Author's notes: Hey guys! Here's the chapter that I promised! Still not happy with these recent chapters but there are about only 2-4 more left until the story is over. It's just been kind of hard to write this because I don't enjoy it as much anymore, but I will still be finishing it. Anyways, excuse my crappy writing and thanks for the reviews!

Enjoy the fic!

A chill ran down my spine as I stepped through the portal. I gazed in awe at the scene around me. The sky was as dark as when I last visited it and there wasn't a single living soul anywhere around us but I still felt like someone or something was watching me.

And that wasn't even the scariest part.

What really caught my eye was the massive cave that the portal had transported us right in front of. The entrance itself was bigger than a house and there was no light to be seen inside the cave. It was radiating fear and evil, as if the cave itself was a living being and daring me to step in so it could swallow me whole. Somewhere inside that horrible looking place, was the key to freeing Marco.

"This is where we will have to walk," Ludo said as he walked in front of me. "We must hurry if we want to retrieve the artifact before Kaquos."

"Um Mr. Ludo, sir?" Sarah asked as she walked over and stood beside me. "Couldn't you have teleported us directly to the thing instead of summoning us outside of this creepy cave?"

Ludo growled. "Stupid girl, I would be able to transport us if I knew exactly where the Purifier was."

Sarah's eye twitched at his attitude. "So you don't even know where it is? Don't you have a map or something?"

"I do have a map!" Ludo pulled the book out of his cloak and waved it around. "-But dimensional scissors don't work like that! Plus, I couldn't try if I wanted to because this cave is surrounded by a fluctuating magical barrier!"

"A fluctuating magical barrier?" I asked. I never heard of that before.

"Yes, to put it simply, I cannot teleport anywhere into this save unless I have been in there before; which I have not! Now shut up you idiots!" he screamed.

Sarah took a step forward and was about to say something before I put a hand in front of her and shook my head. To be honest, I really wanted to blast him, but this wasn't the time to mess around.

Sarah closed her mouth and rolled her eyes before backing down. "Yeah, whatever," Sarah said, aggravated. "Let's just hurry this stupid thing up."

Whoa. I've never heard her sound annoyed before. I guess Ludo had really got on her nerves.

Ludo ignored her and turned around to face the cave then opened the book.

"Light!" he commanded.

I pulled out my wand and cast a light spell that lit up everything around us. Ludo squinted at the book as he read the map and began to walk into the cave, all of us closely following him.

We walked for what seemed like hours around the dark and evil looking cave. Every step of the way, it felt like there was an invisible force that was trying to make us turn back around and give up on our quest. I couldn't shake the feeling of something dreadful as we walked deeper and deeper into the cave.

I looked around me to see how everyone else was holding up. Looks like I wasn't the only one who was afraid. Ludo's minions had scared looks on their faces and flinched every time they heard some kind of an unexpected sound. It looked like they wanted to go back, but Ludo was the only one other than me that had dimensional scissors and it looked like he wasn't going to let them turn back around.

I glanced over at Sarah to see her... smiling? She looked like the only one with energy in our group and had a spring to her step as she walked across the uneven ground.

"Hey Sarah," I called to her.

She stopped and turned to face me. "Hmm?" she said.

"Uh not to say its bad or anything," I started. "But how can you smile like that in this cave? Aren't you... you know, afraid?"

Sarah let out a lighthearted laugh that confused me even more. She was so calm in the situation it was kind of amazing.

"I'm just excited to see Marco again," she grinned. "It's been almost a week since I've last seen him, and I know for sure we'll be getting him back from this Kaquos guy or whatever his name is soon."

Wow. Even though he's possessed, she's still thinking about him. I... I feel useless. I should've paid more attention to him. I should've been able to protect him.

Sarah turned back and continued to walk purposely forward. "C'mon Star! Don't you want to see Marco too?"

I blinked at her and nodded my head before continuing to walk forward. To be honest, I was really nervous about talking to Marco when he comes back to normal, but she was right, I did want to see him again too.

We continued to walk until we saw an opening in the hole of the cave. There was a blue light radiating from it and oddly enough, it felt very comforting in this dark, smelly cave. The shadows surrounding the light looked like they were trying to stay as far away from the light as possible, like it was poison to them.

"There," Ludo said, pointing to the opening. "That's where the Purifier should be according to the book."

My heart skipped a beat. There it was. The key to freeing Marco. I was so excited, I couldn't take it. I immediately ran towards the opening in the cave wall hoping against hope that this was really it. I would finally be able to get-

"Going somewhere?" A familiar voice whispered.

Suddenly, I felt a fist connect to my side as I was hurled away from the beautiful, blue lighted opening in the wall.

I groaned as I rubbed my head, the whole party of people behind me staring at the figure, gritting their teeth in anticipation.

I looked up to see who it was and I felt my heart almost break again. It was Marco. He looked mostly the same except you could tell there was something very wrong with him. His eyes had gotten darker, more frightening since I last saw him. There was insanity and madness in his eyes as he looked down on me with a sneer. Even though he had the same face, that was not Marco.

"Marco," my voice cracked. "I-"

"My name," he growled, losing his composure just for a second. "-is Kaquos!"

"It's no use," Sarah grimaced, putting a hand on my shoulder. "It's like Ludo said, we need the artifact first before we can get him back. He's too full of negative emotions to be able to reason with him."

My mouth went dry. I wanted him back so bad but I knew what Sarah said was right. We needed to get the object first to free Marco.

Now more pumped up than ever, I stood up, glaring at Kaquos defiantly. My hand was gripping my wand tightly as it glowed with power.

He raised his eyebrow. "Oh?" he said with interest. "What's this? You seem to be serious this time."

He raised his right arm in front of him as it started glowing. His face twisted into a wicked grin as all three mist rings disappeared around his purple arm.

"Well if you're so serious, then let's begin."

With that, he attacked.

Author's notes: Cliff hanger lol. Next chapter is going to be about the fight and hopefully it will turn out interesting. Anyways, hope you guys enjoyed this and I'll see you later!