Tail Cave [CJ+Guy]

As the monster suddenly dropped down from the darker ceiling and pinned the warrior woman to the ground, adrenaline shot through his veins as he charged forward as the creature went to take a bit out of Ruby, running into the large spider with his blade horizontal to himself. Both of them went crashing about, flipping end over end as Belneth landed on his back and the spider landed beside him. Both held wounds from the bard's sword, the Skulltula had blood oozing from its jaw from where the blade struck, and while falling Belneth had sliced his left leg with his sword, a shallow wound but annoying none the less.

As the Skulltula recovered, he lunged at Belneth, who soon found his blade was also missing, it had been throw across the room when he fell, and he found himself fending off the beast with the torch, waving it about to keep the spider at bay. While not on his mind, the irony that he was now in the position Ruby was in moments ago was heavy in the air. The fates sure had it in for him when he got the idea he would play daring hero to a warrior woman.

As the beast was torn off her, Ruby wasted no time grasping out for her longsword and scrambling onto her feet. By the time she had regained her ground, however, she could see Belneth had completely lost his.

With her hilt grasped in both hands, she charged forward a couple steps before tearing into the beast's side with a heavy rising slash. Much like the worm before, it was flung upwards and off Belneth will simultaneously suffering a devastating slice. The creature scurried over several feet in a defensive position.

Not removing her eyes from the monster, nor her dominant hand from her blade, Ruby extended her left gauntlet down towards her companion as if to help him up. "...I hate getting close to cornered animals... and I suppose you don't have a ranged weapon?"

After Belneth was on his feet and gave the response she feared, she motioned for him to stand back. Taking both hands to the hilt of her blade, she focused all of her energy into it as she inched closer the beast... careful... steady... not even lifting her toes as her boots scooted across the sand.

Just when she too close, the Skulltulla lunged forth in desperation, only to be met with a vicious blade slinging across its face, immediately followed by a wave of martial energy that tore into its hide. The creature was practically batted away from the one-two strike, and plopped onto its back on the sand. Immediately, its legs curled up, and its body seemed to go still...

"...Should be dead," Ruby felt the need to make the obvious more obvious. She then turned towards Belneth, "It's silly of me to say this, but thank you for getting that thing off me..." With a slightly annoyed expression, she looked away uneasily, hiding her face from him, "Can't stand spiders." Saying nothing more of the matter, the maiden slid her blade back into its sheath proper.

"Now then, I believe our only exit is the door up there." She gave a quick nod towards the ladder at the far end of the room. "Hopefully it can lead us back to the first floor."

Belneth picked himself up off the ground, brushing himself off and sheathed his blade. He rubbed his leg painfully, smearing the blood which had mostly stopped flowing anyways. "Man, I wish I could just save this pain for the morning," he was muttering to himself when Ruby spoke. "No problem, I would assume, and you have proven, that you would do the same for me," Belneth chuckled. With his ill-attempt at humor done, he took the torch and held it up high to be sure nothing else would surprise them before moving over to the ladder.

Climbing carefully with one hand, the other still holding the torch, he carefully pushed the trapdoor open, light flooding into the room as he peaked out and looked around. "Look's clear, hold on." Belneth further pushed the lid back, the edge of it resting on the wall as he climbed out, torch held aloft as he looked for anything hostile. "Same ugly tiles, and horrible walls, we're back on ground floor. Come on up." Belneth waited for Ruby to climb, holding his hand down to help the lady up.

Hopefully this spoony Bard hadn't missed anything in his search...

(Sorry about the delay. )

Ruby graciously took his hand, and soon found herself climbing up onto the tile as well. It was indeed familiar... but not the same. There was a suspicious look in the maiden's green eyes as she scanned every inch of the room--square, fairly large, and devoid of many features aside from five large doors lining the far wall. She couldn't quite place her finger on it, but there was something particularly odd about this room.

"...Hm." Her hand was secure on her hilt, legs angled and ready to move--as if she was already in combat. "Is it just me, Belneth, or is this floor tilted? Towards us, towards this wall. I don't believe this cave is sinking, rather, it almost seems like it was designed this way..."

Just as she said that, a large clunking of a mechanism sounded at the far end of the room. Her eyes widened in shock as a massive iron sphere--taller than any Goron--smashed through one of the doorways and rolled down the incline. It didn't go straight, but bounced off the walls and all over the room. Barely managing to shift out of its way, Ruby watched as the artificial boulder tore through clean the wall through which they had just come, and plopped into the sand pit below.

Her gaze was wide upon it, almost in shock, "How... peculiar..."

...Almost on cue, a symphony of three identical clunks erupted from the wall of five doors.

"Oh come on, like we need this," Belneth swore as he made sure his blade was securely sheathed as he watched the three stones roll towards them. Darting left and right, Belneth tried to watch carefully where they were going, but then one would either hit a wall or another ball, changing its course and making Belneth need to move.

"Screw it," Belneth muttered as he ran forward, up the incline, and dove inbetween two of the boulders before they crashed into each other, landing on the ground with a thud. "That was easy," Belneth laughed as he stood up and brushed his tunic off. Just as those boulders crashed into the wall and down into the sand pit, Belneth turned to see three more boulders come crashing out of the doors.

"Ruby!" Belneth shouted, as sudden spark of insight came to the bard, "so far, the boulders have come out of every door but the second door on the right." It stood to reason that the door no boulders came from would be the doorway out of the room. Belneth ran to his left, running into the wall as a boulder skimmed past him, nearly crushing him.

"Goddess, give me more monsters, these boulders don't fight fair!"