Escape From the City

'Shit. Blanked again.'

Adonis leans his head down, allowing Emiko to get off of him.
"Get off my back, Maikeru. Or I might have to kill you." Zen stares through Mike.

Just as Zen begins to think about responding to either of them, something crawls out of the tower door. Upon closer inspection, it's a man in ragged clothes, clearly on the brink of dying from starvation.  

"Help... Me..." he says.

But before anyone could move to help, a beast of some sort bites his bottom half off, leaving a pile of red innards on the ground. As the beast retreats, the group can see slimy red scales on the tail of a snake.

"The plan? Kill That thing."

Maikeru frantically climbs down and runs to the poor man that fell victim to the large and scaly beast and crouches beside him.

"I'm so sorry that I couldn't save you.." he says under his breath, looking into the mans sunken and blank eyes.

Looking back at the group with a look of anger and fear he feels a tear roll down his cheek, freezing solid at his chin. The air getting colder around him and a thin layer of frost spreading on the ground around his feet. He stands straight up and walks to Zen.

"I agree, we need to kill that thing and soon." Maikeru says directly to Zen with his eyes still a little wet. They appear to be glowing a bright blue as well.

Standing beside Zen, Maikeru starts to form a short sword out of solid ice. Hes only done this once before so it is a little rugged but still very sharp to the touch.

"Shall we go in, Then?"

Emiko didn't jump or even flinch. living alone in the forests, she has become accustomed to large beasts and such.

This monster barely phased Emiko. She placed her hand on Maikeru's shoulder in hopes to provide some sort of comfort. "I hate to sound cold, but death will become a common thing on this adventure, and you'll eventually get used to it."

She pulls a zanbato out of the pack on the back of Adonis. She turns to Zen and Maikeru.

"Lets proceed, shall we?" She said it in an almost excited tone, as if this were fun for her.

Little bitch... You didn't even know him. Like you could've cared that much about him anyway. Zen chuckles.

"You guys are slow as all hell." He pulls out his dagger, motioning toward the frail Kerrin to stay close. As Zen takes the first step into the blackness, his elven eyes adjust so he can see faint outlines of things. He takes a quick step forward, a whoosh of air going past Kerrin's face.

He steps back toward Kerrin, closing his eyes. He thrusts dagger straight up in front of him, impaling the bottom of the serpent's jaw. He attempts to pull the blade down it's throat, but it pulls it's body up and slithers back into the shadows.

"Some help would be greatly appreciated, guys!"

Maikeru follows Zen into the shadows, attempting to adjust his eyes to the light. The darkness forces him to strain his eyes but he can see the faint shadow of the serpent. Grasping his sword tightly he watches quietly, he has gotten used to silence. He can hear the faint brushing of the snake moving toward him.

He lets out a gasp because he was holding his breath to stay silent, when the snake lurches abruptly at him. He evades to his left and feels a sharp pain in his right arm, not sure if it was the serpent or something he couldn't see in the darkness.

With his good arm he lunges in the direction of the snake, where he feels his blade puncture the beasts side. It lets out a loud hiss as Maikeru pulls out the sword to slice it this time.

He misses and gets knocked to the ground by the serpents tail. He then calls out "Zen! You made this tower, So how the hell are we supposed to kill this thing?"

"Mike, you get back, you've been bitten by the bastard and lord knows what kind of venom it possesses!" She pushes him back with a slight amount of force.

Emiko, with her eyes already adjusted to the dim lighting, carefully walks about 5 steps before she stops for a second. She spins around and with great force, she slices the serpent down the underbelly just enough to slow it down, but not enough to kill it.

"Zen! I blame you for this, who thinks of a giant worm from hell to protect a goddamn tower?!" Seconds after she yelled this to Zen, the serpent wrapped its tail around her ankle and dragged Emiko at least 50 feet deeper into the darkness.

'Heh. They think I'm skilled in arts other than necromancy. Sadly that just isn't the case, ignorant whelps.'

Zen takes a step toward where Emiko got dragged. "Kerrin, tend to Mike. I'll make sure you have at least a 5 foot radius around you while you get that venom out of his arm. And Mike, I'm responsible for the barrier around the city and the construction of the tower. There were some other... Skilled individuals that created the beas-"

Zen notices slithering monster's sound across the ground, an arm's length away from him. From a small pouch under his clothes, he takes a small black stone. "Accipio meus anima." An energy radiates around him, then it implodes toward the stone. He places the stone in the pommel of his dagger, and the dagger glows white, emitting an almost ultraviolet light.

"Mother fucker. Die." He says. The blade of the dagger quickly touches the gash that Emiko made in the beast's stomach. "We're safe now. The beast is mine, or at least it won't stay living." The beast wraps it's jaws around Zen's body, beginning to bite down. It's fangs pierce through his shirt and stop, pressing into his skin.

"Zen...?" Kerrin asks quietly. "I'm fine, it's dead now. Now to find Emiko." says Zen. "Emiko!" He shouts as he wanders into the darkness, looking for the outline of a body on his way in.

"Fucking God. I'm already so done with all of this. I'd be much better back in the forest by myself, than with these pointless people. They're nothing to me." She complained to herself as she trudges through the darkness.

Suddenly, Emiko could see a faint outline of a metal door, about 10 feet high. There was a dim light surrounding the door. In the back of her mind, she thought that she should go find the rest of the group, but part of her natural curiosity wanted to go see what the door led to.

Although exploring and going to the door sounded like more fun, the safer option would probably be to go find the group.
"Well, I suppose I should go find the other fuddyduddies." She chuckles to herself as she followed the trail in the dirt that the serpent made when it dragged her while whistling a tune to entertain herself.

She hears her name shouted in Zen's unmistakable voice. "I'm perfectly fine, but I've got something to show you guys. Um i think I've found a way in, maybe?" She replies while sort of jogging to where she heard Zen's voice echo from.

Sitting on the ground attempting to get a better look at his arm, Maikeru is approached by Kerrin. He heard Zen tell her to tend to his wound but in the dark chamber he couldn't evaluate how bad it really must be. The pain was beginning to numb the longer he relaxed.

"I'll be perfectly fine" Maikeru tells Kerrin

When he goes to get up though the pain returns abruptly and without warning. Slumping back to the ground he holds is injured arm with his right hand and feels warm, sticky blood on his fingertips.

He quickly gets up, careful not to harm himself again and walks over to Emiko to see what she had found. When he approached her voice he bag an to see a faint rectangle of light a few feet in front of him.

"lets see what awaits us inter other side of this door"silvery says as he pushes his right shoulder against the large door.

The light begins to fill the room a little and the snake is clearly visible now. It's limp and bloody corpse in a heap across the room.

Turning his head to the door Maikeru sees a staircase lit with torches on the wall, flickering and casting moving shadows on the wall. The stairs lead up in a spiral to who knows where.

Mailers begins walking up the stairs but stops to see if anyone is following him up.

Idiot. Guess I have to stop him.

The serpent's corpse springs to life after Maikeru, wrapping itself around him. "I will kill you if you don't stay back. You don't have a clue what could be up there." The snake lets go of him, blocking the path up the stairs in the process. "Now let Kerrin at least close that cut, idiot."

Kerrin walks casually toward Maikeru, softly touching his arm, making an attempt to close the wound. "Don't run away from me again. Not until I say so." she says softly.

Zen walks to find Emiko, grabbing her shoulders as they approach each other. "Are you okay?" he asks, his arms trembling as his grip rapidly opens and closes on her arms.

Emiko places her hands on Zen's arms in a notion to assure him that she is okay. "Zen, i'm fine. why are you shaking?" She looks at him with a puzzled look on her face and then looks over to Maikeru.

Fuck. Don't catch feelings Emiko.

"That's on hell of a battle scar you've got there!" She says jokingly referring to the large wound he had received from the serpent. Suddenly through a large pipe close to the floor, a substance like hot tar begins to pour out. Emiko looks around and notices that a second pipe begins to spew the black hot liquid as well. And a third.

"Oh shit." Emiko says to the rest of the group with a panicked look in her eyes. Before she knew it, the floor is covered in the liquid, and begins to run up the staircase.