Skylanders Quest For The Core

Ch 24 Mask of Mortalamus

(Cynder's point of view)
The Dread Yacht continued it's course to the academy, but the unnatural clouds blotting out the sky began to make everyone on board uneasy. "This reminds me of the time I flew through a thunder storm," said Flynn, "only without the thunder."

Back at his fortress, Kaos chuckled to himself as he paced around his stone portal. "You know Glumshanks, despite you losing the eternal tech source, and me losing the dark source, I'm feeling quite optimistic, know why?" "Why, Lord Kaos?" Glumshanks reluctantly asked his master. "Because the Corruption is still spreading! It's spreading faster than before! There's no way I can lose!" But Glumshanks himself wasn't too sure, and deep down, Kaos felt the same.

"Well done cadets!" Said Eon as the team returned, "With the eternal dark source, the power of the shadows can return and balance out the light!" The source absorbed itself into the Petrified darkness and a ring of dark shadow energy circled the core's column.

"Now only three elements remain," said Hugo, "and we'll need the eternal undead source next."How do we get it?" Asked Spyro. "Well, we need to find the Skull mask of Mortalamus in order to find the eternal undead source, but both are in the underworld," Hugo explained. As Hugo talked to the four cadets, two skeleton arms burst out of the ground, and dug up a big menacing stone doorway. It's sudden entrance scaring poor Hugo and Arbo. The doors creaked open, and out walked a surprisingly friendly looking skeleton. "Sorry bout that," he spoke, "But we heard the Skylanders have heroes who can help us down there."

"What is that thing!?!?" Arbo shouted. "Hey, I get your a life elemental, and you do seem justified in being scared, but I assure you that undead elementals like me are not evil, especially since our tyrant king was overthrown years ago," he said. "Why are you here?" Asked Hugo, "most of the undead never leave the underworld unless they are greatly disturbed, so this must be serious."

"My name is T-bone!" The skeleton bowed, "And the souls of the undead have become restless because of the eternal undead source returning! If we can't get it out of the underworld, then the souls will never be able to rest easy ever again! My grandma told me the eternal undead source was supposed to be here, in this odd machine, so she got me in the right direction and sent me this way!" "The eternal undead source is bad for the underworld?" Cynder was a little confused at that story. "The eternal undead source was created when the souls of the undead became extremely restless centuries ago," Hugo explained, "The power of the source drives them crazy and is why the undead were actually the first to give their eternal source to the Ancients, though the Ancients wouldn't add it to the core until later. They needed a powerful relic from the land of the undead to harness it, so Mortalamus, the first king of the underworld, donated his mask for the sake of helping his people rest peacefully."

Cynder silently gulped, she hoped she wouldn't have to go back to the underworld. After briefly discussing with T-bone, it was discovered he knew the exact location of the mask, and he was more than willing to help get it from the dark light crypt where it would be found. "In order to safely travel to the underworld, you'll need these!" Hugo passed three necklace charms to Spyro, Stealth elf, and Flameslinger, the charms resembled a blood red undead skull symbol. "These will protect you from the unpredictable energy of the underworld," Hugo explained as they slipped their charms on. "Don't I need one?" Cynder questioned the mabu. "You are already of the undead element, Cynder, while you aren't dead dead, you're going to be perfectly fine when you walk down there," Hugo explained.

As the group followed T-bone into the underworld gate, Spyro saw Cynder completely motionless, she was scared, but he didn't know why. "Are you okay, Cynder?" He asked his friend, he often worried about her, because she'd sometime flip from tough warrior to shy school girl. "I don't want to go back, I know it's for the sake of our world, but I'm afraid, I don't want to see Malefore ever again," she explained to Spyro. Spyro wrapped his wing around her, it's okay, we're all going together, it'll be okay..." Cynder warmly smiled at Spyro and followed him in to join the others.

The mission was surprisingly easy, all that stood in the way were a few giant spiders, but other than that, they pretty much just walked in a picked up the mask. However as they made their way out of the underworld, a dark presence prepared for battle.