Previously in NWC-
Reno and Luna begin to slowly make up with each other. After an uneventful morning, they leave camp and make their way to the ruins entrance. Reno trips on a hole which happens to be where the seemingly homeless chunk of concrete fits perfectly. The door to the ruins opens after the chunk is returned, causing the group to return to camp, packing up and moving to the entrance of the ruins. They spend the rest of the day planning for their descent tomorrow. After going to sleep, Reno wakes up in the middle of the night. On his short walk back to camp, he's frozen in place after locking eyes with a shadowy figure standing in the entrance to the ruins...
"Aghh!" Reno grips his head, keeling over as he shouts with pain. The voice repeats the same word over and over again until his ears begin to ring. His vision gets slightly blurry and his nose continues to bleed, dripping blood on the concrete for it to be absorbed without him noticing. His head begins to pound, the pain getting close to unbearable. Suddenly, the pain disappears and he begins gasping for breath. He feels a hand on his shoulder, shaking him. He gasps for breath as he looks up at the source of the hand. He sees CeCe looking at him with concern, her eyes giving off a sense of fear.
"Reno, what happened?!"
"Huh?" Reno looks at CeCe as his ears slowly regain their ability to hear. "What?"
CeCe kneels down and places her hand on his head. "Your nose is bleeding and you have a fever. Your skin is pale too! What the hell happened?!"
Reno opens his mouth to speak, but the words don't come out. "What was I doing? I was pissing one second, then the next I'm here."
CeCe begins looking over Reno, feeling his body for injuries with a sense of urgency. Not finding any, she breathes a sigh of relief. "I think you might have given yourself a concussion earlier when you fell over. I hate to say it, but we need to get you looked at, Reno. I'll wake up the others and we'll have to cut our losses."
"What?! You're over reacting! Look, I just fell over again, I promise. That's why my nose is bleeding again."
CeCe sighs with frustration. I know you're lying, Reno."
Reno gently grips CeCe's arms, looking at her with his slightly unfocused eyes. "Please, CeCe. I've just been stressed out lately. I'm just tired. I should be fine when I wake up." Reno prevents her from speaking by walking past her and going to his tent, cleaning the blood off of his nose with his water magic.
"Reno…" CeCe watches as Reno goes to his tent. "What is so important that you'd risk your health? I guess we all have secrets, but what is yours?" She returns to her tent, barely able to return to sleep with all of the questions racing through her head. Morning comes and Reno is the last to wake up. CeCe ponders if she should tell Luna about what happened or not. Reno wakes up before she can make a decision. She rushes over and begins looking him over. "Are you okay? Not feeling sick?"
Reno sighs and shakes his head. "I'm fine. I think I was just under a bit of stress, that was all. This is all a lot more exciting than I'm used to. Just me, okay?" Reno gives CeCe a pleading look as he looks into her eyes.
CeCe sighs and nods her head once. "Fine. But, if you start feeling sick then you need to speak up, okay? There's no point being here if you're just going to die halfway through, okay?"
Reno nods his head in agreement. "Deal. I'll let you guys know if I start feeling how I did last night."
With their conversation over, they pack up camp, standing at the entrance to the ruins. CeCe stands in front of the stairs, looking at the other three. "Here's the order I think we should go in. It sounds like I have the most experience with these kinds of places, so I'll take the lead. Reno, you should come in behind me in case I need backup, since it sounds like Medusa can handle herself if the need arises. Thus, following you will be Luna, then Medusa. "Any objections?" CeCe pans over the party, giving them the opportunity to speak up if they wanted. Not hearing anything, she begins walking down the stairs slowly and carefully. "Be careful, guys. Some stairs look perfectly fine but then you step on them and they're super slippery." The party reaches the bottom and begins walking towards the now opened door. CeCe begins pulling out a torch and gets ready to light it as she turns around. "I'm going to get us a light sou-" She turns around to see Medusa's brightly glowing eyes and mouth and Luna's bright glowing body. "…Never mind." She puts her equipment away and makes her way to the doorway. "Alright, I'm going to step in." CeCe announces her next move before finally placing her foot past the door. Not sensing anything, she walks in. They walk for what seems like a full minute, the slope of the hallway slowly increasing until it becomes impossible to not notice. "Careful, don't slip." CeCe continues to lead them through the hallway, using the light from her party members to light the way. Finally, they turn a corner, turning right. However, they're met with nothing but a wall.
"What the fuck, dude." Reno holds his hands up in annoyance.
"Hold on a moment." CeCe slowly places her hand on the wall and begins feeling around. "That might be it?" She finds a spot where she can sense a tiny amount of mana oozing from it, indicating a magically operated device of remotely operated spell. "Nobody move or touches anything. There might be a trap nearby."
Reno sneezes and causes his body to almost fall over. He stops himself with his hand, touching the spot where the spell activates. "Sorry, didn't mean to sneeze." A small rumbling noise can be heard, getting louder. Suddenly the floor begins to shake slightly, causing vibrating shocks to shoot through their feet.
CeCe looks at Reno with disappointment. "Really?" Suddenly, the floor opens up underneath CeCe, causing her to flail her arms and legs and instinctively grab Reno's leg. This causes him to fall backwards and fall in with her. "AHHH!" She screams and falls down the trap hole with Reno before the trap door quickly slides shut.
"RENO! CECE!" Luna begins shouting, trying to get the trap to activate again. "No! It must have run out of mana after all of this time! They have to be somewhere; it can't just go nowhere! Unless… what if it's just a hole and they die in there?!" Luna begins to panic, but Medusa places a vine on her, completely unaware of what is happening anymore. "Luna!" She smiles and calls Luna's name in a successful attempt to calm down Luna.
Suddenly a door opens up, presumably as an after effect of the trap begin sprung. Luna makes her way through the door, making sure to maintain her composure. "Come, Medusa! I'm certain that they're fine, we just need to find them!" Medusa follows behind, her face plastered with excitement at the ignorance of the situation. They make their way in, their own bodies adequately lighting up the hallway. The path begins curving and slanting downwards at an aggressive angle, causing Medusa to slide slightly. "Medusa, honey, make sure to hold on to the walls to make sure you don't slip." Medusa nods her head and extends her vines, using them to grip the wall on each side of her as well as the ceiling. They make their way down the path for seconds, that turn into minutes. Finally, after a couple minutes of wandering through the hallway, they're met with an opening. The other side of the opening is dark and extends seemingly forever. They enter the large room, their natural light barely enough to allow them to see the other side of the room. Inside the room was chiseled stones, made into benches, that lined both sides of a long walkway. On the other end of the room was a slightly raised stone platform, shaped in the form of a stage. A single stone alter stood on the platform, with a doorway in the middle of the wall. "This place… I wonder what went on here?" The two make their way further in, looking around the room. The walls and walkway appeared to be slightly bright in portions, indicating the presence of furniture at one point. The walls had multiple square outlines of noticeably cleaner portions where pictures presumably hung. The floor had a rectangular portion where a carpet may have once existed. They make their way to the stone alter, checking out the alter. The alter had a tattered book with writing similar to the concrete slab on the surface. "This must have been some sort of religious room, used for prayer. But why did they have a trap at the entrance?" Luna makes her way into the next room, shouting with surprise as she does. "Ahh!"
TO BE CONTINUED...