Goron Mines (Idarian + Double_r111)

Jon continued his journey on foot from here. The slopes of the mountain up to the gates of the mines were far too rough for Baratheon to manage, so Jon was forced to leave the horse at the base of the Goron structure. Luckily for Jon, night made the air just cool enough to be bearable, though the heat was quite intense, to be sure. It was an active volcano, after all.

With his shield and war-hammer slung over his back, and with Fire-Brand secure at his hip, he began the final ascent rock-by-rock and pass-by-pass.

By the end of it all, Jon was sweating under his steel coat. Still, he was making good progress. He had fought in Goron City, after all. He knew heat.

Here, at the top of the spire set in the canyon wall, was the gaping doorway into the depths of the Goron Mines...

Scaling the mountain had been hard work, especially for someone like Sapientia who hated the heat, and heat this mountain had aplenty. "This dreadful heat is the reason I specialized in cold magic." Sapientia mumbled to himself bitterly. Sapientia was quite proud of himself for climbing the mountain so well, considering his strength, or lack of it anyways. However, for someone who had loved the cold, and specialized in cold magic, this was terrible heat.

As he finished scaling the cliff he saw another man standing by the entrance to the cave. So this would be his companion. " Hello, I'm Sapientia. I assume you'll be the one who was going in with me then?" Sapientia asked the man, inspecting him. The man had Blond hair, and very strong green eyes.

"Hail, friend. You are to join me, then? I am called Jon, a son of the House of Augustus. It shall be nice to have some company, I would expect."

Jon smiled behind his barbute, sweat beading on his forehead. He knew an ally would be good in this ordeal. The heat from within the mines was sweltering, and could be felt even outside of its entrance.

"You appear to be an enchanter of some sort. Care to spread a wave of cold over this blistering place, or is that not in your power?" Jon gave a chuckle, then made to walk inside.

"Come, we best not delay."

"Indeed I am a spellcaster, specializing in the cold. However unfortunately, that is far beyond my capabilities." Sapientia responded to the hearty soldier, giving no more than a slight smile to show he recognized the joke. walking in Sapientia, already drenched in sweat, felt like he'd just walked straight into a fire. "Ugh, I don't know about you, but I despise this sort of heat." Sapientia complained to Jon as they walked in to the first room. The room was filled with lava and a slim straight pathway, sort of a crudely made bridge. wide enough for a man to walk across, not much wider though. The walls were lined with pipes, which oddly enough didn't look nearly as out of place as it probably should have.

Looking around more there was a geyser of lava spewing out of a pipe blocking the way across the stone bridge. "Well that's odd, how I wander, will we make it through that." Sapientia mused. Then a large metallic switch protruding from the floor caught Sapientia's eye. Walking up to the switch, Sapientia stepped on the switch, to no affect. " Hey Jon!" Sapientia shouted. I need you to stand on this switch. No offense but your a little more... well built than me, and you have so much armor and weapons, your sure to be heavy enough to push it down." Sapientia explained.

The inside of the mines were even somewhat surprising. How could anyone mine any minerals in such a hostile place? The heat blasted Jon's senses, but he managed forward. Ahead was the small, stone bridge across which the pair would need to walk, yet it was cut off by a spout of flame about halfway across. Jon stood at the end of the bridge, pondering how to proceed.

Sapientia then walked over to the rusted switch, and Jon knew where his companion's mind was going.

"Certainly. I seem to be the heavier one, after all."

Then, Jon placed his foot on the switch and stepped up to put his full weight on the metal plate. Suddenly, the switch lurched, and there was a great, hollow click as the switch was pressed into the floor. Slowly, the fire and magma stopped spewing from the thick, steel pipes near the bridge.

"Well then, shall we continue?"

Jon walked across the bridge, moving over the first of what were presumably many magma chasms in the mines. At the other side of the bridge was a large, red, iron gate on tracks, with a metal winch nearby. Doubtless the winch would be used to open the iron gate to allow access to the locked door behind. However, Jon soon saw, much to his dismay, three dinolfos guarding the winch at the end of the bridge. All three carried iron bucklers and wore ax-heads on the ends of their tails. Two of the dinolfos wore only tanned leather vests and boiled leather faulds, with large animal skulls as helms. The third, larger dinolfos wore a coat of light, steel chainmail with silvered, steel plate armor. This one one wielded a fearsome-looking falchion-swordbreaker with a set of hooks in its edge, no doubt designed to tear at flesh. Jon could not help but notice the iron skeleton key hanging from the armored dinolfos' belt.

"Sapientia, we must cut these beasts down to reach that winch. Do not try for it yet, or you will surely but cut to pieces. Kill these first and we will pass unharmed, I say."

Jon led the way, not knowing how capable his companion was of armed combat.

One of the dinolfos approached him as he stepped onto the wider stone ledge leading up to the iron gateway. As the head of the bridge, Jon stood firm, bracing himself as his foe foolishly threw its sword blade upon the soldier's large shield. Grunting, Jon thrust forward with his shield, hearing the dull thud of his assault toss his enemy off balance.

In his own turn, Jon lashed out with his mighty war-hammer. A brutal swing lodged the weapon's deadly, pointed spike in the dinolfos' left upper-back, just behind the shoulder. There was a crunch of crushing ribs and fragmenting shoulder joint as the monster howled in agony, its blood coating the head of Jon's weapon. The warrior then pulled back with all of his might, dragging the monster back toward him and off to his left before turning and throwing the dinolfos toward the ledge, detaching it with a flick of his wrist as sending it tumbling down to the searing magma below, screeching all the while in its misfortune.

The two had walked across the bridge into the next area. Three dinolfos were guarding a nearby winch, used for opening the door. Jon had went ahead, straight into melee fighting and had killed one of them. Sapientia let loose a ball of ice from his hand, aiming for the bare chest of the monster. It would not kill the monster only cause some bruising at this distance, but that was fine for Sapientia was not aiming to kill, but rather to infuriate the beast into attack. It worked. Charging at Sapienta, He let loose a blast of cold air from his hands, freezing the creatures legs. He knew that in this intense heat, the beast would only stay frozen for a few seconds, so Sapientia acted quickly, kicking it into the pit behind him. Looking back at his companion, Sapientia noticed the last dinolfos approaching him from behind. "Jon, watch out behind you!" Sapientia shouted in warning.

Jon spun around to meet his foe, ducking a horizontal swing of the dinolfos' falchion. From his left, Jon saw his enemy's tail swinging around in an arc, bringing its ax-head to him. He deflected the blow with his large shield, then thrust the head of his war-hammer into the dinolfos' gut. The jab knocked the monster off balance, sending it stumbling backward. He stood tall, swinging his hammer at the monster, which dodged the blow and came in for another strike, which Jon parried with his shield.

The dinolfos lunged forward again, and, this time, Jon swept its legs out behind it, sending it flat on its stomach. Planting his right foot on the small of the dinolfos' back, he brought the spike of his war-hammer down on the top of his foe's head. The dinolfos' steel helm seemed to crumple like tin foil, while a stream of red oozed from the crater in its skull.

"Friend, get the winch. I will open the door," Jon said, removing the iron skeleton key from the dinolfos' blood soaked belt.

Walking to the winch, Sapientia placed his hands on it, careful not to touch the metal part, which was probably wise considering the heat in the mine. "How can anyone concentrate in these conditions!" Jon complained, cranking the winch in circles. The door steadily lowered, until it was at the ground. Walking in to the next room, Sapientia was surprised to see it was a main hub of sorts, with an elevator of sorts covered with a huge lock in the cener of the room. the most threatening things in the room fire keese, were more pests than actual danger. There were four doors on the walls, including the one they had entered through.

Upon closer inspection, Sapientia noticed only one door which could be opened, the rest of them were locked. "Well Jon, looks like we're going this way then." Sapientia said, walking over to the open door. A fire keese dived at Jon, who not even bothering to waste his energy with magic just pulled out his Knife, and stabbed it as it approached him. "Would you like to enter first." Sapientia said waiting for Jon at the door.

Jon walked over to the iron door on the left side of the room and rolled it aside. This door led into a large chamber. At the entrance to the chamber, where Jon was, there was a large, iron platform and a ramp winding down to a larger, expansive area below, which was a magma pit, filling from cracks high above that let magma flow, with a collection of stone platforms surrounding a larger, stone passage that led to another door. However, this door was behind a barrier that would have to be removed.

First, though, the ramp was blocked by a mechanical barricade that could be lowered by a foot switch nearby. Thinking little of it, he stepped on the switch, only to find that the iron platform in front of the ramp dropped down. It turned out that the barricade was actually the wall to a mini-arena. Jon looked down the few feet to the platform below, and saw it was filled with three dodongos. In the center of the platform was another switch that would likely raise the arena once more to allow passage.

"My friend... This does not look promising..."

Suddenly, Jon's expression changed.

"To battle, then! Shall we?" He gripped his war-hammer and leaped into the pit with the monsters.

looking at his companion warrior, Sapientia thought the warrior seemed a little hasty, but then again, as he had displayed in his fight against the dinolfos earlier, he was a worthy opponent. Sapientia on the other hand stayed above studying the dodongos for a moment before coming down. The tail glowed a bright red, an obvious indication of it's weakest point. Jumping down after the warrior, Sapientia immediately let loose a ball of ice from his hand. instantly the ball hit the dodongos tail, and while the creature had been stunned, it was still alive. Sapientia took advantage of the dazed moment the monster had too get behind it, and stab it with his enchanted knife. The creature had as it died, surprised Sapientia releasing one more breath of fire. "Yow! Sapientia screamed as a few hit his left hand. He looked at his left hand, but fortunately, the flame had been quick and despite stinging badly, he had been lucky, and it didn't seem to be a serious injury. Then seeing the next one approaching, Sapientia prepared to fight, He noticed this one was bigger than the other two. "Probably their leader." Sapientia had assumed.

Jon dropped down into the pit, his chain coat rattling. He was, in fact, quite surprised that Sapientia could have dispatched that dodongo so rapidly. It would be good to have this ice sorcerer at his back.

Without time for further thought, Jon was confronted by this larger, alpha dodongo. He was swift to assault it, but was halted in his tracks by the hiss of air rushing into the dodongo's lungs. Jon stopped and dove out of the way of a column of flame lunging forward to fry him. He had few options to fight this creature. Obviously, he would need to strike at the beast's weakest point to stun it, then aim for a more vital area to get a kill.

Rolling around to the lizard's backside, Jon grunted, swinging his war-hammer down on the orange-yellow scales of the dodongo's tail. His weapon crushed flesh, and left the monster howling in pain. It spun around, trying to snap its jaws around Jon's leg, but was blocked by his sturdy shield. Jon retaliated with a brutal blow underneath the monster's chin with the spike of his war-hammer. There was a sound of shattering jawbone, and the the hammer was slowly removed from a bloody crater in the underside of the dodongo's head.

Watching Jon dispatch the large alpha dodongo, Sapientia was impressed. Then turning his attention to the final dodongo, his strategic mind began whirring with ideas of how to kill it. Suddenly, he had an idea, but it was risky. He didn't have the element of surprise, so the attack would be tougher than simply distract and knife. As the dodongo took a deep breath about to breathe a wave of fire at him, he prepared to let loose a blast of icy wind from his outstretched hands. The wind hit the fire and the two were about equal in power, colliding in the middle of the two. The spell didn't normally need to last more than a few seconds though so it was exhausting, and having never done something like this, he even risked passing out due to the effort. "Jon!" Sapientia yelled. "Get the tail, hurry!" Sapientia exclaimed, sweating even more than he normally would in a place like this.

Jon rushed at his prey, bellowing fiercely his call of battle into the caverns already noisy with the din of molten, volcanic rock churning far below. He raised his war-hammer on high to strike down upon his foe with a great fury. The hammer's spiked head flashed in a downward arc to smite the thinly scaled, broad tail of the monster.

The dodongo hissed in agony as the weapon smashed into its weakest flesh. It whirled around in a blind rage, snapping at the soldier's unshielded right arm. Razor sharp teeth closed like a vice at Jon's upper arm. Thankfully, the clamp was not closed entirely over his arm, and the teeth bit into, but did not pierce, the well-crafted steel of his klivanion and the heavy, double-layered rings of his 8-in-2 mail.

Jon howled in pain as small trickles of blood began to well in the rings of his hauberk. While not severely damaged, his arm was stricken with a terrible pain, causing Jon to lose grip on his hammer. Trying to shake the monster off, Jon waved his arm around briefly. The dodongo did not break off from Jon's arm, and so the old veteran of war reached for the hilt of his trusted longsword. His fingers gripping above the weapon's pommel, he slid Fire-Brand from its scabbard, with well-honed steel ringing softly. The edge blazed a fierce orange in the light of the fires below.

Jon fought more to toss the monster free. Finally, he succeeded in removing the beast's jaws, at which point he lunged at the hissing dodongo and plunged the point of Fire-Brand into its mouth and down its throat.