Chapter 44: The Gift of Peace

(10 minutes earlier, the attack team's point of view….)

Grunting, Haru Axe-man smashed down a gate of war as he went through, wiping grunge off his forehead. To remind himself of who was in his team, he took out his list.

Exploration:

Mainiac97

Osrie1

Amy11

Haldir6

Attack:

Haru Axe-man

Mark

Slinky

Aubury

Support:

Clayguy7

Capablanca

Creator

Sinlimitless1234

Haru groaned. Rubbing his eyes, he continued to trek through. He saw a footstep. He took a sample from the footstep onto his finger, and sniffed. He growled.

"I smell filth. Dark wizards, to be precise," he whispered to himself.

As he continued through, he heard footsteps from behind him. He swung around.

"One more step, and I will throw this axe right into your skull!" he bellowed.

"Well, that isn't the most romantic proposition I've ever had," a female voice replied. From the shadows, Slinky came through. She winked at Haru cheerily. "You need to learn proper patience-you've left the rest of the team in the dust." Haru blinked apologetically.

Aubury and Mark appeared soon after. Mark ran straight towards Slinky.

"Slinky, my love! I thought I'd lost you!" he shouted, his arms out. Slinky grunted, and kicked him in the crotch. He knelt over, howling.

"Thanks, but no thanks," she said.

They trekked on, until they saw light around the corner. But someone was talking. They tiptoed forward, and listened.

"Come on!" a voice yelled. "Hurry up, or I'll set the ground under your feet on fire!" They recognised that voice-it was James. They all ran forward, poised to fight.

(Current time, exploration team's point of view)

"OK then, troops, let's stop for a rest," haldir6 said, finally. I stopped, sat down, and rubbed my aching feet. I was sure I was getting trench-foot-my feet were swollen and were slightly blue. I gulped down a meat sandwich quickly, before sitting up, and following the others. We saw light from around the corner.

We could hear shouting, screaming, and smashing. A dark wizard went flying towards us. Haldir6 used his fist to push him back into the stone wall. I nodded at them, and we all ran into battle.

It was extraordinarily unfair. There must have been at least fifty dark wizards, while the attack team tried to hold them all off by themselves. In the distance, past all the fighting figures, there was a golden chest. From nowhere, a heavenly light illuminated this gift. The soil around the gift was clean, fresh, pure, and perfect. No baddies were near the light-it probably killed anything evil that went near it.

I walked up to a dark wizard, and punched him in the face. I broke his nose, and blood trickled down his face. He grinned, licked his lips, and lunged at me. I dodged, and smashed him over the head with my stone hammer. He collapsed at my feet. He whistled, and died silently. My victory was very short-another dozen wizards ran towards me.

Just as I finished the lot, and I was drinking a healing tonic, James spotted me, and ran forward, grinning nastily.

"Mainiac97, you and your friends have caused enough trouble for us. It is time to dispose of you all!" he bellowed manically. "Fist of death!"

He punched the air, and where his fist was, I saw a glimmer of shadow. Then, all of a sudden, a huge gust of wind nearly blew me off my feet. A black vortex was being created where the shadow was, swirling menacingly. It flew towards me, and before I could even swear, I was blasted off my feet, swirling swiftly in this vortex. My head throbbed, my body ached, and, all of a sudden, I was floating in the air. The vortex had disappeared, and was replaced by a fist made of shadows. The fist flew into my gut, and disappeared.

I knelt over, winded. The place where the fist hit felt like it had been through a blender. I felt too weak to barely breathe, let alone stand up and fight. James, grinning wickedly, walked towards me casually.

"The fist of death isn't an easy spell to cast," he said. "It weakens me temporarily, but slowly, the pain will spread all over your body, and you will die. Unless the correct cure is given to you straight away, you'll die." I groaned. "But I don't want to wait that long. I want to see you die right now." He grabbed my neck, and was about to snap it, when something hit his side. He looked down, and saw a clay knife in his side. He gasped for breath, shot me a last fleeting look, and disappeared. Just as he was gone, a sinister voice whispered in my ear, "Watch out for the horsemen." I wondered silently whet he meant by the horsemen. I knew that he wasn't dead-just going back up to heal. Clayguy7 ran up to me, a look of concern in his eyes.

"Are you alright?" he asked urgently. I shook my head. He frowned, and took out a bottle of potion from his pocket. He handed it to me.

"Drink it," he said. "Aubury handed it to the support team-it is a pure potion. Only someone pure of heat can brew it-it destroys all traces of evil from one's system." I nodded, and gulped this magic potion down. Aubury sure was good at magic and potion-making, I thought.

"Where are the others?" I asked.

"They are having a minor problem with some wolves and goblins, and they asked me to go ahead, to lend you lot a hand." I nodded, and thanked him. I ran off to join in the growing battle.

A bunch of dark wizards crowded around Haru when they discovered he was the one wiping most of them out. They all cast the bind of pain at him. At least a dozen binds of pain flew towards him, and he was trapped in a spiky rope. He screamed with agony as he struggled against the bind. I felt handfuls of hit points being tugged away from him. When he reached 3hp, he broke from the binds. He elbowed some wizards out the way to get to me.

"I need to leave to heal. I'll come back with supplies. Watch out for the black fly- that world of yours seems like a very dangerous one," he whispered to me, before teleporting away.

Just as I'd finished slaughtering my twenty-fifth dark wizard, a mysterious cloaked man entered the war. I gasped-I recognised him from my dream, after the fight with Gunther the Brave!

He went up to a wizard, and whispered in his ear urgently. The wizard replied, a look of worry on his face. I ran forward, attempting to confront this mysterious cloaked man, but some dark wizards got in my way. I yelled as the mysterious man walked forward to the army that was ambushing us.

"PEOPLE!!" he shouted, and everyone fell quiet. "All Dark Wizards must report to the second floor-Master Samuel requires your assistance."

"But what about the piece?" a dark wizard shouted back.

"Master Samuel says it isn't necessary," the cloaked man replied. "What we do need is the bone piece from the final floor, but Master Samuel is having…complications…downstairs. He needs you. Go!" he barked, and he, along with the legion of dark wizards, ran downstairs.

When they were all gone, I walked forward, into the light. I felt a glorious peace spread from my toes to my head. It was like sinking into a hot bath. I opened the catch on the chest, and it sprung open.

Inside was glorious-several rewards littered the bottom. There was a sack of coins, which I grabbed, opened, and shared equally among us. There was some of the finest wine, which I also shared. I found a most curious object-it looked like a yellow shell that seemed to release light from its depths. There was a note attached, which read 'this is a shell of peace. Open it up in the most heated of arguments and battles, and it will smooth it over. Once it has been used three times, it will lose the stored inner peace, and will become a pretty decoration."

It was the final reward which struck me. It was the half-skull which was described in the diary-it seemed slightly rugged, and must have been sawed apart, for no hand could snap it so cleanly. I pocketed the shell and the skull half, just in case.

Haru returned, fully healed, with loads of lobsters for everyone. We feasted on them in the glorious light, and kept some for the floor of famine. Clayguy7 decided to stay behind, so if anything was wrong, we could return to him. Just as the attack team left, to go ahead, I started wondering what James meant by the horsemen.

We all left for the floor below. Clayguy7 prepared himself for a nice, long nap, when he heard an evil chuckle from behind him. He sat up, alert.

"Who is it?" he asked.

"Your worst nightmare," an awful voice replied. Clayguy7 sat up, holding his clay axe.

"State your name," he said.

"I am war, of the four horsemen," the voice replied.

"What the heel are the four horsemen?" he angrily asked.

"Haven't you heard of the four horsemen of the apocalypse? Created by Zamorak in the God Ward through War, Famine, Pestilence, and Death, we seek refuge here, in the darkness. We each have a floor dedicated to us, didn't you know? You will now suffer, trespasser, by the blunt blade of the sword of War!" Clayguy7 heard a horse whinny, the sound of hooves, and a most horrible figure appeared, holding a huge, black sword. Clayguy7 yelled, and tried, and failed, to flee. War of the four horsemen dragged him into the shadows, where he would have to have the greatest war of a lifetime.