Ase ran across the dark hallways, her footsteps as silent as the wind. This was the fort's end. The dragon wasn't going to leave a single stone unturned. Those doom-bringers burn the living and dead, they are regarded with respect and dread.
The ground shook as a rumble filled the air, a roar boomed as the prisoner gasped in fear. They knew their end might be near, and their legs couldn't run fast enough to sway away their tears.
"Run! That's the death roar!" The old prisoner cried, panting for air. His body failed to run as fast as his peers.
"Damnable Lizard! What are those useless guards doing?!" The shonky one cursed, grabbing the old man by the tunic and pulled him along, "Move! Old fart! Do you want to burn?!"
"Here!" A loud shout boomed from one of the locked rooms. The rustic door was something that some of the prisoners were familiar with, the torture room. It's here where they were questioned and whipped for information they didn't know. The large prisoner that the guard took earlier for trying to feed Shin must be in there.
Before they could escape, the hallway collapsed under a large impact. Ase barely managed to dodge being crushed as she was running in the front, and she looked at the blocked path and growled. "Wasn't he about to use a death roar? Why a dive bomb now?"
Dragons have two infamous attacks, the breath and dive plunge. The breath has four types that the dragon can use, the first three take at least one minute to recharge and are the fireball, the flamethrower, and the focused beam. The last one is the death roar and it takes at least ten minutes to recharge; the dragon would suck air into his lungs, inflating his chest before unleashing a massive burst of fire. While the dive plunge has two variations, the dive bomb where the dragon emits a burst of fire when hitting the ground like a massive explosion, and the dive crash where he doesn't explode, but uses flames to accelerate and land with a higher speed and force.
Now that they were stuck, the old man rushed to open the torture room and get the large prisoner out. Any extra hand would be a great help, they can't let him locked in there and run away.
When the old man scrambled to open the door, the shonky prisoner growled and approached. "Move it." He looked at the lock for a few seconds and snorted, "Cat, you've got the keys." He could recognize the look with a glance. He was used to picking them all the time as a thief.
After Ase threw them the keys, they opened the door and the large prisoner walked out.
The large prisoner's back was lashed, filled with cuts and slashes made by a whip, yet he still moved as if nothing happened. "We must move, the dragon is angry." He growled, "Serve them right, damned imperials."
Ase had already started clawing the rubble away with her claws like a cat digging in the dirt. The spider danced above her head, cheering her with enthusiasm. There is a window on the end of this hallway that would drop them straight into the mote. If they reached it, they could swim away given that the dragon doesn't catch them before that.
The large prisoner looked forward and saw Ase already digging through the rubble. "Why won't we look for another way?" He called her but didn't get a reply. The cat completely ignored him as she kept digging. "Meow! Meow! Meow!"
"Leave her here!" The shonky prisoner turned around and ran in the opposite direction. He could remember another set of prison cells adjusting to where they were. All he needs to do is sneak out and enter the other side. The problem with his plan is that the dragon is outside, and he could be spotted. Nonetheless, he was confident in his sneaking abilities and skill.
"Fool! Come back here!" The old prisoner growled, "Catch him! He'll just die!" He shouted, but none of the prisoners bothered to stop the shonky one. They looked at the large prisoner with a weird stare, he's the one who should hate the shonky one more than anyone else.
As the shonky prisoner approached the door, Ase jumped behind him and smacked him on the back of the head. He dropped to the ground, twitching as the ground seemed to spin around him. Ase dragged him back to the other prisoner and threw him between them.
Shin had warned her, that if the shonky prisoner made it out, the dragon was more likely to notice their presence inside the fort and seek them out. "The dragon would find us. Stay here." She growled and went back to digging. The spider on her head mocking the shonky prisoner by wigging her mandibles.
The large prisoner looked around and counted fifteen prisoners in total excluding Shin and Ase. "Then what do you suggest we do? Stay here and wait?" He asked, looking at her. "Let's work together and survive."
"I don't know." Ase replied honestly, she was only doing what Shin was asking. "But he knows." She pointed at Shin who was tied to her back.
The prisoners looked at her with suspicion, Shin had never moved in days, let alone spoke up and showed competence. It was she who came out of nowhere and freed them.
The old prisoner combed his long beard, out of all the prisoners, he alone had noticed that Ase never looked at them. From the moment she appeared, her eyes were focused on something else. The only person she noticed was Shin, she only freed them to get the rope to carry him.
"What does he say?" The old prisoner asked, approaching her with a curious gaze. "I'll get the to help you."
While digging, Ase replied, "Dig this rubble, we must make it to the other side." She replied, still shoveling the stones and debris with her claws. "On the other side, there is a…" She went silent for a second, "…A cell with a large enough garderobe to fit a man. We smash it, jump into the slope, and escape through the bloodied battlefield. The dragon won't be able to sniff us out."
Shin had noticed the old man never looked at him. Those eyes, he had seen many times before and ignored, but after what he went through, he now finds it hard to believe the scenery of humans, especially with how strange the old man acted with the shonky and large prisoner.
The prisoners gasped, all joining her to shove the debris. "Should've said so earlier!" The large prisoner smiled, "Count on me to break that damned garderobe."
The prisoners dug and dug, the skin on their fingers peeled off as they bled, but still kept shoveling the stones away. Their escape was behind this wall, and nothing would get in their way.