Chapter 7 – The head of the Snake

In a beam of white light the three find themselves in a large royal bedroom, its well lit and very well decorated with golden ornaments and well carved furniture the walls are carved with a pattern resembling some of the symbols they had seen earlier. There is a fancy glass chandelier hanging from the ceiling, as they look round the room they see a beautiful looking woman dressed in a fine silk and fancy dress. She has golden bands on her arms and wrists and wears a small tiara in her long auburn hair as they look more closely at her they can see small scaling round her eyebrows and eyes and she has pale skin with shades of light green around the few parts of scaled skin, she stares in anger towards the group hisses at them then grabs two long blade knives from her dresser and holds them up ready to fight.

"lets do this quickly" says Una as she slams both palms down on the ground and shout out "entangle" her hand glow with a bright green energy that flows into the floor and travels towards the Queen. Vines and plants begin to come out of the walls behind the Queen wrapping themselves around her limbs and constricting her forcing her to struggle and drop her knives, both Una and Victor look at Krum "finish it big guy" victor says. Krum smiles and walks up to the Queen and ready's his battle axe he takes one last step when the Queen struggles and swipes and him with her nails ripping some of his animal skinned cloths, Krum looks at the rip she caused and begins to flair up in Rage. He holds up his axe and puts all his strength into a huge blow that cuts through the air with such speed blade creates a high pitched screech and then slices cleanly through the Queen's torso, through both arms and chest and any vines that where in the way too killing the Queen in an instant.

As she dies her eyes roll back and blood pools over the floor, the remaining vines go back into the walls where they came from and the mutilated body slump to the floor into the cold blood puddle below her. Victor walks over to the corpse and says sarcastically "that was great Krum a bit over the top, but any chance you could do one more swing we only need to take back the head..." Krum looks a little embarrassed and takes another swing separating her head and causing it roll towards Victors feet with a lifeless expression on her face. Victor takes out a sack and carefully picks up the blood soaked head then places it inside his bag and throwing to Krum "here take this and do not drop it" says Victor, "ok lets go" says Una pointing to faintly glowing panel on the wall near to where they entered I think if we touch this panel on the wall we can go back, but we are going to have to be carful im sure by now those guards are surrounding this portal", "right" says Krum as he holds up his axe "Krum ready!". Before they leave they take one last look around the room and pocket a few small trinkets and treasures that they can carry within their pouches, once finished they all touch the panel and again disappear into a white light with another flash.

The three appear in the same spot as they travelled through before but are surprised to not see any guards surrounding them, instead they step out of the light into a sticky and blood soaked floor. They see nothing but mangled and ripped open bodies of the Yuan ti guards spread across the floor and blood splattered in every direction even a small amount dripping from the ceiling. "something bad happened here" Victor says with a little fear in his voice "what could have caused all this carnage" Una says with a similar tremble and discomfort on her face, "I dont know" replies Victor "but we need to get out now, I dont want to find out who or what caused this!" they all agree and begin to move back through the massacre in the hall and slowly back through temple trying to get back to the exit. The temple is different from before the atmosphere has changed, the air is filled with the smell of blood and halls that where once well lit now have snuffed out torch's and some flames barely flickering out light, every now and then they come across more bodies torn apart in an equally brutal way as if ripped apart with claws and brute strength, other have dozens of bite marks on the bodies and are swollen to the point of bursting and other as if already burst!. sometimes they hear screams coming from ahead of them but never the less they trudge on through the chaos until finally they come to a familiar corridor.

"This is it" says Victor "they way out is down here and to the left where we began" they begging to walk faster down the corridor still minding there footsteps, when from the other end from where Una first sensed danger they begin to see many large snake heads slither round the corner followed by one large serpent body with two long arms and razor sharp claws follow, all the head rise up looking directly at the group and the monster stand just shy of the ceiling and lets out a loud hissing screech from all eight of its serpent heads and begins to slither down the corridor towards them at speed. The three just make it to the turning on the left facing the exit, Krum and Una begging to run towards the light beaming in from outside, Victor stops and pulls out a potion from one of his pouches "run, dont look back" he shouts to them, "dont be foolish" screams Una, Victor drinks his potion and smiles at Una and Krum with a strange calmness "trust me, ill catch up soon" he says in a confident tone, then with tremendous speed rushes towards the monster. He hurls two knives spinning through the air directly striking both of them into its torso of the beast causing it to shriek in pain, he then draws his sword and takes a firm two handed grip on it and turns the blade edge towards the creature. Using his gained momentum he falls back sliding across the blood stained floor avoiding the reach of the monstrosity, then pounces up in front of the creature and with a bold stroke cleaves four of the serpents many heads clean off in one swoop, the large monster squeals in pain and lunges backwards. Victor takes this brief moment to turn and run back to the exit with wind like speed, the more he runs the faster he seems to go and just as the others wait by the exit he manages to catch up and run down the temples edge with them the monstrous creature following close behind, as the creature gets to the edge of the temples exit it suddenly stops the chase just before the light hits it as if scared of the outside world or sunlight, the monster continues to shriek and pace at the exit in anger from loosing its prey. The three continue to run through the dense forest until they cannot go any further before catching their breath.

Once they had stopped they decided it was safe enough to take a short rest and catch there breath, they look at each other and the direction they ran from and after a few seconds begin to smile at each other in relief and that quickly leads into laughter each of them knowing they came close to a fight they may not have won. Once they compose themselves they begin to look round and get there baring and rough location so they can find there way back to the guild, once they were ready they set off once again to go and claim their reward.

As they got back to the guild they are greeted just outside the guild hall by the head of the guild, he has a very surprised look on his face. "I, I cant believe it" the man says "you made it back alive, just the three of you its incredible, you truly are great warriors, did you finish it? Did you bring the head?" he askes. Victor takes the bag from Krum and holds out the blood soaked bag with the head in it, the man looks in disgust and at the dripping bag, "do you have our gold?" Victor askes dropping the bag at his feet causing a little mud and blood to splatter over his boots, the man jumps back in surprise and says in a stuttering voice "g, gold yes, yes here take it and please rest here in the tavern as long as you need". They each thank the man as they walk past him and head into the tavern, they go to their rooms to wash up, rest and eat. Once fully rested they meet back downstairs and head into town to sell the trinkets they raided from the Queens room.

As they walk through the town the three notice people beginning to whisper and point at them, Krum confused and a little annoyed approaches a couple that he saw whispering and askes "why you talk bout Krum?" the woman hides behind the man scared, intimidated by the large Dragonborn the man looks up at Krum and replies in a cowardly tone "you are the ones that slayed the yuan ti yes?" Krum nods and says "yea?" the woman comes out from behind "thank you" she says "you three have saved our town and probably many others too, you are all hero's, please we didn't mean to offend you, any of you" she says looking at the others "we are all just a little intimidated by the hero's and the power you hold that where able to stop this army creatures for us" as she says this a crowd gathers around the three and begins to clap and cheer in appreciation. As the trio walk on through the town more towns folk stop their work to clap and shake their hands in thanks for their deeds. After a short time of wandering the praise fades out and the townsfolk go about there daily lives, the three finally track down a trade shop and sell what the treasure taken from the temple. On the way back to the guild they begin to talk to each other "this is great with the reward money and what we got from the loot we can travel in comfort for some time" says Victor happily "sounds good" Krum replies grinning, Una smiles and says with a smug tone "count me in, I mean where would you two be without me... but before we go anywhere how about one more night of rest and all we can share an all we can eat meal in the tavern?" Krum smiles and says "sounds better, lets go" and he walks with haste back towards the tavern, "im not sure 'all you can eat' with Krum is a good idea" says Victor laughing, Una smiles "come on lets follow before he gets in trouble" she says.

Until the journey continues...