A WHOOSH! of wind brought me back to my senses. Twilight was flittering in through small cracks in the ceiling. I sprang up, looking around frantically. I had remained motionless in the Temple of Roo for nearly twelve hours, and could've (and should've) been dead now. What had happened?

I recalled what happened that morning: the Archmagus of Roo had been sucked away in a giant, purple vortex. All the evil being had left behind was a small, clouded gem that was extremely heavy and most probably held some unseen power. The only problem was that I didn't know exactly what I did. I had a good reason to believe that it was the Coruscating Gem, which had been needed by an insane old wizard named Erick in order for him to 'escape'. The last time I had seen the Cybunny was around where I now lay, near the entrance/exit of the Temple of Roo.

I was just about to go and get ready to look for him when, at that moment, he came bounding up.

'Ah! It's you!' he screamed in surprise. 'You- survive! Did- Gem- get?'

I was assuming that Erick was talking about the Coruscating Gem. I held up a paw and then hastily dug in my pack until I took out a cold clouded gemstone. The mage took it from me with great interest.

'This! You got it! It is the Gem! But it is damaged...'

He seemed to be so enlightened at seeing the stone that he began to speak in almost-complete sentences. Quickly, he circled his paw around it and muttered something very quietly. A glowing came from the center of the clouded item, and the light grew until it surrounded the entire thing. It was so bright I had to shield my eyes for almost a minute before the spell was done.

Erick slowly stretched his arm so that the Gem was right in front of me. Wordlessly, I picked it up from his paw, studying the sky-blue gem that seemed to have a small touch of lightening bolt, like veins.

'This is the Coruscating Gem,' he said hoarsely. 'Use it well.'

I pocketed the item and then once again turned to face Erick. 'What about the Jewels of Power?' I asked him.

Erick seemed to think for a while before finally answering, once again using his familiar stutters. 'Seek- Leirobas- Swamp Edge- he will tell.'

I now had two of the ingredients needed to free Erick: the Coruscating Gem and a carved oak staff I had gotten off a monster a while back. Now I was off back in the direction of Swamp Edge City, to find Leirobas and, more importantly, information about the Jewels of Power.

I remembered Mokti's instructions to Leirobas's house when I finally reached the town. It was now nearing midnight, but there was a light at the window. I knocked, but there wasn't a response. I tried knocking again, but still there wasn't any sound from within the dwelling; not a greeting or shout. I was about to knock again before a grumpy voice growled, 'Come in before I change my mind!'

I turned the doorknob and pushed the wooden door into a small room lined with shelves filled with books and strange items in jars. A small staircase led up to the second floor of the house, and parallel from it was a table in the dead center of the room. Sitting on a small stool beside it was an old, tired-looking Quiggle who looked as if he despised visitors.

'He- hello,' I stammered nervously.

The Quiggle grunted in reply before beginning his speech. 'Who're you, and what do you want?'

Once again, I was asked 'who I was.' If you had been keeping up with the story, you might have realized that this had been asked so many times that I had grown to ignore it, and simply skipped to my matter of business.

'I came from the Temple of Roo. Erick sent me here to ask you what the Jewels of Power are.'

For such an old Quiggle, Leirobas sure got up fast. As quick as you can blink he extinguished the candle, locked the door and made sure the window and curtains were well closed before turning to me. His eyes glowed red at me in the dark.

'What are you saying that aloud for? Walls have ears!'

I assumed that he could see in the dark, since he sat back down on his stool without bumping into the table or knocking it over. After five tense minutes, Leirobas finally broke the silence.

'Fine, I will tell you about the Jewels,' he sighed. 'But only on one condition: you must prove that you have, in fact, been in the Temple of Roo. Bring me a piece of living crystal, and I will be happy to tell you everything I know about them.'

A piece of living crystal? Where could I get one of those? I turned to leave, reviewing everything that I had found in the Temple: the Coruscating Gem, the carved oak staff, that crystal from the mad golem-

That crystal! I hastily drew it from my pack. Pulling it out, I studied it. It was dark, but the stone glowed electric blue. The interior seemed to be biotic- as if it were living!

With the light of the rock, I made my way to the table and sent it down at the center. Leirobas gazed at it, mesmerized. Finally, he looked up at my gravely.

'I see...' he whispered. 'So you have been in there... well, as promised, I guess I will tell you about them.'

The Quiggle got up and went to one of the bookshelves. The jewel only lit up the area around the table, so I couldn't see which shelf he was getting it from. When he came back a humongous tomb with the title '100 EASY WAYS TO DESIGN YOUR HOUSE' was on the front. Chuckling, Leirobas ripped it off (it was just pasted on) and I saw the real title: 'MEMORIES OF THE LOST'.

He flipped through the pages until he came to one near the middle: one the left page was a picture of five glowing jewels, each glowing a colour of fire red, icy blue, shocking yellow, night black, and crystal white. On the right side, thin, spidery runes told a story, which Leirobas read aloud to me:

' "The Jewels of Power were ancient artifacts that honed the magic of each of the five branches of magic: Fire, Ice, Shock, Spectral, and Life. Each one held amazing powers, but one day a wizard took them and cast them into a vortex with powerful black magic, and they were never seen again. " 'He looked up at me from the book. 'This is all true, or should be anyways. They are lost for all eternity, but I have conjured a spell that may bring one of them back. However, I need some components from you, because I can't leave my house unguarded!'

Breathlessly, I agreed to his quest by nodding; words didn't seem to want to come out.

'Very good. Now, since you seem to be using a Life Magic Wand, I will need from you a tiny beryl and an emerald for the Growing Jewel, for Life Magic. Do you have them?'

Quickly, I rummaged around my bag until I did indeed find them: a white beryl and a huge, green emerald. 'You really are quite the pack rat,' Leirobas answered, taking them from my outstretched paw.

Leirobas flipped the page of his book, and there were more runes. The only picture there was depicted two stones, white and green in colour. He threw the emerald into the air and yelled, 'Aprire il vortex!'

A purple twister opened, one which greatly resembled the one the Archmagus had been sucked through. I began to get worried, but Leirobas was quick. As fast as a Poogle he threw the tiny beryl inside the center. Through the bottom part, lightening bolts cackled from another dimension as the spell was taking place in deep space.

Suddenly, everything was quiet. The Spell had finished working, and nothing bad had happened. The only way you could have seen that a swallowing vortex had been there earlier was a glowing gem, shimmering as bright as a crystal, hovering in the middle of the room. My wand began glowing, and I raised it towards the shining stone.

Beams of light erupted from the tip of my wand and the interior of the Growing Gem. The light was too intense, so I had to not only shield my eyes but also close them. All I could remember seeing was the Gem spinning like crazy, and my wand shaking like there was no tomorrow. If you had been looking from outside, you would have seen something that looked like an explosion from the house, with all of that bright light.

And then, it was dark.

The living crystal had stopped glowing.

It was silent.

A fire taking place near the table...

A match dying...

The shout of a spell...

Light...

'Lupe!' Leirobas shouted, as if in a dream. I walked over to the table towards the Quiggle. I had not seen it, but Erick had appeared out of nowhere. 'You saved Erick!'

'I'm free!' Erick shouted, with glee. Now that he was freed from the hold of the Temple of Roo, he could talk normally. 'Thanks for saving me, Lupe. In return, I will combine the items you have retrieved and make a new staff for you!

With that, the wizard asked for the carved oak staff, the Growing Jewel, and the Coruscating Gem. I hand them over wordlessly, and the Cybunny took them into his two paws. He took the carved oak staff and placed the Growing Jewel at the very top of it. Then, Erick threw the Coruscating Gem into the air, as it began glowing as bright as ever. All of the rays of glow began to combine into a single line of light, and it was sucked in by the Growing Jewel on top of the staff. The staff in Erick's hand began glowing with a white magic, and when it stopped the people in Leirobas's house could see, in Erick's paw, a pure-white staff with a crystal-white gem at the very top.

The Cybunny handed it to me, and I took it, once again wordless. 'Thank you for freeing me,' said Erick grandly.

The Life Staff wasn't very heavy in my pack as I looked inside a large gap in a mountain. Whether I looked left or right or even to the front of me, I could see mountains. I had reached a large mountain range, and the only way through them was apparently through these caves.

'The Techo Caves string through the Techo Mountains,' Mokti had told me as I was leaving town. That only happened that very morning. After the creation of the Life Staff and the freeing of Erick, I had stayed the night at Leirobas's, sleeping on his spare bed. When I woke up, it was early morning, and I had run from bed and quickened my pace, eager to get to the desert before the sand began heating up. I bumped into Mokti on his early morning stroll ('At dawn?') and he had given me the information that the Techo Caves was a large series of caverns that was the only way to cross the Techo Mountains to the lands to the south-east or Sunny Town without having to climb them, which would take an extremely long time. Apparently there were 7 in all, and one of them were completely useless, which was Cave 5. Cave 1 was the first one, Cave 3 led to Sunny Town, Cave 5 was a dead end, Cave 6 to a mysterious fortress, and Cave 7 led to the southwest. When I asked him how he knew all that, he simply said that he heard it from a traveler once, but it didn't appear to sound like a lie, so I thanked him and left town.

It didn't take long to get through the desert; in fact when I was at the southern plains of Roo the sun had barely risen. When I was crossing I had a small glimpse of the Temple of Roo inside a small semi-circle of mountains, nothing was there. I assumed that the Temple of Roo had sanded-in, and the evil monsters pouring out had all faded away into the dust. No monsters attacked me at this crossing.

And now, I was here, looking into the mouth of a humongous gap dug in the earth. 'I wonder where these caves came from?' I asked myself, stepping inside.

Inside, it was somewhat like the Dank Caves, but if you were to describe them with one word then it probably wouldn't be 'dank'. It would probably be something more like 'Lurking', because a strong sense of evil seemed to erupt from the walls everytime I would turn a corner. Soon, I left the entrance behind, but the caves weren't in darkness- yet. However, I still drew out my wand and enlightened the Jewel at the top, which shone brighter than the Nature Wand did.

As I was creeping along in the shadows, I bumped into a fierce looking Jetsam wearing a green suit.

'Who are you?' I shouted at him, in surprise.

'Eh? Hmmm... you look like a strong person, with a Jewel of Power on their wand!' the Jetsam replied. 'Yes... you seem like the right person for the job...'

I didn't understand. 'Who are you? I'm just trying to get to Sunny Town, not anywhere else!'

'Sunny Town? Then you'll still have to be going through these caves... yes, still good...'

'WHO ARE YOU!'

'Huh?' The Jetsam seemed to look surprised. 'Oh. Who am I? Well, my name is Mr. Irgo, and it ain't anything else. I'm a blackmarket dealer, but don't go blabbing that to the cops. I need some more blackmarket items, like stones from dervishes and body parts of theoe dumb drakonids that inhabit these caves. They're everywhere.'

'Well, what do I get if I get you your items?' I was a bit annoyed, seeing as I wasn't prepared to go out of my way just to get some weirdo Jetsam some profit.

'Hmmm... tell ya what, since you're wearing such a nice robe," - with this he pointed to Leirobas's tattered old piece of armour - "I'll make you a new one. All ya need to do is bring me an eye, a hide, and a heart from the drakonids and I can make you a nice, new one!'

I thought to myself for a second, 'A new robe... well, it would be nice...' I made up my mind. 'I'll do it!'

'Yes, that's good, I really haven't made much profit lately... somehow the monsters are growing stronger... anyways, I'll be waiting at Sunny Town for your arrival with my items. Don't worry; you'll manage to pick up the items as you're passing through these first few caves.'

And with that, he continued towards the exit, back to the Desert of Roo. I just shrugged and continued my way; now that he had sent me on a quest I needed to find my items before reaching Sunny Town.

It wasn't long before I emerged at the exit of Cave 1. The sparkling sunshine announced that it was about noon. The first cave didn't take long at all, even though many drakonids and dervishes attacked me, and the fact that the cave was a pretty big maze. I basically marched down the path, expecting to find Cave 2. But, I as a reached the end, I was completely astonished: There was a fork in the road! There were two paths, each leading to one cave. I didn't know what to do; I sat against a small tree and wondered, under the shade of the branches, which I should pick. Sighing, I dug my paws into the pockets of the robe. I was about to relax them when they nudged something that felt like a piece of paper, pushed to the far depths of the pocket.

Excited, I drew it out: a crumpled old piece of paper. I opened it up, and saw that it appeared to be a map of the Techo Mountains. However, my excitement evaporated: Leirobas had forgotten about it when he had washed, and one half of it had completely faded. I could still make out the other half; near the top was a circle with a '1' inside it, which must have represented Cave 1- the one which I had just came through.

Mountains littered the faded paper everywhere, until I noticed a triangle with a 1 inside it. I could only assume that the circle was the entrance, and triangle was the exit. I saw the little path that had taken me to the fork, and one path led me to Cave 2, while the other went to Cave 3. I followed Cave 2's path using my paw: A triangle was the exit to the second cave, and that only led to Cave 4. Cave 4 then seemed to have two exits; one a triangle and one a square. The square led to a dead end, and the Square led to a small field where there was a house near the ocean. A small caption was right beside the house, but I couldn't make it out. I could only see two letters at the top: SU and one letter under that: T. SU T... Sunny Town!

My assumptions were finished. The rest of the map I couldn't see, but I guessed that in order to continue from there, I would have to go back through Caves 4 and 2 and head through Cave 3. Much happier, I stood up and ran to my left towards the mouth of Cave 2.

The sun was setting by the time I emerged out of Cave 4, exhausted. I could see a small town in the distance, and happily declared, 'Sunny Town!' I dashed towards it, and before I knew it I was inside the village.

It reminded me vaguely of Swamp Edge City; just a little smaller. In fact, there was only one street; at the end of it was a cliff that led down towards the ocean. The sun was setting down the horizon, and it looked beautiful.

Entranced by the sun, I sat down by the edge of the cliff to watch the sunset. The only other person looking at it was an old Pteri. Despite her age, she looked as if she was extremely sharp, and someone not to cross.

Suddenly, I remembered why I had come all the way to Sunny Town: to find Eleus Batrin's old teacher, Gali Yoj! The Pteri looked old enough, so I slid over and asked her, 'Are you Gali Yoj?'

She surveyed me through her glasses before finally answering me. 'Yes... you look like an adventurer... from Neopia City. I believe you've met my old student, Eleus Batrin?'

'Yes I do... you see, he has sent me here to ask you what this is.'

I opened my pack and handed her the rusty Medallion retrieved from the Jungle Ruins. She took it into her wing, and observed it very closely. After a few minutes, she began chuckling. 'Ah yes, old Eleus was never really good with Kayannin... anyways, if you must know, this is the Keladrian Medallion, an ancient artifact by the Kayannin tribe. It does have a very powerful magic, but it seems to be gone; absorbed by something hideous and horrible... but a special magic still lies within to open one's heart if it has been consumed by evil, but you cannot use this... except for one purpose. But you'd have to trek all the way to Kal Panning!'

I was confused. 'What's Kal Panning?'

Gali Yoj let a dramatic, sad silence take over before answering. 'Long, long ago, on an island in the middle of a lake, was great, wonderful city by the name of Kal Panning. The people there were prosperous and jolly, led by the wise Faelinn, their leader. However, when the Great Empire broke into a schism, Kal Panning rebelled against the Circle of Twelve, the great rulers of the Great Empire, saying that they were too power-hungry against the land of Neopia. The Circle of Twelve attacked the city, and a great battle raged for one entire month. In the end, the Circle of Twelve decided to use the last of the power to curse the city. The dead that lay within the battlefield of the City rose again, and helped the Circle defeat the last of the defenders. Faelinn was killed in this battle, and rose from the dead. She cast a spell over the rest of her once-magnificent city, and zombies rose from the ground and would kill anything that would come within the limits. Eventually, people learned to stay away from the island the city was on, and it has been a haunted ruin ever since.'

I had been watching the sun as she said this, and it had taken so long only a few feeble rays could still be seen, though it was quite not finished lowering itself yet. 'Anyways, I believe that if you show this medal to Faelinn, it may unlock her lost heart and finally bring her to rest in peace- if she doesn't obliterate you first.'

At this, my stomach seemed to drop as fast as the sun was setting. 'So- what else lies beyond these caves?'

'Well, the land to the southeast is called the Great Plateau... and great it is; giant chias and other horrible creatures roam the grasses. However, the most horrible thing of all is a mountain range of mountains, called... the Two Rings. There are two rings of mountains, too high for anyone to climb, and many, many powerful monsters slithering about inside. But you haven't heard the worst yet- in the northern ring of the Two Rings there's a great palace where evil erupts from the door; the windows; the cracks in the roof. Monsters are escaping from this place, and it's up to you to stop that. You're our only hope; I am too old and frail to travel and most of the other people around in Neopia are too weak or afraid. Please! For the right of Ancient Neopia, you must do that!'

'Huh? How-' But before I could complete my question, Gali Yoj took my paw and led me to a small cottage that was facing the direction of the sun. 'It is late. You must come inside with me and sleep until the next morning! Evil from the sea can jump on to this cliff after the sun is gone, and you don't want to face that.

I thanked Gali Yoj the next morning, and left her cottage when Sunny Town was just waking up. When two hours after dawn had come, I was already at the mouth of Cave 3 (quick, aren't I?) with all three items in hand. I was walking in when I remembered- Mr. Irgo! I sighed, ready to go back, when I crashed into him also going into Cave 4.

'Oh! It's you!' He said in surprise. 'I followed you from Sunny Town, since you forgot about me. Well, do you have all three items?'

I nodded, handing him the eye, hide, and heart of a drakonid. He smirked evilly, and took them from my paw. He put them in a hidden pocket, and from the same one drew out a sparkling, wrinkleless robe, a colour of royal purple decorated with shimmer stars and moons. 'Here you are- a robe of protection!'

I took off Leirobas's old armour and put on my new clothing. It felt beautifully soft, as if it weren't there. I thanked Mr. Irgo and continued my walk into Cave 3.

Noon bathed my face with heat as I exited Cave 3. I had taken a wrong turn and ended up at the entrance to Cave 5, which I turned my back on. I faced Leirobas's slobbery map again, investigating the part where the ink had run short.

Yes, I saw the entrance to cave 3, and a triangle near two cricles... And inside the circles, I saw a circle in the bottom one and a line in the other one. I presumed that the circle was a faded six, and the line was a faded seven. Cave 6 led to what appeared to be a house with a chip taken off the roof, which might've indicated ruins.

Ruins in the Techo Mountains? I knew I had to investigate. I dashed down the path to Cave '6' and entered the cavern.

The best word for describing yourself when you're shocked and you're feeling dumb is the word 'Stupefy.' And I, as I looked at a great plateau, with a forest at a horizon poking out from a huge mountain rage, I felt more stupefied than a stunned person.

'What happened?' I snatched the map and peered at it closely. Yes, the circle did indeed say that Cave 6 would dump me out at the ruins... but where would it begin?

I looked back at the entrance. There was Cave 3, and two other circles next to the triangle, one which held a line and a circle. But peering closer, I saw that the line was six, and the circle was seven! Leirobas had some very strange writing... well, as I later found out, Kayannin did.

I still wanted to search the ruins, even though I was at the exit of the Techo Mountains. I was about to turn back and go back in when my eyes met the belly of a storm giant chia which was blocking the entrance.

I raised my head to see the face of the monster. Laughing nervously, I said, 'Hey, Adee... I see you've finally raided the ice cream factory?'

With that, the beast let out an almighty roar that shook the ground. Realizing my mistake, I quickly turned around on all fours and ran for my life, nearing the city of Kal Panning and leaving the Techo Mountains behind as the sun began to lower in the distance...