Chapter Sixty Seven

The dragons roar shook the maze as Kayura ran towards the fight with three warlords in toe. She huffed and lungs burned as they ran towards the battle. She could see Rowen in his armor fighting the great monolithic beast, but he didn't seem right to her. Fire licked the maze roof tops on either side, sending smoldering embers upon them. She was glad she wasn't wearing silks now, they might have just caught fire.

"Where are we heading," Kale asked.

"Closer, I suppose," she answered as she saw Rowen appear out of the shadows. "He must have had a good reason to put on his armor even though it was possessed."

"Why is Strata the only one with armor," asked Dais holding up one of his sleeves over his face to keep embers off. She figured he was trying to protect his one good eye.

"How am I suppose to know," she replied quickly as she saw a flash of golden light. The dragon landed on the burning building next to them, and Kayura could see it wasn't a flesh creature but a beast made of armor. It fluttered its wings, and hissed a flames at the warrior who landed not to far away. The flames licked the roof top and missed Strata by a wide margin. Sekhmet saw only a dark looking armor with gold trim, and cold eyes beneath the mask portion of the helmet.

Sekhmet hissed, "is that what Rage did to us?"

Kayura nodded, "yes."

Ruby flapped her enormous wings and beat the air which cleared the smoke momentarily and dove at the warrior. Kayura could see a destroyed building ahead of them that lead to the main castle. She ran along, and they could see someone coming out of the broken castle.

"Halo," Kale declared as they pushed debris out of their way. The blonde man was carrying a creature they knew very well. It was Baroness, but she was covered in blood and her clothes were torn horribly.

Kayura came to him and he gently laid her down and said, "Rowen, had to put his armor on to fight her."

she nodded as she looked at the very still Trickster, "is she..."

"No," Sage said shaking his head. "I don't have my abilities though...have you seen Leea?"

"Earlier," she said thinking about how she phased out of the earth realm to theirs. She leaned over the goddess, "she's lost too much blood."

"I did my best to stop it," Sage softly said as he looked at the war lords. "Weren't you guys possessed?"

Kale shrugged, "I assume so..."

"We don't remember much," Dais added on.

Sekhmet knelt down next to Kayura, he leaned his head over to examine the goddesses wounds, "her abdominal cavity was punctured, I don't think she's got internal damage but I don't think she's going to make it very long without a healer."

Dais came closer and noticed the burn marks on her flesh, "we must have harmed her ourselves before we freed form the Rage."

"How did you get free," Sage asked as he cradled her head.

The three men looked at each other and shrugged, but Kale said, "perhaps when Kayura was freed of it?"

She shrugged, "it was Leea, I don't know, but I doubt she knows how she does it."

Sage looked up the battle fighting above them, Rowen easily keeping up with Ruby because he had the only ability to fly among them. He saw him shoot of another sure kill, but the dragon dodge nimbly who hissed blames back in return.

"SAGE!"

His attention turned another direction and he saw golden wings descending. Leea landed next to them, and the war lords looked at her with suspicion. He didn't know how they viewed her, after all, her powers only showed up right before the Rage took over.

She smiled at them while fluttering her wings, "you guys don't remember me?"

"Oh, god," Kale replied as he remembered the spunky human girl who kissed both him and Sekhmet. "You're the Light?"

"Oh god," Sekhmet laughed as Dais snorted, he still thought that incident was hilarious.

She saw Baroness and ran over quickly, "how did she get hurt again?"

"We found her like this," Sage said looking down at the helpless Trickster.

He didn't have to ask her to heal her, she was already placing her hands on the old being. She closed her eyes and her virtue for empathy lit up in bright gold light. She stroked the beaten woman's face with her thumbs and soft glow light seemed to glow from the wounds. The light became brighter and blinded them. Her wounds healed up before their eyes as large crash was heard from farther on. Leea could see Raleigh go flying and crash into the castle. The woman broke free of the rubble and charged back, although she was worse for the ware.

She looked back down at the being that she just healed and saw blue eyes starring back up at her and she thought to herself that Baroness's eyes were red gold, weren't they.

She shook herself out of it, and her heard another crash from the fight with Talpa, "I have to go back, they need me."

Sage nodded, "go on."

She gave sage a kiss on the cheek and said as Baroness began to stir, "don't die yet, any of you."

Baroness watched as the winged being left them. Her head felt so fuzzy, as the pain vanished from her. Where was she? She looked at her hand and saw golden claws on them. Claws? She sat up and held her head.

Sage stroked her back as she sat up, he figured she would be nautious from escaping being so close to death. He noticed how nervous Kayura looked and said to Baroness, "we need to get moving, this battle is becoming way to large for us to be so close."

There was a significant pause from the Trickster, she starred at him with the bright blue eyes. He had seen them flicker once before to that color, but this wasn't a flicker. She squinted and then wrapped him in a hug.

"Whoa, Baroness," he replied as she almost knocked him over.

"Sage," she cried as hugged him even tighter.

Baroness never called him by his name, he was sure she didn't even know his real name, "Baroness?"

She pulled back and looked at him, her ears twitching innocently. She looked at her hands again, and turned them over. "I guess, I don't look right... but its me," she said with a bright toothy grin.

He starred at the brightly beaming goddess, she was never so cheery. Her tail swishing from one side to another. However, he noticed her smile was uneven on one side.

He stumbled, it couldn't be, "Hoshi?"

She nodded as she looked at her hands, "I don't know how I get in this body."

"You don't remember anything?"

She shook her head and looked over at Kayura and the warlords, "what's going on? I just remember being sick because of the nether shadows."

"You don't remember anything after that?"

"Nope," she said shaking her long blonde hair. She looked down at her torn outfit almost embarrassed at how much it showed. Kale took off his hakama jacket for her, and draped it over her shoulders. Kayura gave the dark man an approving smile.

"I really think we should move," Kayura insisted as one of Rowen's sure kills hit a wall near them and it exploded showering them in debris.

Sage helped her stand up and they started down into the maze, and he noticed her looking up at the fight. She frowned as she saw Rowen, "why is he the only one fighting?"

"Long story," Sage answered as they ran along, "let's say Ruby..."

"That's Ruby?"

"Yes, that's your student Ruby," he answered she pulled the hakama coat tight and cinched a ribbon around it. "What do you remember, and how did you end up in Baroness's body?"

"Baroness," she asked and she noticed the other warriors look to her. "I just remember being sick from the armors, and talking to the spirits who kept coming into my room..." She paused, "oh...and talking to Bastet..."

"Bastet," Sage repeated with a frown and then rubbed his face with his palm. "Could this be Bastet's body?"

"I don't know," she said silently as she saw Cerule from a distance, "whose that?"

Sage paused as he looked at her, it was Hoshi in Baroness's body, or Bastet's body? He was lost, he looked over at the warlords, "we need to stop this. I don't know how though."

Kayura looked at her warlords, "well, defeating Talpa is a big part, but you can't defeat Talpa without the Inferno! Rowen is the only one with armor, why?"

"Because both him and Ruby share the same anger is my guess," Mia said as she approached with Ryo ,Cye and Kento. They all looked like they had been been through the mess that was the fight going on. "My guess is Ruby's armor was able to feed off all of the other armors to make Talpa, but left Rowen's so she could fight him."

Ryo looked at her, "that's a pretty big guess."

"Why would Ruby be mad," asked Hoshi, and Ryo the other boys looked at her oddly.

Sage rubbed his hair out of his face, "guys, look who is Hoshi..."

Kento couldn't help but laugh, "that's good for Cerule!"

Cye hit him in the ribs, "Hoshi? Are you sure?"

She frowned at the boy, "yes, I'm sure who I am. I may be in some weird alternate form, but hey, this is what Bastet gave me."

"Bastet..." Mia starred at her, the cat form was so voluptuous, and she smacked her forehead and rubbed her face, "I am a complete moron...I didn't think that Bastet was the Bastet!"

Hoshi tilted her head and looked at her features, "I guess I'm a cat god."

"So," Kale decided to interrupt their bickering, "how do you suppose we defeat them without any of our armors."

"There's still one person with an armor here," Kayura smiled at Hoshi.

Hoshi looked at her nervously, "I don't think I can use it, I wouldn't know how?"

"Are you telling me you forgot fighting your way out of Elysium?"

Hoshi looked down at her clawed hands, she had vague memories of the endless sea of stars, "I don't think so..."

The orb of compassion appeared in her hands and Sage said, "you don't have to go in there to fight..."

She looked up and at the continuous battle going on over head. Her eyes settled on Rowen, he was holding off Ruby's jaws with his bow itself. Memories filled her head of him covered in blood. What had she been doing? Had she broke his heart somehow? She had to fix it. She closed her eyes, the armor hummed for her softly. She was forgetting something important.

She looked up and saw the rift opening and she felt a chill within her. She could feel the rift opening again.

She smiled at the group of warriors, "you guys gotta promise you live through this!"

"Don't be stupid," Sage yelled to her as she coiled her powerful legs and took off towards the fight with the dragon.

She looked at the orb in her hand, and said, "Kronos. You're going to fix this if I have to destroy all of Elysium."