Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ An Unusual Father ❯ Something Weird THis Way Comes ( Chapter 3 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

An Unusual Father

A Ranma 1/2 Fanfiction by Ryo Oki
ryo_oki@pacbell.net

Disclaimer: All characters and places not created by me
are probably owned by someone else.

Author's Note: This story will be a little different from my last
story, 'Little Angel Lost' in that it has no set ending. I will simply
be adding chapters as ideas come to me. This story will be primarily a comedy
with some romance thrown in. It will be primarily a crossover with the
Baldur's Gate 2 pc game universe and the forgotten realms universe in general
with one other crossover that will be apparent a little later.
For those familiar with AD&D mechanics the setting will use a mixture of
first and second edition rules with a home made spell point system instead
of the usual magic system used in AD&D.

In case I had not mentioned this before, this story is set several
years after the end of the Baldur's Gate 2 computer game. The original
P.C.'s are now all semi-retired and of quite high level. Also, unlike in
the computer game, Minsc did not ask Aerie to be his witch. She decided to
settle down with another member of the party, which I might get around
to discussing later. Sorry, if this annoys anyone, but I feel that it
can be too constraining to always follow the events in a certain
manga or game, when I am writing about the characters in said those
games for example.


******************


Chapter 3: Something Weird This Way Comes.


As Ranma felt his foot begin to sink and the grinding noise echo
from behind him, he could only sigh. One would think that he had learned
his lesson from the little 'adventure' in the Aztec pyramid that he and
Genma had gone through the year before. But no, he had to repeat
his past mistake.

"Well that was bright.", Suzanna said in a whispered, yet
sarcastic tone of voice.

"We should be quiet. Who knows how many kobolds are down here.
They must have heard that door closing.", Marlena whispered to
everyone.

Taking one last look at the closed door, before moving on, Ranma
suddenly realized that they had another problem on their hands.

"Hey, where's Corinne?", Ranma said quietly, causing Marlena and
Suzanna to look quickly up and down the darkened hallway.

"I think she was still outside when the door shut.", Marlena
said, with a worried tone of voice.

"Oh great, the whiny little brat is outside. Can this possibly get
any worse?", Suzanna said quietly.

"Why are you being so mean to her?", Marlena asked.

"Because if the kobolds or whatever else live here, finds her then
they might think that other people are here as well. Now do you get it?",
Suzanna replied.

"We can't go outside to find to her. Maybe we can find another way
out later on.", Ranma said.

"So we just leave her out there by herself.", Marlena said sadly.

"We don't have a choice.", Suzanna said as she turned away from the door
and looked down the long dark tunnel ahead of them.

The small group of 'adventurers' began to move slowly down the dark
passageway. Ranma thought he saw to faint lights up ahead, but it
was hard to tell. Both he and the others were focused mainly on
staying silent and not becoming stuck in the muck that seemed to
compose the floor of this tunnel. The floor appeared to be mud, but
the rather acrid, ammonia like scent of seemed to hint that maybe it
was composed to something else. Ranma preferred not think about that
though.

One thing was for certain, and that he would probably need to
find new shoes after this. His traditional slippers that he wore, were not
cut out to walk through this 'muddy gunk'.

After the small group had traveled about 200 feet down the tunnel,
the floor began to change from mud to that is roughly carved stone. In
fact the whole tunnel had changed from having earthen walls and floor,
to that of rough stone.

Of more interest though, was that 100 feet past the rough stone the
tunnel suddenly change to that of smooth granite. There was barely a crack
in the rock to find, and it appeared to have been built many years ago.

The kobolds had not built this part of the tunnel, Ranma and the
other quickly decided.

About 50 feet further in, the tunnel split into two paths. The
upper path seemed to be composed of rough stone and Ranma and the others
could see the faint flickering of torch light, some distance up the
path. It was hard to see anything in the lower tunnel. Their was a faint
bluish light in the distance, but nothing else could be seen. The first
ten feet of the tunnel which was visible, was composed of the same
smooth granite that they had seen before. Beyond that though, the
tunnel remind strangely dark.

It was almost as if something was absorbing any light that
entered the tunnel. As to who or even what could cause this, was a question
that Ranma and the others were not quite sure that they wanted to know.

After a couple of minutes of whispering, it was decided that the
group would first follow the upper tunnel, which seemed a whole lot,
less creepy, than the lower tunnel.

As the began to climb its slowing sloping hallway, they heard voices
coming towards then from up ahead. Without any other choice, they moved
quickly back down to the tunnel intersection and began to reluctantly
began their descent down the strange lower hallway.

Ranma just hoped that there weren't any trolls or other creatures
that wanted to eat him as he continued to move down the tunnel.


***************


After the door to the Kobold lair slammed shut, much to Corinne's
surprise, she found herself leaping back into the dense brush that
surrounded the door so that she would not be found by a patrol of
kobolds coming to investigate the noise.

Corinne move back into the brush as far as she could go. Her long
blond hair at first clearly stood out from the muted greens and brown
of her hiding place. She fortunately quickly realized this and managed
to tuck most of her hair down the back of her now somewhat ripped tunic.

She was both scared and annoyed at what had just happened. She
rarely left the village without taking someone with her, and when she did
she and her companions did not leave the main road. Now though here she
was trying to hide amongst the trees and brush while silently bemoaning
the damage to her new tunic. She had ordered it all the way the from
Sembia after all. It was one similar to what the priests of Sune wore
when they traveled the lands away from their temples.

She was also quite concerned about the scratches on her arms, and
hoped that there were none on her face. Everyone in the village had
always commented on how pretty she was, despite the fact that she did
tend to be rather clumsy at times, and she knew that she wasn't the
smartest girl in the village. If her face was 'damaged' would anyone
want to spend any time with her.

Corinne briefly imagined herself as being several years older, now
an 'old maid' of 19 with all of her friends now engaged or married while
she was along watching as the opportunity for love past her by. It was a
silly thought to have, given her present predicament, but whenever
she was sad or frightened by something she seemed to always begin to
think about such things.

As she continued to lay on the ground for what seemed like an
eternity, one hour actually, a strong wind began to blow, causing her
to begin to shiver.

Corinne began to wonder what was happening to her friends. From
what she could tell, before the door slammed in her face, the tunnel
her friends went down was all muddy and smelled quite bad. She probably
would not have enjoyed walking through it, but she would at least not
be alone.

After another hour, she no longer heard any Kobolds nearby. They
really didn't seem to put much effort into looking for her when she first
hid. They probably became bored with looking for whatever caused the
door to slam shut. If she was lucky maybe the kobolds had thought that
some animal had just wandered in looking for food or shelter.

She waited in her hiding place for a few moments more, before she
started to move away from the kobold lair and back towards her
village. Hopefully she would be able to get someone to help rescue
everyone before anything bad could happen to them.

Corinne was just about to exit from the dense brush back onto
the small trail that the little goblin had led them down earlier when
a small gloved hand reached up from behind her, covered her mouth and
pulled her back into the brush. She was so stunned that she did not even
try to resist at first, which proved to be quite fortunate for if she
had cried out she would have attracted the attention of a rather large
hobgoblin who had been searching for what had set off the trap in the
back entrance to the lair.

Stupid worthless kobolds..... Have to do everything my self....
(Grumble) (Mumble).", the creature spoke quietly to itself.


**************


As Ranma and the others began to move down the lower tunnel, they
were surprised that the walls changed yet again, about 20 feet from where
they presently were.

"It looks like it is made out of glass.", Marlena said as she moved
her hands across the smooth black surface of the walls.

"It's obsidian, a rock that comes from a volcano.", Suzanna said.

"There is a volcano around here?", Ranma asked in confusion, while
wondering how he could have missed seeing one of those things.

"No not anymore. We learned in school that volcanoes leave these
rocks behind, even after they are 'dead'. This rock is very old, maybe
thousands or tens of thousands years old.", Suzanna said, sounding a
lot like a teacher, the Marlena had a couples years ago, the younger
girl thought to herself.

Moving farther down the passage, the walls began to glow,
surprising the three 'adventurers'. They looked on in stunned silence
as small points of lights in many colors began to glow from within
the walls and ceiling. This made it much easier for them to see where
they were going, not that this did anything to soothe their nerves. There
was just something about the tunnel that was not "quite right".

About 100 feet down the tunnel the points of light began to form
patterns. The three children first saw simple shapes such as squares and
triangles forming underneath the surface of the walls. The rapidly
changed as the lights began to create the forms of many creatures, including
what looked like a dragon.

"This is very weird. This tunnel was made by magic, very powerful
magic.", Suzanna said quietly.

"Who made it? It wasn't those smelly kobolds.", Marlena said.

"I don't know. It wasn't made by the witches of our village and I
that there are no other villages within 20 miles from here.", Suzanna
said to the others.

"It could be old. I remember pops and me finding this old tomb a
couple years ago, back in world. We found some neat stuff in it, which
looked like it could have been magic.", Ranma said.

"You and your father robbed tombs?", Marlena said quietly in shock.

"Well, it's not like the dead people needed that stuff anymore and we
were both really hungry at the time.", Ranma said.

"That was wrong. Tombs are made to honor the dead. You just can't
take things from them. It's an insult to those who built the tomb.",
Suzanna said.

"But they're dead too. Why should they care?", Ranma said.

"Never mind, we don't have time to talk about this now. We should
still be looking for Cassandra, Suzanna said.

They continued to walk for about 15 minutes more before Suzanna
stopped dead in her tracks, causing the others to bounce off of her.

"What are you doing?", Ranma asked.

"We must have walked at least a mile. This tunnel can't be
that long.", Suzanna said in a frustrated tone of voice.

"The pattern on the wall keeps repeating too.", Ranma said.

"Maybe it's just a long tunnel.", Marlena said while trying to
sound a little hopeful.

The three children stood around for a few minutes before Ranma
pulled one of the thunder stones that Grovel had given everyone, and
set it on the floor right below the glowing dragon shape on the wall.
As the other two looked on.

"What's that for?", Marlena asked.

"Simple, we walk a little more and if we see the stone again then
we know that some thing weird is going on.", Ranma said.

Five minutes later everyone found themselves standing next to one of
the glowing dragon designs on the walls, and the stone, which Ranma dropped
was right below it.

"Now what do we do?", Marlena sighed.

"We could try walking the other way, maybe whatever magic that is in
this tunnel, only works to keep people from going into it.", Suzanna said.

They started to walk back the way that they has come and sure enough
five minutes later they found themselves back in front of the same design.

"#&$^#", Ranma said in frustration.

"Stupid hallway.... Stupid halfling girl.....It's her fault we're
here to being with.", Suzanna said while kicking the wall in front of her
and realizing too late that the thunder stone that Ranma set down was in the
way of her kick.

(Boom) (Booom) (Boooommmm), a loud noise echoed up and down the hallway.

The three 'adventurers' were now laying on the ground with their eyes
nothing but swirls as they mumbled and twitched incoherently.

Marlena, being the farthest away from the explosion, was the first
to wake. It took a few moments for the dizziness to fade. As she stood up
she looked over at the position that Ranma and Suzanna landed in and began
to laugh.

As they woke up, Ranma and Suzanna found themselves laying on top of each
other and to make things worse they were laying in such a way that their lips
were touching.

"Oh, ICK!!!", Ranma exclaimed as he jumped away with enough force
that he bounced off the ceiling and skidded down the floor, before
stopping a little behind Marlena.

Suzanna had a different reaction. Marlena was surprised to see the
girl's lips begin to quiver and tears begin to fall.

"(Sniff) (Sniff), It's not fair. Why him? Why did it have to be
that annoying boy. I deserved better than to have my first kiss be with
'HIM'.", Suzanna moaned.

As she watched Suzanna continue to mumble to herself Marlena was
torn between feeling a little sorry for Suzanna and feeling more than a
little amused.

Marlena had heard how much some of the older girls in the village
were looking forward to their first kiss, but considering how Suzanna
tended to treat the other girls as if they were some how not as important
as she was, Marlena really couldn't feel sad for her.

Ranma, looking over and seeing Suzanna sniffling said, "What's her
problem? I'm probably going to get sick from kissing her."

"Why you.....DIE!!!", Suzanna said as she tried to dive at Ranma
and missed horribly.

"Ha ha, too slow.", Ranma laughed as he took off down the hallway
with Suzanna right behind him.

Marlena could only sigh as she watched the two of them disappear
down the hallway and reappear on the opposite side. After a few minutes of
watching this she looked over at the dragon symbol on the wall and
noticed a couple new lights just above it. She touched the lights and
much to her surprise a small panel slid open just to the left of the
dragon.

Inside the panel was a series of lights and geometric shapes. A
triangle with a green, red, and blue light at each of the vertices
formed the inner shape. Surround the triangle was a circle that appeared
to be made of some sort of glowing blue crystal. Quite a contrast to the
dull steel colored triangle. The final shape was rusty colored square that
surrounded the circle and was slightly warm to the touch. The whole
panel gave off a slight hum.

As Ranma and Suzanna approached Marlena, she stuck her arm straight
out catching both Ranma and Suzanna in the chest. Both went down and bounced
once of the floor on their rear ends before skidding to a stop.

"Hey, what did you do that for?", Ranma said.

"There's no time to play now. We have to find Cassandra, Remember?",
Marlena said.

"And how are we supposed to do that?", Suzanna said shortly before
the noticed the new open panel in the wall.

"What's that?", Ranma asked while noticing the panel in the wall.

"I don't know, maybe it has something to do with us being stuck
here.", Marlena said.

"It's magic. I can feel it, but I don't know how it works.",
Suzanna.

"Maybe those glowing rocks do something.", Ranma said as he
began to reach for them.

"Don't touch those, we don't know what will happen if you do.",
Suzanna said.

"So do you have any better ideas, or should we just wait here
until something finds us.", Marlena said as she and Suzanna began to
argue about what they should do.

Ranma quickly grew tired of listening to the two girls, so
as they continued to 'calmly discuss' their situation Ranma walked
back up to the panel, looked at it briefly, then he pushed the
red light first, followed by the green light, the finally the blue
light. The girls did not even realize that Ranma had done something
until they all heard a hiss of escaping air, which was quickly
followed by a low rumbling sound.

"What have you done?", Suzanna said in a panicked voice as the
hallway began to drop quite rapidly.


*************


Outside of the Kobold lair, in the nearby forest, Corinne
continued to struggle with what ever had grabbed onto her.

"Stupid blond girl stay still and nasty hobgoblin will find you.",
said a familiar voice.

As she began to relax, she was let go and turned to see who it
was that grabbed onto her.

"What are you doing back here?", Corinne said to the little
goblin Grovel, that had led them here earlier.

"Sigh, Grovel meant to leave, but as Grovel began to sneak away,
he feel guilty. Maybe Grovel spend too much time with nice lady
adventurer after Grovel leave Undermountain. Grovel has....what you
call it...Oh yeah, Grovel remember now. Grovel have conscious. It
be very distracting. Gravel used to care only about himself, now Grovel
become worried if someone in trouble.", the little goblin said in
a tone of voice that clearly showed how disgusted he was with himself
at the moment.

"Are you sure that is the only reason? You weren't going to do
anything naughty?", Corinne said.

"(Snort), (Cough), (Cough), Grovel never understand why humans
always say such stupid things. Goblins no interested in human mates
or in eating humans. Only stupid smelly orcs interesting in mating with
humans, and many other things.", Grovel said in a disgusted tone of voice
as he turned slightly green at the prospect at having a human mate.

"Are you sure?", Corinne said while not being convinced of the
little goblin had just told her.

"Yes Grovel is sure. Besides even if goblins did like humans,
we would not take child as mate. Goblins don't do such things.",
Grovel said as Corinne looked a little annoyed at being called
a child.

Grovel had managed to lead Corinne out of the forest without
any kobold knowing that they were ever there. As they two approached
to within 200 yards of the village, they heard an annoying voice call
out, "Hold foul creature and release the fair Corinne so that I might
smite thee like the beast that thou are."

Corinne now had a look of utter disgust on her face as she
and Grovel turned to look at a ten year old boy holding a quite
beat up short sword and wearing 'armor' that looked like it had
been made of various scraps of leather and kitchen pans of all
things.

"Great, just what Grovel want to see, another weird little
human.", the little goblin mumbled as he started to walk off down the
road.

"Ah yes, run in terror foul creature and know that thou art
no match for the noble and great Terione Kunanne, then the fair
Corinne can show her appreciation for my person.", the weird little
boy said as he briefly indulged a brief fantasy of he and
Corrine walking side by side smiling at each other, with Corinne
slightly behind him as was due to a person of his station.

"Right, as if I would want to be with you. Besides there is
already somewhere else that I like.", Corinne grinned evilly.

Corinne watch the annoying little boy turn white for some reason
before pointing to Grovel and saying, "You do not mean that creature
do you not?", the little boy said as Grovel fell over.

Once he stood up again, Grovel quickened his pace while
muttering something about getting away from all the perverted little
humans around here.

"Wait what about Ranma and the others. Are you going to help
them?", Corinne yelled at Grovel.

Grovel continued to move down the road until he was out of
sight of the two children. As he past the trail that led to the
Kobold lair he sighed. If he had any sense he should just leave
and never come back, after all he wasn't responsible for whatever
happened to the little group of children. Of course he was the one
that led them to the kobold lair in the first place, his conscious
reminded him.

"Grovel spend too much time with nice lady adventurer. It make
grovel think of doing dumb things.", the little goblin said as he
moved on to the side trail then off into the trees, heading back towards
the kobold lair.

With Grovel's departure Terione turned towards Corinne and said,
"Now that I have driven off the evil beast you may show your
appreciation towards me.", the delusional little boy said.

"You are right, there is something I should show you.", Corinne
said as she walked towards the stunned little boy, who really did not
expect Corinne to agree with him. After all none of the other fair
maidens of the village even did.

"What is it you wish to show me?", Terione managed to squeak out
as Corrine flashed a cute, but insincere smile at the boy.

"Why this of course.", Corinne said as she pulled a small
heart shaped mace seemingly from thin air.

(WHAM)

(THUD)

Corinne looked at the now unconscious Terione at her feet briefly,
then ran off towards the village, while hoping that she could find
someone to help her rescue her friends.


**************


Back in the strange tunnel in the kobold lair, Ranma, Marlena, and
Suzanna were surprised when the tunnel suddenly began to drop quite quickly.

"Ranma, this is all your fault!", Suzanna yelled as she had visions
as herself being splattered all over the tunnel when it finished falling.

The tunnel continued to fall for roughly five more seconds before it
quickly slowed down, then stopped, leaving three disoriented children laying
on the floor once again.

As they began to stand up the tunnel took on the appearance of smooth
grey stone, exactly like the hallways above the they had used. They also
noticed a doorway right across from them and a blue light roughly 150 feet
down the tunnel.

"Well that wasn't so bad.", Ranma said.

"Not so bad...... You idiot you could have killed us.", Suzanna
exclaimed.

"Quit whining. You sound like old woman. Were fine.", Ranma said
as he noticed Suzanna turn a nice shade of red.

"Would you two stop arguing, you are giving me a headache.",
Marlena said.

Ignoring Suzanna Ranma moved over to the door and was surprised
when it opened without any resistance revealing a rather large room
that was lit with a series of glowing white crystals that were
embedded in the ceiling. The room was filled with wooden crates of
all shapes and sizes.

"I wonder if there is any treasure in here.", Ranma said as the
two girls followed him into the room.

"Remember you just can't take something because you like it.",
Suzanna said to Ranma.

"This isn't a temple, and besides if we take it then the 'bad guys'
can not use it, so its ok.", Ranma smirked at a glaring Suzanna as he
started to wander around the room.

Wandering around the room, he saw a large crate in which the top
had already been partially removed. Sliding it to one side he looked in
and was disappointed to find that it was filled with some axe like
weapons that were attached to long poles. Definitely not treasure in his
opinion. Moving to another crate he looked in two see that it was filled
with large two handed swords.

"This is weird the kobolds could not use these weapons. Maybe they are
for someone else?", Marlena asked no one in particular.

"I wonder what this is?", Ranma while pointing to an insignia on one
of the smaller crates in the room.

"That's the symbol of the country of Thay.", Suzanna gasped.

"Who?", Ranma asked.

"They're a country of evil wizards that live to the South. Mother
told me that we have been fighting them for a long time.", Marlena said.

"I think a large battle was fought nearby about 10 years ago, but
I am not sure.", Suzanna said.

"So this is stuff from that battle. The wizards are here now?", Ranma
asked.

"I hope not. They are much more dangerous than a bunch of kobolds
could ever be.", Suzanna said.

As the three continued to look around the room, Ranma was surprised when
he heard Marlena scream then run back towards the door.

"What's wrong?", both Ranma and Suzanna seemed to ask at the same time.

"There's someone on the floor over there. I think they're dead.",
Marlena said while pointing to where she used to be standing.

Ranma and the others cautiously moved over to where Marlena said
she saw this body. From underneath a blanket Ranma saw what looked like
an arm, except that it was red and quite shiny. Moving the blanket aside,
he saw that the 'body' was actually a statue of some little creature that
had been carved out of some time of red crystal.

"Who would want to make a statue of a stupid kobold?", Suzanna
said.

"It looks so real. Look at its face. It looks like it is scared of
something.", Marlena said.

Wanting a better look at the weird statue, Ranma tried to pull it
upright, but it was heavier than he thought. As he struggled with the
object it slipped from his hands, falling to the ground and shattering.

"So much for being quiet, I swear...", Suzanna said, but stop short
as the crystal piece began to smoke, then the turned to a fine black dust
as a low moan briefly filled the room before fading away.

"That was....creepy.", Ranma said as he looked around for Marlena
and found the tall girl right behind, trying to hide.

The fallen statue had managed to hit a small crate as it fell over and
spilled the crate's contents to the ground. Suzanna went over to the fallen
crate and pickup a small hand crossbow and several weird looking bolts
that looked like they would fit into the missile weapon. The tips of bolts
had a reddish glow to them that was obviously magical. The crossbow itself
seemed to have some magic instilled in it as well, for as she grabbed the bow
it seemed to cock itself with any help from the person who held it.

"Um.....If that's magic, you might want to be careful.", Marlena
said while remembering how she was almost fried with the lighting
bolt wand that Suzanna had been holding earlier.

"Of course I will be careful.", Suzanna snorted.

Looking down she saw a small quiver on the ground and put the
bolts in it. She was surprised when the seem to 'click' into place as
she place them in there. They wouldn't move until she touched them, then
they slid out with ease.

Ranma was a little disappointed, all he had been able to find
were some weapons and a few suits of armor that were far too big for
him to ever wear. He did manage to find a few daggers and what looked
like throwing stars in one container, but they were not magical.

Over in a corner of the room he was happy to find a small chest.
He was about to reach for the lock when he stopped short and looked
more closely at it.

Marlena had also seen the chest and was going to reach for it
as well when Ranma grabbed her by the hand.

"What's wrong?", Marlena asked.

"Look at the lock?", Ranma said.

"I don't see anything?", Marlena replied.

"Watch this?", Ranma said as he pulled out one of the daggers
that he had taken earlier and touched it to the front of the lock while
standing off to the side of the chest.

There was a brief clicking noise then a short 'whooshing' sound as a
small dart shot out and imbedded itself in a crate directly across from it.
Being hit by the dart would have been painful. The fact that the dart was
now dripping some sort of black liquid that was eating a hole in the crate,
that it was embedded in caused Marlena to briefly shiver.

"How did you know?", Marlena asked.

"I didn't know what it did, but pops and I have seen a lots of stuff
like that. At least there is no big axe that comes down from the ceiling
like we saw in this weird pyramid.", Ranma said.

"Big axe?!?", Marlena gulped as she eyed the ceiling with some
amount of fear in her eyes.

"Don't worry about it, we'll be alright, now lets see what's in
here.", Ranma said as he opened the chest revealing a pair of dark blue
colored boots.

"That's it.", Ranma sighed as he picked up the boots, which were
too large for him to wear. Still they were in better condition that his
shoes which were all but ruined by the muddy hallway earlier.

"What the @&#*!", Ranma exclaimed as the boot seemed to shrink to
his size as soon as he put them on.

"Oh, magic!", Marlena exclaimed in glee.

"Magic boots? I wonder what they do?", Ranma said while trying to
decide whether or not he should take them off.

"I bet they are cursed. They will drain your soul or turn you into
an old man.", Suzanna said as she suddenly came up from behind Ranma.

"ACK!!", Ranma replied.

"Just ignore her I don't think that they are cursed.", Marlena
said.

"You don't?", Ranma said.

"Of course. If they were cursed why would you put them in a
trapped chest?", Marlena said.

"That's true. They probably would have been thrown away.",
Ranma said, while hoping that she was right.

Marlena walked away from Ranma and began to search through the other
crates in the room, just as Ranma had done earlier. Maybe she would find
something that he had overlooked. Most of the smaller crates had already
been examined, but not the larger ones. The problem was that the larger
ones were stacked at least 3 high and there was no ways to move them at
the moment.

Ranma, still wondering whether or not he should be wearing his new
boots, began to slowing move around the room. Nothing appeared to happening
to him. He wasn't any older, and he didn't feel like his soul was being
drained, not that he knew what that felt like to begin with.

He began to move a little faster, then tried jumping in place.
Nothing unusual happened until began to move at a slow trot. Ranma
was surprised that when he reached a certain speed he found himself moving
without really trying. Soon he began to move faster that he wanted to and
barely avoided running into Suzanna. Soon though he lost all control and
found himself bouncing off objects, and the walls.

As a large crate seemed to just appear in front of him, Ranma
braced for impact as he actually slammed into and through the side of
it, coming to rest against the far side. It wasn't a quiet landing.
Fragments of the crate wall were scattered all over room and Ranma
thought he heard Marlena whimpering from near by.

"At least I know what these boots do now.", Ranma thought as he
crawled out of the crate, his hand unconsciously closing around a small
hard object that lay on the floor.

As he exited the crate and stood up slowly, he saw Marlena standing
nearby, holding her left forearm in her right hand. Moving closer Ranma could
seen a two inch long splinter embedded in her skin.

"Let me see.", Ranma said as he looked at Marlena's injury.

"It hurts.", she said her eyes filling with tears.

As Ranma began to gently touch the Marlena's arm in order to see how
he could remove the splinter, a yellow glow began to come from his right
hand. Ranma and Suzanna, who came over to see how bad Marlena was injured,
were surprised to see the glow spread up Marlena's arm. The splinter seemed
to move out on its own. Once it was clear of the wound, the cut itself
quickly began to heal over. It was almost gone when Ranma opened his hand
slightly causing a gold ring to fall out. The healing slowed down then stopped
with only a slight reddening of the skin on Marlena's arm to indicate that
she had even been injured there.

"I guess this is what got rid of your cut.", Ranma said while
picking up the ring.

"Now you have two magic items. Your lucky......", Marlena sighed.

"You can have it if you want. I mean I only found it because I
smashed into that stupid crate and you got hurt from the flying wood
pieces.", Ranma said.

"You want to give it to me?", Marlena said in a happy voice, that
someone was giving her a ring. Admittedly it would have been nicer if
Ranma was a little older and cuter, but it was still a gift from
someone that cared about her so she accepted it with a smile, then kissed
him on the cheek, causing him to turn away and blush.

"Well, don't the two of you look cute together. So Marlena dear,
is Ranma your new boyfriend.", Suzanna said with a smirk.

Ranma was about to tell Suzanna what he thought of her teasing
Marlena and him, when the three of them began to hear voices approaching
them from the far end of the hallway.

"Damn, I guess we made too much noise.", Ranma said casually.

"Maybe we can hide and hope they don't find us.", Marlena said,
as she and the others looked around the room.

As they hid behind he crates, Ranma and the others saw two Kobolds
appear at the door of the room and look cautiously around. One of the
little creatures was armed with a small crossbow and the other with a
small mace and shield.

"Where this room come from, me no see it before.", the first
kobold said.

"Stupid, this room boss tell us about. Room with stuff in it, hidden
by magic.", the second kobold said to the first.

"Then why we see it now?", the first kobold replied.

"Maybe magic wear off..."

(CRASH)

"Oh maybe someone here!", the first kobold replied as he now looked
over at Marlena who had leaned to far over against a small crate causing it
and her to fall over onto the floor.

"AEEIIII!", exclaimed Marlena as a small crossbow bolt, fired by
one of the kobolds barely missed her head.

"Die you little monster!", Suzanna yelled out as she popped up from
her hiding place and fired a crossbow bolt of her own.

The glowing bolt hit the kobold right in the chest. The little beast
looked down in shock then suddenly gave a muffled scream as its body seemed
to suddenly turn to a reddish crystal-like substance, exactly like the other
'statue' that they three kids had found before.

The remaining kobold turned around in fear and began to run as fast as it
could for the door. Ranma had decided to go after it, so that it wouldn't tell
anyone else about how he and the two girls had into the kobold lair.

He never got the chance. Just as the kobold reached the door, he suddenly
stopped short. Less than a second after that, Ranma and the others were
surprised to see a small sword emerge from the back of the kobold's neck.
The little beast fell to the ground silently, revealing a very familiar
looking goblin now standing in the doorway smirking at the three
'adventurers'.

"It's you.", Suzanna said in shock.

"Yes it Grovel.", the little replied back.

"You said you were leaving. Why did you come back?", Ranma asked.

"Grovel run into silly little blond girl wandering in forest by herself.
Grovel arrive just in time to prevent nasty hobgoblin from find her. She then
tell Grovel about how door slam shut and leave her outside.", Grovel said to
the others.

"Is Corinne alright?", Marlena asked."

"Yes, she fine. Grovel lead her back to village then come back here to
check on silly children.", the little goblin said.

"How did you get in here without being seen?", Suzanna said in a
suspicious tone of voice.

"Rude little girl forget that Grovel tell her he spend much time
in Undermountain. Grovel have many skills. Is very easy to sneak past
stupid little kobolds.", Grovel replied to the others.

"Have you see Cassandra?", Ranma asked.

"You mean little halfling girl?", Grovel replied as Ranma nodded
in the affirmative.

"NO, grovel not see her, but he did see strange looking kobold.
Grovel thinking that maybe he is shaman for kobold tribe. If we find
him then we find little halfling girl.", Grovel said to the others.

"We?, then you want to come with us?", Marlena asked in shock.

"Sigh, yes Grovel want to come with you. probably bad idea. Grovel
most likely get hurt, but it wrong to leave little kids down here
alone. Grovel learn as much from nice lady adventurer, when he travel
with her.", Grovel sighed.

"I'm glad your staying.", Ranma said as the two looked at him
strangely.

"Lets hope nothing happens to change that opinion.", Suzanna
said as Grovel picked up a few weapons from the crates in the
room, leaving his previous weapon, stained with kobold blood, hidden
under a tarp in the back of the room along with the body of the dead
kobold.

The new kobold statue was dragged by everyone to the back of the
room and laid on its side where the previous statue was. Grovel was
inclined to just push it over, until he and the others realized that
they really did not need to make any more noise than they already had.

So with the mess cleaned up, so to speak, they began to move slowly
up the hallway towards the blue light at the end of the hall.

A few moments later they came another series of stairways. One
led upwards and was lit with torches. This hallway was composed of
cut granite blocks and from the footprints near the foot
of the stairs it had also seen extensive use recently.

The lower stairway was of rough cut stone and had appeared to
have been cut recently. Dirt and even some fine plant roots could be seen
sticking out of several cracks in the stone.

"So which way do we go now?", Marlena whispered.

"Grovel come here from the stairs going up. They lead to many rooms
and tunnels that kobolds live in. Nothing interesting was up there that
Grovel cold see. If little halfling girl is here somewhere, she maybe
being held in lower tunnel.", Grovel said.

"I guess that we will have to go down then. Hopefully it won't be
too hard to find Cassandra.", Ranma said.

"Unless she has already been killed.", Suzanna said without thinking.

"You think she's dead?", Marlena said with tears in her eyes.", as
Ranma and the little goblin glared at her.

"Shhh.... It's ok, I don't think she's dead. We still have plenty of
time to find her.", Ranma said while hoping the little halfling girl didn't
end up like that poor Indian guide that lead them into the pyramid in
Mexico that they were there to loot..., I mean explore.

"You think so?", Marlena said.

"Yeah, I'm sure nothings happened to her.", Ranma said as Marlena
took hold of his hand and the two began to walk down the hallway with
Grovel leading the way and Suzanna following in the rear.

They quickly came to a small opening at the end of the hallway, just
large enough for them to squeeze through. The opening led down to a sunken
ditch in a darkened section of what they now saw to be a very large cave.

Across the room they could make out several kobolds holding small
crossbows. They were standing in a semi-circle around a large glowing
blue star, that was surrounded by a glowing blue circle.

"That's a pentagram. It's used to hold creatures in place after
you summon them.", Suzanna quietly said to everyone.

As their eyes adjusted to the dim illumination of the room they
noticed several odd objects against one of the walls across from them.
One appeared to a table with four leather straps and some sort of
wood roller at one end in which chains were attached to. Another
object looked like a large coffin of some sort, but when the light of
one of the torch of the room flickered across it, they could see that
the coffin was filled with metal spikes.

"Those are used to torture someone. My older brother used to tell
me and my sister icky stories about things like that.", Marlena said.

"Where is Cassandra? Do any of you see her?", Ranma asked.

Before anyone could answer there was a sharp grinding noise from the
other end of the room, that caused everyone to briefly duck into the ditch
to avoid being seen. As they peered over the edge of the ditch they saw
a stone door, that was previously hidden open up and through it marched
several kobolds in leather armor, carrying short swords. Following them
was the hobgoblin that grovel had told them about.

Looking at the large humanoid, Ranma and the others could
tell that this creature would be much harder to fight than any of
the small kobolds. The hobgoblin was wearing chain mail armor with
metal plates covering parts of its legs and arms. It wore a leather
open-faced helm, and a green cloak that seemed to emit a faint glow.

From behind the imposing humanoid a small wooden table was being
rolled out be two kobolds who were wearing outfits that seemed to be
composed of leather, feathers, and bits of small animal bones. Who
was on the table though was of more interest to the group of small
adventurers.

Covered by a white cloth sack, was a very familiar young halfling.
She was still alive, judging by how she was trying to raise herself off
of the table, but something was holding her down. No one could tell if
she was injured, from where they were hiding.

The table holding Cassandra was rolled up to and left on top of
a small stone platform that was near the glowing pentagram.

As the last of the kobolds moved well away from the pentagram and
the table holding Cassandra a low hum began to fill the room. Seconds
later the hum turned into a slow chant. A red glow was seen from the
doorway in which Cassandra was carried out of. Seconds later a very strange
creature emerged from the red light.

It looked like a kobold from a distance, but its skin was a strange
grey color and bits of flesh seemed to be barely hanging on to its body. The
creature moved with a strange shuffling motion. Dark black tattered robes
hung from its emaciated body at it seemed to be 'giggling' of all thing to
itself as it approached the table in which Cassandra was strapped to.

"Ack....(Choke)...", Grovel coughed as he suddenly grabbed onto his
nose and pinched it shut while cursing for the first time about how sensitive
his nose was.

"What's wrong?", Ranma asked.

"That head shaman is not alive. Grovel don't think that he is dead
either. Maybe some sort of undead or necromancer. Grovel not think that
kobolds could be such things.", Grovel said as everyone else in the party
began to look quite nervous.

"Are you sure about that?", Suzanna said.

"Grovel is sure. Grovel knows what undead smell like.", the little
goblin said to everyone.

"So what do we do. I don't think that we can fight everyone?",
Marlena said as looked out at the two dozen or so kobolds in the room, not
including the two shaman, the hobgoblin, and whatever the hell that thing
near Cassandra was.

The kobold necromancer, removed some silver powder from a pouch
about its waist and tossed some into the pentagram and some onto
Cassandra, while seeming quite amused at how it made the halfling
girl repeatedly sneeze as she inhaled the strange dust.

The necromancer pulled a bone wand out of its robes and began
to wave it over the pentagram while chanting in a strange language.

"What is he saying?", Suzanna said while hoping that Ranma
could understand the disgusting looking little thing.

"I'm not sure. He's mumbling. I think he's saying something
about demon, princess, hells, and abyss, something like that.",
Ranma replied to Suzanna.

Just as Ranma finished speaking a red pointed of light began
to form over the pentagram. It quickly expanded into an oval,
opaque at first, but slowing changing to transparent. Through the
red light everyone could see a barren and desolate landscape. All
manner of horrible creatures moved into and out of view. Creatures
could be seen tearing into one another, leaving bits of blood and
gore in their wake. It was not a sight for child or anyone with
a delicate constitution to see.

Marlena had seen enough and was crouching down on the bottom
of the pit trying to forget what she had seen.

A dark figure moved up to the portal, its exact nature somehow
hidden from those on this side of the portal. As it pushed though the
portal there was a flash of bright white light. When the light faded
a creature, that in Grovel's opinion, made the kobold necromancer
look normal in comparison, stood in the center of pentagram with a
smile on its face.

"That's a demon?", Ranma said quietly.

"Weird looking demon.", Suzanna commented.

All around the room the kobolds and the hobgoblin looked at the
creature in confusion, unsure of as how they should act.

As strange as the creature's appearance was, even more unusual
was its strange 'battle cry?' or "HIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEE".


Author's Note:

Wow, it's been about 7 months since my last chapter of this
story. Its strange how much time has seemed to slip by so quickly. Now
as to why it has been so long since I released my last chapter, well
to tell the truth it was a combination of being distracted by many other
things and a little bit apathy on my part.

I haven't really felt like writing or even reading any fanfiction
for quite some time. If I remember right, I don't think that I even
started writing this chapter until early august, and even then, the
pace that I wrote was a 'little' slow.

Now that this chapter is finally done I might pick up the pace a
little, but I can make no promises. During the time since I published
the previous chapter, in early February, I have thought of many ideas for
this story and several others. I just never cold seem to get around to
writing them out.

Now as for what will come next, I cannot say. Maybe it will be another
chapter of this story, or maybe another side story to Little Angel Lost. I
an not say, to tell you the truth.

In conclusion, I hope you will enjoy this chapter and if you have any
comments or constructive criticism you can reach me at:

ryo_oki@pacbell.net

Till then,

Ryo Oki