Ker'eg gasped. Inside the room, there was a whole city radiating a low green light, completely made from Adamantine. He flipped through the diary of Scovo and found the passage he was looking for

"We fell upon a city radiating green. The walls were magnificent, majestic. Everyone was in awe."

Drem leaped up and ran toward the inner walls, hopping with joy. When he reached a part of the path that was only covered in dirt he turned back and beckoned for them to come.

"Come on!" he yelled, running to the next patch of earth, "Maybe we can mine something!"

Noj and Iera went to follow, but Ker'eg stopped them.

"Something doesn't feel right."

Noj slowly turned her head toward Ker'eg and nodded, while Iera looked puzzled. "What could be wrong?" she asked, inquisitively, "It's just an inanimate city of metal; the only bad thing that could happen is that we dropped some on our foot while we were mining!"

"It says here in the book that the city was guarded by strange creatures that multiplied when killed. I don't see any strange creatures, do you?"

"Don't believe everything you read Ker'eg!" On that note, she skipped forward and followed Drem. Noj just shrugged and followed Iera. When she reached the same patch of earth that he was standing on, the city trembled and the ground shook. The soil beneath them began to rise and form into a semi-humanoid shape.

"The earth," Ker'eg shouted pointing at the creature, "Its moving!"

The creature stood up and then formed into six smaller ones, each one a different shape. Ker'eg was stunned. "These must be the creatures that Scavo was talking about."

Drem had his feet binded to the ground by the creatures and Noj just stared at the creature, as if it was stunning her with his invisible gaze. Iera was the only one to react.

"Veneficus Requiro!" White beams shot out from her fingertips and struck each creature in the chest. They seemed dazed for a moment, but then they split up into twelve new, foreign creatures; however, this did not stop Iera at all.

"Vehementer Manus manus!" She clapped her hands and the shadowy outline of a hand came out from in between them. It picked the monster up by its head and threw it across the room. Shattering its head. The now lifeless creature crumpled on the ground and returned to the earth. She cast spell after spell after spell hoping to fight them off before they could hurt her friends. She was reminded of an incident from her school days, the day she was kicked out.

"Iera, stop it your hurting him!" Sandy said.

Iera had unknowingly cast some spell that kept Noah from getting up the ground. He was gasping for air.

"Iera, stop!"

"I can't I don't know what I did." Iera said.

A teacher came running and undid the magic. Iera was brought to the school head master. He told her that she was always causing trouble with her spells and hurting people. He said that she was not allowed to come to school anymore and that if she did she would be arrested and put on trial for trespassing.

From that day on she became an apprentice to a sorcerer on the outskirts of town and learned to control all of her magical powers. She could soon cast spells with such ease she became lazy and ignorant. Her mentor told her to go to the city and find someone that she could help and befriend.

That's when Iera stumbled upon Ker'eg who was looking for people that would help him in a quest. She decided this was the person she wanted to help and they became friends. When she thought about it he as probably her first true friend since her father died in the wars when she was 8.

"Iera watch out!"

With that she snapped back to reality. this wasn't a time to be nostalgic, her party was in trouble she had to save them.

Ker'eg pulled out one of his special arrows from his quiver. He howled and let it fly. Iera looked up and saw the arrow flying through the air.

"glacies tempestas!" Shouted Iera and the arrow exploded in the middle of the air.

A sheet of, what looked like mist, came falling down on top of the larger group of earth monsters. When the mist touched them they immediately froze and turned to ice.

"Thanks for saving our butts out their Iera."

Noj and Drem were still in shock from the fight and they couldn't say anything. Ker'eg and Iera went around smashing the ice sculptures and debating what just happened.

"I read about them in the ancient texts!" Iera said, "They are monsters that are formed out of the natural elements of the world. Fire, wind, water, and earth. Obviously those were earth."

Ker'eg thought about his option. He could risk getting into a fight with even a larger amount of monsters than he just faced and probably discover a path to the other side of the mountain. Or go back and try to find another place where they could cross.

"If the monsters attack again will you protect us again?" Ker'eg asked.

"Of course." Iera responded with a cheery smile.

It wasn't all the time that a group of adults had to depend on a mere fifteen-year-old for protection and Iera was enjoying every single minute of it. When all monsters were reduced to dust they started back in toward the city. They hoped to find an exit on the opposite side.

"Are you sure it's safe to go in there?" Asked Drem. "I almost got killed just then."

"Well, you don't have to follow us Drem. You can go off and find an easier way across if you'd like." Retorted Ker'eg.

Drem didn't like the idea of being left alone so he chased after everyone and went into the city. As they passed through the outer gates they got a glimpse of the whole city. It resembled any ordinary city save for the fact that everything from the walls to the shingles on the roofs was composed of adamantine

"Where could they have possibly mined so much of this stuff?" Whispered Noj.

"Well that's not what were here to find out," Kre'eg said "we need to get out of here fast before more of those things show up. I don't know how many are here but I don' plan on finding out."

"Uhhhhh. Too late." Iera said as she stared into the eyes of another earth creature which was backed up by hundreds more.

"Who's up for a little competition?" Drem asked with a sly smirk on his face.