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He let his sleeve fall and shielded his face from the onslaught Celestina unleashed. He wasn't going to leave. He wasn't in pain. He just... Wasn't healing. Ignoring Celestina trying to get rid of him, he instead continued through the room until a shield was put up or he was able to find refuge underneath something. Leaning against a wall he tried to assess his situation. Clearly the God's power was diminished in this pocket dimension, but not entirely gone. He felt stirrings inside him, but nothing was acting. He relaxed on the wall and when he opened his eyes he swore that stone was moving again. He watched it now; but it either disappeared or stopped when he blinked.

"One of those stones is..." He didn't get to finish his sentence because the moving stone had jumped to the wall he was currently leaning on. Arm-like protrusions wrapped around him, covering his mouth and binding him to the wall.

((That's as creative as I can be atm... Do what you will with that trap ))

Oh, now he was Sir Sitta. Typical human - now that he had shown he was willing to leave them, Celestina was being all respectful and meek again.

Disgusting, all of the-

The elf froze when he heard Dadj speak, and immediately realized he had probably done something stupid. He turned too see the ranger bound. Yup, something stupid alright.

If his doctrine allowed him to express emotion, he would be facepalming by then.

His muffled cursing could only just be heard around the stone hands over his mouth. It was obvious that he was trying to struggle against the wall, but each time his body thrashed the arms would tighten. He caught on to this once his bones felt like they were creaking and he tried to stay still; his body was stuck in an awkward position now which he was unable to relax from. His eyes, fraught with anger burned toward his companions.

Then the arms started to recede into the wall, Ranger and all.

Celestina gasped. "Dadj!" That was bad. She rushed towards the wall and slammed both hands on it. Water shot out from her hands, coursing through the cracks in the rock towards the protrusions that held onto Dadj. She just needed it to break. The water pulsed through the rock, seething through the cracks and aiming to break it apart before it could get her traveling companion into the wall itself.

"Everyone be careful!"

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Sam crouched and spun as she grabbed one corner of her cape and swept it around her, knocking the darts that came from her right side away. On her left, most bounced off of Mort's thick hide harmlessly, but a few found purchase. He appeared not to notice or care.

She recovered, noticed Dadj's predicament, and rushed over to help. She soon figured out what Celestina was trying to do, and raised a hand towards the point where the fissures caused by her water magic looked the deepest.

"Cover your eyes!"

With a flick of her wrist, she cast one of her magic blue balls of force at point blank range in to the rock.

Without Celestina eroding the arms, nothing would have happened. But with both of their powers combined, it just... might... work.

Of course it might also go overboard and violently shatter the stone, horribly wounding all three of them with high velocity shrapnel. WHO KNOWS?? (Dadj knows)

((The Shadow knows!))


The rock was certainly weakening with Celestina's water pulsing through it, finding its minuscule cracks and widening them. However, with the edition of Sam's bolt, the living rock was forced apart much faster. The rock was pushing outward at first by the force; only bulging out. The Ranger's eyes moved from his companions to what he could see of the wall, then he closed them tightly in anticipation of what was to come. The bulging stone built up enough force behind it to now burst outward, sending that violent shrapnel out from the wall. Dadj was freed, bruised where the arms were, but freed. He felt a pull in his side and looked to find a stone had embedded itself there. Sighing, he looked to his companions.

Celestina smiled thankfully at Sam, then called for Owaja to make a shield around them. She quickly went to Dadj's side, having easily seen that piece of shrapnel. "H-here, let me help." she said quietly. There was a look in her eyes. She was upset. Sure, it was one thing to go travelling with people with the intent to fight. But when others got injured, she....she wanted to take it all on by herself.

She knew she wouldn't have a chance, but she didn't want others to suffer this battle. "We need a plan.."

Dadj reluctantly leaned to the side for Celestina to inspect the wound. This dizzying feeling of having mortal attributes after so long was irking him. He didn't feel the pain still, but he knew that he was bleeding enough to hinder a normal person almost to incapacitation. Since the Ranger would never actually thank her, he nodded his acknowledgment of her help when she assessed the opening.

Owaja had shielded herself from the shrapnel and was comforting Sunflower who was clinging to her dreadlocks in terror from the sound of crumbling rock. When she finally felt he had calmed down enough, she turned her attention to Celestina.

"Perhaps we should split off into groups?"

Celestina carefully eased out the stone, water brushing against his wound to help clean it. She dug into one of her little pouches and would dress his wound, making sure that the bleeding stopped. "There...that should do." She bit her lip, feeling rather guilty. When Owaja spoke of breaking up into groups, she hesitated.

"I don't know." she said honestly. "It might be better...or it might be worse. I'm just...I'm not sure. Either way, this is dangerous..."

Dadj stared at the open part of his skin in wonderment. He was waiting for something to happen with it... Nothing was. After all this time being stagnant, something had changed. He couldn't stop looking at the redness on his side.

Owaja sat back on a step, her elbows on her thighs and her head resting on her hands. Her hair engulfed her face in a sea of beads and ties as she leaned forward in thought. Sunflower seemed to perk up as the silence of other's pondering ideas drew out. He managed to take a few steps towards the others and took a short leap from Owaja's head to the step beside her. His small black beady eyes focused on Celestina then back to Owaja.

The ferret chittered and hopped around in a circle as if to say "I know what to do!" Placing his tiny paws on Owaja's leg, Sunflower pulled himself halfway onto her lap and wagged his tail in excitement until Owaja looked at him questioningly.

"You want to do what?!" Owaja nearly grabbed the ferret off her lap but stopped herself halfway. Instead she changed the direction of her raised arms and used them to prop herself up to listen to her friend's speech.

The Sibling was now looking around, scanning the room for any more possible traps. What had just happened to Dadj had shown him that they weren't in some kind of joy ride: the dangers were there, and if he wasn't careful, he'd meet a gruesome end in there.

And that didn't bother him in the least.

Well, he was unable to spot anything, so he turned around to face the group.

"It would be easier to watch for traps if there were less people to watch out for... But we have to find alternate routes in order to split up." The Ranger's tone was sedate. Although he couldn't feel the hole in his side, he knew it was there and it was bothering him. His face, in turn was becoming ashen. After tying something around it, some cloth he thinks he was handed, he got up and looked about the room.

"We have to head to the staircase."

Celestina looked towards Owaja. "What? What does your companion think we should do?" When Dadj mentioned heading for the staircase, she flinched. "Yes, yes we do. I have no doubt that there is something wrong with the stairs as well, however." The room was peaceful now, after the sudden burst of action. But it most likely would not last long. "Stay away from the walls. I don't want anyone else to get hurt." She moved towards the staircase slowly, carefully.

"Dadj...are you going to be okay? You don't look well." Her concerned gaze was turned towards the man.

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Sam started fishing around in her satchel when Celestina mentioned Dadj's injury. She found her bottles of Healies (R) and popped the top off the one with the red label. She offered the bottle to Dadj - it contained four large red pills.

"Take one of those, they're the cure fer what ails ya."

She walked over to where they had first triggered the trap, and immediately noticed a multitude of small holes in the walls, cunningly placed to blend in with the stone's texture. She examined the floor, and noticed the stone had a slightly different color here - likely either a pressure plate, or a magical surveillance system of some kind. She pointed these things out to the others.

"Damn. That's my fault. If I'd known we'd be heading in to a deathtrap, I'd have offered to walk up front. With the job I have, I wouldn't be alive right now if I didn't know how to find and deal with stuff like this."

He looked at Sam, who he could really swear he'd met before and reached in to take a pill. He deposited it into his mouth and swallowed it without a drink. He could feel the things being worked down his throat and almost wretched. He did however see the effects not long after consumption. The tear in his body slowly scabbed over and began to itch as the new skin grew underneath. He nodded his thanks to Samantha, who had already turned to inspect the room. The Ranger had been reckless in his assumption that things wouldn't bother him here, but he'd been living so long under those pretenses it was hard to just start looking out for himself.

"Can you get us safely to the stairs, then?"

Celestina smiled in relief when Dadj started healing. "Thank goodness." When Sam said she was good at sniffing out traps and stuff, she nodded slightly. "Then...you may take the lead, if you wish. Just please, be careful." She sighed and would wait, careful and observant. This probably wouldn't end very well...