Chapter 1: Finding Fortune
Winds howled like dying beasts as the sound of booming and crashing sang in the storm over the land as if it were a lalubye to the wavering world of the Theor Forest. It was without a doubt a hurricane like no other that had ever hit Grand Chokmah with such displeasure. The destruction in it's wake had forced citizens to leave for cities and providences in land. The Emperor and the Military always had to stay, and after a hurricane they were on full blown duty, repairing damages and finding better ways to protect from high waves slamming mercilessly into the Fortress City. It wasn't long before citizens began to return home, and aid in the city's restoration projects.

It was times like this though that Jade wished he was absent from the city, and all it's inhabitants. Hurricanes had a cruel way of happening, and an even crueler way of destorying. The rain battered down in stinging waves the soldiers around him and himself. It didn't help that he was running against the high winds which only seemed to amplify the pain of the rain. Even heavily armored and clothed, the rain still bit at him like needles repeatedly pricking at his skin. Jade had removed his glasses before he'd entered the forest, so he wouldn't have to constantly be readjusting them.

"How much farther?" Guy huffed from behind, spitting out water that fell in his mouth.

Jade, wondering the same thing, shaking the wet hair off his face.

Guy had returned with him to Grand Chokmah, coming back to his duties as "royal rappig walker," as Peony had dubbed him. He took up residence in a mansion that had been funded for him by the Malkuthian Royal Treasury. Guy tried to make himself useful each and every day in the foreign city, From helping Peony with every days chores, to sometimes even accompanying Jade to a city with an uprising of crazed Score devotees. Guy could've stayed in Kimlasca, in Baticul where he could help the Fabre residence and so the Princess. Jade guessed though that Guy had come to Grand Chokmah to try and get his mind off of his friend, Luke.

Jade, too, had tried to take his mind off Luke, but Fomicry and all it's causes only came back with a devastating blow, leaving him with an undespensible guilt of responsibility. But Jade wasn't ashamed of it, he would gladly bare the sins of all the things he'd done in his past, and everything he'd done for as long as he lived.

"Reports say it was a few klicks into the forest's interior," one of the soldiers in front of them yelled back. "We shouldn't be to far from the area now!"

The words exchanged were almost uncomprehendeble, the stentorian rain and deafening thunder drowning out all other sounds. Brilliant flashes of lightning illuminated the faces of the men and the flooding ground beneath them as they ran farther into the forest. All was pitch black, and it was impossible to see anything if it weren't for the flashes of lightning and the fonstone beacons some of the men carried with them.

Jade held one tucked up in his right glove in case he needed an emergency light source. The heat of the stone warmed his soggy clothing and sodden skin. It was glowng dully in the fabric, and looked rather strange on his arm.

What was even stranger was what had happened in the forest earlier in the evening. There was evidence of it everywhere, a fight that had left broken and damged trees sprawled in a path leading all the way up to the gates which started the path to the Fortress City. Some areas where dotted with blood, and ground had been torn up with the angry fury of a battle. One man had been reported to have stumbled upon a poisen needle, and was rushed back to Grand Chokmah for medcial treatment while inspecting the scene of the brawl.

It was hard to imagine who and what had done this, and what had left without a trace as to who they even were. Jade tried to think of what could've done it, but nothing and no one he could think of could possibly do something like this.

Unless. . . Jade shook the thought off, wondering why she had come to mind. He thought of her often, but more and more lately he didn't, and when he did, his body grew anxious and unstable. It was hard to ratiocinate where she had possibly gone too and where she was now. Such thoughts left a cold lump in his chest, and he quickly shifted them to a less depriving manner.

When they reached the area Jade was astonished by the amount of damage, and could hardly beleive what he was seeing. Soldiers were scattered about, accesing the harm that had been done. Luckily other than the man whom had carelessly stumbled upon the poisen needle, there had been no other casualties. The smell of blood was heavy in the air, musty and stale like copper or metal. Whatever had come through here, must've been large or there had been several people involved. Guessing by the intensity of the breakage, the battle must've been fairly intense.

"What exactly did the reports say?" Jade questioned through the screaming wind. The trees swayed around them and lightning flashed revealing the areas of the most noticeable damage. Even through the dimly lite night, Jade could see where the areas of the most intense cessions of the battle had taken place.

Trees had been chopped clean in half as if by an extremely sharp and large weapon. The use of incantations and spells were evident where there were charred piles of ash and ground of crushed matter. Fonons were still fluctuating beneath them, drifting up from the ground and into the atmosphere. Jade looked at the ground beneath him, as lightning shimmered in cracks across the sky. The flash of light revealed small but long objects inbetween and surronding his toes. There weren't only one of two of them, but several, seven or nine of them. Sure enough there were needles.

Jade knelt down, pulling the fonstone beacon out from his glove. Guy noticed the movement, and leaned down next to him.

"So, I'm guessing those are one of the needles that the soldier must have stepped on," Guy said gruffly. The weather barring against them all must've been stirring something particularly in Guy which angered and or annoyed him.

"It would seem so," Jade said, guiding the beacon across the ground. The needles where almost pure white with golds and purples swimming around in the middle, giving Jade a sense of hostility coming from them. Without a doubt they were artificial weapons, more than likely composed of fonons. The ground around them was a dark purple, and the purple substence seemed to be burning the earth with a faint, but malicious hiss. Jade could only imagine what the weapons could do to human flesh. Whomever had been hit by one must be in agonizing pain, or if had escaped from the wrath of the enemy, was in deep distress and hadn't wandered off far from here.

"The nightshift guards said they heard some screams and yells, and saw some fonic artes and explosions going off in this general area," one of the soldiers around the two men said. He leaned down to look at the needles. "Sure enough when they got here there was destruction everywhere. They haven't found anyone or anything yet."

"That's impossible. Whatever happened here, who ever caused it shouldn't be hard to find," Jade growled, he stood from his kneeling position holding one of the needles cautiously between his fingers. "You've searched everywhere? In the craters, beneath the wrekage, even in the ditches...?"

The soldier paused, then shook his head. "No Colonel Curtiss, but we'll recheck again, sir."

Jade huffed. "We cannot allow whatever was here to enter the city, understood?"

The man nodded nervously, saluting. "Yes, Colonel," he said, and he trotted off to tell the other men of the Colonel's orders.

Still examining the needle, Jade turned to Guy without looking at him. He felt the strengh of the burn from the poison in the tiny effective weapon. "Whatever did this, cannot enter the city, theres no telling how much damage it could cause."

"Can't you summize anything?" Guy asked. "I mean, something this big, using something like a throwing needle? What could've done this?"

"More importantly what is their objective?" Jade replied. He burned the needle in his very hand with a mumbled incantaion, watching as the fonons disovled into glowing particles and drifting away in the air. He looked up at Guy, the crimson eyed Colonel looking for the first time in a few months, angry. "You and I must search for anything we can find."

Guy nodded, simply answered, "Yeah, be careful though." Guy shook his head solemnly. "Whatever did this is powerful, maybe even more than you." He grinned, waved to the older man and jogged off to inspect the scene.

Jade looked over and around the area once more, feeling helpless and frustrated. He sighed, hoping whatever was here, he could stop before anything was lost that couldn't be recovered. Jade didn't want to lose anything else of importance to himself or any other person for that matter. But his mind hadn't left her the whole day, and Jade could hardly stand it. He silently wished he knew where she was, why he'd lost her for this long and she'd never returned to him. If she were to return, would everything be the same as before when she had left?

He shook his head. It was time to let her go, it was for his own good. She was just a long lost friend, someone he'd never meet again. Jade bolted off in the direction of the others, ready to find what was looking for him.

Guy hated the rain when it got this violent. He hated the winds when they were this defeaning. But what Guy was beggining to realize was that he hated Jade. Guy had never been particuliarly fond of the aged man, but they had defeated Van together, and gone through much more with their friends. It meant something to him that Jade was his friend, and in a way, the Colonel did matter, despite his actions and or attitude.

Jade had been more and more bothersome lately, more frequent when he appeared and began more with his vexing jokes. More quite when they needed him to speak or let his opinion out. Jade wasn't his old self, and he hadn't been since the destruction of Eldrant, when he and the others had been dubbed Heroes of Auldrant. They were praised for their heroic acts, loved for their bravery and courage. His sarcasm was reduced when so many exspected him to be most irritible, and the usual smile he displayed that hid his thoughts and emotions had turned into a steady almost immovable flat frown.

Guy wondered if it'd been due to Lukes death, and still feeling the guilt of all he'd done. In a way, it was Jade's fault that everything had happened to Auldrant. Fomicry, replicas, Vans' plans.

Now that they had some time off, Guy guessed the man had been able to seriously think about the whole situation. If so, how much longer would it be until he was back to normal?

It had been a few hours, and nothing had been found, only more blood and even more destruction. Needles and holes in the earth were found around them, and where the missing chunks of earth began to multiply, havoc followed. Uprooted trees and their veins had been annihilated, and rocks and stone was crushed into thousands of tiny pieces. The fonon frequency surronding them was extremely high, and whomever had dispensed the fonons had probably run dry of power and blood. They'd determined that one of the combatants in the battle had indeed been a human, and that they probably hadn't made it far.

Jade ordered that the area be searched once more, hoping the body could be recovered. If it was, it was more than likely dead. No man looked forward to finding a dead body, there was no telling how mangled the body would be once found. The flooding waters would have dragged the body farther away than they could find. But Jade seemed more than determined to find the body. Guy knew it was for the safety of Emperor Peony. Now that the Score had been abolished, the country needed a strong leader to guide theirs minds and futures away from the old ways of the Score.

Thats . . . strange, Guy thought as he walked along the side of a chasm. Beneath, water was rushing quickly along the cliffs between it, the wind crashing it into rocks and stone.

"The investigation for tonight it over soldiers! Return back to Grand Chokmah until further notice!" Ordered a voice from behind him, closer to the entrance gates of Theor Forest.

Guy had wandered some ways into the deeper regions, hoping he could find the body, and with some remote chance, find him alive and save him. But it was apparent now that there was no hope. All faith of recovering them had been lost, and eventually they would turn up after the storm, when it was still too late to save them. Guy decided he'd spent enough time searching, and turned away to start back to the city, when something black caught his eye in the chasm. There was a dark maroon beneath it and flowing into the stream turning into a river in the chasm, and even more flowing from their head and tracing into the river like thousands of tiny streams.

"I found him!" Guy yelled at the top of his lungs, hoping that his voice would be carried across the howling wind and crashing rain to the men whom could hear him. "I found him!!"

Guy then turned to the man in the chasm, whomever they were, they were bleeding out more than they could stop. Even if Guy did get to him, and the soldiers took him to Grand Chokmah, there was little chance they would survive. They could be in even worse of a condition if they had been hit by the poison needles, and if so, there was definatly no chance for survival.

At least I still have to try . . . Guy thought, and rushed down to the chasm.

As he reached the waters, he threw his already soaked body and wadded through the waist deep water to the wounded man, shouting out to him.

There was no answer, not even a movement. Guy's heart beat faster and faster in his chest, his throat tightened in fear, he wasn't looking forward to finding a dead and bloody body. He reached the other side of the chasm, and lurched at the man, blood sliding on his hands as he pushed himself out of the water and onto steady ground. He crawled to the person, laying them on their side. Guy stradled over his hip and grabbed their left arm. A large white glove that seemed to explode out like a mushroom up to their elbow made it to hard to feel for a pulse. Guy traced up to the persons shoulder, a gold tipped glove that extended to there armpit was beneath the first, as Guy ripped off the glove. He threw it aside, then went to their wrist, and felt for a pulse on the radial artery.

He could feel nothing, and raced up to their neck, just below their jaw, trying to feel anything else. A faint pulse bumped up and down on his finger. Guy grabbed thier face with both hands, then brang his ear to their mouth listening for breath. An even fainter sound of weezing could be heard. The person was alive at least, and could be questioned if they ever made it back to Grand Chokmah alive.

"I'm not going to let you die, hear me?" Guy said, he looked at the face covered in blood, "Not after all we've been through to find you . . ."

"Guy!" yelled a voice across the waters and from the other side of the chasm.

Guy looked behind himself to see a tall longhaired figure standing at the edge of the cliff, looking down at him. Beside him stood two armored figures, yelling at others, telling them of Guys findings. Several more joining from other areas began to surrond them. The figure standing in the middle and closest to Guy had his hair whipping around him, and the lightning illuminated his piercing red eyes. No doubt it was Jade.

"Jade! I found him!" Guy yelled back to Jade. A grin on his face, Guy turned to the man. Guy reached for their head, hoping to stop the bleeding that seemed to be pouring out from the back of their head. He began looking over the body, hoping to acess some of the wounds they'd attained. "But I don't think we can save them! They're-"

Guy suddenly froze.. He could hardly move, he could hardly breathe, it felt as if something had suddenly hit him square in the chest. His hand froze on their head, for what his hand was touching was not blood. Fear gripped at his throat and movements, and he could hardly think. Even if the person was dying and bleeding, it was a . . . .

"Guy!" Jade roared. When he gained no answer, he called again. "Guy can you hear me! Are you alright? Are they still alive!"

Still no answer. What had happened? Could it have been something so horrific that his whole body had frozen up?