Jessie was surprised to see Raiya bolt off with such speed. She looked at the others in the group and shrugged.
"I guess I'll see you gang on location."
Jessie stepped a good distance away from the group and took her tome off her belt. She flipped to a page marked with a thick blue-ish green tab at the top. The page had a detailed summoning circle on it, which she placed her hand on. The circle in the book glow, and a larger version of it appeared at her feet. A fierce wind sparked out of nowhere. The spot where Jessie stood within the circle however was calm. The circle appeared again in the sky, and upwards out of it flew a wyvern. The wind died down and the weather returned to its old state. The wyvern landed next to Jessie. In it's standing position, the wyvern was about two feet taller than Jessie.
"It's been a while Xal. May I fly with you on this fine day?"
Jessie gave her summon a formal bow, holding her still open tome in front of her in her left hand and her right hand lifted palm up to her side.
Xal let out a chirp and bowed to Jessie. Jessie smiled as the Wyven crouched down low enough for his summoner to climb onto his back, Jessie closed her tome and strapped it on her belt before climbing onto the Wyvern's back. She looked back down at the rest of the group.
"Sorry guys, I'd give you a ride, but Xal can only handle one person at a time, and seventy miles is too far for me to maintain a summon so I can't ferry you. Ill see you at the site."
She waved to the group as the Wyvern took off and carried her into the air. Jessie held on tight as Xal flew high into the air. Once they were at a good altitude, Jessie looked at her new manadial as Xal maintained their position in the air. She found the location on the manadial and then directed Xal towards the location. After a short time of flying, Xal spotted the destination and began to descend. As the ground became clearer, Jessie spotted Raiya, waiting at the location. Xal landed, and Jessie hopped off his back. She turned back towards the wyvern and gave another bow to him.
"Thank you for the flight my friend. May your wings forever be strong, and the winds remain in your favor."
Xal gave a chirp and bowed his head to Jessie before flying up into the sky and vanishing into a poof of cloud. Jessie turned towards Raiya.
"So, which of the rest do you think will get here first?"

Artos Bane

Artos watched with curiosity as his leader on this mission took off with lightning speed. Not bothering to go with the team at all. Any simple fool could see the flaw in blazing a trail alone after having been warned of powerful opposition. The angry grimace on his face was short lived as he simply shrugged. One of two was still available.

As rear guard he chose to wait for the others to get started, taking his role quite literally. He could traverse the landscape just fine but the magic usage would likely be quite taxing. Summoning a dragon creature like Jessie had done was likely even more so. Waste of effort. Anyone with a set of eyes would notice such a creature.

Another problem to discuss later if he could muster the nerve.

Instead of dwelling on what he believed were the current shortcomings of his new teammates, he made his way to Felix's personal study and knocked on the door quietly. A response came a moment later and Artos opened the door ever so slightly to see Felix at his desk.

"apologies for interrupting. I was wondering if you by chance had a bow of some sort on hand. You never know when a ranged advantage might be useful. If not, I'll be on my way."

Artos didn't bother explaining the foolish behaviors just yet. Complaining now would only make him feel undeserving of even being here at all.

Nemo listened to Raiya with his thumbs in his pockets as the rest of the team arrived. He tried to think of something to say to keep the conversation going but was coming up short. "I'm sure Feli-" He started before Raiya's monotonous statement cut him off.

Nemo stepped down off the porch and followed Raiya. Eager to begin the first mission he had ever done with a team, not to mention the first mission he had ever done as a co-leader. It was something out of his comfort zone, but as long as he had his new partner for help he figured he'd be able to manage. His daydream fantasy had distracted him from the real world. He only heard the end of what Raiya said next.

"Keep up? But I just used my last te-" He tried to get out until Raiya zipped away. "-leportation card to find you... Oh... Okay... Well that's just great." Nemo rambled as he stared off and watched her disappear into the distance. "So much for leading together." He thought, rather disappointed. However his disappointment soon turned to anxiety once the summoner girl flew off as well.

"If we walk, we'll reach there just in time... to die." Nemo thought as he checked his manadial, his right eye twitched as he came to his conclusion. He turned around and faced the remaining three members of the group, anxiety rising. "How are we gonna get there now?" He said nervously. Nemo nervously rubbed the left side of his face with his hand as he thought. "We've got a untalent, a ruin mage, and a arctic swordsman. There's no way any of them have a way to get us all there. This isn't possible unless Felix helps us, but he was only supposed to help in a emergency. This situation is making me uncomfortable. Nobody has ever waited for me before. I can feel the pressure inside my mind. Raiya just left me in the dust to lead the rest alone, these people are looking to me for guidance but I don't know what to do. Why did she have to leave so quickly? Why didn't somebody warn me how hard this was going to be?" Nemo began to mentally deteriorate on the spot.

Nemo watched Artos walk off, a feeling of dread washing over him now. "Oh no, we failed already! He's gonna go tell Felix what a horrible leader I am. I don't deserve to live anymore. You all looked up to me and I let you down. I don't deserve this title because I'm worthless." At this point Nemo had dramatically collapsed into the porch barrier and limply folded over the railing like a wet noodle as he (mostly) silently spiraled into despair.

Yuno found herself in a peculiar situation between having decided to believe Felix further with recent evidence presented and desiring to head forward due to this, as well as the desire to simply walk away with the choices he had made with the current leadership of this rag tag group of magic users. Nemo obviously had shown signs of his ‘unique’ personality while it wasn’t hard to that the woman in charge was also one with a short temper and a thirst for a certain drink. As she set her plate aside wherever she may be expected to put it for cleaning later and checked out the location sent she felt a sense of partial dread come over her. Despite her dreams and fantasies of such a quest she didn’t quite read storybooks that resulted in interactions she was seeing before her. However, with the small portion of time she had within her allocated room to gather up her materials she made a choice to attempt to set it aside for the mission. This mission was more important to her than likely her leaders simply due to its proximity to her home after all. Hopefully, it was as they said and wouldn’t catch the eye of the current academy and possibly have greater repercussions for Yuno than intended.

Upon walking outside to the rest she didn’t carry tomes like Travis and Jessie had within their belts. No, instead as her sides were two obvious features: A small cloth pouch with a single knot tie at the top that seemed of pristine quality almost dyed a deep purple that stood out from her outfit, and on the other side of her hips lay three hoops in the belt of the pants she wore carrying a piece of chalk, a brush, and a small vial. Unlike her usual garb that was paired with a skirt she instead had slim white jeans on instead combined with a short sleeved blouse and a small open jacket on top obviously to be easier to move with for possible combat than what she had initially worn. The tomes Travis and Jessie did carry though caught her eye and a small desire to see what they may hold inside came within her, but she had a small feeling what they would be used for would be revealed soon. After all, an item as powerful as the Paragon likely won’t be easy to simply take.

Yuno continued her process to refrain from commenting as Nemo and Raiya spoke at first until one of them decided to run off alone, faster than most would be able to keep up with in the first place through most spells. The next person available to leave came Jessie, and Yuno had to take the chance with her to make sure the rest of them wouldn’t be left dumbfounded completely. As Jessie moved to climb the wyvern Yuno moved up behind her and quickly gave her a gentle pat on the shoulder while stating. “We'll be right with you then. See you in a bit.” Not entirely telling Jessie right away what she had truly done by using the contact as a way to leave a rune on the cloth of Jessie’s outfit with magic. Usually she would have preferred to use her chalk or brush, but without the time and wanted use of subtlety she imprinted it with a basic magic spell.

She watched Jessie fly off and quickly made a judgment of the girls trees as she disappeared behind the tall trees. Needing of course to wait for the girl to reach the eventual catacombs before putting he rplan into effect. But, her patience wouldn’t be left untested as Nemo began to almost cry before her and the others. It caused her to sigh once before reaching to her belt and pulling out a piece of chalk. Walking past Nemo on the railing and to the center of the porch where she began to write in silence until he got done speaking. “I don’t know you well enough to look up at you in the first place, no offense, so you shouldn’t be so sad on that part. However, it’s not done as of yet. I prefer using this spell by myself since I could easily mark my outfit with a single rune to do it, but to get you all there as well I need a bit more detail and power behind it.” She commented through the air as she stood back up straight and they would see the finished product of a runic circle. If Nemo remembered the spell on his card he might even notice the similarities to it from Felix’s teleportation spell, though the rune was far more basic with her lack of knowledge in the field by comparison. “Sadly I can’t do it without a marker or else we wouldn’t have to wait for our wyvern riding friend to get there. If you would Nemo… As our leader…contact Jessie and ask her if she has arrived yet? If so, you should all stand in the circle so I can take us to the catacombs.”

Felix was a bit surprised by the request

"Well, there is a bow hanging on the wall behind you. It's more decorative than anything, though." Felix pointed to an ornamental wooden recurve bow. "Go ahead and take it if you wish."

"Hmm... I would wager to guess the white one who captured me. He used a teleportation spell to get me here after all." Raiya explained as she leaned on a tree.

@dndragons

Nemo perked up from the railing after Yuno spoke. "Oh... I see." He commented as he walked over and into the circle, his tone had completely reverted to normal. "So she does have a long distance teleport spell, seems the Academia has been broadening their courses over the years. Feels pretty good to be wrong." Nemo pulled up his manadial and opened the holographic map. Checking the location of a few blips. "Judging by her location on the map, she's right outside our destination already. Ground level too." Nemo explained before letting his arm drop to the side and dispersing the map.

"I'm sure we can keep pa-

Before Travis could even complete his remark towards Raiya's jibing gesture, Nemo's female counterpart suddenly casted what appeared to be a speed or acceleration spell of some sorts as electricity sprung forth from her blue-enveloping aura before vanishing off a split second later. A trail of cloudy dust and dirt soon filled the, air illustrating her path to their objective. Travis and perhaps some of his teammate still gazed at the scene trying to make sense of the unexpected turn of events.

"...she does know none of us can't do that, right?" Travis said aloud with contempt, feeling that they had practically been bailed on. However deep in the recesses of his calculating mind, he brainstormed on the side how to re-produce Raiya's now demonstrated and helpful-proved spell to personal use.

A moment later, Jessie had summoned a wyvern as an aerial mount; fascinating! She soon took off as well towards their destination too but at the very least expressed her condolences to the remaining members of the troubling situation. But just as unexpected as Raiya's selfish departure, Nemo had then broken down, as if overcome by the events that had transpired. Given his calm and "friendly" attitude for a wanted man, Travis was rather taken back by the display of such sorrow. Then again, he didn't know if that was also over-played sarcasm either.

Eventually however, Yuno calmly addressed the issue and developed a teleportation circle around her and after "motivating" Nemo, she prompted their leader in order to make contact with Jessie to assist with pinpointing her location so the teleportation circle could transit them there accordingly. "Excellent proposal Yuno!" praised Travis as he took position in the circle as instructed, eagerly awaiting Nemo to touch base with their allies. While appearing outstaged, given his own understanding of the same rune to, admittedly, the moment had gotten to him as well.

Yuno allowed them both to enter before quickly chanting a few words. Below them the runes started to glow pale white before the light engulfed them entirely, tunes dissipating besides for a few of them remaining seared to the wood in the after effect of the spell being cast. To all those involved the whiteness that had engulfed them began to fade and they were at the entrance that Jessie had arrived at before them. No one seemed to have any after effects besides Yuno who had to wipe a few drop of sweat from her brow. Unlike Felix before her the mana reserved that she had access to and the skill entwined was not on Arch Mage levels. Doing such a task with even a marker wasn’t a simple feat after all, and it wasn’t copying the spell like Nemo. “Alright, now we can finally get back to business correct?” she stated with a small smile as a bit of pride went into her. Being able to at least solve a problem compared to the man who had slumped on the railing gave her a small ego boost after the impressions he had given her of himself, confirming for now a bit of bias she had in place of him being named their leader.

A bright light consumed the area for a moment. Raiya had to close her eyes, as the brightness was a tad blinding in contrast to the dark shady canopy of the forest. After the light subsided, the rest of the four in the group stood where the light once exuded.

Raiya raised an eye. So... it seems like Nemo decided to let someone else courier him here. I know that he used a teleportation spell once, but by the mana wave signature, this spell was obviously cast by that girl clad in white. It might be possible that Nemo was trying to save mana for an anticipated encounter. Which also probably means he has come to the same conclusion I have. That Felix didn't tell us everything about these catacombs. And this slab of runic stone here obviously tells a different story. I can't imagine Felix didn't know about this, he has to be testing us.

"Well, now that it seems everyone is here. We have a bit of a roadblock." Raiya pointed at the large rectangular slab of runic stone seeming embedded in the ground.
"From what very little of the runes I can read, it seems like any tampering with this stone or anything within the confines of it will result in the liquefying of the organs of everyone in the immediate vicinity. My forte is blowing shit up and slicing people, I know very little about runes or the act of disarming them." Raiya glanced at the rock, and then at Yuno and Travis. "Perhaps one of the nerds in our group can handle this one?" Raiya smirked.

"Looks like we made it," Nemo said, eyeing his manadial when they arrived. He was glad someone could take them all to their destination. Nemo gave a sigh of relief, "Indeed, back to business," he commented back to Yuno and walked towards the two members that had already arrived, Raiya and Jessie.

Nemo glanced over to the closed seal slab before looking back. "Couldn't even manage the front door, huh?" He joked, in poor taste considering he couldn't even make it over there by himself. "Good thing we can live without those." Nemo added sarcastically in response to the effect on their organs if they mess up.

"Well, if nobody else wants to, I could sure give it a try. I'm sure it can't be any harder than a puzzle. And I love puzzles," Nemo finished as he observed the seal on the stone slab.

@Cottonmouth@Prodigal Son

Artos felt dizzy the moment he was transported but did his best to wait for the disorientating effects to fade away. Looking around at the ruins around them was awe inspiring. Having been raised in an undecorated town built more for purpose than vanity it was interesting to see other structures. Silently he lamented on not taking the time to view Master Felix's home thoroughly to get a good sense of the architecture. Stringing the bow took a mere moment of his time, his first canteen flowed from its confines and into 8 thick icicles. With a bit of willpower they shaped themselves similarly to an arrow in length and appearance. Satisfied with the work, the arrows were scooped up and held in his free hand. When the time came they would find their place and their mark.

Returning his attention to the group and it's two leaders, the scowl took his face automatically as they began their light hearted bickering. This attitude was not helpful to the morale of the party and Artos had had enough in the short time they had been in the lead.

"You are both acting like children. Especially You," He pointed to Raiya, "For not bothering to wait for your group. How long has it been since Master Felix warned us of a the individuals who leveled a whole city? It is lucky one of our party had the means to transport us or you would have been here almost entirely alone with the unknown on the horizon for hours. Put a little more thought into your position." Artos held up his hand before any comments could return. "When this is done, we will talk. We have a job to do."

Their leadership was a joke, to say the least. These people are no warriors. He reminded himself.

Without another word, Artos turned his attention outward to their surroundings and made for the nearest vantage point. His role was to be spotted first, if the need arose, and buy the rest a chance to find cover and prepare a defense. To be away from these two was welcomed. The chilling aura he surrounded himself intensified with his anger to leave a patch of slippery ice with every footstep.

Nemo crossed his arms as Artos walked away. "You think they have fun where he comes from?" He commented before sauntering over to a open patch of grass. "I'll be over here if anybody needs me... Until somebody opens the door or my organs get melted or whatever." Nemo added as he uncrossed his arms and then abruptly jumped up. His body turned horizontal and he fell flat on his back with a considerable thud. It probably hurt, but Nemo seemed unfazed after the bizarre action.

"Any of you ever make a grass angel before?" He asked in a deadpan tone as he looked straight up to the sky.

"The runes on this thing have no similarity to the ones I use for summoning, so Im kinda useless for this too."
Jessie said, wandering over to where Nemo had laid down, and sat down a couple feet away from him.
"You guys have fun working on that though. I believe in you, don't fuck it up, rah rah, go team."
Jessie waved her fist in the air as if she were holding a small flag. She then took her summoning tome out and opened it up to a random book early in. She tapped a summoning circle on the page, and it glowed before a small vulpine sprite appeared in the grass next to the book. Jessie closed the book and picked up the summon, setting it in her lap and petting it. The sprite let out a bit of a cooing noise as Jessie pet it's fur.

Nemo glanced over to Jessie as she sat down and spawned her companion. He put his hands under his head for cushion as he made himself comfortable.
"I'm gonna go off on a limb and say you're a summoner. Had a few run ins with them in the past. They're a headache, all these little things to keep track of: Imp from the rafters, Chimera from the behind, Dragon from the sky. What's next? Humpty Dumpty with a glaive? Can't just settle on some ruin spell, no, no, that would be too easy." Nemo rambled on.

Jessie chucked at Nemo's comment, but then stopped when she remembered that her cousin's partner summon was in fact, a fat pale demon with a glaive.
"To be fair, most summoners only use summoning as a foundation for other magics. Many will get at most a single partner summon, and from there learn a variety of other ruin, defensive, or healing spells. But as for me personally, I chose to stick almost exclusively to summoning. I personally have six partner summons. The most a single summoner can have however, is twelve. I don't have the capacity for that many yet, but I am working on getting my seventh. The wyvern that I rode here and the fairy I had with me at breakfast were my first two partner summons."
Jessie then pointed at the vulpine summon sitting in her lap.
"This one is not a partner summon though. This guy is a pet summon, we use them to teach our novices the basics. They aren't very strong, but they aren't completely useless in a fight".

"One of the strongest opponents I've ever faced is a ten partner summoner... I say ten because I'm in possession of their missing eleventh partner contract. It's what I got for winning the fight," Nemo explained.
"It's not of much use to me as a spell, but it's was their main summon, so they'd do just about anything to get it back. Which is what I keep it for, leverage."
"Unpleasant person to be around, and unpleasant to fight as well." Nemo then sat up and ran his right hand down his left arm. "Ripped my left arm clean off like a chicken wing. Kinda looked like a chicken wing too with all the cartilage showing as I re-attached it afterwards." Nemo finished.

Jessie gave Nemo a confused look.
"Contract? Summoning doesn't require a...."
Jessie then looked as if she remembered something. She picked her summoning tome back up and opened it to a page filled to the brim with notes. She paged to a certain section, shortly after the end of the beginners tabs and began to read aloud.
"A partner summon takes from the framework of pet summons and expands upon it. To create a partner summon, a summoner must first delve their research into that of mythical demonology. Within this branch of research, a summoner may choose aspects of creatures within various sources of lore and mythology. Once the summoner has a clear view of their desired partner in their head, they must illustrate their summon within circular form using the symbols and runes learned during the instruction of pet summoning. Once the summon is pictured and the circle created, a summoner must begin pouring their mana into the circle as they maintain view of their summon within their mind. The crafting of a summon takes a large pool of mana and it may require a day or two for the summoner to recover afterwards. Once enough mana is poured into the circle, if it was done properly, the mana will begin to take physical shape. Once the summon has stabilized, the mana may be reabsorbed into the summoner as a 'dismissal' of the summon. The summon will maintain it's essence, memories, and personality while within the summoner, but will not witness the events the summoner witnesses while the summon is dismissed. However, due to this inner storage, a bond is created between summoner and summon that permits them light communication even while a summon is withdrawn. This manner of summoning is unique and differs from other schools of summoning that require calling existing beings from another plane of existence and forging a contract with them."
Jessie closed her book and looked back to Nemo.
"You didn't fight a summoner from my clan, you fought a summoner that uses a different school of summoning from mine! Oh I would love to meet a summoner who uses a familiar rather than a mana construct, they must have a huge compendium of creatures that I could research and work elements of into my own summons! Its so quickly glossed over in lessons that I almost forgot about it completely.

"All the summoning knowledge in the world isn't worth meeting that monster. And I'm not exaggerating, I'm pretty sure they are a cannibal; if they even are human." Nemo explained. "Though if it pleases you, I might be able to summon their familiar myself sometime. Might come in handy, but also might backfire as well. It doesn't really like listening to me for obvious reasons."

Nemo figured Jessie's wish might come true. Now that Nemo was out of prison, the previous owner of the contract might come back for it once more.

(dndragons)

Yuno took a brief moment to glance around and take a few steps across their location for a period of time after their group teleportation. Familiarizing herself with whatever could be determined about what may be around them before glancing towards the rune stone itself. As Raiya pointed out the slab to everyone and began to comment on the nature of it Yuno at least was impressed enough that she could read the runes accurately enough to have not touched it and killed herself on the spot, but her momentary period of being happy that Raiya was cautious enough was overshadowed by the fact she had turned to Yuno to ask for her help in such a cocky and rude manner. While Nemo usually had been more active in rubbing Yuno the wrong way especially with his poor jokes to Raiya’s comments now Yuno had to be annoyed at the fact her other leader in this came was determined to cause friction with the young white haired student. Gritting her teeth slightly she took a moment to calm down her response by commenting. “Some of us might actually be prepared to handle a mission in the first place.” Finally speaking out her annoyance in some way towards someone as she moved to approach the runes and get a further examination.

Looking to it she opened up the small bag she had bought that wasn’t her pouch of gems to pull out a pencil and a scrap of paper, finding such things useful for possibly mapping the catacombs if it turned to be a complex maze of corridors and now using it to map the runes clearly on paper instead of dealing with the stone itself. Five runes, No, Tamper, Organ, Transmute, and Liquid all clearly laid out in order before her. Hardly a puzzle to be fair at first, more like a security system that they would need to break through. Reading it at least was easy enough for someone coming from the Academy and putting the time to actually use rune magic on more than a basic level, but the hard part about this was figuring out how to simply get around the runes. She couldn’t simply carve a rune that makes the five runes a negative in which touching does NOT turn them into piles of mush. At the time passed with her scribbling rune ideas into her notebook Jessie and Nemo were quiet easily able to get their conversation going, which while distracting showed how stumped Yuno was at first as she crossed off ideas one by one. Their placement on the slab as well also was partial to the difficulty in simple dispelling them.

Frustration came to her face as she muttered something about how she got stuck doing this and if it was worth it as she tossed a piece of paper aside and started writing out some more. Having found herself sitting cross-legged on the ground at this point to continue. It was something she was supposed to be good at, so why was she letting it get her so easily? Of course, she never was in the realm of disarming runes other than her own, and it’s not as if the Academy would have something placed on a catacomb so important that she would have learned to disarm it from class.

(ShiningSector)

n a flash of white, everyone around Yuno had phased through a passage of surging light created by her teleportation circle. An instant later, the brightness dissipated as they materialized back into reality and joined once more with Raiya and Jessie. Raiya "greeted" them as they arrived and immediately explained the current situation she had encountered upon her arrival. Gesturing to a large slab embedded flat into the earth with grass surrounding the stone-like structure, she explained the runes imprinted into the slab were invoking a horrific transmutation curse on anyone who dared to tamper with it. Travis had to admit he was expecting something more cryptic or mystical about the dialect rather than a simple "touch or die" warning.

While narrowing his eyes in displeasure upon Raiya mocking him and Yuno, his white-haired Academia counterpart fired back before taking the stage and examining the runes. While Travis could interpret the the jab at the reckless Raiya, he however could sense the hint of Yuno's own vexation with the overall leadership of the team that seemed to also address Nemo's lack of organization. However they felt about their team-leads, the fact of the matter was tied to the current problem of disarming the runes engraved into the large slab before them without drowning in one's own ichor.

After a while, Travis could see Yuno's frustration getting to her. She had re-positioned her posture in order to help concentrate in the examination and has already tossed away a few crumpled up pages of ideas and plans they were deemed unusable. As their other party members decided to chat it up or scope out the area, it was clear that at current place, they would be here for quite some time. Travis eventually decided to intervene and assist Yuno, at first silently. She didn't appear to take too much notice, if not at all as he approached from behind and gazed upon the runes himself.

Five runes where organized in a hexagonic manner with conjoined scripting around them. The first rune translated to simply “No” which correlated to its partner “Tampering”. Those two had a separate set of scripting dialect surrounding them as if to form not only the bases of the warning, but also as the activation of the curse itself. The other three runes surrounded by another script, “Organ”, “Transmute”, and “Liquid”, formed the spell that would activate upon triggering the first scripted sequence. The structure was surprisingly simpler than Travis had imagined but the choice of the give pattern nonetheless made the overall slab difficult to handle. But that didn’t mean it was impossible…

“This is certainly a nasty piece of work,” Travis commented aloud as he looked over the runic slab, “However I think I know how we can get away with modifying this monstrosity without being turned into jelly.”

Invoking a light projection spell, he quickly copied the frame work of the runes and displayed the layout in the air. Travis then pointed to a portion of the script surrounding the runes, “What we’re looking at is a rather advanced form of rune dialect that governs how the runes are activated. However, this scripting is pretty dated and more componentized than some of the more linear scripts today.”

Waving his hand with his spell still active, he made a quick gesture with the glowing tips of his middle and index finger and made an incision within the scripting, “Regardless of what we do, this slab will activate. But, we can however delay the process just long enough to defuse it. If we simply erase this segment here…this cuts the mana circuits from trigging the second sequence of the spell; the one that horrifically kills us. This won’t last forever so we’ll need to operate quickly.

Travis then brushed his hand over the rune that made up the word “Organ” and wiped it from existence, “It’s that rune that designates where the curse will cast to on whoever messes with this sequence. By removing that portion there, that should effectively disarm the entire sequence. Of course, if you wanted to make it still look complete, we could always add some rubbish rune in and still screw the entire sequence too.”

After proposing his lectured thoughts, the finally turned to face Yuno with an eager friendly smile on his face, “Sound like a marvelously insane idea?”

(dndragons)

Yuno had continued to work as she took the rune as a puzzle of some sort. Aiming to find an answer, a rune to place or a symbol to change which would give someone with the ‘key’ or ’password’ a way in incase they had ever needed it, yet the container seemed more so sealed in a way to where no one was supposed to get in, even those who had created the defense measure in the first place, something which Travis was able to seemingly identify as he walked up behind her. Turning around at his voice the annoyance in her face more so was clear as she scrapped one more piece of paper with a large written X. Yet, as he stated he found a solution she only shot out. “What?” as the boy projected the runes before him. She was talented, even gifted, so she had been told, and rune magic being one of the areas she studied most the fact that she had seemingly missed the point here was depressing to say the least a realization hit her face. Travis was a scholar, trained to think things over in unique ways as he explained the difference between scripting of the old rune and the new. Sure, she could read the rune but he was more meticulous on the functions even if she could cast modern runes like no other at least in her class. Yet Travis simply took a more common sense approach than her, why look for a key when you could simply break the lock?

From her sitting position she examined the way in which he desired to change the rune, and thankfully it all made sense to her why it would work even if he had been the one to determine the method in which to disarm it, the only portion she had trouble with was leaving ‘Organ' there as she began to speak up. “The run likely will try and activate as you said… so leaving the organ portion there would be a bad idea. However, if I change the script the moment you cut it we should be safe. I know a rune similar to organ that I can replace one of the lines with in a flash. Knowing our luck just erasing the circuit line will trigger a simple failsafe, the safest method is to change." After which looking away slightly for having let her nerve seemingly get the best of her and taking his idea. Bringing out a small piece of rune chalk to add the line or two required for her edit she added. “I knew you worked with runes but I guess I didn’t think to ask.” Obviously she was referencing the rune that had blown him up before that he revealed the night of Felix’s recruitment that she had originally helped improve.

Standing to the side of the rune and looking back she seemed prepared with her chalk and looking back to Travis and the others. “Well, stand back in case we do this wrong okay?” Even though she had been excited before, the fact that if the creator of the rune had done more to protect it they may very well be out of luck. Swallowing once she looked to Travis and nodded once to signal him to start, heart pounding its way into her throat as her stomach felt the wings of butterflies fluttering inside.

(ShiningSector)

"No worries. We'll be fine," Travis confidently replied.

The weariness that emanated from Yuno was logical in a sense. While she was able to quickly accept Travis' stratagem as the only course of action, even see knew the risks they were about to undertake. A simple slip-up would not be tolerated by the runic late and the punishment for failure was a theoretically slow death. Though Travis nonetheless seem calm and determined to see this through, he too felt uneasy about committing not only himself to the dangerous feat, but someone else's well being too. If he didn't make the cut right, both of them, if not everyone, would end up as a splat on the ground.

After Yuno had advised everyone to stand clear of their mad surgical procedure, Travis took the opportunity to identifying the runic scripting he would cut and temporally delay the curse from firing. With the help of his projection spell he was able to relocate the point he would eventually slice through. But even with the help, the many sections of the rune were engraved into the stone slab, only slightly complicating matters regarding the method he would use the alter the scripting. If anything though, he would simply need to etch in the cut.

"Get ready. It'll react the moment I cut the circuit," he warned to Yuno has as he summoned up his spell and pointed his conjoined fingers above the given sections, mana collecting and glowing at the tips.

Noticeably, the runes themselves began to slowly respond to the very close-by source of magic. While not activating, the dialect and shapes of the runes and scripting radiated a faint dark redish hue as if it was preparing to respond to Travis' vandelization of the runic slab. With a deep breath began the count down, "...okay, three. Two...one."

It only took a slight jerk of his hand and the casting of his matter modification spell to cut the mana circuits of the runes's scripting. In an instant, a raging surge of deep red light projected outward from the mystical engraved design, lighting up each portion of the scripting faster than Travis had originally predicted until the beams fell short upon the incision in the fuse-like scripting. The radiant aurora-like light gave a startling inhuman growl as it frantically tried to push past the blockage. Even though Yuno was quickly fulfilling her part, Travis could feel the mana seeping past the incision despite his best efforts. The was perhaps the fail-safe Yuno had surmised; the runes were repairing the damage he had dealt. Travis's heart began to beat faster, quickly realizing that their scheme was falling apart and time quickly running out. All he could do was to delay the runic spell as long as he can.

Just before the he was overtaken, did Travis then learn of Yuno's task having been completed and her modification now in place. With their goals now accomplished, Travis hesitantly removed his hand from the cut and observed how blindingly fast the runes were able to reverse his cutting of the mana circuits. It was then that the rest of the rune scripting aggressively lit up, snarling as the aura spewed upward until the entire spell was then completed. Travis watched in worried dread to see if their plan worked. Suddenly, the blood-red hue from before faltered puled in a blueish hue, and then to green and back to red. What seemed like static electricity erupted from the runes as if lashing out in anger. The aura that was projecting upwards the entire time now reversed momentum, quickly evaporating into the cracks that had now formed as a result to the slab's apparent confusion of the altered dialect. The howling noise that came before also revered into an exhausted moan as the entire sequence destabilized and in a quick flash of light that must have briefly filled the area in white, soon imploded, shattering the slab with a loud crack, sending up a plume of expended mana and stone particles into the air.

Travis was nearly sent to his rear as the even repulsed him away from the site. After the runic slate's apparent destruction, he pulled himself back up cautiously approached the still-dusty scene, weary of any other fail-safe that may have been set is a possible last-ditch effort to neutralize any violators. But luckily, there were no back-up curses present as the cloudy particles faded away did he soon find a stair case leading downward behind the debris of the former slab.

"Well...that went well." stuttered Travis in sheepish yet notable enthusiasm towards Yuno until signaling everyone to gather around him, "We're in."

Giving a brief sigh of relief, Travis momentarily withdrew himself from the entrance before facing Yuno with a once more positive expression on his face, "Great job there! You've successfully dispelled a professionally-made killer rune and..."

Travis then looked around him to see if any of his teammates were listening in before leaning forward and whispered into Yuno's ear, "...saved everyone in the process."

Before casually leaning back, then then noticed a portion of the slab beneath his feet. Picking up and examining the disarmed port of a rune still etched in, he then turned his attention back yo Yuno, "Actually, if you don't mind me asking; what part did you change in the rune?"

After hearing the sound of the runic slab crumble Nemo brought himself to his feet. "Seems it's time to begin," he commented to Jessie as he used a basic spell to wipe his clothes clean of any debris from the ground. Nemo walked over to the area where the hole was located. "Good work you two," he congratulated, peering into the hole with his hands in his pockets. "Hhmmmnn..." Nemo voiced as he thought about what lied beyond the veil of darkness, only able to see stairs so far.

"Ladies first," Nemo said as he leaned back up and looked over to Raiya.