In Search Of The Goddess

Log Seven

Everything is hazy and I can't quite see. My limbs feel heavy and sluggish. I think I may be back from my strange trip. 

A petite person is tucking something blankety around me. At first I think it is Elizabeth, but they are too tall to be her. I blink a few times and the haziness starts to dissipate. It's Javior.

She has covered me with the exact curtain that I had been staring at when I went unconscious. 

I try sitting up but my head feels weird and fuzzy. The blanket slips down and I feel a little drafty. And then I remember I'm down to my bloomers. I look around the room, gradually trying to take it all in. 

"Are you alright," Nik asks me gravely.

"I think so," I say clutching my head. My ribs don't hurt anymore. I stretch my legs out and they feel fine too.

"What did you see?" 

I tell them about the spider and the ki-rin and the knights who came in to help, but didn't really do much.

Nik cocks one hairless eyebrow and looks to the side impishly.

"There's a necklace in the other room? And you think it may be valuable?"

"Yes. I think it is imperative in our search for the Goddess."

"And it's on a statue. Up on the wall?"

"About thirty feet up."

Nik decides to crawl up the wall and get it while I recuperate a little bit and Javior watches over me.

I feel a faint tremor rock through the church. At first I think it must be the ki-rin nearby and then I remember I'm not on the ethereal plane. Or is it "in" the ethereal plane? There wasn't really a ground to stand on.

I shake my head. It seems to be clearing up now. I rub my eyes and hear Javior gasp. She is staring into the middle distance, her jaw hanging open. She must be looking through the eyes of one of her familiars. 

"What is it?" I ask and my voice is a little raspy with disuse. I wonder how long I have been unconscious. 

Gradually, I am starting to feel fine.

Javior's face clears and she seems to come back into herself, but she looks very distressed.

"Nik's fighting a statue in the orgy room!"

What?

I sit straight up and stare at her.

"And he's losing!!!"

I jump to my feet. There is no time to hunt for my clothes, I just rush straight out the door. I slide to a stop at a juncture of three more doors. I chose the one I think I must have come through earlier and wrench it open. 

I have chosen correctly. There is a mass of squirming people in the middle of the room. A few have stopped their ministrations and are staring at the back wall. Nik is there, facing off with one of the large statues of the Goddess. 

It's enormous. And animated. It swipes at Nik and I leap into action. I vault over the orgy and join the fight. 

Javior is right behind me, she holds her staff up to cast a spell. The statue's face shoots a powerful beam of light at her and counters it. Nik rushes in and tries to stab the thing but it also blasted by light from it's face. I get into my stance and immediately hit with the light. Like an amateur.

I fall over backwards and slam into the hard tile floor. Vaguely, I can see nude humans running out of the room. And then

I

black

out.

I'm roused awake with a burst of vibrant energy. I feel like I could fight a thousand spiders and a thousand more strange stone statues. Nik is standing over me, looking very worried, with an empty potion bottle. 

"Thank you," I say clasping his shoulder and I roll to my feet. 

I had thought too hard about form. Executing each move with precision is not my only intention here. 

I hit the creature with a Radiant Sun Bolt. A hairline fissure crackles down it's torso, leaking a small amount of light from the inside. Javior throws a Witch Bolt and it cracks even further.

Two more statues detach from the walls and drop down to the floor. They are smaller than the main one, but they are still very large. 

Javior casts another spell at the large one while Nik and I attack the other two. 

The large one blasts apart. I'm not sure what she did, but Javior is standing on top of it's crumbled corpse. I raise one fist and call out the triumph bellow of the Goddess.

In my moment of distraction, one of the smaller statues hits me in the head and I fall straight down. 

Nik revives me again. I must find a way to repay him after this. I owe a great debt to him now. 

There is one statue left. it is the one that nearly killed me. I rush in without thinking and it with blast after blast of Radiant Sun Bolt. Cracks shoot all over it's body and it falls apart into a pile of rubble. 

My breath is heaving, I am in my underwear, and there is the weird dead silence that comes at end of a deadly battle. I spin around and check on everyone. Nik and Javior are dusting themselves off. There are no other people in the room. 

I see something sparkling in what used to be the main statue's neck. I move some of the rock around and find an ancient rosary hidden inside. 

I recognize it from our studies in the monastery. Three aqua stones with the ability to cast a Blessed spell. Two topaz that cast a Greater Restoration. I put it over my neck for safe keeping. I feel a warmth spread through my from the stones.

"NIK," I suddenly shout. He looks up from a the pile of clothes in the corner, he is holding a wallet and a gold watch. "WHERE IS ELIZABETH?"

He shrugs.

I rush out of the room, almost knocking over the two nuns hurrying back here.

"What is going on," one of them screams. I burst out of the front door to the bitter cold outside. 

The guard is gone. Elizabeth is gone. I have failed as her guardian.