Chapter 4 – Vertigo Volcano

The following morning, the Knights of the Dawn all woke up and had breakfast in the hotel's dining room. Not long after, they were all outside, standing before the front entrance of the hotel. Palm trees lined the perimeter of the curved driveway, which a taxi was driving up towards the front door.

"Well, here comes our ride, Seth," said Vanessa, who was carrying a small gym bag over her shoulder, as was Seth.

"You two have fun at the water park," said Elise.

"You guys need a lift?" asked Seth, as the taxi pulled up to the curb.

"We will be renting a car from a rental service just down the street," replied Tanu. "Besides, there's not enough room in there for all of us. But thanks anyway for the offer."

"Alright," said Vanessa, as she opened the back door to the taxi and slipped inside. "Good luck!"

Seth crawled in after Vanessa.

"See you, Seth!" said Kendra.

"Yeah, bye," replied Seth. "I just don't want to miss out on the excitement."

"We'll tell you all about our experience when we get back," said Warren. "You can see our prize then too."

"You mean it?" asked Seth. Warren nodded. "I guess that works. Okay! See you later!"

Seth closed the door to the taxi, and the car then drove off away from the hotel.

"So, where're you folks going?" asked the cabbie, as he turned on his meter.

"Splash City Water Park," said Seth, "although I'd rather be going along with the others."

"Cheer up, Seth," said Vanessa, as she placed her arm around Seth's neck. "We're going to have a lot of fun today! Warren would've loved to come with us. Consider yourself lucky."

"Yeah, but he still enjoys those more serious affairs."

"Yup," said Vanessa. "He can be so headstrong."

"Vanessa?" asked Seth. "Are you and Warren… dating?"

Vanessa's heart skipped a beat. "Where did you hear that?"

"Well, I've heard that you two have a history together. Know what I mean?"

"Yes, there is some history between us. But Warren's been cautious around me ever since we met up again during what went on in the spring. We're still friends, but Warren's just taking it easy. I distanced myself from him after what happened in the Inverted Tower. The fact that I hadn't seen him for two years leading up to that instance also seems to have distanced us."

"I get it," said Seth. "That's why you and Elise are sharing a room, while Warren's with Tanu. Right?"

"Well that, plus the fact that Tanu wants us to concentrate on our duties over dating."

Seth rolled his eyes. "That Tanu. He's a nice guy, but he has no grasp on relations."

The SUV that Tanu had rented soon drove past the outskirts of town and made its way through the tropical Hawaiian countryside. After driving down a highway for a good while, the SUV turned on to a dirt path through a small jungle.

Tanu himself was at the wheel, while Warren, sitting in the passenger seat, was serving as the navigator. He was thumbing through several pages, all of which contained information they had collected about the Drakesoul from the tome.

"Alright, Tanu," said Warren, "do you see a large, jagged rock up ahead?"

"Yes," replied Tanu, who could see the so-called rock roughly fifty yards ahead of the vehicle.

"When we reach the rock, veer left."

"But the road turns right at the rock. We'll go off-road if we turn left! We're going right."

"The notes say turn left!" shouted Warren, as the rock appeared to be getting larger and larger as they neared closer.

"This vault was built ages ago!" retorted Tanu, who swerved over to the right side of the road. "The land's probably changed!"

"We go left!" snapped Warren, as he reached over to the wheel, swerved the car over to the other side of the road and passed the rock on the left side.

"Are you crazy?" screamed Elise, placing her arms around Kendra.

Suddenly, the SUV began rolling down a slope quite rapidly, smashing its way past countless tree branches. Kendra watched as each leafy branch collided against the windshield, yet failed to shattered it.

"You're gonna get us killed, you idiot!" Tanu shouted into Warren's face.

"They won't be expecting an SUV, genius!" screamed Warren. "Here we go!"

"Quit shouting!" shrieked Kendra, who was shaking madly between Elise's arms as the SUV continued down the hill.

"We're going to crash!" shouted Tanu, who had floored the brake pedal once the SUV reached the bottom of the slope. However, the car had built up too much speed going down the hill and kept rolling onward. Before Tanu could pull the emergency brake, the SUV collided with a boulder . Fortunately, the SUV's airbags had cushioned everyone from the impact.

"I'm going to kill you," growled Tanu, as he pushed the airbag aside and exited through his door, as did the three passengers. As Kendra walked around to the front of the vehicle, she could see that the entire hood of the SUV had been smashed against the boulder, and that the engine was smoking.

Before you do that," said Warren, holding his hands in front of him, "you do realize that this IS where we need to be?"

"Just because Seth is gone does not mean that you need to replace him."

"Warren, are you sure this is the spot?" asked Elise, observing the wreckage of the SUV.

"It has to be," said Warren, skimming the papers he was holding. "According to the notes, the entrance to Vertigo Volcano is right over… there."

Warren pointed over to another boulder, a fair bit larger than the previous one. It was a perfectly round semi-sphere, roughly the size of a tool shed.

"Wait a minute," said Kendra. "If we made it to the vault, how did we get past the distracter spell so easily?"

"Going down the hill," answered Warren suggestively. Gravity is a distracter spell's second-biggest weakness."

"What's the first?" asked Kendra.

"You."

"So how do we open this entrance?" asked Elise, who was taking a short walk around the circular boulder. "We're not supposed to need a key, but I see no way of physically opening it."

"It says that we're supposed to push the boulder to open the entrance," replied Warren. "Don't ask me how."

"That thing must weigh like ten tons!" gasped Tanu. "Even if I drank my enlarging potion I wouldn't be strong enough. You'd have to be Superman to move it!"

"There has to be a trick to it," said Warren.

"Maybe we could tie some rope around the boulder and use the SUV to tow- oh wait minute... You crashed the SUV!"

"Look," groaned Warren, as he leaned again the boulder. "I didn't think- whoa!"

Warren toppled over next to the boulder, which he had somehow pushed back several feet.

"How'd you do that?" exclaimed Tanu.

Warren smirked as get got back on his feet. "Tanu, from now on call me Superman."

"Whoa," said Elise, "what's going on here?"

Elise placed her hands on the boulder, and was startled at how light the boulder truly was, like it was hollow and made out of cardboard, as she pushed it entirely out of its original position. The ground was much darker where the boulder originally stood, and in the immediate center was a staircase leading underground.

"So," said Tanu. "This is the entrance. Rather than locking it, they leave a false barrier."

"I don't get it," said Warren. "The ancients go through all this trouble to hide the Drakesoul in some obscure, yet supposedly elaborate vault, but they can't even bother to lock the front door?"

"That's it?" asked Elise. "We just go down and in?"

"I… guess so," replied Tanu. "We've got the pages that cover the Vertigo Volcano with us. Our equipment's in the car. We might as well go."

After everyone retrieved their gear from the trunk of the SUV, Tanu glanced back at the car, painfully admiring the wreckage that it had become in such a short amount of time.

"Should I lead the way?" asked Kendra, who was staring down the steep staircase.

"Be careful," replied Tanu. "Warren, keep your eye on Kendra as much as possible and always remain close by her side."

"Can do," said Warren, as he followed Kendra down the stairs and beneath the surface of the Earth. The two of them were soon followed by Tanu and Elise.

"How deep do these stairs go?" asked Kendra after what felt like several lengthy minutes. The bottom of the stairs seemed to still be out of sight from where she was.

"Deep," answered Elise. "Unfortunately, we don't know how deep."

"That reminds me," said Tanu, as he wiped his sweating brow and reached into his potions bag. "I want everyone to drink a dose of my heat-proofing potion!" He then proceeded to hand Kendra, Warren and Elise each a vial of a cyan-colored liquid.

Kendra uncorked her vial and downed the contents, as did the rest of the group. "It's so cold!" exclaimed Kendra with a startled look etched on her face. "Like you'd just taken it out of the freezer!"

"The best way to battle heat is with coldness," stated Tanu. "While these potions will protect us and our belongings from the intense heat, they are in no way infallible against direct contact of, say… the lava itself."

"You think these stairs are bad?" asked Warren. "We're probably gonna have to climb UP them to get outta here, and that'll be after we've already tired ourselves out retrieving the Drakesoul."

"That's if the Drakesoul's even still here," said Elise.

"The tome's been correct so far," said Kendra. "Our only hope is that the Sphinx or somebody never got to this point."

"Once this ordeal is over with, we get to call a tow truck as well," noted Tanu.

After walking down the stairs for a few more minutes, Elise pulled out a digital thermometer and stared at it in awe. "It's like an oven in here!" she gasped. "It's over one-thousand degrees at this point!"

"We'd be cooked at this point if not for my potions," said Tanu. "But at least they're doing their job."

"I can see the bottom up ahead!" said Kendra as she skipped down the rest of the stairs.

"Be careful!" said Warren cautiously. "We don't know for sure what could be lurking at the bottom."

"Oh… my… god!" gasped Kendra, as she looked around at the bottom of the stairs. "You guys gotta see this!"

Warren, Tanu and Elise quickly joined up with Kendra at the bottom of the stairs, and couldn't believe what they were seeing. They were on a ledge in a large, near-spherical cavern, with rivers of lava flowing not only below them, but along the walls and ceiling as well. Vertigo Volcano was defying gravity as they knew it.

"What is this place?" asked Kendra.

"Vertigo Volcano," answered Warren. "But, you knew that, right?"

"Where do we go from here?" asked Elise, peering over the edge of the small, rocky platform they were standing on. "Does the entrance we took lead to a dead end or something? We can't continue!"

Tanu took a look around the ledge they were standing on. "Hmm, I can't help but notice that this ledge curves into the wall next to the entrance and starts to create a path."

"Too bad the path's on the wall," said Kendra. "We can't actually follow it."

"I have an idea," said Warren, as he placed one of his boots on the wall and nearly toppled over as the force of gravity pushed his body onto the path. Steadying his balance, Warren stood up straight, standing entirely on the wall.

"How'd you do that?" asked Kendra.

"It's my lucky day!" laughed Warren. "I get to be both Superman and Spider-Man!"

"Let me try," said Kendra, as she casually walked onto the path, her entire body now standing on the wall, which from her perspective, had become the ground, she took a look around the disorienting cavern, trying to remember which way was up. "What if we fall?"

"I'm not quite sure how the gravity in here works," replied Tanu, but if we stay on that path, we should be okay."

Warren took hold of Kendra's hand and led her down the path while Tanu and Elise walked onto the wall and followed them. The path twisted and turned along the vast wall of the cavern, and eventually branched out onto a large, long piece of cylindrical rock that stretched from wall to wall, like a giant log spanning across a gorge. As she and Warren stepped onto the long rock, Kendra realized that by looking at where they had entered the room, they were now standing entirely upside down.

Kendra looked up to the bottom of the cavern, and saw a pool of lava boiling no more than fifty feet below her. Looking down to the top of the cavern she saw more even lava. Feeling disoriented, Kendra took a misstep and lost her balance. Kendra and Warren's hands had gotten so sweaty that Warren lost his grip on her. In just a split second, Kendra shrieked as she began to fall upwards into the higher pool of lava.