Starbound [ IC / Started / Not Accepting ]

[.:Blu:.]

With everyone agreeing to help Albora out on his thief dilemma, the overjoyed curator almost shot out from his chair and hugged all four Starbounds. Instead, Albora merely clapped his hands together in satisfaction. "That's great! Thank you, thank you, thank you!" Albora excitedly exclaimed as he shook Fayte's hand with both of his hands. "Uhh hehe, you're welcome..." Fayte replied with a nervous chuckle and a sweat drop on his head. "(The Skull Grimoire is really important to Mr. Albora. Even Syfa said that it's of legendary status in the eyes of witches and wizards.)" Fayte thought. After the job had been accepted, Albora led the four outside in order to show them just what the Skull Grimoire looks like. They were walking down a long hallway, far away from the other artifact rooms which were filled with Mysteria scholars. Albora, unlike how he was in his office, was rather quiet. He walked far ahead of the group with his arms cuffed behind his back. Not once did he looked back to say anything. It was a bit unnerving seeing such a dramatic change in his personality.

Along the way, Celio tapped Kirei's shoulder twice and asked if she thought the museum curator is peculiar. As if there is something off about him, maybe even shady or untrustworthy. Fayte was standing close enough to hear a bit of what Celio was whispering and that prompted his own thoughts to surge about Albora. "(I hate to admit it but Mr. Albora really does exhibit some strange behaviors. He talks about protecting the Skull Grimoire as if it were more important than his own well-being. And now he seems to have become a whole other person. He's not like the chatty person I met a little bit ago.)" Fayte thought but kept his ideas to himself as the group continued moving down the seemingly endless hall. The atmosphere seemed rather dark and moody as they finally approached the end of the hall. At the end, two large wooden doors stood. Albora stopped, prompting the group behind him to stop. "This is where the Skull Grimoire is kept." Albora told the four without looking back. Walking to the doors, Albora lifted his left arm up to face height and pulled down his brown suit's sleeve, revealing a silver bracelet with a star etched onto a plate which is the centerpiece of the bracelet.

Suddenly, the star etching began to glow a bright blue color and a magical ray shot onward from the star, hitting the two doors in the middle. As the ray made impact, a [url=http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs12/i/2006/316/4/6/Magic_Circle___Water_by_Wildviolence.jpg]magic seal[/url] appeared, floating just a feet away from the set of doors. Right away, Fayte knew just what kind of doors they were. "A set of magically-enchanted security doors." Fayte said. "That's right. And these doors are of the highest quality. The doors were made from a special wood found only in Noctum." Albora explained as the magic seal suddenly shattered and dissipated into the air, showing that the doors can now be opened. "After the doors were created, a Wolfkrone Starbound who specializes in enchantments placed the seal on them. The only way to get through these doors is with this special bracelet." Albora explained. "Of course, since you four will be protecting the Skull Grimoire within this room, I had four more of these bracelets made for your convenience." Albora told the four before handing each one of them an exact copy of the bracelet he has. "I had these made by the same Wolfkrone Starbounds after the second theft. With you four here, hopefully there won't be a third time." Albora stated.

Fayte studied the bracelet briefly before placing it onto his right wrist. Albora then opened the door to reveal a huge room lit by magically-enchanted wall lamps. At the center of the room is the case that held the Skull Grimoire. A square box made from magically-enchanted glass rest upon a dark wood podium that stood five feet tall. The glass was locked onto the podium with steel parts. While that may seem relatively easy for a thief to unlock, the real security is built into the podium itself. A mechanism built within the podium combined electricity and magic to produce a powerful magically-enhanced electric shock that would render any thief unconscious if they have no knowledge of how to first disable the device. Breaking the glass by force would result in the same shock. In fact, without disabling the device first, it is guarantee that the thief would receive the shock. Even if the thief had such skills, he would have to deal with four Starbounds, and not just any Starbounds, Sol Starbounds. Albora haven't even learned that the four people he hired were members of the Sol guild.

Albora led the four to the center of the room where the coveted artifact sat in place. Standing at a distance away from the case, Albora extended his hand outward in a motion as if inviting the four to view the grimoire at their leisure. "Please take a look at the rarest artifact of this museum, the Skull Grimoire...!" Albora told the group. Walking up to the glass, Fayte looked to see an old book covered in writing with the image of a demonic, skeletal being in the center of the cover. Fayte has now laid eyes on the [url=http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-78d3cmZ14GU/TynfxAnyWdI/AAAAAAABy4g/0NU_ZhENXrI/s1600/Grimoire%2Bbook_Page_16_phixr.jpg]Skull Grimoire[/url]. "W-Whoa..." Fayte uttered as he stared at the book in awe of it's legendary status and appearance. "So this is the Skull Grimoire. It looks... well, evil..." Fayte stated. "Yes, Rodingrham was an evil wizard and that is the instrument that brought forth all of the evil deeds he has done. Though it's history is dark, there is no doubt that it is also fascinating." Albora stated. "So what's with all of these writings on the cover of the grimoire?" Fayte asked curiously.

"Yes that. It is said that the Skull Grimoire's power became too much for Rodingrham and caused his mind to deteriorate over time, making him insane. Those writings are 'formulas' that the diseased mind of Rodingrham thought would grant him the ultimate dark spell known among witches and wizards. Safe to say the formulas aren't actually working formulas. No, they were just the inventions of a wizard driven mad by his own power." Albora explained. "So wait, if the grimoire drove Rodingrham insane, what will it do to us???" Fayte asked, worried for his group's safety. "Calm down boy, the grimoire is two thousand years old. It's power is no longer alive, at least in theory." Albora replied. A sweat drop suddenly appeared on Fayte's head after he heard the "at least in theory" part of Albora's response. "That doesn't really ease my troubles!" Fayte explained comically. "Relax, relax, many theories have been proven true. I'm sure it's the same case with the Skull Grimoire." Albora reassured Fayte. "Anyways, you four will report back to the museum at eight so don't be tardy or I'm docking your pay." Albora told the four in a serious tone. After a brief silence, Albora burst out into laughter. "Ohohohoho, oh my... I'm sorry, I'm sorry, that was only a joke but please do arrive at eight ohohohoho!" Albora told the four as he continued laughing. "(That wasn't even funny...)" Fayte thought with a sweat drop on his head.

With that, the group and Albora left the room. Nighttime would come in around four hours and the group needed to prepare.

[Nighttime]

Eight at night, the group arrived as told. Albora greeted them outside of the museum when they arrived and told them he would be going home for then night, leaving things in their care. With that, the group proceeded to the exhibit room holding the Skull Grimoire. Inside they took their posts near the Skull Grimoire. Fayte had the north post, facing the set of doors, Syfa had the west post, Kirei, the east, and Celio's placement, the south post. It was quite boring and tiring just standing there waiting for the thief to make his move. Albora hadn't even guaranteed that the thief would come to steal the grimoire. To pass the time, the group merely chat and told stories. Celio played a nice little ditty on his flute and Kirei sang a piece. Syfa provided some of her delicious food while Fayte performed some card tricks. Fayte even offered to tell his teammates fortune but was hastily denied. Fayte had no idea why. Three hours have passed and still nothing. Fayte leaned against one of the four pillars that were placed near the corners of the room, two in the front and two in the back. Yawning, Fayte crossed his arms and felt like sleeping but was able to stay awake.

Suddenly, a spherical object dropped from above and hit the ground. As it hit the ground and bounced an inch off of the ground, the object burst in an explosion of smoke and an initial bright flash. "Ugh! What the-" Fayte covered his eyes a bit late as the flashed rendered his vision temporarily useless. The smoke didn't help either as it caused him to cough repeatedly. Instinctively, Fayte pulled his left arm up to cover his mouth and nose from the smoke while he used his free arm to swipe away at the smoke, hoping to clear some of it. Just where did the spherical smoke bomb came from exactly? It dropped from above but not even a small hole can be seen up on the ceiling. So how in the world could it have dropped from above? Suddenly, a quick shadow dashed through the smoke towards the case holding the grimoire. Working quickly, the shadow was able to disarm the shock device while the four Starbounds recovered. Regaining his vision, Fayte looked to see a shadow within the smoke. Fayte couldn't fully tell what the figure was doing but it soon became obvious as the the figure swung some kind of weapon and the sound of breaking glass was heard.

"The thief! He's here! Smoke... too much!" Fayte struggled to say more than a few lines as the smoke made it difficult to craft together sentences. The smoke needed to be cleared and fast before the thief could make off with the grimoire. Fayte didn't have anything in his arsenal useful for clearing the smoke. It seems wind magic would be the best bet in this case, and Fayte doesn't have wind magic in his arsenal.

[Kyng's Old Account]

So, 8 o'clock at night. The Grimoire seemed, to Celio at least, safe in the hands of 4 competent Starbounds, each guarding with their eyes peeled...open...warding off sleep, to ensure the ancient treasure's safety. Celio himself, upon re-reporting back, was in a very foul mood: he was at first suspicious of the curator, but his joke, which Fayte wonderfully summarized as unfunny, caused him to despise the man: he needed those 5000 Jewells! Sure, maybe not for absolute need, but every person has a taboo! Celio liked to bet on underground races and fights, not the action, but he loved coins, the sheen and shinies: sure, maybe he was the incarnate form of a magpie, but regardless money was his wish, any form was wonderful, because he dreamed to make the world wealthy, one of his many impossible dreams, amongst them become the King of the World, have an obedient Harem, and getting his hands on this new[i] 'chewing gum' [/i]thing that was buzzing around.

Passing time was swell, stories were told an such: they managed to drag his nervous self from not playing a little he picked up during an old adventure in the seas, [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23XAeJ702VQ&feature=relmfu"]Memories of the Sea[/url], a little ditty he had yet to perfect, but thankfully the clapping of hands were giving him good tempo to toot as much as he could possible toot, tooting on that toot stick 'till the toots he tooted could be tooted no more, thankfully which lasted 'til the end of the song, Celio somewhat out of breath, blushing red cheeks from having tooted such an extent. It was then when Celio confessed something to the others: he wasn't trying to nab cash for any random reason, as in fact he wanted to purchase a Violin: in his town he had little practice, but enjoyed playing such an instrument.

All of the sudden, the room had been smoked out, glass had been smashed, and Fayte had identified the obvious as the thief was in the midst of things: the smoke was unbearable, especially when Celio had let out a nice yawn, taking in a whole ton of the smog, and choking on it, a heavy cough as tried to siphon some clean air into his lungs so that he could breath: this big smokescreen wasn't helping, especially with such a big commotion like this going on, so Celio had to think, and thinking he did: [color=#008000][i]'The smoke needs to be blown away: Razor Winds will part the smoke with ease, and fast. I could Dragon Blast it, but that would be unnecessary right now. A to B, Celio, A to B!'[/i][/color]

And so, the sound of his sword screeched in the room as Celio spoke aloud[color=#008000] "I'll sort out this smoke screen; somebody make sure to get sight of him!"[/color] before his sword glowed green, following which Celio began to slice the air, over and over, concentrated blades flying and bursting through the room pushing out the smoke and replacing it with cleaner air, clearing the smoke screen little by little as Celio, whilst doing his darnedest to keep up the anti-smoke strikes, tried to get sight of the damn b*stard who, he assumed, was trying to steal the box. Aloud, he joked saying[color=#008000] "I hope this isn't a drill!"[/color] with a chuckle at the end, awaiting some form of communication from his allies.

[Hotaru987]

Syfa was at an all time high after hearing that they would be able to see the actual Skull Grimoire. Her eyes were practically a light with excitment and her thoughts was of nothing but the spell book. In fact she didn't even hear the question that Celio asked Kirei even though she was right next to him. At the moment the Skull Grimoire was the only thing on her mind. They finally got to te end of the hallway and stood in front of two large doors. Mr. Albora raised his hand and pulled down his shirt's sleeve to reveal a bracelet. A small star etched onto the centerpiece of the bracelet began to glow, before shooting a beam at the center of where the two doors met and in response a seal appeared on the door before shattering. [i]'A magically enhanced seal door. Nice touch...And that wood...It's from Nocturn.' [/i]A feeling of nostalgia washed over her thinking of her home country, but she quickly shook her head to rid herself of those thoughts. She came back too when she was handed a similar bracelet so that they could get in without problems.

The doors were opened, and Syfa followed closely behind so she could see the Skull Grimoire. When she did her eyes went wide with awe. [i]'N-no way...I-it's actually here. The Skull Grimoire. My parents won't ever believe that I actually saw this.' [/i]She heard Mr. Albora and Fayte talk about the spell book and it's owner. She looked back at the spell book now a bit more reserved. [i]'True...He may have been evil, but there is no doubt that he was powerful. I want to get that strong...But when I do I'll use my strength to protect my friends and family. I just hope when I do get stronger, I don't go mad like he does....I would rather throw my own spell book in a fire.'[/i] She thought determined not to turn out like the Skull Grimoire's owner.

Night came quickly for the group, and Syfa decided to administer the food that she brought. It would be bad if they were fighting on an empty stomach. She was also quite enjoyed by Fayte's card tricks, but when he offered to give her a prediction of her future she quickly declined remembering his last failed attempt on her. Syfa was too comfortable waiting there, and Celio's music playing was lulling her into a light sleep. However, her remedy was given when she was suddenly surrounded by a smoke screen. "Wh-what's this!!" She coughed as she inhaled some of the smoke. She heard some noise and threw the smoke she just made out someone stealing the Skull Grimoire. Luckily Celio was there, and with his quick thinking he blew the smoke away.

Both Syfa's eyes and throat was irritated, but she still stood up rubbing her eyes. "Are you guy's alright? I have to go after him before he get's too far!"

[Elƒie]

Kirei looked to Celio as he made his point about the curator. [color=#008080]"Ya know.. You do kinda have a point.. Maybe how he's gotten it is what's causing the thief to steal in the first place.."[/color] Kirei shrugged a little after barely whispering that. She then watched as the curator then opened the door and handed them each a key within. [color=#008080]"If there's a thief loose.. Then shouldn't there be as few keys as possible.."[/color] Kiree pointed out nonchalantly before the curator told them they needed to be there at 8. Nodding, she simply turned and decided to look at the artifacts, feeling at slight piece as she stared at history, but slightly sad at the fact that she couldn't read about said history. Instead, she would ask the scholars once and a while about an artifact once and a while, after they noticed her interest in it. Before she knew it, it was 8 o'clock already and she headed into the room.

As time went by, Fayte offered to read their fortunes. She would have been happy to accept, the others quickly told her it'd be for the better if he didn't. Shrugging, she simply let it slid. Some other day, she thought to herself privately with a hum. Later on, Celio played his flute, taking every bit of her will power to not interrupt him to beg to play his flute and to not sing along, she still enjoyed the song, though. She made a mental note to ask him for lessons one day. And throughout the night, they snacked/feasted on the wonderful dish Syfa made for them. Eventually, it came time for Kirei to entertained the group.

Looking up, she shifted through her head for a song to sing. Eventually, she decided to sing one of her, if not her top, favorite song. Standing up, string instruments began to fill the air as she started to do a simple elegant dance as she [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_95P3xiYT8&feature=bf_prev&list=PLD60C332C525E12A0&lf=plpp_video"]sang a song[/url]* about courage, determination and searching for the person that belongs most within their life. After finishing, she took a bow and sat back down, beginning to hum the song, it not stuck in her head after not singing it for so long. After a while, she eventually kept the song to herself as she drifted into a daydreaming like state, remembering all of the things she's seen in life. [color=#008080]"I wonder I'll ever be tha-"[/color] Before Kirei could finish her sentence, a smoke bomb engulfed the room, causing her to go into a coughing fit.

Luckily, Celio was quick to think and started to clear the air as best he could. With it clear enough for her to finally take a breath, she ran into the smoke, aiming to grab the thief. taking a big step forward, she attempted to grab the thief but he easily side-stepped it. Swinging her left arm back, she attempt to grab the thief again, but he was too past for her. This time, she chased the thief a little before jumping, hoping to grab him. She missed again and landed to the a thud, facing towards the door. [color=#008080]"Quickly! After him! He's trying to escape!"[/color] Pulling out her baton as she got up, she began to sing her [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmO5LP-9vlY"]song of speed[/url] as orange began to cover her and her friend's hands and feet as she took off in chase after the thief.

*Trivia fact: This song is what inspired me to have Kirei's magic be based around music.

[.:Blu:.]

Fumbling around in the thick smoke, Fayte tried to regain his composure. Fayte couldn't figure out just how in the world was the thief able to get inside to use the smoke bomb. The walls of the museum were thick, really thick. The only way to get in was through either the two magically-sealed doors or force your way in by destroying the walls or ceiling. Entering from underground isn't even a practical method. Just how did this thief entered? Albora stated that the thief merely had speed and nothing else was special about him. Now Fayte started to doubt that claim since the thief proved himself more than capable of infiltrating the museum without drawing attention. But now wasn't the time for theories. Now is the time to focus on the task at hand. Fayte and his teammates' job is to catch the thief, and whether or not he made it an easy or difficult task, the job is still the same. Luckily, Celio had just the magic to clear the smoke. Using Razor Winds, Celio was able to part the smoke and gradually clearing it altogether. Once the smoke was cleared, Fayte was able to see the thief. The thief's attire consisted of a suit, a green-striped scarf, and a green mask. However, his most prominent feature is his glowing green eyes which shines like stars in the night sky.

Just as the thief picked up the Skull Grimoire, he noticed the smoke had cleared. "Huh? Damn it, what happened?" the thief asked before looking back to see the four Starbounds. By the way they looked, the thief knew he was dealing with Starbounds and not the incompetent security guards from the last two heists. "Oh crap, well look at what I've gotten myself into. Say, you kids don't happen to want to share the profit I'm gonna make off of this book thing here do ya?" the thief asked, trying to prevent getting into a fight with the four. "Not interested. Now give up and hand over the Skull Grimoire!" Fayte told the thief. "You mean this thing?" the thief asked, holding up the Skull Grimoire. "So it's called the Skull Grimoire ehh? Well whatever the hell its name is, all I know is I'm gonna make a lot of money out of it selling it in the Black Magic Market, just like I did with the last two artifacts." the thief told the group. "Oh by the way, one of you tried to grabbed me earlier? Whoever that one was sure has lousy reflexes cause I easily dodged ya. Anyways, gotta go!" the thief said.

Suddenly, the thief's shoes began to glow in a bright yellow color. "Buh-bye!" the thief told the four before he suddenly took off. The speed of his running was incredibly fast, blinding fast even. He appeared as a moving blur as he passed the four Starbounds. His glowing yellow shoes gave off what appears to look like stardust as he ran. This wasn't just any ordinary thief. He was a Starbound. As he raced by the four, Fayte looked back to see he had even broken through the magically-sealed doors by launching a jumping kick at them. "T-That thief is a Starbound...!" Fayte uttered. Kirei then took the initiative as she used her Song of Speed to increase the speed of everyone in the group. Fayte nodded to Kirei. "Thanks, let's not give him the chance to escape!" Fayte said before taking off at high speed. A first-time user, Fayte almost immediately crashed into a wall if he had not luckily stopped himself. Kirei's Song of Speed packed quite the punch that took Fayte by surprise. "Whoa, this is harder than it looks." Fayte said before turning direction to dash off again. Fayte still needed to get used to the speed but it seems the second run he had more control.

Taking his mind off of the speed boost he was granted by Kirei, Fayte now focused on the direction that the thief had gone in. By now however, the thief was no where to be seen. "(Arrgh, where is he?!)" Fayte thought as he ran down the long hallway that led to Albora's office. Making his way there, Fayte then saw the thief leaning against Albora's door. "Took ya long enough to get here." the thief said, throwing the Skull Grimoire up and catching it as it descended. Suddenly, Fayte activated his magic and twelve glowing cards appeared, circling around Fayte. Quickly drawing one of the cards, Fayte pointed the card face towards the thief. "Card Art: Fireball!" Fayte called out as a fireball then shot out from the card and headed towards the thief. The thief's shoes began glowing once again as he dashed off in the direction leading to the main exhibit room. Meanwhile, Fayte's fireball only managed to hit Albora's office door, exploding and causing the door to fell off its hinges. "Note to self: don't ever do that again..." Fayte said before running after the thief again.

Finally the chase after the thief had came to a stop as the thief arrived at the main exhibit room. Just in time as well as the Song of Speed's effect finally wore off. Making it into the main exhibit room, Fayte stopped and noticed the thief merely standing there looking at Fayte. Out of breath, Fayte stood breathing heavily, returning the stare. "This is a dead end for you... There's no where left to run..." Fayte told the thief. "Who said anything about running?" the thief asked. Suddenly, Fayte's eyes grew wide as he turned his head to the side after hearing an incoming noise. As Fayte looked, a figure that looked similar to the thief ran up to him and delivered a hard punch to Fayte's face, knocking him flying into the locked main doors. A loud thud rang out as Fayte collided with the wooden doors and then fell to the ground. "U-Ugh..." Fayte struggled to get up but was only able to get into a sitting position. Looking up, Fayte saw what he thought he saw: another thief. There wasn't one thief but [url=http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz46/wirespy/565941.jpg]two[/url] and from the looks of it, they are identical twins. The only distinguishing feature of this new thief is that he is wearing a hat and his eyes are red in color. "T-There are two thieves...? All along...?" Fayte asked.

"Actually, there are three, but the third thief isn't with us on this heist." the thief without the hat answered. The same thief then turned to Fayte's teammates with a calm smile. "Sorry, allow me to give you a proper greeting. My name is Sice and my brother here is named Pictor. Delighted to make your acquaintance." Sice, the thief without the hat, took a theatrical bow. "Shall we be going now Sice?" Pictor asked. "Yeah, we don't want to bother these guys any longer. Buh-bye!" Sice said. Nodding, Pictor made his way to the wall connected to the main entrance and placed his right hand onto it. "Earth Break!" Pictor chanted. With that, the wall suddenly disassembled by itself, creating a oval-shaped hole within the brick wall. Using his unknown speed magic, Sice quickly ran out followed by Pictor. As Pictor got outside, he faced his palm at the wall once again. "Earth Reform!" Pictor called out. This time, the wall reassembled, making it appeared as it did just moments ago. With that, Sice and Pictor was able to escaped being capture by the four Sol guild members.

Fayte struggled to stood up by was finally able to. "Ugh... Damn it, they got away with the grimoire..." Fayte clenched his fists in frustration.

[Morning; Albora's Office]

"NOOOOOOO!!!!" Albora shouted hysterically with his hands placed on either side of his head. Albora had just been told the news that the thieves managed to stole the grimoire and escaped. "I'm sorry Mr. Albora..." Fayte told him in an empathetic tone. "Damn it all! How could you four let this happen??? That was this museum's most prized possession! MY most prized possession! Now it's gone!" Albora told the four of them. "You four are disgraces as Starbounds! What guild are you from??? I have to spread the news that your guild is the worst Starbound guild that ever existed! Your guild will be the laughing-stock of Terrani-ahhhhh!" It was fine and natural that Albora would be furious after losing his most prized artifact, but Fayte wouldn't just sit there and listen to him badmouth the Sol Guild and so Fayte stood up and grabbed a hold of Albora's collar, pulling Albora towards him. "You can badmouth me but don't you dare talk about my guild!" Fayte warned then let go of Albora's collar. "We'll get you the grimoire back but not for you..." Fayte said in a more calm tone. "We're doing it for our guild's reputation." Fayte stated.

Still angry but seeing no other alternatives, Albora then decided to reveal to the group a secret. "The podium that the Skull Grimoire rested on. I had it enchanted so that anyone who takes the book off of it will have their mana unknowingly merged with a small amount of a different mana. The thief won't be able to detect the mana, but we can." Albora stated. "How?" Fayte asked. Without saying anything, Albora pointed to the bracelet that Albora had given to each one of them. Fayte looked to his bracelet before looking at Albora. "You can activate the bracelets' tracking ability by exerting a small piece of your mana into them. After you do, an arrow made from your mana will appear, leading you in the direction of the thief. That's how you'll find him." Albora explained. "Bring the grimoire back or else there will be hell to pay." Albora warned. "We won't be paying you anything, but on the other hand, you'll have to pay us double the amount of the job payment considering you haven't warned us that the thief might have been a Starbound." Fayte stated. "Fine, whatever, just get my grimoire back..." Albora replied as he turned his back to them to look outside the window.

Without saying anything else to Albora, Fayte looked at his teammates. "Syfa, Celio, Kirei... This time, we won't lose...!" Fayte declared as the four of them walked out adamantly from Albora's office.


[center][b][i]With a new resolve, the stray stars head towards a collision course?![/i][/b][/center]


After the four had left, Albora slowly and calmly removed the glasses from his face. Then suddenly, Albora violently smashed his glasses against his office's window, cracking the window and shattering his glasses. A crazed and evil expression was now on Albora's face as he looked up without his glasses. "I will have my grimoire back...!" Albora declared, ignoring the cuts the glass of his glasses had made onto his hand. He continued standing there and staring outside his window, all the while his blood dripped onto the floor below.

[Kyng's Old Account]

The morning was not swell at all, Mr Albora deciding to go ape-sh*t into their ear drums without restraint, the sour bitterness of the man's voice expressing his absolute distaste for the foursome, simply for losing this seemingly extremely dangerous and "lethal to most mortal hands" attributed Grimoire that was so ancient a mad magician was it's holder. Talk about blowing things out of proportion. Anyways, as he was spewing out his ferocious dragon breath, which for the record stunk to high heavens, Celio was simply watching from the sidelines, cleaning his ear with a pinky finger looking as active as a monkey as he daydreamed about a lovely land of food, most of it Syfa's spin on the flavour of course.

All of a sudden, thinks really heated up: Albora took it a step too far, to Fayte at least, threatening his guild's name, to which the young lad to great offence from, grasping the curator by the collar as he threatened- no, this was more like simple instruction. Celio really didn't know Fayte cared so much about the Sol Guild, 'cause he was absolutely sure that the Guild's own stance in response to the rest of the world would allow it surpass such a trivial matter; maybe these four would be punished, but...then again, Mr Albora gave off a very bad vibe, to Celio; he had felt it from the beginning, not trusting him for a second, and right now he seemed so pissed off about losing an artifact: most curators would not be so volatile, but then again those curators didn't hold Artifacts such as the Skull Grimoire.

[color=#008000]"C-c-calm down Fayte, I'm sure Mr Alb-b-bora wasn't serious!"[/color] Celio said trying to lighten up the situation, knowing it would fail absolutely terribly; however, at least the awkwardness moved on, with Albora changing the topic, informing them there was a chance, there was a hope: their bracelets would show them the thief's direction if they used mana to power it...pretty smart, Celio thought. What was stupid was Albora then threatening Fayte again about not returning with the Grimoire, which Fayte returned with quite a snappy response. Double the pay! That meant Celio could get his hands on 10000 Jewells! Imagine how much he could gamble for! Oh, the horizons seemed all but bright for the Dragonic Starbound now; he had to get that Grimoire back! Not just to save their guild's reputation, but also to get some nice dosh!

Right there and then, Fayte had marched them off again, to find this damned thief who had nabbed the Skull Grimoire from Mr Albora. Celio's own self believed that this thief might not be too far away, perhaps in the very same city, however due to this, he also believed that, if this thief knew Celio was thinking that, he'd cover more ground to screw with this Starbound's head, which wasn't sitting very well at all: and so, looking up at the morning sun, Celio marched ahead, hair blowing softly in the wind, smile on his face, as he said [color=#008000]"Let's go nab that thief!..huh, quite ironic, we're "stealing" the thief from his crimes...no, wait, no that was terrible, sorry guys, sorry!"[/color]

[Elƒie]

As the group ran off after the thief and went in separate directions, Kirei decided to go up stairs, in case the thief was getting tricky. Running around in search of the thief, she came to stop at a balcony that over looked the main exhibit room. Panting a little, Kirei still hadn't quiet mastered the breathing for running and singing at the same time. Looking down, over the railing, she watched a scene unravel that showed there were actually two thieves in on this heist as the rest of the group arrived at the room. Hoping to have the element of surprise, Kirei took a few steps back and ran forward.

Jumping over the railing and grabbing onto a banner, she swung down towards the two thieves. As she let go of the banner, the thieves started to make their way out. Rolling forward as she landed to prevent breaking her legs, she used her momentum to get back on her feet and chased after the two as they opened a hole in the wall and quickly went through it. Trying to skid to a stop, she knew she wasn't going to be able to get through the hole before they reformed the wall. Unfortunately, Kire couldn't stop fast enough and ended up running into the wall anyways. At least she didn't get caught with the wall. Pushing herself off the wall, she quickly held her nose as she squatted down, in pain and in disappointment...

---The Next Morning---

[size=3][font=tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"You four are disgraces as Starbounds! What guild are you from??? I have to spread the news that your guild is the worst Starbound guild that ever existed-" That was all Kirei needed to hear before she snapped like fragile twig. Slamming her fists onto the desk just as Fayte grabbed the curator's collar. [acronym="Don't you dare talk about our guild!!! And as far as it goes when it comes to protecting that artifact, you're done nothing yourself besides hire someone else to do the job because your. Fat. Ass. Can't do it!!"][color=#008080]"DON'TYOUDARETALKDOWNABOUTOURGUILD!!! ANDASFARASITGOESWHENITCOMESTOPROTECTINGTHATARTIFACT, YOU'VEDONENOTHINGYOURSELFBESIDESHIRESOMEONEELSETODOTHEJOBBECAUSEYOUR. FAT ASS. CAN'TDOIT!!"[/color][/acronym] With that, Kirei stormed out of the office and building as re-negotiations were half-way done. Stomping her way down the street, she began to sing a [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4shMkF0ymk&list=PLD60C332C525E12A0&index=26&feature=plpp_video"]song[/url] in acapella, half anger and half sadness being heard in her voice.[/font][/size]

[font=tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif]Eventually, Kirei made her way back to the museum just as the others began to go off to look for the thieves. [/font][color=#5A5A5A][font=tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif][size=3] [/size][/font][/color][color=#008000][font=tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif][size=3]"Let's go nab that thief!..huh, quite ironic, we're "stealing" the thief from his crimes...no, wait, no that was terrible, sorry guys, sorry!"[/size][/font][/color][font=tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif] Smiling a little after hearing what sounded like Celio's bad attempt at a joke, she said, "[color=#008080]Yeah, lets get them and teach them that they shouldn't have messed with the Starbounds of the Sol Guild!"[/color][/font]

[Hotaru987]

After the smoke was taken cared of, everyone was able to get a good look at the thief. The thing that stood out the most were his vibrant green eyes, that seemed to glow in the night. He asked if they would be interested in sharing the profit, and while Syfa wasn't sure if he was joking or not, she agreed with Fayte who simply demanded that he hand the Skull Grimoire back over to them. The thief then took that chance to flee, but Kirei was already on it. She started her song of speed, increasing the speed of everyone. Not believing that the speed increase would be that much, Syfa hopped on her staff and took off only to run right into the wall. "ACK~!!" She exclaimed falling to the ground. She shook her head and stood up, "Man that's some spell." She mumbled flying off again but this time doing better to control her direction. Unfortunately she didn't get to the thief fast enough because when she caught up the thief, along with another guy who bared a striking resemblance to the thief got away. "Damn it." She cursed slamming her fist against the wall.

[Next Day]

Syfa stood towards the back, feeling ashamed for having not been able to prevent the Skull Grimoire from being stolen. [i]'If they were to hear this back home I would be looked down on for sure. I can't believe that I let him get away. Not only that but what if it gets out that it was the Sol Guild who failed at this mission. Given we were unprepared for the thief to be a starbound, it doesn't make a difference. We were made to look like fools.' [/i]Syfa thought clenching her fist by her side. It was probably a good thing that she didn't hear Mr. Albora bad mouth the Sol Guild, because an angry witch does not make for a happy result. Instead she came too when they had already left the room, and she felt a certain angry air over the group, mainly Kirei and Fayte. She just assumed they too were angry about the events that happened last night.

Hearing Celio's failed joke lifted Syfa's spirits a it, as seen by the smile that replaced the troubled look on her face. It wasn't really funny, but knowing that they were together it would be a matter of time before they retrieved the Skull Grimoire. "So where are we going to start looking? We don't have any sort of leads." She then crossed her arms. "But where could they possibly go with a book like that? While there are many people who would buy something as valuable as that...They won't be people with good intentions." Because she wasn't paying attention moments ago, she hadn't heard Mr. Albora explain to them about the bracelets being able to tell them which direction to go.

[.:Blu:.]

[center][size=5][b]CHAPTER 3: THE DRAGON, THE SONGSTRESS, AND THE ACE[/b][/size][/center]


[spoiler=Chapter 3 Synopsis]After affirming to Albora that they would get the Skull Grimoire back from Sice and Pictor, the four Starbounds must now use the bracelets given to them by Albora to locate the thieves. On the way however, the group is separated into two teams, one to go after Sice and Pictor in a deadly game of cat and mouse while the other team must face off against a powerful opponent.[/spoiler]


After the argument with Albora, the group left the museum. Stopping outside on the sidewalk, Fayte looked to his teammates. "I think I may have overreacted in there. But I can't stand anyone who talks about our guild that way. I just can't." Fayte explained. "But," Fayte paused as he held up his wrist to look at the bracelet given to him by Albora, "we have more important things to deal with now. We're gonna take back the Skull Grimoire or else we can't call ourselves proud members of the Sol Guild." Fayte confidently stated. "Now the curator said we can activate the tracking feature of this bracelet by melding a small amount of our mana into it. Let's see if it'll work." Fayte said. Before bringing his focus onto the bracelet however, Fayte first turned his attention to Syfa who seemed lost about what Fayte had just said. "Syfa, I'm thinking you didn't get a chance to hear what Albora had said huh? Well basically, our bracelets have a tracking system that can be activated by asserting a small amount of our mana into the bracelet. After doing so, an arrow will be summoned that can lead us straight to the thieves." Fayte explained before finally bringing his focus onto his bracelet.

Concentrating, Fayte began to direct his mana into the bracelet. At first nothing happened, but after a few seconds, the bracelet began to activate. With the sufficient amount of mana poured into it, the bracelet suddenly took on an intense blue glow, showing that there was in fact mana contained within the bracelet. "I think it's working...!" Fayte murmured. Suddenly, a poof of white smoke appeared, large enough to cover Fayte's wrist, hand, and even his face when he placed his head near the glowing bracelet. Upon being covered by the sudden white smoke, Fayte quickly pulled his head up and away from it. Fortunately, no ill effects were caused by the smoke. Accidentally breathing it in didn't even cause coughing. The smoke was airy and light in fact unlike actual smoke from a fire for instance. It seems the smoke was merely for appearance and not a harmful substance. Lucky for Fayte of course as he dealt with enough smoke during late last night. The smoke soon dissipated and now the results of the activation of the bracelet can bee clearly seen. Floating just two inches above Fayte's bracelet is a small, blue glowing arrow pointing south from where Fayte was facing. "It works...!" Fayte uttered out as he held his wrist back up.

When Fayte twisted his wrist a bit, the arrow moved in the opposite direction of Fayte's wrist to indicate where they needed to go was still in the opposite direction Fayte was facing. In a sense, the arrow acted like a compass but instead of always pointing south, it always pointed in the direction of the thief that stole the grimoire; in this case, Sice. Fayte noticed the behavior of the arrow and smiled at his teammates. "Alright you guys, now that we know it works, try yours." Fayte told them. After all three of them successfully activated their bracelets' tracking systems, their mission to find the two thieves and take back the Skull Grimoire can get under way. "Right, it seems the arrow is pointing in this direction." Fayte said, turning around as the arrow moved with him. Looking up, Fayte can see the arrow pointing towards Mensa's exit. "Out of the city. Damn, I hope they haven't gotten far. Let's go." Fayte said before running walking off. The arrow sure is a handy tool. It's amazing to see how magic can be so excellently integrated into technology. It shows how far society has come since the war of Starbounds against anti-Starbound humans. But now isn't the time to be caught up in wonders, now is the time to take back the coveted Skull Grimoire and the Sol Guild's pride.

After awhile, the group had traveled quite a ways outside of Mensa City. The group had taken the city's east exit or entrance, however you preferred to call it. The east exit took the four further away from the road the led from Mensa back to Stellos. Continuing on the east road, the four Starbounds soon found themselves nearing the road's end. At the road's end, the dirt road disappears, replaced by open plains of short grassland. Large grassy and rocky mountains can be seen far off in the distance. The remnants of what used to be long extending, grey cobblestone walls lined the grassy land that all but consumed what's left of the dry dirt road. Near one the wall remnants is a tall, [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phthalocyanine_Green_G]phthalo green[/url] curving street lamp whose metal seems to have rusted away quite a bit. Needless to say the lamp is not in working condition anymore. This area used to be a part of Mensa itself a long time ago, but due to weather problems, this part of Mensa was cut off from the main city and soon it deteriorated into what it is today.

The group continued to pass on through this area. However, as Fayte, who was in front of the group, attempted to go further on the dirt road, a flash of silver headed towards him at a quick speed. Fayte's eyes opened wide as he saw the incoming object. Reacting just in time, Fayte was able to jump back just as a silver, metal whip adorned with a curved-bladed end slashed the ground that he was standing at. Landing on his feet, Fayte's eyes followed the whip as it retreated back behind a wall remnant some thirteen feet away. "What the- Who's there?!" Fayte asked, taking a defensive stance. "You know, you're quicker than you look. Guess my little brother was lucky to catch you off guard with his punch. Too bad I couldn't have that same dumb luck..." a voice emanated from behind the wall. The sound of calm, deliberate footsteps could be heard walking slowly from behind the wall. After a moment that seems to have taken forever, a [url=http://i812.photobucket.com/albums/zz46/wirespy/01.jpg]man[/url] walked out from behind the wall, a calm yet conniving smirk visibly mocking on his face.

In his hand, the man held a curved-bladed knife, the same one that was on the whip that attacked Fayte. Coming to a halt, the man slowly lifted his head up to look at the four Starbounds, his face adorned with the same mask Sice and Pictor wears. Whereas Sice has green eyes and Pictor has red eyes, this man has shimmering blue eyes, reminiscent of mana. Suddenly, the man whistled and tipped his hat towards the four. "Well howdy, name's Dorado, pleasure." the man introduced himself. "The two thieves that stole the Skull Grimoire," Dorado paused, letting the word made impact on the four Starbounds, "they're my little siblings." Dorado revealed. "So you're the third person they mentioned. Where are they?" Fayte asked Dorado. Hearing the question, Dorado smiled. "Honestly, you know that question never works right? You can't honestly expect the bad guy to just tell you the location of where his comrades are. Well, some will, but seeing as how Ma put me in charge of caring for the two rascals, I can't sell them short." Dorado explained. Without replying to Dorado, Fayte activated his magic; as usual, twelves glowing cards appeared, surrounding him.

"You guys, prepare to fight." Fayte told his teammates. Dorado simply stood there with the smirk he had from before still mockingly apparent on his face. "(Arrgh, for all I know this guy is just stalling until the other two can get away. We need to finish this battle fast.)" Fayte thought. "Now you kids listen here. Me alone is stronger than both of my siblings, do you Starbounds honestly believe you can beat me? See, I'm a pretty good guy if you think about it cause I'm offering the four of you the chance to to haul your asses home before things get ugly. However, if you refuse my proposition, then I have no chance but to incapacitate all four of you." Dorado warned.

[Kyng's Old Account]

Celio was fuming angry, his face red and hands balled into fists as they left the gates of Mensa, as he cussed under his breath due to the fact those Starbound thieves had snatched away his 10.000 Jewells to go down Dodgey Dave's with, with which he was going to make enough to get hold of a Violin. The faces were taunting him, laughing at him as they had gotten away with his ticket to advancing his musical capabilities, and he never liked to be taunted. Despite being the patient, calm, and usually happy-as-a-Larry self, sometimes he would get riled up like this, and very few things were able to calm down this sensation of absolute and furiously frustrated tension, something he was going to gladly burn if he got into a scrap.

One of the few things that easily settled this rage was simply nature, the beautiful countryside the four had the opportunity to wander through so freely, well, partially freely, they were still bound to find the Skull Grimoire, but nothing, to Celio, could ever beat a stroll under the lovely sun with a gentle scatter of beautiful white clouds of dreams and desires happily afloat in the air without a care in the world: looking up in the skies, he smiled and simply followed Fayte semi-blind, attention far to interested in the beautiful blue before him; there wasn't a moment he'd rather be in than this, right now, simply enjoying nature's beauty. Arm's spread out wide, he began to laugh and jump around in circles as he said[color=#008000] "I know we're busy 'n' stuff, but I just love the outdoors! It's so wonderful~"[/color]

[color=#008000]"It's like we're wandering in the dreams of Mother Nature herself, the sun shining so brightly overhead as it blesses us with it's radiant glory and protecting us from the evils of the night; and the green canvas of life where so many creatures live inside, the green plain canvas untouched and, yet, at the same time it is a masterpiece in it's own right; and the firm dirty roads, paths of dry dirt simply there to guide us through the world, our map to the rest of our wonderful land we live in, a safety signal which calls out "Come, follow, I shall take you home" to the lost souls. Nature, she has blessed us so sweetly, we always take her for granted. We should just take a step back and marvel at what she has given us, from the great mountains and dense forests to the single drops of fresh water in the rivers, and the simple blades of grass which we trod upon every day."[/color]

Suddenly, Fayte and the Starbounds were encountered by one who named himself Dorado, the elder of the two crooks: seemed to have quite a mouth on him, and an air of arrogance too, Celio himself wasn't sure, though, whether to pin it as overconfidence in nonexistent abilities, or simply bragging what he had to offer. Whatever the case, Fayte asked the others if they were ready to fight, and Celio nodded saying[color=#008000] "I shall always follow you 'til the ends of the earth we trod upon; you have my sword by your side...and break! How was that for a Loyal Squire impression?" [/color]before letting out a confident laughter, drawing his sword and holding it overhead, it's length horizontally as the tip pointed towards this Dorado fella, both hands firmly upon the hilt as he readied his battle stance, calling out[color=#008000] "You'd best not oversell yourself, you don't even know who we are, or what we can do yet; how's about leaving the victory claims 'til when it's in your grasp?"[/color] with a confident grin.

Looking towards Fayte uneasily, he thought to himself[color=#008000] 'Release Greygnarl? I mean, sure, he won't help us out voluntarily, but if we play our cards right, like back in Stellos, we could get this guy to smack Greygnarl dead on, which'd pee him right off...it's tempting, it's really tempting...I'm gonna do it.'[/color] A flash of confidence radiated through him, and with the grin, Celio rammed his blade into the earth, eyes flashing into lizard slits before receding as fast as they had came about, thrusting a hand into the air as he declared aloud[color=#008000] "Spirit Dragon, come to me; Master of the Heavens, come forth, son of Styrmling, Greygnarl: Hero of the Skies, Embodiment of Light!" [/color]which caused his sword to begin to shine brilliantly, a white aura then shooting upwards to the skies as a terrifying roar overhead could be heard; and, from the cracks in the clouds, came forth the beastly Dragon Greygnarl.

Flying down in a spiral, his serpentine body landed behind Celio, which then followed by, of course, Greygnarl folding his arms and resting his head upon them, a sweat drop on Celio as he tapped Greygnarl thrice saying[color=#008000] "Erm, Greygnarl, this is supposed to be really tough 'n' stuff, care to help me out? I mean, you could proba-"[/color] [acronym=If you ever think for a wee second I'd help you out, you've got another thing coming to you.]"If ye evah think for a wee second I'd 'elp ya oot, ya've got anothah thin' comin' to yah."[/acronym] which, the response he expected, caused Celio to fall to the ground in a crash, collecting himself and brushing off his shirt as he rolled his eyes, taking his previous stance saying [color=#008000]"Well, watch me then."[/color] to his Dragon, to which Greygnarl, taking his head out of his arms, let out a yawn as he said [acronym=Agh, fine, I'll watch you all bore me half to death; just make it quick, will you?]"Agh, fine, I'll watch ye all bore meh 'alf to death; just maeke it quick, will ye?"[/acronym]

[Elƒie]

Kirei simply rolled her eyes at Greygnarl. There he went, being rude again. But there were more important matters to attend to right now. Like the man blocking their path before them. She respected him enough purely because of the fact that he was watching over his little brothers, but he could have at least tried to get them to go down a different path. But with how he looked, he was probably long down that path before his brothers were. If that's the case, then why didn't he stop them? Some big brother he was. These were all sorts of thoughts that went through Kirei's head as she looked to the older brother of the thieving trio. Looking to Fayte, then Syfa and finally Celio. Pulling them towards her, she whispered, [color=#008080]"Fayte, Sayfa, go after the twins. I'm sure me and Celio can handle this guy just fine. If not, we'll just occupy him long enough so you two can get ahead quiet a bit and then we'll get him to chase us away from you two before finally shaking him off. Sound like a plan? Dun care if you agree with me or not cause I'ma start occupying him right now. Make sure he doesn't see you snake by, alright?"[/color] With that, she pulled out her baton and looked to Celio, [color=#008080]"Join in the fun when ya can, a'ight?"[/color]

Turning from the group, she looked to Dorado with a smile as she took a few steps towards him, still holding her baton. [color=#008080]"I can respect a man for wanting to protecting his family.. After all, I know what it's like to be abandoned by family.. But tell me.. Are you sure you're protecting them in the right way?"[/color] She continued to smile at Dorado, despite him looking at her like she was nuts, either because of the music baton she held or because she was questioning his way. Taking up the opportunity of him being distracted, Kirei's song of speed suddenly started up as her baton turned into a two and a half foot long [url="http://browse.deviantart.com/?q=blue%20sword&order=9&offset=24#/d2rya82"]gladius[/url].

With the her sword, hands and feet glowing a slight orange, Kirei charged at the man with a horizontal sweep of her gladius. Jumping back just enough to evade her weapon, Dorado returned her attack with an upward diagonal slash of with his switch blade. Using her momentum on her attack, she twirled around on the ball of her left foot in a 360 as she brought her sword upwards as well, deflecting his attack. Sliding her right foot down and causing her to suddenly stop, she gripped the hilt with both her hands as she thrust forward, aiming for a nonlethal spot on his torso.

Swinging his hand down as hard as he could, his switch blade rammed against her gladius, causing her gladius to barely miss him as he turned his body so his side was facing her. Taking up the opening, he swung his switch knife towards her, aiming to cut her face. Quickly squatting down, Kirei barely avoided the knife as it cut a few strands of her blonde bangs. Quickly standing back up as she swung her gladius upwards, Dorado stepped back, barely avoiding her sword as well.

As Kirei began to swing her sword back down onto him, Dorado jumped back as she threw his knife upward, transforming it into a whip once more. Wrapping around her gladius, Dorado yanking the whip upwards, ripping the gladius out of Kirei's hands and sending it flying behind her. Looking up and behind her for a moment, watching her gladius transform back into her baton, Kirei looked back at Dorado just in time to watch him send the whip at her, aiming to cut her in her torso area. Jumping up and backwards, she barely avoided the whip as she began to do about 2-3 back flips before landing low to the ground, her song of speed being stopped after barely being 40% percent done with it. Holding out her right hand, she caught her baton and it began to transform back into her gladius.

Not before Dorado had the whip wrap around her right wrist, that is. Yanking it hard, he began to pull Kirei closer to her. Despite her feet digging into the ground, he was still slowly dragging her towards him. Changing tactics, Kirei began to sing her [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46EvxqggPk4"]song of strength[/url], her body and sword beginning to glow a faint red. Grabbing onto the whip with both hands, Kirei began to pull as well, landing to two into a possibly deadly game of tug-of-war. [color=#008080]"Celio, jumping in now would be nice!"[/color]

[Hotaru987]

"Oh..." Was all Syfa said in response to Fayte explaining that the bracelets would be able to tell them which way the two thieves went. After all of them had activated their own bracelet's tracking device they all headed towards the direction the arrow pointed them in, which was toward Mensa's exit. After a while of walking the path began to fade away as it was replaced by a a simple large grassy field. Even after all of their walking they didn't seem to be getting any where close to the thieves. "Just how far did they get too?" She mumbled right before Fayte suddenly jumped back from a silver hook that almost sliced him in half. The hook seemed to be attached to a chain and was pulled back to the owner who then revealed himself. The guy introduced himself as Dorado, the oldest of the three brothers. "Wait so there were three of them? Great." Syfa groaned. Not only that but she got the feeling that he wasn't boasting when he said that he was stronger than his younger brothers.

Now what were they supposed to do. They didn't have time to mess around with this guy while the other two were getting further and further away. Unfortunately, Dorado didn't seem like he was going to let them pass any time soon. Taking the initiative Celio summoned his dragon Greygnarl, but the dragon was still hellbent on not helping Celio out with his battles. Syfa figured that she should also join in but Kirei told her and Fayte that they should go on ahead and leave Dorado to them. "What!?" Syfa exclaimed, "Are you sure about that?" Her question was answered when Kirei when in head first into battle with Dorado, holding her own for a while until they were locked in a battle of tug-o-war. Syfa really didn't want to leave them but they also couldn't stand to waste too much time. Suddenly Syfa smiled, "Well you guys are part of the Sol Guild so I guess the need for worry is unnecessary."

In her right hand, her staff appeared and she hopped on it. She then looked at Fayte and grinned, "Well lets get going. Since it's just us two I can get us to where we need to go much faster. So how about it?" She held out her hand waiting for Fayte to join her on the staff.

[.:Blu:.]

Before the battle began, Celio took the opportunity to summon Greygnarl. Though Celio knew that Greygnarl wouldn't help with the battle voluntarily, if Dorado accidentally attacked the dragon, Greygnarl would make sure Dorado couldn't move ever again. Dorado looked up at the huge dragon as he was summoned forth, his hand held above his eyes to block the sun and he gave a long, continuous whistle as he saw the dragon in all of its unmotivated glory. "Damn, now that is one huge son of a-" Before Dorado could finish his sentence, Greygnarl began to address Celio right after he'd asked Greygnarl to help out with the battle. Dorado was quite surprise that the dragon had no intentions on helping the young Starbound. While Dorado continued to watch Celio and Greygnarl interacted, Kirei took the opportunity to speak to Fayte and Syfa privately. Kirei suggested that she and Celio would be able to take care of Dorado while Fayte and Syfa went after the twin thieves. And though Kirei was firm that she wanted to go through with this plan, Fayte still didn't felt right about just leaving them.

"But-" Fayte began but then stopped as Kirei went into battle with Dorado. As Dorado continued to watch Celio and Greygnarl, he suddenly noticed Kirei charging at him with her gladius. With a quick reaction speed, Dorado managed to jump back in time to avoid Kirei's horizontal sweep. "Whoa, little lady, no need to be so eager." Dorado teased before returning the attack. Kirei and Dorado continued to clash for awhile, allowing Fayte and Syfa the chance to sneak by and go after Sice and Pictor. With just the two of them now, Syfa was able to use an ability that Fayte had only heard of but never seen in really life before: flying on a witch's staff. Once Syfa had hopped on, she held her hand out to Fayte and told him to get on. Fayte was hesitant even though he had flew before with Marlon's flying magic. "That staff sure is thin, but I trust you Syfa. Let's go." Fayte then grabbed Syfa's hand and got onto the staff. Fayte gripped tightly onto the staff in order to prevent himself from falling off. Once he was ready, Fayte looked to Syfa. "Alright Syfa, I'm ready." Fayte told her.

With that, Fayte and Syfa took off into the sky at a fairly fast speed, blowing a small dust cloud into the air as they flew up. "W-Whoa!" Fayte exclaimed as he was taken back by the initial takeoff. Down below, Dorado, with his whip wrapped around Kirei's wrist and pulling her towards him, looked to the sky to see Fayte and Syfa. "What the hell-" Right after Dorado's surprised reaction, he noticed a strong tug on his whip. Dorado quickly looked back to see Kirei and her gladius glowing in a faint red color. Kirei was utilizing her Song of Strength. "Arrgh, it became harder all of a sudden to pull her. There's no way her light frame can be this heavy... She must've used her magic...!" Dorado told himself. "There's no way I can pull her towards me now. I'll just have to go with a different strategy." Dorado said before puling his whip back and the whip transformed back into his knife.

"Damn, very sneaky of you. You distracted me so those two can go after my brothers." Dorado directed it towards Kirei. Giving a sigh, Dorado glanced at Celio then back to Kirei. "It's fine, my brothers can handle those two on their own. However, it was a big mistake on you guy's parts to not let them stay here and help you. This battle'll be over before you know it." Dorado proclaimed, albeit his voice was calm and a bit frustrated rather than his initial cocky attitude. Folding his knife into it's storage form, Dorado began to threw his knife up and down. A grin soon formed on his face. "I hope you know you're dealing with a Starbound right? But I doubt that you haven't figured it out already. What you haven't figured out though is just what kind of magic do I use. Well, it's a very special and rare magic." Dorado ended his last sentence and caught his knife, this time not tossing it up again. Dorado proceeded to unfold the blade of his knife then held his knife up. With his right hand, Dorado grabbed the knife's other handle. Suddenly, the knife began to glow in an intense yellow color and without speaking, Dorado used his right hand to pull the knife in that respective direction.

As the knife was pulled towards the right, a second knife separated from the first knife held in Dorado's left hand. The second knife in Dorado's right was pulled in the right direction in an arc. As that happened, four exact knives appeared floating in midair just as the second knife passed a point in the air. Finally, Dorado's hand came to a halt. Now, there were six exact knives in total, one held in each hand, and four floating in midair. "This is my magic: Replication Magic...!" Dorado proclaimed. "And if you think this is all I can do, watch this next part." Dorado said before crossing the blades of the knives he held in his hands to form an x-shape. The two blades glowed even more intensely before Dorado slashed them to his sides at an angle. During the process, the blades of the knives extended, creating two knife swords. "Hehe, now you maybe thinking that I merely extended the blades of my knives, but actually I used my magic to replicate the middle section of each blade and placed them on top of one another creating the end results you see here." Dorado explained.

"Now, without further ado, let's end this!" Dorado exclaimed before pointing his left knife sword at Celio, sending two of the four floating knives flying towards him. Dorado then sent the last pair of floating knives towards Kirei. Not done yet, Dorado then extended the blades of his knife swords even farther. He then swung his right sword at Kirei and his left at Celio, creating the appearance of a pair of scissors closing in to cut something, but in this case, there are two targets, one for each sword. Both Celio and Kirei would have to deal with two knives flying towards them and Dorado's individual sword attacks.

-Meanwhile-

After awhile of flying, Fayte was able to get used to the staff's speed. Looking down, Fayte was in awe of how high they were up in the sky. Fayte looked at the grasslands below with wide eyes. The animals that roam below and the living plants that scurry about all took Fayte's attention off of the real purpose: to watch out for the two thieves. "Wow, the view is amazing from up here." Fayte said, dazzled by the natural beauty. If it were Celio who was riding on the staff, he would've been entrenched in the beauty of the land for who knows how long. Luckily, Fayte remembered the real reason for why he was up here in the sky. Fayte looked up as the cool breeze blew through each individual strand of his blonde hair, pushing them back. Fayte then looked down at the strip of land ahead that would soon be consumed by nothing but forest. Fayte looked to his wrist to see the arrow still pointing forward, showing that they were going in the right direction. "Syfa, keep heading the same way." Fayte issued. Fayte and Syfa had now arrived at the forest, flying high above it.

Suddenly, the mana arrow above Fayte's bracelet turned bright red in color and flickered between blue and red. "What the- Syfa, something's going on with the arrow." Fayte told her, holding his wrist up to chest-height. Just then, an earthy pillar of rock and soil shot up from the forest and headed high into the sky, stopping just twenty feet or so in front of Syfa. Fayte then noticed the sudden appearance of the pillar. "Syfa!" Fayte called out. It would take a lot of skill to dodge the pillar seeing as how it was so close to them. But that wasn't Fayte's and Syfa's only trouble, now they had the sudden appearance of Sice to deal with. Using his unknown speed magic, Sice quickly dashed up along the massively tall earth pillar, a calm and mocking grin of his face. It didn't take long for Sice to arrive at the top of the pillar, and once he did, Sice crouched down and leaped from the pillar, all in one amazing, fluid movement. In the air, Sice performed a quick somersault that resulted in a position where he has his left leg extended. It was clear what Sice had in mine. Sice aimed to use an axe kick to break Syfa's staff straight in half.

[Hotaru987]

The moment Fayte told her that he was ready, she wasted no time and quickly took off laughing to herself when Fayte shouted in surprise. The added weight was nothing, and before long they were long gone from the battle field. She heard Fayte comment on the view and Syfa grinned, "It's nice isn't it. Sometime I just fly around when I need to think or just to get away." She said as she kept them heading towards the arrow's direction at a steady pace. Looking at his bracelet, Fayte told Syfa to continue in the same direction, which eventually had them traveling high over a forest. Suddenly Fayte said that the arrow was acting weird so she slowed down so that she could change direction if needed. She looked back at Fayte and saw that the arrow was flickering from red to blue. "What does that mean?"

Fayte then yelled her name, but he was looking at something behind her. She quickly turned her head to see where she was going and saw a huge pillar of earth right in front of her. Her eyes widened, before narrowing in determination. "Hold on!" She grabbed grabbed the end of her staff and pulled back hard so that the staff was parallel to the earth pillar, and just in time as her feet her only inches from the pillar. As they passed the top, Syfa did a loop with her staff so that they were back right side up. She didn't have time to admire her quick thinking because Sice had just leaped from the top of the pillar himself, flipped in the air and was coming down fast with an ax kick intending to break her staff in two. She pushed Fayte away from her and jumped away as well allowing her staff to vanish seconds before being broken. That left both her and Fayte free falling through the air.

However, now that her staff was safe from harm, she called it again and quickly went over to Fayte and grabbed his hand and flying him over to the earth pillar formed not too long ago. She put him on solid ground then hovered next to him. "That was a close one. You're not hurt are you?"

[Kyng's Old Account]

Needless to say, Celio was mesmerized by the intense battle between Kirei and Dorado, the confrontation between the two intensely heated as Fayte and Syfa had fled the battlefield in order to keep up with the other thieves, Dorado's brothers, but what unsettled Celio...no, wait, I've got plenty to post before then! Anyways, Greygnarl, as instructed by Celio, also watched the fight take place, the dragon...not impressed, in the slightest, at all. Celio, looking back to his beastly being, smiled as he said[color=#008000] "Ain't she tough, Greygnarl? Kirei's magic is so unique, it flabbergasts me!"[/color] with a smile, his eyes wide with excitement from simply being able to watch them fight with such force; Greygnarl somewhat stole his vibe as he said [acronym=Amateurs, both of them]"Amateurs, both of 'em."[/acronym] with his typical rough accent, a simple sigh of boredom as Celio rolled his eyes.

[color=#008000]"Well, I think they're amazin-"[/color] [i][color=#696969]"Celio, jumping in now would be nice!"[/color][/i] Kirei called out to Celio with obvious and evident anger in her voice, the fight obviously getting to her nerves as this seemingly oh so talented fighter made us of such graceful and easy dodges, to which Celio jumped a little from surprise, jogging onto the battle field as he said[color=#008000] "Oh, geez, sorry 'bout that Kirei: Alright, let's bust this guy's chops!"[/color] with confidence radiating in his voice, Greygnarl yawning as he roared out [acronym= "Say, when your done arsing about, how's about giving me something interesting to watch!"]"Say, when yer done arsin' aboot, how's aboot givin' meh somethin' interestin' to watch!"[/acronym] to the three luchadors out on the field. Evidently, the battle was going to become intense, and Celio himself figured that all the skills Dorado had shown already weren't the smallest of his trinkets of wonderful prowess.

And boy-o-boy, did he think right: Dorado's confidence boasted again as he then unleashed his powers, his knives glowing yellow before beginning a rather pretty display of lights, slashing his knives around as they then spawned more knives, four more floating in mid-air. Celio marveled with a big smile at the sight, Replication Magic looked awesome, but Dorado wasn't finished: crossing his knives' tips, before slashing them outwards again, they had extended, although it wasn't as simple as mere extension: Dorado explained[i] "Hehe, now you maybe thinking that I merely extended the blades of my knives, but actually I used my magic to replicate the middle section of each blade and placed them on top of one another creating the end results you see here." [/i]to which Celio rolled his eyes as he said[color=#008000] "But wouldn't blade extension be easier?"[/color] as he scratched the back of his head, surprisingly calm and lax when he was being faced with four floating knives and two knife swords.

Suddenly, the knives had made their move towards him, Celio's eyes flashing reptile slits as he spotted them before a simple swift side-step evaded the attack, the rather nifty reflex having flung the knives to what he wished, Greygnarl's direction. Unfortunately for Celio, Greygnarl was watching, and because of that, as the knives flew in his direction, Greygnarl swatted them away with an arm, sending them miles into the air as he said [acronym= Oi! Watch it you twat!]"Oi! Watchit you twat![color=#0000ff][sup]1[/sup][/color]"[/acronym] to Dorado, obvious piss-offishness coming from the dragon's intense, as usual, voice[color=#008000]. 'Nuts, looks like Greygnarl isn't going to be my secret weapon this time.'[/color] Celio noted, some of that confidence being shot right out of him, before all of a sudden an enormous blade had made it's way to slice...crush...umm...

Whatever the case, he had to dodge it fast, and so using his previous momentum, and the adrenaline coursing inside his blood, he side-stepped a second time, watching the sword behind him indulge itself upon the earth as it tore into it like a knife through butter...see what I did there? Anyways, Celio had now gotten his opportunity: praying to Styrmling for Kirei's sake and luck, he held his sword like a rifle, the hilt and sheath still held as a sword, but along the blade was supported by his hand. Reason being? Simple: looking down the blade, he fired thrice, shooting three lightning bolts into Dorado's direction, but he wasn't finished just there. Holding on a little longer, he then fired a Holy Flame blast towards him from the tip of the sword, this flame being a Divine Paralysis, it's intention to paralyze Dorado.

After that, and in the case of a retaliation evading it to ease posting's sake, Celio then held the sword in one hand, his open palm generating and throwing a blast of Holy Fire, which then followed by Celio's sword glowing green brightly as the Holy Fire, the great white flames, gained a green aura, as well as taking the form of an Eastern Dragon, the head making it's charge for Dorado ready to pummel it's entire length upon him. Celio's eyes widened as he took his sword in both hands again, running towards Dorado for some one-on-one, right in your face melee combat, leaping into the air, first throwing a few Razor Winds hopefully to knock off any blocks, he came down towards him with a sword, it's edges sharp and burning with Holy Fire.[hr][color=#0000FF][sup]1[/sup][/color]twat/twät - Noun: A person regarded as stupid or obnoxious.

[Elƒie]

Kirei was impressed with Dorado's magic, but now wasn't a time to marvel. Instead, it was a time to fight as she swung her gladius upwards, deflecting the two knives. Then, she leaped back a few times, barely avoiding the knife sword. It took everything she had to keep herself from stopping her song of strength to let out a sigh of relief. After recovering from that near hit moment, she was about to jump back into the fray when she spotted Celio launch a barrage of magic attacks at Dorado. Then, as good measure, he went in for a strike with his sword. Taking up the opportunity, Kirei made it to where her strength spell worked on Celio as well, his body glowing a faint red as he started to bring his sword down upon Dorado. Running into the fray at last, Kirei slashed her gladius at Dorado from the opposite side of Celio, making it hard for Dorado to attempt a dodge. And if Dorado managed to do a dodge, Kirei was 'on her toes' to speak, ready to dodge Celio so she wouldn't get hit with his attack instead of Dorado.

[.:Blu:.]

The two knives that Dorado had launched towards Celio missed his intended targets as Celio expertly avoided both of them. Now the knives were instead heading towards Greygnarl. "Damn..." Dorado cursed under his breath as he had forgotten that Greygnarl was just a ways behind Celio. Dorado was even a bit unnerved as he had no idea the reaction from Greygnarl if the knives were to make impact. In a half fortunate, half unfortunate result, Greygnarl easily stopped the incoming knives with a simple swipe from his massive arm. Annoyed, the dragon roared back a warning directed at Dorado to which Dorado responded with no signs of wavering. In reality however, Dorado was relieved the massive beast had not entered the battle as an opponent. Two Starbounds were enough, but if Greygnarl had entered, things would've taken a very bad turn for Dorado. And while he may not show his concern on his poker face, Dorado does realize that the situation would be quite grave for him.

Back to the battle at hand, after Celio had evaded Dorado's first attempt of defeating him, Celio now had to dealt with Dorado's lengthy knife sword. As with before, Celio's amazing acrobatic agility allowed for the young Starbound to side-step Dorado's second attack. With Celio evading the attack completely as well, Dorado's knife sword dug its blade into the ground with ease. The display of power on Dorado's part was quite evident as the blade sliced cleanly through the ground with the force of a butcher's cleaver but with the fluidity of a gentle stream. It was truly poetry in motion. But enjoying such arts on a battlefield can prove deadly and so Dorado quickly acted and removed his sword from the ground it had sliced into. "Man, is that kid one annoying thing to hit..." Dorado uttered, referring to Celio.

On Kirei's side of things, she easily handled the two incoming knives by deflecting them into the air with her gladius in an upward slash. Following that, Kirei leaped back a couple of times and was able to barely avoid what would've been a nasty wound, if not a fatal one. Just right after, Kirei's Song of Strength came to a halt. Meanwhile, Celio began his counterattack. Holding his sword as if it were a rifle, Celio shot three lightning bolts towards Dorado which he would then followed up by blasting a Holy Flame, in this case, Divine Paralysis. "(Crap!)" Dorado thought in his mind as he saw the incoming lightning bolts. They were his major concern as the bolts traveled even faster than the Divine Paralysis. In a fortunate turn for Celio and Kirei, the hastily-reacting thief slashed his left knife sword up towards the lightning bolts. And as common knowledge commands, metal is a good conductor of lightning. So once Dorado's sword has cut the bolts in half, the lightning instantly transferred to the sword and electrocuting the wielder at the end. Dorado, being the sword's wielder, was now bombarded by a powerful electric charge.

"Ugh!" Dorado grunted as he received the nerve-overloading damage. But that wasn't all for Dorado's troubles, now the Divine Paralysis made impact with his torso, exploding in a fiery fury, and effectively called upon its effect of paralyzing him. However, Celio wasn't done yet with his assault. Now that Dorado was paralyzed, Celio took the opportunity to fire off another Holy Flame which he then transformed into an amazing attack called Dragon Blast which had transformed the Holy Flame into the shape of a green, eastern dragon. Things now looked extremely grim for Dorado. Suddenly however, the chain connected to Dorado's belt began to glow in the same bright, yellow color as with every time Dorado activates his magic. The chain lifted up from Dorado's leg and began twisting in on itself. Then, the chain replicated with amazing speed until it had formed itself into a massively-sized and lengthy chain-wrapped pillar that extended in the direction of the incoming Dragon Blast. As the pillar finished forming, Celio's Dragon Blast made impact, causing a powerful explosion that devastated the chain pillar.

The chain pillar was able to prevent the would-be, battle-ending attack. However, not letting up, Celio continued on with his assault. Changing tactics, Celio decided to get in close for an attack with his sword. But not before unleashing a few Razor Winds that was enough to destroy what was left of Dorado's chain pillar. Seeing Celio going in for a close-range attack, Kirei used her Song of Strength once more, this time affecting both her and Celio. With the extra strength boost from Kirei, Celio could feel his power surged. Alongside Kirei attacking with her gladius, Celio attacked Dorado with a Holy Fire Slash.

"I DON'T THINK SO!!!" Dorado suddenly shouted out. Then, the still-intact chain on Dorado's belt began to glow once again before replicating and wrapping itself around Dorado, creating a chain cocoon. Dorado was able to create the cocoon just in time as both Celio's and Kirei's attack hit. Both attacks were successful in destroying a layer of Dorado's cocoon. Unfortunately, the cocoon consisted of several chain-wrapped layers and so both attacks were unable to penetrate through. Now there was a big problem for both Celio and Kirei. Their weapons were now stuck, embedded deeply into the thickly-woven chain cocoon. After a brief moment, the cocoon began to rumble fiercely. Suddenly the chains of the cocoon lashed out furiously; the sudden outburst causing Celio and Kirei to flew back with their weapons in hand. Some of the lashing chains were even able to whip the two Starbounds as they flew back. Dorado, in a furious state, grabbed his two knife swords and retracted their blades in order to make them regular knives again. Next, Dorado extended the chains of both knives and swung them towards Celio and Kirei who were still in midair.

"I'm getting sick of you two!" Dorado exclaimed, showing his anger at the notion of being overpowered awhile ago by the two Starbounds. Both whips were able to wrap themselves on the ankles of their respective targets. Now Dorado had both of them entangled by his whips. Not letting time for Celio or Kirei to respond, Dorado, in an amazing display of strength, twirled the two of them around by his whips, causing dizziness amongst other things. After awhile, Dorado decided to end things off by slamming the two towards the ground. Afterwards, he would release his whips' grip on the two and then go in for an ending attack, or at least that is what he has planned.

-Meanwhile-

Responding quickly, Syfa turned around and pulled hard on her staff, directing it to move parallel to the pillar. Fayte held on tight, a comically scared expression on his face. After reaching the top above the earthy pillar, Syfa performed a loop with her staff to return it into its normal flying position once more. The evasion was quite close as they were only inches from the top of the pillar once the loop had completed. However, they weren't out of the woods yet. They still had Sice coming down on them with his axe kick. In a daring decision, Syfa quickly pushed Fayte off of her staff and then jumping from it as well. Though daring and dangerous, it was quite a clever move on Syfa's part as her staff quickly disappeared. Just a second later, Sice passed the location of Syfa's staff with his axe kick but failing to hit anything. "Heh, smart move." Sice said before moving in a blur back to the pillar. Even without anything tangible to support his feet, Sice's magic was able to shift him to the pillar which he then grabbed at hold on to, digging his fingers into the soft soil surface instead of the parts consisting of rocks.

Meanwhile, Fayte and Syfa fell through the air. "Whoooa!" Fayte shouted as he continued to descend at high speed. Syfa quickly summoned her staff, flew over, and grabbed a hold of Fayte's hand; taking both of them to the top of the pillar and setting Fayte down. Syfa then asked of Fayte's condition was hovering over him. "P-Please don't ever do that again..." Fayte said with a ruffled and unnerved appearance. However, there wouldn't be any time to rest as Sice suddenly leaped up from behind Syfa. Fayte's eyes suddenly widened as he saw Sice. From his body form, it seems Sice would twirl in midair and aim for another axe kick, this time aiming exclusively for Syfa. Fayte wouldn't allow that to happen. Reacting quickly, Fayte pushed Syfa's broom aside and activated his magic. Then, Fayte quickly drew one card and launched it towards Sice at a straight, angled path. "Card Art: Quicksilver!" Fayte called out. Though fast, even Sice couldn't react in time while in midair to Fayte's attack as it made impact and exploded in a silvery burst. "Ugh!" Sice grunted from the received impact. The blast was powerful enough to knock Sice back while in midair.

Right at that moment, another earth pillar shot up into the sky a few meters from the pillar Fayte and Syfa were at. The new pillar caught Sice, preventing him from plummeting to his death. The same couldn't be said for Fayte however as the pillar beneath him then retracted towards the ground causing him to plummet down with it. Sice quickly stood up and wiped the dirt from his face as he watched Fayte plummet. Safe to say, Syfa wouldn't allow Fayte to die and so Sice used this as the perfect opportunity to meet back with his twin on the ground. Using his magic, Sice quick dashed down from the pillar towards the open plains below. On the ground, Pictor awaited for Sice so the two can retreat back into the forest that lie only fifty or so feet away.

[Hotaru987]

Syfa giggled slightly unaware of Sice launching his next attack. "Sorry, I'll be a bit gentler next ti-Woah!" She exclaimed when Fayte pushed her and her staff away. The reason for it was soon found out, when she saw Fayte attacking Sice with his "Quicksilver Card Art". She breathed out in relief when she was saved. "Thanks you saved me-Fayte?" She looked around confused wondering where he went. She then heard his screaming below her; the pillar below him having dropped back to the ground in favor for a different one to rise in order to catch Sice.

"Gah!! Fayte!" Syfa exclaimed having a mild panic attack before shooting after him. She covered the distance between them in no time and easily caught him on her staff so he was sitting beside her once again. She then looked at Sice who was running down the side of the pillar to meet up with another guy who was waiting at the bottom. "There's no way I'm letting you get away." She maneuvered on her staff so she was standing on it, and her spellbook appeared right beside her. "[i]Pluto opitulante invoco auxilium mortuis viventes putredine mea. Arescet et putrescet" [/i]During the beginning of the spell nothing seemed to be happening, which made it seem like it was a dud spell. However midway through her incantation a black, dark and thick mist leaked out from the pages of the book and fell over the sides only to vanish as though it were smoke. The staff wobbled slightly as if it was about to give, probably startling Fayte, but Syfa quickly steadied her staff.

"[i]Arescet et putrescet: [/i][i]Cerberus." [/i]Suddenly three transparent, dog-like heads appeared around Syfa and Fayte positioning themselves as tough they were the tips of a triangle. Now whether the Sice was still running down the pillar or had made it to his brother, either way she aimed the three charging attacks at Sice.

[Elƒie]

[color=#008080]"Uhm.."[/color] was all Kirei could think to say as she looked at how her and Celio's swords were stuck in cocoon made of chains. Then a sweat drop appeared on her forehead as started tremble. [color=#008080]"Awwww craaaaAAAAAAAH"[/color] was all she could get out before the chains sent them flying and lashed at them as they were in mid-air. Bracing herself, Kirei waited for the impact to the ground. Instead, she felt like she was sent twirling before finally landing, well slamming, face down into the ground, knocking the wind out of her and making it painful if she took too deep of a breath. Rolling onto her back, she held her rib cage as the whips released their grip on her and Celio's ankle. Sitting up a little, she watched as Dorado began to launch an attack at them.

With her still being dizzy and it painful to breath at times, she had to act quick so Celio could have some time to recover himself and occupy Dorado long enough until the pain was low enough to fight through and sing out a summon. Sitting on her knees, she fought through the pain as she took a deep breath before letting out a high note [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ5jXn0o8qM"](2:31-2:36)[/url], using her magic to manipulate her voice to where it was enhanced in volume and concentrated it towards Dorado as a blast-like wave of air was sent flying towards him, trying lessen the ear wrenching effect it would have for Celio and Greygnarl at the same time. A note sang that high and fairly loudly would cause anyone to stop in their tracks to cover their ears. Hopefully, this was true for what would happen to Dorado, creating an opening for Celio. After a few moments, Kirei ran out of breath and plopped down on the ground. Her singing at that high and trying to stretch out her breath as long as she could caused her dizziness to almost getting worse as she now got light headed. At least the pain in the whole front of her body, mostly her ribs, was starting to go away.

[Kyng's Old Account]

Celio's confidence began to peak as he witnessed good fortune upon his behalf. Dorado's seemingly unshakable cool attitude seemed to begin rattle like a snake, as Celio's lightning had managed to make direct contact to his swords, and due to physics and conductivity, the lightning shocked Dorado dead on; it seemed the blade duplication had not made any improvement defensively, certainly offensively, after seeing what Dorado's blade had almost done to Kirei, but not defensively. Although, he could argue the best defense is a good offense; if that were the case, Celio's defense was coming on very strongly, with plenty of energy and support from Kirei's own song of strength.

Divine Paralysis also had connected, which would have been Celio's set up to the final blow, however Dorado's chain had another thing to say about that, having taken the form of a dense pillar as it deflected the flaming dragonic Holy Fire, shielding Dorado from the blazing rage. Additionally, it still held the Razor Winds off quite potently before ultimately caving in, the concentrated wind blades evidently having finally broken through the rigid defenses Dorado held up with ease against Celio's offense, however Celio's finale, his Holy Fire Slash, imbued with both the momentum of falling freely down towards Dorado, gravity's influence gladly picking up speed, as well as Kirei's additional boost with her Song of Strength, despite being ready to cut Dorado to pieces, was unfortunately unsatisfied with the result it received.

A shout from Dorado, and he formed a Cocoon of his Chain around him, which had trapped Kirei and Celio's weapons in it's dense and thick layers. A gulp fell down Celio's throat, because as the cocoon began to quake, it then had thrown him, and Kirei, weapons in hand, into mid-air, as well as having thrashed and lashed them both whilst they soared, Celio gritting his teeth as he groaned in the agony of the chains striking into his flesh, tearing fine lines in his grey tunic as well as the white shirt beneath, even cutting his skin, the dermis and epidermis shattering with the chains running across him, bleeding out slightly as a result. What made matters worse was when Dorado ensnared their ankles in his chains and, swinging them round before being slammed straight into the earth, Celio being smashed into the ground, his spine taking most of the blow.

Kirei used her initiative and let off an enormously high pitched sonic blast, having hit a severely high note hopefully rendering Dorado briefly incapable and open to offense, which then followed by her falling down, a lightheaded exhaustion having overwhelmed her. Celio himself, dragged up from the dirt his face, gazing at the assumably disorientated Dorado, before taking a groggy stance, slightly uncoordinated from the dizziness; taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and began an advanced meditation, very briefly, enough to charge sufficient energy as he balled a fist, green energy flashing around it, as he then punched it towards Dorado: Celio had launched the rest of his mana into his Dragon Fist attack, a dragon, similar to before, made of pure Draconian Energy, the very energy Greygnarl used, fired in a concentrated stream towards Dorado, ready to go for the kill.

It was all of a sudden when the dragon receded into a simple energy stream, and that very stream shrinking into nothingness, when Celio realized he had already burnt up too much energy, his technique not strong enough to cover the distance at full force yet; as a result, he fell to his knees and panted, gasping for breath, eyes fixed upon the ground before him, which then followed by him taking hold of his flute, then sitting down upon his knees, as he pressed his lips to it, as he played a [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbTAAekGpwM"]melodic tune[/url], which, as a result, had caused something Celio had a feeling would work, but Greygnarl, the rowdy dragon, knew nothing of.

This song was amongst the many which shared Dragon Soul and their master, and making this connection, Greygnarl himself, of course disguising it in his typical harsh nature, roared aloud as he called out to Dorado [acronym=Alrigh', I'm bored now! You, me, let's do this, now!]"Alrigh', I'm bored now! You, me, let's do this, now!"[/acronym] with a sadistic and arrogant grin upon his face, revealed his ferocious and unreasonably sharp fangs, steam seemingly erupting from his nose as Greygnarl shifted from a curled up, lax position, into one simple as he extended his tail, elevating his extremely high into the air, as he roared into the clouds above, simply an act of pride; once again curling his length, returning to a reasonable height, he chuckled as he said [acronym=Your duplication magic isn't nowhere near my brute strength, maggot; you were confident before, care to put her to the test?]"Yer duplication magic innae nowhere near mah broot strength, maggot; you were confident before, care ta put 'er to the test?"[/acronym]

Greygnarl then picked up Celio and Kirei in his hands, placing them behind him, as he made some room as well as having taken them out of his range of danger; reason being was simple: firstly, a pure white orb appeared in Greygnarl's mouth, before shattering as a huge flash of blinding light enveloped the area, obvious use to render Dorado incapable of blocking. Having also taken a hint from Celio's own attack, and Dorado's arsenal of metallic weaponry, Greygnarl them let out a roar to the heavens, an bolt of lightning crashing upon Dorado with reckless force; it's effect was unknown as of yet, however Greygnarl himself was confident enough to know it was over; and simply fading into nothingness, his spirit returning to Celio's blade, the dragon-user had ceased to play the song, standing up tall as he had realized something: Greygnarl may not have followed his instruction, but this showed him that he was improving his bond with the veteran dragon, because even though it was involuntary, the white dragon did help them out.

Standing up tall, holding his injuries, he walked over to Kirei, before kneeling to her side as he created Holy Fire in his palms; the ball of flame was a simple health regenerative technique, and so as he embedded the fire inside Kirei's person, he hoped it had dealt with some of her wounds to which he asked [color=#008000]"Say, feeling any better?"[/color] with a chuckle.

[.:Blu:.]

Dorado watched with a wide, satisfying grin on his face as his chains slammed the two Starbounds hard into the ground. With what he has planned next, Dorado knew the battle would be over. But to continue on with his final attack, Dorado needed to withdrew his chains and so he quickly did. "HAH! You two were tough opponents but there's no way you can beat an ace Starbound like myself!" Dorado cockily boasted unaware that his cockiness would be his undoing. Once his chains had retracted, Dorado lifted his chains high up into the air. Then, the top of his chains began to glow bright yellow and replicated into two giant, chain mallets. Ready to smash Celio and Kirei with all of his force left, Dorado once more wasted time to boast about his abilities. "I hope you understand why you're about to die! It's because you're dealing with the most powerful Starbound ever hahaha!" Dorado exclaimed. And that was the moment that everything fell apart for Dorado. Cleverly manipulating and concentrating her voice, Kirei used it to blast a dense wave of high-pitch sound towards Dorado at high speed.

Dorado's eyes widened as he saw the incoming wave but there was absolutely no way he would be able to dodge it at all, especially since he was holding those heavy chain hammers of his. As the wave struck Dorado, it exploded in a powerful, eardrum-shattering shock wave of pure sound. "GAHHHH!!!" Dorado shouted in pain due to the direct hit of Kirei's sound wave. Along with impairing Dorado from continuing on with his attack, the sound caused the chain hammers and the chains themselves to vibrate so violently that they shattered, rendering Dorado's weapons entirely useless. With his weapons gone, the first thing Dorado did was covering his ears with his hands to avoid the ongoing ringing. His eardrums had now burst and blood was seeping down from his ears, turning his palms crimson. "Gah... Ugh..." Dorado panted heavily as he fell onto his knees, his body shaking from the experience had had just endured. It would be months until Dorado could recover fully but this battle would be over once Celio stepped in. Meditating to recover his energy for a final blow, Celio clenched one fist as green energy surrounded it.

Celio then proceeded to launch his Dragon Fist attack that produced an eastern dragon-shaped energy blast headed towards the immobile Dorado. However, the energy soon dissipated before reaching Dorado. Celio had used up too much mana and energy already. It would take awhile for his mana to fully recover but if he can't deal with Dorado right now, then Dorado would get a chance to recover just enough so he can continue the fight. Celio fell onto the ground, exhausted. Fortunately, there was once more thing Celio could try. Taking out his flute and shifting his body so he would sit upon his knees, Celio started playing a beautiful tune. Dorado groggily watched as the young Starbound played his flute but could not hear a single thing. "(W-What the hell is he doing...?)" Dorado thought. After a moment, a surprising twist occurred that Dorado would never thought would happen: Greygnarl would now enter the battle.

Greygnarl gave a powerful roar before addressing Dorado, but it didn't matter due to Dorado's inability to hear anything. However, from the way Greygnarl was looking at him with his fierce grin, Dorado knew that the dragon meant to put an end to the whole battle. (Why is the dragon entering the battle...?!)" Dorado thought before stumbling to get back onto his feet. After taunting Dorado about his weak magic compared to Greygnarl's own brute power, the massive dragon picked Celio and Kirei up and slung them onto his back to prevent harm from befalling them. Before Dorado could attempt to do anything, Greygnarl unleashed a powerful explosion of blinding white light that easily rendered Dorado's eyesight completely useless. With both sight and hearing gone, Dorado basically had became a training dummy for Greygnarl's awesome power. Next, Greygnarl roared to the very heavens to unleash a devastating lightning bolt to strike the cocky thief down for good. As the bolt impacted Dorado, a thundering roar filled the air, causing birds and other wildlife to flee nearby areas. As for Dorado himself, he was hit by an unfathomable amount of power that drowned out his very out screams of pain. The bolt scorched Dorado's very body and turned his clothes into rags.

Once the lightning finally dissipated, an absolutely defeated Dorado stood there, smoke fuming from his body. And after a second, Dorado fell face first into the ground, unconscious. The battle had been won by a surprising factor: Greygnarl. Afterwards, Greygnarl returned into Celio's sword and Celio stood up from the ground, triumphant and happy about the fact that his relationship with Greygnarl had taken another step forward. With Dorado defeated, Celio made his way over to Kirei. Kneeling down by her side, Celio then used a Holy Fire spell to heal her before asking if she was feeling any better. Their brief conversation would come to an abrupt end however as suddenly, their bracelets given to them by Albora began to glow in an intense blue color. In a flash of blue light, two blue-colored [url=http://th07.deviantart.net/fs7/PRE/i/2005/246/9/5/Magic_Circle_6_by_YamiBliss.jpg]magic seals[/url] appeared, each one binding Celio and Kirei at their torso and causing their arms to be restrained tightly at their sides.

"Hehehe, I should really thank you two for taking care of that bastard thief." a familiar voice came from behind Celio and Kirei. As they turned around, it is revealed that the voice had came from none other than the Mensa City Museum curator, Albora, now without glasses and a crazed and devious expression shown visibly on his face. His right hand was now bandaged due to the fact that he had cut it when he smashed his glasses against his office's window. Behind Albora was two carriages pulled by two horses each and a number of museum security guards, in total six, including the guard that the four Sol Starbounds had met when they entered the museum for the first time. Albora then proceeded over to the two restrained Starbounds with a wide grin. "Don't attempt to use your magic because they are now completely useless thanks to the magic seals activated from the bracelets I gave you." Albora explained.

Albora then walked over to the unconscious Dorado. "Before I knock you two unconscious, I would just like to say thank you for dealing with this one." Albora said before kicking Dorado to confirm that he is unconscious. "Yes, you three will make a great addition as sacrifices for the Skull Grimoire." Albora grinned, referring to Celio, Kirei, and Dorado. "Oh, and don't worry about your other two friends. I'll make sure you'll see them again very soon..." Albora told the two, letting the last part ominously sink itself into both of their minds. With a slight tilt of his head, a security guard walked over and whacked Celio hard with a wooden club, knocking Celio unconscious. The same guard then turned to face Kirei and lifted his club into the air, pausing for a brief moment before finally bringing the club down onto Kirei, knocking her unconscious as well.

After the two Starbounds have been dealt with, the grin wiped away from Albora's face as he turned to face his henchmen. "Three of you will bring these three back to the museum's [i]hidden chamber[/i]. The rest of you will come with me. We have four more birds to catch..." Albora stated, the ominous and wide grin coming back onto his face.


[center][i][b]Albora reveals his true colors...! An unexpected danger now creeps closer to Fayte and Syfa![/b][/i][/center]


-Meanwhile-

With the initial pillar retracted back into the ground, Fayte was now left to plummet towards his death. "Ahhhhh!" Fayte shouted out as he delve closer and closer towards impending doom. Luckily, Syfa quickly reacted and flew towards Fayte to catch him. Sice knew that would be the case and so merely used it as an opportunity to regroup with Pictor down below. With amazing speed, Syfa quickly caught Fayte and placed him atop of her staff once again. Once Fayte was safely back on Syfa's staff, he placed his left hand on his chest and panted heavily to regain his composure. "Thanks Syfa... I wouldn't want to know what would happen if you weren't here with me..." Fayte proclaimed. After Fayte felt his breathing returning to normal, he gripped tightly on Syfa's staff to ensure his safety. Syfa now set her sights on Sice who was still traveling down the side of the earth pillar created by his brother. Standing on her staff, Syfa quickly summoned her spell book. She then began chanting an incantation and in the middle of it, a thick, black mist began to seep from Syfa's spell book.

The staff began wobbling which caught Fayte off guard. He quickly tightened his grip on Syfa's staff, balancing his body on it so he wouldn't fall off. Fayte found it absolutely extraordinary that Syfa could stand on such a thing thing, but that's why Syfa's a witch. With one last chant, three transparent dog heads appeared around Fayte and Syfa, positioning themselves in a triangle formation. Fayte looked in amazement at Syfa's magic. He had never seen this spell before. Syfa surely grew strong since three years and Fayte was glad to be on her side. The three dog heads then launched themselves towards Sice who was still making his way down. Hearing the incoming dogs, Sice turned his head to the side and saw all three of them closing in on him. "(Crap!)" Sice thought before doing a circular leap to the side, avoiding the first of the three heads. As the first head collided with the pillar, it easily shattered the pillar in half and scattered smaller chunks of the pillar into the air. The attack also created a large cloud of dust that impeded Fayte and Syfa from seeing what was happening.

After Sice had dodged the first head, he used his magic to launch himself onto one of the smaller chunks that flew off from the main pillar. Sice kept himself on all fours to provide more stability so he wouldn't fall off of the chunk of pillar. Sice had a critical problem however. The thick cloud of dust also impeded his vision and made it hard for him to breathe. Suddenly, the second head flew through the thick cloud and made its way towards Sice. Fortunately for Sice, he was able to avoid a direct hit as he leaped off of the chuck just in time. However, Sice could not avoid the medium-sized debris that collided into him as the head impacted with the chunk of pillar he was standing on. Recovering quickly, Sice leaped onto the lower half of the destroyed main pillar. He needed to get to ground and fast. Not wasting any time, Sice pumped up his magic and ran even faster towards ground all the while the lower pillar was plummeting towards the ground. For caution, Sice looked back and what he saw was quite an annoying sight. The two heads that had collided into the pillar hasn't been destroyed at all. In fact, the appeared the same as when they were summoned.

"Damn!" Sice cursed. Just then, the third head appeared from the cloud of dust and along with its other two counterparts, chased after Sice. Now their real power came into play as the three heads began firing beams of dark energy at Sice. Acting quickly, Sice began moving in a zig-zag patter, avoiding the beams. Now Sice was finally nearing the ground and below, Pictor could see the three heads chasing after his twin. "Where did those things come from?!" Pictor thought out loud. Pictor quickly extended his arms in the direction of the three heads. "Earth Crusher!" Pictor shouted out before cupping his hands together in a loud clap. Suddenly, two earthy pillars shot up from the ground next to Pictor and made their way towards the three heads. Once each of the pillars made their way towards the side areas of the three heads, the pillars collided into each other, crushing the three dog heads in the process. That allowed for Sice to safely reach the ground, ending in a kneeling position.

Without any communication from his brother, Pictor motioned for the pillars to now attempt the same attack on Fayte and Syfa. If the pillars were able to crush their enemy then that would be the best outcome for the two thieves, but Pictor intended for his action to be more of a challenge to Fayte and Syfa, getting them to fight the two if they want to get the grimoire back. Of course the icing on the cake came when Pictor used one hand to remove the Skull Grimoire tied to his belt and brought it up for Fayte and Syfa to see. Seeing Pictor's challenge, Fayte looked at Syfa. "If they want a battle, we'll give them a war!" Fayte declared.

[Kyng's Old Account]

It went without saying that, after the resolution of Kirei's status was resolved, the sudden ensnarement in the magical seals had taken Celio by shock, having just been quite pushed already due to the very vicious confrontation between Dorado, Kirei, and himself, which had also taken a tole upon his own self, with some cutes in spots, as well as torn clothing, left him quite open and vulnerable: when better to trap him in some handcuffs attached to his body? But, the question wasn't when to assault the wounded Starbound as well as ensnare him in the trap, but rather it was who did the act, as well as why was it done, and as Celio's head turned to the very familiar, and equally untrustworthy voice, soon answered these questions.

The voice was from the one he didn't trust from the start, who so happened to be paying them the 10000 Jewells, Mr Albora, however he looked rather sinister in turn from his usual dumbfounded and bat-sh*t crazy state, although this seemed equally as bat-sh*t crazy with a deadly dose of dangerous deviance, a devilish grin upon his crazed face as he told them not to waste their magic on getting free, due to the seals rendering it useless, to which Celio gave him a sunny smile, obviously purposely sarcastic upon the feux-smile as he said [color=#008000]"Oh dear; 'tis a blessing I've ran out of all my magic then."[/color] Obviously, the reason behind this was simply to make some form of light-heartedness from the gloomy situation, as well as take the piss out of Mr Albora, which Celio found he just loved to do.

Then, he went on about being grateful for them two having dealt with Dorado, which then followed a remark about Kirei, Dorado, and himself being sacrifices for the Skull Grimoire, to which he smiled and said [color=#008000]"Well, it was our pleasure to help you out. Say, my Dragon helped burn this guy to a crisp, want him to say hello? Well, whatever the case, I still hope you'll be giving us our pay; now, what was it again? Oh, that's right, Fayte had you quivering by the collar as he doubled our pay, so that's about 10.000 Jewells. Say, you wouldn't mind dropping us off to Dodgey Dave's before this sacrifice of your's? I bet I could win a big few back home at Stellos!"[/color]

Of course, what then followed was simply blackness...

[Hotaru987]

Syfa cursed to herself when she saw that Sice was able to dodge her attack, quite impressively as well. It was then Pictor came in to help his brother and made two pillars of earth to smash the Cerberus'; but he wasn't done there. He also attempted the same attack at Syfa and Fayte. Syfa was able to easily dodge the attack, but she was sure Pictor expected her to dodge it, and it was more of a tactic to allow Sice more time to join him on the ground. Even though her attack was destroyed, that should show them that her and Fayte weren't just kids to be underestimated. They would get the Skull Grimoire back at all costs. She then notice that the Pictor held up the Skull Grimoire, and understood the challenge. Fayte then said that if they wanted a battle then they would give them a war; and Syfa was compelled to agree.

"Then lets give them hell." She smirked she said as her staff began a descend towards the ground until they were some distance away from the two brothers. Syfa jumped off her staff, and waited for Fayte to do the same before making her staff vanish. "So how should we do this Fayte? Do you want to branch off for a one on one? Or just take them together? I'm fine with either plan because I refuse to lose no matter what. They made fools of us once, but they won't get away the second time."

[Elƒie]

Kirei blinked quiet a bit as Celio walked over to her and healed her. [color=#008000][font=tahoma, helvetica, arial, sans-serif][size=3][background=rgb(251, 253, 254)]"Say, feeling any better?" [/background][/size][/font][/color][color=#008080]"Y-Yeah. Thanks! Now it's my turn~" [/color]Standing up, Kirei picked up her baton from the ground. the baton began to glow a soft white as did Celio's wounds as a beautiful piano solo began to fill their ears. [color=#008080]"Day to night, dark to li-EH?!"[/color] Before Kirei's song could get truly going, the bracelets acted up and their arms were bound to their body. Squirming around as she tried to pry her arms from her sides, she let out a small yelp when she heard Albora's voice behind her. Turning around to face him, she let out another yelp seeing the face he had. Then she heard Celio ramble off about something that should have been last on his mind, the money. [color=#008080]"C-CELIO! How can you think about money right now! We're about to get kidnapped and sacrificed for a freakin' book! I think I'd rather be sold off to the circ- A-ANYWAYS!"[/color] Kirei would either be flailing her arms about in panic or shaking Celio out of frustration for his coolness over the situation if it wasn't for the magic seals binding her arms to her. Anyways, with her arms bound to her and her magic not working, Kirei was about to enter panic mode when the solution to that problem came in: a club to the head.

[.:Blu:.]

[center][size=5][b]CHAPTER 4: COMET[/b][/size][/center]


[spoiler=Chapter 4 Synopsis]With the Skull Grimoire at stake, Fayte and Syfa now enter into a battle against the twin thieves, Sice and Pictor, but will Sice's magic prove too much for the two Sol Starbounds to handle? Meanwhile, Celio, Kirei, and Dorado awaken to find themselves in a strange cosmic world.[/spoiler]


Accepting Sice's and Pictor's challenge to battle, Fayte and Syfa landed onto the ground some distance away from the two twins. Standing up from the ground, Sice looked to Pictor. "We didn't need to resort to this ya know?" Sice said, referring to Pictor challenging their opponents to a head-on battle. "On the contrary, I see no more options. This two annoying pests are set on chasing after us wherever we go. Might as well stop them now than later." Pictor replied. Sice gave a sigh and then turned around to face Fayte and Syfa. "Guess there is no other options." Sice stated. "Let's make this fast." Pictor said right after. "Oh I will..." Sice boasted. Back on the other side, after the two Sol Starbounds have landed, Syfa turned to Fayte to ask how he wanted to approach the battle. "If we separate them, chances are that we'll be more likely to win, but... I want to defeat them at their best. To teach them not to underestimate us...!" Fayte stated. Twelve cards then appeared floating around Fayte to show his magic has been activated.

Sice smiled seeing the determined Fayte. "Whoa now, no need to be so serious. Think of this more as a friendly sparring match." Sice said. Without replying, Fayte drew one of his cards. "Alright Syfa, let's go." Fayte said without turning around. Right away, Fayte threw his card towards Sice and Pictor, followed by a quick succession of four more cards. Along with his specific spells, Fayte could also use his cards like throwing knives to attack his enemies. Seeing the incoming card, Sice quickly backflipped through the air, leaving Pictor to handle the incoming cards. "Earth Log!" Pictor called out before punching both hands towards the cards. Suddenly, a medium-sized earth pillar shot up from the ground in front of Pictor and headed towards the cards. The cards then made impact with the face of the pillar and embedded themselves into it as the pillars advanced towards Fayte and Syfa. Knowing Syfa can easily handle herself, Fayte rolled to the left to evade the pillar. Without standing up, Fayte quickly entered into a kneeling position and took off towards Pictor.

Seeing Fayte drawing closer, Pictor quickly reacted by sending a barrage of earth spikes towards him. Seeing the spikes, Fayte stopped himself. "Card Wall!" Fayte called out, extended his arms out and forming a bit of an "x" shape. Suddenly, more cards appeared from Fayte's pouch and packed themselves together in front of Fayte, creating a thick card wall. As the spikes impacted with the wall, the spikes shattered into tiny debris and dust all the while Fayte's Card Wall took minimal damage. Seeing as how his attack failed, Pictor turned his attention to Syfa instead. Punching the ground, Pictor created a shock wave that can be visibly seen heading towards Syfa. The shock wave then caused the ground to splinter and create many gigantic earth spikes that moved towards Syfa in the same pattern as the earlier shock wave. Just before Fayte could put down his Card Wall, Sice appeared right above him and with an axe kick, shattered the wall; the force of the kick sent Fayte stumbling back and trying to regain his balance.

Not letting up however, Sice zoomed towards Fayte and delivered a series of lightning-quick punches, sending Fayte onto his back. Leaping up, Sice then aimed for a powerful punch to the downed Fayte, but thankfully, Fayte was able to react just in time. "Card Art: Fireball!" Fayte shouted out as he drew one of his cards and sent a medium-sized fireball right into Sice, knocking him on his back. Still on the ground, Fayte lifted his legs and kicked up to return to his feet in order to attack Sice first. Using his magic, Sice quickly pushed off the ground with his feet and launched himself into the air. Then using his amazing acrobatic skills, Sice backflipped in midair and landed into a kneeling position. Meanwhile on Syfa's side of things, the numerous large spikes continued on their destructive path towards her. "Earth Prison!" Pictor shouted as he cupped his hands together. Suddenly, the area around Syfa started to shook violently. Within a moment, curved slabs of earth arose from the ground, closing in on each other in order to form an earth dome prison. Pictor knew Syfa would attempt to escape the incoming spikes by flying and so he needed his Earth Prison to keep Syfa grounded all the while the spikes advance closer.

-Meanwhile-

"[i]Awaken young Starbounds... You are in grave danger... You must break from this place... You must break from his influence...[/i]" a deep masculine voice resonated through the minds of an unconscious Celio and Kirei. They lie unconscious within a strange-looking world. All around the two Starbounds, a cosmic explosion of bright colors predominantly bright yellow is all the eyes can see. Celio and Kirei lie on no visible ground but something unseen was there, something tangible. Below the unseen ground is more of the same cosmic colors. Spheres of cosmic rainbow lights are scattered throughout this world, distanced far away from one another. Celio and Kirei are not alone however. Stuck within this strange world is Dorado as well. Unlike Celio and Kirei however, he is conscious and walking around, dazed and confused. He looked in awe at all that was around him. "Where the hell am I...?" Dorado asked. Dorado looked over to the two unconscious Sol Starbounds and sighed. "Might as well try to wake these two brats up..." Dorado told himself before kneeling over them.

"Hey, you two, wake up." Dorado said but received no sigh that they would awaken. Annoyed, Dorado grabbed each one by one of their shoulders and pushed the two of them up against each other. He then began to shook the two of them. "Hey I say wake your asses up-" Dorado exclaimed. Just right after, he heard a vicious growling noise emanating a long distance away from him. Dorado stood up and turned around to see if he can pinpoint the location of the growling. "Okay, I'm now officially freaked out..." Dorado dryly stated. Suddenly, two of the floating light spheres began to exhibit some erratic movements. "What the hell..." Dorado looked at the spheres from far away. Suddenly, the movements became even more frequent and soon the spheres morphed into wolf-like forms. The wolves have no actual animal features except for their shape and white-glowing eyes. Their entire body appeared to be condensed night skies adorned with hundreds of tiny stars.

The wolves fixed their emotion-less eyes on Dorado and began to growl fiercely. "Oh crap..." Dorado said. Hastily Dorado attempted to activate his magic but nothing happened. "H-Hey what gives?!" Dorado asked. "[i]Your magic won't work here...[/i]" the voice from Celio's and Kirei's minds stated to Dorado. "Huh? H-Hey who's there?! And what do you mean my magic won't work?!" Dorado asked. Just then, the wolves began to sprint towards Dorado. "Ahh, they're coming! Come on magic, work!" Dorado shouted as he once again attempted to use his magic but failed to. "[i]Your magic is of no use here... Only those two will be able to utilize their magic... The ones named Celio and Kirei...[/i]" the voice stated. "W-What?! Holy crap, wake up damn it!" Dorado shouted to the two all the while the wolves drew closer.