Hope seemed to be in short supply this time around. Wess sat right beside his friend looking towards the courtyard and the fountain with the running water. He then realized something...

“Hey, wait a second… Isn’t that the red maiden?”

Ezra’s head immediately lifted up in excitement as Wess said that. Only to not see any red statue in his field of view. He immediately glared at Wess.

“That’s fucking cruel. Even for you, man.”

“No, I’m serious. Look at the fountain. Look at what is on top of it.”

Looking up once more, he inspected the figure atop the source of the gushing water.

“No fucking way... That looks exactly like the red maiden!”

“Possibly. I don’t know for sure.”

“So, you're telling me that the one inside was a fake?”

“Most likely.”

Ezra ran towards the fountain, easily vaulting over and grabbing the statuesque of seemingly marble from the fountain’s top side. While doing so the color of red began to slowly return to the piece of art. It had been disguised as such from the very beginning.

“So, we went into the hellish mansion for no reason at all.”

Derek was quite disgruntled by the fact he had risked the lives of both himself and his daughter when the maiden was literally up for the taking from the beginning.

“Well, crew, this was unexpected, but hey! Look on the bright side, we're all still alive and we’ve got plenty of adrenaline still pumping through our veins.”

“Hurray!” said Allison who was the only other person visibly excited for this sudden revelation as she clapped.

“And besides, we had to go in there to know what the maiden looked like. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have known it was here.”

Derek lifted his finger to say something but then he realized that what Ezra said made sense.

“Well… I think we should get going, then.” said Ezra.

“Yeah, let’s go… Wait. What’s happening to the house…?” Wess said as everyone turned to see what he was talking about. The mansion had started to disappear particle by particle, almost as if it had been built by very small bricks which were slowly vanishing into nothingness.

The party remained there speechless as the source of the death of the previous visitors no longer existed after a few seconds' time.

Soon enough, there were no traces whatsoever that there had ever been a mansion there before. Both the fountain and courtyard had also disappeared; They were in the thick jungle of the island now.

“That was… You know what? I’m not even gonna say it. Let's just get to the ship." commanded Ezra.

Once they made it to the ship, it did not take long to notice that the ship was actually under attack by a gryphon.

“Oh, so that explains the guardian part of the legend." said Allison in awe of the monster attacking their transport.

“Well, don’t just stand there. We gotta save the ship!”

Rushing to the ship, those who were not exhausted from the engagement with the house jumped into action as fast as they could. Allison threw fire from her hands, forming a path of stone allowing her to run across the water.

Ezra proceeded to jump from wreckage to wreckage along the shore, hoping to get a quicker start. Derek transformed into a bat to intercept the monster mid-flight and give the crew some breathing space to situate themselves.

Raven looked on towards the action while holding up a very weakened Wess. She knew they could use all the help they could and she was not feeling as tired any more after running while levitating her father the whole way.

“Stay here Wess, I’ll help them, too.”

“Alright...”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

She zoomed towards her father who had materialized a sword from his blood, rapidly shifting between his forms to evade any strikes of the gryphon.

"Tenebris Materia Trabem!" she said as she blasted the fiend with her dark matter beams, slightly knocking it off balance. That surprised Derek who was grateful his daughter was assisting him.

Down below, on the ship, things were not so looking so good. The ship had taken some severe damage from the monster, with one of the masts toppled over.

“What happened? Why is a damn gryphon attacking my dad’s ship?” Ezra asked.

“No clue. Allison. You think you could look back in the past to see what happened?" Juana asked.

"I think so. Let me just grab a piece of the broken mast."

She grabbed a piece of wood from the mast, held it to her chest and closed her eyes. Her eyes then opened and they were glowing yellow.

"Apparently, a bunch of tiny dust specks up in the sky formed into a gryphon and started attacking the ship. It happened shortly after the house disappeared."

“Wait, you’re saying the gryphon came out of a dust cloud?

Allison nodded.

“Dammit!” Ezra stood there, thinking about their next move. While Ezra strategized, the fighting in the sky wasn’t going well for the Valtaheims. They were quickly losing their element of surprise when they started the fight with the gryphon.

Its sharp claws slashed at Derek several times, blood dripping from his wounds. Yet he continued his onslaught. Raven’s attacks were becoming less and less effective as the gryphon used its wings to shield itself.

“They seem to be having a hard time up there. Ez, what do we do?”

“Hold on, I’m thinking...”

With a brilliant plan in mind, Ezra quickly continued.

“I got it! Juana, do you think you can get us up there? Can you use the waters to launch us into the sky?”

The pink succubus nodded.

“I think I can throw you both in at once… But I’ll only be able to do it once, so you’ll have to make it count.”

“Don’t worry, we will. Allison, remember that the gryphon is a minion of the house.”

“Right. Well then, surely its insides are made out of plants as well. If we can make a large enough hole in its armored skin, I can set its insides on fire. It’s a bit of a stretch, but I think I can do it.”

Momentarily pausing, Ezra energetically responded back.

“Let's do it! Juana, get us there.”

“On it.”

As the two jumped down towards the waters below, Juana began to concentrate on her spell. The gryphon was now clearly overpowering its assailants. Derek’s left arm had been bitten severely and it was hanging on by a thread as it quickly tried to heal. Meanwhile, his daughter, too preoccupied with the fighting, had barely bat an eye at her father’s injury.

The quick overpowering gryphon hastily closed its distance on Raven. She constantly attacked it while still making sure to keep her distance. The gryphon then head butted her with extreme force. The attack knocked out Raven. Derek, who could barely stay afloat in the air with one of his arms broken, desperately tried to rescue his daughter from falling from such a high height. While he approached her, the gryphon proceeded to charge at Derek, knocking him off course.

Allison and Ezra were immediately launched towards the two. Ezra caught the unconscious fairy, lifting her from her fall with the sheer force of his launch. The gryphon barely processed what had occurred when its lower torso was quickly torn off by the ravenous werewolf after throwing Raven even further above to free his hands to strike the fiend. Much like he and Allison had guessed, the interior of the beast was filled with bushes and leaves.

“NOW!” He shouted to Allison, who was waiting for that exact window to strike. As if rehearsed, she poured as much fire into the opening as she could. The gryphon screamed in enormous pain, quickly falling down below in grand fashion as they all plummeted down into the sea.

Ezra caught Raven’s descending body to avoid the full damage of the fall. Allison utilized her flames further on the gryphon and when she thought it had been enough, she redirected it to diminish the speed of her fall. Derek was utterly speechless over how they were able to quickly defeat the monster. His arm was now healed again and he made his way down towards the ship.

Ezra landed at the deck of the ship with a sonorous thud. His legs were able to absorb the entire impact of his fall without any harm. The rest of the crew observed as the flaming gryphon continued its fall, crashing onto the island’s sand and burning to a crisp until there was nothing remaining.

Raven finally came to. She realized that she was being held by Ezra and quickly forced herself out of his grasp and onto the deck. Ezra gave a slight laugh.

“You’re welcome.” he said as she walked away towards her dad.

Now, let’s get ready to go. I’ve had enough of Vostar. Allison, go grab Wess at the beach.” Ezra commanded.

“Okay.”

“You two Asteliras and Juana, give me a hand here. We need to repair the mast of the ship.”

“Right.” they said.

“Very good work, everyone. After the mast is restored, we should be at a resting place in no time.”

Red maiden in hand, Ezra observed it closely, admiring its fine details. He then went into his quarters and set down the little statue on one of his dressers.

“We did it, dad… We got the maiden. I hope it was worth it. Hope you’re proud of us...”

Ezra looked at the statue one last time before recomposing himself to his former cheery and arrogant self, shouting celebratory words and orders to the assembled crew.

The maiden glistened in the sunlight from the window as the ship departed.