"Where is Erich?!" Sydra yelled as he ran over to help Robert deal with the crystal gargoyle. Looking at the gargoyle, Sydra noticed that its arm had regrown from earlier when Robert had shattered it with his hammer. 'Well this isn't going to be easy if it can regenerate,' Sydra thought.
"He is still up on the third floor where we ran into these monsters, and before I was sent flying out of the house I saw him dealing with two of them. I've already destroyed this one several times, but it keeps regenerating somehow," Robert yelled back as he slammed his hammer into the gargoyle's chest, sending it flying backward several feet into the wall of the house. Infusing more of his fire aura into his war hammer, Robert jumped into the air and aimed his hammer towards the gargoyle's head while it was still struggling to get out of the wall.
"Can you manage this one on your own until Cidre shows up, I want to go help Erich out?" Sydra asked as he looked over to the house that Cidre had been in last. With all this commotion, Sydra was certain that Cidre would come to help before long.
"Of course, it seems that this thing's regeneration is starting to slow down, anyway," Robert said as he tried to pull his hammer from the grasp of the gargoyle, who had grabbed it before it could smash into its head. Getting mad, Robert yanked his hammer harshly, only to end up stumbling backward when the gargoyle let go of it at the last moment.
'It seems these crystal gargoyles have a bit of intelligence,' Sydra thought as he raced past Robert and ran into the house. Looking around for the stairs to the next floor, Sydra noticed that the first floor of the house resembled the other two houses he had visited closely, the only difference being that everything seemed to be three times longer.
'Odd,' Sydra thought as he raced to the area where he had found the stairs in the second house, thinking if the rest of the house was the same then the stairs should be as well. A few seconds later and Sydra had found the stairs that led up to the second floor. Grabbing onto the crystal railing, Sydra ascended the stairs two at a time, quickly flying up the stairs and reaching the second floor. Turning around, Sydra hoped that the next set of stairs would be over the first set, but he was wrong and had to search around for them.
"Dang it, I never finished exploring the second house's second floor," Sydra grumbled as he ran around the second floor, shoving the doors open and looking inside the rooms. When he reached the fourth door, Sydra began to become anxious at not having found the stairs yet.
"Please be here," Sydra said as he pushed open the fourth door, and saw the stairs leading to the third floor. "Yes!" Sydra said as he ran up the stairs and stumbled out onto the battlefield of the third floor. Most of the crystal walls had been smashed through, and Sydra saw the scattered remains of a gargoyle spread across the floor. Past the remains, Sydra witnessed another gargoyle being thrown through one of the few remaining intact crystal walls. A moment later, Erich ran after it while swinging his mace wildly.
"Erich, how did you kill this gargoyle?" Sydra called out, wanting to figure out how Erich had done, so he could relay the information to Robert. Seeing that Erich hadn't seemed to hear him, Sydra ran after him as he disappeared into the next room over. While running over, Sydra looked out the hole that Robert had flown out of earlier and saw the Cidre still hadn't shown up to help out. Unable to figure out why Cidre hadn't come yet, Sydra gritted his teeth and kept running after Erich.
"Shatter for me!" Erich yelled as Sydra ran around the corner, and witnessed him swinging his mace into the gargoyle's back and shattering its wings. As the wings fell to the ground, Erich pierced his hand into its back and pulled out a light red crystal, before crushing it to dust in his hand. Erich then opened his hand and let the dust fall to the floor, while the gargoyle exploded into multiple shards that flew across the room in all directions.
"Oh, Sydra, I wasn't aware you were here," Erich said as he stepped over the crystal remains and walked over to Sydra. "Has Robert figured out how to destroy the gargoyles yet?" He asked as he stepped through the hole in the wall.
"I don't think so, were there any others?" Sydra asked as the two of them ran back to the hole in the wall and jumped out of it. After plummeting down the three stories, Sydra and Erich landed heavily on the ground and looked around. Robert had managed to destroy the gargoyle, but it managed to break his arm before it died.
"No, but where is Cidre?" Erich asked as they walked over to Robert and Sydra began healing his arm.
"I'm not sure, Robert, did Cidre come out while we were inside the house?" Sydra asked as he finished healing Robert's arm.
"No, he hasn't come out of the house yet, and it's starting to worry me," Robert said as he began to move his arm back and forth, making sure everything was working properly. "We should go check on him right?" He asked as he lowered his arm back down to his side.
"Of course, but maybe we should stop having him go off on his own. I mean, he keeps disappearing on us, and we have to look for him," Sydra said as he led the other two over to the house that he had seen Cidre entering last. Earlier, when Sydra had left the first house, he had been surprised to see Cidre already entering the third house.
Pulling out his spyglass, Sydra looked through it to see if he could spot Cidre that way. Scanning the house, Sydra was startled to not find Cidre anywhere inside at all, but there was another life form on the third floor. The life form seemed to be the mix of a man with large black wings and a long tail with a snake head at the end of it.
"What is that?" Erich asked as he glanced at Sydra and saw him peering at the house through a spyglass.
"It's an enchanted spyglass that can see through things to whatever I want to see. I found it in one of the houses earlier, but that's not important," Sydra said as he lowered the spyglass from his eye and looked at the other two with a grave look on his face. "I didn't see Cidre inside the house, but there is another person, or thing, that has a humanoid shape, but two large black wings and a snake tail, with the head of a snake at the end of it. If we go inside, we will more than likely have to fight it," Sydra said as they looked back at the house in front of them. Although Sydra hadn't seen Cidre inside the house, that didn't mean he wasn't in there. And if he was, and he needed their help, then that meant they had to go in.
"So another battle, that doesn't seem new for us," Robert said as he continued forward towards the house with conviction. As he was about to open the door, a window on the third floor exploded and the winged being flew out. He was covered in light purple mist, and in his hands was the sword that Sydra had given Cidre earlier that day.
"Where are the bad guys?" The man yelled as he flew around in the air crazily, as he had never flown before. Looking around the man saw Sydra and the others and flew down towards them. "Hey, gu..."
'Bam' Erich slammed his mace's handle into the guy's face and knocked him out, before hopping on top of him and grabbing his wrist tightly.
"Quickly get me some rope, we can tie this guy up and ask him where Cidre is when he wakes up!" Erich yelled as he looked back at Sydra. Taking some rope out of his backpack, Sydra walked up and was about to hand the rope to Erich before he stopped.
"I don't think we need to ask him where Cidre is," Sydra said as he put the role back into his backpack.
"What do you mean?" Erich asked before he looked back down at the man he was holding tightly onto. The purple mist had dispersed, and the man's face could be seen clearly. Seeing who it was, Erich quickly hopped off the man and brushed off his clothes.
"Urgh, what the hell hit me?" Cidre asked as he sat up and rubbed his forehead, before looking around at the guys standing around him.
"Uh... It was crazy, this humongous demon appeared out of nowhere and slammed his fist into your face before disappearing again," Erich said before looking away quickly.