MAZE - The Endless Quest

Once they were inside the mines, Alan explained to Helena what they were doing. As the fight started, some of the people working in this area rushed here to hide. They had the option of going to the one on the opposite side of the valley, but it was more dangerous there. According to the man, monsters would occasionally get inside the tunnels, and that didn’t happen here.

After arriving, some of the people who didn’t come with their families, or the ones that were brave enough, would leave in order to bring the others here. But it was clear that this wasn’t an option anymore. The fight was getting increasingly more hectic and if they kept going back and forth; it was more likely for them to attract the wrong kind of attention. Doing that hurt, and there were a number of people who just left to look for their loved ones, but people were scared. More than anything, they were scared that a stray spell or attack would hit one of the children. They all had yet to gain their first level up, which meant their attributes were currently extremely low. A strike that would injure the parents could kill one of the children with ease.

It didn’t take someone specialized in reading people’s expression to realize that decisions were weighing on the group. Helena just patted Alan’s shoulder, “Don’t worry. It was a good call.”

A loud blast made the entire cave tremble.

“Should we stay here or go deeper inside?” Alan turned to Helena.

“I’m not sure. Does anyone here understand caves?” the mage faced the crowd of 40 or so inside.

A fox beastwoman in the back raised her hand, “I’m an earth mage. No one used spells to make the mine, but generally, the deeper you go, the more dangerous it is.”

“Wouldn’t the shock of the impacts be smaller if we went deeper?” a triton asked.

“Yes, but that’s only the case if the space between the surface and where we are is completely filled. If there are caves, or small gaps, then the impact might dislodge something, and that can trigger a cascade effect.”

“Like a landslide?” one of the kids asked.

“Exactly.”

“Ok then. We stay here,” Helena glanced back to the door, thinking if she should use her spells to make it harder for people to notice it. On one hand, that could help the group hide. But seeing the door might make people be more careful with attacks aimed at their general direction.

The noise became even louder. It was clear that the fight outside was picking up momentum. But unfortunately, they had no way of knowing which side was winning. Not from inside the cave. Helena tried sending her shadow army outside, but unlike Hera’s court, she had no way of communicating with her summons properly. Those constructs also had very limited intelligence. As a result, any attempts to talk with them ended up being a waste of time. Still, the mage had nothing to do but to wait. Which was almost as bad as the anxiety she felt once she found out about Alan.

Unable to do anything else, the group just stood there. All in silence while hearing the sounds of battle outside. At one point, the sounds grew louder, showing that the fight was getting closer, but thankfully, it just continued moving. After an extremely long 20 minutes, the place became silent once more.

“We are doing a roll call. Answer me when I call your name with your status and location,” Tania’s voice suddenly came from the communicator. When they started this operation, it was configured so it only could receive signals, but now that the fight was over, Kaela had removed that restriction.

She went down a list, calling everyone and giving a few seconds to hear a reply. It was in alphabetical order, which means that Helena would be the Second to be called amongst the people she knew. Flint came first, and he grumbled that he was ok, just tired and by one of the entrances of the camp.

“Helena?” Tania called.

“I’m ok. Inside one of the mines with some of the prisoners. Is it safe to leave?”

“Yeah, bring them out. We are gathering everyone in the central square. Now, Hera?”

When no one answered, Helena froze, could Hera be hurt? Did something happen to her? How? She had the entire court, how was the Ophidianite too injured to speak? Could she be….

“Hera?” Tania called again.

“Here,” the Empress coughed, her voice really raspy, “Sorry. Was drinking water,” she coughed again, “It went down the wrong pipe.”

“Girl, you scared me,” Tania’s relief was palpable, “If something was able to bring you down we would be in trouble. Where are you?”

“In one of the ends of the camp too. But I don’t see Flint around, so it’s probably the opposite end.”

“OK, go to the square. Also, I don’t know if I have to ask this, but is your court ok? Does that matter?” Tania asked.

“More on a personal level than what you might be thinking. But they are fine. The twins got hurt and are resting for now. They should be good to go in a couple of hours.”

“What happened? Did they find someone that strong? Is that person dead?”

“No, no,” Hera cleared her throat, her voice finally returning to normal, “They got greedy, jumped in the middle of a dozen humans at once with no backup and no one else to distract them. It was too much for those two and they got a bit beaten up because of it. But they managed to win.”

“Got it. Next, Kristal.”

“Here. Literally by your side, Tania,” an annoyed voice replied.

“I know, but it’s part of the procedure. Let me just continue,” Tania huffed and continued the roll call. From the 30 members of her team, 26 replied. The remaining four were quickly found as people started to search. Two were hit by sleep spells that knocked them out, and one was injured to the point of losing their conscience. The last one was killed during the fight. The Harmony Guardians were all doing fine, and so were the people who went alone to cover the exits of the valley.

Later Kaela also gave them all the rundown of the situation while the groups gathered in the central square. Among all the 70 people participating in the operation, three were dead. Five people were injured to the point of not being able to fight for a while, and ten were momentarily incapacitated by various spells ranging from sleep and paralysis to a nasty petrification effect. Still the healers already started working on them and it seemed like soon they would all be able to fight again.

Helena accompanied Brian, Alan, and Celeste, along with the rest of the people inside the mines, to the central square. Only now she saw the full extent of the damages caused by the attack. About half of the camp was destroyed, or in the process of being destroyed by whatever leftover spell was still acting. On the flip side, there were only a handful of prisoners that were hurt during the battle, and no one died.

According to what people said, that was a funny situation. Every member of the Alliance team wanted to protect the families for obvious reasons, but it looked like the humans were also following similar orders. Once an attack of a fight got too close to the people living in the camp, the combatants would stop what they were doing and walk away before resuming their clash.

That fact left a weird taste in everyone’s mouth. Since it would mean that the humans here were not as bad as they thought. Still, war is war. And all members of the team already accepted they were doing something they didn’t want to do.

Once most of the people involved in the operation arrived at the center of the camp, Kaela started to designate tasks for everyone. The first step of the plan was over, now they had to prepare defenses in this position so the humans wouldn’t gain control over the area again.

“Crafters split into two groups. Group one is making the defensive weapons. Ballistas, any sort of arcane torrent and things like that. Group two is making weapons and armor for the families. We are also taking any item that was with the guards and can help. For the people who live here. You don’t have to participate in the fight, but I advise all of you to be armed. We don’t know how many humans will come to try to take us out. Harpies, I need you to cover the plateau. Work with the crafters to set up the long-range weapons up there. We are also going to use barbed wire or anything of the sort all around the mountain to stop them from climbing. We are also lining up the entire valley with traps. I’m talking spell traps, pitfalls, barricades, whatever we can do. Don’t worry about being able to leave later. We can go from above if we need. In addition, we need people to fuel a large scale barrier we are placing here in the center of the camp. This will stop people from dropping from above like we did,” Kaela looked around. The people just stared back at her. With a nod, she added, “One last thing. We are collapsing part of the mine. We don’t want the humans using the same path we did to get here. Now move people, we are already behind schedule. Go, go, go!”

Flint quickly moved with the crafters to set up the defensive weapons with Vash, while Neria was with the healers helping those in need. Roan and Skyler turned to the traps. Hera and Helena were also going towards the valley to help with the traps when Alan stopped them.

“Hang on. Why are we doing this? I thought the Alliance had figured out a way to bring people somewhere safe. Or they already had taken over the room.”

“Thats…” Hera looked around and noticed Tania close by. The team leader nodded.

“At this point, you can tell him. We already sent a signal, everyone should arrive soon,” the triton said.

“Ok, so no. We didn’t take over the room. Not yet. We had to come save you first to stop the humans from using you as a bargaining chip. Now an army is coming to take over the room. But in order for that to work, we also need to protect this place. Well actually, no. We need to protect you, and this is the best place to do that,” Hera explained.

“Why? Can’t you just take us to the doorway so we can stay behind the army, then?” Alan pressed.

“Honey…” Celeste placed a hand on her husband’s arm, trying to calm him down.

“Alan, it took us. A team of people with specialized gear for hiding hours to get here without being seen. How do you expect us to do the same with this many people? Or how were we supposed to hide from the humans? There is also the case of monsters. For us, we could scare them off of quickly kill them. But with a group this big? I don’t think we can protect everyone. Even if we could. Why would we leave this place? This is a very good defensive position,” Helena said.

“Besides, doing this close to a doorway is not the best idea,” Hera added.

“Why not?” Alan frowned.

The Empress turned to the man, staring deep into his eyes, “Because it’s an escape route. It’s an oh shit button that people can press if things go south. Even if those with families here would stay behind, that doesn’t mean everyone else would act the same way if we had an escape route. Fighting here means we have to defend the position. There is no other choice.”