Felix tapped his index finger on the side of the book he was reading as he finished up the chapter. Closing the book, he pulled up his manadial.

"I am sure they are at the catacombs by now. Time to give them a call."

He tapped a few buttons on the hologram, sending a call out to every manadial in the party.

---

"Oh, how cordial." Raiya replied sarcastically to Nemo.

As she was about to step into the opening, the manadial in her pocket started vibrating and glowing. She pulled it out and removed the inlaid manacrystal from the center of the band. She then put the manacrystal up to her ear, and it sunk in a bit, molding to her inner ear, and leaving a hollow hole in the middle of it so she could still hear naturally out of that ear.

"What is it, Felix? I hate using manadial ear pieces, so this better be good." Raiya said in an irritated tone.

"Well, you'll have to get used to it, all of you. I will be talking to you and using manalasis through your dials from now on."

Raiya huffed in annoyance. She had hoped he would have just decided to take a nap after they left and forgotten about the dials he gave them. But it appeared Felix was going to try to be as professional as possible with this ragtag group.

"well, the academia nerds got the entrance open. There was a rune slab that blocked the opening, I'm about to head in now." Raiya explained.

"I'm extending my manalysis radius, and I can see that the opening is simply a long corridor. I can't follow it any further, but I will keep watching as you progress and keep you updated on what's up ahead." Felix said through the manadial earpiece.

"Alright." Raiya said in confirmation, and then began to lead the way down into the catacombs.

The first thing that struck Raiya was that the walls were made of a dark-grey transparent looking stone. But after further examination, she realized it was pure manacrystal. As she continued on down further, she could see blue coffins made out of manacrystal, their transparent quality allowed Raiya to also see the bones they would have otherwise hidden."

"Felix, everything is made out of manacrystal down here." Raiya waited a moment for a response, but when she received none, she said, "Though I suppose this comes of no surprised to you."

"I'll explain later, but no, I expected as such." Felix's voice replied.

Nemo noticed the call on his manadial. He held up his arm and looked at the all gold dress watch with a white dial. As the clear diamond like crystal below the twelve o'clock marker flashed he pushed in the crown. After a small click was heard the flash stopped and he was now in the voice channel. The watch was sync'd to his ornate silver bell earring, which then telepathically transmitted the sound straight to his ear.

Nemo followed Raiya down into the catacombs. The manacrystal walls had him almost salivating, to a person with his abilities they looked more like they were made out of rock-candy.

Nemo pressed his pointed finger onto the crystal above the dial on his watch, letting him speak on the channel. "I wonder if there is going to be any souvenirs down here," he whispered.

"I'm sure there are many items that could be considered useful. I have no qualms with you all taking what you wish, just be wary of the fact that some items there might be cursed." Felix replied

Raiya continued to walk down the corridor leading the way for all the others to follow.

"Yeah, Nemo. Maybe we can find you a sense of propriety while we are down here." Raiya smirked.

A hearty chuckle could be heard on the line.

"Something funny, Felix?" Raiya snapped.

"Oh, no. I was just remembering that one joke about the pot and the kettle. Don't mind me." Felix said in an exasperated tone.

Raiya's smirk turned into an expression of irritation briefly, but she didn't rebut Felix's comment.

"I happen to think I'm rather well mannered," Nemo commented while gazing at the crystal coffins as he walked by. he didn't seem to have much of a reaction to the jest, especially with Felix evening the score.

Nemo turned away and thought for a moment. "But maybe you're right Raiya," He started, his voice sounding a bit more sardonic. "If you're gonna be my plus-one we can't be roaming around in public like a couple of savages. Perhaps we should have etiquette lessons as well." Nemo suggested, using their deal to his advantage.

"What do you mean?" Raiya asked Nemo skeptically.

"Hold on. About two hundred feet in front of you, you will see a large room with a great sealed door. The door is emanating mana waves, so it is probably enchanted with runes or a some other spell." Felix said

"Great, more runes!" Raiya said sarcastically as she continued walking down the corridor.

"Have you ever seen the self proclaimed social elite have dinner? Well it's gonna be a lot like that, but again and again until it's just right. We're gonna learn how to hold forks, say hello, sit proper, and articulate our words like chivalrous men and women... Don't worry, I have experience. I'm sure it will be grand." Nemo explained as he continued on. "Speaking of which, do you know how to curtsy? Though maybe a bow might be more useful in this case" He added.

Raiya let out a long exaggerated sigh. She couldn't honestly think of anything worse than having to go to dinners with the guy who basically scammed her into joining her brothers ragtag group of misfits. All she wanted to was to get back to her gang as soon as possible, but at this rate she might have to kill Nemo in an, "accident", to expedite the process.

I do have honor I need to uphold. But how far am I willing to go to uphold it... Maybe I'll get lucky and he'll just die on one of these missions Felix has sent us on

Raiya let out another sigh as they continued to walk, and pulled out her silver pewter flask and drank from it. The burn of the rum which was Bicardi 151. The alcohol being 151 proof, it definitely wasn't for the lightweight drinker.

Being so far into the month, I've been accustomed to this level of drinking. But it's almost that time to renew again... Raiya thought as she took another gulp.

They eventually arrived in the room with the doors.

The room was a large square room, around a hundred yards square. There were still the mana crystal coffins with skeletons lining the walls, reaching all the way to the top of the room which was about fifty feet tall. The doors themselves were a set of double doors nearly as tall as the height of the room at 45 feet tall. The doors were made of solid granite inlaid with blue flakes of mana crystal throughout.

Raiya walked up to it and scratched her head.

"Felix... there aren't any runes on this door.

"It's probably enchanted, then. What does the door look like it's made out of?"

"Well, it's almost solid black stone with little shimmering flakes of mana crystal inlaid throughout it." Raiya replied

"Enchantments tend to lose their infused mana if they aren't contained in an adequate material. Unfortunately for us, mana crystal inlays are some of the best materials for holding enchantments. And without doing tests, there's no way to know what the enchantment does..."

"Well, I figure it's a small chance this door is the same enchantment as that last slab, and even if it is, I could welcome death right about now. So..."

Raiya stepped back from the door twenty feet, and held her hand out in front of her, aimed at the door. She didn't need to say any incantations because she had used this spell often enough that it became a second nature to her. It was her basic Plasma Arc spell.

She focused for a bit, and a magic circle about two feet in circumference appeared in front of her hand, and rotated. Out of the center of the circle a large tendril of electrical plasma burst forth and hit the doors with a large electrical snap.

She continued to pump mana into the spell, but as she was watching, she could tell the door wasn't being affected.

She dropped the spell and walked forward to examine the door. And sure enough, not even a mark was left on the doors.

She stepped back lifted her right and exclaimed "Kore wa hokori ni henkō sa remasu! (this will become dust)"

Immediately a red beam left her hand and struck the door, and after a second a large fiery explosion enveloped the door.

After half a minute the fire died down and the door was standing there unscathed.

"Well that answers that." Felix said.

"What does?" Raiya said in an exasperated confused tone.

"Well, it's obvious the spell is a shielding of some sort. It's probably being powered by all of the inlays and a few large mana crystals behind it. Which means, you could be attacking that door for a hundred years before it would fall." Felix explained

Raiya let out a sigh, and sat down on the ground, and opened her flask.

"I guess we wait for the others to catch up and try and come up with some ideas." Raiya said as she sipped on the rum.

Artos followed the group into the dusty tomb, refusing to believe it to be anything but a tomb. The air was cold and dusty, but it was a step up from the heavy sunshine up above. What lay in the catacombs below weren't important to him in the slightest. The learned of his group would be interested and Artos would certainly encourage them to take their time, be thorough, and get them to the objective quickly. While the rest took their time and chit chatted as they walked, he glanced into every shadow with his sword in hand, the other hand still holding the ice arrows.

Artos was fascinated by the time it would have taken to carve this place from the stone and wondered just why anybody would go to such lengths. Surely if they wanted something to never be found it could just be locked in an iron chest and thrown into the sea. Yet despite the logic, it occured to him again that those from the continents didn't seem the practical type. They wanted to know beyond doubt that what they wanted locked away would stay locked where it could be monitored. That in itself was respectable.
Perhaps, he wondered, they would not see a fight at all and simply enjoy the feel of this forgotten place.

Nemo came to a stop once they reached the door. He seemed to be admiring the scene for a few moments until Raiya fired off her first attack. He stood with his hands in his pockets and she fired off the second, seemingly keen on conserving as much of his own energy as possible. The display also allowed Nemo to slowly learn more about her abilities.

"So... we've learned that granite can't be electrified or burned. That's a relief. Do you think we should try having Artos freeze it?" He said with a mock-serious type of tone.

Nemo looked over to Raiya, watching her sip the rum. He could smell it even easier now that they weren't outside in the fresh air. Nemo realized that he couldn't remember a point since he met her that she hadn't been drinking something with alcohol in it. It began to make him ponder just what the extent of her "problem" could go to. After all it did basically cause her to be in her current predicament. He also wondered why she drank in the first place. Nemo liked a good drink, but something this excessive was likely caused by something.

Raiya sneered at Nemo after his facetious comment.
"Hey, genius. I don't expect you to know much about shinto magic, but that spell wasn't a fire spell. That spell is meant to be able to disintegrate any inorganic object up to fifty feet long and twenty feet thick. And even if this door was thicker than twenty feet, it would still have taken off a full twenty foot layer, and I'd just need to blast it again. It's obviously being negated like Felix said. The only reason it erupted in flames was because of th excess energy being reflected and dispersed." Raiya huffed out a scoff before she took another sip from her flask.

Nemo was inclined to come up with something crude to reply back with, but his thoughts about her drinking had caused him to lose his appetite to further push the issue; after all they were supposed to get along. At least Nemo was able to get her to spill the beans on how some of her spells work.

For a few moments he stood silent, but eventually started back up again. "Have you ever had Elderflower Cordial?" He asked with a more benign voice, seemingly trying to pass the time until the rest of the group arrives. "If not you might be more acquainted with St. Germain, they share the same key ingredient."

"I saw some of that in a health food store once. I didn't care too much because I rarely drink anything that is non-alcoholic." Raiya replied. " Though, I've never heard of St. Germain. I'm assuming that is an alcoholic variant of the cordial?"

"That's a bingo, it's a elderflower liqueur." Nemo confirmed. "But the former I know much more about, I used to make it myself and save it in mason jars for later. Aromatic and relaxing." Nemo had been looking back to see the rest of the group arrive, but eventually grew bored and turned to Raiya.

"I used to know a talent that drank it obsessively. Kept it in a metal flask in his breast pocket right here." Nemo said as he patted his chest. "Elderflower cordial is a victorian drink, and he was... old fashioned, up-tight, prissy even." He explained. "Going hand in hand, he also had a very large ego, incredibly overconfident. He claimed that there wasn't a person in the world who could beat him in a duel, and fought anybody in a duel to the death on his estate that was willing to risk it. Often ridiculing them into accepting."

"Eventually at one of his parties a poor girl bursts in and confronts the talent. She says that the man killed her father in one of his duels, and vows that she will get her revenge. The talent sees the duel as a waste of time, and sets the date a week away, expecting her to come to her senses by then and not show up. But sure enough, the girl does."

"Everybody at the party expected it to be a landslide, but instead, in front of a crowd of hundreds of people, they watch the duelist meet his end bleeding out on the floor after getting stabbed in the neck by the girl." Nemo explained. "Turns out somebody had laced his elderflower plants with a new special ingredient days before. In the end, what is skill worth if you can't tell you've been drinking poison for the past few days?" He finished with a somewhat pleased expression on his face.

Raiya listened, seemingly distant and disinterested. But when Nemo finished Raiya let out a scoff and her eyes narrowed.

"If I found the bastard that killed my parents, I wouldn't choose such an underhanded tactic as poisoning them. Only the weak choose to use tricks to bring down the strong. No, if I was in her same position, I would have trained as much as possible until the day I was confident in my strength. And then I would have beaten and emasculated him in front of the audience. I would have made sure he felt the full weight of what he did before he died, and just how foolish he was for underestimating me, before killing him. I would want to see the regret in his eyes, I would want to capture in my mind the very moment he realized he erred in his assumptions. And to savor the pitiful cries of mercy from a man who could spare none unto others." Raiya explained.

She gulped down another sip and let the burning sensation of both the alcohol and her anger consume her for a moment. She would find who killed her parents and make them pay, eventually. And as soon as she could figure out how to get out of her deal with Nemo, she would go back to amassing the resources to do just that. After all, it was her curiosity after leaving the Arcanocracy rhat had lead her to the truth that her parents were murdered. And just a few more underworld connections, and she was sure she could pinpoint the perpetrator.

Nemo stared blankly as Raiya spoke, a rather odd look crossed his face before his head suddenly cocked to the side. "The truth depends on perspective, I never said that she was the one who poisoned his flowers. To the girl beating him fair is exactly what she thought she did, and to the audience that's exactly what they thought they saw her do. It made a better story that way. Like David and Goliath." Nemo explained. "We have to accept that there can always be more to the story than what's showed. In the end three things happened that day, the duelist died, the girl got her revenge, and I got paid."

"What we think, know, or see isn't always the truth. The bigger picture is what counts. Anger and rage are forces uncontrollable to it's originator but easily manipulated by others. It's a weakness, much like the duelist's drinking was his own. I'd say if you're gonna have a weakness, make sure you're certain about it beforehand, and make sure nobody else knows.

Upon stepping down into the hidden passage, Travis took careful note of the aged architecture and became surprised to learn that the very materials around them were practically made from pure mana crystals. In most uses, mana crystals typically were utilized in conjunction with spells and enchantments. Seeing structures and constructs made from the stuff was intriguing as it was potentially considered unusual. Even more so was the lighting within the corridors and perhaps much of the rest of the catacombs. He recalled no torches or and magical lamps of any sort. In fact, it seemed that sculpted mana crystals, despite their dark coloration, seemed to give off a sort of soft illumination that fairly lit up the transparent yet reflective walls in which light was forever constant.

Travis however wondered if the mana crystals were merely an aesthetically appealing theme or if they served some sort of unknown purpose. Stepping further into the catacombs did they soon find coffins also made from mana crystals lined up against the walls. Like the architecture, the coffins also displayed a physical transparency but unlike the mana crystal structures around them, the coffins actually held bodies within them or put simply, the skeletal remains. Not minding anyone for a moment, Travis investigate one coffin up close but dared not touch it when hearing Felix over the manadial warning of another spell up ahead. With no markings to address the identity of the skeletons, Travis brainstormed why these were even here in the first place. Did the architects construct a tomb to bury important figures at the time related to the Paragon? Or could this be some form of magical trap that encompasses the mana crystals as a whole?

Their ventures inward eventually lead the group to a surprisingly large room climbing several stories high with more mana crystal coffins decorating the place upward. But the more important feature that would test their progress were a number of granite doors covered in small flakes of the crystals that seeming made up the whole catacombs. Raiya and Felix went back and forth identifying the sealed entrance before them. While similar in concept, the door however had no runes written upon it and was speculated to be enchanted by the mana crystals around it. Raiya casted two advanced spell in an attempt to test and possibly destroy the entrance but neither could even scratch the door despite their explosive results. A protection spell was likely responsible for this.

While Nemo and Raiya seemingly switched topics on something irrelevant while the rest of their party formed up, Travis decided to investigate more of the doorways to see if there was any way to exploit their design like before. Since there were no intricate runes to rewrite, this puzzle at least to him, seemed more linear but theoretically hopeless with the aspects of the enchainment painfully clear. Summoning his own arte of mana analysis, he scanned the surroundings seeking to find anything that was not visibly evident. As he did so, Travis eventually toggled his own manadial until he figured out how the earpiece.

“…quite a few occupied coffins here – all made out of mana crystals as with the rest of the place…Notably the same color as the gems inlaid with the door…” Travis said to himself aloud before raising attention to him, “Anyone have any ideas what purpose these coffins serve? I’d be disappointed if they’re made out mana crystals just for the sake of being made out of ‘em…”

"Looking at how everything is made of mana crystal, in a reverent almost religious manner... this is definitely not Academia's doing." Raiya replied to Travis.

She picked herself up off the ground from the spot she was sitting on, and tucked away her pewter flask inside her jacket.

"But you knew that already, didn't you Felix?" Raiya asked and waited a few seconds for a response that didn't come.

"I'll take that as a yes." Raiya sighed.

Raiya then held her left hand out the the side, channeling mana to her hands and visualizing her katana, and beckoned it from her mana inventory.

In a bright blue discharge of electrical mana, a sheathed four foot long odachi appeared in her hand.

"And my guess, is that these mana crystal coffins are not just decorative." Raiya said, her expression darkening.

She walked over to the opening to the room they had come through from the corridor.

Raiya stopped three feet before the opening, and took a slightly crouched combat stance. She reached her right hand over slowly, charging mana as she did so, until her hand reached the hilt of the katana. Immediately she used her left hand which was holding the saya (scabbard) of the sword, in tandem with her right hand on the hilt, and her mana she had just enhanced her arms with to draw her sword lightning fast in a horizontal slash.

The slash arced out crossing the threshold of the room to the corridor, the slash was faster than the normal eye could follow, and within that same fluid motion she had placed the sword back into the saya. Within a half a second of the sword crossing the threshold of the room to the corridor, a large door came crashing down, blocking the entrance and leaving them sealed in.

Raiya turned back to face the group, and saw that the coffins that were lining the walls of the chamber were glowing fiercely now. Each coffin was slowly sliding open, and the bones within them began to stir. Slowly the skeletons in each coffin came alive and began to crawl out onto the ground. Soon the group was surrounded by a legion of the undead, about two hundred in total.

"Now, this is the type of action I've been waiting for." Raiya smirked.

Suddenly there was a large rumbling and the floor in the middle of the room opened, revealing a large coffin. It contained the bones of an ogre, about twenty feet tall.

"Well, if no one wants to take the Ogre, I will." Raiya's eyes glowed brightly.

Nemo stood rather plainly as the group was surrounded. Only letting out a "Huh..." at the turn of events.

"Quality? Or quantity? Take your best shot at it." Nemo commented to Raiya. He didn't make a move for any of his guns yet, instead he pulled his black leather glove tight and pointed his right hand in a 'fake gun' fashion towards one of the skeletons. "I never bothered with the undead all that much, it just doesn't give the same rush as fighting something alive. However there is one thing I always liked..." Nemo fired a white manablast from his fingertips straight at one of the skeletons head. When it connected it exploded it's skull with an audible pop. "The wonderful sounds they make." He finished afterward.

Artos stood defiantly with the others, both swords at the ready with the bow strung across his chest. Ice Arrows resting in the now empty scabbard of his right hip waiting to be used. The undead were too numerous to count, already they began to gather for their assault on the small party. As he had expected the creatures were the key to the door and only those capable of destroying them would gain entrance to the next area of the dungeon. Silently he wondered if the real enemy would show themselves after the group had done all the work. Entirely likely. The group already had a few shots taken at the swarm but as for inflicted damage, a few re-killed zombies in a sea of them was not giving them much of an advantage.

Artos pointed his right hand blade at the swarm and felt the magic build until finally he released it in a cloud of freezing air, his energy would create a zone of absolute zero. Lacking any real defense the creatures were likely to freeze and crumble under their own weight. All it took was to will the zone to be colder, cover more distance, and they would have the fight at the ready. It would have been easier if he could be in the center of his own field forcing the monsters to enter it to attack him, but until the wised up and avoided the patch, it was as good a tactic as any.
Any other ghouls that wandered too close would find his blades and the swift flight back to the afterlife.

It was pleasing for Travis to know that someone else was sharing his same line of thinking. However, the individual in question was none other than Raiya whom Travis still felt weary of but nonetheless was satisfied of their equal conclusion. She was right that the theme this room represented didn't appear to relate to any Academia mannerisms, instead, as Raiya pointed out, seemed to correlate with a more religious tone. Curious how that came into being. Perhaps another organization gave its influence here too in order to safeguard the Paragon?

As Travis pondered more on the subject, Raiya had shifted her earlier focus and unexpectedly in a quick mana-infused swipe of her blade, just barely catching Travis' eye, the entrance they came through moments ago then had become sealed with a larger slab blocking their escape route. Just before Travis could understandably object to this course of action, the coffins around and above them suddenly began to glow brilliantly, reacting to the now obvious trap that had been sprung. In eerie fashion, the gleaming coffins slowly opened revealing their skeletal occupants to stir and clatter as they arose and crawled forth from their tombs.

Startled by this sudden turn of events, Travis took several steps back, distancing himself away from several now-walking skeletons treading towards him while their soul-piercing eyes glowed the same hue as the mana crystal. When one of them jolted into a lunge, Travis hesitated only for a instant before casting a repulsion spell, sending his lanky foe crashing against the opposing wall, falling into disarrayed fragments. Despite his attack, the skeletons still advanced toward him unfazed.

“Well I’m happy you’re getting want you wanted!” Travis said aloud in response to Raiya’s initial comment of the situation before repelling another skeleton with another spell, sweat already beginning to form above his forehead as each discharge sapped him of his already limited mana reserves.

It was then a loud rumbling occurred before him did he freeze his place and slowly turned his head to investigate the disturbance. A massive casket rose from the floor and soon too opened, bringing forth the undead skeletal remains of an orge lumbering into the room. Its size was nearly half that of the entire space above them and displaced many of those around it with ease.

“Uh…you can have it,” Travis worriedly commented as he backed away all the while continuing to repell his own attackers.