Theo and Lillian wondered why Joy had immediately sped off from the group. Ian had been discussing splitting into smaller teams to cover ground faster. But as soon as Joy heard the words splitting up, he immediately high tailed it out of the meeting. Muttering something about bad decisions under his breath.

It was not the first time Joy had done something impulsive and dangerous, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. So, people were a bit confused, but no one went running after him to inform him that he had misheard the instructions.

Instead, Lillian and Theo joined forces with Benny, who had decided to stick around. His ridiculous bowler hat was still magically attached to his head. Lillian was pretty sure it was some nefarious magic that had cursed him long ago. No matter what happened he would wear his shame upon his head for all eternity. Or the man just had awful taste in hats and refused to lose it. She wasn’t sure which one was worse.

The final member of their curious group was Ian himself. He was seemingly about to go off on his own when he noticed that Benny had survived and decided that he would require the man’s abilities to meld with shadows for reconnaissance. This meant that Lillian and Theo were along for the ride, which could be worse.

Ian was a powerhouse. Lillian had listened to Theo tell stories about Bloody Ian and how lucky they were to be able to train with such a master. But before this battle, Lillian had never seen his true prowess. Why he had the name had been a mystery, but now it was clear.

When he got angry, heads rolled.

But with that power on their side the group of four made very good progress throughout the castle. Any time the group came across an impassable obstacle, Ian would just cut through it magically. His sword sheared off sections of snow and stone, leaving impossibly clean lines cut into them.

Lillian was fairly sure that his gift made him able to cut anything. It seemed like the only logical option. His blade was unaffected by anything it touched. The blade still looked razor sharp despite the constant use against things like rock.

She still wasn’t sure how his gift allowed him to cut people from a distance, but it explained a lot of the power and skill she had seen from him. However, there seemed to be one massive drawback; he needed to sheath the blade before he could do a second cut. It honestly was a broken gift, but Lillian was not going to complain about it.

Their group had been able to make incredible time throughout the castle. They had stuck to the main floor, searching for the throne room or a prison wing. It seemed haphazard to Lillian, but she thought that Ian was just frazzled and wanted to find the prince badly.

Benny’s gift meant that they had been able to scout out locations at an absurd speed, and Ian’s battle prowess allowed them to cleave through any obstacles or enemies that stood in their way.

The powerful synergy between Ian and Benny made Lillian and Theo feel rather useless, but there were worse things than feeling a bit idiotic.

Benny had guided them towards the center of the building. Ian had asked him to find the largest gathering of enemies in the entire base, obviously hoping to cut the problem off at the head.

It had been going splendidly, other than the violence and mayhem, and Lillian felt the adrenaline pump through her system as she felt them close in on the enemies.

Then the floor underneath them blew up.

A massive explosion tore the floor out from underneath their feet. And sent them all plummeting into the deeper sections of the castle.

Lillian shot gouts of flames from her hands, causing her descent to slow down as she approached the floor. Benny escaped into the shadows and reappeared on the floor. Theo made a ramp out of ice that he slid down. And Ian withdrew his sword and vaguely cut in the space above his head, after which all his momentum suddenly disappeared.

Through their various methods, the group landed on the floor and surveyed the room around them.

It was beautiful. The entire floor was covered in a tiny replica of a real city. It was clear that painstaking detail had gone into every little part. There were tiny residents going about their days, intricately carved with different expressions and backstories that seemed to blossom in their wake.

Underneath Lillian’s feet she had crushed a bell tower and one half of a couple holding hands. The other half of the sculpted couple had a face of pure elation, doomed to be forever unaware that their other half had been smushed.

“Old men grow tired. The first thing that goes as you grow older is your eyesight. Then your hands start to shake as you try and do anything. Then the weariness truly hits you.” A voice emanated from the shadows surrounding the room.

“None of you have truly grown old yet. Most of you are children, and one of you seems to fancy himself wise beyond his years. But I am age and wisdom, so I am going to teach you a lesson here.” Slow and quiet footsteps radiated out of the darkness; the group pulled closer together. Lillian tried warding off the shadows with the flames that appeared out of her hands, while Benny slid into the shadows and started searching. Yet the footsteps continued unimpeded and unseen.

Lillian started throwing gouts of flame into the surrounding darkness. She knew that she was eliminating a lot of Benny’s space to use his gift, but the rest of them needed to see the enemy.

Spurt after spurt of flame erupted from Lillian’s hands as she turned in a short circle. Until eventually the light shone upon an old man and a younger woman.

The old man was throwing a little ball up and down in his hand while the younger woman looked apprehensively around. Everyone’s eyes locked onto the woman as soon as she appeared though. She was the teleporter who had stolen the prince.

“Hey! Where did you take the prince?” Lillian, never one for beating around the bush yelled at the woman.

“Which one was that?” The woman asked rather nonchalantly, it was almost enough to fool everyone, but a slight shudder in her hands spoke volumes about how she really felt.

“The last person you took from the battle.” Theo said cautiously.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“He’s safe, for now. We will return him to you if you…” Ian’s blade suddenly cut her off. He had unsheathed it and cut the air in front of him, and suddenly the woman couldn’t speak anymore.

“What in the name of the God’s did you do to me?” She cried out in outrage. Not even realizing that her voice had suddenly come back.

“I cut the falsehoods out of your words, liar. You hoped to trick us; return the prince and we will not hurt you.” Ian glowered at the two figures in the dark, sword pointed at them unflinchingly.

The two groups stared at each other. Neither was willing to concede to the other’s demands. There was only one way to solve the dilemma.

Lillian shot beams of cold energy into the two enemies, while Theo crafted walls of ice between the two groups. Benny was still yet to be seen, and Ian released one of his invisible slashes at the group.

The old man started chuckling and threw the little ball in his hand towards the group. After which the two of them disappeared. All the group’s attacks passing harmlessly through the air.

The little ball exploded as it reached one of Theo’s walls. Turning what had been a formidable defense into a liability, as large hunks of ice came flying towards the ragtag team.

Lillian released a powerful blast of heat out of her hands, feeling the odd energy inside of her dissipate a little as she pushed it to the limit. The pieces of ice melted and turned into steam as they passed through the wall of heat.

Even as all of this was happening, a voice from the shadows yelled, “to the left!”

Ian was unconcerned with the shrapnel that Lillian was defending them from. And he immediately turned to see the duo standing on the other side of the room preparing their next attack.

A new volley of small spheres was thrown at the group. But this time Ian took no chances. He sheathed his sword and in one fluid motion cut the air in front of him. A screech erupted as the air rushed forward and cut all the spheres in half. As soon as they were damaged, they exploded. This created a beautiful image in Lillian’s eye as she saw Ian buffeted from the winds of the powerful explosion, undeterred and already searching for the enemies that had teleported away.

Lillian and Theo felt useless, since the walls of ice they could create were essentially useless in this situation and they were not observant or powerful enough to truly combat the enemies in the direct way that Ian was showcasing.

Lillian fumbled around, searching for something to help, but Theo let his creative side take over. He started freezing the ground around the group. He had seen that one of the enemies looked like an older man, he was hoping that his balance wasn’t as good as it used to be.

All it would take was one mistake.

Lillian immediately caught on to what Theo was doing and started freezing as much of the floor as they could muster. It was difficult work, since the entire floor was covered with something. It seemed like an entire replica city had been built into the floor of this room, Painstaking detail etched into every surface that the eye could see.

None of it mattered though, Lillian froze it all. The scene became a winter wonderland, a strange mirror to the very city that the two groups had been exploring here on the Frozen continent.

Explosions rang out as a fevered battle between Ian and the older man continued. Exploding orbs flew from every conceivable direction while Ian cut them out of the air, detonating them prematurely.

Neither man giving the other one a moments rest. Ian had the edge in terms of pure skill, but the unpredictability of the old man’s teleporting companion was able to eke him out an advantage. Unfortunately for him, Ian had also brought allies to the battle and Benny’s watchful eye was able to ascertain where the danger was at any given moment.

After what felt like an endless stalemate the mistake finally appeared. After teleporting away from their last barrage, a short cry escaped from a different side of the room.

The teleporting woman had slipped on the icy ground. It was a stupid mistake, but not one that Ian was going to miss capitalizing on.

The air screamed as Ian released his invisible cut towards the immobilized pair.

An endless sigh escaped the old man’s lips as he pushed the younger woman out of the way. The cut severed his arm and leg cleanly, and he collapsed to the floor, blood seeping out of his wounds.

“Go.” The command was short and sweet, but there was no denying a dying man. The teleporter looked at the dying man with regret in her eyes. But she built up her courage and disappeared from the battlefield.

Ian slowly approached the old and weak man. He didn’t want to get caught in some final suicidal explosion that the man had planned out.

“I have always been an artist. I have wanted nothing more than to just spend years honing my craft and reaching new inspirations. Yet life was not so kind to me. Here in this frozen landscape, we must fight for every breath we take, and the tribe had no use for an artist.”

Everyone approached the man but were oddly respectful of his dying words. Ian was probably hoping to glean some final information about the prince from him, but everyone else was respectful of the enemy that they had vanquished.

“So, I was elated when I received my gift from Retribution. They had heard my prayers, asking for a way to practice my art to the fullest. We made a deal of sorts; I could create my art and it would become a mighty weapon.”

The ramblings were getting less coherent, but they watched as the man passed away.

“I saw what true humanity looked like when the youngster took down the monster who had been chief before him. I was allowed to travel with Tera to the real continent to see what true art looked like in the civilized world. And I wanted to make my masterpiece.”

With a final twinkle in his eyes, he surveyed the room around him.

“Isn’t it beautiful?”

After a wet cough he continued. “But what makes my art so beautiful, is that it is coming to an end. Goodbye younglings, I hope you don’t hate me too much for killing you.”

Lillian felt the world start to charge. She couldn’t describe it, but it felt like something vast had just opened its eyes and stared down at her with the old man’s last words.

Energy built up in the air and Lillian looked down in horror at the artistic sculpture that was carved on the floor. That old man had thrown ornate spheres, and from his ramblings she knew his gift had to do with the art he made. If those little spheres could produce massive explosions, how large would the devastation brought on by this be?

Lillian accepted her fate on some level. There was no escaping this, there was nothing she could do, so she sighed and waited for the end. She wished she had gotten to do so many more things, maybe talk with her family just one last time. Fall in love. Run through the fields naked and let the power of nature envelope her.

Ian was not one to wait for his end. With his sword he furrowed his brow and cut the air in front of him. For the first time Lillian saw him struggle with whatever he was cutting. The air around the sword took on an ephemeral quality and Lillian could see the sword trying to cut through something that wasn’t quite there.

Ian screamed as they started to feel the energy building up, fade away. The explosion was moments away and he had to succeed or else he would be dead, and the prince’s promises would be for nothing.

Suddenly a hand appeared above Ian’s sword and pushed it down slightly. It was a bone white hand with black painted nails. Intricate tattoos covered all the available skin. But with the final push, Ian was able to cut though whatever had been blocking his way.

A gateway made of pure blackness stood in front of them and the team of four ran into it as they felt the world explode behind them.

As soon as they entered a presence bore down on them and a voice screamed, “what the fuck are you doing here!”

The voice sounded like a tired middle manager of some small apothecary. It was the voice of someone who worked far too many hours for someone who did not care about their wellbeing.

They were in the halls of gift giving. The marble floors and colorful ever-changing tapestries all the same as the day each of them had turned thirteen.

Thousands of eyes appeared over the group as the voice regained a bit of its lost gravitas, “this is not a place for mortals. Begone.”

As suddenly as they had appeared in the land of Gods, the four of them reappeared in a crater. A massive chunk of the castle had been destroyed and rubble was everywhere.

Corpses were strewn about, and everyone could feel that luck had more to do with survival here than any sort of skill.

Lillian was unperturbed by all the weirdness they had seen in one day. There was no reason to get caught up in impossibilities and the realm of Gods. She still had a job to do, they had to save a prince.