BOOM!
With a great explosive force, the ceiling and walls of nearly the entire castle collapsed, which only revealed further to the inhabitants that weren't particularly flattened the sheer madness going on outside. Water elementals crawling out of the well at a rate the capitol guards and adventurers could barely hold back. Giant mechanical things with bodies and legs like spiders and covered in gears that emitted steam crawling around wrecking the roads herded by Al, piloting the largest one. Gimme tossing cannonballs into the air before swinging his club into them, propelling them at random guards or passerby, as though some mixture between a shooting gallery and baseball.
In all of this chaos, who could blame the royal guards for not paying enough attention to notice the relatively innocuous sight of a griffon ridden by our elvish friend Pat and dear kobold Boldy, Boldy locking a chain around his waist that Pat was holding. Of course it didn't help that one of the castle guards was in fact Kelly wearing a skin suit, throwing a smoke bomb creating a cloud of smoke, obscuring everything. Only those paying enough attention from outside the smoke would notice Boldy, swinging into the smoke empty handed, and leaving with none other than Elliane Olivier, the princess of the Taren Empire!
Ah, good, we're caught up to speed now. Time to continue where we left off before.
While in the air, Boldy quickly soaked the rag in sleeping potion and used it on the princess, knocking her out. Once Pat saw this, he took out a shortbow he had with him, and knocked an arrow. He cast [Contagion Flame Arrow], igniting the arrow with an infectious fire, then he let it fly onto a mostly untouched house.
Once they saw the burning building, each member of Chaotic|Nonsense pulled out their crystals. They channeled a small amount of mana into the crystals, which glowed brightly, before that light enveloped each of the members, as well as in two cases, an extra griffon and princess.
In the capitol, the large spidery machines followed a last intention given to them by Al before he left,
"Go wild." Continuing to stomp around faster and faster, destroying and raising the casualties ever higher until eventually adventurers and guards managed to knock them over and break them.
The elementals meanwhile kept crawling out until the fortieth, then no more came out. The elementals, well they seemed to just hate everything, so they caused their own havoc with their brutal Melee [Crashing Waves] attacks.
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Through the arch, Pat, Kelly, Al, Gimme, and Boldy appeared, each after using the crystals, Pat with the Griffon in tow, and Boldy with a freshly knocked out and tied up princess.
After Boldy put the princess down, they all looked at each other and after a moment of deliberation shouted.
"We did it!", followed by high fives all around, or low fives in all of Boldy's cases, and all of Gimme's. What? Why the weird look? They may be terrible murderers, arsonists, thieves, and rude on occasion, but they were still guys that could celebrate with a high five.
They then split up, each going to their own lands to get one key each. These five keys, when all used together, would be able to unlock the front door to Emp's castle without his master key. It was a way of Emp saying, "I trust you enough to come in while I'm out, but only if you all agree on it".
They entered his castle with the still sleeping princess and went for the room housing the staircase up on the ground floor, the grand banquet room. From there they began setting up everything they brought from Gimme's hoard once they were back.
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Out in the southern continent, Emp stopped to stretch a moment, he had felt a little stiff after dealing with dragons all day. He was currently levitating seven small eggs and one large one behind him. The small eggs from white, black, red, brown, blue, and yellow scaled dragons, and one being the chameleon dragon's egg. The large one was also another one of the chameleon dragon's eggs.
Emp got up and thought, 'Well, I best start getting back, can't be late for the meeting.' He brought up his wooden staff, doing what he did at the arch before to call up the rift, and stepping through with the eggs to find himself just ahead of the arch, and a note at his feet.
"We've decided to hold the meeting in your castle today, meet us at the ground floor's staircase room. Signed -K."
At this Emp felt honestly quite saddened, he had grown to love their nice round table meetings and dinners, right in the middle of that neutral space, nobody had to worry about knocking this over or don't do that, it felt homey.
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In the castle everything was up, which was a banner, a curtain hung from a chandelier to the ground after moving the table that was beneath it, a small but comfortably sized feast made up of food Gimme had nicked and Pat either grew or recently put down and cooked. Overall, a feast for for slightly more than eight people, with no desserts and freshly cooked exotic meats and plants.
It had been then that Elliane woke up, and upon realizing five of the members of Chaotic|Nonsense were around her, five of her six most feared people, her eyes went wide and she nearly seemed to freeze, not daring to move an inch.
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Pat saw her eyes open and rushed over then said, "Okay, look. We need you to do two things now that you're awake, firstly, you need to keep quiet, not a sound. Secondly, you're going to stand behind that curtain, and do not move from it. Now."
At those last words Elliane couldn't think of anything to do except, 'Don't anger the people who very well could be living avatars of evil.' So she went behind the curtain, wondering what in the world was going to happen, and silently hoping this was some cruelly vivid nightmare.
Now that everything was in place, Al used a long range mana link he set up before with the smaller machines he built and later scattered around the city while causing havoc. It was extremely taxing on his mana to reach through that far with the link, but he only need to give one command, so he didn't have to maintain the link too long. This command was to channel the mana in the storing crystals into their scrolls. This cast a simple remote viewing spell, into the throne room, and showed it to the capital. The remote viewing spell was almost identical to the rift in appearance, but trying to walk through it would have the same effect as walking through curtains with a projection on them. Except unlike the curtains, you'd still see it, just from a different angle.
Once Al had finished he said to the others, "I just barely managed that, but now I'm completely out of mana. I really need to work with Emp on finding some way to make that easier. Ah well, some other time, not today of all days."
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The townspeople were shocked and devastated, not only were their festivities interrupted by Chaotic|Nonsense themselves, but the princess had been kidnapped!
Now they could all see, projected into the sky in many places, the view of an incredulously opulent throne room, tables of jade with gold trim and chandeliers of gems and silver, But the more important detail was the people they saw, five of the members of Chaotic|Nonsense, now getting into positions around the door. Many also wondered, what were they doing? And why did that banner say-
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Emp arrived and found the keys in his door, the door still being open.
He walked through the various halls and rooms until he reached the Throne and Banquet room, only when he opened the door to enter...
"SURPRISE! Happy birthday!" Everyone, with the exceptions of Emp and Elliane, shouted out loud, surprising Emp.
Emp stopped, smiled with pure joy, laughed and then said, "And here I was, ready to remind you all with some lightening strikes, when you were just making it a surprise party! Sorry for doubting you guys, I had no reason to but I did anyways. Oh yeah, Pat, I still have the eggs." He pointed his thumb to the eight eggs behind him.
Pat said, "Well, first things first, Eradicator, we're using some remote viewing spells to show off right now, so all of the Taren Empire's capitol city can hear and see us right now, but more importantly, I did kind of lie about the eggs. The smaller ones are just like a chickens eggs, yolk and white, nothing will actually hatch from those, but I suppose something might from the big one. More importantly, we have extra food for a while, which we'll need!" Pat smiled at the last part.
"What do you mean by 'Which we'll need?" Emp asked, inquisition in his voice,
Al said, "Well, we all pitched in and got you a present together. So,"
Gimme continued, "From all of us,"
Kelly continued, "Just for you,"
Boldy said, "We hope you enjoy your birthday present!"
At Boldy's words they ripped back the curtain to reveal The Taren Empire's Princess, Elliane Olivier!
At this Elliane realized and thought, "I-I'm a b-birthday present to The Eradicator. I'm his... birthday present.. For, THE Eradicator. The one that's rumored to destroy souls for fun. The one said to lead Chaotic|Nonsense. I'm.. his... birthday present." She began to tremble, struggling not to faint, and to comprehend what was happening.
Emp said, "You guys... You guys,"
Emp stopped to breath in,
Emp finished, his eyes welling up and crying tears of joy, "You guys are the best friends a man could ask for!"
He rushed over to Elliane, grabbed her by the shoulders and faced her towards the rest of the group and said to them, "What other friends would get someone a princess for their surprise birthday party? None of them!"
At this they laughed and smiled, and unanimously agreed to an unspoken question, the meeting could wait another day.
The rest of the night was spent in many various ways, for Chaotic|Nonsense, they showed off the rest of their night of eating and laughing to and at the capital city, eating steaks of one of Pat's oldest dragons that wasn't doing anyone else or itself any good anymore. Emp seemed to get a good kick out of hearing what they did to the city while they were there, and Gimme happily showed off the loot that was still in his bag to the others. Mostly armors and weapons that tended to be broken or bent in one place or another, and a few leftover cannonballs.
For the others of that world, they all watched or heard the news with shock and worry. They were forced to accept that Chaotic|Nonsense still both lived and thrived, and that they had the Taren Empire's only princess, captured in the center of a storm with no eye.
For those of the other world that heard on Fantasy Today, some hoped something would be done to stop them and get the princess back, while others logged in, and already tried to rally other players and make plans to get her back.
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So ladies and gentlemen, this is only the beginning of our story, so allow me to start it like a true beginning.
Once upon a time in a land of fantasy and adventure, an evil group of six men lived, causing havoc and mischief wherever and whenever they pleased to sate their boredom. They were powerful and deadly and it seemed none could oppose them, not even dragons of old. One time it was the birthday of their most powerful member and leader, so the others went and kidnapped the fairest princess in the lands to give to him as a present, for him to lock her away in the topmost floors of his evil castle, where he himself resided.
Where it goes from our beginning? Perhaps some young lad who stole to live will rise up to bring the princess back? Or perhaps a glorious knight in shining armor? A mage of unrivaled arcane knowledge? An overzealous paladin leading a new crusade? The gods themselves granting their blessings to a chosen one who has passed their holy trials? A drunken man with a strong will and booze to spare?
Well, if you wish to know, please, read on dearest of wonderful readers. Come see not how deep the rabbit hole goes, but to watch my attempt to reach the bottom with a shovel, and dig it ever deeper.