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the king sat in his throne room, content that another bunch of delinquents had been taken care of. his kingdom was all that much better and cleaner without such scum wandering around. even that one who asked all the questions. she would have been causing problems anyway. there wasn't even the worry of them grouping together and trying to beat the labrynth. he made sure they were all placed in different locations and with the vastness of the corridors and rooms, there was no way they could find each other. at least he hoped so. it would be a shame if he was the first king to have someone escape the labrynth. many people felt that it would be a wonderful thing to see someone finally emerge from the other side but he knew better. criminals don't change. they're better off killed

makla picked himself up, shaking his head to rid it of the relentless pounding. where was he? how did he get here?
... and what the hell was with these little floating things?
all around him, hovering at least two feet off the ground, were little blueish orbs of light. they couldn't be any bigger than an inch and cast only enough light to mess with his sight. squinting, he put his face up to one, reaching out a hand to poke it
it was cool to the touch and not being harmed in any way, he thought it was something there to play with. laughing like a child, he promptly began pulling the glowing orbs out of the air and stuffing them in his pockets
"i'm a glow-sickle," he giggled, liking this new made up name. content about his captured lights, he ran down the long hall, watching the lights dance around under the fabric of his jacket. he didn't even notice when the walls changed from compacted dirt to wood. or from wood to stone

Jason slowly woke up, lying on his back. Or maybe it was the whole world lying on top of him upside down. Rolling upright, he looked around at the dark corridor. "And one, and two, and tree trunk." He turned around and saw the locked entrance. "They locked me up!" he wailed, banging his fists against the door. "They took me away!"
Turning back around, he dashed off in random directions.

Stars twinkled overhead, but Yuri knew better than to think they were stars. The glowing bugs buzzed around the roof of the cave, and provided dim light in this section of the labyrinth. She briefly wondered whether they were magically induced to shine, or of a local fauna. Reaching out the 18-year-old touched the thin strand of magic that was her link with Kuall.

Young one, I lost contact with you. What happened? Did the king imprison you, or perhaps... worse?

Not nearly so bad as you may think, it seems he has thrown me in his little pet project: the labyrinth you sent me to inquire about.
...
Though, I suppose I really didn't want to find out if the rumors of no one making it out were true firsthand...

I am sorry I put you in this situation, Yuri, perhaps Kurichi could have handled things more delicately...

Master, you didn't tell me the king was so unbalanced, otherwise I would have treated him differently.

You must learn to read your kind, especially the powerful, if you wish to survive, you cannot rely on the ponderings of an old dragon like me, especially when I myself get my information from impatient little whelps who get themselves into trouble more often than not...

Yuri fumed silently, and that silence was answer enough as she wound her way through the winding passagways.

Dashing headlong down a passageway, Jason ran headfirst into a wall.
Result: Jason 0, Wall 1. He tumbled to the floor, and just lay there for a moment. Fumbling around, his hands closed on a loose brick.

Veailsba pried her scarlet eyes opened and forced herself to sit up. The cool chill of the floor under her, gave her all the motive she needed to bare the protesting shocks of pain her muscles greeted such actions with.

She begrudgingly pulled herself to her feet after that, and scanned the room before her. It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the barely lite room before her. Which seemed to be empty besides her herself.

She stood there stunned and slightly confused at her surroundings. She'd recalled exactly how she'd gotten to such a place, or why she'd just in a coma on the floor. It took a few moments just standing there for her memories to catch up with her.

She remembered finding a strange new place to explore while on one of her many exploits. Apparently the locals weren't too fond of visiters. To make a long story short, she'd been jumped, beaten, shackled, and then thrown into the place she was now. The fall had knocked her unconscious, and given her a few more lovely bruises to add onto her new collection.

Veailsba, took a deep breath and sighed. If any thing there was really only one thing for her to do. Like any time she went exploring, and got stuck in a sticky situation, the only way out was to go forward. Veailsba started onward, with her bow readied and her eyes peeled. This wasn't the first time she'd been tossed in a dungeon, and she wasn't going to let it be her last.

A tripwire lay across the labyrinth floor, much to Yuri's surprise when she almost fell for it, literally. She scrutinized it and the ground beyond and picked up a pebble and threw it at it. It took a few tries, but when she hit her mark, immediately the ground beyond the wire vanished and a snake-filled pit appeared. "Despicable... Absolutely horrible..." She turned on her heel, but realized that the exit might be passed the snake trap, and by turning she'd be playing right into the king's hands. Determinately she turned again, dropped to a racer's mark, and charged, jumping over the tripwire.

"Oh... Kuall damn it!" She didn't sense the wall until it was too late. It was made invisible and undetectable by some sort of enchantment, and was right at the pit's edge on the opposite side. She collided with it, hard, but somehow managed to get a grip. Her feet scraped uselessly against the stone wall and she could feel her hands' strength failing. Not knowing what else to do she shouted, maybe screamed in panic: "Help!"

"And the cat went around the mulberry bush, the mulberry bush, the mulberry bush...” Jason paused when he heard someone shout for help. “The call of life, amidst death? Intriguing.” Following the sounds, he stopped at the edge of a pit where a woman hung by her fingertips. “Scintillating. But the fish in the gray suit has his plans, and none involve cords.” Raising the brick, Jason stopped when he saw the snakes. “Snakes? Why’d it have to be snakes?” Extending his arm, he grabbed the woman’s hand and began pulling her up. “I hate snakes.”

occ: don't be afraid to make the posts as long and filled as you want
makla was humming
he'd decided his little glow pets loved music and was very cheerily making up songs for them. he wasn't bothered in the least that he'd just killed some kind of feral cat a little ways down the corridor. it had been grumpy and mean
"left, right, left left, right," he said in a sing song voice. he'd kept track of all the turns he'd made so far and was putting them together in a song. he rather liked it. what could you expect? he was a famous songwriter after all
well, at least today he was
...or was it today? he had to stop and think about this. the only lights were his little pets and they definately didn't have a say on the time of day. they weren't old enough. but there were no clocks on these walls or a place to see the sky. how unthoughtful of whoever made him this palace
he would have to speak to his steward about this. he was the king after all
completely not paying attention by this point, he turned a corner and ran right into an elf

"Thank you, heh, for a second there I thought you were going to beat my fingers with that brick..." Yuri examined the path below, but with her mind's eye, not her useless eyes. "Interesting, this road is higher than that one, but it's enchanted to look like it just goes on like normal, without the pit, wall, and tripwire. A triple-trap it seems." Her senses went back to her savior, her eyes stared right passed him. "What's your name? I'm Yuri Dragonspeaker," she held out her hand to shake.

"Baker, baker, how many do you wish?" Jason ignored her and walked up to the edge of the pit. "One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish. And what's in a name?" He tossed the brick over the edge and watched it fall. "A shoe by any other name would still smell like feet." Cocking his head, he watched the snakes for a moment, then leaped over the side, dropping lightly to the ground amidst the serpents. "The eye sees what it will, the mind sees what it wants, but only through denial of assumptions is truth." He looked back up at Yuri. "The snakes are harmless, but-" He tapped a jutting rock. "The falling gasp for hopeful salvation, and..." He gave it a yank and dropped flat. With a rasp of metal on metal, a large blade swung around horizontally, sliding back into the wall. "One becomes two."

"That's all well and good, but what are you going to do to get out of there? Like you said, you can't climb up without being sliced in two." She sighed, sitting down.

Kuall?

A deep rumble through the connection was his response.

I know you probably have more pressing engagements, but if I get stuck down here for weeks, you will come for me, right?

And risk insulting the king directly by rescuing a criminal? I think not. I do not want to be hunted down like many of my brethren, even for the most noble of reasons. I am sorry Yuri, I will offer my usual more supportive help, but nothing more.

So, assuming I make it out, what do you want me to say to him, the king?

You will know what to say when the time comes, young one.

Yuri pulled at her hair. Why does he always have to do that? Answer me with riddles, you'd think I would have learned not to ask him anything anymore.

"Rockaby baby, in the cold pit, when the heart fails, the muscles will quit." Jason started poking around the edge of the pit. "When the strength fails, the mind must come through, or down will fall every man, in one life or two." Hauling back, he delivered a solid kick to the side of the earthen wall, which crumbled away to reveal a staircase leading back up to the other side.

"The fallen!" Jason shouted, twisting around tackle the guy that had knocked Yuri into the pit. "You will not take it away! No!" Grabbing at a snake's tail, he used the hapless reptile to beat the young man about the head. Unfortunately, it being a one foot long grass snake he'd grabbed, Jason accomplished nothing except annoying him.

Yuri, needless to say, was surprised at being tackled into the snake pit. If it wasn't for her dignity, and a lack of air in her gut, she would have screamed. She wheezed, trying to get her breath back, skirting away from the slithery reptiles. Now that she was closer, she could sense the snake's tail had a single spike on it, hardly noticeable at a distance. "These aren't normal snakes... Especially not grass snakes.... They're chimeras, powerful ones too, they emit an anti-magic field from the antenna on their tail, I read about them in school. It seems that they have a purpose besides just scaring people." She turned to the two squabbling on the stairs. "Break it up, it's no big deal that the kid knocked me down here, we all need to head the same direction anyhow."

"Sane? Who are you calling insane, you- ooh, shiny." Distracted by a glimmer, Jason approached the stairway up. Streaks of marble shot through the floor. "And the crystal depths go on and on again..." Climbing up, he began to follow them.

Jarrel looked casually around the room he awoke in. It was roughly square in shape with what looked like torches in the walls.
Wait a second, he thought, torches, didn't the King learn anything?
He tried to manipulate the blue flames to no avail. Damn, guess he did.

He then set off out the only door he could see...

So, the king uses this not only as a prison, but an asylum and orphanage too. We're going to need to have a long talk... though I'd bet this place is more entertaining to than either of those institutions, if it weren't for the death factor... Yuri sighed, and followed the sounds of footsteps up the stairs.

location: soul chamber
first monster and first test. good luck. person who figures it out gets a small weapon of their choice

makla decided he knew where he was going (though he had no idea he actually didn't) and kept trying to take the lead from the others. it was while he wasn't paying attention like this that, after deciding to walk backwards, he collided with something hard, knocking some of his glowing pets from his pockets
it was a bit of a shock to him when they combined and became an even larger glowing ball
seeing this as a great game, makla very promptly emptied his pockets, watching in fascination as the balls collected to make it even bigger. now sitting in front of him was a glowing orb, about a good foot high, emenating a soft blue light
unfortunatly, the increased light threw into sharp relief the predicament the group found themselves in. it seemed the walls had opened up, leaving them in a round room... but where had they come in? there were no doors. no entryways. it was like they'd just appeared by some whim. what seemed even odder was that at even spaces there were large indents in the walls labeled one, then two, and all the way up to twelve before it met back at one again
"clock," makla said, spinning and pointing at the numbers
the hard thing makla had run into was placed in the middle of the room. it looked like a rock but didn't feel like a rock. first off it was leathery and had little bumps all over
the 'rock' also had what appeared to be an eye socket carved into it and along the edges it had writing

when do griffins have twelve legs?

"well that's just silly," makla huffed, poking at the letters. "silly question to put on something. stupid, if you ask me. why yes you did." bored with this he began kicking the glow orb around like a ball

occ:yur mean to me making me read all this i wasn't gone that long ah well i'm skimming though so don't get mad if i screw up.

Ic: Veailsba was over come with shock. Out of no where a strange stringy man rushed into her knocking her to the ground. She simply gazed up at his back as he went running the opposite direction. Unsure if she should follow the unusual fellow, or pretend she'd not even seen him.

After all he could be some kind of illusion sent to set her to wrong path, or possibly a guide to lead her to safety. She had not the pleasure of dealing with such things before hand. Finally after sitting dumbfoundedly on the floor for a good five mins, she decided to toss her better judgment out of the count, and followed in the direction he'd gone.

Carefully she made her way though the vast quantity of traps and snares. A lot slower than he current target had done. And while she'd caught sight of him again a few more times she just couldn't keep up with the risk of setting off traps.

Then just when she'd thought of giving up and heading back the way she came she heard voices. One of which was chattering mindless jabber. She figured maybe this might be the man that bumped into her before. With the thought still fresh in her mind she carefully made her way across a pit of strange snake-like things,and onto a ledge leading to another hallway. With people heading down it.

It looked to her like two men and a young woman. Carefully she took to sneaking behind them. She didn't know if these people where hostile, or even what they were there for. So she was more than a little warry of just walking up and saying hi.

As she continued to observe them she came to piece together that these people were prisoners as well. Which didn't make her feel anymore comfortable than before. She doubted they were all there for the same reason she was. Which meant there was no reason for her to believe they would be friendly to her.

Not many people enjoy the company of a dark elf, and those with lower morals would have no problem trying to kill her for it.

She was so into her thoughts of whether these people were friend or foe, that she stepped right on a trip wire, and a giant mace-like structure swung down from the ceiling threatening to end her then and there.
With no where else to go Veailsba took a bounding leap forward, and landed on top of the head of the mighty weapon, and held onto the bar holding it to the ceiling for dear life, as it continued to swing to and fro.

She might have been rather proud of herself for pulling off such a feat, had she not been so fear stricken at the time.

Jarrel moved rapidly down the corridor, making only left turns as he ran.
I wish I had my weapons, he thought irratably.
After about two hours of running, he hit a dead end with an actual torch.
Praise the Lord! was all that ran through his mind as he grabbed the flames, enlarged them and set them flying down the path in front of him...

“One and two and one…” Jason cocked his head. “When there are three of them?”

correct

makla cocked his head sideways and stopped kicking around the glowing ball. when he spoke, he almost sounded sane.
"all well and good knowing what the answer is but why do you need it?"
he walked back over to the rock and poked at it. "silly riddle with no point. you figure it out but you can't use it. and look at this clock," he gestured to the numbers around them in a big circle," there are no hands. just this ugly thing in the middle." he bent near the carved eye socket. "and this ugly thing."

"Connections." Jason started pushing on the lump in an attempt to move it towards the third marking.