Spinning through the path beyond the gateway, Sydra feels the air around him becoming hotter by the second, 'Where does this gateway lead, for it to be getting so hot?'
Flipping his body forward, Sydra peers toward the end of the path, which is another gateway. Looking through the gateway, he can make out black trees growing out of red dirt, with beasts walking about.
"It's home! That's my home!" The girl with red wings shrieks, her wings flapping excitedly, and hitting the others.
"Hey, watch it," Lucas says, covering his face before the wings can rub against it anymore, "Anyways, how long is this path going to take?"
"I'm not sure, but we've already been traveling down it for several minutes," Sydra says, his eyes still focused on the gateway. Suddenly, he feels his body pass through a barrier, and begin falling towards the red ground below, "Wait! That was too sudden!"
Wishing he still had his wings, Sydra braces himself as the ground gets closer and closer, but right before he hits it he feels the back of his armor being grabbed. Looking back, Sydra finds claws going through his armor, and keeping him from slamming into the ground.
"Why are you all so heavy?" the girl with red wings asks, her arms holding onto the bodies of Lucas and Kayla. Dropping them all onto the ground, the girl moans and flaps a few feet away before also landing on the ground.
"Why? Why did you save me?" Lucas asks, looking at the girl in confusion, "I thought you hated my father for capturing you,"
Stretching out her wings, the girl looks at Lucas and laughs, "I don't hate your father, I just owed him a favor," she says as she makes her way back over.
"A favor?" Lucas asks, becoming even more confused, "For what?"
"My name is Glaycia, and several years ago your father visited this place in the search of a special stone. The one that he later used to create that gateway. While he was here, he saved my life from some people and brought me back to the place afterward," Glaycia says, sitting down on a stump that was nearby.
"Then why were you chained up?" Sydra asks, "And who was the ice user that released you?"
Holding up her hand, Glaycia creates a ball of ice above her hand before tossing it over to Sydra, "I was never really chained up, that was just to trick anyone who might have been watching Arthur. In truth, I actually had a really nice room, filled with all sorts of goodies at the bottom of the staircase,"
Thinking back, Sydra realizes that although what Glaycia said was hard to believe, it wasn't impossible. If she really did have the ability to escape at any time, as well as kill the guards as easily as Kayla said she had, then what was keeping her from doing so before.
"Hey... Does it look like someone else is coming out of the gateway?" Kayla asks, turning everyone's attention to the red gateway in the sky, which was beginning to pulse.
Jumping up, Sydra looks around the area they had fallen into for a place to hide. As he searched, he found out that they were currently standing between three volcanoes which formed a triangle. Two of the volcanoes appeared to be dormant, but the third one had magma leaking out of its sides.
"Follow me, my actual home is over there," Icemelt says, pointing towards the active volcano, "We can hide there, and wait to see if whoever is coming out is someone we can trust,"
The four of them run up the side of the volcano, jumping over small streams of magma as they went. About halfway up the volcano, they spotted a small hole behind a boulder and Glaycia motioned for them to jump inside it.
"Ahh!" Kayla yells as she slides down a tunnel made from ice. Behind her, Lucas and Sydra are sliding through the same tunnel, and Glaycia is covering the top of the hole with a stone.
At the end of the tunnel, the four of them slide into a room filled with furniture made from ice. However, the thing that gathered everyone's attention wasn't the furniture, but one of the walls, which was made from clear ice allowing the group to watch the magma flowing on the other side.
"This is my room of Nevermelt Ice, and no matter what the temperature is, the ice will never melt," Glaycia says as she walks across the room and settles down in one of the chairs, "It's good to be home,"
"Is there some way to see outside?" Sydra asks, still worrying about the person who came through the gateway behind them.
"Sure, just look at that table over there," Glaycia says, pointing to a table that had a smaller version of the Volcanic Isle on it. Making his way over to it, Sydra sees that the model shows everything happening on the island with small ice sculptures.
"Hey look, it's us," Kayla says as she stares at the volcano representing the one they were currently occupying. Inside the smaller volcano were four ice sculptures that closely resembled Sydra and the others.
"Yeah, and it looks like the one who followed us through the gateway was Captain Henry," Lucas says, pointing towards an ice sculpture flying around the island. "It looks like he is using gravity to move himself around the air,"
"Do you think he will find us?" Kayla asks, stepping closer to Lucas. "What will we do if he does, none of us are his match,"
Getting up from the chair, Glaycia makes her way over to the table and watches the sculpture representing Captain Henry, "I wouldn't worry too much about him, the ruler of this island will take care of him,"
"Ruler? How strong are they?" Sydra asks, remembering how easily Captain Henry kicked him around. Sydra was pretty sure Captain Henry hadn't even been using half of his full strength, and the only way he had managed to escape was through a sneak attack.
"Considering the ruler is a legendary beast known as the Magma Titan and is the spirit of three volcanos, I would say he is pretty strong," Glaycia says, her face becoming slightly red as she thinks of the person.
Turning their attention back to the Volcanic Isle, the group watches as the magma sea around the volcanos begins to collect together, forming the titanic form of a man wearing armor made from flowing magma.
Back on the surface, Captain Henry is flying around in search of Lucas and the others, "Damn it, they couldn't have gotten far, so where are they?"
He had been circling over the volcanos for the past fifteen minutes, and every minute that passed seemed to be hotter than the last. Preparing to do another sweep of the island, Captain Henry pauses when he sees the magma sea around the volcanos begin to collect, and a towering person emerges from it.
The man is covered in black armor held together by lines of magma and has two horns of obsidian emerging above his red eyes. Below his eyes is the bottom half of a demonic mask with two more obsidian horns curving out of the bottom of it.
In the titan's hand is a red mace, burning with blue flames, and he points it towards Captain Henry, "I am Hyperion, the Lord of this island. Tell me, mortal, why have you come here?"
Instead of answering, Captain Henry raises his sword towards Hyperion and releases his gravity aura in an attack. The gravity around Hyperion's chest contracts and cracks begin appearing on his armor. Frowning, Hyperion taps his finger against his chin as he studies Captain Henry.
"I wonder if you are 'special'?" Hyperion asks, causing Captain Henry to become engaged. Raising his other hand, Captian Henry increases the amount of pressure on Hyperion's chest plate, but it only causes more cracks to appear.
Seeing this, fear appears in Captain Henry's eyes, and he drops both his hands as he turns around. Moving his body as fast as he can, Captain Henry attempts to get far away from Hyperion, but he soon finds his path blocked off by a wall of magma.
"Where are you going?" Hyperion asks, taking a single step to reach Captain Henry.
Before Captain Henry can think of escaping in a different direction, he finds himself pinched between Hyperion's fingers. Raising his to his face, Hyperion takes a closed look at Captain Henry, before turning in the direction of Glaycia's volcano.
"Glaycia, I thought we discussed you bringing people back with you," Hyperion says, his body sinking back into the magma sea, "Hold on, I'm coming over,"
Back in the volcano, everyone is watching the ice diagram in awe as they listen to Hyperion's thundering voice. Hearing what he said, Lucas looks around the tiny room they were in.
"Um, what does he mean by coming over?" Lucas asks. But Glaycia doesn't have the chance to answer before the sound of someone knocking echoes through the room. Turning in the direction of the ice wall, Lucas's mouth drops open as he sees a young man standing on the other side, Captain Henry knocked out beside him and trapped in chains of magma.