Chapter 1

The Kri'lla scuttled about on the wall, it mandibles snapping in excitement, its twelve beady eyes scanning the room. Someone is coming, it thought. A human. The kri'lla could not recall the last time a human had last stepped in these passageways. It had to feast on small animals and insects, so feasting on human flesh was a welcome change of pace.

Where are they? Where is the human? It chittered, trying to locate the human. It managed to pinpoint a human, a good thirty feet away. It seemed rather young and lean, it thought with disappointment. The kri'lla preferred supple bodies, it made it far easier to dissolve the organs, but well, one can't be too picky.

So absorbed the kri'lla was in anticipating its next meal, it failed to noticed a ray of magic that landed squarely in its abdomen. It shrieked pitifully as it fell to the ground, its six legs curling up as it lay there dying.

"Well that was easy," the boy remarked, dusting off his gauntlet, which hummed quietly. "Must have been distracted by my gorgeous face." He shot at the kri'lla one more time for good measure before pulling out a map.

"Still, though, there aren't that many traps here," the boy murmured "Maybe there isn't anything here?" He was ecstatic when he had (literally) stumbled upon a secret passageway while exploring a catacomb for relics, but so far, nothing had really piqued his interests. There were very few murals, little to no traps, and even the creatures themselves were disappointing. The boy's hopes of a rare relic was rapidly diminishing.

"Well, I've come this far," the boy said to himself. He picked up his lantern and continued down the passageway.

The passage was, as the boy feared, rather uneventful. A few more kri'lla, some man-eating rats, very much the norm expected. He was beginning to have second thoughts about continuing on, but finally found a door. Grinning slightly, he pulled out a sweeping lens from his pack. The lens hummed lightly as it scanned for traps, bathing the door with a red light. Once it revealed there were no traps, the boy cautiously pushed the door open.

He groaned. It looked as if there were any artifacts here before, they were now gone. Instead, an empty pedestal stood in the center of the room. A little further ahead, an raised archway loomed in the room. Curiously enough, there was nothing behind it as far as the boy could tell.

The boy scanned the room, wondering if there were any other passages, but beside the door he just entered, there was nothing else.

He scratched his head. Finding nothing in ancient passages and ruins was not uncommon, what with all the grave robbers. Nine times out of ten he would leave a ruin empty-handed. But his intuition was telling him there was more to this room.

He walked up to the empty pedestal and saw, on closer examination, five etched grooves, faded symbols surrounding them.

"Hm" the boy said thoughtfully, staring at the pedestal, then redirected his attention to the archway. He walked around the archway, studying the ancient symbols. He did not recognize them at all, so it must have been an ancient civilization lost in history. He waved his hand behind the arch to make sure there was no invisible pathway, but unsurprisingly found nothing. He was able to sense vestiges of magic, though he could not completely analyze the formula.

"Could it be teleportation magic?" he wondered. It seemed impossible, since all the scholars claim it to be impossible for at least another hundred years, and he never heard of anyone capable of teleporting, but he did hear of legends of how the ancient civilizations far surpassed that in magic capabilities. In fact, the gauntlet on his left arm was a testament to that, allowing him to blink short distances, and that was only one gauntlet. Imagine two gauntlets, or an archway? Perhaps this was their way of hiding their treasure room?

Unfortunately, he was not sure if he could open it. He was almost certain now that the pedestal did not hold artifacts, but keys to open the archway. He did not have the keys, but…

He stared at his gauntlet once more. The magic should be similar to what the gauntlet was using, and he more or less knew how to use it. And since the magic was similar, maybe he could use it to jumpstart the magic?

He studied the archway, searching for a chink in the magical formula. Though he did not brag about it a lot (ok, maybe he did), he was considered to be quite a prodigy. As his forty-third tutor had told him before quitting "If you could actually focus for ten minutes, you could have revolutionized magic as we know it!" So while he had no idea how this magic formula worked, he still could sense the general gist and feel of it.

He scanned the archway once more, nodded to himself, then aimed the gauntlet slightly above the lower right corner of the archway. Concentrating, the gauntlet lighting up and making a humming noise, he blinked foward, careful to land exactly at the spot he was aiming at. He glanced up.

It did not work. More accuately, the archway's rune did light up and there was a definite hum, but the spell itself was not activating.

"Not enough energy, huh," the boy said, disappointed. He had a suspicion that could be the case, but he was hoping that maybe the archway had enough leftover energy to start it. He scratched his head. He could theoretically keep placing energy, but he had no idea how long that could take, especially if the place he was tansported to was across the world. Maybe he should come back with a magical generator?

So absorbed he was in his thoughts he noticed too late that the walls had shifted and turned over to reveal several hulking golems, standing over ten feet tall, while the doorway was covered by a rock slab, sealing him off. He leapt back reflexively, his gauntlet aimed at one of them before realizing they weren't moving. On closer examination, he saw that their energy was mostly depleted likely due to the fact that they were worn away and cracked. He sighed in relief. This must have been the guardians for this room.

"Hm?" he said, noticing one of the golems still had energy in its core. "Is it it too badly damaged to fight?" he wondered, tapping the golem. Maybe he could use the core to power the archway…

A second later, a rock arm sent the boy flying across the room. The golem, a soft blue light emitting from it, wobbled out of its capsule and fixed its sight on the boy.

The boy was coughing and dusting himself off. "Stupid faulty security," he grumbled, glaring balefully at the golem. Then he grinned. "Well, what's an adventure without an epic fight, right?" And with that, he aimed his gauntlet and fired a shot, running towards the golem.

The ray bounced off the golem, and it swung its arms forward, trying to crush the boy. The boy, however, blinked behind the golem and fired another shot. The golem quickly dragged its arms across the ground to catch the boy, while the boy deftly rolled out of the way, but not before firing another shot.

The golem was strong but slow. While the boy could easily dodge and land shots, most of the shots got deflected, with no signs of the golem slowing down. Furthermore, fighting underground was severely limiting his firepower. While the golem could probably survive a cave-in, he very well could not.

He did notice that whenever his shots made it through the cracks of golems exterior, sparks would fly. He was probably attacking the core. He could destroy the core and stop it moving, though there was the risk of it exploding, but at this point, he did not have much of a choice.

So the boy used himself as bait, luring the golem before placing a few well-placed shots before blinking away, repeating the process again and again. After a while, the golem was noticeably slower, sparks emitting occasionally. But the boy was also slowing down. The cooldown to blink was becoming longer, and he could feel his magical reserves depleting. He was not sure how much longer he could keep this up.

"Come on, just ie already!" he grumbled, aiming another shot at the golem.

The golem stiffened up, then slowly landed with a thud, the light dimming from it.

"I did it?" the boy said, confused. Realizing the golem was not getting up, he let out a cheer. "I di it! This is definitely going in the log book!"

Suddenly, the golem's light tuned red, ending the boy's celebration. If his gut feeling was right (as it usually was), the golem was going to explode. He rushed to the door, only to find it was still barred. He fired several shots, all in vain. Any moment the golem would explode. The boy scrabbled away to the other side of the room, hoping to at least not be caught in the middle of the explosion.

The golem's light was blinking rapidly now, about to burst any second now. The boy squeezed his eyes shut and covered his ears, bracing himself for the inevitable. He waited. He heard a boom.

But felt nothing. Surprised, he cracked his eyes open, and was surprised to see that the explosion was being absorbed by the golem, the light seeping through the cracks of the golem, leaving the golem an empty husk. The archway's runes glowed brightly, and was now humming almost deafeningly. The boy watched as crackles of electricity emitted from the archway. Though he could not see clearly, he could see that through the archway glimpses of something. Fields, deserts, then strange looking buildings and curious flying objects. Before he could make sense of it, there was a loud crack and a flash of light, blinding him. Then, nothing.

He rubbed his eyes, trying to adjust his eyes to the darkness. The archway was back to how it was before, and he could sense that the archway was completely drained. He frowned, then squinted his eyes.

There was a person, lying face down. He cautiously approached them, nudging them lightly with his foot, but no response. He turned the person over and examined them.

It was a girl. It was odd though, since despite the fact the she appeared to be alive, he could not sense any magical aura from her, which should have been impossible. Everyone, no matter how inept at magic, had a magical aura. Furthermore, he did not recognize the region of clothes she was wearing, with her odd blue pants, a loose red shirt and what appeared to be a jacket with peculiar writing on it. Perhaps she came from an isolated, unique tribe?

The boy hurriedly fixed his hair before shaking the girl.

The girl stirred, opening her eyes blearily. She blinked.

"Uh, hello," the boy said. "How are you feeling? Is you head all right?"

The girl frantically looked aound, shock evident on her face. "Where—" she coughed. "Where am I? Who are you? What's going on?"

"Whew, I you can speak. That's a good start," the boy said. "That's right, I haven't introduced myself, have i?"

He stood up, whipping his hair as smiled, puffing out his chest. "I am Ezreal, the Prodigal Explorer!"