Old storyline; locked

Hawke looked at the fight, and then at Cibhi and the woman.
"I don't know about you, ma'am, but me and his majesty are getting the hell out of here." He grabbed Cibhi's hand. dragging him in the direction of the Tree.



Mazei looked down into the calm waters of the Tree's nutrient pools.
Not so calm for long.
He poured the liquid into the water, and it immediately turned black for a few seconds, then cleared again.
5 hours until the forest's death, now.
"Master...it is done, lord." He whispered.
And Optimarus meleded into his mind.
Indeed, said a voice in Mazei's head, The tree will die, You have been useful. However, this delay was intolerable; you have put the mission at risk. For that, there is no going back.
Mazei did not scream. This was because his internal organs, including his bloodstream and his voice box, were being heated and he suffered several minutes of excruciating pain as his blood sturned to steam and molten iron and other substances, and his flesh began to melt.
After 5 and a half minutes, there was simply charred flesh hanging off a blackened skeleton.

Xu narrowly dodged the mace, ducking beneath it. It was best to get into a More Open surrounding if he was going to use his Magic, so he shone a bright light to dazzle Bandon for a second, and ran over to the opening, where the Tamarisk Tree was...

Optimarus delved into Xu's mind.
Change of plan.
Kill the king. The boy; he must not be allowed to reach the Tree! These are my orders!

Xu heard Optimarus' Orders, and forgot about Bandon. His fists started glowing white as he ran towards to the King, then he generated a White Energy Ball and flung it in Cibhi's direction.

Cibhi shuddered.
"Ugh...somthing bad has happened."He said,kicking his horse,which went into a fast gallop.He,and probably all other Lorians worldwide,had felt it.The tree was dieing.It had happened once before.Only once.People had learned from that.As he bent down to lower wind resistance,a ball of energy flew over his head.He almost shot a fireball back,but then realised how flammable the area was.

Bandon's mace hit Garan straight in the head laying him out. If it was not for the Deva's hardened skull he would of died. Garan slumped to the floor and Bandon dropped the mace and started sprinting after Xu. He leaped at Xu hoping to knock him over...

Hawke looked behind at Bandon's spectacular flying tackle, and decided to leave it to him to keep Xu away.
"Damn," He muttered, leaping onto his own horse and hcarging towards the tree. Lorians all over were groaning or even at their knees. The tree itself, if you looked closely, was withering, only slightly, but leaves were already blackening and falling.
The truth was that Mazei had underestimated the power of the Zydromus poison. It was about ten times as fast as he had thought; it wasn't five hourse to save the tree, it was half an hour.
"Damn!" He said again, jumping off the horse and running inside the tree.

OOC: blast it... I am behind now... now I must think.

Bandon caught Xu and put him to the floor, Bandon forced all his remarkable 20 stone body mass onto him. He pulled his sword out and pushed it next to Xu's throat. If he moved it would slice his head off. Bandon summoned his elemental and got him to try silence Xu so he could not use magic. "Go now!" Was all Bandon said to the prince and his new guard.

Xu felt a sudden energy surge pulse through his body. This was Optimordus's doing. He kicked Bandon off him to his left, but the Elemental did not realise Xu didn't need to speak to conjure his magic powers.
He shot a Blue energy ball into the ground directly beneath him, and he flew up into the air. While he was up there, he fired a rain of Small, nail-like fire bolts towards Bandon...

When the first fire ball had erupted from the Airien had nearly fallen of her horse. When Cibhi had galloped off she galloped off after him thinking, "Get away from that magical brawl."

Bandon swore from the confusion and lifted his heavy shield to cover him from the fire nails. He then went back to attack Xu just to find out that his sword was flung from his hand. "Sh*t" Was all Bandon said and then realised. Wasnt Thunderlord entombed in his body? Of course. Why did'nt he use his power? Because he did'nt think of that. He then unleashed his potential catching Xu off guard...

Xu was flung back into the treetops by a sudden burst of flames.
He shuddered, but then he got a reminder of what his new task was:
Kill the King.
He shot a small, black energy ball into the sky, and about 50ft above the treetops, it exploded, and in it's place was a large, black dragon, hovering in the sky. Xu jumped, and landed on the Dragons massive back. The Dragon then launched several huge purple flames towards the ground, where Bandon was. He then set off in the direction that The Kind was Headed...

Optimarus shuddred as he supplied the power for the creation of the dragon.
Xu was being just a little more showy then he needed to be.

Hawke rushed downstairs into the caverns below the tree, and was not blocked by the spears he was expecting. Instead, he saw two dead guards.
Ah. Not good.
He ran, but silently, because there was a feeling of great power all around when you were in the caverns below the tree, and when Hawke nearly ran into a gigantic root 10 ft across, he stopped running.
Then he saw the pool. It looked normal at first, but when you paid attention, there were ripples even though there was no wind, and strange gas-like bubbles.
Then he spotted the body, and threw up.

Koroa finnaly got to power, incinerating hopefully all of the ninjas, killing or injuring them. This still ment enough time to get away...Toro teleported upon Koroas back and they zoomed off, the acceleration of the beast astonishing Toro. They dived in like a torpedo, began swimming down to the caves, not knowing that the ninjas were following them.
It was further down than Toro remembered, and the Ninjas were summoning creatures to help, or even turning into one! This was going to be one scary pursuit...

When going through the caves, the attackers getting closer, Toro felt a strange presence. It pained him, ached so badly, telling him something....
"Go back." Toro said in his air bubble to Koroa. "There is something wrong..."

Xu and His Dragon advanced quickly on the horses. The Dragon let loose many Purple Flames from it's mouth, and as it flew, the trees either side of it were being blown to one side. It then Matched it's Speed with that of the Horses, and let off another batch of flames...

Bandon picked up his sword from the charred ground only just dodging a falling, burning tree. He summoned his horse and started galloping towards the dragon. He then got level with it just as it shot flames out towards the king. Bandon stood up on top of his horse and jumped, grabbed and hauld himself onto the low flying beast. He pulled his chainblades out and sent them twirling towards the pilot. Bandon's glowing conduit of skin was hurting the dragon just as it was destroying the undead beast of a pet which was Bandon's horse...

Cibhi felt the fire before he saw it,and jumped off his horse moments before it was reduced to a pile of ash and bone.He was up faster than he had ever been,and was running to the tree.He literally jumped through the hole into the roots leading down into the lower depths,and landed on the knot of roots next to the pool just in time to see Hawke throw up.
"Pull yourself toghether."He said"There are MUCH worse things than that."
-----------------------
Verraidor stood infront of a group of people,dukes and landholders.
"Hello,ladies,gentlemen.I am here to tell you a grave thing."He announced."It would appear the King has been captured by the Ex-Head of the Royal Gaurd Bandon,and the Conman Hawke.We sent a magician called Xu to save him,but he has yet to report back.
If any of you,or the people on your land,find the King and bring him here,they will be rewarded 10,000 gold."There was a murmur."And the duke,duchess or landholder that owns the land they live on will be given 200,000 gold."At this there is a cheer"And,anyone who kills and can prove they kill will be given 1,000 gold and the landholder 20,000 gold."He paused."So what are you waiting for?GET GOING!"

Airien dived off her horse, dragging it by the reins into a bush only to just narrowly escape a similar fate as her horse whcih was reduced to a charcoal mass. She pulled out her crossbows, cocked them and aimed for the dragon, waiting for it to fly low enough to make firing worth it.

Hawke wiped the bile from around his mouth. It wasn't the sight so much as the smell that had caused him to throw up. Rotting, burnt flesh; not pleasant.
"The tree is poisoned, I think, badly. We may need powerful magic to cure it." He said grimly, and the dragons roar echoed around the forest and into the cavern.



Optimarus watched Verraidor's speech through a spectators mind, and was almost impressed. The mention of Xu was clever, he though; it prevented anybody panicking when they saw a powerful mage on the trail of the king.
Now then...to business.
He walked over to his ex-guard. He was lying on the ground, moaning in terror and pain. Optimarus barely even moved that much, but even after all this time doing almost nothing, he had ferocious strength and skill for inducing pain.
"So...who, exactly, do you work for? I could simply extract it from your mind, and trust me, thats considerably more painful then telling me."
Optimarus was in fact lying. He was unable to extract memories without the victims permission, but the guard didn't know that.
"No! I beg you...I am sorry I spied...I will tell you who i work for..." the man said hurriedly.
Optimarus smiled. Excellent.
The guard told him.
And a flash of light illuminated the room, and the guard slumped to the ground.
Optimarus walked back to his throne, and sat down.
Ah....Now he knew who was spying on him.
And now, for the first time in an immense amount of time, he felt very slightly afraid.

Airien was still a ruins explorer even when in danger, she noticed a strange, artificial hole in the floor of the forest, by a tree (ooc: the same one Cibhi jumped down...) she crawled over to it, still carrying her two handheld crossbows at the ready and droppedinto the hole after looking in to check for stakes.

Cibhi jumped out of the way when he saw Airien jumping in,and almost landed face-first in the dead body.
"Knock next time?"He said,getting up."So...any ideas what to do?It has happened before...I can't remember how they fixed it..."

The ninjas barricaded Koroa, her flames usless in the water. Many creatures attacked the dragon, Greater water Spirits/Golems weren't controled by the Ninjas...but not on are side either. Koroa unleashed a beam of water to blow some away, then wipped her tail at some others. Though half of them were still there...
Koroa swam down, screeching in a demonicly beautiful scream. She flew down through the hole in the see floor. Toro meanwhile was floating a few meters above the hole, confused. Suddenly bullets came out. But they were the sea dragons. The demonic screech was made again, and suddenly beams of energy wipped out all the sea creatures in an explosion of the dragons.





Toro climbed on Koroa, with the other seaphents going back, and flew off, Toro realising how lucky he was....

Airien glared at Cibhi, "Shut up and be quiet, that thing is after you, if you hadn't caused trouble for some magician I wouldn't be here you stupid boy." She recocked her Crossbows and looked up out of the hole, arms tensed, ready to fire the crossbows at the appearance of the dragon or magician or the warriors.

The Dragon screeched in Pain, it's leg burnt. The weapons Bandon had launched had hit the side of the Dragon, near it's chest, but being so large it didn't slow it.
It noticed the dreaded crossbows too late..