(ok a few quick notes here. I originally wrote that the heroes were brothers. I went back and changed it but wattpad doesn't always update the edited stuff. I changed it to them not being brothers but instead like friends. And now I'm thinking I want to change brimstone's original quest time from one day or whatever I wrote cuz I forgot, to three days. There is a lot of content I wanted to add to actually make a better story outline but I ended up needing more time frame lol.)
Linda, Barley, and Ian take the armor of the hero and the sword and exit the cave. Barley is wearing the armor when the shrinking spell from earlier wears off and he grows too big for it. "Tight?!" He gasps.
Ian is about to adjust the armor when it begins to glow and changes shape. It now fits barley perfectly. "Magic armor." They realize.
Linda can't help the little gasp she makes when she realizes it's magical armor. "Wow."
"Rare metals and magic." Barley says. "The forge dragon Artaka did such a great job." He looks at the armor in the light of the outside. "The armor covers perfectly besides the broken piece." He points to the chip near the shoulder of the armor. "It looks like no ordinary weapon can penetrate the steel."
Ian observes this statement. "He was slain by his own blade."
"Magical armor can only be pierced by magical items." Barley says trying to remember if there was a quest of yore card for magical armor. "I'm sure I remember something about magical armor being written in the guidebook." He wonders out loud.
"Is it possible the three heros are written in the guidebook as well?" Ian asks.
Barley looks towards the library. "Maybe. I know it isn't in my books though I would have remembered that. The seer said to go to the library."
The morning light drifts over the horizon. Had it really been a few hours down in the caves?
Colt and Laurel return from the cave relieved to see the teens standing outside. "Looks like everyone is ok." Colt says. "And the forge is still functional. We should maintain it instead of tearing it down." He notices some construction guys had just pulled up and they were getting ready to set up their demolitions equipment. "I will take care of this." He nods to barley.
Laurel walks over to the teens and gives her sons a hug. "We didn't find anything but sure seems like you did."
Barley nods. "We found the sword along with this magical armor." He says.
"And a seer who told us part of the history of these three heroes who used to live thousands of years ago." Ian says.
"We need to go to the library." Linda says.
Barley and Ian nod. "She is right we have to complete this quest." Barley says looking at his mom. "Don't worry we can handle it.
Their mother nods. "I think you are right. I underestimated you boys last time. Just promise me you'll be safe."
Ian nods. "Of course."
Barley laughs. "When are we ever not careful?"
Laurel crosses her arms and sighs. "Don't make me start regretting this already." She smirks a little and looks toward colt. "I had better help organize the town and save the forge."
Barley digs in his pocket and finds the key to the room that the mayor had given him. "Here." He hands his mom the key. "I was able to get a rented space in the townhall. I have plenty of lists and charts of all the places around here that need saved."
His mother chuckles a little bit. "You are both so much like your father." She slips the key into her pocket. "Maybe we should be saving history instead of trying to erase it."
Barley nods. "I have been saying that for years. Glad we are finally on the same page."
Linda sighs a little bit and looks away. "I wish my mom was around so I could have touching moments like this."
Laurel says good bye to her sons and walks over to see if colt needs any help.
Ian and barley lead the way to the van.
Linda climbs in the back and sits on the floor. "No back seats?" She asks.
Barley shrugs. "Sorry it only ever needed to sit two. There is a pile of clothes back there you can sit on those."
Ian looks in the passenger seat. He finds a quest of yore card and a half a bag of chips. "Cinda left a card here?" He says picking it up. "There is a picture on it."
Linda leans over the seat. "Her parents." She points at the card. "Her mom had gotten sick when she was very little. We had just met. Her dad left soon after. She was furious at him."
"Why did she tape it over this card?" Ian asks as he buckles himself into the seat.
"I'm not sure." Linda admits. "I think it was just a token." She shrugs. "She never told me."
Barley buckles himself in. "Ok we are going to the library, but this quest might get dangerous. We should grab provisions."
Ian nods. "We should stop at the house and get our school books."
Barley looks at Ian confused. "You think about school at a time like this?"
"I promised I would help Linda study." Ian says.
Barley shrugs. "Alright."
They stop and get the text books from home. Barley checks on his mini figs and Ian grabs a few supplies from his room.
They go to the library.
As they come to the door a centaur comes to the door from the other side. The lady has long braided golden hair done up with a pink ribbon. "Oh hello? Are you guys coming in?"
"Yes ma'am." Barley says.
"Oh!" The lady centaur says excitedly. "We don't usually see visitors around this time. I was gonna hop out for a donut."
"Don't worry about it." Linda says. "We are just going to look around. We are looking for books on ancient history or heroes."
The lady turns back inside and points. "We have an old section in the very back. All sorts of history books about weapons, magics, and heroes."
Barley bow to the assistant. "Thank you ma'am."
The centaur lady clops down the stone steps. "I will be back in a few minutes just running next door."
Barley shrugs. "Well at least nobody will bother us."
They head inside and go straight to the back where the lady had said the books were at.
-Meanwhile-
it had been a few hours passed and brimstone was watching barley through a crystal ball next to his throne. He had only seen them find the item he had been long searching for, but there had been interference of some magical kind when the seer had appeared, so as far as he knew barley, linda, and ian had fought a giant spider, but he had seen ian using magic and realized the three would walk right into his trap.
He came away from his orb after a few failed spell attempts to get it working again. "Blasted thing." he mutters. "No reception apparently." he grumbles as he steps toward Cinda in her energy prison.
She scoffs at him. "Whatever your planning you won't get away with it."
He chuckles. "I already have." he grumbles. "Soon I will have the sword in my possession and better yet a new magic user to help us open the way."
"You only caught me off guard. You couldn't beat me in a real fight!" she grumbles.
Brimstone walks away towards the exit. "They don't know it yet but they are helping me more than they realize. Not only will they bring me the great heroes sword, which is the final piece I need for my puzzle, but they will bring that twig of a magic user."
After brimstone has left the room Cinda sighs and slumps against a pillar inside her prison. "I hope he knows what he's doing. Barley shouldn't worry about me. He should keep the sword away from brimstone." she reaches into her pocket to find her cards. She starts flipping through and realizes her family photo was gone. "Oh no! I must have left it in barley's van!?" she checks again spreading the cards out on the floor. She sighs as she realizes it really isn't there.
Inside her pocket she also finds the piece of metal she had found in the forge caves. It's silver gleamed in the torch light. "I wonder what this even is." she looks at the rigged edge of the metal. "It looks like it broke off of something."
-meanwhile-
Ian, Barley, and Linda are all reading different books at the same table. Barley has a book about ancient history from the fiction section and it contains things that he had read about it quest of yore. Ian has a book of real history that had been covered in dust and looked like nobody had read it in several years.
Linda had a series of huge books that marked the tails of great warriors and wizards from thousands of years ago. She turns through several pages of worthy people but none of them appear to be the people they are trying to find. "Slayer of trolls, slayer of evil, slayer of goblins, slayer of elves..." she pauses. "Wait..." she reads that last one. "Bark the tree nymph slayer of elves was the first wizard ever documented to have turned sour. Power had driven him blind and he took it out on the innocent."
Ian glances up. "Wait? What?" he mumbles abandoning his book to look at her book. "He killed elves? Why is he in this book of great warriors?"
"Before the power went to his head bark was a great wizard who dealt mainly in healing and growth magics. He planted many gardens and established a city in his honor. After the power went to his head his own villagers turned on him and replaced him as idol of the place he had grown. This caused him to turn even more and become a full blooded dark wizard. The elves were just an unfortunate circumstance."
Barley shivers. "Good thing we weren't around then. Does it say how he was taken down?"
Linda nods. "The council of wizards was established to deal with rogue wizards. Ten wizards stormed his castle and sealed his soul in a magic stone." she pauses for a minute and kind of gasps.
"What?" ian asks.
"It says. they believed magic that was soiled by evil deeds can only be contained... it can't be destroyed." linda looks at barley. "Maybe there is a way for us to help brimstone. Get him back to normal."
Barley puzzles for a moment. "We would need a magical stone." he looks over at her book. "Does it say what kind they used?"
"No." linda shakes her head. "Any ideas?"
"Well phoenix gems are used to amp up magic and guide it. We need something meant to contain magic." barley says. "Something like a topaz might work."
"A topaz?" ian questions. "What would that do?"
"It's meant to help ward off evil spells." barley says, grabbing his deck of cards. "The topaz might contain properties that could be used to contain evil or at least ward it off." as he looks at the topaz card another slips from between his handful of cards and lands upright on the table. "Diamond." he says reading it. "OH! That'll work!"
"Just one problem." ian says. "Where will we get a diamond? We are pressed for time as it is."
"Mom has one." barley suggests.
"Oh sure?!" ian huffs. "Lets just ask mom for her ring. Excuse me mom i know this is going to sound like an odd request but can we borrow your engagement ring so we can trap an evil magic cloud in it?" he pinches the bridge of his nose. "I'm sure she will really like that."
"Shhhhhh" somebody says from somewhere.
Ian looks around kind of embarrassed about his little outburst. "Sorry." he mumbles.
"If it's diamond you're looking for I..." linda mumbles. "I have one, but it's small."
"You have one?" barley questions. "where?"
Linda meekly pulls a small chain from inside her shirt. A little silver ring with a diamond attached to it hangs from the chain.
"Brilliant." barley smirks. "And you've had it this whole time?"
"I-it was my moms." linda says kind of looking away. "It's the only thing I have left."
Ian frowns. "We have to get another one. We can't use this."
Barley thinks for a moment. "Maybe manticore has one." he thinks up a plan. "I really wanted to learn more about the great heroes but this seems like a bust and we don't have time to dilly around here anymore."
"I agree. We can do this later." ian says.
"I think you two should go try to get a diamond and meet me at brimstones castle." barley suggests.
"You won't go alone?!" ian says. "We promised mom!"
Barley shakes his head. "He is expecting me by myself with nobody else. I can exchange the sword for Cinda and then we can figure out what to do after that."
"You're a fool if you think brimstone will set her free." Linda says. "He needs her magic. If he said her would give her up he lied." she looks back at the book and glances over a section about a great hero. At first glance she doesn't see how this relates to their story but she happens to see a drawing in the book that resembles the armor and sword of the warrior hero. "I think i found it!"
They flock over to read the section over her shoulder. "The greatest of known heroes was the trio barth, meldo, and slick. A powerful and cunning mage, a swift and deadly accurate archer, and a brave hearted warrior. The three were best friends through life and together brought a great peace between several races. The forge dragon Artaka saw what these heroes might accomplish with the aid of his helper who was a seer. He crafted each of them a magical item for the mage a beautiful golden armor, for the archer and golden bow with magical properties, and for the warrior a sword of silver metals embedded with magical properties and glittering jewel encrusted on the hilt."
"Wait... the armor was for the mage?" barley says confused.
"The trio accepted their gifts but the armor weigh too heavy for the mage to carry so he bestowed it on his friend, that it may protect his body from harm. The trio amassed a great wealth in that time." linda continued to read. "In the end it saved his life neary a hundred times. That is until the great war against the rock trolls. The brave hero fell by his own blade on the cliffs of Orgra. His remains were buried at the sight but the armor and sword were returned to Artaka. The surviving heroes were able to complete the war with only minor casualties. It was said that the two remaining heroes then lost the spark to battle and sealed away their riches using their weapons as keys."
"So they took the sword to Artaka so that their weapons would never be in the same place at the same time." barley mumbles. "But they can't be anyway. If this is true we lost dad's staff in the ocean. So brimstone wouldn't be able to get it."
"Unless the reason we couldn't find it is because he already had it." ian says.
After a silent pause they both smack themselves in the face. "Of course?!" they both say at the same time.
"So your father had the hero staff, and Artaka was guardian of the sword. Then where is the bow?" they look at the pictures in the book. "It doesn't say but we have to assume brimstone already has it or at least knows where it is."
"So we definitely descend from the mage hero." ian says. "Because dad had the staff." he glances at barley's armor. "But then why do you feel so connected to the sword?"
"My guess is the warrior never had a family." linda says. "I bet the war ended and the remaining two settled down. The fact that the sword seems to respond to barley is probably because it was meant to respond to the heroes kin, which he is the kin of the mage."
"I wonder who is kin of the bow... it couldn't be brimstone could it?" barley wonders.
"Doubtful." linda replies. "He would have told me that."
"Ok well we got the information we wanted." barley says. He takes out the map brimstone had given him. "We have 3 days to get the sword to brimstone. It's not a far journey but i don't know how much time we have for a detour."
"Manticore is near the path, it's only about half an hour out of the way." ian says.
"Yeah if she knows where we could find a diamond that would be fantastic, And if not we only waste an hour." barley says. "Already let's get moving then. Side quest time."
-meanwhile-
Brimstone had been yet again watching barley on the crystal ball but he got bored because they were all just sitting around reading so he walked away. "Bad news deary." he grumbles walking over to Cinda. "Your little boyfriend doesn't care about you."
"He is not my boyfriend!" she growls back. And then she gets embarrassed. "Well not technically... I mean we were going to have a date but..."
"All the same time presses on and it seems like he would rather go to the library to read about the sword. What a waste of time. If the knowledge could have been found at such a place people would be searching for the relics. I am the only one who is. Therefore it is a frivolous waste of time."
"Unless his goal is to insure you never get your hands on that sword." cinda smirks.
"Ridiculous." he grumbles. "That would imply that even your best friend didn't care about your safety. And she knows what I am capable of."
Cinda simply smirks.
A cloaked figure makes its way into the room at a sort of shuffle. It drops a tray of tea on the arm of the throne and departs from the room. "Ah. tea time it seems." brimstone says making his way over.
"Oh sure. Gotta have that soothing chamomile to wash down the taste of defeat." cinda chuckles.
At that moment brimstone overhears ian mention the staff their father left them and how they must descend from the mage hero. He nearly drops his cup. "Could it be true?" he wondered out loud. "Could these two really be blood?" he sets his cup on the tray and moves to the center of the room. He waves his hand over a door on the floor and it begins to rumble as it parts. Up rises a slab with two objects laid out next to each other with room for a third.
Cinda looks at the things but it's kind of far so she can't really tell what it is.
"I found this abandoned in the ocean." brimstone says lifting the staff from the table to show it off. "This has to be the staff of the great hero Meldo."
"I'm not familiar." Cinda mumbles.
"Of course you aren't! Your young people today. You scawnder your gifts. You don't even know your own history!" brimstone grumbles. "These heroes were obsessed with battle. Until the warrior died. All the wealth they had gathered was said to have been locked away. Their weapons are said to be the key to obtaining that wealth."
"If you have the staff and bow and barley did bring you the sword, why do you need me?" cinda questions.
"The spell requires three magical elements." brimstone says. "Myself, you, and my servant will probably bring plenty to the table, but with the addition of this other wizard. There is no way we can fail." he looks at the crystal ball again and sees the teens are back in the van now. "Looks like they are on the road again."
Barley is asking ian to put the map on the seat so he can see it. "Lay it out here please."
Ian is in the back sitting with Linda and they are trying to study while the van bumps around. "Ok but please keep your eyes on the road." The van swerves a little off the road and ian falls against the seat. "barley!?"
"Sorry. Yeah I will watch the road." he mumbles. He looks at the map.
Brimstone smirks. "They are following the map I Ieft. they will be here soon."
"Barley no!" cinda yells, But the orb doesn't send sound so he can't hear her.
"I guess he did care after all." brimstone chuckles. "Though I wonder why waste time at the library if he already had the damned thing." he puzzles for a moment. "Perhaps they know i'm watching and are trying to trip me up." he walks away again back to his table. He raises the bow this time and admires it. "Such fine craftsmanship. A golden bow embedded with gemstones that protect the wilder from malice magics. Artaka had really out done himself."
"It is very pretty." cinda says to herself. She could almost swear that under that cloak of darkness Linda's uncle was still in there. He seemed to be switching from evil villian to normal guy every few moments like his brain was struggling with itself. Maybe she could test that theory? "Linda would be so upset if she saw what you were up to."
Brimstone looks at Cinda kind of upset and tired expression which changed to straight faced and kind of a sneer. "I don't care what she thinks of me. She never understood what I was trying to accomplish. She thought she could take you and hide in mushroomton. To keep you from me. She knew I needed more magic."
"She knew you were insane." cinda replies. "They will find a way to stop you. I may only have just met barley but I know he won't give up."
"He's just a delivery boy." brimstone grumbles. "He is nothing. Linda can't stop me either. None of you could stand a chance against me."
Cinda stands close to the energy barrier. "You just don't fight fair. You're a coward."
"Or maybe you're just weak." he says back with a smirk. "Not unlike your father. Seems the apple didn't fall far from the tree."
"You knew my dad?" cinda questions.
"He and I go way back." brimstone smirks. "We used to have adventures together. We explored tons of caves and old dungeons."
"Wait, you knew my dad?" she asks again confused.
"Until he started a family." brimstone grumbles. "That woman was always in my way. He was a magic user like you. He got lazy and tried to settle, but I still needed him. He abandoned me for a boring life."
"My father left after my mom got sick. He didn't care about us." cinda replies.
"That isn't true." brimstone chuckles. "I just had to remind him where his loyalty lies."
The cloaked figure enters the room again, walks over to the throne and takes the tea tray, and begins to exit the room again.
"He listens so well now." brimstone smirks. "It's amazing what a little possession magic can accomplish."