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Classic Fantasy Adventure
Chapter 6
It was Yohji that saved them in the end. He had found his sword, and just as the rockrester was about to throw its deadly body over Nagi and Omi in a final act of vengeance, it's head arched back and the rest of the body with it, falling in a scaly, grime-covered pile out of the way of the two adventurers.
They got up cautiously, their weapons bared and spells kept at bay, and slowly they made their way around to the head of the rockrester, and they cried out in disgust. Along with the splintered shafts of Omi's arrow, there ran through the eye and brain and out the other eye Yohji's sword. Blood and other bits of gore still trickled from its head over its pointed nose to runnel down its cragged jaws. From it's slightly open jaws wafted a smell so vile that covering their noses was nearly not enough to hold back their meals.
And there, slumped on the top of the head, between the two greasy shreds of ears lay Yohji, having somehow been able to hang on when the rockrester made its fall. Together Nagi and Omi hurried to reach him, sliding and slipping their way up the flabs of scaly skin to the head, until they knelt, panting, next to their fallen comrade. Omi shook him, worry evident in his face. "Yohji…Yohji, are you ok?"
Yohji moaned and batted at Omi's bothersome hands, rolling to his side and covering his eyes with a fist. "I don't ever want to do that again…" he murmured.
Omi laughed with relief, and helped his friend up. If they had been weary and scratched up before, their condition had definitely not improved from this last obstacle. Yohji had a deep cut above his brow, from which a little blood still oozed; Nagi's arms and knees were scraped up from all his flying trips to the ground; Omi's right arm was burned from where he had fell in a puddle of the rockrester's blood, which they had come to learn had various acidic properties.
The three boys limped across the broken and scorched earth, and on the horizon the clouds began to pinken, and a gleaming rime of orange crept up over the rim of the earth. Slowly the land lightened, and the boys found where the rockrester claw had thrust up from the earth, and there they found Ran, and Schuldig. To their surprise, Ran had been awake, waiting for their return. He seemed angry, and there were raw marks on his body, where he explained to them very vaguely he had received when trying so long to loose himself from the jagged rockrester claws.
Along with Ran and Schuldig, wedged in the cracked skin and under the yellow claws there was a treasure chest worth of gems and gold, magnificent weapons and beautiful clothes. It was like the dragons of legend, who spend their lifetimes gaining and hording the treasures they pillage from the villages of their choosing.
"None of which is any use to us right now…" Yohji murmured sullenly, as he sorted the last gold coin into a pile with the others and sat back on the ragged grass. Ran stared at the coin Yohji had just placed on the ground, his eyebrows furrowed and head tilted. "No….good…?" Yohji smiled wanly, staring into the elf's eyes. "You said a "g." Ran blinked at him, and pawed at the coin. "…sed a she…"
Yohji shook his head and sighed. The warm sun felt good on his body, almost making him forget the burning pulsing pain emanating from his head. He gave a little hiss as a muscle he didn't know he had flexed, hurting a large black bruise on his shoulder. Tears pricked his eyes and he allowed the rest of his body to sink to the ground. Ran curled up next to him, silently, holding Yohji's arm to his chest.
Omi turned from where he was helping Nagi tend to Schuldig's wounds. "Yohji… are you ok?"
"Yes…" the brown-haired thief answered flatly.
"How's Ran?"
Yohji glanced at the red-haired elf, one eyebrow raised. "He…seems…better…somehow…I swear I thought he was dead when I first saw him there…"
Omi frowned, and returned to helping Nagi as he tore the sleeve from Schuldig's robe and wrapped it around a raw sore on the Guild Master's shoulder. "If only we had some…water or something we could clean these wounds and… get some water down their throats." Omi said, looking hopefully at Nagi. Nagi sighed and shook his head. "Sorry… I can't make something out of nothing, and even if I did turn this sand into water, it would only be sand in the wounds, sand down the throat. Changing things are only good for illusions to trick the eye…that's all…"
Omi nodded solemnly, absently combing Schuldig's hair away from his face with his scuffed fingers. "What…do you suppose… happened…?"
Nagi shook his head, muttering an incantation of quick healing. When he watched the little wisps of magic disappear into Schuldig's wounds, he slumped forward with a little sigh, more tired than ever. "I-I don't know what happened….I think that…it wasn't only the rockrester that did this to him, Schuldig is too strong to be felled by this…"
"Well, what kind of thing IS stronger than him?"
"Just a few things…" Nagi mumbled, shrugging his slender shoulders. "I'm really tired…I think….I'm going to lay down for a little while…" Omi looked at him sympathetically, and nodded. "I'll…watch you. Make sure nothing gets ya, ya know?"
Nagi managed a small smile, and drew his robe about him, lying on his side and closing his eyes. "Why are these things happening?" He whispered, a tear trickling from his eye and making an uncomfortably hot track down his face.
Omi's frown grew fiercer, and he felt his own eyes burn. "Don't worry, I'm sure things will only get better."
"I hope…"
"Omi?"
Omi started, whipping around behind him in surprise. "Oh! Yohji, you scared me!"
"Sorry, chibi. I was just gonna let you know that I'm gonna walk around for a little while, check things out. I was havin a hard time takin a nap."
"I'm sorry Yohji."
Yohji shook his head and turned to leave, but Omi caught him by the hand. "Wait." Using Yohji's arm as an anchor, he hauled his sore self up, wincing as the burn on his arm brushed the rough fabric of his cloak. "Let me see your head Yohji, just for a sec."
"I'm sorry, it's kind of attached right now."
Omi laughed. "Very funny Yohji." He squinted at the gash above his friend's eyebrow, and hissed. "That's bad." And though he was exhausted, Omi managed to incant a small bit of magic for soothing, and watched for a few minutes as he trekked out into the brush.
So out onto the plains Yohji trudged, beyond the dead body of the rockrester, beyond cracked scars of ground, beyond the grotesque claw that thrust out of the ground all alone as if it were a tree.
There was nothing anywhere. No matter which direction he looked there was only a sea of grass, and far away the tiny black dots that was their meager camp, and the dark mound that was the rockrester. This frustrated him, all the grass, and in his anger he sought to defy this fact, resolving to walk until the end of his days if he had to, just as long as their would be something else besides the accursed grass. So for hours he walked, chewing on stems of grass and delicately licking the dew from a few choice leaves that had evaded the sun. He was hungry, and he knew that the others were too, and if he didn't find something—anything here, they would die. But before he managed to see anything different, he noticed something else. That no matter which direction he looked he could no longer see the camp. He jogged a few feet forwards, frantic. He thought he had walked straight from THAT direction, but, then again, he remembered thinking he had seen something over THAT way, and struck out there…or, was it that way? His heart thrashed in his chest and a cold sweat broke out on his forehead. He was utterly lost. As this fact sunk in, lending weight to the stack of other "misfortunes" he had already encountered, he began to notice everything that he had managed to ignore so far. His legs ached, screaming for water and rest. His tongue had seemed to swell into a thing made of sand that certainly did not belong in his mouth. And as the noonday sun continued to burn down on him, he began to feel something trickle down into his eyes…something warm. He put his hand to his forehead, and he cursed to see that there was blood splotched across his fingers. The wound had opened. He shuffled forwards a few feet, a sick feeling gurgling in his stomach. The world tilted before him…Oh God…have mercy I'm going to die…
And at the moment he felt he could take not another step, his body pressed into something cool and rough. It was a wall.
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Eeeee…there you go guys…I hope you're happy with it, and I'm sorry I took this long to update! :.:cough:.:LadyK:.;cough:.: ^-~ I promise I woulda had it MANY days sooner but stooped ff.net was down……….again……. and then when it came back up the document manager wouldn't work……::cry:.: GOMEN
EEF sorry about another cliffhanger…….I just noticed it kinda left off at a bad spot…….hee