Chapter 8 – The 3 tasks

Chelsee POV

I followed Jade down the mountain, She wanted to go as soon as possible.

"So, what do we do first?" I asked

"At the academy, there is a reliquary…Do you have the seal?" Jade looked at me, I nodded. "there is the magic music box from the second game."

"oh, the one that destroyed Lucien?" I asked, Jade nodded. "What does it do?"

"No idea." Jade grinned, laughing. "It is strange though, you never really find out. After it is given to Sabine, you never see it again."

"Ah, So all we have to do it is find it, fight mercinaries and ask brightwall to share its food." I went through our to-do list

"Pretty much…" Jade nodded, she stopped.

"what i…" I began , she pointed. WOLVES! "Cute." I smiled

"Er…chels, they are going to kill us!" Jade grabbed my hand and pulled me along.

"Can't we tame them?" I asked

"Nope, each creature here attacks. Not sure why." Jade admitted, We continued running from the wolves, soon Jade pointed out Brightwall. "There it is, get there and we'll be safe!" She said, just as we ran into another pack of wolves.

"I don't think getting there in one piece is an option." I told her.

"I second that. We're going to have to kill them." Jade said "I don't it in the game, but in life?" She shook her head. There was a sudden round of gun shots, taking down all the wolves. Jade looked at them in surprise.

"Chelsee!" I turned and saw Ben and Major Swift. I raced over.

"Ben, Swifty!" I smiled "What are you doing here?"

"To help you…I guess that is Jade?" Ben looked over at Jade, who was watching from a distance.

"yep, that's Jade." I nodded. Jade knelt by a fallen wolf and place a hand on its neck. "We should go. She is very sensitive at times…" I said. Ben, Swift and Jade all headed to Brightwall without a word. I sighed.

Brightwall was a nice place. Jade seemed happier here.

"So, where's the academy?" I asked

"Right up there." Jade pointed to the top of a large building "Built by Sparrow. Closed by Logan, going to be reopened by us." She headed up there.

"How are you going to do that?" Swift asked

"Easy, get that box first,do whateverelse Sabine requested, go to the fort, then the rebels, then to Aurora…." Jade stopped, she turned to me. "Don't let Walter come with us to aurora. I know Thersea said don't change anything, but we can't let Walter come."

"I don't think we'll have much choice, he has made it quite clearly, where we go, he goes." I answered.

"Yeah, that's the problem." Jade sighed heading up to the Academy.

"That was rather grim." Ben said

"Yep, Jade can be very grim at times." I nodded, we followed. Jade pushed open the Academy doors, we all looked in. We all entered, cobwebs hung in every bookshelf.

"yuck…" Jade looked around and gave a shiver. She turned to me. "Get the seal ready." I nodded getting it out. Ben and Swift looked surprised.

"We don't sell drinks, we don't sell chicken feed, now leave before the guards believe you have gained any real knowledge." The Librarian said

"Samuel, Me and my friends are here to enter the Reliquary." Jade said.

"Impossible, many professors have tried to unlock the door, but there is only one thing that can." He said, still reading from his book.

"This thing, for example." I halt up the seal, it glowed, the librarian looked up, shocked.

"The guild's seal." Samuel gasped " The old hero queen said there will be challengers, but I never guessed it would be in my life time. Come this way." We followed Samuel to a large door.

Dennis POV

I paced around, I was worried. How couldn't I be? Two of my friends where still out there and Ben had gone with the major.

"Dennis?" Elise came over "Are you ok?"

"No…" I looked at her "Where's the others?"

"With the soldiers, playing cards, or at least trying too." Elise sat on a crate.

"You should have stayed in Industrial, it would have been safer." I told her.

"but, I felt useless there. Here, I can help, like doing washing, tidying up, those sort of jobs." Elise said, I smiled

"But you joined a place that has frequent battles, that you never truly know when they are going to happen."

"Like freak weather." Elise said, " sudden storms, I'll be fine. Trust me."

"I will, but be careful." I told her.

"I will." I smiled, I looked up, the sun was still pretty high up in the sky. "This is going to be a long day…" I sighed.

Hayley POV

I sat between Elliot and Ellie as they played cards with the soldiers. Elliot was terrible at it, but Ellie was pretty good.

"My dad taught me to play, and all the tricks too." She whispered as she won for an 4th time. I giggled, after the 17th time, the soldiers got bored with Ellie winning all the time.

"Just like Ben, always winning." A soldier said.

"He won all the time too?!" I asked

"Yeah, You should play against him, I would love to see that one day." Another smiled

"I'll wait until he gets back." Ellie smiled

"Can you teach me to play Ellie?" I asked her

"Sure, now…" And my lesson began.

Jade POV

Chelsee looked around as we entered the reliquary, Ben and Swift was amazed.

"Welcome to the Reliquary, placed by here by Sparrow." I said "I hope you are in a mood to fight?"

"Why?" Chelsee asked

"This place is full of Hollowmen." I smiled

"And you find that funny?" Swift asked, sounding annoyed

"Well, of course. This place is protecting a treasure of a hero. I was kind of hoping for a banshee or two, maybe the occasional balverine. Hollowmen are the weakest of monsters." I told them

"If only you…" Ben began

"knew?" I finished he looked at me. "Hollowmen are bones in cloth." I created a fire ball. "A hit or two from on of these and down they'll fall. Everyone knows hollowmen are weak against fire." I walked off, leaving the others staring after me.

We reached a place where a blue floating symbol was in the way of a large drop.

"Can I borrow a sword?" I asked, Ben passed me his, I sung it at the symbol, at contact, it vanished and the ground shook. A stone bridge appeared, I gave the sword back to Ben. "you're gonna need it now." With that I walked across the bridge.

"are you sure it's safe?" Chelsee asked

"Yep, but be ready to fight hollowmen if you're willing to cross." I told her.

"Stay close." I heard Ben whisper to chelsee. I choose to ignore the bugging in the back of my mind. Yeah, Ben was cool and cute and all that, he was also a womenizer. I entered the center chamber a wisp dived into the ground.

"And now, it begins!" I smiled, readying a fire ball.