I awoke to a knock on my door.

"Anna! Anna!" The knocking grew more intense. I got to my feet and opened the door.

"Wow you look like you just woke up." Zach laughed before looking at my dead eye. I covered it with my hair and scoffed.

"What." I snapped.

"Arin's been missing since we showed up," Zach mentioned.

"So? He's a grown man, he can do what he wants." I said. "I'm going back to bed." I began to shut the door but Zach stopped me giving me a worried look.

"Alec told me he went to confront Malphas alone." His voice was grim. "We need to go."

"Alec?" I asked.

"Kayden's Guardian. We are leaving in two hours, Grayson is going to take us to Arin's last known location." Zach said hurriedly. "Be quick Anna, we don't have time." He ran off, leaving my door open.

"Fuck." I said out loud, wishing for a little bit more sleep. I guess I can sleep on the way there. I thought to myself while getting ready. What an idiot! Why the hell would Arin go off and fight Malphas by himself! He could have formed a party or at least waited for us! Was it that important for him? God what a fucking idiot! These thoughts raced through my head as I continued getting ready for the day and putting on my armor.

"Miss Anna." It was Stephanie, she was in a new set of white robes, with her staff on her back. I had just opened my door, revealing her soft face. "Master Zach told me to come see you."

"What's up Stef?" I asked.

"Well, Master Zach has now taken leadership of the party." We walked down into the main Temple area as she spoke. "Kayden has resigned his leadership, and will also not be coming with us to rescue Arin."

"Are we going to be a man down?" I wondered.

"Oh no! We're actually going to have more than one full party coming with us. If Arin went up against a Lord of Terror, we should bring everyone." Stephanie replied. "The lords of Terror are extremely powerful, and it's never a good idea to bring just one party."

"That's good to know." I kept walking along with Stephanie, out through the main gate of the temple, and into the back training area. I was absolutely appalled to the amount of people outside.

"Yo shortie." Zach said playfully. "You finally awake?" I rolled my eyes at him and punched him in the arm approaching my caravan.

"Wow." I stared blankly at my caravan. Lots of people were there, taking on this quest to save my guardian. "I'm Anna, nice to meet all of you."

There was Alec, Kayden's Guardian. He was a tall guy with jet black messy short hair. He wore plate armor similar to Arin's, but it was pulsating with electric blue energy. He must have been in the same class as Zach, a Harbringer. He approached me, smiling.

"Hello." He said, I tilted my head as it looked like he was giving me eyes. "I'm Alec, another Guardian." he turned to Zach. "I must say Zach, you didn't say she was this pretty." My face went hot as he shook my hand before taking my hand and kissing the top. I pulled my hand back and gripped it, still red faced.

"Don't-" I started, before calming myself down. "Don't do that please." I said. He laughed, and apologized, before moving out of the way to let the next person introduce himself. Eric was a tall and bruting man, easily looking double my size and extremely tall for a human. He wore all white and held a mace on his belt with a shield and large two-handed axe on his back. He had roughed up plate armor as if he was in combat a lot. His hair and beard were brown and scruffy. His hair slid to the back of his head like gel ran through it.

"Lady Anna." He reached out his hand. "Name's Eric. I'm a Paladin. Nice to meet you. I guard over Stephanie." Three guardians was a lot, I wondered if we truly needed that many. He stepped aside, it was as if each character was waiting in line to meet me.

"Name's Kane." the man with the spiked hair spoke. He held a grim look on nice face as he sat inside the caravan. His hair was white, contrasting his dark clothing. He wore cloth and chainmail. "Arin was my friend once," he said. "So I owe him a debt. That's all." He scoffed and didn't even look at me.

"What about everyone else?" I asked, motioning to the few others crowded around the caravan. "What are they doing here?"

"They came to make sure we left with everything in tact. New weapons, new armor, supplies for us." Zach spoke. "It's a strike team to save Arin, and possibly defeat one of the lords of Terror, so overnight the news became quite the talk of the town." I smiled, knowing everyone here was rooting for us.

"Let's get going then!" I said excitedly.

"Sure thing, Anna." Zach put his thumb up at me.

"Lady Anna." Stephanie addressed me. "I ..." she trailed off and I raised my eyebrow at her.

"What's up Stef?" I smiled, and her little ears flopped.

"I want you to have this." She held out a cloth. "It's a rank 7 cryo catalyst. It should make your weapon more of a threat." She handed me a small dark blue gem. I embedded it inside of Arin's dagger, and a small vortex design appeared over the blade and where the gem was. It now glew a dim blue.

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"Vortex." I said aloud. "I'll name it, Vortex." I sheathed the blade, and hugged Stephanie. She gasped out of surprise. "Thank you" I muttered, holding her. "You're a good friend."

We all got into the caravan one by one. The lot of us were a bit much for the caravan. Eric, the white knight. Alec, the charming but annoying warrior. Zach, well he's Zach. Julie, the shadow-wielder. Stephanie, our healer. Kane, the mercenary. And Me, The Tempest. The caravan ride was short, and I even fell asleep on Stephanie's shoulder, as I was still exhausted from the day before. Before we left, I noticed that Kayden was standing in a crowd of people who helped us set up. I smiled at him, and he smiled back. Despite the loss of Tye, he was still hanging in there. I hope so at least.

* * *

Stephanie shook me awake. It was raining, must be the Rainsong Forest again. We had arrived down a narrow path that was surrounded by forests. A large cave that sunk deep into the ground, reminiscent of an animal pit lay out before us. The caravan had stopped a few feet away from it, and Grayson had transformed back into his human form. Everyone got out of the caravan and formed up on Zach, who had taken the role of leader. As awkward as he was, his newly activated relic gave him some confidence.

"I have a plan." Zach said, motioning for all of us to come together. He pulled out a map from his backpack and pinned it to the ground, we all knelt down to look at it together.

"There are two entrances to the caverns, and knowing Arin he probably went in the back way. So I decided to have us each split up into two equal parties. I want Stephanie, Anna, Alec, and Kane to go this way, the main entrance. They have the heavier hitters, so they should be able to handle the main entrance way much easier. Whilst Julie, Eric, Grayson, and I, will head down the other path and we will hopefully meet up." He paused for a moment, and then pointed to a location on his map. "Right here. This is the center, and if Arin is still here, that is where he will be."

"Now. Any questions?" He stood, his hands on his hips, confident and smiling. "This dungeon is level 10, but all of us have either surpassed that level, or are just about to hit it." He looked at Stephanie. "So we should all be okay."

"What if one of the parties is over run?" Kane asked, spitting into the dirt.

"If one party is over run, we call for a total retreat. Alec and I have obtained some new dwarven technology for all of you." He reached into his bag and held out a small black earbud that wrapped around your ear.

"These are Dwarven communication devices, and can be extremely useful when running through dungeons." Alec explained, handing one out to each of us. "Now, if anybody requires any communication between the parties, we will be able to talk through these." I put the earbud in one ear and pushed the button to turn it on

"I will be leading Team A." Zach said, gesturing to his party members who have now surrounded him. "While Alec will be leading Team B." We formed up in two groups and stood aways away from each other.

"Let's get going." Alec said, and with that we split off into two groups. Conquering the dungeon from two sides was actually quite a good idea. Stephanie, Alec, Kane, and I entered the dungeon, and I was immediately thrown aback by the smell. I drew Vortex, Arin's dagger, and followed Alec carefully. He held a large lightning ball, overflowing with blue energy. A large two handed sword in his other hand. Kane carried two scythes held together by a chain. Stephanie carried her staff, and I carried my dagger.

Alec lit the way as we entered the dungeon, fighting off spiders the side of our torso's was the easy part, but as we made our way deeper we came across what looked like a man. Alec approached it, thinking it to be Arin.

"Arin?" He asked softly, trying not to startle anything nearby. "Is that you?" And with a screech, the humanoid turned towards us, and the light from Alec's lightning bolt went out as he was tackled to the ground with the creature.

"Light!" Stephanie shouted, illuminating the whole area with a light from her staff. I immediately made my move to help Alec, lifting up the creature by its neck with my bare hands. I gripped my dagger tightly as it transformed into its sword form. I threw the monster into the cave wall before stabbing it in the stomach. The creature fell dead and turned to frozen dust.

"What the hell was that?!" Alec said, getting up and dusting himself off.

"Unclear." Kane spoke.

"Thank you for the save princess." Alec said, grinning at me. I scoffed at him.

"Don't expect me to do it again if you talk to me like that." I folded my arms and flipped my hair back. I slid my mask up above my nose before continuing to move forward. Stephanie continued with providing light for everyone as we moved forward in the cave some more.

Three spiders crawled out of the ground and attacked us. They were huge, almost as big as us with large fangs and hairy legs. One of them pounced at me, but I slid underneath it, using vortex to cut it in half. I got up from the ground quickly, only to notice everything else was dead. Stephanie had yet to do anything but provide light for us, but she was here to heal more than anything.

"A..n...n..a" A weird tingly sensation filled my eardrums as I heard Zach's voice just barely. "Th-e... al... de....ad.." The voice kept glitching in and out of my eardrums and I couldn't tell what he was saying. I pushed the button on the earbud to communicate while Alec and Kane fought off more of those humanoid spider creatures.

"Come again?" I said into the mic, pulling the attention of Stephanie.

"They are all dead!" Zach shouted clearer into the microphone. "They're all dead! You need to get out! You need to-" The microphone cut short as I was left hearing the screams of Zach being pulled away.

"Shit. Shit. Shit! What?! Zach? Zach?" I stuttered. "Kane! Alec! We need to move!" I shouted at them. They looked at me with weird concerned faces.

"You okay princess?" Alec said. I pulled vortex out, immediately activating my magical aura, turning the dagger into a sword. I pulled out my second dagger and exploded with a magical energy.

"Everyone is in trouble! We need to move right fucking now! You either come with me and keep up or go back the way you came!" I shouted angrily at the both of them before quickly taking off through the cave, cutting through multiple spiders and other creatures. I sliced through a spider with both weapons before quickly turning behind me to stab a humanoid in the gut before taking off quickly towards the next part of the cave. I heard shouting from behind me, Alec and Kane were saying something to me but I didn't pay attention.

Then silence. I looked behind me, trying to pinpoint where they had gone. Nothing. I must have been too quick for them.

"Guys?" I asked, the large corridor opening up to a large room ahead of me. No response. "Whatever, they'll just slow me down anyways." I scoffed rolling my eyes and heading into the large open corridor. It was so dark I could barely see. Fear crept down into my stomach, but I gripped my weapons tightly and continued forward.

"Ah!" A feminine voice exclaimed as I entered the room. "Welcome, Welcome." I couldn't see her so I held my guard up. "Please do take a sesat, and enjoy the view." I still couldn't see but I kept spinning around trying to focus on my enemy. If she even was an enemy.

"Who are you?!" I spat. "Show yourself!" I crossed both my blades in a defensive position. "Where are my friends? What did you do with them?"

"I didn't do anything sweetheart, they all came to me." Her voice lowered in the middle of the sentence, sounding more cruel and unusual. "But I came here for you, Annabelle." I cringed at the use of my full name and crushed a cryo-catalyst to illuminate part of the room. I could see massive spider legs in front of me, and I backed up slowly.

Snap. She snapped her fingers and immediately lights started flaring up all around the room. Torches lit and illuminated everything, and I was absolutely horrified by what was in my sight.