Jesse yelped as something hit her face on the way down, before her entire body collided full-force onto cold dirt.
Well, ow.
There was more yelling, and the others fell too.
Jesse clambered to her feet, batting away the bat which had gotten plastered to her face. Thankfully it flew away with not much damage done to it... Jesse didn't think, anyway.
Mist curled around them, clouding some of the ground away from sight. There were trees with vines draped on them, and they appeared to be in some sort of bizarre... graveyard.
"Uh, okay guys," Jesse said, a bit shakily, every instinct in her body screaming at her that there was something wrong, "I'm seeing grass, forests, ground in all directions... pretty good signs so far..."
Ivor tapped on her shoulder, making her look at her mentor- who seemed even paler than usual, if that was possible.
Her red and green eyes followed his pointing finger, and she let out a sigh at the sight of the twin moons glowing in the dark sky. "Aha," she sighed, quietly. Well, at least she could brush off the uncomfortable fact that her instincts were wrong...
"Verdict says?" Petra asked, arching her eyebrow, "definitely not our world." And she elbowed the ocelot hybrid. "You owe me two iron, Lukas."
Lukas rolled his eyes with a grin, tossing her the two iron bars. "There ya go, Petra, your two iron."
Jesse shook her head with an amused smile playing on her lips. "You two bet on the outcome?" she asked, amused. She must've missed it this... uh, 'morning', in the portal hallway.
"We were bored," Lukas said with a shrug.
"Well, I'm sure you guys can hear it," Jesse said, a playful smile beginning to come over her face.
Petra tilted her head, scratching her head a bit with her free hand. "Uhh, spooky forest?"
Jesse stifled a laugh. "No... well, yes, that too. But no, that's not what I was talking about. It's the sound of a new adventure. I bet this place is going to be pretty exciting."
"I hope you're right," Lukas said, his face going a bit more sober than usual. "It's just... I'm worried about Axel and Olivia."
Petra's gold eyes blinked almost owlishly. "What? Why?"
"Well, if they followed us back to that Old Builder temple, and went through the portal-"
"Oh..." and Jesse winced as she realized what her ocelot friend was getting at. "They'd arrive in Sky City to find it overflowing with monsters. Hm, well, they basically ARE monsters themselves, half anyway. And they don't have to worry about all the citizens like we did, so... I feel like they'd be fine. I'm not sure they would follow us anyway. I left them a note, but..."
"Your handwriting isn't exactly what one would call beautiful," Petra finished sardonically.
Jesse rolled her eyes. "Gee, thanks," she joked back, and Lukas chuckled a little too. "I see your point. Besides, I'm sure they can handle themselves. They'll probably find the next portal, just like we did-"
"And hopefully, we'll all be back together again soon," Jesse finished.
"We can hope," Petra nodded agreeably enough.
"I for one vote that we not be so hasty to try and get out of here," Ivor said, raising his hand like a schoolboy. "Who knows what sorts of treasures this new world could hold?" And then he sighed, kneading his temples. "Besides, unless the next portal is... disguised as a tombstone... I'm not seeing anything like it anywhere near here."
Jesse let out a sigh of agreement, looking around, before spotting something on a big white pedestal nearby. She squinted at it, focusing her gaze on it for a moment while trying not to lose it in the mist. After a whole minute, she was fairly sure it was actually there. "You guys seeing some... sort of... thing, over there?" she asked, trying to train her eyes on it.
Petra's brow furrowed, gold eyes glowing faintly. "Yeah... what is that?" she wondered.
They all moved forward, cautiously, before the shape came into view, revealing itself to be a book floating on what seemed to be some sort of large pedestal, though it could've been a tomb.
Jesse reached out and took it off the pedestal, carefully opening the book. "It says, 'invitation,'" she read off the book. So far so good.
"And then... 'read immediately, your life depends on it!'" Annnd things took a bit of a downward turn here. Just a bit. She cleared her throat again, before reading the next part. "'Greetings, traveller-'" And she was cut off by the telltale moans of zombies.
Lukas let out a rather annoyed sigh, tail twitching. "Yep, that seems about right."
Petra whipped out her sword, flicking it out at a zombie and knocking it down. "Keep reading, Jesse! We've got your back!" Jesse's lower arm pulled out the sword and held it at the ready, Jesse's attention focused more on the book, now. "'I humbly invite you to my mansion for an evening of food and festivity with your fellow adventurers!'" she read, quickly, jumping up backwards onto the pedestal and swiping with her sword, slicing off a zombie's head.
"That's odd," Lukas grunted, flailing out with his claws and raking through a zombie's guts. Jesse resisted the urge to make a face at that. "Yeah, weird, right- whoa!" She flailed out with her sword again, slicing right through a zombie.
"Toss it here!" Petra called, her area momentarily clear of zombies.
Jesse shut the small book and tossed it underhand towards her friend, the book sailing in a lazy arc towards the redhead, who caught it and swiped through another zombie.
Ivor was hopping up onto a stone spot, throwing potions of harm everywhere and trying not to hit the hybrids in the face with them. "Petra, anytime now! You can read, right?" he barked.
"Hang on, hang on," Petra snapped back, eyes scanning the pages so intently Jesse was a bit surprised the book wasn't in flames by now as she stabbed her sword into another zombie, "need to find Jesse's place... got it!"
Jesse lunged forward, Petra leaning down as Jesse flicked her sword into a zombie's face, bowling it over. "'Come to my home on the hill, just follow the path. Please look out for zombies-'" Petra flicked her blade into another zombie, Jesse darting to the side, "'sincerely, the Host.'"
A/N: Ooh, this is exciting!
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