Chapter 2: The Pit

Location: Drakestone, The Arena, Preparation Room.


Yui found herself face-down on the ground when she awoke, her spear still being gripped tightly in her hand. She climbed onto her knees, shaking her head to try to clear her mind before taking a quick look at her surroundings.

Since J'Asha was being an ass and stepping on William as he left, she assumed that their team had won. Sylvan didn't appear to be dead either, which was a plus. She slowly started to get to her feet, stumbling for a brief moment before being escorted back to the preparation area. Her movements were a little sluggish, feeling rather stiff and sore after being knocked out.

William was in a foggy place,  he was trudging through it.  He could not figure out where he was but as he walked he saw several doors. opening them he say memories of his childhood.  as he looked in the rooms he realized he had always been alone.  left to his own devices, he read and played games, he remembered how the other kids called him weird.  As he watched them he cried.  even as a member of the team he had never truly felt he belonged.  This world was
 his chance to belong.  But the truth was he didn't even feel he belonged here either.  He wanted to survive to find a place to belong,  he knew he had a place just for him and all he had to do was survive long enough to find it.

William awoke in great pain.  He had been defeated again, but this time he didn't even have time to mope about it.  He was being ushered on into the waiting room.  He looked down in shame, He kept being beaten and others had to save him.  Perhaps he truly deserved death like the other weak ones.  But somehow he could not accept that, he had to survive to prove his life was not pointless.  "I must find where I belong"  He said through the pain.  No matter what he refused to keep losing like this.  He looked at his fellows and said.  "Man I feel like I was hit by a truck." Then he sat down leaning against the wall.  He sat there thinking deeply about his losses, and his place here on this team.  so far all he could muster was meat shield.

A tinge of guilt sparked in the back of Maria's mind. If she left right now she'd essentially have completely turned her back on Red. She had planned on keeping an eye on her originally, but... Maria's tail drooped down and began swishing back and forth anxiously. She let out a soft sigh and turned around on her heels. Maria sprinted down the streets of the town heading in the direction of the pits.


Sir Gene was with Eishi. Sir Gene was with Eishi. Sir Gene is strong. He can be trusted to keep Eishi safe. Plus, I gave him a sword to protect himself. The two of them will be okay, I don't need to worry about either of them for right now. I'll meet up with them when I'm ready. For now, I'll keep an eye out for Red and make sure she is okay. Her and the other people from that world are fighting for their lives. I should be worrying about them more than anyone else right now.

Maria kept repeating this over and over again in her head as she raced down the streets toward the Pits. Then she stopped for a moment as a though entered her head. The thought made her tail straighten back up and a mischievous grin appear on her face. Besides, the longer I take to meet up with them the more the thought of something extra as a reward for Sir Gene will keep teasing him. He can be patient and wait for that, if it ever happens. She giggled to herself before continuing to head to the pits.

Once she reached the pits though, she immediately asked the first person she saw how the fights so far had gone. They didn't seem to be in a particularly happy mood, which she guessed was because they placed a bet and lost, but she did learn that Meera's stables had won their first match. The good news partially had her jumping for joy. She stopped by a vendor to grab a thing of barbequed ribs from them. She didn't exactly wait to find out how much it would cost so she simply placed 20 gil on the counter of the stand and took off with one of the ribs as quickly as she could manage. Darting and weaving between other spectators as she tried to find a good vantage point for the rest of the fights. She made sure she kept one hand on her gil pouch to make sure that nobody decided that they could just walk on over and take her gil again. Fool me one shame on you, fool me twice shame on me. She wasn't going to take any chances. As she went along she began to eat her barbequed ribs. If nothing else, she had to admit that they had good food prepared for the people watching the fights. She wanted to make sure she got as high of a seat as possible so that she could keep an eye on everything that went on. She began making small talk with some of the other spectators as she waited for the next fight as well. Nothing major, nothing to bring attention to herself too much.

Maria kept an eye on the fights that were going on it the pit as she waited for the next fight Red would be in. While she waited her mind started to wander. First she began thinking about how oddly perfect the armor fit her. It fit her a bit too well for something that she sort of just ran in and grabbed, but what could she do about it really? It wasn't like it really mattered all that much anyway. Then she began to wonder how she got away from the creature in the sewers. That line of thought didn't last long either though. It should of been obvious to her from the start, it was fake. It explained why when she woke up she was floating on some boards and her knife was gone. Which led Maria to her last train of though, remembering when she got the knife from her father.

Maria hadn't been handed the knife directly by her father, it was left to her in his will. It was something that he had bought for her a number of years prior to his death. He had always known that she'd get bored of the daily life in that town and so he bought it for her, intending to give it to her when she became old enough. It would be a parting gift from her. She had initially debated heading back into the sewers to grab it after she realized it had been stolen from her, but she knew it would have been pointless. I was an old dagger and she was going to buy a new one anyway, so why would it have mattered to go and reclaim it anyway.

Life is pain, anyone who says otherwise is selling something. Maria would never forget those words for as long as she lived. Life is painful. That pain was a way to prove that you were still alive and breathing. But she wanted to make a name for herself regardless of the pain that she would have to go through. So now here she was, sitting in the stands of an arena, waiting to see what would happen to the people that had crashed into the waters near her home and gave her a chance to make a name for herself. If they survived then she was going to help them as much as she could. She'd already helped Eishi by putting him in the care of Sir Gene, so she had accomplished that side of things. Now all she had to do was help out Red and the others. If she helped them, then she could likely make some friends to share her journeys and adventures with. With Maria's course of action finally figured out she nodded to herself and focused back in on the pits. Anxiously awaiting the next fight along with the other spectators.

Drakestone City

Thomas was quite upset that nothing had been turned up in regards to the fugitive wolfqin. He knew that the knights of the Empire were intelligent, and would see anything that could be used to track her down, but so far they had been unable to get what they were after. This is not to say that they were not trying, however. Using his slightly superior knowledge of the city, he was scouring it, walking up to different people throughout the city asking if they had seen the woman today, although it seemed that even then it was to no avail. Not even combing the barracks of the Shuffle Alliance and any places within said headquarters that the woman might have hidden herself or been hidden away in had turned up anything.

It is always a pain when someone slips through one's fingers even when one knows that the target is nearby. Sadly this is a case of too much ground and not enough people. It was not unheard of for a single person, especially one as slight as the fugitive in question, to evade notice or capture by using terrain that their pursuers were unfamiliar with, although the blond knight wondered how long she could keep it up. While he could be patient, he was rather vexed that someone he had just seen the other night could evade him so easily, although he had a feeling that Nigel had a hand in this. He had been unable to figure out where they had been sent to train for the Pits, after all. Even when he had warned the Clubs official that to get in the way of the Emperor's will was basically signing one's own death sentence, he had not done as was asked. It seemed that something would have to be done about that. 

As his search widened, Sir Alexander grew increasingly agitated. He was unused to such a failure, as with all the knights roaming the streets he had thought that something would be turned up by now. Then again, she has evaded us this long, so who is to say she does not have any other tricks up her sleeve? He shook his head. Thinking about it clearly would not get him anywhere, and yet not thinking about it would not help him either, not that he had any idea where she might hide. The sewers? The crowds in the Pits? Perhaps in the water by the docks, even? No, he had no idea where she was, but that did not mean he would not try and look.

Unfortunately at the moment he had no idea where he could gain access to the sewers, so in the meantime he would check the other areas first. The docks would be the easiest, as the crowd would be quite hard to navigate without some idea where she was, and he did not know of any place that would give an overhead view, something that would be essential in having even a snowballs chance in a firestorm of finding her, and even then he would have to keep in mind that she might be using a cloak and hood to hide herself further. He sighed, no, the Pits would be a pipe dream.

Moving through the people in the streets, he moved past houses that had been checked and houses that had not. But, knowing that there was the possibility of hidden trapdoors only made him more leery of trying that avenue again. A man could only take so much failure before he decided that something was not going to work and moved on. Plus he was tired of all the looks he was being given from the locals. The docks and the sewers were his only options. 

He knew she could have fled, but he was of the mind that she had not. Why, he did not know. Perhaps she felt secure, believed that she had not been caught up to yet. Or maybe she was confident enough that she could evade the Empire even when some of its best warriors were mobilized in the same area. Or perhaps she was just a fool and did not know she was even being chased. But no matter what the case may be, they would find her, and while orders were to bring her in alive, he would have no problem venting a little on all the trouble she gave him... them. He meant them.

Shaking his head, he moved through the crowds and eventually arrived at the docks. At one point during his searching he saw a female qin that he thought might be her, but then he looked closer and realized she was a nyan and had black fur, not white. He mentally chastised himself for letting his frustrations get to him. It would not do to suspect someone of being someone else in such a place. While he knew he was strong, that did not mean that he was capable of taking on the entire city by himself, even with the other knights backing him up.

That being said, he continued his search, moving from one end of the dock to the other, not letting anything slip past him. He absently noted when the female nyanqin ran from the docks, but considering that he hadn't seen her slip anyone anything or be slipped in return (not that he was saying he was all-seeing, just that he did not see such an action take place). So having disregarded the woman, he knelt down on the edge, peering into the depths trying to see if the girl was hiding somewhere beneath the wooden planks. He was aware that many of the qin did not like getting wet, but he was not overly familiar with wolfqin, so he did not know whether they were capable of withstanding the cold for long periods of time. He sincerely hoped that they could not, as otherwise his job would only get that much more difficult.

Ace looked down at the rat biting his heel. He stopped and took off his shoe and placed it on the ground. He stared at it for a moment while thinking about what to do. Did pops ever teach me anything on how to deal with a pack of animals?

He then thought back long and hard to when he was younger and his pops had brought back a small animal that was injured.
Ace: Hey pops, what are we going to do with the... whatever that is. Are we going to be having stew tonight from it? 

Pops: Ace my boy, its time i taught you a little bit about nature. See this little beast? It may be small right now but it might be of some help in the future if we take care of it now. You see, in order to get animals to like you, you gotta give them heaps of respect and kindness. Doesn't matter if its a pack of wolves trying to eat you, or a cat that brushed up against your leg. All things in nature need to be treated just so.

Ace: Oh... so we arent going to eat it?


Pops: No you little shit! *whack* 


Ace: Ow! 

After rubbing his head for a minute where his pops would bop him sometimes when he acted stupid, Without a word part of his lunch and put it on the ground in front of his shoe, it was a large piece of bread with some dried meat in it, the last food he made himself before he left his pop's home and went on his journey. If Ace knew animals, then the rats would be distracted by the food and let him pass... that and he would get his sandal back.

The silent dark sewers echo with the sound of wet footsteps followed by the chittering of starved diseased vermin. Sakuya had been using her speed as much as she could to outrun the rodents who were pursuing her. The wolf girl Sakuya dashed along calm and levelheaded with swift precision, bounding around turns on her way to the exit while fending off jumping rats with swipes of her trusty blade while holding out her other hand to illuminate the way. The swiftly swung blade in one hand appeared to be a somewhat abused katana, crafted with care and currently suitable to the wolf-girl's needs while the other hand raises a small glowing fungus that glows to illuminate her way. Her wolfqin sight allowing her greater vision in these dark surroundings. Soon the light of the luminescent fungi shines down a decrepit hallway of the sewers, half way down the light glints off of a half broken rusty ladder leading up into the city above. Wasting not a moment the wolf girl Sakuya jumps up onto the ladder and begins to scramble her way up, flicking her tail out of the way of rat nips and pounces while continuing to fend others off with her sword. Half way up the ladder the wolf girl sheathes her sword to focus herself for the escape, With a claw like swipe the Sakuya pops the manhole cover off and up allowing her to hop out and close the cover behind her.

Sadly Sakuya was not quite familiar with the layout of the large city of Drakestone, and as such she was lost from the moment she reached the surface out of the sewers. The only place here she really knew of was the Freelancer's guild she was at before this whole quest had even began. She was at least relieved that she was no longer wandering down in the murky and dreary depths of the sewers where the rats had tried to make her their prey. She began to look around, hoping to find some sort of landmark that would give her any sort of direction in which she could begin to walk in the direction that it was located. Sakuya's ears drooped as she could not see any she could remember off the top of her head, and so her attention then turned to trying to find a map or get directions from someone more familiar with the area. The rusty ladder she had climbed up was in a state of disrepair for reasons that seemed clear now, this portion of the city did not seem as hospitable or as inhabited as the area around the docks where she had entered. This was enough to make Sakuya cautious to avoid having to be too social in this area, she lifted her nose and caught the faint scent of the sea and fish wafting from on direction. It was this way she decided to go until she was in a nicer place or until she could locate a map to guide her through this city's streets.

She continued to walk down the streets towards the scent she had picked up before, the scent growing stronger and stronger with each step that she took. While she was walking she took the time to check her robe, it appeared that the rats had managed to take a few nibbles of it and she decided that she should visit the tailor if she could find one while she was in town. This however was not her main priority, what was more important now was ensuring that she could make herself back to a place she could recognize. Never before had the scent of the corpses of aquatic life smelled so good, she felt as if though the remnants of those fish were serving even more of a purpose by guiding her where she needed to go. She eventually found herself at the outer edges of the fish market that was adjacent to the docks. It was from this point that Sakuya was able to slowly make her way back towards the freelancer's guild, hoping that the others eventually made their own ways out of that dilapidated hell of a sewer system.

This entire journey had begun to wear down on Sakuya, her equipment was beginning to feel cumbersome as her whole body felt as if weights had occupied every fiber of her musculature, but she knew she had to make it to the freelancer's guild, hopefully there she would be able to find out the fate of her temporary compatriots, and if not she could request that a search party go into the sewers to retrieve them and return them to safety. She hoped that would not be necessary though as she wandered down the street towards her final destination. In a fortunate turn of events for Sakuya, as she was walking down this street towards the guild, she was able to spot a tailor's storefront. It would be here where Sakuya would deposit her robe which had absorbed most of the sewer's grime and the rat's wrath, and have it cleaned and repaired for her later use. For now she was left in what she was wearing under it, a still respectable bit of clothing similar to that of what a ninja would wear during a mission, in other words a garb resembling that of a kunoichi which consisted of a gi like top and some short bottoms. After that side trip was over and she had paid in advance for the services that would be rendered, she continued her walk to the guild, thankfully feeling alot lighter as the damp robe that was covering her was now off of her, reducing the weight her tired body had to drag around quite considerably. Looking back on it now her body was probably this sore from overworking herself in her escape from the rats. Despite her soreness she was able to drag herself to the freelancer's guild before she had no choice but to sit down and relax her muscles.

Ace ran past the rats as they swarmed his food. It was dark, very dark. Twists here, turns there, barely able to see 4 feet ahead of you even with a torch. It was tiring. Ace knew this, but his own feelings on the matter made it so that he would get out of this place even if it killed him. Walking, walking, stopping to rest a bit, then more walking. Ace just... kept walking. Alone in the dark, with nothing but himself, a torch, and his thoughts. He thought about quite alot of things. His now dead grandfather, the scar on his back, his missing memories... as well as the fact that he didn't understand the cause of his memories going missing in the first place. It was strange really, he remembers everything after meeting the man who he would call Pops and grow up with. But before that, he couldn't remember anything. It was like someone had violently broke open his mind and ripped out that chunk of his memories. 

He then subsequently fell into a deep pool of water due to not knowing where he going. Not to diffuse the dreary set of text above, not at all. He flailed around a bit in the water, then realized that it only reached up to his waste and feeling a bit embarrassed he reached for his torch, which he soon realized wasn't there. But where was the light coming from? He then looked above him to see the light that was streaming above in a circle. Ace cocked his eyebrow and thought for a moment, either he had finally gone mad from being down here in the darkness so long, or the light meant a way out! This was of course confirmed when a wooden bucket slammed down atop his noggin with quite a bit of force. 

"OW! WHAT IN THE BLAZES!?" Ace yelled in pain at the sudden shock to his head. 

A voice was then heard from above him. "Oi! Is there someone down there? Are you the spirit of the well come to grant my wishes?" It was the voice of a women, one who may or may not be quite in her right mind... Ace however, was relieved to hear the voice of someone else. However, relief and and irritation at getting hit with a bucket were two different things. "Excuse me mam, but are you doin throwing a bucket down here?!" 

"What am i doin? Aren't you a well spirit? Well spirits should know that they are the spirit of a well. Thas how it works you know?" she replied. 

"Im not a well spirit, im a human! I got trapped down here after a hole opened up at the sewers!"

"The sewers? What in blazes where you doin down there?" 

"It was a quest from the guild." 

"Oh the guild! You be one of those spade chaps? Not like the other factions, bunch of stupid pricks." For a woman who sounded a bit elderly, she had quite the sharp tongue. 

"Actually, i am a spade, although im a new recruit though. Which reminds me, you got any way to help me get out of here?"

"Hmm... laddy i think you can climb the rope, if your strong enough you can pull yourself up."

"Alright! Can do!" Then after pulling himself up out of the well, he thanked the rather beautiful woman in her 20's (although what surprised him the most was the sound of her voice which made her seem much older), then after a small bit of persuasion with a few gill in her hands, she then told him the way back to the guild.