LoD Chapter 2 - The Legend of the Forsaken Brother

[TheBlindMime]

"He stands at the ready, with blade in hand. I could find no better place for him to rest. An assassin would never understand such a thing." He straightens his jacket for a moment before turning to the man who had been dishing out the orders with his now heavily reduced crew, "As you can see you are outmatched, surrender now." He cracks the joints in his right hand as he speaks.

[Bosolai]

"Regroup with the others. I'm going to make sure Renetta doesn't get into too much trouble." Gwyn said to Ian and Connor before flying after the girl. Gwyn flew as fast as she could, but still couldn't keep up with those damn human strides. By the time she caught up with Renetta, she was too late and could only watch her fall to the snow below. Following the girl to the ground and casting some of her most potent rejuvination spells, Gwyn cried, "Renetta? Renetta! Get up! We can still catch Trevor if we can get moving!"

*************************************************

Howl spoke too soon. When he looked where the leader was originally, he saw nobody was there. Kerith's kidnappers were long gone, no footprints in the snow or anything. Meanwhile, Trevor suprise attacked the weakened warriors. He leaped, smacking Howl from behind with the blunt of his axe. Jumping backwards, Trevor shot three arrows at Samoht, and then another at Karnok. "Renetta's friends, why do you persist to live? Well, lets see if you'll follow me here!" Trevor laughed as the altar appeared just in front of the fountain. He placed his hand on it, and disappeared just as the other four managed to reach him.

"We're too late!" Gwyn exclaimed in disappointment. "Hey, what happened to Kerith?"

**************************************************

Not too long after, in a prison cell

"You're up. Get ready, you've got a fight to get to soon." One of the trainers said, tossing a bag at Kerith. "You're stuff's in there. I polished it myself."

Four men armed with spears walked up next to the cell door. "Is he ready yet?" one of them asked the trainer.

"Give him a minute. Kerith, you know the drill. They'll escort you to the pits when you're ready."

[Mintaro]

Karnok Drooped into the snow narrowly avoiding the shots fired at him. He was standing back up when the others arrived. "Dey took da quick man. We be havin no time ta worry." Karnok said. Picking up Howls dazed form he Leaped through the portal. Partially because he was angry at being surprised attacked, but mostly because it was what he had been sitting there all day for. The light of the portal enveloped The large Minotaur and the smaller Wolfin.

[Zephie]

(( n33dz m0r j3n ))

An hour's time passed after the great fight in the square, and it would be hours more before word reached other towns, or the small tavern south of Fariya.

The same one Jen had told Kanos to wait in. "Waiter," Sora bellowed across the room, motioning with a hand. "Another spirit."

"Make that two."

Sora looked up and back with a cocked eyebrow, gazing on the figure of the young human there. Noting the quick wink, he faced forward and exhaled nasally, confirming the order. "Yes, two."

The waiter nodded and waved to the bartender, then left to fetch the drinks as the young lady sat. "You."

"Am I not timely?" she replied with a smile.

"You could at least have picked something a little more..." He eyed "her" up and down, and waved a hand slightly. "Masculine."

"I use what works, hon'."

Sora had to shake his head, and rubbed his temples. The bastard even made a good woman. "Did you get it?"

Jen pulled out an item wrapped in a dark cloth, and placed it next to his hand, sitting back in "her" seat with a beaming grin. Sora stopped rubbing and picked up the trinket with that same hand, opening it up just slightly enough to see the gold inside.

"Your drinks."

He shut it quickly and looked up, nodding. "Yes, thank you."

Jen picked up the second drink and gave the waiter a flirtatious eyeing, and smiled. "Thanks, hon'. I'll let you know if I need anything."

The boy blushed and smiled back nervously, then hurried off to get away from the embarrasment. As Jen looked back at Kanos to drink, giggling, "she" noted his hard glare. "What?"

Sora just shook his head again, and reached into his pocket. A second later he produced a black sack, heavy and lumpy, and set it down on the table with a satisfying thick clinking. Jen forgot all about the drink after taking just one sip, and sat up to take the gold with wondrous greed. "Ohhhhh, yesss..."

"Ninety. As I promised." Kanos then rose from his seat and took one last drink, finishing it off with one swig. "Our business is concluded, thief. Now go have fun with your boy."

Jen just waved off the old man and felt the bag in her hands, the weight of it, the feel of it, the glimmer of the gold inside that was hidden by the sack... yes, this was precisely why he'd gone into this business. Jen forgot all about Kanos for a moment as he left, instead enjoying the payment.

[Raiden]

The arrows sailed through the air at Samoht's chest, and if it weren't for the fact that Samoht had an electric force field placed in front of him, the arrows would have hit true. Upon contact with the electric aura, the arrows started aflame, and fell the ground in ashes.

"Alright. That managed to piss me off."

Samoht headed for the fountain.

"He is so dead."

[lazy man]

"Yeah, yeah..." Kerith muttered as he opened the bag. All his stuff was in it, just like the trainer said. Taking out his chain mail and slipping it on, then digging out his gloves and putting them on as well. Pulling out his clymore, Kerith took a look at all the runes on it. They really were beautiful, but they almost always seemed to be covered in blood. The fact that it was always polished like this when he wasn't in the ring didn't bother him, it was that soon he wouldn't be able to see these runes.

"Alright, I'm ready. Let's go," Kerith said quietly as he got up.

Walking out of the prison cell, and into the center of the formation of the men. Walking in unison in them, Kerith felt like he was being taken to his execution, especially since he'd just escaped. The mood of this walk especially didn't feel right, but he had to. If he didn't, the men escorting him would kill him.

Eventually, Kerith reached daylight. The sudden change in tone made him squint, but he walked out into the open. He was greeted by the many whoops and hollars of the crowds in the stands. The pits looked the same as ever, at least in this area. He'd been to so many of them, he could never tell the difference any more.

"So much for freedom..." Kerith muttered as he walked out to the center of the ring, the crowds cheering for him as did so.

[Toastburner B]

((OOC: Sorry for not posting for a while...again.))

Connor joined the rest of the group just in time to see Trevor go through the portal. His eyes narrowed.

"He seems to know what the altars are." he said. "He seemed pretty sure that touching the altar would take him someplace else.

He started to walk towards the altar. "He's probably waiting for us on the other side, waiting to shoot the first person who comes through. Someone who can dodge or deflect an arrow quickly should go first."

[Lioness]

Ian's group joined the others in the park in time to see Trevor disappear through the portal.

"Yes, he does seem to know a lot about these portals. Certainly someone agile should go first, but the rest of us will follow quickly."

[Bosolai]

Not taking attempted murder too kindly, Gwyn chimed in, "He's a bad guy, I think we should just let him weaken the other baddy back there. We can take on whoever wins." Renetta activated the portal anyway, being that Trevor was still her stepbrother.

Everyone who either went in earlier or followed Renetta saw the majestic surroundings. Anyone who saw the water temple would say 'Its been done', but anyone else would gaze at the snowflakes falling out of the statue's hand, or the tundra far below. That would be, of course, if Trevor wasn't floating in the middle of the room, quickly absorbing the dark mist. When he took it all in, he still looked the same, only with a dark aura about him. "Renetta, its not too late to leave with me. All we need to do is kill the chosen, and we can live happily ever after."

************************************************** ******

Elsewhere,


A relatively small man came into the fighting grounds. He was holding a trident in his right hand, a net in his left, and a shield over his right arm. This was no common foe, this was infamous Bort. He was good, among the same class as Kerith. They never faced people like Kerith against their same class, cause these people were also murderers. Putting them into the same ring would drastically lower their count of good fighters. It was always 'Two men enter, one man leaves', and that was exactly the point.

Bort started walking slowly forward. "You inspired all of us to revolt. Because you escaped, we found enough courage to break our enslavement. Of course, they caught us, and forced us to fight after fight against opponents of increasing skill. Losing gets us killed, so we couldn't lose, but almost everyone has. It was our punishment. Death. And now, I need to take down the great Kerith. Thanks a lot, asshole."

[TheBlindMime]

"Karnok, you can let me down now." The minotaur complied lowering the wolfkin to the ground, "Thanks for the lift, but next time let me try interdimensional teleportation on my own." Howl held his stomach for a moment and winced as he felt his stomach turn back over.

His eyes slowly flitted up towards the temples center, he watched as the last of the dark mist absorbed into trevor and listened to the man's insane ramblings. He shrugged for a moment before stepping forward, "Pff, you are merely a child in a game you can no longer grasp the rules of. There are no happy ever afters in this world, merely beginnings and then ends." Howl throws himself forward and hunches down as he begins running at a pace so quick his hands hit the ground for balance.

"This shall be the end of you!" Howl yells as he leaps against one of the never ending columns and thrusts his hand against it. Howl was in his element now, there was snow and ice everywhere his environment itself was a power to draw upon.

His spell created a gigantic spear aimed straight for Trevor's chest, although with its immense size it was likely to crush everything above his shins. As howl watched the shimering cylinder fly towards Trevor he wondered whether or not adding a point to its end was pointless or simply extravagant.