Royal Plaza, center of the ruins.
It didn'¨t see like anybody else had managed to get this far yet. Apart from the motley crew of misfits, both noble, common and otherwise, nobody else seemed to be showing up. Which meant that either everyone else was pre-occupied with still tearing each other a new set of orifices, or something was preventing new arrivals from showing up.
Whatever the case may be, the five stooges had been blessed enough not to see any additional people since the party of Hawklin, Krenna, Glum and Norb had left in a hurry. The only things that kept them company, aside from each other, were the strange crystals and the dead-silent ruied buildings around them. The palace tower, which had the big hole in it, stood equally silent and void of motion or life. Of course, getting everyone up there would be a challenge, especially since the crevace was located up on par with a four-storey building.
The Church
"
Mukiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~!!" The priest let out a rather pathetic-sounding screech, like that of a teenage girl throwing a temper-tantrum because somebody had just insulted her favorite pair of pink pumps. "How dare you? How dare you? How dare you? How dare you? How dare you?How dare you?How dare you?How dare you?How dare you?HowDareYou?HowDareYou?HowDareYou?
HowDareYou?HowDareYou?HOWDAREYOU!?! Heathen sinners slaying the souls of the pure and divine!? Blasphemy and heresy, all and everyone! Nonononono, no choice, no choice!
JUDGEMENT UPON YOUR WRETCHED HIIIIIIDES!!" The insane fellow then howled, out of the blue and to nobody and everybody all at the same time.
It seemed the loss of the majority of his zombies, the take-down of his mind-control victim and, perhaps, the insult of having been called a toad, had gotten to the old coot. Of course, agitating somebody who was mentally and morally unhinged, as well as out of touch with reality, was perhaps not always the best course of action - especially when said individual harnessed the power of some god or other higher existence...
Slamming his two bone-like blades into the stone floor, as if the ground was nothing more than wet mud, the man clasped both hands together infront of him and began to murmur something in his faux-latin-sounding phrases once again. His voice started low but gradually grew in volume, until he was almost shouting. And thus, once his string of syllables reached their culminating climax and he threw his arms into the air, the sound of a thundering clap could be heard!
...
...
...
"
Huh?"
The man cocked his head sideways. Nothing seemed to be happening. There was no beam of light striking down the unbelievers, no new zombies rising from the corpse-pile and certainly not holy fire with which to purge the filthy ones... That is, until a low rumble could be heard. A rumble that grew in intensity and soon began to become noticeable inside the locked and sealed-up structure. This small rumbling soon became shaking and eventually grew to an outright, balance-crippling tremor. The floor, walls and ceiling all began to quiver and move, as if an earthquake was in full effect - through, only the old church seemed to be afflicted with this very localized phenomenon.
The old man's lips spread across his gaunt face into a smirk, and his eyes bulged with anticipation. He began to cackle once again, in his hoarse voice, while shouting 'yes!' over and over, as if he had called down the hammer of justice and was now just waiting for it to smtie his opponents. Well, until a piece of the ceiling got dislodged and unceremoniously fell ontop of him, silencing the laughter instantly. Although it looked like he'd just been swatted by a large fly-swatter made out of solid stone, the groans and pained, plaintive voice coming from underneath the slab indicated that the madman was still alive.
Unfortunately, as the quaking intensified even further, the main entrance, where all four adventurers had entered from, soon collapsed and became buried behind fallen debris and pieces of crumbling stone. With no windows to leap out of, and the closest exit now buried, the group of three plus one now only had very limited time before the entire structure would start collapsing on them.
It seemed whatever prayer or magic the cleric had invoked, had either backfired, or been intended as a suicide attack to take
everyone down. Whatever the case, they were all mere moments away from their undeniable doom.
As luck would have it, the smaller backdoor which previously had been blocked by the bone-bars, was now open. If everyone were to spring and make a mad dash for this exit, perhaps they could all make it out alive! ... Well, almost everyone. The old priest certainly wasn't going anywhere, and the archer-elf who was still lying on the floor had suffered several falling bits of buildings to land on her as well. Sure, she wasn't dead, but if anyone wanted to get her out of this place, she'd need to be carried...
... And time wasn't exactly plentiful, nor was the stability of the structure. A large pillar-like wall-fixture loosened from its place and fell, crushing the high elven mage's summons with a crunchy ... crushing noise. Good thing it wasn't anyone important though.
The smaller backdoor, as it were, led back into a one-way alley, which funnily enough, led up all the way to the royal district and plaza. Imagine that, how convenient.
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