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B2: Chapter 26: Taking the Short Way Down

B2: Chapter 26: Taking the Short Way Down

When Everyone arrives in Ala-Ash everyone takes a deep breath of the fresh mountain air and Ryan examines the beautiful mountains around them. The air was about 59 degrees and the sun was out in full effect. Ryan and his team learned from their mistakes last night and dressed right for the conditions here.

Everyone looks up at the massive mountain towering above them and smiles.

“Wow this is cool!” Ryan shouts in amazement while looking at this massive mountain in the distance.

“The best part is we’re are climbing up that thing!” Liz said in a hyper tone while picking up Zara and putting her on her shoulders.

“Wow! This is going to be so Fun!” Ryan said while doing a little excited dance. They then all start following Liz up a trail that will lead 4 miles that would take them up to the peak of this mountain.

Meanwhile in Palmlandia

Mriya mildly limps into the village outside of Migraine all bruised and mildly burned. She had her left arm in a sling and still had dried blood on her face. She reports to one of her Generals who seemed nervous.

Mriya looked like she was in a lot of pain, and she also seemed extreamly pissed. As she walks around the village, she notices dead soldiers around the area and one of her Siege weapons missing.

“Where is the other one of these?” Mriya said in a hot-headed tone.

“I don’t know commander. It looks like this base was attacked last night” One of her Generals replies back to her.

“Weren’t you in charge of this sector Sergei? She asked him in a pissed off tone.

“Yes, commander I was” He replies back to her really nervous. She then walks over to her hangar and has her men open the door to it.

Mriya than sighs in disbelief

“Where is my Attack Bee?” She asked very calmly.

“Again, Commander I have no idea what happened last night here.” Sergei replies to her.

“Where were you at EXACTLY last night Sergei?” She told him very calmly.

“I over saw the deployment of our Anti Air Fire mages near the border Commander” He replied to her.

“But I assigned you to stay HERE why were you OUT THERE” she screamed at him.

“I got pulled off my post Commander by Yuri. He told me I needed help overseeing the A.A. Mages” He replied back to her really nervous.

“You did a Really GREAT JOB at overseeing them! They snuck right on through and decimated the 9th Army Sergei!” Mriya said sarcastically.

“That’s because Faterra sent a task force of highly skilled operatives that killed all our skilled fire mages in the north east sector commander” Sergei replied to her.

“Operatives? I heard it was only 1 person that cut down our Air defenses” Mriya replied to him with serious look.

Sergei upon hearing that didn’t know what to say.

“You left your post, you mismanaged the Anti-Air team, and allowed Faterrian bombers to break through and harm our comrades and let them harm me, and you also allowed a Rogue taskforce to sneak in here and steal one of MY siege weapons and MY experimental Attack Bee!” Mriya screamed in rage at him.

At this point in time Sergei’s heart was beating extreamly fast right now.

“I’m going to Gulag Aren’t I?” Sergei said in a tone that signified he knew he fucked up.

“YES GO TO GULAG!” Mriya screamed at him.

Meanwhile in Ala-Ash

The team were climbing a winding trail and Zephyr was randomly kissing Ryan on the cheek every 5 minutes for no apparent reason. Misty who had her daughter on her back was enjoying this breath-taking hike. She was thinking about how shes been stuck in Staug trying to make ends meet and keep her daughter feed ever since Liz killed her husband accidently. She was enjoying this change in hardship.

She was happy she gave Liz a chance to make things right. Now she and her daughter are living in luxury, and at the same time Misty is offering motherly advice to Liz when she needs it. She knows Liz has problems with trying to be independent and hates being alone. She wanted to take this hike up here because she misses Vedra greatly. This very same hike she took alone on the last day she saw her before her death. Misty knew Liz was still emotionally damaged from that night, and really advised against coming here, but at the same time she is happy she tagged along.

The wonderful scenery of the mountains was something she never imagined she would ever get a chance to see with her daughter Zara while she was running her own business selling textiles and being a single mother.

“Mommy how did those get there” Zara asked while pointing the mountains around them.

“They were caused by magic explosions!” Misty said in a playful motherly tone while sending a small ice shard into the air and detonating it causing snow flurries to rain down on Zara gently. This makes her smile at her mom and also makes Zara giggle.

“Hey, hold up just a second Liz” Misty said while feeling her daughters forehead.

“Liz conjure some water for her please” Misty asked her seeming concerned.

Liz does so and gives her some. Misty watches as Zara drinks the water and then feels relived that shes now hydrated. Everyone then also takes some water from her and drinks up and then gets back to hiking up this trail.

45 minutes later everyone takes a break from climbing and Ryan does the honors and starts a fire for everyone to warm up since it was getting colder the higher up, they climbed. Misty pulls out some precooked steaks that she made last night that she actively kept chilled during this hike and throws them on the fire for everyone. After the break they keep climbing for another hour and then reach the peak of Mount Cheat.

At the top of the mountain the view was breath taking. You could see the whole surrounding area with ease. Snow capped mountains in the horizon, a Large lake in the distance and trees surrounding that lake as well. Liz took a deep breath and smiled at this view and laid back into a small pile of snow near here. She thinks hard about Vedra and catches herself before she cried. Misty picks up on this and sits down next to her while Ryan takes out his phone and takes a picture of this view.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Ryan can I see your phone really quick?” Liz asked him. Ryan then smiles at her and tosses it over to her.

She then searches for a song to express how she feels right now.

Liz puts on the song “Welcome To The Black Parade” From My Chemical Romance on Party mode and stands up. Everyone listens to the song and reflects on the song in their own way.

Ryan thinks about him killing himself and ending up in this world, and all the events he’s experienced up to now. Liz thinks about Vedra and how she will never forget her, Greena thinks about Yulee and this immortality curse she has on her, Kannell thinks about her teammates that have been killed in the past because of actions, and Noddle thinks about how happy he is to have Kannell back in his life. Zephyr on the other hand has an overload of emotions surging through her heard that this song starts bringing forward. She just stands there smiling at Liz. Then there is Misty. She thinks about her husband while she stares off into the distance over this mountain peak.

“Hey guys, the Wonder Tombs are on the other side of the lake” Liz said as she pointed to it in the distance. She than started Buffing everyone up with [Slow Fall] along with Kannell. Zephyr then gives Liz a hug and Ryan takes his phone and prepares himself for this glide over there. The glide looked like it was going to be 5 miles away and he was jumping up and down in excitement.

He then takes his phone from Liz and gives her a Hug. He then puts on the song “Fly From The Inside” From Shinedown on party mode and gets a running start and jumps off the mountain peak. Zephyr and everyone else sees this and joins him. As jumped off this massive mountain headfirst, he gains forward speed and watches the jagged edge rocks fly past him. He was at 10,000 feet and the landing zone looked to be at around 5,000 feet he had a long glide ahead of him. He was having so much fun. As he glided away from the rock cliffs the terrain dropped off directly below him into the massive lake below.

A minute into the glide his hands and face start getting cold, so he starts casting [Ball lightning] in fire mode from both hands and holds the spell in front of him. The heat coming off the spell warmed his hands and his face up and also left a smoke trail along his glide path. As soon as he gets warmed up, he gets a little surprise. Zephyr catches up to him in the air and clings onto his back. She wraps her arms around him and gives him a kiss on the cheek and then breaks away and rolls off in midair and flies next to him. This makes Ryan feel happy and then he and Zephyr watch Kannell and Noodle race past them going as fast as they could. They appeared to be racing to see who could reach the targeted area first.

Still at 7,000 feet and enjoying the view Ryan decides to glide next to Zephyr and run his hand through her blue hair. He then dips down and decides to gain massive amount of speed. He accelerates up to 250 Miles an hour moving forward and then starts casting [Ball Lightning] again in both hands but doesn’t launch it. He uses the spells as an Airborne Jet engine and races past Kannell and Noodle. Kannell who was a little surprised activates [Air blast] and catches up to Ryan.

At this time, he and her have managed to pass over the lake and were now headed toward a wall of jagged mountain cliffs. Ryan leans left to change his heading but realizes he’s moving too fast forward to maneuver quickly. He then brings his hands out forward to apply reverse thrust to slow him down but as he does that, he starts to get a headache.

“I shouldn’t be low on mana already!” Ryan thought to himself as he sees a huge mountain wall in front of him. Ryan who was realized this wasn’t good tries to lean to the left but wasn’t turning fast enough. He sees a wall he could glide over and aims for it. He then nearly hits this low wall of mountain and when he comes out the other side he starts scanning. He looks to his Right and sees a descending mountain ridge he can follow he can get his speed down. He then leans back and starts controlling his decent. He glides parallel to the mountain ridge until he gets a gap he can fly over. When he finds one, he glides over it with 10 feet to spare and then on the other side he was over the Lake where the terrain dropped off straight down. He then looks to his left and to his right and tries to remember where the landing zone was at. He flies out to the middle of the lake and then turns until he sees a weird roof shaped rock. He then looks at his altitude and is mildly alarmed. He might not make it there. He then starts kicks on his “Afterburner” spell and really starts gaining speed until he has a massive headache.

When he suffers this massive headache, he cuts out his spell and pushes his hands into his eyes in hopes the pain will stop. Then without paying attention he hits the water going 60 miles an hour and bounces off of it and starts rolling in midair. He then hits the freezing cold water again while rolling and comes to a dead stop in the water. Immediately after he lands in the water Ryan realized he fucked up. The cold freezing water feels like sharp knives on his body and he starts screaming for help.

Not a second after that happened Zephyr screams in shook from midair. She slows down and waits for Greena to pass her. She then grabs onto Greena.

“Kill this spell! We need to dive down there and get him!” She tells Greena.

“Alright! Hold on!” Greena shouts as dispels both of their [Slow Fall] Spells. They then start falling straight down from 6,000 feet. They fall until they are at about 500 feet above the water and Greena Rebuffs both of them with [Slow Fall]. Their falling speed then is reduced greatly and then right before Greena and her hit the water Greena Activates [Hover] which allows them to hover above the water. Zephyr then let’s go of Greena and runs over to her boyfriend and pulls him out of the freezing water. She grabs his hands and pulls him up onto her back and they she activates [Sprint] and carries him to shore. While she was running with him Ryan felt her body heat that was extreamly high and comfortable to him. He then also starts burning [Ball Lightning] in front of him to heat him up. As he “Burns” this spell like this he notices that it consumes a lot of mana when he uses it like this. When he gets a secondary headache, He stops. By the time he stops it Zephyr has already arrived on land and puts him down. She takes out her battle axe in her bag and starts chopping up small branches and brings them back to Ryan. He immediately ignites the wood and then Greena who was casually walking from the water picks up pinecones and small sticks on her way to them. She puts this stuff on the fire and smiles at Ryan.

“He’s going to have to take his clothes off and dry them on the fire” Greena Suggests to her.

Ryan who looked at her like she was crazy is then immediately grabbed by Zephyr and she takes off his shirt and starts taking off his shoes. Ryan then gets closer to the fire he just started and helps her remove his socks and his pants. Greena casts [Hover] on Ryan so his feet can remain out of the snow while he then removes his underwear.

“Baby what happened to IT? why is it so small!” Zephyr said in concern while looking at his manhood.

“Not now!” Ryan said as he recasts [Ball Lighting] In burning mode and starts casting it at the ground near his clothes. The water from his closes then starts to steam off quickly and when he notices that he brings the spell over his clothes very quickly, so they don’t burn. When his underwear was dry, he puts them on as Zephyr couldn’t help but touch his “package”.

“Baby! I’ve very worried about this what happened to it?!” She asked him really worried.

As soon as Greena heard this she shakes her head and giggles at Zephyrs Innocence.

“Look when it gets cold it shrivels up. Its just temporary” He replies to her as he starts to then put on his pants while suffering another low mana induced headache.

“It better be temporary! That’s like a huge reduction in size” Zephyr said while she helped him get his pants on. While Zephyr helped him, he then puts on his long sleeve Emo stripped shirt and then his jacket. He then puts his Socks on, and Zephyr helps him on of his shoes on while he puts on his other shoe. After he was dressed, she looks into his eyes and kisses him. He then hugs her and loves her amazing body heat. He then Makes out with her for 20 seconds and they all get up and start marching toward the Landmark that was about 1/2 mile away.

When they arrive there, they find Kannell and Noodle who were arguing over who won the “Race” here. When they see Ryan, they laugh at him.

“Nice landing Noobie” Kannell said while teasing him.

“Hey, I wish I knew I couldn’t turn before I started hauling ass like that” Ryan said trying to defend himself.

“Well news flash you can’t turn in the Air when you’re flying full speed like that dude. Be careful next time” Noodle told him while placing his hand on his back.

“Hey, you want to know something funny?” Ryan said while crossing his arms.

“What?” Kannell asked him.

“Turns out Zephyr doesn’t know what happens down here when we land in freezing water” Ryan tells them with a smile on their face.

Both of them smile and start laughing.

“Oh, she is so Naïve that it’s cute!” Kannell said while walking over to her and smiling over at her.

“Quit picking on me!” Zephyr said with a childlike playful tone.

“Oh, you have so much to learn Zephyr” Kannell said while giggling at her.

Zephyr then just smiles at her and rolls her eyes.

“You all ready for this dungeon? Its going to be cold inside”

At the very same exact time Greena and Zephyr said “I’ll be alright”

They then look at each other confused and laugh. Then they all walk past a group of 110 people who were all looking for a party members and then proceed inside the huge dark cave entrance.