Barely thirty minutes into the competition, Emilio was honestly getting rather sick of the event, despite the fact that it'd only just began. The noise level in the room had reached levels far beyond unbearable long ago, he was losing sense of time and spatial awareness, and the pure concentrated amount of brain dead sheep present in the room was suffocating, to say the least. It was a good thing that no one was paying him much attention, because Emilio was wilting in the chaos. Leaning lightly against a wall for support, Emilio closed his eyes and willed himself to count to ten. Someone stepped on his left foot with no small amount of force, and Emilio forced in a breath. The more competent of his teammates were gathered across the room, and had Emilio been feeling any less faint from being stuck in the room with idiots he might have tried to make his way across to volunteer to help. They were losing precious time, and even Emilio was willing to have to actually carry out teamwork for once than to fall behind on the competition. God forbid, if someone like Aster ended up taking home the trophy instead of him because of his team's utter incompetence, there will be blood.
A cheer went up around the room, and it was the most welcome sound in the world then. Sure enough, the masses of people started clearing out of the room through the portal, and Emilio could have cried with relief now that existing was no longer a chore. Straightening himself up, he made his way to the back of the crowd and took his time meandering in the back, trying to get some air before he's locked into the other room once more.
Finally making his way up to the portal, Emilio stepped through the ring feeling as prepared as he could be. He was feeling much better now that the his head was cleared, and he decided that he would offer as much assistance as needed to get himself (and the group, but they don't really matter) out of the maze as possible. Anything for a swift victory. Wars, after all, weren't fought by picking your allies based on your likings.
Then, the situation managed to go to hell in less than three seconds flat.
The world was suddenly thrown into pitch darkness, and Emilio flailed from the sudden loss of sight and almost lost his balance. His head started buzzing, and not only because he felt like he was about to lose consciousness again. Oh, this was bad. Somehow, by some cursed fate, the situation was even worse that it was before. The screaming had gotten louder. Someone was crying. Emilio's loss of sight resulted unfortunately in all other senses becoming more acute, and the din in the room was amplified tenfold and reverberated back to him like a plague. Hell, he felt like crying at this point of time.
Stifling his own despair, Emilio began making his way around the room, groping blindly and pushing away whoever was in front of him. Hamilton and Pier were bound to be somewhere close, since they'd passed through the portal last. He needed to get to the only competent people in the room so they could figure out a way to get out of this wretched maze, and if it meant stepping on a few unfortunate Wands, then so be it.
"Hamilton," he barked out, ignoring how his voice wavered and the desperate tinge lacing his tone. "Pier, where the hell are you?!"