A few moments passed and then Cornell began to stir, once again in his human shape. The battle with the giant skull had tired him greatly. He had needed time to let his wounds to heal and to catch his breath; but most importantly, how to get past the castle wall with the drawbridge up? He got up and walked towards the edge of the cliff. Lengthwise it would be suicide to try and jump. Vertically he couldn't climb down for two reasons. One, the cliff side was smooth and he could see nothing to grab hold of. Two, its depth was endless. Cornell was in no hurry to redefine the word "bottomless." His two options as he could figure was to either circle around the wall through the forest and see if there is any point where the cliff isn't as far away or go all the way back to the wreckage of the ship and pray that there is a rope long enough to throw across. Neither plan seemed likely to work. The purpose of this drawbridge and wall was to make sure that those who are inside decided who can and who can't go through. Going all the way back to the ship wasn't to appealing because it would involve going back to where he started. Cornell had just begun to consider cutting down trees and building a bridge when he heard a noise. Another loud noise sounded, and then another. Cornell then saw that the drawbridge was slowly coming down. Cornell jumped out of the way as it came crashing down the last few meters. Cornell pondered for a moment what this meant. Someone was watching him and letting him pass. The question was if it was a friend or foe? Whatever that person has planned for him, he wasn't going to let it stop him from getting Ada away from here. Cornell crossed the bridge, then when he was safely across and in the castle wall the drawbridge rose up again. He watched as his last chance to turn back, his only window to escape, grew smaller and smaller until it finally slammed shut.

"No turning back now."

Cornell was standing in a small hallway. Each end had a door. In front of him was a closed gate and beyond which was another open one. Beyond the last gate was whatever is inside the castle wall. Cornell tried to look and see what was beyond but could not. All he could see was darkness beyond, darkness that was suddenly…moving? A sudden laugh filled the room.

"Who's there!" Cornell demanded.

 "Shocking to find the great Cornell helpless in a place like this?" Then out of the gloom came a figure familiar to Cornell. The figure was muscular and of the same height as Cornell. He wore a yellow sleeveless shirt and red trousers. His hair was long and spiky; and its color was a mixture of yellow and white. White markings covered his tan skin.

"Ortega!  You're alive!  I saw the village after it was attacked.  Your home was burned to the ground."

"I know."

            "Ortega? What's wrong? Have you nothing to say to your pack brother?"

"It has been one year since I lost to you."

"What?"

"And Ada, why, she has really blossomed into a beautiful woman."

"What are you saying?"

"She will be a perfect sacrifice to offer Dracula for these powers!" Suddenly an aura of light engulfed Ortega.

"Dracula?! Powers? Wait... you were the one who led the attack on the village?  Who kidnapped Ada?!!  Have you sold your soul to the devil?!"

Ortega merely smiled. A grin of utter enjoyment spread across his face as he watched Cornell explode in anger. "When I get my claws on you Ortega, I'm going to remind you the humans were so eager to accept a truce with us."

Ortega's smile vanished. "You will find everything out soon enough, Cornell.  Soon enough." The light that surrounded Ortega faded and he turned and walked away into the darkness. He exited as silently as he had appeared.

  "Ortega!" Cornell screamed. He was angry beyond description. He grabbed hold of the closed gate and began to conduct his energy into it but to no avail. Whatever metal the gate was made of would take too long to melt away. He needed a quicker way. Cornell took a quick sniff of the air. He could smell that Ada was beyond the closed gate and in that darkness.

"I'll save you Ada. Don't worry, I'm coming."

Cornell ran to the door to his right and tried to open it but it wouldn't budge.  It was a firmly shut iron door with a relief of the sun. An engraving on the door read, "Sunlight releases the seal". A powerful magic had been used to keep this door locked at night. Cornell ran to the other door and found the same only instead of a relief of the sun it had one of the moon. It was still night so he assumed this door would open. He pushed hard and the door creaked open. Beyond Cornell found an extremely large and extremely dark room. It consisted of a central pillar that towered beyond his eye could see and stairs that hugged the walls. The only light came from the torches that hung from those walls. Cornell wasted no time and began running up the stairs. No sooner had he reached the second level did he run into what looked like a pillar of…bones? Two skulls of what looked like dragonheads lay on top of each other facing the opposite direction. He cautiously crept closer to it. Then when he was only a few feet away from it, the pillar turned around and Cornell was pushed off the edge of the stairs by white-hot flames. After the initial flame it began to systematically shoot out a ball of fire from its mouths every minute or so. Hanging from the edge of the stairs Cornell fired one big blast of energy at the pillar and it fell to pieces. He pulled himself up and was about to continue running up the stairs when a giant blade swooshed down from above, nearly cutting off Cornell's nose and the very tips of his toes. The end of the blade was stained in blood. After a few seconds the blade went up again rising into a section of the stairs in the above level. Cornell suddenly recalled a drunken woodsman boasting how there are more ways to die in the forest than in any other place in the world. He obviously had never ventured to this "demon" castle as it had been referred to over the years in legends. By the time he reached the top of the stairs he had encountered flying medusa heads, hoards of blood sucking bats, a number flame throwing skull heads, and rotating platforms with spikes.

At the top was a single door, which Cornell opened cautiously. It was very dark in the chamber that lay behind the door. Cornell had trouble seeing exactly what he was looking at. It was a large chamber, which was open to the moonlit sky. But even with the moonlight Cornell couldn't quite make out what the large object in the center of the chamber was. But more importantly where the loud sound of breathing was coming from. Cornell strained his eyes until he could finally see. It was a giant wheel with a lever mechanism in front of it. But at the moment Cornell was more concerned with what was on top of it. The reason that he was running to the other side of the chamber. The reason that there were blue flames chasing him. A three headed dragon. Cornell was sweating through his clothes. He could feel the heat on him. The dragon was wrapped around the wheel but its heads were free to roam around. Cornell had a plan to change that. He stood still for a moment and fired off a few energy blasts to make sure that he had all the heads attention. Then he started to run around the wheel. Soon the heads were chasing Cornell around the room and without realizing wrapping themselves tight against the wheel. Eventually they could no longer chase him and were quite stuck. Angered by their predicament the dragons continued to shoot fire from their mouths. But it was to no avail, Cornell fired his energy blasts and the dragons crumbled to ashes. Cornell didn't bother to rest after defeating the dragon. Being so close to where Ada was being held fired his soul. He run to the device and after some inspection Cornell could only assume [and hope] that this was a device for opening and closing iron bars such as those that were blocking his way. Cornell cleared the switch mechanism of the dragon's charred ashes and read a message that was engraved into its face.

"You must close all the open eyelids."

"Could this switch's purpose be to close all the iron bars? But one of them is already closed and that's my problem."

Cornell looked around the room and saw that there was an opening. He walked towards it and found himself on a balcony above another smaller chamber. In the chamber below was a long crack in the floor, which led down into yet another level of the castle wall. Directly across from Cornell was another iron bar. Behind it was what Cornell assumed a similar chamber to the one he was in. Judging from the distance between his balcony and the raised iron bar, the iron bar was the open gate where Ortega escaped. But the switch he had found apparently only close open gates not open the closed ones. He would have to take a chance that there was a switch to open ALL the gates behind those iron bars. Cornell went back and threw the switch. Then he ran back to the balcony. The bars were lowering! There was no direct route to the other chamber. He took a few steps back to gather some momentum and then made a jump for it. Whilst in mid-air Cornell quickly changed into his wolf form. This gave him enough force to make to the other side safely. The other chamber proved to be more or less the same thing as the other one except for the engraving that he found on this chamber's switch.

"Open the closed eyelids and close the open ones."

Cornell had already closed all the open "eyelids" so if this engraving told the truth it would only be a matter of throwing this switch and he would be on his way. The sound of gates being raised was music to Cornell's ears. He immediately leaped over the raising bars and dropped into the middle section. Cornell found himself facing yet another pillar of bones. But now that the gates were open he would not waste time. Ada's scent was shooting into his nostrils. He ignored the pillar and brushed off a few skull warriors that popped out of the very floor with one wide spread blast. He jumped into the crack and into the second level of the wall. It was a storage room with various sacks lying around. Looking around there was no hole into the lower level, only another door.

"No more doors!" he howled as he charged his fist and punched a hole into the floor. He jumped into his self made hole and finally found himself back where he started. Only this time there was nothing to stop him from following not only Ada's scent, but also Ortega's as well.

Cornell ran into the darkness. His thoughts were of his sister who he would soon rescue and vengeance against the man who betrayed his village. Once his closest friend, now, Ortega was going to be his lunch.