.

“You okay?” asks Nathan.

Elwyn nods slightly.  “I’m, I’m, I’m fine but, I don’t think I have the energy left to lift us out of here”

“I guess that means we have to climb out.  What about you though?” says Elisha.

“I should be able to manage to lift myself out but, anything more than that”.  Elwyn shakes her head.

Jessica looks at Elisha in complete shock.  “You expect us to climb THAT?”.  Jessica points at the hundred foot walls around them.  “Free hand?”

“You got a better idea?” asks Elisha.

Nathan puts a hand on Elwyn’s shoulder and looks at her face.  “How long would it take you to recover to lift us out of here?”

Elwyn shakes her head.  “I don’t know.  But I think we should leave, now”

“I agree” says Elisha.

Jessica glances at the wall then back at the others.  “But, climbing free hand?  In this armor?”

“It’s either that or we sit around here waiting to be attacked again and if we are Elwyn won’t be able to protect us”

Jessica looks at the ground seeming depressed.

“I’m sorry” says Elwyn.

Jessica shakes her head.  “It’s fine”

One by one they go over to the wall and start climbing their way up.  Meanwhile Elwyn concentrates carefully and very slowly yet wonkily rises into the air.  With heavy panting and sweat dripping from her forehead she manages to quickly rise up to where the others have climbed.  After only a few short moments pebbles of fire start raining down from above and pooling on the ground below.

Jessica looks down at the ground as fire dances across it’s surface.  “Are those more golems?”

“Yeah they are” says Elwyn.

Elisha smirks at Jessica.  “And you wanted to wait”

Jessica glares back at her.  “Oh shut up”

As they continue to climb the pebbles of fire start pooling together forming the basic outline of golems.  Elisha turns her gaze up above at the top of the column where the bandit mage is standing carefully observing them.

Elisha quickly turns her gaze over at Nathan.  “Hey Nathan you think you can handle my weight?”

“Um, yeah I guess so, why?” says Nathan.

Without a word Elisha starts maneuvering around the wall over to him.  Once she’s near him she climbs above him.  “Brace yourself I’m gonna stand on your shoulders”

“You’re what?”

Elisha ignores him and turns herself around putting a foot down on each of his shoulders.  Seeing what their up to Elwyn quickly rises up toward them and stands in front preparing to grab Elisha should she fall.

“I hope you know what you’re doing” says Elwyn.

Elisha readies her bow and looks up at the mage above them.

“What are you doing?” asks Nathan.

Nathan looks upwards to see what she’s up to but finds he has a full view under her skirt of nothing but her white silk panties.  He quickly looks down again and his face reddens.  Meanwhile Elisha aims carefully above.  Once she’s certain of her aim she lets her arrow fly.  Above them the mage turns to see the arrow but it’s already too late.  It slams into her forehead and her body goes limp then falls off the ledge.

As her body flies down the golems immediately disappear leaving no trace they were ever there.  The mage continues falling for several moments then finally lands with a sickening crack.  As the gang looks down blood starts to pool out from beneath the dead mage’s body.

Elisha looks at her corpse with a smug look.  “Well we won’t have to worry about her anymore”

Jessica stares at Elisha in utter disbelief.  “Have I told you recently how INSANE you are?”

“Hey Elisha if your done can you get off my shoulders now” says Nathan.

“Yeah sure” says Elisha.

She carefully puts her bow away and climbs off Nathan.  He groans out in relief as he suddenly becomes almost fifty kilos lighter.  Instead of continuing her climb up Elisha starts climbing down towards the bottom again.

“Hey where are you going?” asks Nathan.

Elisha smirks.  “Looting, see you at the top”

Several minutes later everyone except Elisha is sitting around at the top catching their breath.  After several moments of waiting Elisha climbs up to them and sits down.

Nathan turns to look at her.  “That was really dangerous you know that right?”

“Well what else were we going to do?  I didn’t think she was up there.  When I saw her I was worried she was going to start shooting us off the wall” says Elisha.

“Just, just be careful okay”

Elisha smirks.  “You worried about me?”

Nathan looks at her sternly.  “Yes I am”

Elisha looks surprised hearing that.  She quickly turns her head away and blushes.

Jessica raises her hand.  “I vote we take five, better yet ten minutes break before continuing on”

“Agreed” says Elwyn.

After resting for a little over ten minutes they get up and start walking their way through the halls.  After a lot of walking and even more steps up to higher levels they eventually they come to a section where they hear voices talking in the distance.  Nathan silently sneaks up to the corner and peers around seeing the same bandits they saw earlier.  After observing them for a moment he sneaks back over to the others.

“Alright we got the drop on them” says Nathan.

Elisha thinks for a moment then turns to face Jessica and Nathan.  “You two sneak out and as soon as my arrow hits attack.  If we do this right we can get them all before they even have a chance to fight back”

“What about me?” asks Elwyn.

“I don’t think you’ve recovered enough to help us.  You just stay back, we can handle this”

“Are you sure?”

“We can handle it.  You’ve done more than enough already” says Nathan.

Elwyn nods and sits down next to the wall to relax.  The others quickly draw their weapons with the addition of Elisha preparing an arrow on her bow.

“Ready?” asks Elisha.

Nathan turns to Jessica seeming somewhat concerned.  “You okay with this Jess?”

“Yeah this is what we’re here to do right?  Besides they already tried to kill us” says Jessica.

With that Jessica and Nathan sneak out towards the bandits.  Once their close an arrow flies past them and hits one of the males in the back of the head.  The bandits quickly stand up in shock and look around.  Jessica draws back her sword and swings it like a baseball bat taking off the female leaders head in one swift swipe.  Nathan quickly draws back his sword and thrusts it into the spine of the other male.  Despite wearing plate armor it offers absolutely no protection what so ever from the attack.

Not even pausing for a moment Jessica turns and slashes one of the women across the chest shredding her skimpy leather armor with ease and leaving a deep bloody streak.  The final male bandit is about to draw his sword when an arrow flies past and skewers his forehead.  After wobbling on his legs for a moment he collapses to the ground.

Nathan rests his sword against his shoulder and draws a breath.  “That went well”

Jessica looks down at the leader then turns her head away and holds a hand over her mouth as she feels sickened by the sight.  “I can’t believe I cut off her head”

“You did good.  You may be riddled with morals but you’re a pretty good fighter” says Elisha.

“Uh, thanks, I guess”

Elisha grins evilly.  “Alright time to loot”

“Somehow you get pleasure out of undressing the dead and taking their stuff don’t you?” asks Jessica.

Elisha smirks at her.

Jessica turns pale.  “You know what, don’t answer that”

Jessica wipes the blood off her sword and puts it away before walking off slowly leaving Nathan and Elisha to undress and loot the bandits.  Elwyn seeing the battle is over slowly walks over to them.

“Do you need any help?” asks Elwyn.

Elisha looks up at her and smiles.  “Sure”

Elwyn kneels down next to Elisha and pauses with her hand over the dead bandit.  “You got a way to carry all this stuff?”

Elisha grins broadly.  “We got an enchanted bag.  It can hold quite a lot”

“Oh okay”

After spending almost half an hour undressing the bandits and gathering up everything of value their finally ready to leave.

“Well I guess we’re all done here” says Nathan.

Elisha pulls out a portal scroll and unrolls it.  “I’ll teleport us back”

“Uh, I could teleport us all to town if you want” says Elwyn.

Elisha pauses and looks at Elwyn surprised.  “You can do that?”

Elwyn nods.

“That’d be great.  You sure you’re not too tired though?” says Nathan.

Elwyn shakes her head.  “No I’m fine.  I got more than enough energy to teleport us out of here.  Ralion sound good to everyone?”

They all nod in response.  Elwyn concentrates for a moment then motions her hands in the air.  Back in Ralion at the center of town thousands of particles quickly form together to make the gang as they teleport in.

“Thanks for teleporting us” says Nathan.

Elwyn smiles.  “No problem”

Elisha stretches her arms in the air.  “I’m gonna go sell this stuff then, I think I’m gonna head home I got some stuff I want to do”

Nathan nods.  “Yeah I guess I got some stuff to do too”.  He turns his gaze to Elwyn.  “Say, do you want to meet up after we log out?”

Elwyn looks at him cluelessly.  “Log out?  What do you mean?”

“You know when we go back to the real world”

Elwyn looks at him confused and even somewhat afraid.  “What do you mean real world?”

“You…”

“She must be an NPC” says Elisha.

Jessica smiles.  “No way, she can’t be an NPC.  It’s a joke right?  A joke?”

Elwyn looks at Jessica seeming more confused than ever.

“I…don’t think so.  You haven’t noticed that people are disappearing into thin air?” says Nathan.

“Huh?  Their just teleporting…aren’t they?” says Elwyn.

Nathan cups his chin and goes deep in thought as he tries to think of how to explain things.

“To put it in laymen terms there’s two worlds.  This one the one you live in and the one we live in.  We’re able to visit this one anytime we wish from the world we live in.  However there’s no way for people from here to visit our world” explains Elisha.

Elwyn looks at her blankly not really sure if she believes it or not.

“If you come with me I’ll explain everything on the way”

“O-kay”

“How about we meet around here tomorrow afternoon?” says Nathan.

Elwyn looks at him for several moments before replying.  “…Sure”

“Log out” says Nathan.

A computer voice rings out around Nathan.  “Confirm logout please”

“Confirm logout”

Nathan’s body shatters into thousands of white particles that disappear after a few moments.

“We’ll see you again tomorrow okay Elwyn?” says Jessica.

Elwyn waves slightly as she watches Jessica logout.  Once their gone Elisha smiles and motions her hand forward.  “Come on, I’ll explain on the way”

Back in the real world Nathan lifts off his helmet and sits up on the seat then stretches himself.

“I can’t believe Elwyn’s an NPC” says Jessica.

“Y-yeah” says Nathan.

“I guess it just proves how realistic the NPCs are in Eden”

“She wasn’t just realistic though, she was real.  She talked, she thought, she was just like a person”

Jessica looks a little depressed.  “Maybe we shoulda stayed and explained it to her with Elisha”

Nathan shakes his head.  “Nah, she’ll do a good job explaining it.  Besides we probably would have confused her even more if all three of us tried to explain it”

Meanwhile Elisha and Elwyn are walking together through town.  Elisha is busy explaining the whole concept of Eden and the real world to her.  Elwyn listens intently as she talks but looks as if she’s in a bit of a daze.

To be Continued

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