"Help me! Someone, please save me!"
An adorable little girl's forlorn voice echoed in everyone's head, accompanied by the adorable sound of a cat's cry. Coming from the last, unopened door at the end of the hall, Maven was energized at this opportunity for some real adventure. Eyes gleaming in excitement at the chance to rescue someone, Maven ran excitedly to the door at the end of the hall.
"We're here to help!"
Maven shouted as she turned the door into fine powder, not even trying to turn the doorknob or open the door. She burst into the room with all the momentum of a raging bull. Was there any need to preserve the property value of a warehouse used by evil cultists, especially if the life of a young girl was at stake?
"Eeeep!"
Surprised by the sudden noise and outburst of divine power, the unknown voice let out a cute little scream. Maven, hearing the frightened cry, lost a lot of her momentum as she drew back in embarrassment. In her excitement to rescue whatever damsel in distress was trapped here, she ended up just scaring the poor thing even more.
"I'm sorry for scaring you..." Maven said regretfully, looking for the source of the meow. "We're not here to hurt you, I promise. I just let myself get a little carried away… We took care of all those big bad guys out there for you, so you don't need to be afraid anymore."
"R-Really? They're gone now? No way…" A young girl's voice asked in disbelief, her voice dead and full despair. After spending so long trapped by the Malum Dictum, she just couldn't believe they were gone.
With each of her mental communications accompanied by weak meows, Maven managed to use the sound to figure out where the voice was coming from in the dingy old room.
"So pretty…" Someone let out a breathless gasp as they came face to face with the one had been calling for help.
There in the center of the room sat a single metal cage, visible only by the one tiny ray of evening light that made its way through a small, grime-encrusted window. Somehow, even in this poor environment, the lone occupant of the cage managed to shine like a jewel.
"What's a Siberian Tiger cub doing here?" Maven asked, confused at the presence of an animal which looked almost identical to the famous feline from Earth. It appeared to be a shining white tiger, glowing with gentle silver light and exuding a deep spiritual aura that didn't match its small size.
"That's not a Siberian Tiger, Maven." Henna said with exasperation. "What would one of those be doing here on Avalon, anyway? That's a juvenile Mirage Tiger, of all things. She's the Divine Beast of the Light element... but what's one doing here? There's only ever supposed to be one at a time, but Lyla should still have several hundred more years to live."
"You knew my mom?" The little tiger asked, eyes sparkling as she spoke to the group beyond the cage bars.
"I sure did!" Kannon said, bursting to the front of the crowd eagerly. "I knew Lyla from the time she just a little baby, when she was even smaller than you are now!"
"Really??"
"Yeah! We were best friends. I used to play with her all the time. I even helped her pick her child's name... Jasmine, that should be your name, right?"
"How'd you know?" Jasmine asked, heartened by the news.
The tiger rose from her prone position to stare at everyone through the bars with eyes shining with hope.
"Let's get you out of there, behind bars is no way to have a conversation." Maven said soothingly as she reached for the bars of the cage. A solid metal monstrosity with bars thicker than her arms and brimming with enchantments, even a powerful Earth mage like Shayna could only shake her head in despair. Such a cage fell apart into red sand in a matter of seconds after Maven used the same Death magic technique she used to disintegrate the door, her divine power rendering those enchantments meaningless.
Now freed from her bindings, the little tiger padded over to Maven and gave her an upturned gaze full of gratitude.
"Thank you for saving me!" The cat said, her large eyes glistening with tears.
Presented with such a sight from a tiger just a little larger than your average house cat, Maven's brain ended up shorting out from the sheer adorability of it all.
"You're so cute! So cute! so cute!"
Snatching the fluffy feline up in her arms, Maven rubbed her face in that fur as she buried the divine beast in endless kisses as she raved.
"Maven…" Ela said, hesitantly shaking Maven's shoulder as she tried to wake Maven from her fluff induced madness. "Maybe you should stop… I don't think she likes it."
Noticing the tiger's raised hackles, Maven blushed with embarrassment and pulled her face away in a hurry.
"L-Let's get out here." Maven stammered as she hefted the tiger onto her shoulder and made her way to the door, "We've got to figure out where we ended up."