Chapter 37 – The Fire Idol

"Jai..." Aurora said sadly.

Luke and Flora were in a state of horrified shock. The sight of Jai's burned body plagued their minds.

The professor and Emmy were banging on the door, trying to get it open.

"JAI! JAI OPEN THE DOOR!" Emmy screamed, kicking it as hard as she could, but it still wouldn't budge.

Bronev grabbed Emmy and held her back. "It's no use, Emmeline; you won't get it open; you'll only hurt yourself. Please, Emmeline, if you want to help Jai then you need to calm down."

"What am I supposed to do, leave her in there to burn to death?!" Emmy sobbed. "I'm sorry, Uncle Leon, but that isn't an option!"

The professor was still banging at the door, trying to force it open. He couldn't see anything else that he could do. He felt so helpless, just standing there while Jai could possibly be burning to death. Desmond stepped forward and took the professor by the shoulders.

"Calm down, Layton, we'll find a way in there," Desmond said firmly, pulling the professor back.

"I... I just don't know what else to do," the professor panted.

Luke looked on worriedly while they tried to figure out what to do. He could see that the professor was panicking over what he had just seen, and it scared Luke to see his mentor at such a loss. Flora was in much the same state. Aurora tried to appeal to some sort of Azran power, a kind of sixth sense, to try to see what was happening to Jai. Her eyes were closed as she tried with all her might to figure this out. "Jai..." she thought. " What is happening Jai?" Aurora could see it, a blurred vision of the inside of the chamber, and despite what the others were thinking, however, Jai was doing remarkably well. While the idol (which, as she suspected, came in the form of a giant fireball) was injured by arrows she had fired while it ran out of energy and the flames went out, Jai had managed to clamber onto it's back, despite being critically injured, and she had landed a semi-fatal blow into the back of its head, where its weak point resided. It was now sluggish in its movements, and Jai only had to dodge the flames that were thrown at her and wait for the beast to get tired. But, despite the hardest part of her operation being done, dodging the flames was easier said than done. She had to jump and dive and roll around on the floor at times to manoeuvre out of the way of the idol's flames, and the extensive third degree burns to her front side virtually screamed out in protest as she did this. All the while, she felt like fainting, the pressure of her body because of the damage done by the idol almost overwhelming her mind. Almost.

Jai rolled across the floor, missing the idol's latest fireball by a mere few inches. She bit her burned lip to prevent herself from crying out – even though she had every right to – and clambered to her feet, readying herself to shoot another arrow and dodge the next one. When she fired her arrow and caught sight of the idol to see that the flames were beginning to die down, she almost smiled, though she could only smile in her mind, as it was physically too painful for her to do so. The flames had almost disappeared as she ran towards it, her arm outstretched with the sword in hand.

But apparently, this idol was much too clever for her. Within a fraction of a second, the idol's flames reappeared. Luckily, Jai had excellent reflexes on her side, and threw herself to the floor as the idol fired another fire ball. While she was on the floor, Jai caught glimpse of a door on the other side of the chamber. And then it clicked. She didn't have to defeat this idol – she merely had to make it to the other side over to the door, grab the artefact and run like hell. Sure, she didn't particularly like the idea of running away, but with her severe injuries and lack of time on her hands, as the spy was waiting for her, then what choice did she have? Jai jumped up to her feet and tried to run around the idol, only to earn another number of fireballs being launched at her. Jai dived out of the way and hit the wall. She looked up to the ceiling, dazed, and saw her escape. Her ticket out of that situation.

She saw a chandelier hanging from the ceiling, completely untouched by the fire idol's wrath, the perfect way to get up and over the idol and into the door. But how to get up there…

She looked at the wall behind her and saw a ladder, leading right up the wall and over the ceiling. "Well. That's just great. Really clever of me not to see it before," Jai thought, as she grabbed onto the ladder and started her climb to freedom. She reached the part of the ladder that went over the chandelier and jumped down into it.

The fire idol, luckily for Jai, did not see this, so Jai decided to go one step better than simply running away. She readied her arrow and fired.

It hit the idol square in the centre, making it scream loudly and send flames and fireballs everywhere. But Jai hid inside the chandelier, and the chandelier took all of the damage.

The idol was getting weaker again, so Jai took this opportunity to fire some more arrows in the idol's direction. It screamed louder and louder, fading away more and more by the second, until a little wisp of smoke remained. Jai knew that this was probably a trick, and jumped down onto the floor and ran into the door without a backward glance at the idol.

In this room, she immediately spotted the fourth and final artefact, perched on a pedestal in the very centre of the room, whose walls were covered in ancient Azran manuscript written by the victims of the Grounds of Rebirth, begging the person who was just about to grab the artefact and flee with their lives not to use it. But Jai had a good reason for taking the artefact. She was taking it so that no one else could get to it and use it. Not Vaughan, not anyone else who worked for him in exchange for him letting them use the grounds. And not anyone else that may be lurking behind the scenes, like Jai suspected. Jai grabbed it and went back to the door. She peeked through a gap in the hinge and saw that the idol was re-emerging, slowly but surely. Jai knew that this time, as much as she hated to admit it, she had zero chance of winning a fight against the idol this time. Either the idol had grown stronger or she had grown weaker, and Jai knew that the second option was likelier to be true.

Jai acted fast. She rushed out the door, threw herself onto the floor, slid underneath the idol, much to her discomfort, got back onto her feet and rushed out the other door as quickly as she could. She had to get the others out of there as fast as possible. Jai slammed the door behind her.

She was greeted by stares as she exited the chamber. Horrified stares, filled with pity and, more evident than that, fear. They were all frightened to have seen by mere glimpse through the door that the idol was still alive. Jai sighed.

"I cannot fight this thing. I am weak. We all need to leave at once, before the idol can get to us. Quickly." Jai began to hobble down the corridor, her adrenaline rush now gone and tiredness overwhelming her.

Aurora stared at Jai as the rest of them followed Jai's lead. Jai was burned to the flesh all down her front side. It was a miracle that she was even speaking, let alone walking. Aurora stared, half in pity, half in admiration at the saviour of the day. The saviour of the month. The saviour of the year, probably. No one had been through more than Jai had that day, and yet no one had been more heroic that day either. Aurora knew that it was this strength that Jai possessed that made her remembered by every civilisation known to man. She knew that it was impossible not to admire such bravery, strength and loyalty to a race that had made her people extinct.

"Aurora?"

Aurora looked up to see that the others were quite a bit ahead of her. Desmond called out to her.

"Aurora, dear, we must leave quickly. The fire idol is probably getting stronger and stronger by the second. Come, now."

Aurora ran to Desmond and the two of them ran to catch up with the group. This was lucky. If they had stayed there a minute or two longer, they would never have made it out at all.

As they all clambered out of the secret entrance that Jai had entered into, the heard a loud roar of flames echoing from down the corridor. The all looked at each other, worried.

"Meh. None of our concern anymore. We got the artefact, that's all we needed." Bronev slammed the door shut and covered it over with dirt once more.

"Emmy," Jai said suddenly.

Emmy jumped and turned to Jai. "What is it?" she asked gently.

"I have someone waiting for me at the school. I would go myself, but I fear that the state I'm in now may shock them..."

"I understand," Emmy said. She turned to her uncle. "Get her to a hospital or something. She needs urgent medical attention. How she did all that in the chamber, I'll never know."

"We should all go and get checked out," the professor said firmly. "Luke, my boy, you are unharmed, are you not? Go to the school and greet this person for us."

"Right you are Professor!" Luke beamed. "You can count on me."

"Bring the artefacts," Jai croaked. Her condition was worsening and she was now leaning on Aurora for support.

"I'm calling an ambulance," Emmy said firmly, pulling her phone out of her pocket.

Luke took the artefacts from the professor and Jai and threw them into his rucksack. He then ran off in the direction of the school.

"Can I have an ambulance, please?"

Luke reached the school about five minutes later and waited by the front door, where he would be plainly seen. He was currently in a state of disbelief. He could not believe all that had happened that day. Horrific stories of other people's traumatic pasts, several fiendish puzzles, a giant fire ball and watching his best friends get burned; one to a disgusting degree was pretty heavy material for a thirteen year old. And now, the four most important artefacts ever to face the history of the world lay in his backpack, waiting to presumably be handed over to some secret spy that Luke had probably never even met before and did not trust. Luke sighed, several mixed emotions of shock, terror, doubt and adrenaline-aided excitement running through his mind.

"Luke Triton."

Luke turned around. He recognised that voice. And that face. And those clothes. He was shocked.

"I suppose I should say that it's nice to see you again. You remember me, don't you?"

"Y...yeah..." Luke was lost for words.

"It's me, Clive. Clive Dove."