《Girl with the Golden-Cat Eyes》


 1 One last day

    The fire crackled as the wood inside the pit popped, embers fluttered slowly into the clear and star-filled night sky above. A fair-skinned girl sat on top a small rock at the edge of the pit as she stoked the fire with a glimmering blueish sword out of bored. The wood within the pit didn''t move at all when prodded, but she did so mainly out of boredom. She sat while leaning forward, her right elbow on the corresponding knee and used her hand to prop her head up listlessly. Her eyes were half closed with two dimly glowing irises peeking out from beneath her long eyelashes - two deep gold feline eyes.


    Her snowy white hair cascaded off her head as if a curtain of silk. Dressed in an equally white and beautiful sleeveless dress that draped over her crossover legs. Her soft pink lips were slightly parted, allowing a view of her small pink tongue playing with a single fang out of boredom. A single sandal hung from her right foot as it dangled mindlessly. The girl looked like a fairy, alone in a large glade as ancient oak trees towered high on the edges. In the distance, a large monolithic mountain stood; illuminated by the snaking rivers of lava flowing down its side.


    The howls of the distance Demon army echoed through the forest, scaring any all life that was not demonic or an idiotically brave adventurer like the girl.


    From the shadows came a lion-sized wolf. Its fur was as white as it''s master''s hair with black eyes. It padded over to the girl before it laid down beside her and then only stared off into the distance. A holographic screen appeared before the girl. The sight of it perked her from her uneventful wait and read its contents. It was a scouting report from her familiar. Her eye lips slid back, revealing her eyes in full as they ticked side to side as she read.


    A few minutes slipped by as she read the wolf''s report. Just before she was finished, she heard the rustling of branches opposite the mountain. Her head perked up and her eyes scanned the tree line before a pale figured stepped out into the glade. "Making yourself at home already?" A male''s voice that cooed with mirth. "I always make myself at home when I have to wait for you slowpokes." The girl''s lips formed a sweet smile.


    Once the figure stepped closer, the firelight revealed the hauntingly beautiful face of a Moon Elf. His skin was as pale as fresh snowfall with a tinge of blue. His eyes were two dimly glowing rings of silver but were normal irises aside from that. His hair silky ink black hair was groomed back into a tight, but complimenting ponytail to his slender figure. A trait of all elves.


    "Sorry, Cyril. I tried to get here as quick as I could." The elf said as he reached out, patted her knee and gave it a small comforting rub. "Sorry, Jax. I know you have things you have to do... Its..." Cyril trailed off as she became unwilling to finish her sentence. "Yeah, you don''t have to remind me. I wouldn''t miss it for the world" Jax replied - his eyes never leaving the beautiful girl beside him.


    The peaceful scene lasted for a few seconds longer before more people broke through the shadows. "O snap! Jacky over here trying to put the moves on!" A human paladin whooped as he wagged his finger playfully at the moon elf. Nearly ten people trailed after the paladin. Priests, clerics, fighters, and on. Soon, even more, people followed after until tens of campfires and torches were lit. The number of people was so great that people had to make camp in the forest, beyond the glade.


    After everyone had assembled, the forest canopy shined like the starry sky above it with orange lights from the fires and laughter danced through the air. While most were out keeping with their friends. The rowdiest bunch gathered at the glade''s center, where the original fire had been placed. "Ho! To our goddess!" Cheers erupted from the group while a few people listening to the festivities joined in. "Who knew we''d get to slay a god today! Ha''zaah!" Another cheer was thrown up as the leader of the festive mood was the Moon Elf, Jax.


    Cyril only sat and smiled with a small cup in her hand. While she was happy that so many people had come, she was visibly distant from everyone, but no one let that stop the fun. They all danced, sang and laughed together, sure to make sure Cyril party''s mascot wallflower. At a glance, she may have seemed unsociable - but today was her last raid in the game.


    And tomorrow, her life would end.


    Stepping back, the world all these people resided in was nothing more than a digital world. An online Virtual Reality Massive Multiplayer Online Game Roleplaying Game - VRMMORPG for short. The game was a popular fantasy game that was played via Full Dive Machines that players connected to their body via a helmet to have full control over their characters. While massively popular and used widely in gaming now, the technology was not originally meant for videogames; though due to the novelty and experience, the player count reached close to a hundred thousand.


    In the grand scheme of everything, the technology was created for Cyril - the white-haired maiden. Cyril, using her real name as her user, was the Head Administrator of the game as well as holding titles in another aspect of game''s company such as design, directing and the likes. With such freedom over the game, it was a shock for most people to know she was actually the sole prisoner of this game.


    Cyril was born into the Bailey family, a large multibillionaire family that her father was the heir to. Being the sole child of her parents, she would be the heir of the company as well. However, with fortune came misfortune. With other uncles and aunts, the fighting in the family was constant but never violent. That was until her father''s brother delusions of grandeur became mixed with hard drugs. Her uncle was the definition of trust fund baby and drowned himself in alcohol, and women. He held grand parties weekly that was harmless for the most part.


    For the most part, he was harmless as well if only just a drunk ass. That was before drugs became part of the equation. Soon, he was beginning to get into more and more trouble. Often hanging around bad people, he began to become bolder and bolder each time her father saw him until he began demanding her father turn the family fortune over to him.


    Then the feuding became violent.


    On the day her grandparent''s funeral, her uncle came with a few thugs to try and steal the family fortune. A bad idea when dealing with rich families with armed guards. Furious, her uncle had left and the family was able to finally finish the funeral. To the family''s dismay, that was not the end of their uncle''s rage. While they were exiting the church, her uncle plowed down half the family with his truck, taking a few lives with him and destroying even more.


    In the end, her uncle was thrown in jail and the key was thrown away, but that didn''t change anything for the broken family. The attack left Cyril alive, but the attack left her in a coma. In the end, it became undisputed that no matter what happened, the fortune would not go to any other family member if any of the heirs died, effectively cutting off all further thoughts of the money.


    On Cyril''s end, they had estimated she would have been in a coma for a few weeks, but weeks turned to months. Months turned into a year. Grief-stricken, her parents began to pour all their funds into trying to awake their beloved daughter. Without their child, the money was nothing but worthless paper. A few years after long extensive testing, they managed to wake Cyril up again. In the Virtual World.


    Cyril had a unique medical problem, she was not awake, but she wasn''t actually asleep and by a one-in-a-billion chance - they found her in her own mind.


    The attack had happened when she was nine and after five long years, her parents finally brought her back. For Cyril, everything happened in a blink of an eye. One moment she was with her parents walking to their car - then darkness. It was like a dreamless sleep, devoid of time before she found herself in a new void; Different. Her new darkness had a visible boundary with a single holographic screen that projected her hospital room.


    From history''s standpoint, this was a historic moment. Here was the point where such a niche and underdeveloped tech had made such a large leap from obscurity, and into the mainstream of every sector in the world. However, this was the beginning of Cyril''s nightmare. Her uncles attack, her mother''s paralysis, and her father''s endeavors to bring her back. And that she would never mostly step foot into the real world ever again...


    In the months after, Cyril was forced to come to terms with her new reality. Her world at first was but a small black room with a single overlook of her hotel room. Then it became a beautiful meadow where her parents came to visit her in their own dive drives. The world grew ever so slowly, with new additions every day. Yet, it was ever so lonely. The animals that roamed were lifeless buggy AIs. Aside from her parents and sometimes her doctor, no one else ever came.


    In all accounts, this was her prison. Unable to die by her own hands, unable to live by them. Then, her father surprised her with a new life in a game, a game called EOS.


    In the coming years, EOS gained a massive following with its backstory of being made for the CEO''s daughter to have some semblance of a life. The novelty of being the first VRMMORPG matched with its heart wrenching back story rocketed into the mainstream news for the first few months until it became a profitable business venture, easing the burden of the family funds. While EOS was the company''s flagship product, it mainly stayed in the medical and military fields.


    Developing training simulations for the army and devices to help those who would never leave the hospital have some semblance of a life. But no device was like Cyril''s. Hers was interconnected with the company itself. That was how she managed to keep in the loop of what they wanted to do next with the game or her device. That was how she became the official mascot of the game, eventually earning the nickname "Firekeeper", derived from a different game, due to her odd tendencies.


    As the game''s one and only full-time resident or prisoner, depending on which side of the legal aspect you stood on. Cyril''s case was unique all around due to it being the first case of a medical patient living full time within the VR drive. No one could stay in the virtual world for a long time, even those who bought the drive for entertainment purposes.


    In the end, it all seemed like Cyril would live a somewhat normal life, excluding having to live in the virtual world. That was until she was eighteen and the doctors said she wouldn''t live to nineteen due to organ failures, something she was somewhat living with already. The gods, or God - whichever resided over their world, did not see fit to spare her after all.


    . . . . . . . .


    Tents surrounded the glade as the rest of the players partied, their singing and laughter drowned out the distant howls of the demons and monsters. It was purely for immersion. NPC merchants stood stationary around the glade now. This was another unique feature within EOS. Raids could not begin immediately. There was a two-hour buffer period before the teams could even enter the instance. The first half hour was simply traveling to the secondary location to prepare and scout.


    The next hour-and-a-half was simply preparations. While on paper, it sounded redundant and unnecessary, the raid exclusive merchants would spring up in the location set by the raid leader. These merchants sold valuable items that were not sold elsewhere such as Pheonix-Ups, Holy-Barrier Matrix, and as well as a plethora of other items that were useful in raids. This perk was only for the latest raid. Once a new raid came out, the merchants would never visit a raiding camp for a previous raid location.


    Players buzzed around the NPC merchants, their faces hidden beneath thick black hoods that were devoid of any light or features regardless of how close you held a light to their faces. The Faceless merchants were officially called the Phantom Company, with no nation, no race, or gender, the Phantom merchants were almost as popular as the Diamond Shop''s Maid outfit.


    Jax sat beside the unusually anti-social Cyril who clasped a small wooden cup of soda, one of the many Diamond store''s items. "Hey you. Ya'' gonna set up one in the boss room again?" He sat back on a simple wooden stool as he played with the silver wolf by her feet. "Mm. That''s the plan." She said softly before looking at her lifelong friend and love. "Maybe we coul-" He was about to ask the same question that he had been rejected many times before. "You know I don''t want you tied to me. It''s better this way." She smiled softly at him with the blunt rejection she had given him so many times before.


    Jax felt his heart twist in pain but only smiled back, acknowledging her rejection. They loved each other mutually for years, though four years her senior, they were childhood friends and the only one that had stuck around since that day. Both were equally stubborn, one in loving her till her last moment and the other to trying to ease the pain of her death on her lover''s heart. Though they were not "Officially" together, those who knew the two already had them coupled in their minds. This simple interaction was something they were used to.


    Jax slipped his hand into Cyril''s hand and gave a gentle, and comforting squeeze. His gentle expression understanding her intent. The two fell silent and left the other raiders party in peace without pouring their solemn moods over the rest.


    . . . . . .


    Lighting danced across the volcano''s rocky sides as the grey clouds swirled high overhead. The howls of the demons reverberated through the air, overpowering the howling winds. At the mouth of the volcano, high above the swirling clouds was a massive battle of the ages, beneath a fractured blue sky. Fireballs danced wildly over the heads of the fighters before exploding in an orange splash of death, wiping away any unlucky demon to have been in its radius while other mages made ice shards rip through the rock and burst from beneath the others.


    Nearly half of the players were fending off the Boss''s minions as they clamored over the edges as the rest fought against a large black dragon that had constructed a large ceremonial platform over the volcano''s mouth with twenty-four pillars. It was formatted in a clock fashion, glowing with black miasma.


    The dragon was the Evil Dragon God Hades. His goal was to tear the magical weave that separated Heaven and Hell from the material world so that all the planes could exist in the same world. Why? because he was chaos and destruction in material form. He was the personification of every living thing''s hate and anger. He was the evil manifestation that lived in everyone''s hearts and he was the final boss.


    Gods were immortal - ageless and unbound - but if other gods were to step in, mortals could still strike them down.


    Tens of raids were sent flying off the platform, some landing lucky on crevices or on the edge of the bleeding mountain. A few unlucky landed in the lava below or off the mountain as Hade roared in anger. Sharp jagged spindles lined the dragon''s spine, semi-transparent as gems, glowed violet as the dragon inhaled. "Breathe attack!" Alarmed cried surged through the players as golden half-dome barriers blinked into existence seconds before a wave of black inky breath rushed over the platform, dripping down to the lava below like a large stormy sea wave.


    While the players held their ground, shielded by their holy barriers - the pillars all around the summit pulsed with a chilling black light like heartbeats. Hades let out another roar as he channeled more miasma into them to push the spell forward.


    Just as the miasma around the players had finally slithered away off the summit, the hairline fractures in the sky ripped apart with a large ear piecing similar to a large glass pane shattering. The sky dimmed; the daylight replaced with a beautiful hue of silver as heaven became visible through the large rift that had opened up above them where angels began to pour out to protect the newly made entrance.


    Following this, the clouds that hugged the throat of the summit began to glow a hellish red as Devils exploded out from beneath the cloud cover, engaging the angels one by one with gleeful laughs. The two celestial forces clashed above the cloud cover until thousands of devils and angels danced across the sky in their own little deathmatches. The sight of these skirmishes caused a wave of astonishment to overcome the players, distracting momentarily as they tried to figure out if they were fighting these new forces.


    Hades took advantage of the sudden distraction to awash the closest team of raiders in a thick miasma breath that cleared away a cone-shaped area to its left. "Team four is down!" the announcement was spread through the entire raid party within seconds as everyone quickly found their bearings and priests erected their holy barriers in time as Hades slowly turned his head towards the rest of the teams.


    Once the remaining players were safe and Hades tried to direct more miasma into his reality-bending spell, Cyril quickly called out to Jax. "It''s time!". The snowy-haired maiden, dressed in thin ink black leather clothing. This was topped with grey tinted mithril armor - breastplate, pauldrons, cuisses, gauntlets, and greaves. Each piece was elegantly simple with runes inlaid with gold. A thick black hooded cloak was clasped to her shoulders with a golden paw on the back as she held a blue-tinted sword.


    She was at the front of the pack, defending the priest''s left while Jax defended the priest''s right from the devils that flew down at random to pick off the raiders.


    The moon elf was covered head to toe in blueish metal armor and a scutum shield and held a spear. His armor was also adorned with the same magical runes and a single golden paw on his tower shield. In every way, Jax was her tank. Where ever she was, he was regardless of how people felt and at the sudden call from Cyril, the priest cursed and pulled some raiders from behind her. The two quickly parted from the team, making towards the center of the platform as Hades began to spread his wings. Just before the couple would have met with the feet of the dragon - it burst upward with an immense speed that downdraft created from his leathery wings was visible.


    "Iron fortress!" Jax called out as he took the helm, Cyril clinging to his back. Both of them were outlined with yellow light, signifying that the skill had activated. The gust crashed into them with a sudden boom but never moved an inch. The gust took everyone by surprise, though she had warned them ahead of time while not spoiling the actual sequence of the battle -a lot of players had not taken her warning seriously.


    Once Hades had taken to the air, the rift in the sky began to open wider and wider, finally bringing the gods to arms. Several large figures towered at the opening of the rift; their pure golden figures featureless as they rained down attacks at any devil that slipped past the angelic defenders. Hades let out a pained howl as one such attack had managed to hit one of his wings, sending him crashing back down to the platform below.


    But the damage had already been done. The spell had run its course and the rift could only grow and grow, taking all the gods'' attention away. Hades thrashed on the platform in pain as the players quickly evaded in every direction to escape the dragon. However, the couple stood their ground as Cyril waited for the final piece to finish off the Dragon. A heartbeat later, a lightning bolt struck the ground a few feet from them.


    On the stone platform before them, a golden spear was stuck in the ground. It was a Celestial Spear with the holy attribute "Kill the scourge young demi-gods while we try to stop the spell!" A voice boomed over their heads as more strikes poured down, only this time they were attacking the black pillars that held the spell. "Finally!" Cyril said with a grin as she jumped forward and grabbed the spear. "Show off..." Jax huffed, but the elf kept protected her as she pulled at the spear with all her might - stabbing any demon that tried to attack her. It took a few pulls before the spear pulled itself from the ground, and Cyril saw her skill bar change suddenly.


    All her skills vanished, replaced with two skills - Flight and Helios''s Wraith.


    She knew how the raid battle would play out. Up until the spear crashed down, however, she was only told to go all out once she had the spear. Her character pulsed as golden power flowed through her and a pair of pure white wings sprung from her back. She quickly activated the flight skill and the wings reared back before pushing forward, sending her high into the sky.


    Hades had finally regained himself just in time to see the change in the girl. "No! That''s against the rules! You cannot create an angel from a mortal without the ceremony!" The dragon''s anger colored his howl to the gods above before he got a mocking response. "We did not create an angel; we created a goddess." The dragon was momentarily stunned, his eyes bulged in shock as he watched the lone figure hovering overhead as she glowed with golden power. The power of a god.


    Before the dragon could utter another word, Cyril activated the Helios''s Wraith. The spear leapt from her hand like a hungry leopard, leaving a strike of gold in its wave before it pierced through the dragon''s forehead and out the back of its upper neck. A black concussive wave erupted from him and it washed over everyone, nearly flinging Cyril away, but she managed to recover after flying end over end a few times.


    The black wave washed over the mountain, easing its raging magma flows and erasing the demons away in small pitiful puffs of black dust that fluttered away silently into the brimstone. The Devil''s quickly became panicked. They loved destruction and chaos, but they loved themselves more. With the loss of its power and the attacks from the gods above, the pillars exploded into millions of pieces, the wisps of miasma cleansed by the golden lights of Heaven.


    . . . . .


    The night was slowly coming, the game world''s clock set on an hour day cycle and the players had once again set up their tents around the large blackened sides of the now dormant volcano. Cheers, singing, and laughter filled the air as if they were back in the Adventurer Capital of Bastion. No longer was it just the raiders now, but most the active players who wanted to be a part of the final festival of the game. Every end-game merchant was posted around the mountain for the players to drown all their saved fortunes to finally get the most coveted items.


    There were tablets with drinks and food where players could party to their heart''s content and the music flowed freely at every nook and cranny, despite the unusual decor of the mountain.


    Cyril and Jax stepped back onto the stone platform. Nothing had changed, aside from the dead god and the broken pillars of course. While the game was rather groundbreaking in many aspects, they still couldn''t change the terrain during battles. Only when they were scripted during boss fights and those were used sparingly due to the about of processing it took.


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    The two stepped up to the dragon''s head, looking over the body with raised eyebrows. They waited a few seconds before Cyril kicked the dragon''s head with all her virtual might. "Ouch!" The dragon barked, howling out dramatically as it rose up and held its forehead with its right paw. "Well, don''t make us wait!" Cyril pretended to be angry and folded her arms over her breastplate while Jax only snickered. "You didn''t have to resort to violence!" The dragon whined, ignoring the large hole in its head.

 2 Forsaken City

    Soon, a knight approached them from the field side and told them to quickly cross the field. Just as quickly, a gaggle of maidens quickly hampered off through the path the knight made through the field. Words of seeing their betrothed or dream knight leaped from their tongues as they passed Mai and Desmond. "There they go again." Mai''s tongue clicked before she pulled Desmond along by the arm as the rest of the host followed after the girls.


    As the girls bounded after the knights, Randol and his men had reached the end of the field. They held their advance at the foot of a short but wide stone bridge that reached across a mildly deep moat. The moat itself was filled with rubble were parts of the outer stone curtain and crumbled. Either from the passing of time or from the city''s fall. The outer ramparts were topped with beautiful orange and golden trees who''s roots weaved in between the stonework. Small chunks interweaved between them as nature slowly returned to the city to the earth. Randol turned his attention to the gatehouse, or what remained of it, as it stood half destructed with its portcullis bend inward. After that, was a large heap of rubble, moss, and bushes.


    Once he felt he saw enough, he turned his attention once more to the bridge. He bent over to examine the stones. A fine layer of dirt and moss had built over most of it, but enough of the bridge shined through to tell him that it was in fact, a stone bridge. From his experience, it had been undisturbed for a long time. He also noted that there were large collapsed sections further down the walls on either side. Monsters or people could have been using those openings.


    After a few minutes of contemplating, he made up his mind and stood up. "Tell-" As luck would have it, the gaggle of girls caught up with the men. "Your Highness-" One of the girls, full of bravado and delight, called out loudly to Randol. Her voice was shrill and powerful, disturbing a flock of birds just inside the wall. Tens of blackbirds took to the sky, their startled calls just as loud and sharper than the girls.


    All the knights brandished their swords on reflex and took a single line formation in front of the bridge; ready to kill whatever was coming from the ruins. It only took a few moments for the knights to realize what had happened and sheathed their weapons. The girls only giggled at their actions. "It was but birds, Your Highness." Another girl spoke up, her voice full of dignity and grace, but her cheeks were red as roses as she looked shyly at the Randol. The person in question wanted to slap each of the girls for their behavior; it had not even been the first time they had done such things either.


    "Alas, I''m tired of having angry nobles coming to me to speak about how I spoke to their daughters. The damn pests." Randol replied before he turned around. "Come. Let''s get this over with so my brother can complete his expedition. Gods know I hate these morbid places..." The knights crossed the bridge just as the students arrived. The rear guard took up security around the bridge in a much more relaxed manner than the front guard. Desmond put away the large parchment by rolling it up and sliding it into his robe were a satchel had been as to keep it from being caught on anything.


    Mai sat on a large rock and pulled Desmond down to sit beside her. "C''mon. We''ve been walking for half a day now, take a rest." She said as she gestured towards one of the students with a large sack. His robe was not like theirs, but grey with a sword and shield on it. "Squire Cameron, it''s time for everyone to have a meal while the knights secure the entrance." Desmond did not refute and took off his robe, revealing hard leather armor beneath and a short sword. "These damn robes are going to get us killed." Desmond grumbled as he folded the robe and stuck it in the leather satchel at his side.


    "Don''t be like that." Mai said as she took a handful of jerky from Squire Cameron and a waterskin. "Here, drink and eat. I don''t want you to collapse while we''re in there." Desmond nodded and expressed his thanks as he took half the meat from Mai and picked at it.


    The squires went about handing the rations out to everyone just as Randol returned. "Everything''s okay, but it''s a damn mess in there. Taking a break? Mai, how kind of you." He said as he nodded his head to the vixen who only flinched his ear towards him as she munched down on her jerky. "Hey, what if it was my idea?" Desmond complained as more knights began to return and get their meals from their respective squires. "If Mai was not here, you would eat and shit; not to mention take a quick break." Randol laughed as Desmond glared at his big brother.


    A few of the other students, ones who''d been with Desmond on a few expeditions already, were well aware of this fact. "Nothing gets done without Lady Dragonfang, right?" One of the students jested and the rest agreed.


    An hour later, the sun made its way towards the horizon and everyone had done what they needed to do. Thus, everyone filed through past the portcullis. "So, where too o'' great explorer?" Randol said to his brother as they slowly circled around the large pile of debris. "I want to head to the mountain." He pointed to the large mountain that scraped the clouds that dared to do float over it. A few heavier clouds only smashed into the snowy rim. "No, we''re going to aim for the city center. From this map." Mai held a large scroll in her hand, turned it sideways and unfurled it. It was a rough sketch of the city. Its large layout was straightforward and did not incorporate any confusing paths that most large cities did today.


    "Hey, when did-" Desmond''s whine was cut short by Mai. "You forgot it while we were packing. So, I put it in my stuff." She flashed a mischievous grin towards Desmond and continued on. "The city center looks like a great place to set up an exploration camp. The secondary location would be the cathedral by the mountain. If none of the above are useful, the field is the only other option." She looked at the map once more before she looked up at the mountain. "Though, it shows there should be a river and a long set of stairs running up the mountain..." Mai had the best vision in all of the host as a beast woman, but her eyes did not see any of these pieces of infrastructure


    They pushed that aside, as it was not that big of an issue at the moment, and focused on the ruins itself now.


    The buildings towered as high as four stories while the shortest was a mere ten feet of pure debris. The street appeared to have been once paved with beautiful cobblestones, though it was now littered with craters and moss-covered bones. The rooftop, like the ramparts, was home to the autumn trees; their leaves and branches giving added more to the crawling shadows of the forsaken city. More trees grew sporadically within the street, as did bushes, and weeds. More often than they would have liked to, they had to snake through side streets and cross through ruined buildings.


    Nowhere they went was free from the carnage. Deep gashes in the walls, craters in the streets. One crater took up an entire two city blocks of the ruins and had formed its own little small lake that primed with life. Desmond was in awe at how well preserved the most of the carnage was; untouched by outsiders for the longest time. Even the elven skeletons remained. Fey races and monsters were full of magical energy; thus their remains could live on for at least two thousand years.


    Mai kept track of the routes they took while Randol kept a keen eye on the shadows. The other students, aside from those who aspired to be knights themselves, were plagued with boredom. While they were considered "scholars", they were only there because of their lineages required them to be learned people. They chatted amongst each other, and a few knights even had to tell them to lower their voices.


    They had not encountered any life aside from a few deer and plenty of birds. Though, Randol had noted that amongst the larger roads, something large had been prowling through. He made sure to let the other knights in on his observation.


    Several spines towered over the head, close to thirty stories, all of which nearly equal distance from the other. That was until they noticed that a few had been toppled or halved in whatever battle had taken place here. Eventually, they found themselves back onto the main road after an hour of trekking through the city. They could finally see the ruins of the cathedral from where they stood, but a large stone blockade impeded their path. "I guess we''ll have to go through a side street again." Desmond said as he looked at the heavily battered stones. "No, we don''t. There''s opening in that building. It''s small, but it might lead around."


    Mai chimed in and pointed to a hole big enough to fit two fully armored knights'' side by side through. "Yeah!" Desmond''s voice went high with glee until Randol stepped in. "Woah, not without us checking it out first." Desmond nodded at his brother before he turned back to Mai. "Nice catch." Randol and his knights went in without another word. Their figures disappearing into the dark interior of the building as if the void was swallowing them whole.


    Ten minutes of tormenting waiting had been inflicted upon Desmond and Mai as they stared at the entrance. No word had come to them the entire time. Just went Desmond was about to go in and look for his brother, he heard the rattle of armor. Half a minute later, Randol appeared in the doorway. "You''re going to want to see this." His face was stern and he only appeared long enough to speak before he turned back into the darkness.


    Desmond and Mai jumped at his words and followed him into the darkness.


    Their eyes quickly adapted themselves to the low light and found themselves inside what looked to have may have been a mansion or a store, but all things wood had long rotten away. All that was left was the rain stained walls and a roof woven from vines and roots. It took them a second to get their bearings before they found Randol slipping through another opening to their right. They followed after him and they passed through a line of buildings, all of which seemed untouched by the carnage outside. "Wow, these buildings are quite pretty." Mai commented.


    Each interior had been carved with beautiful murals of nature, elves, and animals. Some had the likeness of Cyril, but those were few compared to the rest. The one main point of each of the buildings was none lacked in stone art. "I wonder if every building had such murals in them. Too bad all the ones we had gone through were so wrecked." Mai lamented at the beauty and made a silent vow that she would like a copy of these murals in her quarters back at the Academy. "This isn''t what I wanted you to see. It''s just a few more buildings up." Randol called back to them.


    Just like he had said, a few more buildings up, something unexpected was found. A small dragon skeleton entangled with a large golem that was just as tall as the building. The too appeared locked in battle before they both had been impaled to each other with a large rod that bad half-rusted away. "I think that''s... Mithril?!" Desmond gasped as he looked at it. The golem and dragon had appeared to have crashed into the building during the fatal blow, but the fact such a huge rod of mithril had been used so wantonly was too heart wrenching.


    "What makes you say that?" Randol, who had stopped beside the large golem, appeared dwarfed by it. "Mithril is the only material that would have lasted this long in this form." Desmond added hurriedly as he came close to the golem. The rest of the students began to file in and gawk at the sight, though most were uninterested. "Mm. Okay, well let''s move on." Randol said and turned to go through another opening to his rear. "Wait, we''re just going to-" Desmond was cut off my Mai. "Yes. We''re leaving it for later." She grabbed him by the arm and pulled him with her to follow his brother. "Get a palace!" One of the students called out to them and a chorus of laughter followed.


    A few more turns and a single set of stairs later, the couple appeared on a dusty balcony overlooking a still plaza. Only the clicking of plate armor disturbed the still air as several knights made their way toward them from their left where the balcony was full of debris and hanging roots. To their right but only ten feet away was the main road and a missing section of the balcony that would have crossed over to the next building. A waft of crisp mountain air entered into their noses and filled them a small burst of energy. "I always forget how used to the musk of ruins I am." Desmond said as Randol waved him over to a set of stairs to their left.


    "That''s because you always have your nose stuck in some old scroll or a tome." Mai complained as they went down the steps. "And put your robe back on" She added. "You could just take yours off too." Desmond said without much attention to his words as his eyes scanned over the broken stone floor. Large piles of bones were pushed up against the left and right buildings of the plaza and there were almost ten large golems in fetal positions beside them.


    "You bet that damn bitch would want a real man putting his nose between her legs." A soft chuckle from one of the boys reached Mai''s ears. She felt her rage build up inside of her but she did not need to avenge her own honor ¨C this time.


    A swift metallic thwack reached her sensitive ears and a harsh reprimand. "Do not speak about Lady Redleaves could be your future queen!" One of the knights who had taken up a position at the top of the stairs hissed with contained rage. "Tsk, she''s a demi-human! My fa-" Another thwack, but louder, caught everyone''s attention this time. Everyone turned to see the commotion, even the ones by the altercation who tried to ignore it could not help but look now. Even Desmond''s attention was caught.


    What everyone saw was one of the knights looking down on a boy no older than sixteen years of age as blood dribbled onto his fine blue robes. "H-How dare you! I am the heir to-" The boy was silenced by a loud booming voice from the bottom of the stairs "Enough!" Randol roared and the two looked at the prince. "Everyone, quickly come down the stairs. Mai, tell me what you heard." Once Randol gave out his orders, not even Desmond dared to dally any longer at the bottom of the steps and quickly pulled the fox-girl over to his brother. "Did that damn child do it again?" Randol said, his eyes stern with his anger flexing in his cheeks.


    Mai repeated what she heard and Randol only looked up. "Brother... Just... Leave it for when we''re back at the Capital, please." Desmond pleaded with his brother. "No!" Randol said in a hushed tone, that was barely heard over the loud shuffle of feet as everyone tried to comply quickly with the angered prince''s order. "He has been degrading my sister-in-law; your future wife, the entire fucking way here!" Randol stared daggers at the now red checked teen that defied his order and kept himself at the top of the stairs but didn''t dare hold back the others. "Aren''t you going to say anything?! You can do something about-" Desmond waved away the suggestion.


    "Look, brother. I know how you feel; however, I can''t just do as I like. You know that." Mai looked at Desmond before they dropped in disappointment. "Fuck all about what Father would say about it. Mai is your woman!" Desmond wanted to refute his brother''s words but the words were caught in his throat. He couldn''t say it in front of Mai anymore. He was not that dense of a man. "We''ll talk about it later..." Desmond mumbled. "Lets...Lets just the current expedition over with and we''ll talk about... that..."


    Desmond made himself scarce as he floated away quickly to avoid that topic from being furthered.


    Mai looked up at the fleeting back of Desmond. "Hehe. See? I told you I''d help you." The anger had left Randol the moment Desmond gave him the promise of talking further on the relationship. "I..." Mai was lost for words. Randol patted Mai''s shoulder as she was lost for words. "Do not speak of it. I wish the happiness of both of you. Just like I promised, I''d get him to face it. Sadly, I cannot give you any more words as I have to go deal with a dog who does not know his place." His eyes gleamed again as they locked onto the child who was halfway down the stairs in an attempt to sneak by. A hopeless endeavor because he was flanked by the knight he had quarreled with.


    He pardoned Mai to join with his younger brother. "Now, you and I are going to have a chat about your conduct during our trip."


    Mai quickly caught up to Desmond after many of the girls in the host had given her words of comfort to ignore him. She gave quick "Thank you"s and such before her arm clasped around Desmond''s left. Her smile radiated hope that Desmond tried hard to ignore. "Hey. Look, a statue." He tried to take the attention away clumsily and Mai only smiled with a nod of her head.


    The statue stood full of bravado with the figure standing tall at three stories tall. It depicted someone in full armor with a sword in both hands and its tip stabbed into the ground. No one could see the figure''s countenance as it was completely wrapped in a thick layer of moss with a few squirrels resting on the figure''s shoulders. The statue was a pale purple. "A complete mithril statue?" Desmond said in admiration. "I wonder if it''s a statue to Alistair..." He theorized as he approached it, careful not to trip on the broken stones until he noticed that there were none within five feet of the statue. "Hey..." He said as he bent down to touch the stones and felt the thick magic interweaved in them.


    "I''m pretty sure that''s Cyril. See the paw on her chest? Cyril''s sigil is a cat paw." She beamed at Desmond. "How so? Cyril is said to be a peacemaker, not a warmonger. These poses are for those ''knightly'' people that go to war, right?" He turned to Mai. "Wel..." Mai gave him a defeated shrug as. "Besides that, it looks like a good place to set up a camp." Mai quickly changed the topic to avoid answering any hard questions. "Hey, don''t just-" Desmond was cut as Randol came up to them. "She''s right. Have your quarrel later, but we should return now that our objective is complete. "


    "But I want to see more." Desmond said with a groan. "Last time we gave in, we spent an extra three days with completely ran out of supplies!" Mai quickly refuted his plead with Randol backing her. "Maybe if you brought more supplies, but we don''t have enough supplies for any extra days. We''re cutting it close. If you want, explore that statue." Randol laughed at his last sentence, the kid he was scolding earlier trail slowly after the rear Knights with a swollen cheek. "Fine." Desmond relented as his eyes followed the student before he joined the rest of the host a few meters away.


    After a few more words about what they were to do, they agreed to spend the night in the row of buildings that led them into the city plaza. All the students broke off into their own small groups and either helped set up camps with the squires or explored the plaza with knights accompanying them.


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    Mai and Desmond examined the statue. Both of them examined the statue as Desmond pulled out another scroll from his satchel. With the setting sun, he did not have that great of light as he tried to look over the parchment. "Why don''t you just use Mage Light?" Mai asked as she brushed away layers of moss from its base. "Remember the last time I used that in an unexplored ruin?" Desmond responded without looking up from the parchment. "But we''re outdoors?" Mai said as she finally cleared away the moss at the boss and found an inscription. "Magical explosions are no less dangerous just because you''re in the open." Desmond said mechanically


    "Hey, Dessy. I found something." Mai said as she pivoted on her foot and looked up at the prince. "What does it say? ."


    [ Mother of all; Daughter of two.


    Cast from her world into another.


    Let this world rest with her in her tomb.


    And should this world reject her,


    Mother of the Light shall burn all life;


    Father of the Dark shall reap all souls.


    Only those with the stones of Heart step forth upon her place of rest.]


    Mai read the inscription off to Desmond. "That''s a really shitty poem for a statue in an elven city." He chuckled as he looked up from the scroll as he rolled it up. "Still got that stone?" He looked at her. "Yup." She reached into her robe, rummaged around for a moment and pulled out a small palm-sized golden topaz. It was shaped as an artistic hard, polished to a water smooth surface that held not a single flaw. "Too bad you won''t let me keep it..." Mai pouted as she handed it over. "If it doesn''t get stuck or destroyed, you''re all the more welcome to have it." Desmond said as he took it from her hand and looked it over in his hand. "Not what I meant..." Mai sulked even harder.

 3 Forsaken City 2

    Desmond looked over the statue and found a small heart-shaped indent by the tip of the stone sword. With a steady hand, he slid it in and pulled his hand away. Nothing happened for a moment but then the whole city shook.


    Everyone stumbled as the ground around them shook. Terrified screams filled the air as the knights were quick to take up positions with the students to their backs. A few buildings came down and a few unfortunate students were buried alive along with their guard when they tried to clamor out of the building they had been exploring.


    "Quick! Everyone! Retreat to the statue!" Randol bellowed as he stood guard by Desmond as Mai took up position by him while she pulled off her robe to reveal armor like Desmond''s. He kept his sword at the ready as he watched as all the groups sprinted from all over the plaza and huddle behind him with the knights on the edge. Black wisps of smoke danced off the bone piles on the plaza''s sides and from the large pile of rubble that had occupied the main entrance into the plaza.


    "Black magic!" Lady Priscilla said in alarm once she saw that black mist that began to cover over the city. They had tomes upon tomes on the subject of Black Magic, though none of them on how to use it; they could identify it from where it came from and how it acted once in the world. With all the signs in place, it only took one of the students to hold enough of themselves together to see it.


    Randol''s outlook on the young noblewoman had been favorably elevated by her call. Desmond, who was trying to remove the stone with a small blunted dagger, yelped as light burst from the said stone.


    "What happened?" Mai turned and caught her love as he stumbled backward. She steadied him as the stone burst from the statue''s base and arched back over the figure. It flew like a meteorite before it crashed into the spot above the cathedral doors; The light rippled across the cathedral walls before it danced off its face and onto an invisible wall that divided the plaza from the mountain.


    Before they could watch what came next, the piles of bone mounts erupted as several skeletons blitzed the group like rabid wolves. The knights were taken off guard by the sudden rush of skeletons and were overpowered momentarily before the apprentices blasted them away with minor spells that only had enough force to push them back. Wind and ice crashed into the skeletons, some even exploded into shards as a few lucky ice spikes managed to hit their weak spots.


    Just when they thought it was but another one of those traps set by a normal ruin, they were horribly corrected. Black tendrils erupted from the rubble across from them. The buildings on either side of the main street fell apart as the long thick black eels unsettled their foundations.


    "Incoming!" Randol called out as he had taken up the front of the host. The tendrils moved with horrifying speed as five of them shot through the air towards the host. Just before they met, a golden light shun from their feet and the tendrils rocketed back the moment the light touched them. No one could see the figure that was slowly rising from the rubble as the skeletons were embodied by the light and threw themselves at the host.


    "Stay in the light!" Desmond cried out once he saw what happened. "No matter what! Stay in the light!" The light was around a fifty-foot diameter with enough room for the host to fight with enough room not to hit each other when they took caution. Though, the moment he gave the warning, the light split in half and slowly crawled around the statue. Each brick lighting up with the strange magic that kept the black eely arms away from them.


    Mai, Desmond, and Randol managed to stick to the right group as well as Priscilla; She kept up by staying close to her crush and kept him buffed when she could.


    The left group was no so lucky as most of the knights went with Randol. The skeletons were quick to blitz them with their overwhelming numbers. They did not kill them, no, they pulled at them. Tens of skeleton hands with black wisps of smoke that bellowed from their eyes grabbed at whomever they could reach before they pulled them from the light. In a matter of seconds, the group was swallowed whole in a sea of white and black as the tendrils deal the final blows to the group.


    Their cries made Randol''s hair stand up on end as he could hear it all over the clatter of bones. "Do not give!" He roared. "Fight or die!" The knights repeated his words with feverishly as they hacked at the monsters. They too heard the death throes of the others. Their resolve was only strengthened by the will to survive.


    "We''re moving towards the cathedral!" Desmond called out. "Just keep heading towards it!" He did not want anyone else to die. His heart trembled when he saw a few tendrils slither over the horde, fresh blood dripped from its ends as it passed over the skeletons; it stained them like some twisted sort of war paint. A few tried to pierce through the light, only to disintegrate only an inch from a guard.


    With a quick headcount, their numbers had been nearly halved or so. Twenty guards remained and nearly fifteen students.


    "We got a large one!" A guard called out. "South!"


    At the call, all the apprentices directed their spells towards the large boar type skeleton that was hurled itself through the skeleton horde. Ice and fire splashed over its skull and crumbled away with the rest only to take out the skeletons around it. The sudden lack of support taken away, the sides were pressured in as the Knights had to contend with double the number of skeletons they had been fighting already. One knight had both his armed seized by six skeletons. Though they were weak monsters, they kept their hold by throwing themselves one after another in an attempt to pull him out of the light.


    "No!" The knights cried out and the knight next to him tried to pull him back into the group but it was a mistake. He was so focused on repelling the skeletons in his section as he was before. The skeletons, while dumb, were able to see it and poured in to take advantage of the sudden gap. Soon, both the knights were plagued with bone hands that grabbed at them; pulled at them; bit at them with their cold dead hands. The apprentices were scared senseless but refused to cast any spells that could have splashed back, even though they did it earlier, they were no longer sane at the sudden break in their defensive circle.


    The two knights were eventually pulled half out of the light by their legs, their armor scratching against the flagstones before two tendrils burst forward with sickening speed. They pierced each of the knights above their tail bones. Two horrible cracks thundered followed by a gut-wrenching splatter - then they disappeared into the horde without a cry. Utter chaos broke out and Desmond did not know what to do except continue to hurl all the offensive spells he knew into the crowd, but in a city full of the dead, was it even enough?


    One by one, they lost knights as Randol continually fought to his limit. He no longer tried to properly use his sword now that it had been blunted from tens of skeletons; He used every part of his blade as a blunt weapon.


    "We''re almost there!" Desmond called out. "Watch your steps! We''re going upstairs!" He sweated profusely. He felt his heart race from the adrenaline as death nipped at each of their heels. Yet, did not fear it so much as it feared whom it nipped at. Desmond no longer had the safety of the knights any longer but he fought harder to protect Mai only. He feared that death would come to take her. He fought harder than he had ever done so before, completely disregarding that he held no skills in close combat; he still would punch and kick any skeleton that tried to reach for her when she was not looking.


    Lady Priscilla was also surprisingly steadfast in her desire to protect Prince Randol. Though she did not possess the natural strength of a man; she still punched and kicked all the same.


    The steps of the large stairs were barely wide enough to fit five men across. Its granite steps steep and majestic, even when as death stepped upon it. Fortunately for the group, it proved to aid in their plight as the steepness prevented the attacks of the larger skeletons from all angles but their back. The large and high reaching golden dome glowed oddly as it swirled over the Catedral doors. With the sudden lack of enemies at their front, Mai and all the frontline survivors moved to assist Randol whose attacks had become slower and less impactful as he struggled to keep up the momentum while moving.


    "Your Highness, please retreat and take a quick break!" Lady Priscilla called out. She too like Desmond was covered in sweat from the hefty amount of mana she had used during the move. While it seemed like an eternity was only no more than ten minutes of none stop combat. With the use of lesser spells and medium spells, she had managed to ration out her mana. The two other surviving apprentices were spent as well.


    Randol switched out with the five remaining knights; With their brief respite, they were more fit to fight than Randol was at the moment.


    He joined Desmond and the others by the door; his tanned face paled from exhaustion. He had to drag his sword as it was either hold it properly or properly use his legs. He chose his legs and Desmond helped him sheathe his sword as the light finally touched the golden barrier. When it did, the barrier began to hum. At first, barely enough for Desmond to hear, but it quickly escalated in pitch as the golden dome began to glow with greater intensity than before along with the sound.


    The night was soon to encroach on them, but the dome burned like a sun; Its cries deafening. The skeletons who stepped within the harshest part of the light -closest to the cathedral - was burned away. The ones further out began to steam and char. The Tendrils retreated back into the giant and it hid in the shadow of the statue. For half a minute, everyone was spared from the onslaught.


    Then the dome shattered. As if someone had shattered thousands of glass bottles on the stone floor. The dome itself became fragments that floated outward against gravity before all the pieces fizzled away. In its wake, the mountain was still there, but the ruins of the cathedral changed. The ruins were no longer a ruin, nevertheless, no longer a cathedral.


    Where the cathedral entrance sat was only a large stone archway set with magical runs that glowed faintly. Where the inside of the cathedral was, once filled with debris, a bridge rested; Its grey stone untouched by time. It was two men wide and lept across to the middle of a lake where a platform with another archway with four golems with spears stood beside it.


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    Two orbs of light appeared in front of Desmond and Lady Priscilla as they were the two closest to the archway. The orbs turned into two stones, each made of the same material as the heart stone. One was etched with a key and the other a sword. No one had time to think about what had just happened as once the light died away, the undead charged them in a frenzy. With the protection of the light gone, they had nothing to stop the tendrils from killing them.


    "Cross the bridge!" Mai called out to everyone, but the tendrils grabbed the two knights on the staircase. However, Mai was quick to notice that the tendrils could not pass over the railings; but instead had to channel themselves through the walkway. She didn''t bother to call out her discovery. They would notice in a few minutes anyway.


    The group sprinted across the bridge with haste as the skeletons and tendrils alike came across feverishly towards them. The tendrils still hovered over the skeletons, yet it could not pass over the railings or it would burn away. The sudden constriction of its movements slowed it considerably and gave the group its much-needed respite from the threat of instantly being killed.


    Unfortunately the other tired apprentices, the physical strain was too much. Without the tempered bodies such as the knights or at least, the bodies of Mai or Desmond who had delved regularly into ruins; they quickly fell back in the group before subsequently being killed by the undead...


    Lady Priscilla wheezed deep and heavy, her face beat red from the effort, but she knew it. She was going to die too. They were only half the way to the middle when she began to slow and her legs began to fail. No! NO! She screamed in her heart, afraid that if she voiced her resentment; she''d die there. From the front to the back she slowly slid. She felt a single pulled on the back of her robe and she gave it, the stone in her hand clenched.


    She let out a terrified scream finally once she knew it was the skeletons. She closed her eyes and prayed for a quick death.


    She felt more force pull her back, but then she felt herself be pulled forward and her the back of her robes tear. Suddenly, she had become weightless and the rattle of armor became more pronounced. She dared to open one eye meekly and saw Prince Randol''s pale face as he carried her the rest of the way.


    Randol could not let her die that way, not after she had proven herself a great comrade in the end. While they may die today, he wouldn''t let her die now. That was his thoughts as he pulled her forward and carried her. The surprisingly light teen has only weighted him down a little, but after that small break earlier, he could do it. He no longer dared to fight back against the horde as they ran. Neither did Mai or Desmond. The four were the last to survivors of the group and now they had the undead just out of a fingers touch away.


    Desmond was the first to reach the gate. He quickly saw another hole similar to that of the statue in the gate and tried to stick the stone it. He could not though. He tried four times but the stone would be repelled. He remembered that Priscilla had a similar stone as well and turned for her.


    "Priscilla -!" He was shocked when her in his brother''s arms but quickly dismissed it. "Priscilla, your stone!" He called out and she was quick to toss it as Randol put her down and faced the horde. They had a twenty-second gap before they would be overrun by hundreds of angry undead. Desmond shoved the stone into the gap and it took to it. The golems, who were lined in a row of two on each of their sides, activated and their spears pointed towards the undead with lightning-fast speed.


    Light jumped from their spears and cut through the undead. Within a matter of moments, the undead horde had disappeared along with the giant who was at the end. It''s shrill death throes sounded more of despair than anger.


    The golems did not point their spears to the group and returned to their original positions. With the sudden threat of death relieved, everyone collapsed as fatigue attacked them the moment the adrenaline subsided. Desmond laid on his back while Ma laid beside him. Desmond cried silently while Mai only patted his arm to soothe him as she laughed slightly. A laugh of joy that they survived.


    Priscilla collapsed into a sobbing mess as all her emotions caught up to her. Ten odd minutes of overwhelming odds had suddenly been turned so strangely. She was but a sheltered teen who aspired to be a princess. She had only come to try and catch Prince Randol''s eye, but her friends were gone. She had almost been killed and she was sitting on a godforsaken bridge in the middle of the wildlands.


    The weight of all her impulsive choices rammed into her like a runaway stallion and she could only cry it away. Randol was the only one who did not drop to fatigue. Though he was tired, he kept his eye on the south with tired eyes. He waited a moment to see if they were all really dead and they were. Once he was sure that the undead was not coming back, he sat next to Priscilla and pulled her close to his chest in a hug. Not in any romantic way, but he had done it to Desmond plenty of times when they were younger.


    It was the only way he knew how to soothe another human.


    While they let out all of their resentments and joy, the gates slid open silently; The mountain rippled like disturbed water. After a moment, another platform after the gate appeared. Circular with a small knee-high wall that ended where another archway was, but nothing through or in it. A single pedestal rested in the center of the platform with a similar hole. On the mountain, broken stairs were revealed, unreachable from where they were with a gushing river that poured into the lake.


    The sudden sound of a rushing river caught all their attention. Randol was the first to notice the sudden appearance.


    "Desmond... It''s another platform..." He called out. "The mountain slightly changed too..." He added and slowly got up while he helped Priscilla.


    Desmond got up with Mai and noticed the change. "Two massive illusion barriers?!" He yelled in surprise. Not to mention how the wildlands heavy with a massive confusion spell that effected demons and Humans, there were even two almost godly illusion barriers that covered an entire mountain! He did not even want to think about the logistics and impracticalities of all of this. Whoever set these spells up were definitely trying to keep them out of whatever came next.


    Mai was the first to test the platform. She looked for any traps or spells, but only found the same hole as gate they had opened.


    The group rested until night fully came. Under the stars, they decided to move forward. To leave was probably as dangerous as moving forward. With no supplies, it was a death sentence; Though no one wanted to head back into the plaza where the dead may still be waiting for them. In all honesty, if his little brother and Mai weren''t there, Randol would have chosen to leave. He could not protect them in this state so whatever came next... Came next. They had already lost so much and gained nothing. There was no point in going back in that sense.


    . . . . . . . . . . . .


    The group came out onto a raised stone platform. All around them was crystal clear water that shimmered in the nightlight. Large barren tree trunks rose from the water ominously as well of what looked to be broken stone walls.


    "I.. Think this may have been a part of the city as well." Mai commented as she had the clearest vision due to her race. Her eyes shimmered in the nightlight as she took the helm. The platform ended at a staircase that took them down into the water. With such clear water, Mai believed there was no life inside of it. Though with such a wide area, there was no way to be sure from her point of view. They crossed through the water as it came up to their thighs.


    The area was a large enclosed valley that appeared to be flooded. Though, by the halfway point, Mai told the group that there was a massive structure on a plateau ahead, slightly illuminated by a golden glow. As they crossed the valley, the cold water felt good on their skin. Randol had tested it and found it was clean and drinkable. So they stopped where a broken stone wall rose close to the path to step out of the water for a moment.


    "So... What do you think is up ahead...?" Priscilla asked Desmond. It was the first time she had spoken to him the entire trip. "I mean... If you want to tell me... I just... Wanted to talk to someone and your brother..." She turned to Randol who felt distant and closed off. He sat more away from the group whereas Desmond sat close to Mai.


    Desmond looked to his brother. He held his head in his hands as he sat on the wall. His hair dripped from the water he had splashed himself with and the water below him was dark. The blood slowly floated away towards back the way they had come. "Hopefully nothing dangerous." Desmond finally answered. Though it was the first time another apprentice had spoken to him, aside to mock him, he wasn''t in the mood to be happy.


    Mai was no different. Her eyes were dull and she jumped at every perceived sound. Her ears lat flat back and her tail was fluffed in fear. "Alright. Let''s keep moving." Before the fear of what''s next kills us. He added in his heart.


    The group came went on their way, snaking through the almost endless forest of barren trees and water.


    It took a half quarter of a moon to reach the end of the large flooded valley and eventually reached a small waterfall that cascaded off a small plateau. A large outdoor structure rose at the top of the waterfall. Six thick stone pillars rose up and connected with a large stone ring rested ontop. The pillars were mostly wrapped in a strange crawling plant that blossomed a strange golden sunburst rose that emitted a soft light that illuminated the structure.


    They found two sets of stairs on either side of the waterfall, but only one was usable. So they climbed that and found themselves at the source of the river. It was not flooded here with well-trimmed grass and a single dormant longhouse, and a beautiful pergola that sat at the foot of the structure. The sunburst flowers grew all around the area, the source seemed to be the pergola. The beauty of it all seemed almost fairy in nature, though sadly, no one of them were in the mood to take in the sight.

 4 Wings of White

    "Where do people go when they die?" A small chubby boy asked.


    "I don''t know." A smaller girl replied.


    The two laid on their backs, dressed in their pajamas; their eyes observant of the starry violent and ink sky above them. Trees rose in the distance, small and unimportant in the twos'' eyes. The singing cicadas filled the cool summer night as the two laid. Two stars danced across the sky, catching their attention momentarily before it disappeared over the distant mountains out in the great beyond.


    "Do you think your dad knows?" The boy asked. "I mean, he''s the one taking you to the funeral..." The boy trailed off, unsure of what it a funeral actually was since he had never attended one before. All he knew was she had said her grandfather died and they had to attend.


    "Maybe." She responded lightheartedly, unperturbed by the gravity of what they were actually discussing in their youthful innocence. "But I think daddy won''t like that, Jax. Daddy hasn''t wanted to talk or play since he told me." The girl rolled on her side. Her steel-blue eyes caught the moonlight and radiated an angelic beauty. Her light blonde hair a nest for the loose blades of grass for the freshly cut grass.


    "I..." Jax didn''t know how to respond to that. "Maybe he needs his space, Cyril. I know when my dad gets made, he likes to lock himself in the room. That''s what mom says."


    "It''s fine." Cyril responded as she looked at the pudgy Jax Besides her. "I don''t want to talk about it." While she was pretty in the moonlight, her face showed betrayed her sadness and Jax felt the sudden urge to hold her. He did not understand these newfound feelings he had been getting when he was with her. He suddenly found his cheeks were hot.


    "So, how''s the tutors?" He asked, quick to escape the sudden influx of foreign feelings.


    "Mm. Boring. All they talk about is math and history." She said and turned on her back to stare back at the stares above. "How''s school?" Cyril asked.


    "Lonely." He responded without thinking, but the words were out there and he couldn''t take them back.


    "Why?" She asked without looking.


    Jax thought about whether he should answer her question or leave it. Though, Cyril had never mistreated him; He was still scared about how she would think if he spoke the truth.


    "Jax?" She turned to look at him since he hadn''t answer.


    "Because no one treats me nice there." He admitted under her soft stare. "I rather come to study with you." He looked back into her eyes and felt it was alright if he could stay like this.


    "Mm. You know your dad won''t let you do that." Cyril said with a small smile. "Remember the last time you asked?"


    "Sure." Cyril said to his surprise. "I''ll ask him after the funeral." She let out a great yawn and sat up. A woman''s voice called for her. One of the maids for the villa and Cyril called back her acknowledgment. She stood back and waved at the maid who was only at the end of the large outdoor patio. She turned to tell Jax that it was time for them to come in, but Jax was gone.


    The field had disappeared and replaced with a parking lot. A large gothic cathedral rose behind her where her country home had been. A large group of people exited it and she looked around in confusion. She was in her mother''s arms now as she raised her head. The night lit up bright as she turned to the right and saw the headlights of a car; Then a long blare of its horn and the roar of its engine.


    . . . .


    Cyril fought to escape from the car, but she suddenly found a cold weight press down on her. The light she was so frantic to escape from began to fracture as it glimmered above her. She felt weightless herself and she finally registered she was in submerged in crystal clear water. She began to feel a burning sensation in her chest and was quick to upright herself. She felt coarse stone beneath her feet and she pushed off on it. In a blink of an eye, she broke the water''s surface and clung to the first thing within arm''s reach.


    Her hands gripped the stone edge of the pool, her eyes obscured by water briefly.


    Cold air wafted against her skin, a new sensation that made her freeze in her tracks. She felt the weight of something on her back and she felt the coarseness of the stone against her arms. Before she could come to terms of these new sensations, she felt fire rise in her lungs before it gushed up her throat. Then, against her will, golden liquid spewed from her lips and into the pool of water on the other side of the pool.


    The liquid glowed as beautifully as her eyes before it dulled and disappeared into the water. She sighed in relief; her body felt better than a few moments again. The crisp mountain air entered her lungs and it perked her mood up. Now, she registered these newfound feelings. She looked at the stone beneath her arms and brushed the tips of her fingers across it.


    I can... feel? She said silently. The stone was cool to the touch, as was the water; but each felt different. None just a different point of pressure. The disturbed water lapped at her chest, each wave renewing its refreshing touch. The stone rough touch was uniform and its grey texture was vivid to her. This can''t still be the game! Alarm rose in her heart as she began to notice more and more.


    When the water in front of her returned to its mirror-like surface, she saw her reflection. Two soft doe eyes with two drops of glowing gold looked at her, framed by that flawless fair skin that was her in-game avatar. She touched her cheek with a weary touch. Her supple cheek was smooth and to her surprise, was not just pressure she felt. The tips of her fingers were smooth as well. Then she noticed the snowy white wet hair that was flattened against her head. She picked it up and felt the pressure against her scalp.


    She also felt each individual strain between in her hair.


    It''s real! She screamed in her heart. Her eyes widened and she looked around now. There was no time lapse in the rendering of her surroundings. The flowers were three dimensional, rather than just pasted pictures to save processing power. The pillars that the flowers hung from had flaws that were definitely not skinned on. She noticed that she was in a small circular pool. The pillars rose from a slightly wider ring that left a two-foot gap between her pool, but it sat nearly half a foot beneath the water surface.


    The weight on her back became more pronounced as she began to feel something move; A similar feeling to when something brushed a toe. She turned her head whilst keeping her body still and saw a large white wing. The very tip brushed the surface of the pool behind her with every movement. My wings... Wings were a special trait given to Demi-gods who had finally achieved full divinity, or so the lore was set by her. She got her wings in the last raid, but they had been more of a symbolic gesture from her mother.


    She wanted her to become an angel in heaven, or so her dad had said.


    While the wings startled her, she pieced together the situation in her head. A conclusion came, but she held it back in fear of her hopes being shattered. First, she''d focus on what was in front of her then she''d figure out the rest. She looked down into the water and saw she was completely naked; her well-endowed breasts bare in the water below. She felt a little discomfort at her nudity. "Clothes." She mouthed the words, but a graceful voice came out rather than her usual higher-pitched voice, one that was mostly machine.


    "Um..." A new voice joined the fray and Cyril froze. "If... you need clothes... I can lend you my robe..." Cyril turned in the direction of the voice and saw a young girl. She could not tell her age as the game world dulled all sense of that. Men in the bodies of young girls, young girls in the bodies of sagely men.


    The girl stood in the stone pergola she had created before her death. Three other people stood next to her. A large knight with blonde short hair. His red armor that was ornated with golden dragons was marred with buffs and scratches. His hair was matted and disheveled. In his hand, a heavily damaged sword was pointed at her. Just beside him was a girl with large brown fox ears and equally matted disheveled brown hair. Her Brown eyes were narrowed with fear and she wore a light amount of leather armor. Behind her was another boy with the same disheveled look and leather armor, but held a wand.


    The girl who spoke to her had more clean hair, though it was obviously freshly washed. It was silky black and she held no weapon, though she had pinched her blue robes that were wet below her thighs. No one looked at her with hostility, but they were apparent how weary of her they were. She stood before the trio and was on the edge of the pergola where the outer ring connected too.


    "Ah..." Avery uttered in confusion but suddenly was reminded of her nudity when her breasts grazed the coarse stone. The unpleasant and harsh feeling sparked her mind back into gear. " Please." She nodded towards the girl.


    The girl pulled the robe off her back, revealing a simple white dress that went down to her knees where knee-high brown leather boots started. The robe came off like a bathrobe, held together by a few buttons and a leather belt that held a wand. The girl kept the belt and tossed her the robe.


    "Priscilla!" The knight hissed, stepped forward and reached for the girl "We don''t know if she''s dangerous!" He pulled her back towards the group.


    Cyril felt offended but kept her thoughts to herself as she pulled the robe over herself. She disappeared underneath the water and tried to put the robes over her, but found she could not fit her wings underneath the robe. She resurfaced. "I can''t put it on." She sighed. "My wings won''t fit. " The wings themselves stuck out five feet in each direction unfolded; Two-feet and some odd inches folded.


    Maybe it was the troubled expression Cyril hand, but Mai sheathed her sword and handed it to Desmond.


    "Hey!" He said as Mai dropped the sword in his hands. "What are you doing?!" He asked.


    "Helping her." Mai said. She crossed stepped up to the edge of the pergola, stepped onto the outer ring. "Sit on the stone, I''ll wrap it around you." She said and pointed to the stone wall that housed Cyril''s pool. The girl in question nodded, aligned herself with the vixen so the men could not see her and heaved herself on the small wall. She handed the soaked robe to Mai. "Turn around, please." Mai said.


    Cyril nodded and turned; the wings bushed against the pillar before they gave Mai a soft wet slap. "Sorry!" Cyril felt her wings brush against something, with the wet slap, rightly assumed she had hit the girl. Mai said nothing as she was surprised by the sudden womanly back of the girl in front of her. The girl looked about her age, she had such a defined back that she felt a hint of jealousy appear in her heart.


    Dismissing the feelings, she placed one foot on the inner ring as she wrapped the robe around her back; just beneath the base of her wings. "Grab the ends." Mai said gently. Cyril did as she was asked and finished wrapping the robs over her breasts. It unsettled her how plush they were when she pressed her arm against them. "C''mon, I''ll help you up." Mai said.


    Since Cyril seemed to have been friendly given their interaction, the three put away their weapons. They all let out sighs of relief as they seemed to age slightly now that the tension had left the all as Mai helped the girl from the water.


    The beauty of the white-haired woman made everyone suck in a tinge of air. The curve of her collar to the plumpness of the top of her breasts. Her wide hips showed as they were outlined by the dripping wet robe. Desmond was more enthralled by her beautiful dove wings that seemed to move every now and again.


    "What''s you name...Err..." Randol was the first to break the silence. His face contorted. Even his face seemed to bloom red - so did Mai and Priscilla.


    "Cyril. Cyril Bailey." She said. "Mm. It''d be better if we talk in the house." Her golden eyes moved to the longhouse opposite the pond. Cyril was in no hurry to have introductions dressed in such a fashion. While she had been stuck in a game for half her life, she was not ignorant of the social norms between men and women.


    "Just as I thought..." Mai muttered. She suddenly felt... Honored to help her. It took her a moment to notice it when she looked to them, but she had seen her face enough; Heard enough, not to mistake it. "Please, let''s get you something more... appropriate."


    . . . . . . .


    Desmond, Randol, and Priscilla stared slack jawed at a large dragon skull that hung over the firepit inside Cyril''s longhouse. By its size, it had to be a greater dragon at the very least. It hung supported by four thick chains from four thick beams that had not rotted from the long years. The longhouse''s floor was ten feet below the plateau''s level and with the walls being five feet taller than the ground; The grand total being fifteen-foot walls that stretched out to sixty feet. Widthwise, it was forty-feet long.


    This was only just part of the home. Mai and Cyril had disappeared into a hallway opposite of the front door to get clothes. When Randol had heard this, he doubted there would even be a single fabric that would have survived the centuries. Now that he had seen the inside of the home in pristine condition as if this home had only been built yesterday for a noble - he did not doubt she had clothes.


    Underneath the hall was a clear cooking area. Pots and pans hung from a small iron rack a few feet away from the cobblestone pit with utensils. From what Desmond could see, the smoke would channel through the dragon skull where a hole had been cut into the bone. Then it would ventilate out the stone chimney. Desmond actually felt this was quite wasteful for such a mythical beast!


    She really turned a magical S-Rank material into a damn centerpiece?!


    Desmond''s face twitched at the madness of it all while Priscilla was scared of the skull. She preferred cute things over such dreadful things like dead bones. Even more so after what had happened earlier. She trembled behind Randol who was considerate of her and let her be. Lucky for Randol, the skull was the only death related item inside the hall. The rest was full of gems, weapons, paintings and a single statue of a dancing bear with a lute.


    Actually, the hall itself quite the mess. Nothing had really been placed in proper order now seemed that it had any proper order. Kind of like a... teenager?


    Was the angel stuck going through some sort of rebellious phase before...? Randol asked himself.


    The room itself was lit by four large clusters of glowing white crystals. They were light crystals that were only used in quite important ruins, and the girl had four of them... Randol had seriously put some thought into whom the girl could be, but nothing came to mind. He was not the religious type, he believed in the sword and never bothered with the subject. The only deities he knew of was Alistair to the west, God of Light and Hades to the north, the god of demons. His father cared little for the gods, so there weren''t many statues of deities out in the open at the Capital.


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    Deeper in the home, Mai stared at the clothes that began to pile on the floor as Cyril tore through four wardrobes. She never spared a second look to any of them, either she was quite the decisive person, or she knew what she was looking for. She would find out soon either way.


    The room they were in had been down a hall that led into the mountain and up a single flight of stairs. It was the only room at the top of the stairs and it was quite homely. Build directly into the mountain, the room was made completely of stone. The floor was polished to a smooth shiny surface that felt refreshing to walk on with bare feet. How did she know? Cyril had forbidden shoes to be worn in her room.


    The room was about twenty feet wide and thirty feet long. The door was on the north side, center of the long wall. On the south wall was a floor to ceiling window pushed to the east side of the south wall that overlooked the valley. How they hadn''t seen the window earlier, she couldn''t say.


    There were a few couches and a small table in between by the window with a single hearth center of the south wall along. Then finally, the west side was where Cyril''s small bed and large amounts of wardrobes. While there were those things, everywhere but the sleeping area was cluttered with different items. The couch was stacked with furs and fabrics. The table was stacked with a variety of tomes. In front of the hearth was several stacks of different metal ingots. The rarest one she could identify was the meteorite. There were at least six different metals after that and they had been obviously stacked by rarity.


    "Is... this a warehouse rather than a home...?" Mai asked nervously. She felt the strong urge to swipe something, but she felt guilt immediately after the urge came up.


    "Nope. All the warehouses should be in the guild houses." Cyril answer as she got the fourth and final wardrobe and began to throw items out of it in her search. "This is just the things I had carried on me before I... Well..." She never finished her sentence. She was stalled midmovement, her face dark from what Mai could see and she suddenly felt the room''s temperature begin to drop.


    "F-Forget I asked!" Mai said with forced happiness. The suffocating atmosphere quickly disappeared and the room returned to normal. She never suspected that question would have been a big landmine. She really is the Goddess... She said in her heart. The beast folk believed in the True one belief, that Cyril was the creator of the world. Her statues dotted the beastial planes and the mountains at their back; regardless what the Dragon Empire and the Sun Kingdom said - Any true beastmen would recognize her.


    "Ha!" Cyril cried out as she pulled a black dress that was near the end of the rack of clothes. She pulled out a black sleeveless dress that fitted nice down to her just above her hips where it became flowy. It must have allowed good movement. There was also an embroidered golden paw above the heart. The single doubt she had was removed then. There it was, the symbol of Cyril.


    Cyril, after having gotten her underwear with matching a black bra and panties, tried to put on her dress... But she should have retracted her wings...


    "Your grace..." Mai said with a troubled expression. "Shouldn''t you retract your wings?" She stared at the dress scrunched up upon the base of her dove wings while the front dangled freely. It honestly made Mai want to laugh. It was... Adorable.


    "I don''t know how..." Cyril admitted with a straight face that looked at the vixen as her golden eyes watched her attempting to hold back a laugh.


    Silence fell between them too before Mai couldn''t hold anymore and let out a good laugh before she managed to gather her dignity back up. "My apologies... but... how did you activate the light gems?" She pointed to the two large clustered that lit the room in a comfortable white light.


    "They should activate when you enter the room." Cyril said seriously. Maybe another time she would have laughed at her predicament, but she was still fumbling with the entire situation of being alive - and in a real body at that. So, her emotions were a jumbled mess and it took quite a bit of will power just to not break down on the spot. The fact she could not properly put on her favorite dress, the one her mother made designed for her, was slowly grinding away that facade.


    Mai was quick to notice that narrowing of her golden pupils and she felt the temperature rise in the room. She quickly wiped the smirk away and composed herself. "I''m sorry, but I do not know much about how wings work, maybe with a thought?" She heard there were quite a bit of Races that had certain traits that could be summoned or dispersed with a thought, Elementals being one of them.


    Cyril nodded and closed her eyes in thought.


    The room fell silent. A few moments past and the wings twitched a few times; a frown formed on her delicate lips.


    Then the wings were sucked into her back almost silently, which was almost creepy to see, and the dress fell down to cover her body completely.


    "I did it!" Cyril''s eyes opened and a beautiful smile blossomed on her face. "Thank you." She turned to Mai and nodded her head.


    Mai smiled back, happy for her to have figured out how to do it; though she was worried about what else she didn''t know...

 5 Wings of Broken Wing 2

    A light mist drifted across the lake''s mirror surface just as the sun''s rays kissed the western cliff head. The morning air enraptured Cyril as she drank the air through shuddering breath. The air chilled her lungs as her heart was chilled by her thoughts.


    She sat upon the top of the broken western steps, with the hope that the waterfall would drown out her the plethora of thoughts that plagued her. While it worked for a while, the sounds of the waterfall disappeared as she drifted back into her grim thoughts. She had not slept the entire night. Neither had she felt tired.


    They had moved Priscilla into her bedroom to sleep in the bed with Mai. Mai had stayed up a little longer to talk with Cyril; The information she had gathered through their brief conversation weight heavily upon her heart though.


    She had spent half the night in the air to train with her new limbs. She found that her clothes would morph around them. However, she was aware that her clothes weren''t made from ordinary materials, she was happy that she did not have to strip to summon her wings back out. The rest of the night had been spent with her thoughts as she mulled the information in bite-size pieces.


    With the first part being that Cyril was considered a mythical legend at this point in time. Long absent from the world stage, Alistair - God of Light - had also replaced her mother years ago. Mai was not aware of the change, but Madin had a few statues here and there; She was just not as mainstream as her daughter. The most famous statue was in the Capital of the Beastial Planes. There also wasn''t a mention of her father, Edward.


    There also were no records of Madin being Cyril''s mother. The popular doctrine only states that she was the sole creator of the world. Cyril was not in the mood to correct her; tell her that the world had been created by a team of hundreds. That she only had been a part of a few teams. Administration, Design, and Final World Set. Three teams. Only one delved into the grit of the world and it was only her stating what she wanted, with little of the actual drafting of the designs themselves.


    She also was the one that set down the environments, at least, when Jax was not around and no "Friends" had been on.


    It only took ten minutes to two hours for a green light for the game teams. Cyril was not aware she had single-handedly designed and, or, approved all the items in the world. Nearly half the biomes had also been placed by her. Though, it had been stripped down afterward by a team to optimize it for the servers. Maybe it was a stretch to call her THE creator, she certainly was the God of this world.


    Why am I still alive? Cyril thought to herself. She was no saint; She was not charitable; She did not give her hand out freely; and certainly, she was not good. Morality was vague to her. She really only had stories to tell her and, in a world, where anything could be fixed, consequences were always reversible. It was as simple as putting as opening the Admin Menu.


    Jax was the one who taught her about morals and good. Her father spent more and more of his time with the company to ensure she could live. Her mother had spent a lot of time with her in the beginning, but that soon fell away once the scope of the company had grown. She handled the medical side since her father had purchased her hospital to ensure they had doctors they picked.


    The more she thought about it, the less she saw her value in living. She could not be called a human at this point.


    Without her family - without Jax - was there a point in living?


    She was alone.


    It was all so much for a single night. She even contemplated suicide for a moment, as ridiculous as the notion of it was. She lamented how lucky she was to have had Jax. He would have talked her through the night, even if he had worked the next day. She was alone in a foreign, yet, all too familiar world without the people who gave her a reason to suffer it all. Even the valley she had crafted with care had been changed.


    It was all so much to absorb in such a short amount of time.


    With such a dark heart, even the water seemed to lose its shine and the cliffs miles high. She felt hopelessly small compared to her new world. This was her tomb and she felt it threatened to swallow her whole... With a shudder as she hit rock bottom, she hugged her knees to her chest. Her eyes shot from the endless tears shed earlier in the darkness. Everything was so large now... And with her love...


    She felt so... So, lost.


    Lost in her thoughts, she had not noticed Mai behind her; Concerned as she watched Cyril slowly make herself smaller. Wrapped tight in the thick cotton blanket, her nose was red from the frosty morning air. Mist parted her lips as she contemplated whether to step in and break whatever spiral the goddess had gotten herself into. Though, ideas were not actions.


    "Lady Cyril-" The sudden turn of Cyril''s body scared her as two orbs of bright gold stared at her with slit eyes. "Sorry, but I was wondering... Are you okay?" She had already disturbed Cyril. Now she had to follow through or she believed she''d look a fool in front of her deity.


    The sudden appearance of Mai had ripped Cyril from her void of darkness. The valley itself seemed to brighten with her appearance. The shimmer returned to the lake, and her ears became aware again of the waterfall as it gurgled beside her. She cleared her throat, but Mai saw how bloodshot her eyes were.


    "Y-Yeah." Cyril said with a weak voice.


    "May I join you?" Mai asked. She was dense like Desmond. She could see when someone needed a friend. Cyril clearly needed someone and she was aware that the girl had not slept with them; Thus, she must have spent the night in solitude. That fact made her tender heart bleed, just as it bled for those they had lost yesterday.


    "Up to you." Cyril''s voice sounded better now. She watched Mai shuffle over to her and sit beside her. The blanket pressed warmly against her cold skin. The touch warmed her heart in a way she never had felt in such a long time. Mai opened the blanket and cursed at the gush of cold air that hit her barely clothed body. She wrapped her arm around Cyril and wrapped the blanket around them.


    "Bring it close or I''ll freeze!" Mai chuckled as her body shuddered.


    Cyril obediently did as Mai bid and brought the end close tightly to Mai''s end. The blanket was rather large, with enough room for another person, the slack of the blanket felt homely.


    "Better?" Mai asked with a soft, reassuring, smile.


    "Mm." Cyril nodded once.


    "Do you want to talk about it?" Mai asked - sure not the pressure the girl.


    "I''m fine." Cyril said. "But thank you." She smiled meekly and chuckled at the girl''s concern.


    "Did you sleep well?" Mai changed the subject without hesitation.


    "Mmm." She murmured before she shook her head. Even after she had been pulled from that darkness, she still brimmed with energy. "Did you sleep well?" Cyril returned the question.


    "I... slept well." She said unsure of herself.


    "You don''t sound too sure of yourself," Cyril commented.


    "Given what happened yesterday..." Mai said as she looked over the beautiful lake. "I figured my dreams would be haunted."


    "Doubt it." Cyril added. "Not here."


    "How do you figure that?" Mai turned to the white-haired girl, even a side view was so breathtaking in the early morning sun.


    "Since this world is real." Cyril turned to return the stare. One that made Mai''s rosy cheeks turn even redder that she had to look away. "I figure all the items in there would do their jobs."


    "What do you mean by that...?" Mai looked back; This time in confusion.


    "Red orb on the hearth. "Cyril said. "It''s called Tranquil Last Wish. It brings peace to all who rest within any abode it''s placed in."


    "Holy shit..." Mai said with astonishment before she covered her mouth with a hand full of the blanket. "Pardon me, but you have one of those?!" She brought her face forward, her eyes gleamed with curiosity."


    "Mm." Cyril nodded her head. "About ten if I remember. I have a lot of crap in that house, so I could have m-" Mai cut her off.


    "Those are made from the most violent battles?!" Mai raised her voice. "Only two of those stones have been able to form in the last thousand years! Just how violent was your time that you could have more than ten?!"


    "Because I could create them?" Cyril said matter-of-factly. "While, yes there was plenty of battles that would have made them lore wise; I only brought them into existence after the Demon King Raid."


    Mai sighed at that. As expected, she thought of what she would say if she created something of such value and she figured she''d be lost for words.


    ...


    They talked until the sun touched the lake''s surface and the rest of the group awoke. They all came out when they couldn''t find the two and saw they huddled by the lake. Everyone came out smelly and dirty, as they had when they went to bed.


    Cyril had them take a bath, girls first and the guys last.


    Four doors occupied the hallway. The two on the right were to the warehouse and workshop respectively. The two on the left led to another workshop and to a bathing pool.


    The bathroom was cut from the stone, similar to Cyril''s room. Four large pillars rose from each corner of the large steaming pool. Each wall was carved with a scene from nature. One of the flowers, One of a sea, one of a mountain valley, and one of a vast forest. At the head of the pool, a stone unicorn stood. Its tail was pushed to the side and water gushed out its butt. The statue definitely was one of Cyril''s more... childish jokes... One she forgot to remove.


    Once the girls had bathed, the boys changed out with them.


    For food, Mai had caught several large golden salmon that she hadn''t seen the last night. When she brought them back onto the grass, Cyril looked at them with surprise.


    "O... "She muttered. "They''re still here..."


    "You know what these are?" Mai asked. "I didn''t see these last night, but they''re here now. So I figured we''d eat a few."


    "Yeah." Cyril said as she sat on the grass. "They''re Heavenly Salmon. They turn gold after dawn and translucent after dusk. They thrive off mana."


    Priscilla, who had been walking towards them, stopped when she saw the fish. "Are those... Heavenly Salmon...?" Her eyes were wide in shock.


    "Mm." Cyril looked to the fishes again then nodded. "Yup. Only fish that should exist here."


    "You know what these are too?" Mai asked Priscilla.


    "They''re only the rarest breed of fish in the world!" Priscilla yelled as both the girls watch a gleam of greed flash in her eyes. "They can increase the flow of mana the person who eats their meat!"


    "Mm. They should also increase stamina and health as well." Cyril spoke up. "I guess that would be vitality now... I guess stamina would still be correct. " Her thoughts trailed off.


    "H-How do we cook it?" Mai said as she stared nervously at the fish.


    "I heard my father say that the imperial chefs had to infuse mana into the meal before it could be served!" Priscilla said.


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    "No?" Cyril refuted that. "It should cook like normal salmon. Why the hell would you use mana infusion on food?"


    "To cook it better!" Mai said gleefull now they were on a topic she understood. "Similar to smithing higher-end materials, you need to-"


    Her explanation was cut short as she watched Cyril take the fish and begin to cook it in her hands with flames of gold. The girls looked at her in astonishment at her flamboyant usage of magic.


    "Your hand isn''t burning...?" Mai asked nervously.


    "What do you mean?" Cyril asked without looking to her. "Why would spells hurt my hand?"


    "Because of the heat!" Priscilla said as she stared at Cyril''s hands which never showed any signs of burning. "Spells like frost or fire, are dangerous to handle with the bare hand. That''s why we use special wands for those."


    "I''ve reached the highest tier of flame magic. " Cyril commented. "It''s fine."


    No one had the heart to tell it that it wasn''t. Then again, Priscilla wasn''t aware that she was also a Goddess. She viewed her as an angel, but angels could be harmed too. Yet, Cyril had reached the highest pinnacle of a branch of magic... This morning was too much for her.


    Cyril had slightly overcooked the fishes, but it was still delicious. Priscilla warned Cyril to not eat the bones since such a dense concentration of mana could not be consumed directly. It had to be cooked in a soup and it could make ordinary ingredients on par with low-level magical ingredients. The boys came out and joined them for the meal as they were enough for both the boys to eat their fill with how large the fish was.


    Priscilla also jogged Cyril through magic, since she figured things must have changed quite a bit since her time.


    There was a four-step process she told her. Imagination, Knowledge, control, and induction - only for spell casting though.


    "The first step is Knowledge," Priscilla said. "To weave mana into what you desire, you need to know what as much as possible about it. Experience trumps book knowledge, so low-level fire magic is the easiest."


    "The second step is imagination." She added." You have to imagine how your spell is going to come about. Such as a small flame or a shard of ice."


    "The third step is the induction." She continued. " You begin to weave the mana into the spell. You weave your spell with chants or keywords laced with your intent to cast the spell. This also means you have to be aware of mana. " She finished with that last step. " Control is the final step in this crash course. This is where your intent and will come into play. You have to master-"


    A torrent of fire erupted from Cyril''s hand. "That''s a lot of work use for a small fire." She said with a pained face. Priscilla didn''t have the heart to refute her. The fire was at least taller than her if she stood on Cyril''s palm.


    "Ah. I didn''t know angels needed a crash course in magic when they woke up." Randol teased lightly. He was about to compliment Priscilla on her crash course, but a ball of fire burned past him in the time it took to blink and exploded on the lake behind him the water rose nearly forty feet into the air like a geyser. Everyone looked at Cyril, shocked by the sudden force.


    "Oops." Cyril said with a smirk. "I guess might need more practice."


    With that, the meal had ended and Cyril''s situation had given each of them a much-needed respite. Though yesterday''s events weighed on their hearts, it seemed a greater deal lighter now with a few laughs and a meal to warm their bellies.


    The group entered Cyril''s home again before she spoke of her new plans.


    "I''ve decided I want to leave here." Cyril said.


    "I didn''t think you would." Desmond said. "I don''t feel you''d the type to stay hold up somewhere." He shrugged.


    "Mhm, I thought that would have been a given," Mai said.


    "Yup." Priscilla and Randol agreed.


    "Hey!" Cyril groaned "In the stories, the character has to say it!"


    After a good laugh, they ironed the details out as Cyril figured out how to use her inventory ago and then shoved everything that wasn''t nailed down into it. The group had already become numb to it and they helped her clean all her things. Randol and Mai had been given new enchanted steel swords, though she didn''t tell them they were considered trash to her. It made them happy, so she couldn''t just burst that bubble for them. Priscilla received a new robe and an enchanted light steel breastplate. Now she had some sort of protection.


    When she was done, the entire house was empty as the day she created it. She felt a pain in her heart, but she did not know what this journey would bring; She didn''t want to leave something and regret it later. She wasn''t going to return that''s why. As much as she wanted to set fire to home as some sort of symbolic gesture, she figured it would be best to leave it since it had survived this long.


    The group set out across the lake. Cyril, in her own fashion, walked on the lake''s water. When asked how. "Magic!", when asked why "Because I can."; They had their first taste of the goddess''s whimsical nature. Her steps never disturbed the water''s surface as she walked as a brisk pace here and there. The rest of the group suffered through the water, wishing they could use their magic as freely as she did, but she was a divine being. They just accepted it as such.


    She was the first to reach the platform where the portal rested. Half way through, the barrenness of the basin had made her feel depressed. Thus, she chose just to make haste to the portal. It took another ten minutes for the rest to catch up. "Ready?" Randol asked her. She took a final look of the valley before she nodded her head. It was midday when they crossed back into the city.


    They appeared out on the platform center of the lake at the city''s center. The first thing Cyril noticed was the sudden howls of distant monsters. Puffs of smoke rose around the city, none near the city''s main square as there were already a few large monsters dead. The group proceeded with caution, but it looked like a lot of the fighting had taken place in the night. No one, aside from Cyril, wanted to linger in the area any longer. With no signs of their dead fellows, they had even less reason to stay.


    Cyril picked up a few monster bodies and placed them into her inventory when she passed by them. It was the most she could do since the rest were nearly quaking in their boots. They continued with Cyril at their head with Randol as they proceeded down the main road. It had been cleared in the number of battles that must have taken place. More buildings had been torn down. Plant life trampled. Everything was beginning to fall apart.


    In the distance, a spire fell down and urged the less hardy of them to move faster. To their wish, Cyril stopped collecting things and moved faster. The others wished she had a sense of danger like them.


    A few large wyverns glided overhead; their cries stirred. More cries returned. Their guess had been wrong, the battle was going to heat up more. The outer fields of the city had been trampled as well with more bodies strewn about. It was complete chaos. There had even been a few monsters lurking about, but none bothered the seemingly weak group that was leaving the contested area.


    Once they reached the foot of the forest, Cyril looked over at the city. She didn''t know why she had to keep looking back. Maybe the future scared her. The past seemed so comfortable. It was known and treaded. For once in her life, she may have had something to look forward to.


    . . . . . .


    "Noo!" The man howled as he tore at the black mass that made up his lower body. His voice was thick with anger as it echoed through the large brimstone chamber. He could not free himself of the mass, no matter how he tried. His skin was paler than moonlight. Lack of sun had made his skin almost see-through as his black veins pulsed with rage. His glowing red eyes were wide as he roared once more at his inability to break from his cursed body.


    His cries alerted the others around him. Deformed beings that would have been called nightmares came to his side. Demons, Monsters, Evil creatures - Devils. They were the Devils that served him. Their weapons were brandished in the thought that someone had tried to attack their lord, but only found him in a fit on unexplainable rage.


    "My lord!" A Devil, larger than the others, came forward. His skin was black as night with dim red pupils. " Tell me what angers you so!" He pleaded with the man.


    He only received a swipe of the man''s arms in response. He was smaller; His arms shorter, so the swipe only took the empty air with it. The Devil was nearly double the man''s size at fifteen feet tall with large bulging muscles. White painted adorned him in ornate tribal signs that stated he was the leader. A leader who reported to the angered god.


    "Who do you wish killed?!" He bowed before the man. "Please, Your grace! Speak your will!"


    The man eventual calmed down. His face still contorted with anger as he heaved heavily as he dug his claws into the black mass that weaved itself into the floor below him. Its tendrils pushed aside the stones like he was a tree.

 6 A lonelier world

    The main menu''s music looped once more as he stared vacantly at his character, Cyril leaned on him from behind, hugging his avatar, and her head on his shoulder with the sweetest smile. Their characters were married. No, that wasn''t right, he was married to her in the game. Her avatar was her. Not that shriveled husk that could not even let her enjoy the world he lived in. Half of him hoped that if he logged into the game world, she would be there to greet him within seconds. The other half hoped she wouldn''t.


    Reality dictated that he would never find out that possibility, though, he knew she was gone already. The game servers had been deactivated and its access revoked from everyone.


    With a sigh, he looked away from the faded red button that said "Enter World" and the "Log Out" button was reluctantly clicked. He felt disoriented as his consciousness was pulled from the machine. It lasted a split moment before he found himself face to face with the tinted glass shield that kept users from being "Tampered" with while they dove in their games.


    The filtered and conditioned capsule he laid in felt comfortable; more so than his own bed. Maybe it was the hours of diving, or maybe the small confined felt reassuring, but he found it easier to sleep in it than a real bed. At the very least, he reasoned, he couldn''t be stabbed in his sleep.


    He pulled the manual release latch and the locks disengaged, allowing the sleek and futuristic glass piece to rise away from his face. His face cringed as he smelled the pungent scent of sweat and ass chase away the filtered air. He sat up, swung his legs over the capsules edge and came face to face with the dim room. It was awash in a dim cyan color that illuminated portions of clothes, dishes, and a half-open door.


    He clapped his hands three times and the light exploded in the room. He had to blink away the momentary blindness as his eyes adjusted. The room was destroyed as pieces of clothing littered the floor as if they were the rug. Dishes were piled on a desk next to a dusty computer monitor. Letters and bills were thrown into a heap on the floor next to the desk. The only clean spot was the computer chair, where a black suit laid in its plastic armor. He had yet to open it after he picked it up from the dry cleaners the other day. He was not eager to slip into it either.


    The screen blinked away and the shield lowered itself. The near-silent hum of the internal fans died away before the room became quiet, aside from his own heavy breathing. He picked up a small white box from the side table and pulled a new cigarette from inside. He lit it with the lighter on the table and took a long drag to burn away the misery that threatened to overrun him.


    The smoke barreled down his throat and crashed against the bottom of his lungs. He didn''t stop there as he continued to inhale; the cig''s end burned bright against the soft white light as if both were in a competition.


    By the time he finally exhaled, half the cig had turned to ash and fell away onto the clothes below. He let out a bellow of smoke, that made covered the room in a haze. The pungent smell of the room was cashed away with the smell of burning tobacco.


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    His lungs burned and, for a moment, he felt free from his misery as his body shuddered from the fit of coughs. The relief was short, and futile, as in his attempt to escape; they came back worse.


    It had been trying to run from these emotions for months and now it all came rushing out. So much had happened in such a short amount of time. He couldn''t process it all, he was not as strong as Cyril. O, how he wished he was...


    . . . .


    He spat tar laced spit into the bathroom sink. His eyes were puffy and his eyes bloodshot from the tears. He cleared his throat, which turned into another coughing fit. He looked up into the mirror and glared at his sorry state.


    "What the fuck are you doing, Jax...?" He asked himself. "Do you think they want you like this?"


    Of course, the answer would always be a resounding no. Yet, he could not help but run to drinking. Run to smoking. Run to destruction.


    Cyril had been the catalyst that anchored him to sanity. He knew he had become too depended on her. He tried to run from it, but... She was the drug he could never stop taking. Now she was gone and the withdrawal of her from his life had finally sent him spiraling into this pitiful state. His once handsome tanned face had become slightly pale with a bushy beard. His once bulging muscles had faded away in the last few months; He had prioritized spending Cyril''s last days with her.


    His social life had left him. His job... Well, Cyril''s father gave him money. Yet, after everything laid in ruins around him - He didn''t regret any of it.


    He exited the bathroom in only his food-stained shorts, out of his room, and into his dimly lit apartment. He came face to face with Edward, as if the old saying "Speak of the devil and the devil shall appear." He sat facing the large screen TV, though, it was off. From his spot, he only saw the man''s right side.


    "Sober?" Edward asked.


    "Hung over." Jax replied.


    "So long as you''re functioning, I won''t complain." Edward sighed.


    Jax noted that the living room was strangely clean and smelled of spring. He felt he may have jumped forward in time, but he felt relieved when he looked out his sliding door to Edward''s book. There was a blizzard.


    "Since when did you clean?" Jax asked in a half-serious, half-joking, manner.


    "I had a company come in." Edward answered. "If you spent less looking at your character screen and more in the real world, you would have noticed the bustle."


    Jax felt a hint of anger at his remark, but he bit it back. Today was not the day to get in another fight. Especially not today. Edward was already in his suit and he looked to have aged a hundred more years.


    No... Today is the day... I''ll behave... Jax told himself as he walked into the kitchen and fetched a bottle of water before he made his way back to his room.


    "I''ll be ready in a few minutes." He said in passing.


    . . . . . . .


    After the two had set everything, Jax found himself enjoying the snowfall as he smoked another cigarette. Snowflakes clung to his slick gelled back hair. Edward had made a quick stop to have Jax made presentable at the Saint Seraphim''s Cathedral in the wealthy part of town. Jax''s eyes never left the parking lot where the cathedral''s steps ended.


    His eyes burned with a mixture of emotions that he couldn''t put into words, so in his fashion; he tried to burn them at the stake that was a cig. It never worked. It never had. It never stopped him from hoping it would. Just like the drinks never numbed his pain. He wondered why he continued this cycle, but his thoughts were interrupted by the sudden arrival of cars that began to pour into the vacant lot.


    BMWs, Lexuses, Porches, Infinities, and a bunch of other brand name cars from out of the country. It fact, it was his old beat-up Toyota that now looked out of place in the sea of white that housed the fleet of luxury. Like a tug boat sailing between tens of yachts. It was even noticed by the newcomers. Most only glanced at it, but a few man poor jokes about the car. However, in this situation, he found it funny as well.


    What the fuck am I even doing here... He asked himself. His only reason to be here was the Bailey family; but so were they though.


    The attendees filed in past him, and he didn''t receive the usual disgusted stares his previous look would have elicited. For nearly twenty minutes, he watched the folk shuffle as he lit a cig in his right hand. He took a drag of the cancer stick and exhaled it in a slow deliberate manner as the smoke made him feel warm inside. The attendees had become sparse with a few stragglers who arrived late as a man in white extravagance robes approached him from the cathedral.


    "It''s nice to see you again, Brother Jax." The man said, his wrinkled face plastered a smile that almost felt patronizing to Jax. "But I was hoping it would have been a happier circumstance."


    "And this isn''t?" Jax spat back at the man.


    "I would say a funeral is not a very happy event." The man said. "But should you need someone to talk too, someone is always available. Brother Edward has already made sure that we are available to you by phone should you need us." The man''s voice was soothing and soft, and it bothered Jax.


    "Tsk." Jax stuck the butt of the cigarette into his mouth as he turned to him. His glared at the man, but the man kept his peaceful expression. The staredown ended when Jax had decided it would not have been appropriate or even smart, to blow his smoke in the man''s face. So, he turned his head and exhaled a large sideways mushroom.


    "I''ll keep that in mind, Cardinal." Jax hissed.


    "Grieving for loved ones is always hard." The Cardinal said. "I understand you are going through a very unpleasant time. It won''t be easy, but time and God will heal your heart. The church can offer you solace from your pain should you need a place to rest your heavy heart."


    "I have my solace right here." Jax held up the short cigarette that was an inch away from reaching the orange section.


    "Those will take you to our Lord much sooner than you should." The Cardinal commented. "You should at least limit your consumption of them."


    Before Jax could retort, music began to play inside the church. The Cardinal turned from Jax and took his leave with a small goodbye. The outside world was bright, desolate and lonely now. The storm had done quick work to remove all traces of the large crowd that had passed by. The snow had already perched itself on his shoulders and head, but he hadn''t bothered with them. With one more look at the winter sky, he finally went in just as the Cardinal took the stand.

 7 Faith, lies, and the politics

    His silvery eyes stared intensely to the north-east, where the sudden wave of golden mana had come from. Anticipation, fear, and curiosity filled his heart like never before. That was the real feeling of Divinity, the power he desired most. It had lasted for a moment, but he felt it. Just as everything else in the world had felt. A wind of change that all felt.


    He could feel it. The world was calling to her. He could feel the world beckon to her like a babe to its mother.


    Maybe... Maybe I could- His thoughts were interrupted by an agonizing plea from behind him. He turned from the large open balcony he had been staring out of, only to turn to a large extravagant room filled. It was plain in his eyes with four walls with large double doors on the north, east, and west side respectively. The south was the stairwell that went down his tower.


    The room was illuminated by the rising sun and all the doors had been opened to allow the fresh morning air to ventilate the smell of blood.


    On the red polished floorboards knelt a naked and bloodied old man. He seemed a frail thing that would have never survived the beating, but he did. A resilient rat in his eyes. He only managed to stay knelt by way of his two hands that propped his upper body up. Blood pooled around him and Alistar half-heartedly praised him in his heart for his tenacity.


    "Your... Your holiest..." The man groaned weakly. "I... I have fulfilled my penance..."


    "It was not a penance." He replied, his deep voice held disappointment. "The Judicator had to issue your punishment. If not for the threat of death and my will, you would have just brushed it aside like your other transgressions."


    "L-Lord Alistar!" Disbelief perked the man as he tried to raise his head. The Judicator was quick to tap his head with the hilt of the whip and a warning.


    "Pope Reef." Alistar said. "Do not think that because I do not intervene immediately; That I do not know what you have been up to. You are not the only one who whispers in my ear."


    He did not answer, but Alistar noted that he may just be finally half in the grave. For all this man had done to ruin his plans, he wanted to dispose of him. Luckily for this rat, Alistar wanted to honor his own promises. Should the man have done so too, he would not have been here.


    "Your sins have been forgiven." Alistar said. He wanted this man dead, or out of his sight. Either would appease him. He would never have power again though.


    "Y-Yes..." Reef said before he motioned to the Judicator. "Help me." The Judicator did not move. "Help me! I am the pope and-"


    The man wept, a few tears dripped into the pool of blood and Alistar felt even more disgusted. This was the man that had raped children and women, embezzled thousands of gold coins, and even had his adversaries murdered under the guise of witch hunts. Yet, he dared to weep in front of him after all this?


    "If you cannot leave on your own power..." Alistar looked to the burly Judicator who wore nothing by leather boots, thick black pants, and the steel helm of the Order of Judgement. "Our Judicator here will see if you can fly."


    The sudden threat of death spurred the man, though weakly, he did manage to get to his feet. Though, it was an agonizing feat for the injured man. He paid no more respect to Alistar, there was fear and anger in his eyes. He also knew that this man never really believed in him, but he had been useful in his youth. It was just unfortunate that he did not age wisely, or he could have had a pleasant retirement, with a few blind eyes to his... tastes.


    But he grew bold and arrogant. He was not a man of faith, but of his own desires. Yet, he failed to see that Alistar would never let a man like him go unsupervised. He even cleaned up after him because he was such an important figure. However, the man managed to pick the wrong woman to ****. Even Alistar had to intervene with his "Divine punishment".


    If he walked away now, he would die later. Very painfully. O'' so painfully. If he failed, he would get to make a public show of force; one that would show his believers that he was not idle.


    And the world smiled upon him.


    The old man fell to the floor with a loud thud as his legs gave way. He tried to crawl, but he had not the strength to do it. His nails only clawed at the floorboards. No one else occupied the room, yet he still pleaded for help. A dangerous smile bloomed on Alistar''s lips as he motioned for the Judicator to bring him. The man wailed like a dying pig as the man dragged him by his foot to the terrace he had been looking out from earlier.


    The man cursed as he wailed. He damned Alistair, he damned the church, and he damned everyone in the world. It wasn''t until he mentioned a certain someone that Alistar finally intervened.


    "Cyril will kill you!" He wailed. "We all know that was her earlier! You-"


    "And?" Alistair stepped in. "Her and I have no qualms or reason to fight. We''ve never met nor clashed."


    "B-But!" He managed to look up as the Judicator turned him over. "The book!"


    "Tsk." Alistar grimaced at the mention of the Sun Church''s bible. "You believe those little birds? I thought you were not a man on faith."


    Reef only stared at him in confusion.


    "Most of what''s in that book is a lie." Alistar admitted. "Your previous Popes have been tweaking the truth to the point that no one ever knew the truth. Did you know it use to only be a small list of things on a single paper? Now it''s over three hundred pages. Not even I know what they''ve been putting in it." He huffed in contempt; the smile replaced with a sneer.


    The ex-pope could only resign himself to the fate he had brought onto himself now. Now he had the knowledge that he was not even aware of the truth, but he had also been played with by this god. He was never a man of faith, but he did like that he served under such an accomplished god, but if the book was not true...


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    He never got to finish those words as the sprawling capital spun into view. It was like he was looking into the reflection in the lake... It was beautiful.


    Screams followed afterward as servants watched the man splatter on the flagstones, tens of floors below. It was only after the Knights saw Alistar''s figure on the top floor of the Sun Tower did they make quick work to calm the grounds.


    Both men looked over the railing before the Judicator looked to his god. He knew he had to die, or his god would never be at ease. As if to confirm, Alistar turned to stare back.


    "You know what has to happen now, right?" Alistar asked.


    "That I am to die with your secrets?" He asked.


    "Yes, my smart Judicator." Alistar had a hint of sorrow in his voice.


    "I understand." The judicator asked without hesitation. "Shall I jump as well?"


    "No, no." Alistar said as he parted from the railing. "Come and kneel. I shall end it painless and quick."


    The judicator nodded, pleased that he would at least not suffer for having to bear witness to that conversation. He praised his god in his heart for his mercy. He knelt just inside the room; Alistar''s hands caressed his head from behind, and the Judicator closed his eyes - ready for his life to end.


    "Is there anything you would like to know?" Alistar asked, pained he would have to lose such a faithful man, but secrets can only be kept between two when one was dead.


    "Are you really a god?" The Judicator asked. It had been a question the filled his heart once he heard about the bible''s falsehood.


    "Yes." Alistar said. "But not by design and not truly. I am this way by the power of millions of people believing in me. The power of faith has can elevate someone into pseudo godhood. A real god does not need the help of others to be a god, but I can only stay powerful so long as others believe I am a god. Satisfied?"


    "Yes." he replied, peace in his heart and voice. "I am ready to be sent to heaven, My Lord. I have served you to my final moments and I am glad to have been given eternal peace."


    Once he finished his words, his neck was jerked violently as Alistar snapped his neck and crushed his head in one go. It was quicker than one could blink, so the man would not suffer needlessly. A man who could carry out his duties without the threat of violence was a man Alistar could respect. It was just unfortunate he had a moment of bad judgment. He was still a flawed human after all.


    "Sadly, my faithful one, there is no heaven that I know of..." He said as he lowered the body gently to the floor.

 8 Kiss of Violence

    An orb of light struggled to keep pace with the raven-haired girl. Her disheveled hair trailed after her as she ran with all her might. The brick walls at her side kept her from evading the danger that lurked in the dark behind; shimmers of slimy tendrils that hovered on the edge of the darkness, almost teasingly. Bloodstained the walls around her and the remains of her fellow students lined the floor - Their faces staring accusingly at her as she passed.


    Why are you alive...?


    You abandoned us...


    Little whore...


    Their ethereal voices lashed out as she passed. No matter how fast she ran, they still came back. Over and over. She ran for what seemed like miles, but their faces still appeared from out of the darkness, still against the walls. Still accusing her of their untimely demise.


    Her legs burned from the effort to escape this narrow hell. Her lungs felt like thousands of daggers were pricking at her, and just when she thought she could slow, a tendril would nip at her heels to spur her onward. Minutes? Hours? Days?


    She did not know. There was only darkness as she tried to call for help. Tried to call for her Prince in shining armor, Randol. He was the prince of her dreams, but he was nowhere to be seen. A logical thought would be that he was safe and sound because only the dead were haunting her. Only the dead accused her. Only the dead came to retrieve her.


    Her heartbeat was a chaotic martial drum on course into battle, but her mind screamed for her to flee. So flee she did. Yet, the tendrils and the dead still chased her. Just when she was about to lose hope, just when she thought she could no longer run, the stone floor gave way to dirt. Now, darkness and trees.


    Now, the tendrils were everywhere.


    She didn''t stop, and she noticed that it was not in fact tendrils but thin trees, that rose all around her. The moment she thought she was done, a tendril slashed at her feet behind her. That was enough motivation for her to take flight through this lightless forest. As she ran, the shadows danced around the trees. She felt some respite that the dead was no longer here, and she only had to contend with the black tendrils that slithered eerily behind her.


    That was her mistake, believing that the nightmare was fading...


    Now, the bodies hung upside down, supported from the unseen branches above. None of them impeded her flight, but they all hung at eye level. So, she could the friends she had forsaken. Each one had their chests had been ripped open, their entrails spilling out, and their arms dangled lifelessly; Each face frozen in a mute scream.


    She slowly rotated end over end. The first rotation, nothing had been above her. Just a mass of darkness. She noticed the light dim just as she turned away.


    On the next rotation - The bloodied face of her best friend, Serina. Her eyes dull and her mouth opened, and a tendril flew at her and -


    Priscilla screamed, her voice shrill and full of fear. Hot salty tears streamed from her eyes as she tried to find the tendrils, tried to find the dead, but nothing was there. Nothing but two golden suns in the darkness. Two suns that looked and... and her friend''s dead face overlapped with it...


    The darkness was suddenly chased away, light exploded around her, and the Serina''s dead face evaporated along with the dark. In her place was the most beautiful woman she had even seen. Her fair complexion was framed with her pretty snowy hair. The molten drops of gold were Cyril''s eyes, filled with nothing. Her expression was blank as if she wasn''t actually staring at her but through her. Her feline eyes were narrowed, her pupils a faint black vertical line.


    "What happened?!" Randol''s voice pulled her from her little world.


    She had now noticed that everyone had their weapons drawn, yet, all of them looked at her in confusion... and fear. She stammered, unsure of what to say. A nightmare? Randol looked at her, his face pale and sunken. Black rings framed his eyes and he looked pitifully tired.


    "Nightmare." A soft voice that seemed to smother the flames that had been lit in Randol.


    Priscilla felt her body drop an inch from the ground. She had just registered that Randol had held her up by her right arm when he asked that. She finally felt the pain from his vice tight grip. She looked to where he had held her. Thick red marks burned brightly in the white magical light.


    She didn''t know how to react; she didn''t know what to say until she felt a soft hand rubbed her back. She looked up and found Cyril knelt by her. Everyone else had backed away and started sheathing their weapons, but still, they all glared at her.


    "Do you feel better now?" Cyril asked as if she was trying to soothe a newborn.


    Now when she looked into her eyes, she felt safe. She felt like this woman could have been her own mother. She felt Cyril''s arms embrace her now as her eyes welled with tears before they finally spilled over. Priscilla wailed into Cyril''s arms before she spoke of the nightmare, albeit, in broken sniffled words. The light dimmed around her, and for a moment, she felt that she had returned to her nightmare. When she looked up, she found two large white wings surrounding her.


    "They can''t hurt you now." Cyril said with a smile and motherly eyes."Bad, bad things; Go away. Never to come back another day." In singsong, she said those words.


    The others no longer disturbed them, though, Randol felt a little unsettled. Now that the adrenaline had left him, the memories of his own nightmare returned. He felt bad for his outburst and just tried to keep himself level headed, despite his fatigued state. He looked to the couple next to him and saw that they too had looked worse for wear.


    He looked over into the forest, a few large trees were illuminated around them. They had stopped for the night in a small glade. The forest itself was pitch black, maybe it was because it was a moonless night, or maybe the canopy was just too dense. Nothing changed that none of them could see. At least, none of the mortals in the group. Cyril was the only one who could see perfectly fine. That didn''t help them transverse the heavy forest terrain.


    Randol quickly turned his head from the darkness. Things he didn''t wish to see. Things he would keep buried in his heart. They were not here, but he didn''t wish to see them. He felt happy that he did look away. He saw his brother and his lover cuddle up to the angel for comfort. They too must have seen what waited for them in the darkness of the hellish night. He felt a smile... Happy that their pride didn''t prevent them from seeking comfort when they could...


    He didn''t let his eyes wander from the light no longer.


    . . . . . . . . . . . . .


    Dawn had come.


    A few of its broke through the dense canopy. All of them had taken to slumber around the angel. Her wings had been their small heaven for the rest of the early morning. The nightmares never returned, but only dreamless sleep. Randol felt uncomfortable with cuddling up to the Angel, though, he slept just behind her. Security was the excuse. He had nightmares for a while, of the dead. Of his regrets... Of the Ruins... Then darkness took him in an ironic respite.


    When he woke up, Cyril''s back was pressed against his chest. She smelled of summer, warm and refreshing against the winter morning. She felt... small against his broadness. She was smaller than him by nearly two heads, but she felt like a titan at that moment. He didn''t feel repulsed by her touch, only comfort. Not in a sexual way, rather, like when one had entered their home. When you knew you were safe from danger and the outside world.


    Yes, she felt like... Home.


    The group trekked with renewed vigor. No one looked horrid as they had a few hours of safe sleep in them. Priscilla now clung to Cyril''s arm. It finally made it home to everyone how much younger she was than all of them. At the age of thirteen, she shouldn''t have been allowed on this expedition. She probably would not have come if Randol hadn''t either. Despite all that, she was here, and she was very scared.


    Desmond knew what it was like and he had seen it plenty of times with the younger students. They knew that it could be dangerous, but as nobles, they never really understood the danger. What it meant; what it felt like. Now the poor girl understood it. She very much knew how it felt like. She knew death, and death knew her.


    She had broken into a sobbing mess when Cyril tried to separate from her. Unfortunately for them, Priscilla had also wet herself after the nightmare. Everyone besides Randol had to bath. The poor young girl was fraught with embarrassment, though Cyril didn''t mind, the vixen in the group kept her distance as Desmond cast a few cleansing spells. It didn''t replace the need to wash, but it removed most of the smell and... liquid.


    As of now, the group had found their original path after some time. With Cyril around, most of the monsters seemed all too willing to walk away, especially at the sight of her wings. The sudden lack of constant security allowed Randol to finally relax and decided to ask Cyril about earlier.


    "So..." He said, trying to formulate what he wanted to say. "Those nightmares-"


    "A curse." Cyril cut him off.


    "All of us?" He asked.


    "Yes." She said.


    The conversation wasn''t... A conversation. He was hoping to get more information, but she seemed more interested in the girl that clung to her. For a moment, he wondered if it was sexual in nature, or if it was just a casual interest. He did not mind either, in fact, if would be good if she had a love interest in the girl so the angel would stay in their empire. The pres-


    He stopped his thoughts. That was unbecoming of him. He shook his head and reprimanded himself for thinking like his father. Cyril was not some pawn, not a merchant, or a powerful individual. Well, she was that last part, but she was a divine being. Something above them. Someone that walked without being bound to borders to others - He should not think of her as he would another mortal.


    "How do you know?" He asked.


    Normally, he would converse with someone. If he found that they could be a benefit to him, he''d try and bring them into his faction. It was out of habit, something ingrained in him since he was young. Something Desmond never learned, thankfully.


    "The static." Cyril said.


    She pointed, without Priscilla seeing it, into the darkness of the forest. While the sunlight had broken through the canopy, it had not done so with much success. Most of the forest remained in large inky patches. They could proceed with enough light not to fall into a hole, but they still had to tread very carefully.


    Randol looked to where she pointed and saw a ghastly face. Blood covered them and he noted it was one of his personal knights that had died in the ruins. He felt cold inside, he felt guilt and fear as well. Before the feeling could take hold of him, the face faded away into the darkness. Something that hadn''t happened before.


    "What-"


    "It took me a few hours. "She cut Randol off again. "But I figured out how to deal with them, well more like I remembered. Curses were something that happened at low..."


    Cyril went off on a tangent about levels, skills, and something... Yes, Early game. He didn''t understand much of what she was saying. He, however, understood that there were several levels of curses. This he was aware of, but someone of Cyril''s level, they were just groups of small black and white dots. She could see where the curse was materializing.


    She also said this meant it was not a mental curse, as a mental curse would just have the static around the target''s head. It was an Area of Effect spell. She figured it''d wear away eventually. She also ordered to just have everyone keep their eyes forward where she could dispel the effects. Something she had learned to do while they slept.


    Randol couldn''t help himself though. Knowing that he was cursed, curiosity and pride welled in him. Logically, he knew he should listen to her and he''d be okay. Yet, the prideful part of him wanted to define it. It told him he was not some babe to soothe. He was a warrior, a killer; a prince.


    Yet, after an hour of seeing the dead all around them. Some moving in the distance, some no more than a few feet from his sides - his pride crumbled.


    Thus, they went on in silence as Cyril dispelled anything in her sight. She kept Priscilla''s young curiosity from peeking in any direction but forward. It wasn''t hard, after the first ten minutes of her becoming petrified by the apparitions in the distance. Afterward, she had become quite the docile child. It also stroked something in Cyril, a desire she could never have fulfilled before. Something that hurt her heart.


    . . . . .


    Smoke obscured the sun like a thin veil as they approached the burnt Northern Keep.


    Built into a large mountain at the end of a half-mile manicured stretch of field, it was attached to a large stone curtain that crossed to the east, over a large river, and to a mountain. Both of the mountains were steep and created the perfect chokepoint for the empire''s Northern Keep to stem the tide of monsters from entering the nation on its northernmost point.


    Yet, it was this very same keep that had been blacked and plagued with fires around on some of the turrets. Parts of the wall missed large chunks at the top, but for the most part, it had stood whatever attacked them.


    A born blew from somewhere in the Keep and Cyril saw a small blackened part by the last tower by the wall part. It was a gate. A large group of battered soldiers and stepped out with spears.


    "Who comes!?" One of them yelled out.


    He was dressed in armor that Randol recognized as one of his own knights that he had left at the fort to ensure safe passage.


    "The First Prince, Randol, of the Dragon Empire!" Randol yelled back.


    The soldiers relaxed until they finally reached the gate at the foot of the keep.


    "Where is the rest of your group?" The knight asked in confusion. "Did the Dragon get them too?"


    "No." Randol said, with a more regal demeanor than when he spoke to the others. " The ruins were a death trap. We lost most of them, but we-"


    He wanted to say they had brought back an angel, but Cyril''s wings were no longer there. For a moment, he thought he may have dreamed up that the girl had them. Until she winked at him. Cyril didn''t want to show them off. Was it not customary to hide when in a new world? It was actually customary to just hide in general. These three knew what she was, thus she could not hide from them. She could hide from these people though.


    "- We''ve gained but a few treasures." He quickly changed his words.


    "Forgive us." The man bowed. "It has been a time of sorrow indeed. Come in, My Lords; I shall fill you in on the happenings here."


    . . . . . . . . . .


    The presence was gone...


    Good.


    Rynnaid, Lord of Southern Skies; Guardian of the South Forest of Angels, had been spooked by the presence that had appeared in the night. It felt like a God, but much more powerful. He was sure the Humans could not feel it, but they were heathens that deserved death.


    Yes... Those unholy pests... Defiling the Holy Lands... He thought.


    He had sensed that humans had crossed through the lands and he had failed to sense them until they had long passed his territory.


    They would pay for their transgressions. He, who has lived many moons, would not allow this to go on challenged. He knew of their fancy stone Keep on the southern end of his land, but he could not touch them without being provocative.


    Yes... The rules of Engagement must be always kept... He thought.


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    All the Guardians knew of these rules. Given to them by the Goddess of Light, long gone from these lands. He had only known their Goddess for but a few moons before she perished at the hands of that unholy Demi-god. That was when he had been a hatchling and he had been given this land.


    Yes... They hurt our goddess. Killed her... Taken her... Now is the time for retribution. He gleefully thought.


    His forked tongue tasted the air, tasted the death that hung in it as he flew silently in the cloudless sky.


    Rule one, monsters should not be attacked, unless for food. Rule two, all sentient beings are to be killed once found. Rule three, to not attack those who leave my land. Rule four, should they transgress you, only then may you strike those on your border if you feel they will do such again...He recited the rules in his head.


    Yes. Rule Four was his reason. He knew humans would take this small victory and do such again. He had watched them spread like a disease across the southern lands and watched many forests disappear. He had seen the fall of many nations and the rise of new ones. He knew... They would have to feel his wraith for this transgression. The transgression of crossing his lands.


    And he would do so with immense pleasure. Kill the ones who killed his patron. Kill the bugs that greedily eyed the Forests of Angels.


    Kill.


    Kill.


    Kill.


    Rynnaid bellowed his war cry. As lord of the southern forest, he could assemble all those who lived in his boundaries. Rynnaid believed himself of those stupid guardians elsewhere. He was smart enough to contact all those who wished to live in his lands. Aside from giving him tribute, they would also fight when he called, or face decimation once whatever crisis had been dealt with.


    All of them assembled in the forest below. As a Greater Dragon, he had an amazing memory, far beyond the likes of those lesser races. He remembered all those who have taken his blessing. Only a few groups who thought they could escape his call to arms had not arrived. He could sense them leaving his western border, he would not deal with them now. Doisicrurth was not as smart as him and would eat them all. Griffins were stupid, lesser races, and did not need the respect of beings such as him.


    He flew lower, appearing below the cloud cover as the sun reached its zenith. As a Dragon of Flames, it made him feel good. He did not like the night as the sunlight was not there to warm his scales. His volcano was further north. Rynnaid snarled with pleasure as he looked over the burnt fortress off in the distance. He felt powerful now, not that the sun had an effect on him. Using magic made him feel... slow. The sun, however, made him feel great. Now that he was warm, he would bring down divine wrath upon those.


    The Goblin war-drums beat, the howls of wolves rose, and the march of trolls began. The monsters began to move at his call, careful not to ruin the trees, but Rynnaid wasn''t worried about the thickets and other small plants. All of them had value, but in this conquest, so long as no human ever came back - he didn''t care.


    He flew past the march, over the unnatural field, and flew over the charred keep. He rammed the tower had he weakened earlier. He felt the force like he rammed into a mountain. The feeling lasted for a split second as the tower gave way to him and he flew past. His chest hurt and most likely would be tender later. He had to destroy them. Destroy everything.


    He circled around the keep as more of the human contraptions took aim at him from the other towers. Wooden poles tipped in iron flew at him and missed. It was not until one of the projectiles had grazed the underside of his tail did he understood... These were an actual threat and they needed to burn.


    It wasn''t until one grazed the bottom of his tail did, he understand... Those had to burn. His tail had been defiled and they would pay.


    He had planned to circle around back to the forest, but he changed his mind. He dove low. The machines went out of view and thus, they could not fire at him. He nearly grazed the ground until himself and smashed into the tower that had attacked him. The tower crumbled into thousands of stones in light of his impressive weight. He could now hear the cries of those pests below as they scattered from his sight.


    He did not bother with them and instead chose to attack the opposite tower.


    He inhaled air through his nostrils, felt his chest bulge, and added his mana; he willed the fire to come forth. He unleashed a torrent of fire onto the tower and it disappeared in a flowing mass of reds and oranges. A wooden pole cut through the fire, whistled through the half a hundred-yard distance, and struck his shoulder. He bellowed in rage and pain as he reeled backward. He stayed on his perch, the remains of the tower he had knocked over, and glared at the tower that crumbled under the might of his flames.


    He turned to the next tower as the humans began to turn it towards him. They didn''t live long as he coiled back, sprung forward, and the tower crumbled under his weight as he grabbed one of the two humans with his jaws. With the man''s lower body half hanging from his jaws, he finished crushed the man in two before he tossed his into the field in front of the forest. The man was still alive as he flew through the air, his entrails flying after him like lose pieces of rope.


    He roared once more, a call to arms now that the insufferable human machines had all been destroyed. In the distance, the tree line came to life as hundreds of goblins, wolves, trolls, and kobolds stepped out into the open and began their charge.

 9 Kiss of Violence 2

    Priscilla''s chest burned with pain above her heart, but her eyes were locked on the goblin that had stabbed her. Its dilated pupils locked on hers. Its carrot-like nose and comically long ears... And its wicked smile. Time seemed to halt as the goblin pressed the dagger into her heart. The world silent. Her only thought was that in her final moments, she would die with the goblins pungent scent filling her nose. Its child-like body nearly half her height, scrawny, yet filled with wicked intent and death...


    She felt... confused.


    Is this how I die? In some backwater keep by a goblin...? At that moment, tens of thoughts flowed through her. Like how goblins were known to **** the girls they captured, wounded, and or killed in massive orgies. If you were alive while they raped you, you would wish they had killed you in the beginning.


    Death before dishonor... Death before dis- She tried to think the mantra.


    The mantra any noble girl was though, to fight before being defiled. Yet, she couldn''t move. Only watch this moment stuck in time - until the goblin''s head disappeared; replaced by a few squirts of blood. She felt the blood splatter across her face, but the only reaction she gave was a flinch with each new squirt.


    She felt the world swing back into motion as she was heaved up forcefully by her left arm.


    "Get up!" Cyril''s voice was the first sound in her world. " You hurt?"


    Cyril ran her hand across her chest, over her breasts, and down her stomach. She found nothing and nodded.


    Then the roar of clashing steel, roar of men and monsters, and the shrill screams of the dying rushed her. The smell of goblin was quickly replaced by the stifling air of the audience hall, which was neither better nor worse than the smell of goblin. Priscilla only gaped at Cyril as she smiled at her. Her sun drop eyes glowed in the dim hall, and she could see the mirth in those eyes.


    Was she... Having fun...? She thought in horror.


    Yet, regardless of how the immortal felt, she looked like a titan in that moment. They both were the same height - Five and a half feet tall - but she felt small compared to her. She saw the speckles of blood that spotted her face. One drop was just a hair on the left corner of her lip. Priscilla thought that the Angel was about to like it too.


    But she didn''t.


    Cyril only turned and Priscilla saw the thin line of defense made up of the battered human soldiers. They were only a two-man deep line that was being inched back as more kobolds filled in the twenty-foot wide by thirty-foot long hall. Goblins climbed up the lizardmen and flung themselves over the defense line or at the line itself. Priscilla had been unlucky and she was attacked by a goblin just as the men were establishing their line.


    Cyril pulled Priscilla behind her as another wave of goblins tried to pull the same trick again and this time, a few fireballs joined the fray from Desmond. Still, the line had been pushed back to the last ten feet.


    "It''s open!" Mai called out.


    Priscilla looked to the left and saw the iron braced wooden door that had sealed them in the hall. Cyril was the first to react and went through the door, pulling the young teen behind her. They entered a stairwell and found there was another person at the top. A soldier.


    "This way!" His voice echoed between the stonewalls. "The damn noble has another entrance on the wall!"


    He disappeared through the door at the top of the dark stairs. Cyril chased after him, followed by Desmond and Mai. Then the servants came, quickly followed by a few soldiers and a mass of murder hungry monsters.


    "They got a troll!" One of the soldiers cried out just as the stairwell exploded just as Mai reached the top. Dust billowed out of the doorway as a few coughing soldiers and servants made it through.


    "They''ve destroyed the stairs!" A large older lady cried out.


    She wore a simple faded green dress with a green bloodied apron over it. She had a spear that had broken just below where the head would have been, but it still dripped with blood. A testament to the lethality of the weapon. Just as soon as she called out though, the sound of shuffling bricks pained their ears and the laughter of a troll reached them.


    One of the soldiers looked into the staircase but then tried to quickly shut the door. Only, a large fist the size of the man''s head punched the door off its hinges. The door flew, splintered and split in half along with the man, across the room. The debris took out a few servants and killed the unlucky lady that had called out.


    Whatever shock that had gripped Priscilla had finally broken and she screamed.


    ? ? ?


    Rynnaid had been pleased with the first half-hour of the monster army''s assault on the keep. They had followed his superb orders to focus on the gates. Within fifteen minutes or so, they had ripped it open with the help of ten trolls. Most died in the process, along with the lesser monsters, but Rynnaid had expected to lose a few grunts to take the gate.


    What he had not expected, was the slow process of claiming the rest of the castle. He snarled at their incompetence. None of the monsters were had even thought to go over the wall! He glared down at them, aura pressed down over them, and the monsters were almost killing each other to get within the keep. It would have been comical to the dragon had he not felt his honor trampled upon by their stupidity.


    "This is why they''re beneath me." He growled to himself. "They cannot even think for themselves."


    What the dragon had failed to understand, he never told them what they were attacking. The lesser monsters only knew once they had charged down the slope to see the keep. The only order was to "Attack their gates and kill all the humans. Claim their walls."


    Regardless, the dragon looked over the siege from the luxurious view of the eastern mountain summit. His large body was the length of a Boeing 767, and large - girth wise.


    He contemplated intervening since it was taking too long. With thousands of monsters down there, the keep should have fallen.


    "I should just smash it." He growled and a small puff of smoke leaked out.


    Just as the words left his maw, part of the wall above the outer bailey exploded; as a troll arm punched through it. Its fist clenched with a human in its bloodied grasp. The dragon smiled at that, but the smile quickly cramped up as the arm slid out the hole, severed. It was a cleanly cut as blood a large trail of blood was left in its wake.


    "Hmm..." He contemplated. "Maybe... One of the piglets might be able to entertain me."


    The troll who had lost its arm bellowed in pain that managed to momentarily stop the flow of monsters. All the monsters below froze at the sound, unsure of what to do. Rynnaid let out a mighty roar, ordering them to continue or die. Thus, the monsters quickly continued their scramble to take the keep and its walls.


    The dragon kept his eyes on the battlements for someone who looked powerful, only to see a gaggle of girls burst out of the door near the hole. The first one was a beast girl, then a black hair child followed by a white hair -


    His heart skipped a beat for a moment.


    The sight of the girl sent a chill through him, a deep-seated primal fear at the sight of the girl. He had the intense urge to fly and never be seen again, but he couldn''t. His pride fought back.


    Just mere mortals! He raged inside his heart, attempting to calm himself.


    Yet he couldn''t. His heart raced and he felt slightly weak. Rage overpowered the fear, and he leaped from his perch to kill the human that made him feel that way.


    ? ? ?


    Cyril didn''t feel that. She had already accepted that this was her new reality. Maybe it was a dream, maybe she was in hell. Maybe... Maybe... She didn''t care. She finally had the power to fight against death, dream or not.


    She watched the troll slide down the broken staircase, his blood pooled on the floor between the bricks and quickly tainted with dust. None of the soldiers from below had survived, and the few servants that had made it up were terribly wounded. She was about to go back down the stairs when Priscilla stopped her and pulled her away.


    She turned to the back just in time to see Mai spartan kick a door open.


    "We have to go!" The young teen cried out as she tugged the goddess with her.


    The sight of the terrified girl was enough to make Cyril abandon the idea of rejoining the fray below. She followed after her and the group stalled at the base of a broken tower.


    "Which way!?" Desmond asked Mai


    "I don''t know!" She yelled at him in duress. "The man who was leading us was just killed by that fucking Troll!"


    The two argued, but Cyril was quick to turn her attention to the sudden dragon''s roar. It was loud, but only if you weren''t in the thick of battle. The battlements were filled with screaming men, soldiers, and monsters that poured through other openings on the wall around the inner bailey. A lot of goblins were actually climbing the catwalk that lined the other bailey, much to the defender''s fear.


    The child-sized monsters smelled horrid and their looks fared little better. Their little goat eyes made Cyril cringe when she first saw them, but they were designed that way. She contemplated the fact that there were cute goblins in the world, just unhappy these weren''t those goblins. Her mind was ripped away as a goblin spear cut the air by her hair. To her, it was slow and she sidestepped it with a scowl. She was about to return the favor with a fireball, but Priscilla pulled her away.


    "It''s dangerous!" She cried out.


    Cyril turned to let the teen pull her away to return to the group as they followed the wall towards the cliff face in hopes that the other entrance would be there, and unenchanted like the one below.


    But the dragon did not want them to escape.


    Another roar, much, much louder one; broke the fierce battle. When Cyril turned, she saw the dragon gliding down - towards them.


    ? ? ?


    Rynnaid soared over the long wall that the humans thought would separate the forest from their pitiful lands; ready to bring retribution upon the filth for their transgression. The transgression to disturb his heart, the insult to his honor and pride. Even now, he felt his heart scream to pull off. When the girl looked to him, her eyes locked with his - he did just that.


    Because a ball of golden flames rocketed at him and every instinct screamed that it was dangerous. His pride had made him hesitant and he pained for it as the flames crashed into his left side, just beneath his left front leg.


    He felt the area scream with pain. His scales failed to protect him and he felt a few had even gone missing from the impact, which sent him soaring out of control. He was too low and flying too fast to stop. The inevitable result was that he crashed into the monster field land in front of the walls. He barely felt the tens of bodies beneath him and he slowly rose along with the fear in his heart.


    No! He screamed in his heart if only to keep whatever dignity remained. I am a dragon!


    His ego quickly beat down the fear as his mind raced to catch up. He took in his surroundings and found himself facing away from the keep. He turned around and was quickly found the target of his ire.


    "You!" He bellowed. "White-haired wench! Come and face me, die for your transgressions!"


    He challenged her. Neither monster nor human was stupid enough to not realize it, but the girl in question only laughed.


    "Did... Did..." Her words were interrupted by another chuckle. "Did he just challenge me...? After I blew him out of the sky?!"


    It was too.... Stupid!?


    She knew she wrote that dragons were a prideful race, but to challenge her during a siege? Wasn''t the idea to just wholesale slaughter?


    "You dare mock a challenge?!" He roared.


    His earlier fear and the pain of his wound were forgotten as rage replaced them.


    "No, no!" She chuckled sweetly, much to everyone''s dismay. "I accept."


    "Come and face your death! I''ll- " His words were cut off.


    The white-haired girl had stepped onto the parapets just as the monsters around the dragon cleared the field, happy to break away, but also annoyed they wouldn''t get to kill either. The girl''s actions were interesting to the dragon, almost childishly amusing. That was until two regal angelic wings sprouted from her back. Her fair and beautiful face stained with green and red from monster, and human blood, alike.


    The aura he had felt earlier, ancient and commanding, overtook the area. The humans were oblivious to it, but to those verse in mana and those of the immortal races, felt it all too well.


    Fear and trepidation crept back in as he felt his heart stutter from the sight. He was almost inclined to call her a fake angel until she leapt from the stone wall and charged him; sword in hand.


    ? ? ?


    Cyril dove at him, though it was easy enough to do, she still wanted to see what would happen if she fought the dragon head-on. Would she die? Would he die? The anticipation excited her and she was all too willing to find out.


    The dragon seemed startled by her wings and hadn''t reacted in time to her attack, again. For that, he lost his right-wing as he tried to jump aside.


    The dragon roared in pain as he tried to put distance between them. With the lack of practice with her new wings, she didn''t have the experience to stop in time and crashed into the grassy field below. Dirt and rocks shot forward from the impact. Cyril stood; her sword impaled in the ten-foot deep crater. Her tight grip on the sword had saved her from tumbling around.


    She jumped out of the crater and into the air. She had enough time under her wings to figure out how to hover, albeit, it was quick annoying to do. However, the more she did it, the more she liked this ability to do so. It let her stare into the dragon eyes on the same plane.


    "Well?" She smiled at the dragon.


    Yes. It was fun.


    The smile scared the dragon, but he had courted this himself. It only took him a moment to resign himself to this battle. He charged at the girl and snapped at her with his massive jaws, but she quickly dived away; leaving a long cut down the center of his lower jaw. Blood began to pour from the deep cut and Rynnaid scrambled back as he roared.


    Cyril crashed into the ground. She quickly recovered after having put too much momentum into that drop. Lucky for her, the dragon seemed momentarily occupied with her sudden gift.


    Rynnaid shook his head, rage slowly building. Enough was there to cloud his judgment and he only wanted to strike back.


    His neck coiled back as he inhaled quickly, then, exhaled a firey inferno upon the goddess.


    She disappeared in the storm


    "No!" Priscilla and the others cried out from the battlements in unison.


    It was in vain though.


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    The dragon''s fire died away after a few seconds and Cyril remained unchanged.


    "That was a cool trick." She said as she looked up at the dragon who stood no more than fifty feet away. "I think I''ll try it."


    There was a spell to cast fire like a dragon, one powerful AoE effect. The hard part was the inability to just cast via a skill bar. The need to know how to do something, mixed with the ability to do so - as Desmond had said - was important. Unfortunately for the Dragon, he had just shown Cyril how to do it. She inhaled a lungful of air, her chest puffed up. Then she released it.


    ? ? ?


    Rynnaid roared in agony as his lower half was engulfed in the fire. His pride, his honor, and even the fact he was a Great Fire Dragon had fled his thoughts. Only the unending pain of being burned alive filled his mind. The golden flames washed over his front legs and his back legs. He felt all four limps burn. The fires even kissed the lowest point of his stomach. And. It. Hurt.


    The did the only thing he could do and jump away, albeit, clumsily. It was enough to get out of the funnel of fire though. He stared at the charred earth that glowed red from the girl''s fire. The rage that had been grappling with his fear had finally lost the battle. Not even dragon fire could do that within just those short few seconds. Even with mana behind it.


    "Yup." The angel said. " Wicked cool"


    She turned to him with a grin and started to walk towards him, sword in hand.


    "C''mon." She said playfully. "Let''s finish it. You said you''d kill me, right? Sorry dude, but I''ve already died once."


    Rynnaid could only scramble back as the angel walked towards her with that murderous smile.


    "Stay back!" He pleaded; his voice weak. "Demon!"


    "Nope." She said.


    She flung another ball of fire at him, but he was too close to doge. The ball crashed smashed into his chest and he was flung onto his back. His head smacked into the stone wall and he felt it shake from the impact. His chest burned and he couldn''t feel much there besides the burn.


    "Just a girl." The voice was closer now.

 10 Ripples

    Faint light illuminated the cavern, large and foreboding. Tens of strangely glowing mosses grew amongst the stalactites. Their light reflected off the reflective water that pooled around the stalagmites. A few of the oldest ones barely touched the surface of the water, creating what appeared to be a pillar of light that made the carven seem like one continuous orb. On the far walls, long ruined murals remained. Their stories forever lost to the annuals of time. And in the center of all this, a small stone platform, free of dirt, grime, and life.


    A stone coffin rested upon it


    The water, peaceful and pure, rippled. Silent, but the disturbance was still there. Soon, more ripples came until the reflection in the water disappeared. The water shook violently now, as did the cavern. Just when the cavern began to groan from the event, a golden wave of light pulsed through chamber once. Gone as soon as it came, the place slowly fell back into peace, but not the same peace.


    What was once left undisturbed for thousands of years and unseen... Now shone. Faint ghostly chains wrapped around the coffin in neat rows. Each chain, a binding spell. The cavern walls were alight with runes that were as ghostly as the chains. On one wall, just left of the platform, a stony outcrop faintly resembled a doorway. A single intricate spell circle was etched into the wall.


    Crack!


    A single hairline crack appeared on the corner of the circle.


    Cr-crack!


    The cavern whined and a single chain broke in the coffin. It too began to creak from the sudden pressure building within the cavern. Skeletons were etched into the side, depicted as if they were dancing with swords and spears. On another side, it depicted headless humans. On the lid of the coffin, a single name was etched...


    "The Lord of the Damned".


    . ? ? ?.


    His steps echoed throughout the empty hall. Dawn would be here soon, but his master had summoned him. He was almost entirely sure it was in regards to the that... Magic wave. At the age of fifty, Nicholas was still a handsome man despite the clear signs of aging. Tanned faced with long hair. Long for a man. It hung down to his mid-neck where it was tied off into a loose ponytail.


    He was not a large man, nor was he small. With with his silk robes on, his well-toned body showed through as he opened the door at the end of the hall. The room inside was only illuminated by the sun that had just broken the night no more than a few minutes ago, but he knew where he was going.


    With trained motions, Nicholas plucked out the second-lowest brick in the fifteenth row directly left of the small window that illuminated the room. Nothing happened and he reversed the prick, channeled several breaths worth of mana into it; then reinserted it. The brick glowed, illuminating the room in a thick pasty blue light. Then the light began to trace over the mortar. The line traveled up twenty-five bricks, turned left and traveled ten before it turned left again to return to the second brick to the floor. To complete it, the blue line cut across to the first brick.


    The bricks inside the lines disappeared, replaced with a dark staircase that led into the depths below. Down into the Old City. He stepped into it, careful not to trip on the last row of bricks that remained and disappeared into the darkness below. A deep, draconic voice welcomed him.


    .? ? ?.


    Akyryss looked over the island of Haven, a frown occupied her pretty face.


    "Are you sure?" She asked with restrained annoyance.


    "Yes, your Holiness." A man replied as he knelt behind her.


    Clay tiled roofs occupied the land below, topping hundreds of homes and shops. Her master once said. "Italian villa homes" Before. She never understood the term, but the style was pleasant on the eyes, equally from above as it was below. Yet today, the view only seemed to anger her.


    "Maybe I''ll teach them why I am to be feared," Akyryss growled, the voice deeper than a human could ever do.


    The Holy White Dragon, Akyryss, stood on the large balcony overlooking the Free Port of Haven. Dressed in a pure white dress that trailed along the tiled floor, she contemplated going on a rampage across the continents. Contemplated being the keyword here.


    "It would be ill-advised. By all reports, Alistar is not the one coordinating the destruction of Lady C-" His words failed as an aura pressed down upon him, forcing him onto his hands as well.


    "My Master is not to be addressed by such a pheasant''s name." Akyryss turned around. "Her name is too precious to be defiled by such lowly titles. She is to be known as the Creator. How many times must I repeat myself to you?"


    While the human priest was her most loyal follower, it was just that. Her follower. He paid respect to her master, but not enough. The love she had for Cyril was far greater than any being but short of that of Lord Hades. It was he who did not respect the memory of his daughter - her creator. Yet, he was her father those she could not reprimand him as well. Defiled in the north by her father, nearly forgotten in the south because of the False God Alistar. She had half a mind to wage war against them.


    "Send a one of the Elder Dragons to Alistar," Akyryss said. "Tell him that if him, or whomever in his order, continues to destroy the statues of my Master. I will attack..."


    If only I could move them... She lamented.


    She would gather them all into her abode, keep them among her horde... Her master... Her one true love...


    The priest looked up, saw the Holy Dragon''s expression slowly slip into that of a love-stricken maiden, and rolled his eyes. He did not have to ask about it. There was no one on the island that didn''t know about the kind of love that perverted dragon had for her creator...


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    To his astonishment, her expression had suddenly become serious. She turned back to look over the Island, to the east.


    "Your Holiness?" He asked. "Is something-"


    Akyryss waved her hand as she focused on the horizon. The sea was neither calm nor frenzied but just was the sea. Yet, she kept staring off into the distance. A wave of gold, taller than the sky and as fast as a tsunami rolled towards them. The priest became alarmed. As did the city. The storm bells tolled and the city stirred. He wanted to tell the dragon that she had to leave, but... Her face turned size to size as she examined it... An almost sinister smile was there.


    Screams filled the city as the citizens began to rush towards the shelters. Ships began to try and salvage themselves, but all for nothing.


    A woman''s laugh rang out over the city, catching their attention just as the wave of gold crashed into the island and... passed without a trace.


    "She''s back!" Akyryss roared with a sick joy that made the city shiver.


    .? ? ?.


    Layla looked to the storm that brewed on the western horizon. It was midday, but the autumn day already sent a shiver through her, or maybe, it was just her.


    A strong gust of wind brought with it the freshness of the mountain as she looked down to IronHorn village below. Hundreds of thatched roofs, like little golden mountains, shone in the sun. A large palisade separated the village from the Elavon Forest beyond. From there, she couldn''t see the lands, only the large stretch of forest. While situated at the foot of Elavon Mountain, they were a long ways away from the main road or any town and garrison.


    Such knowledge settled in the pit of her stomach, along with the cold and a bad feeling.


    She took a deep breath to ease the raw mix that troubled her. The wind pulled on her wind cotton dress; belted with a worn leather belt that rested on her hip, a shortsword dangled from on her left along with a messenger bag. Her eyes finally settled at the mining town''s large clearing by the gate where several wagons had been lined beside the gate. Today was market day, and the day Old Man Tenni came along with his wagons.


    Her feet filled with purpose, she trodded down the gentle sloop lined with rocks and down into the village. The vast expansive view from her home''s perch above disappeared, replaced with aged cottages that lined the muddy footpath. The freshness of the mountain was replaced with the pungent stench of humans filth and still air. She tried not to cringe when she plunged into the stench, but her neighbor must have seen whatever reaction that slipped her attention.


    "Still not use to the smell?" The old lady laughed. "I was the same when I came here."


    "Sorry for the face," Layla said, not actually sorry.


    "Don''t worry, girl." The elder smiled. " I hate it too."


    It had been a year since she settled in her belated husband''s village after her retirement from monster hunting, yet she still hated it. That was going to change soon though. She spent a few minutes speaking with her neighbor, giving the often annoying pleasantries that kept two people from hating each other. Then she continued on her way down the narrow path.


    After a few minutes, she appeared on the large packed dirt road that led out of the mine just as a large lizard passed. It was a Scaled Ox, a magically bred drake that had no wings, intelligence or hostile to any living being. It was used to pull heavy loads out of the wagon, but they also costed a fortune to feed, thus, they were only used for lucrative ventures. Like pulling boatloads of ore from a mountain underbelly.


    However, she still kept her distance from them because they were large eaters. It wasn''t uncommon for one of their miser owners to try and skim on their meals. Those often quickly learned that, just because it was magically bred, you don''t want to short a beast of dragon ancestry. It had happened once within the first few months she had moved here with her daughter. She had to put the beast down itself after it charged her and her girl on the main road.


    Now, she never allowed her daughter to play near them anymore.


    She kept herself behind the cart, her hand on the sword''s grip in any case, and followed the wagon until it veered away in the square. It joined a small concession of other wagons full of ore to be transported. Layla turned the other way, to Tenni''s merchant caravan.


    A crowd had gathered as wives tried to haggle with the slaves, men carried away the goods their wives bought and a few opportunistic villagers set up food stands nearby. She was interested in neither as she scanned the crowd. She skimmed the edge, looking for the old man, and found him as he was speaking to someone just by the village entrance. He seemed to be laughing and Layla made her way towards him.


    When she got only twenty feet close, she stiffened up as a black figure appeared in front of the merchant. Tenni had turned from the figure to look at Layla. He smiled and waved, said something to the black figure. It made no motion as its faceless abyss that swirled in its hood faced her. Yet, she knew it was looking at her. Emotionlessly. It was a Faceless one, A Phantom Merchant - The omens of disaster.


    "Afternoon, my dear." Tenni laughed, his bony features twisted with joy. "How are you!?"


    Old Man Tenni was a short ratty stick of a man. His sharp facial features remained him of a mouse, and he was just bones wrapped in flesh. His eyes glowed with joy, most definitely not from seeing her, but she learned that Tenni was usually happy to see everyone well in IronHorn, being a partial resident of the town itself.


    She had almost forgotten the figure in his joyful greeting, but when she looked, the figure had turned away already. She smiled back at the man, returning her attention to him as she led him back to his wagon without a word. He went on about his day until she interrupted him.


    "Why were you speaking with that Death Bringer?" Layla asked with forced calmness.


    The joy on his face froze, not exactly understanding the sudden change. Layla gestured with her head towards the gate. He looked over his shoulder and saw what she had been referring too.


    "They''re no death bringers," Tenni said as the happiness was sucked from his tone. "They''re harmless. I''ll admit they have strange ways, but they''re not the reason for the disasters they often appear before. I''ve seen enough to know that."


    "No." Layla refuted. "They''re the omens of death. They''ve been there, as massacres, assassinations, and wars. They''re well documented and they can slaughter the entire village!"


    "No, child." Tenni shook his head. "They may be watchers, but they''re also merchants."


    He held up a large strange coin. Rimed with bronze and inlaid with silver. A semi-transparent rose color gem was embedded in the center of the coin. The stone was practically the coin''s center, polished with a single etched... Cat paw on top of it. An odd thing, but Layla could only look at the... Odd item, made from strange materials. She had to admit though, she could feel the magic in it. Powerful. Ancient.


    "It is said that the Faceless deal in a strange currency." He smiled. "The coins have mostly been lost to the world, but I learned but a few years ago that nations still traded with them. Albeit, one-sidedly. "


    He grinned as Layla tried to take in the information. Old Man Tenni had been the most learned man in Ironhorn in his youth, or so the elders said. She had traveled the world, but she couldn''t refute his words since she never bothered to pick up books. Unless it had information on how to kill something.


    "I''m guessing this is the coin?" She said, mystified by the beauty of the coin.


    "Yes." He answered with a smile. "The Faceless one told me it was called Fabled Coins. Though the name is tacky, I admit. It does seem to relate to the rumors that they work for the Creator."


    Layla groaned. For as great as Tenni was, he was a scholar and a religious fanatic who followed the Forgotten. It referred to the religion around Cyril, the Goddess of Creation and Hearth. A dying religion that only really lives on in the beast lands, and on Haven if the tales are true. But she wasn''t one who believed in the gods. It suddenly struck her that the coin looked all too familiar.


    "Hey..." She looked at it. " Doesn''t that look like Savanah''s amulet?"


    Tenni looked at her, thought about it, then his eyes went wide.


    "The one Reeylian gave her before he died?" He asked.


    "Yes...." Then it clicked. "He said it would help her in a time of need..."


    Things began to fall into place. Almost as if... Fate had led her here on purpose. She remembered her original purpose for coming here.


    "Nevermind." she quickly said "Another time, but I need you to deliver this letter."


    She reached into her pouch and handed him a small letter. Her perfect handwritten letters detailed to a Glynii in the Elven Greens in the west. Her old team leader, and an Elder Elf.


    "And I also need you to take Savannah with you to the capital." She said as she closed the pouch.


    The sudden shift in tone had thrown the man off.


    "Wait, wait... "He paused as the words digested. "You'' re-!"

 11 Onward, into the new world 1

    "I! Said! To! Shut! Your! Filthy! Mouth! Whore!" While he snarled his broken sentence, Early Assem of House Kavak brought his leather boot down onto his bed wench''s neck. An audible, and disgusting, crack came with it and the girl went limp. The noblemen''s struggled to regulate his heated breath as the dragon in him flared. His eyes were wide with rage, and his hands trembled. His brown hair soaked in sweat, and his brown eyes


    He stared down on the young girl, no older than twelve, she met her end on the cold flagstones of the Northern Keep''s inner sanctum. For a man who couldn''t keep his hands off "young" girls, he was surprisingly... Unforgiving towards their volatile emotional states. The beating had neared the sixth minute and the chambermaid had noted that she had wouldn''t have survived even if he had spared her.


    "That''s the fifth one." She stated. "You''re not allowed to have another until next year, you know that, right?" She stared with cold eyes on the noblemen, her tone even colder. Though the keep was under attack, she didn''t particularly care. She wasn''t just a chambermaid, she was one of the Royal Family''s chambermaids. Until the dragon breached the wards and enchantments, it wasn''t a concern. Unlike the dead child on the man''s bedroom floor.


    The man''s hateful glare turned to her. A retort on the tip of his vile tongue, but he elected not to say it. He knew he''d lose in a war of wits with this maid, and he couldn''t kill her even if he tried. So, he kept his mouth shut as he grounded his teeth in frustration. He had known that but in his brief, yet not so brief, the moment of rage - he had killed her.


    "All she did was cry like the child she was when the dragon struck the keep." The maid continued. "That''s what children do, and if you want to keep sticking your manhood in children; you''re going to have to learn how to tolerate it. While you have the blood of the Dragons in you, you''re only the son of the emperor''s brother. You do not have the impunity reserved for full-blooded Dragons."


    The maid sneered, and he sneered back. For a few heartbeats, neither of them broke away.


    Assem was the first to back away, just as she had anticipated. He was a weak-willed man-child that had never seen battle, his rank given to him because of who his father was, rather than merit. He a soft, lustful, and vindictively violent who had an inclination towards female children.


    "You know I''ll have to report this to your father, yes?" She asked.


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    "Are you done yet?" She spoke up again, "Or do you just enjoy kicking children?"


    He huffed and glared at her. "I don''t know why father''s limits me." His voice was pompous, to say the least. "I only fuck the low-born. I''m not touching just any noble child, why do I have to be limited to five a year? They''re stupid creatures whose sole purpose is to serve us!"


    "Despite what you may think of serfs and the common person, they can still kill a noble as easily as you kill them." She said with a tired sigh. While most nobles failed to understand this and lorded over his subjects as if they were gods, a member of the Royal family had to remember this. Even if they did not care to believe it, let it not be said that they tried to educate a good ruler. Assem would never be an emperor or a minister, but he was still of royal blood.


    Thus, he was relegated to the land he was lest to harm the royal reputation, as futile as it was. The chambermaid reflected on her actions in her younger years. She was only a few years older than the Earl, but she had been much too skilled in her duties. She always managed to clean up after him when he was younger. Always torturing the family hounds, bullying the servants. She never believed it would have gotten to the point of ****, but for all her good points, she could never tell when Assem had hit the bottom of the shit pit.


    He hadn''t been in this post for but a year before he started openly taking young girls from the nearby village for his pleasures. He didn''t even shy away from telling their parents his intentions for them. Most didn''t mind. A silver here, an Imperial Crown there, and very rarely did anyone put up a fight. But he was running out off greedy parents. At this rate, he was going to run into a parent that would run their pitchfork through, or knife, or whatever weapon a low-born could find.


    "Are you threatening me?!" Assem raised his voice. "I am royalty and I demand--!"


    The maid cut him off. "Yes, you are of the royal blood, but you''re not of the direct line. That is why you are an Earl, not a prince. Need I remind you, if you continue your antics, you''ll be a dead prince by the end of the year. One of these days, you''re going to take the wrong child. It will be one of your guard''s precious apples, and then when it happens, you''ll be slaughtered. I won''t stop them either." Her voice chilled the moron to his core.


    "But- But-" He stammered, his eyes searching for something he could use against her. "You are supposed to protect me!" He squeaked.


    "No." She retorted. "I am to make sure you don''t lay your hands on another child of nobility. I am the holder of your leash. You''re free to try and kill me, but I''m also free to protect myself, which would involve killing you for trying." She smirked gleefully at the thought of being freed from this wretched man.


    Northern Protector of the Dragon Empire, Assem Kavak, Earl of the smallest fief in the empire, went pale as his bedsheets. While another complaint was on the tip of his tongue, he was saved from his egotistical head, a soldier burst through the door. Spear in hand, he stood in the doorway about to speak when he saw the dead body on the floor. He looked to the pale Earl, then the demon maid. Like all the other guards, he quickly stuffed whatever insult he had for the Nobleman and spoke his message.

 12 Onward, into the new world 2

    Cyril and Priscilla sat side by side on a large rock a few feet in the river as they washed away the grime of the battle. Cyril was a much more pressing issue of cleaning as she was soaked from the very tips of her beautiful snowy hair to her very, very fine boots. None of them had stripped, but that was at Priscilla''s request since there were still within view of the keep. While Cyril never thought of the act as scandalous, Priscilla was a noblewoman, versed in the modesty and etiquette


    She had almost gone into a lecture of both but Cyril was not going to have any of it. She was quick to simply haul the child down to the river, on the southern side of the wall, to wash off. Priscilla found something out about her newfound hero -


    Cyril hated the feeling of blood on her.


    Priscilla had watched the goddess scrub, and scrub with a rag at every inch of her body. Places that would have been to immodest to show under the sun, Priscilla helped her with. Blushing all the while at just how fine of a woman Cyril was. She had helped washed her mother, and her... belated best friend. Neither of them had been as plush as her. While she had all those good parts, thick thighs, soft and sizeable rear, and small waist. Not to mention how soft her skin was, she could feel the powerful muscles beneath those.


    Not her breasts though, Cyril washed under there herself.


    Still, it amazed her just how beautiful she was, and how deadly. She wouldn''t ever forget the scene of her slicing off a dragon''s head. The geyser of blood. The terrified retreat of the monster horde as their red eyes faded into nothing and ran for the forest with their tails between their legs. Cyril looked just like someone from one of those great epics at that moment. And she did it to save her...


    Priscilla smiled like an idiot to herself as she splashed her feet in the slow-moving river as her mind slipped into her own little world. None the wiser that Cyril had only charged the dragon in a strange mixture of battle happy impulse, and a desire to just kill it. The killing part was habitual. Which gamer didn''t dream to face off a dragon? Cyril was no different. She loved fighting BAMS, she loved it even more when there was sweet, sweet loot. Despite what others thought of her, most of her items were gained through her own efforts, only very few - the really cute ones - were gotten via the administrator panel.


    Both the girls sat and splashed their feet in the water, each stuck in their own thoughts. Each beautiful in their own right.


    He stood just on the cusp were the gravel and fertile bank soil met the lush, and unburnt grass. He looked onto the two girls.


    "And who are you two?" He asked.


    At the sound of his voice, Priscilla shuttered, remembering who he was.


    "Earl Havak!" She squeaked with the fear she failed to contain.


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    "Ah!" Assem chuckled devilishly. "The lovely raven of the Hammel house." He smiled confidently, like a wolf who had its prey fall right into its lap. Priscilla gulped. Cyril felt the sudden shift between the two. She didn''t know what history laid between the two, but she wasn''t so blind to see how to two reacted to each other.


    "Who are you?" The goddess asked the glow of her eyes hidden in the sunlight and the dangerous gleam.


    "You will address Earl Havak as such, or not at all!" One of the knights barked halfheartedly before the man in question could fly into one of his moods again. Least he''d want to see something happen to these two angelic girls.


    "Who are you?" Cyril repeated her question in spite of the knight''s subtle help.


    "I am Earl Assem of House Havak, lord of Lanthra''s Pass!" He huffed. "But since you are such a beautiful lass, I''ll spare you!" He puffed his chest as he pulled down on the hem of his shirt in discomfort. His maid was had half the mind to slap him upside the head. Clearly, the white-haired maiden looked like nobility, and she practically screamed of wealth.


    She knew of Lady Priscilla, but she could tell that it was the sister dress of the one Cyril wore. The fabric was something that looked even better than what the Emperor had, a far cry from some mere village girl. Yet he spoke to her as if she was that, a mere village girl.


    "Cyril." The woman responded before she got up from the river. She helped Priscilla up but kept their hands in each other as Cyril lead her across the short stretch of water between the rock and the bank. She passed the group, ignoring the stares and kept Priscilla from giving her partings with the Earl, least she''d have to speak more with him.


    "Are you ignoring me!?" He roared, indignantly.

 13 Onward, into the new world 3

    Prince Randol DrakeFang glared at his cousin as he hollered on the top of his lungs. Something about a white-haired "Bitch" disrespecting him on the river bank. She apparently pulled away Priscilla while he attempted to converse with her. He didn''t doubt the words, because the pair had told him about a creep when they passed him on their return from bathing. Randol only wished he could slit his own throat. Desmond and Mai had already vacated the war wrecked outer bailey when he had appeared from his little enchanted inner keep.


    They also hadn''t bothered to warn him that this plague of an extended family member was coming out, but lucky enough, he managed to blend into a group of soldiers resting after the terrible battle.


    Nothing, however, could have been done when he stormed back. Like always, his non-existent dignity had been insulted and he was going to rain fury about whomever it was. Now he had to listen to his rant while being assaulted by the stench of the dead. Randol only stared at him with tired and resigned eyes. He was tired, hungry, and damn it, why did he have to deal with this blight upon the empire?


    Unlike this pariah, Randol held the beliefs of the Imperial Family close to his heart, and while he may have... deviated from his duties slight, he was not sexual deviate who desired the young and wasn''t above cradle snatching.


    And where were the ladies who had earned his ire? His eyes turned to the only cleared corner within the bailey. They both stood there gathering a few pieces of dried meat to munch on, alongside Desmond and Mai. Cyril was the only one who wasn''t attempting to make herself inconspicuous. She stood out among the beaten and filthy soldiers who were all too pleased to let her get her cut of the rations first. Hell, they were practically trying to hand her theirs.


    Randol had to suppress a groan as Assem finally noticed when she had let out a songbird-like laugh. Two of the larger soldiers were acting like fools and attempted to show off by picking up a barrel of ale. He may have been able to do so if he was in a normal state. He was weary from battle and tired, thus, the barrel swayed before he lost hold of it. It fell off and broke against one of the bench tables and shattered. Ale rushed over the table before it splattered over a soldier who was resting on the bench.


    It probably would have ended in a fistfight if the lady hadn''t broken out in laughter. Soon, everyone was laughing and the bulky soldier apologized to the other in embarrassment.


    "You there!" Assem''s roar stilled the laughter as he strode over, sighing maid in tow. "You bitch! You think you can just--" The Earl''s hung flung backward as a thick wooden mug exploded across his face, smashing his nose.


    This time, the maid broke out in laughter.


    ¡Á ? ¡Á


    Priscilla clung to Cyril''s left arm as the goddess held onto the shire horse''s reins. The rustle of the dirt beneath its hooves that only thing that disturbed the deathly silence that hung over the group. While her arm was fair, soft, and almost too feminine, it felt more reassuring than a thousand knights could ever feel. The warmth, the tend pat with her other hand.


    The visions returned with a vengeance, and they all felt it.


    The dead. Each student, each knight... Each goblin. When they had first mounted up onto the horses left at the stables at the edge of the forest, they had all been fine. It was only once the entrance had long disappeared did the visions strike. The beginning was like a murderous monsoon of hate and death, as all their dead walked out from behind each tree. As blood began to drip from the leaves onto them, so warm... So... Real.


    It had only lasted a few seconds before Cyril could react, but it had done its wish. They were all terrified. Randol was still pale and shook slightly on his mare. He kept his eyes on the horse''s mane, careful to only look up to once and a while. Desmond kept his eyes on his brother''s back, and Mai... The poor beast girl clung to Desmond''s chest, still crying. It became apparent that Mai was not as mentally strong as they all thought. It had caught her off guard, her mind not prepared for the brutal and harsh scenes it slammed her with.


    Priscilla... She shook like a leaf, but after Cyril had fought that dragon for them. She did not cry. She felt the fear deep in her bones. Down to her very being, but she had grown today. She had seen a dragon and saw its end. She would coward, but she would not turn - so she told herself; and for the next five miles, Cyril spent every waking moment, like a vigilant hawk, tearing apart any wisps of static. While winter was coming, the air around the small line of horses felt like summer as her anger stabbed, torn, and obliterated them when she found them.


    For five miles... the curse and Cyril played a dangerous game of Cat and Mouse.


    After two painful hours and five miles, they brought through the treeline and plots of farmland welcomed them. Sunlight kissed them, and the visions had no other place to erupt from. Maybe on the treeline, but that would be a waste of its mana. Something that had been nearly drained as it tried to fulfill its mission and Cyril would rip it apart. She had also learned had to consume mana, thus, for every ten attempts, Cyril could completely destroy seven of them and deal a blow to the curse on each of them.


    She wasn''t sure if that was how curse-breaking worked, because she didn''t actually write that part of the lore. Jax had. He had a knack for being the "good guy", even when he wasn''t, but that was in the past and Cyril pushed the memories down into the depths of her heart. She had to remind her self not to think of home because home was pain.


    She had to focus on the now. At least, until she sorted her situation out first. Unlike before, she was sure she would have time to do it.


    "There it is!" Priscilla finally chirped. "Quinn''s Wood. It is the way-point between the Northern Keep and the Gully Point."


    "Gully point?" Cyril forced a chuckle. "What kind of name is that?"


    "Its a port," Priscilla said. "It''s a hub between the western border and the empire. It''s quite a popular city."


    "Is there anything between Quinn and Gully?" Cyril asked.


    "A lot of hamlets," Priscilla muttered. "The northern lands are not well thought off in the Empire. It''s too close to the forest. A lot of monsters roam up here. The south is quite peaceful, so you''ll mainly find adventurers up here more so than commoners. Knights also come up north to test their mettle against the stronger monsters too."


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    "Hmm." Cyril mused. "I see. Where would a dragon fall on the scale of monsters these people fight?"


    Priscilla turned around and stared into the maiden''s lovely molten eyes. She examined each of her eyes, perplexed. "Really...?" Priscilla said after a few moments of just jumping from each eye to another. It had been so amusing, that Cyril''s anger had simmered at it and she chuckled for real.


    "Yes!" Cyril''s voice rose in joyful defense. "Dragons weren''t the biggest baddies before. There were tens of bosses to fight, and dragons were only a small portion of the lineup!"


    "By the sun!" Priscilla exclaimed. "She''s not joking!"


    Slowly, but surely, the darkness had passed as they stepped foot into a small piece of civilization.


    Quinn''s Woods was a large village with a population of just under five hundred. In Cyril''s eyes, that was a damn town! Desmond had to point out that there was no real set number to be defined by, only whatever the central government deemed them to be. Quin''s Wood was only labeled a village, and probably would always be labeled as such. The village had only grown from a hamlet by the road and into what it was nearly only ten years ago. There was a need to have a waypoint for the constant flow of goods and human resources as Quinn''s Woods was sat on a vital crossroad.


    Before Desmond could go on about the historical facts of the quaint little settlement, Mai shoveled a spoonful of mashed potatoes into his mouth. She no longer avoided the shadows, but she also made sure to stay in the light. As such, they sat around the largest table the only tavern in town had. While the village had a huge population, the town was quiet and alone bard who strummed a lazy, but catchy tune as he sat on a table pressed up against the large tavern wall.


    A few women passed by with buckets in hand, and a few even eyed Randol with bashful stares just before they reeled at the sight of Mai. None of them paid any mind to them as wooden plates of roasted duck and venison were laid out before them. The tavern''s owner personally brought out slightly cold mugs of mead that, while bitter, was okay to Cyril. When in Rome, do as the Roman''s do. Unless... Well, use your head in that regard she thought.


    She sipped at the mug sparingly, aware that she hadn''t felt the urge to eat, or do any of the other... bodily functions the others had to do. Not that she didn''t appreciate not having to crouch behind bushes. It made her wonder what would happen if she did eat. She ripped a leg off the whole duck and nibbled on it. The taste was flat, and a small pink tongue ejected the small morsel she had chewed.


    "I-Is something wrong with the duck..." The tavern owner seemed to have materialized out of thin air, the group unaware that he was just off the side hoping none of the high-born patrons would be offended by his humble cooking.


    "It tastes... flat," Cyril responded, her golden eyes rose to meet the man.


    "Err..." He looked to the others at the table.


    "It''s acceptable," Desmond said as he finished a sip of his mead, his love only nodded in agreement.


    "Food is food," Randol said as he sat up, his eyes fell on Cyril.


    "What?" Cyril looked confused at why he was looking to her.


    "What''s... flat about it?" Randol asked, not intending to fight, but purely out of curiosity. It was far better than a soldier''s ration on a battlefield, but it was certainly far below the palette of a noble.

 14 Onward, into the new world 6

    The cold autumn air kissed Priscilla''s nose as she took a whiff the tolerable village air. Unlike the Capital where you could often smell human excrement and other pollutants on the air, the village took a crisper - more farm-like - smell. Her mother often complained of the stench of villages, but she couldn''t. It was a much more pleasing smell than everything smelling like one large chamber pot. She sat outside the tavern at one of its many outdoor tables, and a nervous barmaid swiftly came by. She didn''t bother with anything fancy, and just ordered bread, cheese, and any fruit there was to be hand.


    After Cyril had lifted their curses last night, and a small meal, everyone had slept like rocks. Not knowing when the curse was going to lash out again had been a weight lifted off their shoulders. Sleep was the best thing they could do afterward, and sleep they did. The dark rings that had haunted Priscilla had faded enough that a light coat of makeup could have easily done away with them. That was if she had any. She had elected not to bring any on the behest of her maids, one of them being a retired adventurer. She had told her that most women in the trade never wore makeup on their missions because the smell could attract monsters.


    The tavern door swung open again, its iron hinges sang in protest as a pretty beast woman walked out. Priscilla looked to her with the hope that it was the barmaid with the food but became dejected when she saw it was only Mai. The vixen planted herself across from her with the grace that most beast folk from the bestial planes had; like a brute. She plopped down with a groan and ordered a mug of ale from the barmaid as she appeared after her with plates of food.


    "You know." Priscilla began. "I would have thought that having spent so much time in our capital, you''d at least learn some of our etiquettes." Her voice was light as she teased her. Still in a good mood from a peaceful night''s rest.


    "Eh." Mai said. "I have, just it''s a pain to act so strung up all the time."


    "Oh?" Priscilla smiled and leaned forward. "Then why did you sleep in Desmond''s room?"


    "Why did you sleep in Cyril''s bed?" Mai smiled back.


    "N-Not fair!" Priscilla blushed, but the smile remained. "We''re both girls!"


    "And Randol is a man, yet he--" Mai covered her mouth. "Nevermind. Desmond and I sleep together a lot when we''re on expeditions."


    Priscilla''s curiosity was peaked by her half stated sentence, but the latter half smelled too juicy to just leave well alone. Her eyes went wide, and they sparkled with a young noble woman''s curiosity that often plagued them in regards to any aspect of romance.


    "Have you--" Priscilla was cut off by a quick wave of Mai''s hand.


    Her smile was ear to ear as she sat back just as the song of the door sounded. Both the girls turned to the door as Randol came out. He was flanked by Desmond and the barmaid. The girl held more mugs as the boys planted themselves at the table. Desmond on Mai''s left and Randol on Priscilla''s right. Unlike Desmond, however, Randol kept a more appropriate distance from the young girl; practically on the edge of the bench.


    In a time before, if this had happened, Priscilla would have been bold enough to close the gap and pester the prince. Now with that brutal experience, she had wiped away that childish inclination. She still liked the prince, but more as a... Something... She didn''t know, but it wasn''t that infatuation that had afflicted her in the years before. She held a deep respect for the man, for what he was, and what he could do. Once thought upon, she didn''t actually like him for who he was. Just who she believed he was.


    She greeted the princes formally for once in the past two days. A good night''s rest did well to put someone back into their right state. The boys, however, didn''t care for it. Randol smiled at her, but not that fake smile - a real smile. He told her to just address him by name, as did Desmond.


    "We''ve all gone through that horrible event, and lived," Randol stated as he pulled apart the loaf of fresh bread in front of him. "The way I see it, you''ve earned my respect. And more. If you will have it, I wish to count you as a good friend. Many would never rise to the call of battle, even when their lives are at stake."


    Priscilla blushed and nodded. A testament to her sudden growth as a person, she didn''t pretend to act embarrassed. It was expected for a noblewoman to act shy and adorable when complemented by someone they liked. If it was just someone on good terms, you were expected to act with grace and accept it. If you disliked them, you were to ignore it. Now? She openly blushed, rather than hide behind her hand, or a fan.


    The thought had crossed her mind to follow these strange rules of gender interaction. She thought better of it and just allowed herself to live in the moment. She had stared down death and lived. Even if by the skin of their teeth.


    "I agree," Desmond said as he slid Mai her mug and he took one for himself. "You are quite extraordinary. I won''t lie, we both abhorred you on the journey, we never thought you''d be someone to rise to the occasion."


    "I''m sorry about that." She deflated a little. The happiness from the compliment diluted by the truth of her previous conduct. "I''ve--"


    "Don''t take it the wrong way, Pricilla." Desmond cut her off before she could finish. "We''re glad you rose to the occasion. If you hadn''t, we all may have died on that mountain; but we didn''t. You helped us live. You fought. We may have not won, but we survived!"


    Desmond rose his mug in the air. Randol followed suit. Mai had her face in her mug as she chugged it and both the boys looked to her, waiting for her to join in. She finished the drink in seconds and was about to slam it down with vigor. Then she saw everyone''s eyes on her. It took a second for her to process before she rose the now empty mug up with a toothy grin.


    "To you, Lady Priscilla of House Hammel!" Randol said. "You survived. Revel in it."


    Despite the intent behind the toast, she felt bad. She survived. Her friends did not.


    "But my friends didn''t..." She became small in her seat. She looked down at her food, then to Randol. "Is it okay that I survived, but they didn''t?"


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    The joyous atmosphere that had begun to build between the four died quickly. Randol gave her a knowing look, while the other two took pity on her.


    "As a Knight." Randol stopped and amended the thought. "As a warrior, I''ve lost countless friends. What happened up there... None of us could have known. Desmond and Mai have both delved into many of the ancient ruins in the country. From the reports, there was never anything worse than a few monster nests."


    "It was something I''ve been wanting to ask Cyril." Desmond joined in. "Just what in the hell was that thing."

 15 Onward, into the new world 4

    With the arrival of dusk and the absence of the horrors that the curse normally haunted them with; The group had decided to stay the night within the village. The previous tavern had explained they did not have the room for them and directed them to the best tavern in town. While Cyril was quite unhappy to change locations, Randol had to explain the concept of the common folk never wanting to offend those with power. The tavern looked like it would only have straw beds in one common hall. It would have been okay if they all didn''t look nobles - Especially Cyril.


    They parted with the tavern with that tavern''s owner as a guide. He led them, nervously, towards the center of the village where the market stood. Despite Quinn''s Wood being a countryside village, situated in a fief no one wanted to be, it was surprisingly thriving. With the last bit of light, the market bustled with life as people went about their last-minute shopping. They were lead to a large timber-framed building on the southern end of the market. The building was situated next to the large bridge that spanned across the river, with a sign that said "Ironhorn", and an arrow pointed to the east across the bridge.


    With the bit of coin they had managed to scrape from the guards of the keep, they secured rooms for each of them within the tavern. During which, Cyril had noticed the curse had fully repaired itself and had adequate mana stored to continue its torment. It never activated out of the bounds of the forest, so she surmised that it wouldn''t activate outside of them. She brought this information forward once they were all together in private, which somehow, ended up being her room.


    "Ah." Desmond muttered as he leaned back in one of the chairs beside the frosty glass window that overlooked the dying market. "It''s a conditional curse then."


    "Mm." Cyril nodded as she laid back on the queen-sized bed. It was quite plush. She had half expected the mattress to be filled with hay or something of the like. It wasn''t as large or springy as the mattresses from her childhood, but it was quite comfortable. Several pillows occupied the bed and she had managed to only get two of them before Priscilla laid next to her and stole the rest. She wasn''t going to argue as the child rolled side to side.


    It was one of the barmaids. "Y-Your drinks." She said as she held a wooden tray with five wooden mugs.


    "Bring them in," Randol said as he pushed the door open, but made sure to only step back enough to allow the worker to set the drinks upon the table. She tried to walk further in the room to hand the drinks out personally, but by habit and training, he blocked her. "Set the drinks on the table, we''ll get them when we''re thirsty."


    The barmaid looked dejected momentarily before she smiled. She nodded her head and quickly set the mugs on the table. She wanted to see the pretty white-haired lady again with the exotic eyes. It wasn''t often a beauty came around, but when they did, they quickly became the talk of the town; and she wanted to be one of the few would say she had seen her. From where she stood, she only saw two humans and the beast girl, but the snowgirl and the raven-haired girl were out of view. Then that girl''s voice called out from behind the handsome man.


    "I just remember!" Cyril snapped her fingers.


    Randol turned to face Cyril, and the barmaid saw the snowy maiden sitting on the bed, her eyes locked on the man beside the fox girl. The next moment, Randol ushered her out the door. The barmaid was too stunned to protest. The woman''s eyes were burned into her mind. Two glowing golden eyes... She quickly scurried away, nearly skipping down the steps with the latest gossip.


    Once the room had been resecured, Desmond spoke up.


    "Well?" He asked.


    "I just remembered I had an item that could deal with conditional curses." She beamed as she tore a hole in the fabric of time and space, opening her spatial storage. The sudden use of that magic chilled everyone''s spine. Spatial magic, outside of enchantments and prepared rituals was a near-impossible task. Yet, Cyril did it as easily as she breathed. Desmond only wondered why she hadn''t fully grasped the use of her magic yet if she could cast.


    She rummaged around with her hand. After a few moments, she became agitated and stuck half her body in the tear. That scared everyone, but before anyone could pull her out, she plopped back out with a frosty crystal fashioned in the likeness of a human skull. The tear shut itself and faded away with a sigh.


    "This!" She laughed. "I''m such an idiot! I have so many things that it all gets jumbled together!"


    "That is...?" Randol asked.


    "It''s a Curse Breaker." Cyril beamed. More proud that she remembered what the item was than actually having a solution to their problem. "It sucks away the negative energy out of the curse completely. That destroys the curse and bam! You''re free!"


    "By the gods!" Desmond cried. "When we get somewhere safe, we''re going to have to sort through your stuff!

 16 Onward, into a new world 5

    And one!" Edward''s disembodied voice called out. Cyril''s eyes were wide and childish joy burned in them. A large white wolf, the size of a lion, and fur pure as clouds towered before her. Beautifully crafted amethyst eyes stared unblinking forward. After her father had finished his count down, the wolf''s head slid silently down to hers. The wolf bowed with a knightly grace before it returned, then it laid down on before her. Its head held up as if it awaited its new master''s commands.


    She finally had a pet!


    "Say hello to your new friend!" Her father laughed. "It''s a learning AI that''s mainly here to help keep you right." That was an understatement. Humans were designed to go long periods of nothing, which was the state their VR technology was at.


    Edward looked down at the screen were a finely crafted model of his daughter stood as she clung to the wolf''s fur. The collision boxes and graphics had been fine-tuned, but her world was still just some pretty meadow that was only half a mile in diameter. Devoid of life, and human interaction aside from talking to disembodied voices, Cyril was slowly going insane inside that world. They were in the process of developing more VR capsules for him and her mother, but in the meantime, he had his company "Comendeer" an AI from one of their sub-companies that worked for the military.


    He had them repurpose a copy of one of their smart AIs to be a welfare monitor, and friend, for his daughter. He hoped it would help lighten her days from now one.


    "Hello!" Cyril beamed, that small nine-year-old model was vastly different from the husk that laid in the VR Pod in front of him.


    His hands gripped the edge of the console, his hands turning white. His eyes stuck on his daughter''s real body in front of him as she clung to the wolf and touched his fur. She could only register pressure, and yet, she seemed so happy about it. It pained him. A primal rage grew inside when he thought about how he failed to protect her. A failure he would never let happen again. He finally tore his eyes from his sweet little caged bird, and turned to the doctor.


    "Do you think this will be enough?" Edward asked.


    "It will have to be." She said. "For now at least. I still stand by my recommendation to have either you or Mrs. Bailey here to talk with her. I don''t know if its the lack of physical human contact or parental love, but we don''t have any historical data to go off of. Your daughter is the first human to live within a virtual world. We can only move forward by trial and error."


    "You''re doing all you can do." The doctor said as she pitied the poor man. "I''ll say it straight, you''re the only rich parent I''ve seen try and turn the world on its head to get their daughter back because of how much you love her. Most of the time, its because they don''t want to be embarrassed, or put caps on their care. Some times, they just open up foundations. If you need something to be proud of, be proud of that."


    "I don''t need too," Edward said as he stepped away from the screen. "That girl... She is my pride and joy. My reason to live. My purpose." The microphone had already been muted, so she couldn''t hear their conversation. He only watched her try and teach a computer how to act like a dog. She even got on her hands and knees to teach her how to bark. Of course, the program already knew all that. He chuckled to himself.


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    "I see." The doctor said no more. There was nothing to add. The pain was as clear as the rising sun. The old man''s face gaunt and tired, as a few tears streamed down his face.


    "I''ll name you Fenrir!" Cyril exclaimed. "Yeah! Just like that wolf god Jax keeps going on about! Dad said you''re going to be my best friend forever and you''ll never hurt me! I''ll hold you to that!" She laughed as she tried to play with its paws, only for the wolf to prance around her playfully.


    "That''s a stupid name," Edward said as a tired smile bloomed on his face.


    "Not very creative." The doctor commented as well. "But regardless, Fenrir is apart of this place now." She turned to the newly added console that sat beside her VR pod. It was rugged and modeled to fit right into a military base. A status screen above it displayed the AI''s designation. "Guardian SAI IV". The name then disappeared, replaced with its new name. "Fenrir".


    "You''re going to be my best friend, but you can''t replace Jax. Dad said when the new pods come, Jax will get to play and you can''t hurt him either! He''s my best friend too!" Cyril began to prattle off about the boy she liked. A child of one of his friends.


    "I should have gotten her that puppy..." Edward broke down. Old and worn, it couldn''t keep it together anymore.


    For his regrets.


    His failures.


    His heart lived in a virtual cage.


    Out of his reach...


    Out of his touch...


    Out of this world...

 17 Onward, into the new world 7

    Cyril appeared out of nowhere and took the gap between Randol and Priscilla. They weren''t sitting shoulder to shoulder, but she did fill the small gap quite well. Somehow, she seemed more beautiful today. Her snowy hair glistened in the morning sun as it began to climb higher into the cloud spotted sky. Her lips were pursed as she took Randol''s mug from his hand and took a gulp.


    She cringed at the taste, but only stuck our a small pink tongue in disgust. She had already swallowed the ale. It was not to her tastes.


    "Now what in the hell is that?" She handed the mug to Randol. He probably would have laughed if not for suddenly feeling ashamed for talking about her.


    "Ale." Desmond spoke up. "It''s not great, but it''s definitely a local brew."


    "You guys really drink this stuff besides water?" Cyril asked.


    "No," Desmond responded. "We drink water too, but beast folk love their beers and ales. They have it throughout the day. Mai here doesn''t actually hold true to her race''s customs, but she does enjoy it at least once a day. Often for breakfast."


    "Ah." Cyril smiled. "That''s nice to know. So what was did you want to ask?


    " A lot of things, actually," Mai spoke up. "First off, about last night."


    "Sorry," Cyril said. "Classified."


    "Wait!" Mai''s eyes furrowed. "What does that mean?"


    "Officially a secret and open to those on a need to know basis." She repeated the words from a movie Jax had shown her before.


    "Well, I need to know." Mai said." You were cr--"


    Cyril shot her a warning glare. That was something very personal, and if she could have stopped it, she would have. Her sudden breakdown after she used that artifact last night was not something she intended. It was a lessoned learned though. Take the flavor texts seriously. Mind''s Lullaby was a shop item that was used to break illusion curses. When used, it was supposed to show the bearer a happy memory, one that would overpower a curse with goodness.


    Unfortunately, Cyril''s good memories were far few between. Despite her demeanor, since she had been here, she actually thought about the past a lot. What she would do, how would she live... Why would she live... Among other things people often thought about when they questioned their existence in the universe. It was just after a few experiences within the last year, she just more...


    "The black monster with those massive tentacles," Desmond said. "It went on a rampage in the city below your mountain."


    "So a Kraken appeared in the city?" Cyril''s eyebrow rose in visible disbelief. "Out of water."


    "No!" Desmond paused. "Krakens exist?!"


    "Of course they do." Cyril rolled her eyes. "Okay, just once exists."


    "As a wagon?!" Cyril laughed. "Don''t be stupid! The Kraken is bigger than that keep back north!"


    "W-What?!" Everyone gasped.


    "Those squids the size of wagons are its children," Cyril said. "Only one Kraken can exist at once. Think of it as a beehive, just less hivemind like and sprawled out across thousands of miles. One queen, and when that one dies, another should take its place in a few hundred years."


    Or so the lore stated. Silence fell upon the table and the few merchants at the surrounding tables.


    "Madam." One spoke up. "Do you speak the truth?"


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    "Mhm." Cyril turned in her seat to face the tavern owner who had just seat down another customer''s plate.


    "Then how would they be able to sail the seas with such a monster about?" The owner asked the question everyone else had.


    "Have you guys gone to the bottom of the sea?" Cyril asked.


    "No one at the moment has ever been that deep." Desmond finally spoke up.


    "Then, of course, you won''t have to deal with it." Cyril rolled her eyes again as if this was common knowledge. "By rite of ancient laws, until transgressed by the souls who swim upon the dry land, will the Queen of the Murk stay within her palace. When those who defile her kingdom become known, only then will she rise to torment those above."


    Cyril recited a piece of lore by heart. It was easy when it was only a small passage about a raid level boss. If you asked her about small fries, it was a hit or miss.


    "If the seas aren''t being torn up by a giant ass squid, then no one has broken those laws of the sea again." Cyril shrugged.


    "What do you mean ''again''?" Randol asked.


    "Yeah, we entered her kingdom and she found out," Cyril shrugged. "Then she tore about the eastern seaboard. Tens of cities were torn down."


    Well, she was the one who created the monster and the storyline for that particular event. She grew tired of those cities and wanted to change their layouts. Jax had argued with her for half a day saying she "Couldn''t just replace tens of player cities" on a whim. So, in spite of him, she created the Kraken and the Kingdom of the Deep Sea before she had said monster destroy all those seaside cities. While Jax had been shocked by her antics, the event itself had been widely received since she had talked to the programmers about an underwater raid.


    It had been quite a refreshing raid compared to Jax''s obsession with nordic stuff and moldy dungeon crawls.


    The original question that they had wanted to ask her about was long forgotten as Desmond was quick to dive headfirst into this new discovery of a kingdom under the sea. While Cyril had created the whole event, she had only dabbled with the major points and none of the small things, unless it was something she wanted a detail modified or completely removed. Eventually, Cyril had to cut the Q&A session off because she was annoyed by just how knowledge thirsty the prince was. Mai had to explain that he got this way about new things.

 18 Onward, into the new world 8

    They followed the river south. Their horses trotted at a leisurely pace and while the events at Fable''s End had left deep scars in the survivors, they left with a Goddess and a new lease on life. Not exactly something comparable in gold coins, and definitely something they weren''t going to tell the others, but to them - it was a story worthy of a song. Then again, they all agreed to keep the part about awakening the Creator of the World. Not even they had completely digested that bit of their journey.


    Ten minutes later, they saw the end of the village as they followed the river as it curved to the left. There was also a large group of mounted men on the road as they galloped towards them. Randol, who took the lead, was about to have everyone dip onto another road to let them pass, but then he saw who was leading the host. Earl Assem. He didn''t look like he was here to give them a warm goodbye either.


    Randol sighed and had everyone stop. It only took a less than a minute for the group to come to a stop before theirs, and man, Assem was burning with rage.


    "There you are!" He snarled as he pointed a bare steel saber towards Cyril. "I''ve come to pay you back for what you did to me.


    His nose was discolored where the mug she had thrown at him struck. It looked strange, and funny, that he''d appear in public like that.


    "Dear cousin..." Randol wanted to sigh again, but he wore his armor. After he had paid the stable boy to clean it up, it shined under the sun with the colors of the Royal family. He still had his pride and honor to uphold now that he didn''t look like a vagabond. "If you wish to make a formal complaint, you can send a raven to Father Emperor."


    "Fuck your father, and fuck you!" Assem roared. "I want that bitch on her knees now! I want her to beg for her pathetic life, and when I and the rest of my knights fuck her stupid, I may spare her!" Some spit came out with that last word. His eyes burned with a fury Randol hadn''t ever seen in the man before.


    "I will--"


    "I don''t care what you will! "Assem''s voice whipped across the group and cut Randol''s words off. "This is my fief! My lands! And yet, she dared to humiliate me in my own land! She isn''t apart of the royal family, so give me to her!"


    "No." Randol disregarded any notion that he could defuse the situation. Assem had always been a prideful weasel, even when he was struck down by his betters. He would always lash out at whomever he could wield his titles and little authority over. But he couldn''t hand Cyril over.


    "I do not care what you want!" Assem barked again. "Hand her over, or-" He turned the point of his sword to Randol. "I''ll take her and the rest of the girls!"


    "I''ll give you one chance," Randol''s eyes narrowed and his voice became dangerously cold. "Sheathe your weapon and return to your keep. I will forgive this transgression only this time but continue... " He pulled his sword from his side. "And I will met out punishment for this.


    Cyril tightened one arm around Priscilla, who slowly pulled her wand out of the new leather belt she had gotten early. Before, she would have shaken at the thought of an actual fight. Now though, she was ready. Assem and his shit-eating knights were nothing compared to death incarnate. Mai also brandished her sword and Desmond his wand.


    Assem dismounted his horse, along with the rest of his host, and he gave Randol a sinister smile. "I have lived under your damn boots while I was in the Capital, but I thought I finally became free once I got this backwater land. It turned out, I quite like it here, no dear Randol, or Father here to tell me what to do. Even if that damn maid is here, but I''ll change that today. If I can''t do what I want in my own lands, then I might a well-cut that pretty head of yours off and declare war on Uncle!"


    In spite of the dangerous situation, Randol was perplexed by how crazed this man was getting over such a simple knock out. Just how hard had she hit him to make him this crazy? He dismounted his horse always, and the others followed suit.


    "And do you all agree with him?" Randol turned his attention to the knights behind Assem.


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    All of them shook their heads and stepped back, but the crazed Earl didn''t notice. They all held their hands up while they guided their horses away from the host. They had also attracted quite a crowd around them and even more, people gathered on the other side of the river.


    "Back up." Desmond said to Cyril as he also backed away from the confrontation.


    The girls followed suit as Assem suddenly thrusted the tip of his saber at Randol''s exposed head. While Randol was a trained warrior and an official Knight, he barely avoided the sudden attack due to the lapse in his attention. He leaned to the side and brought his sword up.


    Steel on steel sang as sparks flew from as Randol deflected the blade away. Assem quickly stepped back, brought the sword with him before he thrusted again. This time, he aimed for the small opening just below the lip of his breastplate. Randol was surprised by his quickness. Last time they had spared ten years ago, he could barely hold the sword properly. Now, he moved with some proficiency.


    Unfortunately for Assem, some was not enough to beat Randol.


    Retaliation came too quick for Assem to pull away as the prince sidestepped the stab. He stepped in as he threw a heavy punch towards Assem''s chest. The metal-covered hand-hammered the man, who''s only protection was his finely made golden doublet, and he reeled away foaming with anger. The hit must have hurt as Assem clutched his chest, but he kept his sword up.


    "You''ll pay for that!" He roared like some cookie-cutter bad guy and lunged at Randol with a slash from the right. The attack was easily deflected as Randol parried the blow, reached out with his free hand and grabbed his shirt. Once he grasped the fabric, he pulled Assem around and ran him nose-first into the brick foundation of a raised house. Randol let him go and made some distance while keeping his back towards his group.


    Blood was smeared across the stone where Assem had been struck against. The sound had made a dull slap and the sound of his nose breaking. Assem curled up on the dirt road as he wailed in pain as blood gushed from his nose.


    "Give up!" Randol said. He''ll admit, the man had improved in his swordplay, but it was still like fighting a child. He didn''t want to take the life of this scumbag. It wasn''t worth it, and him being an Earl was enough of a political issue. He just wanted this farce to end. Assem slowly struggled to his feet, and nodded, still attempting to stem the blood flow.


    Randol sighed in relief and sheathed his sword. "I apologize for the offense Lady Cyril has done to you, and I''ll make it right," Randol explained. "But this is now how it will happen, and it won''t end with you making her a slave. Wait until I get to the capital and I will send remuneration."


    Assem only nodded. They stood in their respective spots for a few awkward moments before Randol gave his partings and gestured for his group to follow. Cyril was behind him while everyone else had decided to lead the horses on the river''s side. Things looked to have been settled as Assem finally managed to stop the blood and glared at Randol as he passed. When Randol passed, Assem suddenly whipped his sword around and pierced towards his unplated back. Steel rings only protected his back, and that was only for slashing. The saber was sharp and its tip truth. It would never have the ability to stop his thrust.


    "Look out!" Priscilla cried as she tried to form a spell along with Desmond. Mai rushed forward, but she would never reach him. Assem was only a couple feet from Randol...

 19 Onward, into the new world 9

    Each group, knights, commoners, and royals alike, stared in shock as Assem fell backward. His pained wails only stifled as his back crashed into the rock wall foundation of the house behind him. His off-hand clutched his now stubby arm below the elbow tightly. Rivulets of blood trickled from between his fingers. The rest of his arm missing, lopped off as it soared into the air; an uneven serpentine string trailing after it. After a few moments of flight, the liberated end his limb plopped onto the dirt at Cyril''s and Randol''s feet.


    Assem''s weapon, the saber, was now held in the ancient deity''s right hand. Its blade glimmered as the sun caught the crimson that slowly ran down its tip. She stood there, proud and beautiful, but also terrifying, as she stood over the maimed Earl. Her feline eyes narrowed with a reaper''s intent to take his soul. Confusion swirled through his mind. He hadn''t understood how she had managed to take it from him within the blink of an eye. However, more fear than confusion swirled through him and so he never voiced his questions - only his terror.


    "My Lord!" One of the Knights called out as he began to charge forward. His steps were quickly stilled by a warning glance from the perpetrator. At that moment, she resembled a Grim Reaper. Assem''s hand laid at her feet like some submissive demonic dog. She - it - was not human, the knight''s mind concluded before he scrambled back to his horse. He mounted it and quickly galloped away back into the north. The other knights rose their hands in surrender but made no move to follow their comrade.


    What she had done had only been a few blinks of the eye to them. To her, however, it had been nearly more than several seconds. Her form had been befitting of an amateur. Her swing was bulky and unsightly. The pure force she had put into that strike had cut away his arm, this she knew. She could kill a dragon, but strength didn''t make you swing better.


    Just as Desmond had prophesied before, Randol was just too arrogant for his own good. Not in a bad way, but Randol was an honorable man; he expected others to be the same. Even worse, he believed anyone of royal blood would also be honorable. He would eventually be stabbed in the back one of these years. Had Cyril not have been there, Desmond''s ill-fated words would have been fulfilled. Now, the blade was in her hand. It''s blade now pressed against the craven man''s chest above his heart.


    To Cyril''s hidden surprise, she felt her mana flowing into the blade. Its bloodied tip glowed faintly in the sunlight. To the untrained eye, it was undetectable. However, everyone in Randol''s grip knew what it was aside from Cyril. It was an enchanted blade. Assem himself had stopped wailing. He too had noticed the enchantment activate and he stiffened with dread.


    Assem knew what the saber had been enchanted with. It was his only trump card, one that had taken quite a bit of coin to have done quietly. Knight''s Bane was the name. It reinforced a metal point to pierce metal. Bone, wood, metal, or something else. So long as it was a point, it could be used. However, it was a difficult spell to have permanently attached to an object; as enchanting was.


    "Did... Did he try and--" Randol''s words were cut off by Cyril who was still burning with bloodlust.


    "Yes." Her words cracked like a whip in the air. It had pulled the dread-filled man from his trance and he began to plead.


    "Please!" He squeaked. "It was a joke! I swear!" The scent of piss and shit reached everyone''s noses. Mai had to keep her distance.


    Randol was still in shock. His mind saw the enchanted saber in her hand, and it couldn''t process it. "It was a joke, Cyril." He didn''t want to think that his family could do this. He could accept everything, but not his family willing to kill each other. Cyril stared at Randol, her pupils narrowed dangerously as she applied a small bit of force. The saber''s tip broke the luxurious fabric and drew blood as it dug into the flesh. Assem wailed like a pig being boiled alive.


    "I am Royalty! You can not k--" Assem tried to speak, his voice high and lacked its previous arrogance. Cyril did not dignify his words with her ears. With a quick thrust, the sword pierced the stones behind his heart. Blood pulsed out his back and down the blade. His life''s essence watered the weeds that grew along the wall. His face frozen with pain, fear, and the knowledge he had been killed. Indignation, confusion, and unwillingness swirled in his eyes.


    "P-Pull it out..." He whimpered. His hand clawed weakly at the hilt. Cyril felt annoyed that he was still alive and twisted the blade. Blood immediately pooled over his chest. She twisted the sword again, and more blood gushed forth. Assem tried to scream when it was twisted. Nothing came out. He fell limp after a few more seconds and the saber slipped from his chest as Cyril pulled away.


    "Anyone else?" Cyril asked as she turned her attention to the remaining knights. They all backed away, unwilling to fight the girl. She had enough gall to murder a royal family member in front of the First and Third Princes. Neither of them had ordered her to be killed yet either, thus, they weren''t going to try and fight her. They all scrambled onto their horses, and without a word, chased after their long gone comrade. She ignored the other audience and turned to Pricilla. She stared at the dead Earl with surprise.


    "Mai, get her saddled," Cyril ordered, her blood still up from Assem''s coward attack. She hadn''t been repulsed by the ease of her actions. All she thought about was protecting Randol. It had been a reflex, one she never knew she had.


    She watched as Mai and Desmond helped Priscilla onto the shire as Cyril walked over to the river and dipped it into the water to clean it off. When she came back, she found Randol waiting for her. He looked conflicted. "Why did you have to kill him...?" Randol asked. "He should''ve faced trial!" He raised his voice.

 20 Onward, into the new world 10

    Three long tense days later, the group had arrived at Gully''s Port. The journey had been heated as the First Prince and the ancient goddess had argued over Assem. As to add to their worries, they also weren''t sure how effective the artifact Cyril had used on them was. But no more apparitions haunted them within the woods, and it had been extremely dull. When they had more people, there was always some sort of entertainment to be had. Singing, dancing, or gossip. There was none of that within their group, at least, not after that argument.


    They passed beneath the Old Gate, the guards were more than happy they were gone. Priscilla had noted that the Inspection Officer, a low-ranked noble, had been nervous around Randol. He had been more nonchalant and uninterested in actually inspecting from what she saw. He had been more interested in making conversation with Cyril. This was until Randol had pushed his Royal Token in the officer''s face. Afterward, it had been smooth sailing, the officer more than willing to let them by.


    Priscilla rode between the goddess''s lovely arms again. She had been more than aware of the lustrous gleam; the officer hadn''t even bothered to try. It reminded her of a few of the "forbidden" books, stashed upon a high shelf in the study, she was keenly aware that it was a "romance" story. In it, there was a scene were an Inspection Officer had harassed the heroine sexually. This went out for a few paragraphs until the charming male lead came in to save her.


    While she didn''t remember the rest of that story, she had come to know that it was quite common for inspection officers to do such acts. Of course, to the common folk. In fact, there wasn''t a year when some inspection officers had not been jailed for their behavior. Nonetheless, once presented with a royal token, none of them were harassed.


    The horses trodded down the Old Avenue, their horses kept in single file and lock-stepped. Stalls lined either side of the large road. Wagons and carriages occupied the center, and in between it all, foot traffic weaved about. The peaceful sounds of nature, the songs of birds and wind, were replaced by shouts. The wagons rattled and there seemed to be someone always being nearly missed by one. Merchants advertised their wares loudly, and some even argued with each other.


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    Cyril wasn''t impressed. She noted that heavily beaten dirt road. The lack of buildings taller than three stories. Most were timber-framed while a few had some rock foundations showing. The only complete stone structures were the city''s walls and the City Lord''s castle. Built upon a hill, natural or man-made, she couldn''t say, it towered over the port city like a lone sentinel. It was... dull...


    The cities she had designed, along with her parents, were majestic, to say the least. Towering stones that caught the passing of digital clouds. City centers could reach stores close to one-hundred stories, though that was the technological cap. Buildings were adorned with murals and--- She changed the thought with a sigh. She made the mistake of comparing a real-world place to her digital empires. Of course, they wouldn''t have the ability to do such. Magic, in its very lore, was hard-pressed to complete the feats she had built.


    She didn''t exactly build within the confines of her own written lore.


    Her eyes wandered over the buildings on their sides. None reached higher than three stories. They were timber-framed homes with wood tile roofs. All of them were built up next to each other apartments. She hadn''t paid much attention to the homes in Quinn''s Wood, it had been a village, and she had not expected much there. This, however, was a city and her expectations were quickly broken. Unlike in anime, there weren''t any shops with glass windows. They were open windows with shutters and secured from the inside with security bars. The only structure that had remotely interested her was the castle that loomed over them.


    "Noble ladies!" A merchant called out to Cyril and Priscilla, their file forced closer by a small traffic jam. "Your beauty will be complemented by my wares!" He held up a lovely metal hairpin shaped in a moon and another shaped with a sun. Priscilla''s eyes lit up, but Cyril only smiled and waved them away with a polite refusal. They weren''t much to look at.


    "But they were adorable!" Priscilla whined as she leaned over to steal another glance.


    "We don''t have money." Cyril reminded her. "Desmond the rest of the money on rations."


    The merchant''s stall was left behind. As if a spell had been broken, shop and stall keepers called out to them. Their file smelled of money, though they had none to spend. Assem''s saber came to mind. Maybe she could sell it, Cyril thought.


    "Finely tailored dresses here!" A shop girl called out


    "Fresh bears!" A stall keep yelled. "Lovely ladies must have lovely fruits!"


    One by one, tenders tried to lure the file to their wares. As it was midday, the traffic was at its peak. They were kept to the fringes of the road, close to the shops and stalls. Thus, the two girls at the back of the line kept being solicited. The treatment, unfortunately, was not extended to the non-human in their group.


    Mai had to suffer dirty glares and mothers steering their children away in fear. Had she kept her robe, she would have hidden away underneath. It wasn''t until one of the stall owners had yelled at her did Cyril and Priscilla notice.


    "Filthy savage!" She cursed with disgust.


    Then she noticed the stares, and even obscene gestures were thrown up at her.


    "Stupid peasants." Priscilla''s demeanor changed as she glared down at the people now.


    "Why are they doing that?" Cyril had half a mind to dismount and commence a whole-sale beating upon them.


    "They hate her," Priscilla said. "She''s a beast-kin, and they still hate them from a war none of them had ever fought in."


    "War?" Cyril tried to remember if there were any long-held grudges she wrote, but none came to mind.


    "The War of the Planes," Priscilla answered. "It happened nearly just over a hundred years ago. The Empire tried to annex the Beastial planes. They had underestimated the tribes and ended up retreating from the planes utterly defeated. The Beast-kin are stronger, faster, and more resilient. Only off-set by their low birth rates, they''re forced to be reckoned with. Mai is more human than beast, but it doesn''t stop them from hating her. "


    "Do you hate her...?" Cyril asked.


    "No..." Priscilla asked sadly.


    The pair fell silent as Desmond began to shout back at a pair of men who yelled at Mai.

 21 Onward, into the new world 11

    "Take good care of her," Cyril sent the tavern''s stable boy a smile that stole his breath. "She''s my friend." The boy was taken aback by the tender affection she showed the horse. She patted the horse''s side before she turned to him and held out a single gold coin. The glint of gold broke his trance, and he tried to decline it out of fear. "Take it and take care of my friend here. I don''t need you to hand feed her and treat her like a queen, but just make sure she isn''t mistreated."


    "Of course, me'' lady!" The boy took the coin after several more assurances that Cyril didn''t want over the top treatment of the shire. "I''ll give her fresh apples as well!"


    "That''s more like it." Cyril let out a melodious laugh. The boy, no older than Priscilla, blushed. She bid him a good day and left the large stables. Beyond the stable''s doors, was a courtyard. It was larger than courtyard a city tavern had the right to have, but the Ivory Pavilion was Gully''s Port''s best tavern by word of mouth. Cyril weighted the remaining ten gold coins in her hand. She considered depositing it into her storage.


    "Don''t do it," Priscilla warned her as she appeared at her side.


    "I was only thinking about it." Cyril rolled her eyes and dumped the coins into the new leather pouch. It hung beneath the hilt of her sword. "Where did you come from anyways?"


    "I waited for you." Priscilla smiled innocently.


    "You were supposed to go with Desmond to get our rooms," Cyril said as she found an empty table to sit at.


    "Desmond wanted me to make sure you didn''t rip reality open in front of everyone." Priscilla laughed. "I have half a mind to believe you''d do it."


    "I do not rip reality open in --" Cyril was cut short by Priscilla.


    "Your storage space." She reminded her.


    Cyril''s lips were parted, caught mid-sentence. Her pride wanted her to fight against the notion. The problem was that spatial magic technically was ripping apart reality. At least, in the way she designed it to be used. It was a cool notion she had stolen from a movie with Jax, and thus, she added it into her game as the lore behind it.


    "So is any other magic." Cyril huffed in defeat and Priscilla covered her mouth as a grin began to spread.


    "Anyways," She began. "I never knew you were a natural flirt."


    "How?" Cyril''s right eyebrow raised.


    "The stable boy." She said. "I saw what you did in there." And she was also a tad jealous that damnable peasant got to hear Cyril''s lovely laugh.


    "People are more willing to do nice things for you if you''re nice to them," Cyril said as she waved over a barmaid. She only ordered a mug of water while Priscilla chose tea. The barmaid disappeared into the tavern, and out came the rest of the boys. Mai was absent. "Where''s Mai?" Cyril asked.


    "I wasn''t asking you." Cyril bit back.


    "A prince does not--" Randol was cut off my Priscilla.


    "And she''s the creator." Priscilla buffed out her chest with pride like a minion would do when their boss was a big shot.


    "You''re getting braver," Randol observed, annoyed that for once, someone other than his father could speak to him without respect.


    Added into the pot of grievance that Randol had compiled since Quinn''s Wood; he had to add Assem''s saber in. Cyril had stopped at a large weaponsmith on the way. She had sold Assem''s saber for nearly half its worth. Fifteen gold coins. Randol had wanted to hand it over to his uncle as an apology, though, Cyril was a vindictive goddess from what they found out. The shop owner offered to pay twenty-five gold coins for the saber, as he had known someone who''d pay for it.


    Randol, still annoyed with her, had begun to argue with her in the shop. Honor demanded that the sword be handed to Assem''s father. Cyril had the shop owner lowered his buying price by a gold coin. When Randol had begun to argue again, She lowered it again. Then again, until it had stopped at fifteen gold coins where Randol had finally kept quiet. To top it off, she kept ten for herself and handed Mai the rest. She did so while she kept eye contact with the angered prince.


    Randol took that as an insult to his pride.


    As they sat at the table, the maid came by and took their requests for food. Desmond rubbed his head in distress. Cyril had been quite the agreeable person, if not allot somewhat, but she turned out to be just as stubborn as his brother. She had wiped away the blight of the northern lands, yet Randol couldn''t be happy about it. The woman had slain a dragon in a matter of minutes. That fact may have been the only reason his brother hadn''t challenged her to a duel. There was nothing he could honestly do to her, even if he tried.


    "You were doing so well a moment ago," Desmond sighed again. "Can you both just at least act amicable?"


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    "Only if he apologizes," Cyril said resolutely.


    "Only if she promises to tell Assem''s father what she had done." Randol said.


    "Fine." Cyril shrugged. Randol hadn''t expected her to agree, his retort hung on the tip of his tongue. "I''ll do it." She said.


    "Okay then..." Randol''s eyes narrowed suspiciously.


    "Dearest brother," Desmond sighed again. "Bury this hatchet, please."


    "I apologize for arguing with you," Randol chewed the words awkwardly.


    A smile bloomed on Cyril''s pink lips that made Randol smile back on impulse.


    "Done!" She said as the barmaids delivered their food. "Friends?" She held out her delicate white hand out.

 22 A night full of terrors

    The man''s wail was cut short, his face illuminated by orange light, as the black longsword cut him in two. From his shoulder to pelvis, his guts splattered onto the onyx skeleton''s bony feet. Blue hell-fire eyes reflected in the man''s terror-filled eyes. The village of Iron Horn on his left, being ravaged by flames. Screams filled the air along with a mass of smoke that half shielded the moon and stars.


    Layla''s heart roared as fear and adrenaline pulsed through her veins. It screamed at her to run, run far from the unholy monster that stood before her. Black as night, and nearly invisible if not for flame-light; but her maternal instincts kept her rooted. Because behind her, terrified screams of children and their mothers sounded. However, even if she wanted to flee, the skeleton blocked the path.


    The skeleton brought the longsword up again, almost mechanically, and stepped over the dead man. Then it brought the sword up and chopped at Layla. She parried at an angle with the flat. The swords sparked on contact, but the longsword slid away into the dirt at Layla''s side. She used the moment to spring the shortsword around, then thrusted the point of her sword at its skeleton''s right eyesocket. She was too slow.


    The skeleton reared its head. The blade fell an inch short, and she retreated; cursing her short reach. The monster pulled the blade from the dirt and gave chase. Its bones rattled angrily with each step up the side of the mountain. Layla was already tired from the other skeletons she had fought, this being the last one of the group. She didn''t know how much longer she could fight for...


    Without respite, the skeleton attacked again. It brought the sword around again, this time, it swung horizontally as it stepped at her. With a longer reach, and well within its range, Layla had no choice but to duck. The sword cut a few locks of her dark brown hair that had failed to follow her in time. Once the sword had passed, she took her chance.


    She sprung up, like a leopard, and stabbed for its eye again. This time, the skeleton could not react in time. Just as it was recovering from its own strike, it turned into the attack. The blade pierced through the socket, and the flame. The skeleton let out a low whine before it crumbled to the dirt. Its bones joined its fallen brothers as they clattered against the other bones.


    Layla panted heavily, and her body burned. She had been fighting for no more than ten minutes. However, she hadn''t fought for her life in years. Her muscles had grown weak with peace. Reaction, strength, and agility had left her. Had she been at her peak nearly ten years ago, she could have easily slaughtered all of these monsters. Alas, motherhood had called upon her, and she had grown complacent, and that complacency would be the death of her yet.


    Her little enclave was the most defensible position with one way up or down. Steep precipices towered opposite of the village. She had picked this spot because of it. Had this been a bandit attack, it would have been the safest place in the village. The undead did not think nor fear, thus whatever advantage she had, besides it being a chokepoint, was lost. Even after she had killed six of them, that last one still fought to the end.


    She turned her eyes back down the path. Several more bodies laid further down, where the skeletons had caught some.


    Her eyes flicked further down as a group of four villagers scrambled up the path. In tow, six skeletons gave chase; their blades nipping at their heels.


    "Help!" One of them called out.


    "Layla, help us!" A woman cried. "By the Gods, help us!"


    She could faintly see their bodies. They were bloodied and covered in grime. None of them carried any weapons of a sort. Layla cursed them in her heart. They had brought more to her, and she was nearing her limit. She had just fought a group with just her and the dead man. Now, they brought more. Without offering to help her fight, the group passed by her. The fresh skeletons changed their target to her.


    The group was not tight or orderly, rather, they were a small file of monsters. The first in the file charged Layla with a black shortsword. She pulled the mana in her to her offhand, knocked the monster''s blade aside, and countered with an open palm-full of swirling wind. The magic, shaped with her intent, exploded forward and flung the skeleton over its friends. The next one never faltered and cleaved down at her with a bastard sword.


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    She sidestepped to the right and crashed into the stone mountainside with her right side. The second skeleton and the third stabbed at her, and she evaded backward. The swords bit into the stone and skeletons jerked from their momentum. She took the momentary opening and pierced the second skeleton''s eye. It crumbled away, and she kicked the third before it could fully recover. A gleam of a black blade cut through the darkness on her right. She ducked and rolled back.


    It was the fourth skeleton, flanked by the last two as it charged past the third. She willed mana into her offhand again, but this time, the three skeletons attacked at once. The first chopped down, and the other two attacked from their respective sides with stabs. The three-pronged attack almost got her. The blades only tore through the hem of her dress. Then the middle skeleton attacked again.


    It thrusted the sword out, long and black, it cut the smokey air. Layla parried, knocked its blade away as she stepped into the attack; throwing a large semi-transparent orb that swirled in her off-hand into its face. The aethereal orb splashed over the skull and both the Hell-fire and the orb clashed for a moment. Then, the skeleton crumbled. The hell-fire extinguished from its eyes.


    The fifth and sixth continued their assault, the left skeleton stabbed again; the fifth slashed downward at her. She jumped back, rammed against her fence that marked the end of her courtyard. The wood creaked in protest, and a black blade cut against through the air. She was late on the evasion and the blow, a stab from the third skeleton, had stabbed through her left forearm as she tried to bring it up forth another spell.


    She let out a pained gasp as she felt the blade stab through her muscle. Searing heat shot through her arm, followed by a sudden chill. As she pulled away, the blade cut a few more inches down her forearm. She swung her sword around and severed the skull from its spin. The onyx skull danced wildly through the air and off the edge of the sloped path. The skeleton let go of its weapon and tried to chase after its head before, it too, fell off the side.


    How, along with her lungs, her forearm burned, and she had lost the ability to juggle spells with her sword. She was not a trained Magic Swordswoman, she could not challenge her mana through her sword, nor could she rely on her magic solely. Thus, she could not use her Holy Banishment anymore. One of the few spells she had learned from her adventuring days.


    She grimaced at the pain. Baring her teeth, she charged wildly at the remaining two monsters. This warcry was accompanied by another as one of the wounded men from earlier charged in with her, Layla''s shovel in hand.


    "Aaahhh!" Layla cried out in her do or die moment.

 23 A Night full of Terrors 2

    Both the skeletons, unthinking monsters with the sole intent of killing the living; stabbed and cut at her. The left one swung at her, and the man parried away the blow with the blade of the shovel. A lucky blow. Layla stepped slightly aside, let the blade cross a foot away and grabbed the hilt of the black sword. The skeleton tried to pull away, if only just to set up for another blow, and Layla stabbed her the tip of her sword through its left eye socket. Its death whine called out before it crumbled away.


    The man was not so lucky after his entrance. He tried to parry with the shovel again, but the blade cut through the wooden shaft. Then through his skull.


    "Aahh!" Layla cried out once more, and with the remains of her strength, killed the last skeleton.


    It fell away down the sloped path as the man fell back. Sword still cleaved through his head. The sword pierced the dirt, not willing to give from its new home. The black that colored the blade melted away in the firelight and was replaced with rust. The blade was but an old blade, no longer that ominous blade that had cut her flesh like butter.


    "Fredrick!" One of the women called out as she rushed out to the dead man.


    She sobbed as she knelt beside the dead man. She muttered insults and promises to the man, her sorrow was as clear as he was dead. Not that it mattered to Layla. She cared not one bit for the man, nor the girl. She had only cared to protect the children, and maybe the mothers.


    Layla fell back against the fence, only built a few years ago. It hadn''t been painted yet, and now was stained with her blood. She stabbed the sword into the dirt and tore a peirce of the once pristine cotton dress. She bandaged her wounds quickly before she could bleed out, her arm already red with her blood. She tried to control her breathing as her lungs protested from her sudden fight. Her muscles quaked from the effort, and now her left forearm burned.


    But she was still alive.


    She was not religious, still, she uttered a thank you to every god she knew. To Alistair, the human god; to the forgotten wind, God of the forgotten; To Hades, the god of the Demons; Lastly, to Akysyss, God of the Dragons. Then she uttered a wish, a prayer, or a desire. She did not know what to call it, but she wanted the strength to see her child again. To see Savannah and to tell her she loved her.


    Despite her sudden willingness to pray to the gods, she laughed out at the childishness of it. They would not help her survive. She had to do it on her own.


    "Why are you laughing?" The sobbing woman looked up, almost offended.


    "Shut up," Layla said with a groan. "I''ll laugh if I want to. I just killed a group of fucking monsters. You did nothing."


    "Family is the most important thing. Go to her, and never let her go." A sweet, melodious whisper reached Layla''s ear. As if it were just a passing breeze. A sudden warmness filled her. Summer. It felt like a cool summer day...


    ¡Þ?¡Þ


    Twisted and pale, his body rested on the lip of his tomb. One black feathered wing stretched out on his left. One Boney wing stretched out on his right. His eyes, glimmering blue orbs of ice, looked over the kneeling draugr. The Lord of the Damned, or little known by his truth name of Lahabiel, was pale as snow and wore nothing over his muscular body. His body the height of perfection, aside from a glaring red "x" over his heart. The mark of his failure.


    "And this mortal, who had slain a part of our forces, got away...?" Lahabiel''s voice was dangerously low, almost a snarl.


    "Yes. She was a skilled warrior." The draugr answered.


    "And you did not kill her yourself, why?" Lahabiel asked.


    "I had sent more of Black Ones." The Draugr answered. "I believed it would have been enough to deal with the mortal."


    "Clearly, it wasn''t," Lahabiel growled.


    "We have given chase, my Lord." The Draugr informed Lahabiel, but he only huffed at the undead''s failure.


    "Commander Jogun." Lahabiel began. "You have led my forces in the years past, but I did not believe you would have such a meager failure."


    Jogun''s only response was a deeper bow of his head.


    "Leave," Lahabiel commanded. "Chase after them, but do not go too far. If they manage to leave our reach, it is nothing... There is a more pressing matter. I feel a great power to the south, and we will march for it."


    "Yes, my lord," Jogun said.


    "Also find out how long we''ve been gone from the world," Lahabiel added. "Let us leave now."


    The drauger nodded as the fallen angel got up from his tomb. His angelic body perfect, and beautiful, and deadly. While he was an angel, he was also the Lord of the Damned. The fallen angel who had helped destroy heaven, and joined the Evil God Hades; Goddess Cyril''s father. He was one of his warriors, and now he walked the mortal plane. As did Jogun. Neither were aware of why they had been brought back.


    Lahabiel, nude for all to see, passed the draugr and into out through the broken doorway. He stepped out into a large corridor, old and forgotten by time itself. Tens of tombs lined the corridor, and all of them had been opened. Blood and mangled dead men littered the far end of the corridors. The foolish mortals who had broken into his tomb, and had paid with their lives.


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    The tombs belonged to his Black Ones. While they were not great fighters, they were immortal. If one had died, Lahabiel could create another. Constructs of Lahabiel''s creation, and far from perfect. They learned over the course of their lives but lost their knowledge upon death. Their uses were limited. For now. He had not the time to tinker with them before he had died, but he would change that. Eventually, he would create a powerful undead army and renew the world.


    Lahabiel smiled as he stopped in front of the dead men. There were no less than twenty men, armed with pickaxes. He raised his palm, pulled the mana from the air, and it festered into a black fog in his hand. Once he was satisfied with the amount he created, her upturned his palm. The black corruption dropped listlessly from his hand and onto the bloodied flagstones below. It began to swim towards the nearest ten bodies before it slipped in through their mouths.


    The bodies began to convulse and the flesh began to split. The bodies bent unnaturally as their bones began to move. First, their spines ripped broke the skin before their hands moved over and torn their wounds open. Blood and guts gushed over the flagstones, wetting Lahabiel''s feet. The sensation made the corner of his smile grow.


    In a matter of minutes, the ten glossy black skeletons stood in the ruins of flesh and meat. Their bodies were unmarred by filthy mortal blood.


    "Rearm yourselves," Lahabiel said in the dialect of angels.


    While Jogun did not speak Heavianic, he still understood it. His black hollow eyes watched as the skeletons, drone-like, wade through the shallow sea of blood. They found stone weapon racks. Their contents, long rusted, turned black in their hands. Longswords, shortswords, and maces. All obsidian.


    As they did that, Lahabiel dropped another mass of fog onto the ground. It infected the remaining bodies and they danced more wildly than the skeletons had. Also unlike the skeletons, their transformations were done within mere seconds. They did not become Black Ones, instead, they became snarling zombies. Fresh, they snarled at each other before they whimpered at the fallen angel.

 24 Righting Wrongs Through Blood

    The bar was empty, aside from the two men who sat at the long counter. A woman had just finished setting the chairs on top of the tables. She mopped away the day''s spilled drinks now. She was watched by another man who stood at the entrance to the establishment. His watchful eye trained on the mop.


    A TV shimmered with the late-night news. The light reflected off the whiskey bottle in Edward''s hand as he took a sip out of it. Jax sat beside him as he nursed his beer bottle. He was not looking to be hungover today. It was a form of self-punishment. So he would not forget what today was. For the rest of his miserable existence, he had to remember.


    Neither had spoken to each other for the better part of the night. Edward was now visibly tipsy. His eyes bloodshot, and his gaunt cheeks tear-stained. He drank the whiskey for courage. He had just lost his entire world, his moon, stars, and sun, in a single week. Both buried in a span of six days. He plotted in his head, schemed on what to do from there. Edward had always found a path forward.


    Sadly, even with the liquid courage in his veins; the old man could not find a way forward. It angered him. Annoyed him, and for the worst part; it reminded him how powerless he was against nature.


    "So are you going to talk to me?" Jax finally spoke up


    Edward blew a sigh, then he shifted in his seat. He did not honor that with a reply. He only frowned.


    "I see it on your face," Jax said. "You want to chew me out. I know that look."


    If this were any other time, the two men would be joking and socializing. Edward was good at that. Now? He wanted to rip heads. Burn towns, and scorch the earth for his woes. Yet, Jax had finally pushed the button for the flood gates to open.


    "How could you have done that?" Edward asked. He looked down at the whiskey bottle with a look of repulsion.


    "Do what?" Jax asked as he sat his bottle down.


    "You know," Edward said with a sneer.


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    "No," Jax said, a flame growing in him. "I won''t know unless you tell me."


    "Cheat on my little girl." Edward spat.


    The suddenness of that made Jax wince.


    "So she told you," Jax mumbled. For the most part, he had hoped this wouldn''t see the light of day. In some odd way, it hadn''t since it was night.


    "Are you going to do it now...?" Jax looked over to Edward''s personal guard. The man in question only glared at Jax.


    "Heh," Edward huffed. "That girl is as stubborn as I am. If I did that, she would never speak to me for a month. Wasn''t worth it." He took a swing of his whiskey. Though, this time, it was to calm his rage.


    "So... How did you find out?" Jax asked timidly.


    "You think I don''t read her messages?" Edward asked. "Two kids ''madly in love'' and I''m supposed to leave that unchecked? Your fucking ass I wouldn''t. We argued over it for a while, but you''re lucky. That girl loved you something fierce."


    "Yes..." Jax said sadly. "She did. Of all my regrets, that is the biggest one. I was weak, and... I couldn''t stand not being able to hold the one I loved. I know it''s a stupid excuse, and I hate myself for it."


    "I know, I read that part too," Edward said before he took another swing.


    "I guess you did, heh," Jax said as he twiddled with the bottle in front of him.


    "But, why?" Edward asked softly. "Why did you have to hurt her? Do you know how much that hurt her? I love you like a son, yet I hate you just as much because of it. You had a good thing, and you fucked it up."


    Jax winced.


    "I''m not going to lie," Edward continued. "I take great pleasure in your self-destructive tendencies now. I like to see it as karma if there was any."


    "If you love me, why are you taking pleasure in my suffering?" Jax asked.


    "Because you can still hate someone you love," Edward answered. "Love and hate go hand in hand, boy. I learned that long ago. But why I take pleasure in seeing it? Because you broke my girl. If she hadn''t loved you, maybe she would have lived longer. Maybe she would have survived. Yet, she loved you, and she''s dead now."


    "I don''t think it''s fair to pin all---" Jax was cut off.


    "Yes, I think it is," Edward growled. "Or had you never noticed? She only grew worse after you broke her heart. She lost her spark, her will. She lost what made my star a star, and she grew dull until she fizzled out. You little fucking shit, if you loved her, how could you never notice that?"


    Jax only felt smaller in his seat. He knew it in his heart. The stress he caused her, the stress of their relationship. It was only after he lost her and matured that he knew his folly. Knew his transgressions must have been the biggest factor in her growing worst.

 25 2

    The man slammed the bottle on the bar top so hard, Jax could have sworn it could have broken. Edward''s grip was white and he could see he gripped it fiercely. He was mad, grieving over his girls, and he lost his way.


    "We loved you boy," Edward whined as more tears came. Maddin and me. We always hoped you would have been our son-in-law, but you had to go and kill her.


    Jax had no defense. He had been stupid and young. Despite that being no excuse for his sins, it was all he had.


    "You can hit me in your want," Jax said as he looked the crying man in the eyes.


    "That isn''t going to fix anything," Edward turned back to his whiskey, but Jax saw the desire to rip into him. "I''m too old for that, and Cyril will be mad with me if I do. She''s had her heart broken once too many. My little star trusts me, and unlike you, I cherish that."


    "I know. I didn''t deserve her." Jax agreed wholeheartedly.


    He had fallen for an angel but dishonored her by sleeping with the snake. And it had bitten him in his ass. He had been so lonely, never able to touch the one he loved. He just wanted someone to hold in his darkest moment. Yet, that weakness had cost him dearly. He was less than a man. Less than an insect. He had no more worth than the dirt upon the earth.


    "You know," Edward began. "All that money I give you, that''s all Cyril and Maddin''s."


    "What?" Jax turned to Edward. "Wait, wasn''t--"


    "The trust fund was Maddin and Cyril''s last wish," Edward said. "That you''d be taken care of after my little girl was gone. Despite being hospitalized, and my daughter, I did pay her for what she did. Even against her, and those fucking board members'' wishes. Even bought her that house in Malibu for you guys... Maddin... I don''t know her reason."


    "Wait..." Jax stiffened. He was aware of where the money came from; however, he was not aware that of a house in Malibu. "I never heard of this house before."


    "Of course you didn''t." Edward rolled his jaw as his merry-go-round of emotions swirled to its new target. "I had to sell it before one of those fucking board members tried to steal it! The stuff they''re doing, the things they''ve done, I''m just learning about. I''m thinking of fixing that soon, though.


    "W-What are you going to do...?" Jax felt a little fear. If you''d known Edward for a week while Cyril was alive - You''d know how fiercely he''d protect her. He was domineering, petty, and was not above underhanded tricks. Jax had an inkling of how Edward used to be. He''d heard rumors. By his late wife''s words, the man now had calmed dramatically down when Cyril had been born.


    "So," Jax paused to contemplate his words. "Criminal proceedings, or just an all our war.


    "Neither," Edward''s old smile turned sinister. "It''s going to a massacre.


    ¡Þ?¡Þ


    The rear passenger door of the SUV opened, and a black umbrella fanned. It''s inky plastic collected the rain that fell from the grey night sky. Out stepped Edward, his suit slightly disheveled from a small fight he and Jax got into. Despite what that boy had done to his little girl, he couldn''t... fully hate him. He too had been an idiotic child. Ruined love for temporary pleasures. Despite what he said to him, he couldn''t fault it. Edward wasn''t a perfect man, but Cyril...


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    Cyril had been the star that guided him in the night. Maddin had been the moon that lit his path onward. All that he had done, all that he was. His family didn''t get filthy rich by being clean all the time. He''d done things. Those girls had set him straight. Given him a purpose. Given him a reason to make amends, and a purpose. Now that both of them were gone, he threw it all to the wind.


    "Everything is ready, Mr. Bailey." A man dressed in black tactical overalls appeared in front of him. He had been more occupied with seeing the night sky that his surroundings. He appraised the man for a second, noted his rifle slung across his chest. There was a pistol on his leg too.


    "Good." Edward nodded.


    He seemed to age a few years with those words as he moved. His once confident stride, now no more than a Death Row Inmate''s last shuffle to the chair. His aim? His mansion. The mansion he had raised his daughter in. The mansion where he had wed his wife. The mansion that was supposed to be passed to his only child. It was the very same mansion where tens of men began to spread out. Their figures slowly melting away into shadows as they prepared.


    He found himself frozen on top of the covered landing by the front door. His eyes wandered to the floor. There, by his feet, was the last physical thing his daughter had left. A misshapen yellow chalk drawing of a parrot.


    "Daddy!" Cyril''s voice echoed in his ear. Her ghostly child figure was there, still drawing it. "Will you buy me a parrot too?! I want one just like the one we saw today!"


    "Daddy will." Edward''s voice roared in his ear. "James, have Katalin look up information on parrots. Have her also print out photos of ones for sale, and we''ll let her Cyril pick out which one she wants."


    The ghostly scene had wafted away by the cold wind. Or, had it been the passage of time? It had been the day of the incident. It had been one of the few times he sat, and played, with her. Actually played with her. It had been a beautiful day they had shared at the zoo, then they drew this picture together before they left. He had needed it; the stress had been eating him alive.


    And after almost nine years, this single last drawing had been preserved. Held from the elements with science. It was held under a thick layer of clear coat.


    "Are you sure you want to do this?" One of his guards asked him. "You''d be--"

 26 3

    With that said, he pushed open the front double doors. The foyer was dimly lit and visibly decrepit. It wasn''t run down, but it hadn''t been cleaned in months by the dust. The living room was visible from where they stood. Every piece of furniture had been covered with thick cloths. However, this was a backdrop to all the men in black who carried thick military cases around.


    Thick cables ran through the hallway, half of them ran off to the servers important company. Fiance, logistics, and other highly sensitive information he had long moved into his home. The business world was violent and unforgiving for those who reached his heights. It wasn''t unusual to deal with corporate spies who''d seek to steal Cyril''s code or schematics for her medical pod. It was his way of protecting the companies profits. In turn, kept Cyril alive with her multi-million dollar medical bill...


    A bill he''d gladly take on if... If she could come back to him...


    "Sir?" His personal guard was beside him now.


    "Yes?" Edward cleared his throat. "Was I doing it again?"


    The guard nodded, and Edward continued on.


    They passed by the several men, all of which stood at attention as they passed by. They turned a corner and entered Edward''s study. It was a windowless room with a hologram picture on the wall. It was a picture of Cyril and Maddin enjoying a nice summer day. It was one of Edward''s favorites. He pulled a chair behind his large real wood mahogany desk, then brushed his fingers through his thinning hair.


    None of the two men sat in the seats across from him.


    "Are you sure this isn''t overkill, Sir?" The man in black asked.


    "No," Edward replied weakly. "Nothing can survive. Not a single server must survive."


    "Would could wipe the servers," His guard said. "Just to be safe."


    "No!" Edward looked up. His anger at the notion gave him the strength to challenge it. "My daughter is in those servers!"


    "Sir, not to be disrespectful, but the Yo--" He was cut off by Edward''s glare.


    "Died?" He huffed. His scowl, once a fierce thing, not looked forced under his withered appearance. "I''m aware that she is dead. But her avatar is just as much my daughter as her real body had been as well. Those servers are her grave as much as the one under her tree!"


    "I''m sorry," The guard bowed slightly. "I misspoke."


    Silence filled the room for a moment.


    "Its fine..." Edward sighed afterward. The anger was still apparent on his flexing jaw. A jaw that was soon covered by a hand. "What am I doing..." He asked himself. By his tone, both the men knew it wasn''t meant to be answered.


    "This is crazy..." Edward said as he rubbed his eyes. Despite the guard noting his bad complexion, he seemed to have aged more in the span of a few minutes.


    The old man chuckled at that.


    "I would agree," The personal guard chimed in. "Look at what he did for the Young Mistress? Crazy, yes, but it''s the Bailey way if there was one."


    Edward looked up and nodded with a smile. A genuine one.


    "Well," Edward began to chuckle. "I got one more in me. I''m going to let them remember why I use to be called the Black Dragon of America. They want my treasure? Well, they can have it. Along with fire and brimstone."


    Edward''s eyes glinted with cold malice.


    ¡Þ?¡Þ


    Mr. Harrison stepped out of the Chevy Suburban. His umbrella in his left, and a small Subway sandwich in his right. Front and center, his potbelly slightly jiggled as he planted both his feet on the driveway. His eyes looked over Chairmen Bailey''s home. He felt mortified, but curious, both equally wrapped up in one large fat package. Mr. Harrison never forgot who he worked for.


    Some sort of Mafia, or gang, or something... Maybe the Yakuza. He didn''t know. What he did know was his boss was some sort of terrifying man. Said to crush a man with his bare hands. Mr. Harrison wasn''t a man to believe in petty rumors. He had seen a glimpse of the underbelly of the company; that was enough to kill even the mere thought of taking advantage of him.


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    Mr. Harrison was a man who loved dogs, food and traveling. Moreso when he could take his pets to travel to sample the cuisines of the world. To do such, Mr. Harrison had developed a keener eye for details. Such details had made him quite the board member.


    All these small details also led to one thing... Why was he called to Owner Bailey''s home? Did he figure out that he had been secretly hiding snacks in the company vehicle? Or did he find out that he had charged his company card to cover a meal the other day? He meant to put the money back, he only 3had just forgotten his card at home. The money should have already been put back in fact.


    He cycled through all the possible scenarios in his head. Even the mundane ones. He had too. He''d seen plenty of crime dramas, and usually, one didn''t get summoned to the boss''s home unless they were about to be killed; or praised...? He hadn''t done something to earn Chair--

 27 4

    Mr. Harrison froze as he turned slowly to his right. A few feet away stood a man in all black and held a rifle. Pointed at him.


    "Mr. Bailey has requested your presence in his office." The man said calmly.


    Mr. Harrison slowly turned to where his guards were in the SUV. Only, he found that they all were surrounded by six armed men as well. All of which outgunned, and outnumbered the two suited guards.


    "Y-Yes!" Mr. Harrison squeaked. "B-But could you not kill them...?"


    "We had no intention to do so. As long as they behave, that is." The man said.


    With that, he was lead - along with his guards - up the walkway. Any thought of escaping was smothered in its crib. The closer he got, the more of Owner Baliey''s guards could be picked out among the garden. Most of their eyes and guns trained on them. Nothing unsettled him more than what he saw next.


    Bodies and blood. Lots of blood. The insignias of his three colleagues on their suits. They were their personal guards. Nearly twenty bodies were neatly lined up, off to the side and out of the way. Despite the amount of blood on the floor, the landing was pristine. There wasn''t a single pockmark from a bullet anywhere. The sheer brutal precision scared Mr. Harrison as he skirted the scared puddles of blood.


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    "You''re men are going to wait out here." One of the masked men by the door said.


    Mr. Harrison stiffened at the words, but the guard was quick to soothe his fears.


    "Mr. Bailey has ordered you and your men safe," He said. "The others did not have that protection."


    Even with that, Mr. Harrison felt he was walking on thin ice now. Leaving his protection at the front door, he was lead through the neglected home. He could see that beauty it once held, many years ago, through all the dust. As he looked up, he nearly tripped over a thick cable. He was caught mid-fall by the guard.


    "Watch your step, sir." The guard warned. "Plenty of trip hazards."


    "Right, right!" Mr. Harrison nodded vigorously as he regained his balance.


    "Hello, Harrison." A dreadful voice sounded out. "Take a seat."


    "G-Good evening, Owner Bailey!" Mr. Harrison squeaked as his body quickly gravitated to the empty seat closest to him. His eyes settled on the old man across from them. The man''s eyes had a sharpness that could flay them if it wanted too, and he felt it.


    "Good evening." Edward nodded. "Now that we''re all here. Let''s get into the thick of it. Starting with why you are all here."


    The board looked at each other with a mix of fear and uncertainty. On a normal day, no doubt they''d stomp right up to him and demand answers. Now, after having lost their protection, they meekly kept their egos to themselves.


    "O," Edward gestured with his left hand to a dark corner of the office. "I forgot to introduce you to a very important guest."


    As he said that, one of the guards went forward and pulled a man from the corner. His head was covered in a black cloth, and he wore an orange jumpsuit. He was hauled over front and center, then thrown on the floor at the board members'' feet. The man pained groans were soft, almost like he had no energy to voice them at all. The armed guard then pulled the hood off and revealed a withered elderly man.


    "Met my brother," Edward had a smile ear to ear. "I spent quite a lot of effort to... Liberate him from his prison cell. He''s been my guest here for a couple of days. Say hi, John."


    "H... Help... Me..." He pleaded. His face was cut and bruised, and he appeared skeletal.


    "Mind his manners," Edward said. "He''s been in prison for eight and a half years. He was the one who ran my wife and daughter over. So I felt it was only right that''d I include him in tonight''s festivities."


    "And that would be?" One of the board members asked. He was tanned and slightly chubby. He was the youngest and most brazen of the four members at the age of thirty-seven. While he clenched the arms of his leather chair, there was anger in his eyes. Edward only turned his gleeful eyes to the young man.


    "A Bailey always remembers its debts," Edward laughed.


    "Debts?" The young man asked.


    To the question, Edward offered a response in the form of a hand gesture. At the sight of it, the guard walked over to the desk. It was then that Mr. Harrison noticed there were files on the desk. Thick ones. These were handed out to each of them, though, John Bailey''s folder was just dropped by his face.

 28 5

    Mr. Harrison''s hands trembled as he took the file from the guard.


    "Page one," Edward narrated. "Mr. Owens has... appropriated fifty-six million dollars since his introduction onto the board three years ago. Also since his introduction, he has been found to have committed about sixty-three crimes in his capacity. Included is the attempted bribery of government officials. **** of several low-level female employees, and the murder of said employees, and tampering of witnesses. These are the largest issues on the list. I won''t delve into the smaller, but equally damning matters."


    Mr. Harrison read down the list. He felt disgusted at his colleague. He also felt confused about how Owner Bailey had known about all of this, yet had not done anything. However, before he could ask that, he went on. They flipped a few pages over to the next person. His crimes had been even more horrible. Molestation of children. Kidnapping. Drug trafficking...


    On and on they went until all three of his colleagues were just as pale as the man on the floor. Each of them looked ready to lunge at the Owner Bailey but were kept in place by the sudden appearance of more guards. Each held pistols in their hands but kept them pointed down behind them. Mr. Harrison began to sweat. He wasn''t a dirtbag like the others, but...


    "Mr. Harrison," Edward smiled, for the first time since he began to read the file, and that made him dread whatever would come next. "Several parking tickets for blocking hydrants, none contested. Several code violations for having unsafe Christmas decorations, and having too many pets at your old home. Took a few company vehicles out without permission, but always returned them cleaned and refueled. Used a company credit card on an unauthorized transaction, but also repaid the funds back."


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    Mr. Harrison began to almost feel... Embarrassed. He had a slight doubt that, maybe, just maybe, all these crimes were fact. But Edward had listed all his transgressions down to the T... Did he even deserve to be in this room full of...


    "Honestly, Mr. Harrison," Edward chuckled. "You''ve been the most mediocre member of the board. You haven''t done anything outstanding, but you also haven''t destroyed anything either. I like that. Steady and peaceful. That''s quite the skill in of itself."


    "This brings us to the reason we''re all here tonight." Edward turned his attention to everyone. "To clean house. Starting with Mr. Owens."


    Bang!


    And Mr. Owen slumped over, joining bits of his brain on the floor.


    ¡Þ?¡Þ


    Jax''s apartment was warm and welcoming. A contrast to his torn, drunken heart. His blurred eyes scanned over the still clean living room and kitchen. It had been three days since Maddin''s funeral. Edward and he had spent most of their days drowning themselves in food and booze at the places Edward owned. However, tonight, Edward hadn''t drunk a drop. Instead, he told Jax goodbye. Quite as rudely as it was abruptly.


    "You use to be a boy I could see as my son, now you''re just a disgrace." Edward''s voice echoed in his ear. "I''m not going to be around any longer. Fix yourself, or just end it. This is goodbye, kid."


    The apartment''s lights were slightly blinding as he squinted to see. Anger boiled in his veins as he tossed the whiskey bottle in his hands. It didn''t go far, and by chance, only landed on the never-used couch. He grew hotter as he was not gratified by the sound of glass breaking. He went forward to grab it and smash it by hand, but he smashed into the wooden coffee table.


    "Fuck!" He cursed as he faces placed on the floorboards between the couch and table.


    "Hey, Jax!" Cyril''s voice chimed out. "Why aren''t you answering my messages?!"


    He stiffened at the voice and his eyes were wide.


    "I''ve been trying to call you," She continued. "Dad said we have to talk about the new ex--"


    The voice faded to the back of his mind as he thrashed about to get up. He knocked over the table in his drunken fit and his old Holo-Machine. It was something the size of an older laptop that projected the face of the caller. It landed right side up and he could see Cyril''s beautiful Avatar leaning there with all her sass... The girl before he broke her... Before.


    "Baby!" He pleaded as he crawled across the floor to the device as he tried to answer the call. It was... Not a call.


    "Video message paused." The device said in its synthetic voice.


    Jax only stared down at the familiar hologram. It... It was an old message. Dated a few years ago, when she was fifteen. He had forgotten that these messages existed. Only Cyril had his home phone number, aside from her parents, no one ever called or left messages. He felt warm at the memories of her love. The warmth of someone had truly cared about him... Not like that... Woman...


    The one who bewitched him. The one who whispered in his ear that he had to think about that after.

 29 6

    He stared at the old machine, in all its delicate nature, it still held the past.


    He barely touched the machine on the side, and the message changed again.


    "Hey... Um..--" Cyril''s voice was paused. Her face held a pleasant smile, but it wasn''t her smile. It was one of those pre-programmed faces she used to hide behind. It was the last message on the machine. The--


    He rolled over and closed his eyes as he took a few deep breaths.


    "Its all gone..." Jax said. "You can''t change the past..."


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    His words were slightly slurred as he laid there. Alone and broken, with a stupid broken holo-machine. In his stupid fancy apartment, and all his stupid trust fund money. He didn''t deserve any of this, but the pain. Maybe it was just God''s way of punishing him for breaking that poor girl.


    He took one final breath before he sat up for a moment. He got his bearings, then got up and trudged to the bathroom. In a slum, he did his business and returned to his bedroom. The room had been deep-cleaned down to even the cracks. The smell of tobacco still lingered, but it was fresher. Not that disgusting smell that could have been a bio-chemical weapon.


    He threw himself down onto his bed and contemplated what he had done to himself.


    He hadn''t seen that happy side of Cyril in years. It... Was eye-opening to just how much he had done. He brought his cellphone up along with the picture app and set it on selfie mode. He looked at himself, eye to eye. It was something he hadn''t actually done in a while either. He was skin and bones, his face gaunt and just in general, looked like an ugly wreck.


    In that moment, he came to a conclusion. This had to end.


    Maybe it was the whiskey bottle that had given him courage, but his body roared with courage as he sat up. He hopped into the shower, still undressing as the water rained down on him, and washed thoroughly. Once he was sure he had scrubbed away the smell of booze, he brushed his teeth until the stank of alcohol had mixed with mint. An odd combination, but the much less foul smell.


    Still... He could only see a bad man. One who broke his promises. Who lied. Who cheated. The sudden change in appearances didn''t change the heart, but he''d fix that too.


    Once he was satisfied with the look, he walked out of the bedroom and into the living room. He took a look around, admired first once how clean it was. Calm, and still pretty drunk, he took there for a moment. Then, he walked to the glass sliding door and opened it all the way. Winter kissed his freshly washed face. It was a harsh, cold kiss, but it welcomed him nonetheless. He stepped out onto the short balcony and leaned over the rail.


    The ground below was scarily far, and everything looked like ants. The street lights illuminated the street below enough for him to see the people and cars go about. He took a whiff of the crisp night air.


    "It''s a lovely night, isn''t Cyril?" He looked up to the starless sky.


    He turned on his heel and strode back into the apart with drunken confidence. The cold breeze whispered by the apartment afterward. Then hard thuds echoed through the apartment and Jax dove off the balcony. Through the night sky, he tried to fly.

 30 7

    Bits of snow slid past Mr. Harrison''s window as the SUV roared to life. A masked man, who may have been the leader, closed his door politely after him. The man then nodded, and the - now ex-board member - returned the gesture timidly. The vehicle lurched forward, passing by several full-sized black trucks. The black-block men were slowly mounting up as they loaded large military-style crates into their beds.


    Only then, did Mr. Harrison let out a staggered sigh of relief. His heart threatened to rip itself out in fear that they''d turn on their word. He took a few moments to calm himself, then turned his eyes out the window. The cabin was dark as it kept a safe speed as it navigated the snow-lined road. They had been within the mansion for quite a while. An hour if the SUV''s clock was correct.


    It had snowed heavily, then the clouds had parted to bring out a beautiful view of the galaxy. Its gradient vivid lilacs and fathomless voids spanned the heavens, and he sent a pray to Mrs. Bailey and her daughter. A thank you and well wishes where even they may be.


    Then, he turned to the blank manila folder in his lap. Despite the chill, his palms were sweaty and he was reluctant to touch it. The disbelief of what had transpired made him keep it shut. Afraid it had been some nightmare turned heavenly dream. If he wasn''t... dreaming... Then inside this folder was his resignation papers; signed by both him and Owner Bailey. Along with a full retirement package and "saint" bonus that had come out to nearly two billion dollars, tax paid by Owner-- Mr. Bailey.


    The event itself had been fairly dreadful and maybe he''d be traumatized for life. However, he had been freed from the company he had diligently worked for. And he since he had never crossed the company. Being a lover of food, he never really had any other desires that''d pull him to do so. Pride? Can''t eat it. Money? He had enough to dine in any restaurant or pay a chef to make it on his salary and then some. Fame? He was a board member for the most renown company.


    Because of all this, he had been spared.


    Five men had gone into the mansion, and only one walked away. With money and freedom. He shuddered as he recalled each thunder shot. The blood-covered floorboards. The fierce howls of fear of them all as the men executed each of the board members. Until it came to him.


    No man had come to press the rifle to his head; instead, Mr. Bailey had led them out of the office. Mr. Harrison had been asked to follow. The man had never seen a man die, and he was cowardly to the sight. He''d been happy to follow suit. Mr. Bailey''s wicked grin had transformed into one of endearment. Something that felt weird.


    Cyril''s room.


    Anything that was Cyril''s had been fiercely protected. Toys, pictures, drawings, etc. He was scared of why he had been brought up. Then, when he opened the door; it became clear. Inside was the core of the wires, this he knew. A large server rack had taken up the far wall. It hummed softly, almost like an angelic melody. Tens of green lights glowed across it, and a large screen was attached to its center. A single name had been neatly etched into a plate above the screen.


    Cyril''s Core


    It had been the core of that miraculous world the company had built. The one that thousands of companies had tried to steal. There had been plenty of attacks on servers, cyber and physical, over this. In all his life, he had never suspected it would have been here. Then again, it made sense, if you knew the man.


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    Then and there, Mr. Bailey had explained everything. His past, his feelings, and what he was doing then... What he had--

 31 8

    Edward stared into the screen, center of the large server. Mr. Harrison had just been escorted out of his daughter''s old room; left alone with his thoughts as the grounds were being vacated. The large server hummed low, patiently waiting on someone to activate it. His eyes lingered on the screen, Then it scanned the walls around him. Pink paint, freckled with drawings and pictures. A small bed, loosely scattered dolls still scattered. The floor... Clean and sterile...


    His jaw clenched at that.


    The maid had cleaned the floor after they left; only the floor. They were trying to teach her self responsibility. It had been just another regret on his long list of things. He had hired a special crew to keep her room clean since that day - to keep it like the day she left. The house hadn''t been lived in for a few years since that morning. It wasn''t until the VR project had come to fruition, did they come back. Without her.


    Cyril had wanted them to, and at her insistence, they had put her source code in her old room. They could "act" like a family again. Though, the "act" had only lasted a few days before neither of them could take it. Since then, Cyril avoided using primitive Hologram technology. Because they had begged her not too. Because they couldn''t hold her...


    His heartache at his selfishness. At the same time, it burned with rage to think that Jax had betrayed her. They both had wronged her... She was just a child and they had kicked her around because they couldn''t handle it... Old age had brought wisdom and empathy. And with both, he hated the world, Jax, Maddin, and most of all, himself. Of the three, only he was left, old and wither. Stuck in this perpetual loop of wrathful self-hatred and reflection.


    Then his mind brought forth the deadmen in his office. Vengeance had been swift, sweet, and short. Like his daughter''s life.


    He smiled as he held his palm up to his eyes. A square black object rested there, a short red lever on its side. It was marked for military use, but Edward had his ways of obtaining illicit goods. In fact, it had been easier to get than spiriting his brother out of prison. Easier than locking him away somewhere and starving him. Well, the easy part was collecting the man. The hard part was not putting him down as the mutt he was before tonight.


    Edward looked to the window. A fake window. It was an LED screen hooked to a camera outside. It was to preserve a sort of "natural feel" to the room. Cyril had rebelled against the natural portion and pointed it to the sky. Instead of a view of the old forest that she used to play in, it looked to the sky. The beautiful purples and blues, framed by the void; freckled by distant stars.


    He was alone. He was lost.


    Rich and powerful, yet because of it, he had lost his wife and daughter. That money had been nothing but grief since that day. Billions of dollars sunk into the medical field. They were regrowing limbs. They could make the blind see and the deaf hear. Autism could be cured to a certain point chemically, and cripples could walk again...


    Yet his wife refused to be treated until their daughter woke up. And she never woke up. No matter how many medical breakthroughs they made; they could never wake her. Not without the unbearable wails of agony and pain. They couldn''t figure out it until they... No... He had stopped it... He was just as guilty. He couldn''t stand it anymore.


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    He too had given up on her.


    Anger.


    That was all that festered in him. At himself. His wife. Jax. The world. Everything.


    Revenge had been a cold dish in winter, for those who''d wronged Cyril. He had the uncanny ability to singlemindedly march forth, till his objective had been met. These four men had only been the beginning. Mr. Harrison had done no wrongs, and thus, could have that accursed money. It was karma.


    All of them had been stealing resources from the medical research he''d commissioned. Maybe that could have contributed to their failure. Hiring incompetent doctors to "save" money. Leaking company secrets for money, which in turn, made it harder to fund research. It had already been difficult to recruit the brightest minds. Most of them refunded to work for him, or even with him.


    Pride.


    Their pride had cost him his daughter.

 32 8

    "What?" Edward growled as he tapped his smartwatch.


    "No need to be rude." A man cooed, his voice thick with a Chinese accent. "I take care of your problem, so I call you."


    "Good." Edward leveled his tone with a sigh. "And the others?"


    "Shot. Lynched. Burned, so on." The man reported.


    "Even better." Edward smiled." That''s all then. It''s been a pleasure. Your money has already been transferred."


    "Yes, yes. I know." The man chucked. "I saw. However, it''s a shame. You good customer and a good friend. Is there no other way?"


    "Cao Hu," Edward stated. "You have been the same. It''s been fort years. A lot has happened, as you know. I have no other reason to be here, anymore. I''d rather leave the world in ruins before I left."


    "Yes, yes." Hu sighed. "Dramatic as always, Old Dragon. You have not changed."


    "On the contrary, I have." Edward scoffed. "They''ve lived this long, haven''t they?"


    "Very true," Hu said. "I thank your girls for that. Give me money for my retirement."


    "Di--" Edward was cut off by the man.


    "I mean no offense," Hu said. "Girls always change boys. Its simple, and I think, they changed you for the better. You lived this long. I expected you to die sooner with how you acted."


    Edward did not reply to that.


    "I miss them too," Hu went on. "I understand, for our loved ones paid for our sins."


    "They did." Edward said.


    "I loved Cyril like my own daughter. Its a shame I will have to lose you too, but such is the way of life, yes?" Hu said.


    "Mhm." Edward agreed. "Death comes for us all, but I chose to go out on my own terms, and it''s getting late. Is everything finished?"


    "Yes yes." He answered. "Their deeds will come out in the morning. News bribed already."


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    "Good... Then I guess this is our goodbye, old friend." Edward chuckled solemnly.


    "Edward Bailey, the Dragon of America," Hu said. "It has been a pleasure to be your friend. Maybe in a different life, we could have been better friends. Goodbye, Old Dragon."


    Since then, Cao Hu had elected not to take any contracts on Edward. In turn, Edward always supplied him with work. Over the long years, Edward no longer gave him those kinds of jobs; choosing to higher him as Chief of Security in his company. They had been at odds, yet, they remained close friends. Cao Hu had even been one of the few people Edward trusted with Cyril... Cyril had even come to call him Uncle.


    He lamented on how their fates had taken such odd turns.


    A renown assassin eventually becomes a trusted friend. Then, Chief of Security. Then, a friend to his family. The strangeness of it all wasn''t lost on him. Had it been a different life, Edward was sure they''d be too bickering old men on the porch. Growing old, and watching their families play. Life had an odd way of repaying karma though, and both the men had lost their families.


    With a sigh, Edward tapped on the server''s screen. It lit up and displayed the Administrative Login Screen. He pulled a keyboard from under the screen and locked it into place. He then logged into the server, and it displayed a menu. With a few taps, he found what he was looking for. His daughter''s avatar.


    Beautiful, mature, and vibrant. This avatar hadn''t changed much over the years. Aside from the whole "I''m an adult!" phase she went through at fifteen.


    He chuckled fondly at the memory. Cyril had played a child''s character. A mirror image of her before. Puberty hadn''t done much for her ill body, unable to grow normally. Her real body had become decrepit, sickly, and... Ugly... He had to admit, her real body had become ghoulish. Even he didn''t think it''d ever be healthy if she was cured of her ailments... As harsh as he had been on Jax for his "mistake", Cyril had faced a plethora of health issues stemming from her long coma.


    Eventually... When he thought of his daughter, he thought of this white-haired maiden on the screen. Bright-eyed and pure. She was the definition of an ideal woman, but it wasn''t her real body.


    Then again, it was.


    He felt his thoughts slipping away into the philosophical side of things. Thus, he simply dove into her character''s bio. The one thing he''d never done before. It really had been an act of courtesy. As a girl who''s whole life revolved around numbers and codes, nearly everything she did had been monitored; until the last year or so of her life. When she had given up.


    He looked down the long and depressing back story that was her character. The adventurers she had written down. A good portion of it was childish and nonsensical; all of which brought him to tears in laughter at the pureness of it all. Then, slowly, he could tell were things began to change. When the weight of her situation began to weigh on her. Slowly, it became darker and darker. The story slowly veered away from her character, and into the world.


    It wasn''t the anguish you''d see from an emotional teenager going through puberty; it was the anguish of a trapped bird. Eventually, he reached the end - when she had given up. Left with a small note.


    ["I''m a trapped bird, strung up in a tree on a sunny afternoon. Everyone around me visits. When they''re done, they fly away. They spread their wings and fly away into the open sky. But not me. I sit here in this cage, watching. Waiting. Left behind. Will they come back? Will someone save me? Do I matter...? Am I real...? It doesn''t matter. This is the cage I will die in, and when I''m gone, no one will remember me."]


    He stared at it. Unsure of what to do. He knew she felt this way, but to actually see it jolted down. It hurt. He stared at the screen for a few minutes. Then, he deleted it all and wrote in one final entry in its place. In a matter of minutes, he had left one final wish for his departed daughter. Once done, he entered it into the system.


    "For you, I''ll shoulder any sin if it meant your peace," Edward whispered. "Should I need to destroy this world or the next - I''d do it all for you."


    With that, Edward plucked three stuffed toys off the bed on his right. A white dragon, a white wolf, and an elf. Three of her favorite toys, who''d gone on to become her companions in her little world. He resettled them on top of the screen and left them as he walked away. He''d no longer defile this small heaven with his bloodied hands. It was a grave as much as the one by tree outside. Or, the one within that server.


    Three graves, and no real home... His heart died at that thought.


    He stopped in the doorway and looked back at the server. Her avatar still smiled back at him, as if sending him on his way.


    "It was a blessing to have you, Cyril." In a raspy voice, Edward muttered his final words. "If you''d have me, I''d love to be your father again. To do it right. Take you to school. Fight with you when you become a teen, and hand you off to your husband..."


    All those things he had dreamt to do as a father. A rather romanticized list of what he''d do as her dad.


    "You take care of yourself, you hear?" Edward said as he lifted his chin with a smile. "I love you."


    He slowly closed the door on the machine. His feet softly thumped down the hall, and the screen remained unchanged.


    Then, the house roared to life as fire tore through it. The office was obliterated with the foyer. Wood, tile, floorboards, and memories were consumed within a blink of an eye. Pictures of a smiling child, unmarred by the world glowed orange for a moment then disappeared. Edward and Maddin''s wedding photo, cake smudged across both their faces. The fire consumed it all as it rushed past Edward, killing him instantly as it raced toward''s Cyril''s empty room.


    The server''s lights began to flicker as if sensing the rush of destruction coming its way. Yellow, green and red as cycled before each light turned a brilliant gold. The screen began to glow, and as the fire reached out for it, the server had cycled one more time.

 33 Grey Skies

    "Eeee~!" Priscilla squeaked as she flung herself into the snowy fallow.


    Balls of snow exploded around her, sending puffs of white to settle over her freshly bought winter clothes. The rows of dirt in the large field were just high enough that Priscilla was hidden from view. All around her, joyful shrieks of children danced in the air. A figure passed through her field of vision up ahead. Graceful and beautiful; it held a snowball in hair as her angelic hair chased after her.


    The children screamed louder and a herd of children passed dangerously close to her. She nestled into the rut, trying to avoid detection. The children cried out as the figure gave chase. Then, deeper voices joined the fray. Priscila dared a peek and rose just high enough to see past the snow. To the west, on the village side, ten teenage boys were bounding across the field; careful of their steps and picking up snow to toss.


    She turned to look back, where small children were scattering in every direction. At the epicenter, Cyril stood like a valkyrie, adorned with a prideful grin. She looked around in an exaggerated manner, then she bolted after the one. She ran at a speed that outpaced the little ones, but it was slow enough not kill everyone''s fun. She had done it at first, then, she had learned how to control herself.


    Because this was a children''s game, snowball tag.


    And it was everyone against Cyril.


    However, as they all found out, no one can fight Cyril. While she was clumsy and often lacked precision; she made up for it in reaction and movement speed. She couldn''t hold herself back in the heat of the moment, and thus, she didn''t throw any snowballs. She opted for pressing them against the others. Softly at that. She''d slow down before she attempted to tag. This presented the biggest advantage to the children.


    Also dressed in fresh winter clothes, but lighter dressed than anyone else; Cyril slowed as she came upon the child, her breath a stream of wispy smoke behind her. She reached out to tag him, but he dropped herself flat on the group. Cyril missed by several inches as she tried to stop. She sprinted past him nearly ten feet before she was able to turn. By the time she did, the boy had already managed to get up and sprint away.

 34 2

    "Easy!" One of the teens snickered as he closed in on her.


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    "Go soft on her!" Another said.


    Cyril jumped back to avoid the volley of snowballs. The children took the opening to wider the distance. The teens advanced to death - obliviously. With grace, she avoided the first snowball the teen through. She made a wide birth around the group. Slowly, she closed as she kept low to the ground to make herself a smaller target. The boys, agitated and surprised, began to hurl loosely packed balls of snow.


    Some turned into puffs of snow as they left the hand. Others fell apart mid-flight. very few stayed intact long enough to join the snow around Cyril.


    "Shi--!" One of the boys cursed as Cyril appeared in front of the leader.


    She halted in front of her for an instant, her flowing hair swung forward from the momentum. With it, the smell of a gentle summer night whiffed between the group. A pair of exotic golden cat eyes, matched to smiling pink lips on her small face. Then the snow in her small hand slapped against his wool overshirt. The small, and angelic girl tag felt more like a punch.


    The boy grunted ass it fell over on his rear. It was over for the teens at that moment.


    Priscilla burst into laughter at the pitiful scene. She almost broke out in tears from how funny it was. Then, two orbs of molten gold locked onto her. The laughter quickly died as they stared at each other. Priscilla felt a chill. The wolf had found its rabbit. Priscilla scrambled, and as if on cue, Cyril broke into a full-on sprint through the snow.


    Pricilla wasn''t as strong as Cyril and had to fight with the terrain of the farmland. The girl, on the other hand, tore through it like a raging bull. There was about a fifty-foot gap between the two girls. Cyril was gaining on her as if she was a turtle. The harsh crunching of snow grew in the young noble''s ears as the goddess gained on her. She peeked back and saw the sheer expression of ecstasy on her face. She felt another spurt of speed in her step.


    Then the only the sound of her steps called out. She turned around and only saw a small wisp of snow circle upwards before it fell to the ground. She turned forward, and Cyril was there.


    Yet, with the slowing of that moment, so did her reaction - and thus, she crashed into Cyril. The two girls toppled over into a ditch.

 35 3

    The smell of a gentle, loving summer, drifted into her nose. Wide-eyed, Priscilla stared into the, also wide-eyed, Cyril. Eyes, brown as fertile earth, stared into pools of polished gold. Each girl stiff in awkward shock as their lips were pressed together. By instinct, Cyril had caught the girl in her arms as they fell. Priscilla felt Cyril''s warm arms around her waist. The young girl''s cheeks began to slowly burn with strange emotions. One thought floated in her mind.


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    Her lips were softer than anything I''ve ever touched...


    The moment was over and Cyril had been the first to react. She broke away and helped Priscilla sit up. Just as that happened, the others arrived.


    "Are you okay!?" One of the children asked


    "Yes!" Cyril answered. "We''re fine. Right?"


    Cyril turned to Priscilla. She nodded with vigor as everyone began to crowd around. Neither girl would meet each others'' eyes.


    ¡Ü ¡ª ? ¡ª ¡Ý


    "So, me'' Ladies... Err.." Alderman Joseph stalled; now noticing he hadn''t asked their names.


    "Priscilla Hammel," Priscilla bowed her head as she lightly sipped at the stew.


    "Cyril Bailey," Cyril said absently.


    Cyril''s eyes examined the small cottage that the Alderman lived it. It was small, faintly lit by a hearth to their left - pressed into the corner. The man''s wife sat beside him, both dressed in thick wool attire. With Cyril in the cottage, the temperature began to rise higher than any mere serf hearth could ever do. It was like an autumn night rather than a winter day.


    "Alderman Joseph." He gave a weary smile. "What brings you girls to our small hamlet?"


    Serfs held no last names, only job titles at the most. He was the village alderman, and thus, he was Alderman Joseph. He became slightly more nervous now though since both these young girls held last names. One, he even knew off. The Hammel Family. A Warrior family, one who''d served the Empire for nearly two hundred years; a prestigious bloodline. If this was a daughter of that family, then he''d be damn sure to beat those kids up. If they had hurt her or offended her, or... Or...


    He dared not to think the wrath that''d fall on all their heads...


    "My friend here wanted to ''play'' in the snow," Priscilla smiled.

 36 4

    "Yes, play." Cyril jumped in slightly annoyed. "We were playing in the field, then when the others joined; we played with them too."


    Alderman Joseph was more scared of this fairy-like girl - Cyril. She was unnaturally beautiful, flawless with a milky complexion. Her white would''ve blended with the snow if the snow didn''t glitter. Yes, it was not the albino eyes that''d made Alderman Joseph unsettled. No, all of that was quite charming. It was the inhuman eyes she held. They glowed slightly in the faint room, like too polished gold coins. No matter which angle he looked at it from, they were always clear. Just bright enough to see their beauty.


    Her eyes fascinated him; yet, were repulsive.


    "I had heard of the game that took place in the fields." Alderman Joseph commented the moment Cyril caught him staring. "It is kind of you both to play with our youngins'', but they''re not too bright. I''d like if they not offend you g--"


    "They were fine," Cyril''s eyes narrowed on the elder. "Quite more pleasant that you."


    Alderman Joseph set a silent prayer for protection, in hopes this... Strange girl, would not kill him. Nobility did things like that to the serfs, and he''d had hoped never to suffer a fate like that. This act sent a shiver up Cyril''s spine, and the sheer audacity of him to do that... Cyril was fed up with this man.


    "Let''s go, Priscilla," Cyril said as she stood from the table - her golden eyes never leaving the old man.


    "Wait, can we just warm up a little more?" Priscilla protested weakly.


    "We can warm up back in town." Cyril huffed.


    "Please, forgive my husband for what--" The Alderman''s wife tried to apologize for her husband, but Cyril cared little for whatever excuse she had for him.


    "It''s obvious that I''m unwelcomed here," Cyril said. "We''ll be leaving now."


    "Excuse us," Priscilla said


    Both the girls exited the cottage, the Alderman and his wife too shocked to do anything. Priscilla felt horrible about what Cyril had done. Though, she was sure there had been a valid reason for it all. Still, she felt bad for the serfs. Her eyes scanned the village as they stepped out into the snow. Straw roofing. Poorly constructed walls, and a single sorry lone road - covered in a thin layer of snow.


    Sadly, in this backwater hamlet; she''d had a great time...


    Having experienced that, this game had meat more to her than Cyril would''ve ever known. It had liberated her mind from the darkness. It forced her lungs to breath in nature. Her muscles ached from the effort, and it reminded her that she was still alive.


    "Its her, mum!" A boy cried out as they passed the last cottage by the river. "Its the Fairy!"


    "I told you there were no such things as--" The mom froze as she went to close the shutters the boy was by.


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    She caught sight of the two girls as they trudged down the road. Cyril and Pricilla smiled.


    "See!" The boy exclaimed. "Come play again!"


    "If we''re ever in the area again," Cyril promised.


    They waved to the family that''d watched them leave the town. On down the snow road, they went; following the large river back towards the bridge a few minutes down.


    "What happened back there?" Priscilla asked.


    "With?" Cyril asked, her golden eyes glued to the grey rushing river beside them.


    "With the Alderman, what did he do?" Priscilla asked again.


    "He kept staring at me like I was a freak," Cyril said, then kicked up some snow. "Then he dared to pray for protection from me!"


    "Wait, he --"


    They both stopped in the middle of the road.

 37 5

    "Wait, a minute!" Priscilla raised her voice. "How did you hear him? He hadn''t said a single prayer in front of us!"


    Cyril set her jaw stubbornly. She hadn''t met to air her grievance out, but it had hurt her. Not physically, or mentally, but on some deeper level. That it had been an affront to her. Priscilla looked at her with worry. Cyril wanted to tell her, but how could she had told her about her "dream" last night. Or the fact she''d been hearing people... Praying... It felt like some sort of privacy violation at the least. Abuse of administrative powers at most.


    That was if her administration powers were manifesting. She hadn''t even thought about that. A slow return of her powers. Still, though, it was too much to explain to this little girl. It was why she had to get out of Gulley''s Port. All the voices, so many pleading voices... It was tearing at her very being.


    "Please talk to me," Priscilla took Cyril''s hands in hers. "I know you''re troubled."


    "How?" Cyril''s lips pursed.


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    "Becuase in the short time I''ve known you, you''ve practically worn your heart on your sleeve," Priscilla confessed. "We thought you were just aloof, but... You''re hurting too, aren''t you?"


    Cyril was hurting, but that wasn''t what she took up.


    "I do not wear my heart on my sleeve." Cyril protested.


    "Yes, you are." Priscilla chuckled at how childish an Angel could be.


    Cyril was quite childish and prideful. Wrapped in a beautiful husk of a woman who''d had an insane amount of power. It stirred a strange feeling in her heart.


    "Yes," Priscilla smiled.


    "No!" Cyril protested again.


    "When we kissed earlier, it was written on your face too," Priscilla said proudly.


    Cyril stiffened. That had been Cyril''s first real kiss. Not some virtual pressure or animation. Despite it being an accident, they had kissed.


    "It was an accident!" Cyril blushed for once.


    "But we kissed, so you have to marry me to repair my honor." Priscilla half-teased.


    "No! You''re too young!" Cyril raised her voice and began to walk away while throwing her hands into the air.


    "I am not! I''m thirteen!" Priscilla laughed.


    "I''m seventeen, I''m too old for you!" Cyril was heating up, more from the topic than any romantic feelings.


    Priscilla lied. It would have been weird. She was young, and he''d be old. She''d still be a young maiden when her husband was in the grave.


    "Ew!" Cyril turned around. "That is disgusting, and I am not a pedophile!"


    "Pedophile?" Priscilla repeated the odd word.


    "I''m not into kids!" Cyril said.


    "I''m not a kid!" Priscilla was beginning to feel hurt. Was she so against me...? Am I unattractive...?"


    Cyril saw the look of hurt on her face and winched. She hadn''t meant to hurt her. Still... It was not apparent to Cyril that Pricilla was sore about this topic. The young girl in question had regretted teasing Cyril now.


    "Look, I get it..." Cyril said softly as they stopped. "Look... Where I''m from, the legal age of marriage is eighteen. Children are still children until that age."


    "Heaven has laws like that?" Priscilla looked at Cyril.


    "Yeah!" Cyril lied. She didn''t know what she wrote for that piece of shit place!


    "You''re lying!" Priscilla pointed at her. "It''s written on your face!"


    "N-no!" Cyril stumbled over that and looked around for an escape.


    She then bolted down the road towards the stone bridge in the distance.


    "Hey!" Priscilla screamed. "You get back here and tell me the truth!"


    They ran down the road. Cyril ran only fast enough to keep out of finger''s reach. Priscilla was hollering for her to confess her sins to her. They followed the river, it''s grey waters rushed as melted snow drained into it. To the east, the forests crawled up the sloped lands towards the mountains. Its trees brushed with white along with the mountain tops. The clear day held no passing clouds, and the sun smiled upon the cold lands.


    To the west, the suburbs rested against the City''s outer curtain. It''s wooden canopies thick with fallen snow. People were roused by the distant laughter of girls, but they quickly went about their day. Even the shantytown was thriving with life as the poorest of them tried to survive in winter''s first fall. Amongst the beauty, humans struggled for survival, but today... These two girls set aside their woes and took in some of that beauty.


    They crossed the stone bridge, still chasing each other as the bored guards looked on with interest. Some entertainment in this weather was good.


    It was only when they reached the eastern gatehouse did they stop. Priscilla nearly out of breath, and Cyril helped her by warming her up with her magic.


    "That burns." Priscilla panted, sweating from the effort.


    "Burning is good." Cyril smiled.


    "Hey..." Priscilla said. "Thank you for bringing me with you. It was fun."


    "I"m glad you have fun, " Cyril''s smile became mischevious.


    "Why are you smiling like that...?" Priscilla felt worried now.


    "We''re going to have to deal with Randol now."


    "Why?" Priscilla asked.

 38 6

    "You should have told us!" Prince Randol yelled as he slammed his fist on the tavern''s table. "You''re lucky the barmaid told what you were up too, or we''d have the entire City Watch looking for you two!"


    "Why?" Cyril groaned. "I killed a fucking dragon, I can handle myself."


    Randol then gestured to the thirteen-yeard old normal mage girl.


    "Err..." Cyril couldn''t say anything about that." She was with me?"


    Randol took a deep breathe as his gauntlets groaned. Priscilla had bowed her head in shame. She felt guilty for not checking with Cyril if she''d told Randol about their outing. Now, they were being reprimanded for it. Well, Randol was attempting to do so. Cyril seemed to accept that she should have said something. However, she also was pushing back against him.


    "That doesn''t matter." Randol sighed. "You can''t protect her if you''re busy!"


    "Yeah I can?" Cyril said, not so sure she could, but she refused to give any ground. If only because he was shouting at them.


    Randol rubbed his throbbing temples with his fingers. Mai was repressing her laughter, but Desmond was also annoyed with the girls as well. During the time the girls had spent out of the town, the other three had already purchased the supplies to last them until the next town. Winter wasn''t good on the villages, thus, Desmond wouldn''t rely on them for any of it.


    "I swear, I could have handled it," Cyril said innocently.


    "Why are you being stubborn?" Randol asked.


    "Why are you yelling at me?" Cyril fired a question back.


    "You both fight like cats and dogs," Mai finally spoke up. "Just let it rest. I think it''s time for us to leave the city anyway."


    "But the snow is still deep." Randol shook his head. "And Cyril needs to--"


    Mai leaned over the table.


    "She killed a dragon," Mai said.


    "And what does that--" Mai cut Randol off.


    "You can''t kill a dragon." Mai smiled.


    Randol glared at her, mulling over his response before finally, he gave up on it.


    "Fine," He said. "I''ll be the adult in the room and leave it be."


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    "Well yes, you are the oldest here," Demond said. "I do believe that''ll be quite appropriate."


    "Don''t be snide, Little Brother," Randol hissed.


    Randol glared at Cyril now. His pride and honor had been trampled, though, he knew he was blowing it out of proportions. He couldn''t help himself though. While these four were off galavanting like everything was normal, it wasn''t. Not by a long shot. Nothing was fine.


    "Look, dude." Cyril held her hands up in resignation. "Really. I. Am. Sorry. I get it, I really do."


    "Do you?" Randol said as he got up, and stomped off.


    The group watched him before Mai spoke up.


    "Just... Forgive him." Mai sign as she ran her fingers through her hair. "He''s... Going through stuff."


    "I don''t think that''s a good way to handle stuff though." Priscilla, worried, stared after him. She debated if she was supposed to go after him or stay with everyone else.

 39 7

    Long black nails tapped clicked against the pristine wood of the throne''s armrest. Deep emerald eyes swam with repressed rage; its serpent pupils daggers. Before Akyryss, was the Theocracy''s Ambassador to Haven. He was a young noble, handsome and well-bred - for a human. His short crop blonde hair was oiled back, revealing a slightly tanned face. Blue sapphire eyes stared back at the dragon in human form. A welcoming smile was posted on his face.


    And all of it was a facade.


    The old dragon could smell it. The fear. The arousal. The anxiety. He was a young human at the age of twenty-four. Dressed in the fashion of the theocracy, modeled after a European fashion, or so her big brother had told her. She wished that old Wolf was here now. Because she was close to tearing this human''s head from his neck. She grappled with the urge - pushing it down. Killing this pest was more trouble than she wished to afford to him.


    "The G-Great Alistair also apologizes for the destruction of the statues on the coast." The Ambassador said.


    His voice shook as he read off the words on the parchment. If she voiced her actual thoughts, it''d mostly mean war. A war she so desperately wanted to wage. One she could not afford anymore. Her mistress was back, and Haven had been created to welcome her. To be her new home since Fable''s End was left in ruins... That was the purpose Haven served. The Ambassador knew it. Alistair knew it.


    That was why he did this. Never had so many statues been destroyed within two days. This meant Alistair was trying for complete dominion over his lands. A being risen by faith into godhood, that was heresy in of itself. The presence of the Creator''s idols, faith-based gods would lose power. Having those litter his domain acted as a floodgate. Now that they were gone, he held complete control; at least, more control than when they were there.


    A fickle thing of faith was that, no matter how many you purged, there was always another. With the Theocracy''s Inquisition in full swing hunting down non-believers, they''d at least stop pestering her island. She had enough with hanging them from the guard towers.


    "Tell Alistair, that if he wishes to remain untouched." Akyryss paused to regain control over her emotions. Smoke billowed from her mouth. "That if one more statue is defiled... Even if it meant the destruction of this Island, I will personally pay him a visit."


    With that, the Ambassador was allowed to retire from the audience chamber; after some gentle persuasion of a broken armrest. The young man scrambled away when the armrest was ripped from the chair. When it exploded against the wall as he exited the chamber, it had put a skip in his step. And a squeak in his voice. A minor victory.


    "A true blow to our world''s history." Sicuro Tantillo, the High Priest and Akyryss''s Governor of Haven, said as he appeared a moment later.


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    Akyryss glared at him, and he cleared his throat.


    "I mean, a devastating loss to the citizens of this world," High Priest Sicuro said before adding. "I''ve spoken with the Ambassador, and the remains of the statues will be delivered to the island by the end of the year.


    "If they haven''t thrown them into the sea already," Akyryss snarled, revealing pearly perfect teeth. "The statues weren''t created to withstand abuse. They''re normal stone, just enchanted."


    "My Great Dragon, they''re made with Elven Stone," High Priest Sicuro reminded her. "They''re no mere stone. They''re quite valuable and, frankly, take quite the beating. I''m sure it took them quite a bit of magic and force just to break the enchantments."


    Yes, Akyryss agreed. She hadn''t remembered that in her anger. She took a mental step back and thought about it. The statues themselves would''ve taken at least half of her strength to break. In those standards, it was around two times as strong as normal stone. This placed it around the A-rank in strength. It was hard to gauge it all into a measurable system.


    What wasn''t hard tell, was that this had been ordered from high within the country. Alistar was the only one in there that had the power, and the inclination, to waste resources on such a thing. Especially when he had to contend with Death Valley to his north.


    "Shall I call off the warships?" Sicuro asked, breaking Akyryss from her thoughts.


    "Ah, yes." Akyryss sighed. "No point in having them wait any longer. But do keep them on alert. I feel that things are going to change soon. For once, I cannot place my claw on it. I just feel it."


    Her green eyes looked down on the priest, his white robe emblazoned with a golden dragon and an orange rose. The sigil of Haven. She stared at her sigil for a moment longer than turned to the priest, a new thought came to mind.


    "Any word on locating my master?" Akyryss asked.


    "The report stated that the agents had arrived in Fable''s end," High Priest Sicuro said. "They said the summit was full of dead fish. The pond and the house were empty."


    "She''s out in the world..." Akyryss sighed.


    "It seems that way." Sicuro agreed. "But I highly advise against trying to find her. It seems that Alistair is not taking you seriously anymore. That was your fifth threat."


    "I know, I know," Akyryss said as she pushed herself off the throne and strode forward.


    "You will have to act upon this one," Sicuro said.


    "Yes, I''m very much aware of this." Akyryss agreed. "However, I will speak with Lord hades first."


    "My Great Dragon, I highly object to the notion of bringing the Evil God Hades into this dispute." Sicuro grimaced. "I do not see how he fits into this."


    "You don''t?" The dragon stopped on his left, staring at the open doors.


    "No," Sicuro said.


    "I never told you?" The dragon now turned to him with a look of mischief in her eyes.


    It was an odd shimmer in her eyes, one that he knew would often lead to headaches. She was regal, demanding, and tyrannical. But when she got that look, it was almost childish - unlike a dragon. Sicuro didn''t think this was just her. This must have been an inherited trait. Like a child who carried a few habits from their parents. The first time it happened, he was dangling upside down. From the top of the clock tower. Midday. For an hour.

 40 8

    Cyril''s eyes shimmered with delight. Mischief and payback were one and the same right now; Priscilla highly disagreed though. They stood in the tavern''s hall as they argued.


    "This is madness!" Priscilla protested quietly.


    She looked over her shoulder to Mai. Both her and Priscilla had been roped into this by Cyril. Priscilla being the objecting one. Mai had strangely been willing to do it.


    Cyril was a madwoman!


    "It''s not!" Cyril giggled sweetly, like a devil trying to trick a mortal into a deal. "It''s just a little payback."


    Mai grinned at Priscilla.


    "It''s harmless," Mai said. "We''re just going to throw leftover food on him."


    "Yeah, and its fresh," Cyril rolled her eyes." And, I made sure to make sure the food wasn''t hot or disgusting. Look! It''s mostly just leftover bread and vegetables!"


    Cyril showed her the bucket full of garbage.


    "I would like to state for the record that this is the worst payback ever." Priscilla groaned.


    "How?" Cyril asked.


    "For one, isn''t this to tame of a prank, or payback?" Priscilla said.


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    "No? I''m not trying to get him too dirty." Cyril stated matter of factly. "He''s training and he''s going to have to bathe afterward; or is it not a custom to bath after getting sweaty?"


    "He bathes after practice every time," Mai stated. "Desmond told me."


    "For one, aren''t you suppose to use real garbage?" Priscilla asked. She felt the thought process here wasn''t lining up.


    "Of course, but I don''t hate him," Cyril said. "It''s just a little payback for yesterday."


    "You''re still mad about him yelling at you?" Priscilla asked and grasped Cyril''s arms. "Please, let it go. I swear he--"


    "Psh, no. " Cyril said. "I got over that, and he had a point. No, I''m mad about him saying we were leaving yesterday."


    "Wait..." Priscilla paused. "How is that a good reason to do this?!"


    "Tis the only reason we need!" Cyril gloated and raised the bucket.


    "Err..." Mai looked troubled.


    "What?" Both the girl turned to her and asked.

 41 9

    The street was unnaturally empty for the morning. Stalls had yet to open, and the bustle had only been a trickle of uneasy town folk, who kept a brisk pace to their destinations. A stark difference from yesterday, as Desmond noted. He too strode down from the Lord Gulley''s keep. Another wave of snow had taken the region during the night. Along with it, dark tidings. Surprisingly, he was calm.


    The city itself held its breath as the City Watch was clade in all the arms they could muster. Even the knights and nobility had been roused in the dead of the night. What was once patrols of two, was now bolstered into groups of five. As the sun peaked over the white horizon, it became more obvious how scared they were.


    Quinn''s Wood had been destroyed.


    The news had been a spark in the night. From the story told to Desmond by Lord Gulley, survivors had arrived in the night. They had ridden all-day to get here, and with it, news of the destruction. Of the dead. Of the horrors. Lord Gulley had been restless as he reported to the prince. While he showed little respect for the unwanted Third Prince; he still handed him an official report. One addressed to his father, Emperor DrakeFang.


    Desmond watched as a patrol marched past him. Their eyes distrusting and tired. He nodded to them as he turned into the square. Unlike the previous days, it was empty as well. The lack of other people made the city fell colder. He crossed the vast empty space to the Ivory Pavillion, the large tavern that had occupied an entire corner of the square.


    As he walked through the courtyard, he was greeted by a much warmer atmosphere; It reminded him of a late autumn night. What also greeted him, was the sight of his brother, sitting across from Cyril. Both of them were furiously chugging down drinks. Mai and Priscilla sat beside them, urging the young angel on as she was spilling the contents all over herself in panic.


    A moment later, Randol slammed the mug down on the courtyard table.


    "Ha!" He cheered.


    Cyril was still chugging furiously, but she couldn''t contend with the Prince. He, who''d fought alongside knights and soldiers. He, who''d partook in festivities with them. He, who''d drink a drunk under the table. It was like a man racing a toddler - it just was unfair. A moment later, she brought the mug down on the table as she fought not to spill the drink. She only managed that for a moment, then; she spit it all out off to her left into the snow.


    A waft of beer hit Desmond.


    "This is horrible!" Cyril cried. "Why would you drink this?!"


    "You didn''t say anything with the first three." Randol laughed. "Why this one?"


    "Becuase I was too focused on beating you!" Cyril said.


    "T-This isn''t fair!" Cyril cried out as she slapped the table. "I demand you revoke this and we try something else!"


    "A deal is a deal," Randol smirked, pleased to have one-upped the goddess.


    Cyril''s lips pursed as her nostrils flared. It was then that Desmond noticed a bucket of food refuse was on the ground next to the table. She brought it up and slammed it on the tabletop. Her clear honey eyes glared at him for a moment, then she raised the bucket to dump it over her snowy hair.


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    "Wait!" Randol cried out and gripped the bucket''s lip before the contents could spill out. "I was only joking! I wouldn''t make you do that!"


    "But you didn''t revoke the deal!" Cyril said as she held the bucket still.


    It never budged, no matter how much effort Prince Randol put into it. Desmond could see his muscular arm puff slightly.


    "I only meant to teach you a lesson!" Randol said. "I would never sully a woman''s honor with such pettiness!"


    "I gave my word," Cyril said with conviction. " ''Whoever loses, dumps it over themselves. Cross our hearts, and hope to die''. We even did a pinky promise."


    "This is ridiculous!" Randol huffed. "You can''t be serio---"


    He paused for a moment.


    "You really are serious..." Randol said.


    "My father always told me that a promise is a promise," Cyril said. "If people are to trust your word, you must never break a promise. In that sense, never make a promise you never planned to keep. While we didn''t shake hands to seal that promise, we did a pinky shake. Its still the same thing."


    "... I agree." Randol said, not quite believing it.


    "What are you guys--" Desmond, along with everyone else, froze.


    The prettiest girl they''ve ever seen - dumped the whole bucket load of food over herself.


    ¡ª ¡Í ¡ª


    Desmond''s room was tense as he and Mai sat on the bed; Randol sat across from them, at the desk.


    Mai stared blankly at her feet, lost in thought. Desmond sat forward, with his elbows on his knees and his foot tapping the floorboards nervously. Randol folded the letter up and began to burn it against a lit candle by the window. He had no reason to keep it, and he would not leave it. It was a request, a rather forceful request. To assist him in combating the new threat in the north. The undead.


    "Did he ask you personally to help?" Randol asked.


    "No, he only briefed me on what happened when I went to inform him of our departure," Desmond said. "Did he ask for our help?"


    "He did," Randol confirmed. "He wants me to help him defend the city. He believes the horde will be coming down the road within the day. He sent scouts north in the night, and they''d probably be here by now."


    "What are you going to do then?" Desmond asked.


    "Not assist," Randol stated and dropped the last piece of burning letter out the window into the snow.


    "Shouldn''t we help, though?" Desmond asked.


    "Of course, but we still have our own duties to attend to," Randol looked to the two on the bed. "Such as reporting the destruction of our group."


    Mai''s hands gripped her pants tightly.


    "We have no choice," Randol said. "I''ll have Cyril stay here, and have her give us something of value to placate the nobility."

 42 10

    What do you mean?" Randol looked to her, his eye sharp. Eyes of a Prince who''d circled the political world. "She apart of our group."


    "That''s not it," Mai said, meeting his eyes. "She isn''t any of our subjects, nor a slave. You can''t demand anything of her."


    "I am the leader of this--" Mai stood up and faced Randol.


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    "You were the leader of this group," Mai said resolutely. " Since Fable''s End, we''ve all just been a small band of stragglers, held together by Cyril. If anything, Cyril should be the one calling the shots."


    Not to mention, Cyril was the Creator!


    However, she kept this comment to herself. The Empire was a patchwork of religions that, so long as they paid tribute to the Emperor, were nearly out of this world in their beliefs. Randol believed only in the power of the country. Desmond believed in... Nothing. Mai believed in the one true Goddess; the Goddess that had created her people. The Goddess born of darkness and Light.


    She believed in Cyril.


    She had too.


    Randol and Mai stared each other down - neither willing to step back. It took Desmond having to pull Mai away from his older brother for the tension to come down a notch.


    "Look, why don''t you both just ask her?" Desmond asked with care. "And brother, she is right. We cannot control Cyril, nor order her around. She killed a dragon, for the love of all that is good, set aside your pride - please..."


    Randol looked to his little brother. Mai watched Randol''s jaw flex as he bit back his retort. And she felt horrible about what she said. She knew how prideful Randol was, the stark differences between the man she loved and his brother had even manifested itself physically. Randol was an entire head taller than both of them. Far larger, and broad of shoulder. Desmond was skinny and frail compared to Randol.


    And he stood between them because even she was too prideful to let this go.


    She was strong as well, maybe as strong as Randol on a bad day. She didn''t know, because she had never fought him. And in this room, she may find out.


    "I''m sorry," Mai said. "I crossed a line I shouldn''t have."


    There was a pause.


    "I accept your apology." Randol took a breath and stepped back before he sat back in his seat. "It''s been a rough few days."


    "I''ll ask her," Randol said.


    ¡ª ¡Í ¡ª


    Mai led Randol into Cyril''s room, whereupon entering, though something... more naughty had been transpiring.


    He heard Cyril moaning, and saying "That feels good...". The things that''d lead one to believe that night time activities were being done during the day. Quite the bold move on her part he thought. That was until Mai rolled her eyes at him.


    "Priscilla is just combing her hair." Mai chuckled.


    And when he turned the corner, it was indeed the case. Priscilla sat on the floor with Cyril laying on her back on the bed; dressed in a sapphire blue shoulderless dress. Cyril hung her head off the side of the bed, and Priscilla was there combing it with an elegantly carved bone comb. Cyril''s expression was one of complete bliss. Her snow-white hair cascaded down, and with it still wet from the bath, it shimmed like snow itself.


    "Cyril," Mai called out to her.


    "Mmm." Cyril acknowledged her without opening her eyes.


    "Randol has something he''d like to ask you," Mai said.


    Priscilla shot them... What looked to be a territory glare. Though, Randol missed it entirely.


    "Cyril, Lord Gulley - the man who governs this time - has requested we aid him with a certain problem," Randol said.


    He waited for her to ask about it, or just say anything. She remained silent though.


    "I wanted to volunteer you to help him, however... " Randol looked to Mai. "I''ve been told I had to ask you since you were not one of my subjects or men."


    No reply.


    "I wanted to know if you''d be willing to help?" Randol asked.


    "What''s the reward?" Cyril purred the words as the comb slid across her scalp.


    It was such a wonderful feeling being pampered. At least, this is what she thought pampering was. Priscilla had offered to comb her hair on her own accord, and Cyril didn''t mind. Now, she wanted to know if she could keep this girl.


    "There is no reward as of now," Randol said.


    "Pass," Cyril said.


    "Pass?" Randol repeated.


    "Negative," Cyril said. "Refused. Denied. Rejected. No way, Jose."


    "Why?" Randol asked, feeling awkward at being refused.


    "Because requests from nobles mean trouble, and or a lot of work," Cyril said. "Often than not, it''d be apart of the main quest. Thus, rewards should mandatory; at least in the sense that, with all that bullshit I''d have to deal with, it''d be worth it. Or at least, enough to make me not want to raze a country to the ground."


    "Have... You razed a country before?" Priscilla asked, her hand stilling.

 43 11

    As they viewed it as an Angel, no one was particularly surprised by her words. Only, it was just jarring on how leisurely should utter that confess. Randol had just wanted to urge his case. Now though... He was a little scared too. Least he''d the reason this Angel play with his country like it was some pass-time.


    "Surely a Prince wouldn''t skimp on finding you a reward," Priscilla stepped in to help Randol. "Maybe a nice villa in the capital, or a bit of land with a cottage in a forest."


    "Ooh," Cyril cooed at that thought, "I was thinking maybe a few gold coins, or maybe a fancy sword, or a bit of information - but I like this idea much more. Maybe a house on a cliff, overlooking the sea?"


    "Maybe be lord of one of the port cities?" Priscilla''s eyes sparkled as her mind began to think up possibilities.


    "Nah, way too much work," Cyril hook her lovely finger in the air. "Maybe... A nice castle on a cliff?


    "A nice castle out in a forest?" Priscilla jumped in again. "And there''ll be a lovely rose garden, and have a cute bear waiter!"


    "Okay, okay!" Randol through up his hands in defeat. "I''ll build you a cottage on a cliff, and I''ll hand the land over to you, so you''ll own it; but please, don''t make me build a castle!"


    "Deal!" Cyril agreed.


    She flipped over onto her stomach with the agility of a cat, then clamored off the feather bed. She then stood before Randol and held out her pinky to him.


    "Do we have to do that again?" Randol looked apprehensively to the pinky, feeling it was too childish for something so major.


    "Yes." Cyril beamed as her chest trembled with a repressed giggle.


    "Fine..." Randol sighed. "I promise, cross my heart and hope to die."


    Like previously, shadowing Cyril, both of them ran their finger over their hearts in the shape of an "X". To finish it off, each pointed to their eye. However, unlike before, he felt the skin over his heart sing - as if bitten by something.


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    ¡ª ¡Í ¡ª


    He hadn''t lied to her yet, and that was all she could ask in something. The truth.


    Cyril strode down the up the Lord''s Way, dressed in an olive green oversized modern zip-up jacket that stopped mid-thigh. Its insides lined brown fur, with its hood over her head.


    "You wouldn''t happen to have another one of those I could have, would you?" Priscilla asked, envy and cold in her eyes. While the article was quite... outlandish to her, it looked really warm.


    "Nope," Cyril asked. "I only ever bothered to keep one of every item I liked. Even then, I had given any a lot of my stuff before I ended up here.


    The jacket had been zipped up, and Excalibur''s belt wrapped over her waist. Lucky for Cyril, it didn''t block none of the pockets, as they were real now. She took full advantage of by stuffing a few coins in each. Well, whatever coins the prudent Desmond would allow her to take. Beneath, she had her black dress and some "assassin" leather pants. All items from the premium shop.


    In the end, Randol approved it - reluctantly - and they found themselves here.


    "Your highness," One of the castle guards greeted Randol as they approached the castle''s entrance.


    "I''ve come to see Lord Gulley," Randol announced.


    "He was expecting you a few hours ago," The guard reported. "He left not but twenty minutes ago for the Cathedral - over there."


    The guard pointed to the large cathedral that broke the sea of snow-topped roofs just several blocks south of them.


    "I was predisposed when your lord asked for me," Randol said. "Send a runner to bring him back, and I''ll meet with him in his audience chamber."


    The guard looked to the two girls behind him. Priscilla glared at the man with that insinuating look. Cyril hadn''t noticed as she was still in awe over the view from the gate. The guard quickly looked away, then summoned another guard to lead them into the castle. They crossed the outer bailey, swarming with activity from officers trying to plan the defense of the city, to the servants trying to store rations away for an expected siege.


    Cyril watched it all with great interest. Priscilla felt more nervous and stayed close to Cyril for comfort. She was like a mountain, powerful and unmoving. She need only to come closer to escape the waves of chaos that lapped at her feet, and it''d bring peace of mind. Though, this mountain had to repeatedly be pulled along by her to keep up.


    They passed through another gate and into the inner bailey. Finally, they reached the audience chamber, which was Lord Gulley''s solar. Illuminated by the winter mid-day sun, Randol and Priscilla were led to a large table with tea placed in front of them. Cyril declined it and instead walked around the room. Admiring the paintings on the wall as she lowered her hood down. Her hair seemed to brighten the room as the light hit it.


    "Cyril, why don''t you have a seat?" Randol asked.


    "I rather stand," Cyril replied. "These paintings, are there anything like this in your home?"


    It was a lovely painting of the sea, marked with a single ship as it sailed into the sunset. She had seen hundreds of digital photos of paintings. Digitally done, hand-done, robotically done. Done this way, or that way. She''d seen it done many ways. Despite that, there was a certain allure to seeing it in person. Though, Cyril found that many things were better in person.


    "Yes, and much better done," Randol said. "If you''d like, I could show you around the Royal Palace whenever you care to visit."


    "I don''t mean better," Cyril said. "Just... I don''t remember the last time I''ve seen a painting in person. Well... My father had one family portrait painted and huge in the living room. That was a long time ago... I don''t think I even remember how it looked."


    "You don''t remember how... You look?" Priscilla asked.


    The two nobles looked at the Goddess with uncertainty. There was a feeling of loss around the girl right now. Randol had never known painting to bring out such an emotion, not a genuine one at least. The girl seemed to have quite the mood swings though, so he wasn''t sure if it was the painting.


    "Mm, no," Cyril said. "It''s been a long time since I''ve seen my face."


    "If you''d like, my fair lady, I could gift you a mirror?" A voice called out as an older man walked into the room.


    He was trailed by a man who dressed like a Bishop. On his white hat, a sun had been displayed. And he walked with leisure. He also looked out of breath.


    "I''m fine," Cyril said, turning to face them.


    The two men paused when her golden-feline eyes turned to them. Their subtle glow and pureness caught them off guard. The Bishop stood his ground afterword, but the older man approached.


    "I am Viscount Herald Gulley, at your service," Lord Gulley bowed politely to Cyril, who in turned nodded her head to him. "I rule over quite the port here, a mirror would never be troublesome to acquire. An exquisite gift for an exquisite woman."


    Lord Gulley was stood a quarter of a head taller than Cyril. He had sharp sky eyes, and graying blonde hair. He was also fit for a man his age. Wearing a fancy leather coat, it did well to show he was a fit man. He had a short beard and mustache that protruded from his wolfish features.


    "Lord Gulley, it''s a pleasure," Randol stood from his chair and walked over to greet him. " I apologize for the delay."


    "I was told you were predisposed," Lord Gulley looked over the two girls. "I hope I did not ruin your fun, but we''re currently facing quite the threat at the moment."


    "I believe you have it wrong," Randol frowned. "Lady Cyril... Let us just say she is not one to offend, and neither is Lady Priscilla, the only daughter of the Hammel Family."


    It was then that Lord Gulley saw the sword at Cyril''s hip.


    "I see," Lord Gulley said. "Forgive me, I misspoke. I was consulting with the Alistairian Church to see if they''d be willing to provide aid. This is Bishop Luis, he agreed to muster up mages for the defense."

 44 12

    The sun burned with its usual fiery intensity, but its warmth was not. The midday winter chill reigned over it. Randol stood on the poop-deck; his hands gripping the wooden railing. His eyes lingered on the gathering clouds far on the northern horizon. Thought and foreboding, it crawled between the snow-capped Sentinel Mountain peaks. The clusters of mountains that stood between them and complete destruction. It was dark and foreboding in its vestige as it loomed over the port city on the sea''s edge.


    "Don''t worry about Priscilla, Brother," Desmond appeared behind him. "Cyril will watch over her."


    "You''re putting an awful amount of trust in her," Randol commented despite not actually being what he was troubled by. "We''ve known her for less than a week."


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    "And yet, you let her travel with us," Desmond said. "You could have stopped her."


    "You stop her, then tell me how that goes," Randol huffed.


    "I''ll have that little girl do it," Desmond half-joked. "She seemed quite attached to Priscilla."


    "You''re going to have to start addressing her less informally once we reach the capital," Randol said. "We''re going back to where we belong. We should have never gone out there. We had no business out there."


    "We woke Cyril up, didn''t we?" Desmond said. "We brought an Angel back into the world. That has to count for something."


    "Remember when you were just a bit younger than Lady Hammel?" Randol asked as he turned Desmond. "You had told me you were delving into these ruins to prove to our Father that you could be brave?"


    "Yes, what of it?" Desmond sighed.


    "You said, if you could bring something to prove you worth, Father would praise you," Randol said. "Maybe it''s time to rethink that stance."


    "Why?" Desmond asked curiously.


    "Just like in those mountains," Randol pointed north to the fading mountains. "A storm is brewing in the capital. I swear that I will try my best to keep you safe, but what happened out there... We both will have to answer for it... I don''t think you''ll ever have that chance to earn that praise."


    Despite his treatment, it still hurt to hear it from Randol. The brother who believed in family first.


    "Do you think so?" Desmond said after a few moments.


    "I do," Randol said. "Father hasn''t stood in your way, but neither has he helped you. I''m not blind to how he views you... But I had hoped you could have earned merits on this trip. However... We failed. I may be spared, but..."


    Desmond would not.


    "Just like before, I''ll get through it," Desmond said. "I always have."


    And I have Mai by my side now.

 45 13

    For the tenth time, Lord Gulley sighed. Priscilla swore that Cyril was just one more sigh away from tossing the Viscount over the wall. With each sigh, the air around her felt slightly warmer. This change hadn''t gone unnoticed by Bishop Luis either. He had a keener eye, and he brought up the rear. The man-made her feel uneasy with the way he watched Cyril with his hawk-like eyes.


    "We will need more men here on the eastern gate." Lord Gulley stated out loud for Bishop Luis as they approached the gatehouse. "I expect the church could accommodate these requests?"


    As they approached the gatehouse, Cyril could already tell how undermanned it was. The two towers that encased it was empty. The Northern Gate, the route expected to be attacked, had four men on each tower. More where to be stationed within to rain arrows through the portholes in the masonry. Her assumption was vindicated when they stepped into it. They''d been greeted by the Knight-Captain who was in charge of the eastern part of the city.


    "My Lord," The Knight-Captain nodded his head.


    "How many men do you have?"


    "Less than five. I sent everyone else to reinforce the northern gate." The Knight-Captain reported. "However, at the moment, only I and one other are on duty at the moment. I sent the others to rest. We''re going to try and be as rested as possible for tonight''s storm."


    "Good." Lord Gulley said as he turned to Bishop Luis, but instead caught sight of the girls. His eyes sharpened with annoyance at the sight of them. He did admit they were quite beautiful girls, but he needed fighters.


    "Yes?" Cyril asked defiantly.


    "I require nothing from you at this time," Lord Gulley stated with force. "Bishop Luis, will you have enough men to help man these weak points?"


    "I believe I do." The Bishop spoke up. "If not, I can leave the cathedral undefended. Should we lose the gates, it would not matter if I have five or ten."


    "Good," Lord Gulley said before he ignored the hostile looks Cyril sent him and left the gatehouse.


    When they exited it, Priscilla noted sun setting in the west. The sky was painted with streaks of golds, oranges, and tans. Streaked with slivers of white. To the north, the storm had already begun to roll down towards them. She estimated that it''d be here within a couple of hours at the soonest.


    "Y-Yes!" Priscilla squeezed the words out.


    That had turned Cyril''s attention away from glaring at the City Lord''s back. Her golden eyes, more brilliant than the hues of the setting sun, narrowed at them. Priscilla shot her a reassuring smile. However, it did the opposite.


    "You go on ahead," Cyril said to Priscilla.


    "No, no. I''m fin--" Priscilla tried to reject, but Cyril shot her a look that conveyed that it was not a request, but a command.


    Priscilla meekly nodded her head to Bishop Luis before she scampered past the Goddess. She quickly floated over to Lord Gulley, who''d been more than happy to entertain the young daughter of Viscount Hammel than the albino no name.


    "What was your name again?" Cyril asked pointedly. "Leelu?"


    "It''s Luis, Lady Cyril," The Bishop nodded with a kind smile.


    "Mmmm," She acknowledged flatly as she followed after Priscilla, albeit, more slowly.


    However, the Bishop had grown bolder and walked side by side with Cyril. When she peaked up at him, he still had that "kindly" smile of his. It made him look handsome in a way, but creepy in another. It conflicted with Cyril''s heart on how to treat him.


    "So, Lady Cyril, where does one such as yourself have such beautiful eyes?" Bishop Luis asked as if he was just asking where to find a tasty snack.


    "Had them," Cyril stated as she looked at the tall buildings that rose around them.


    "They say, Golden Eyes is the surest way of knowing if one is a God." Bishop Luis said. "It''s nothing but wives tales and talk of the Beast-men. However, I''ve never met someone with such beautiful eyes. "


    "An answer for an answer," Cyril said as she kept an eye on the man while keeping an eye on Priscilla.


    "Ask a question, and if I can answer, I will," Bishop Luis said.


    "Why was he nice in the first minute I met him, but he''s a total asshole now?" Cyril asked.


    "Habit I suppose. Nobles often greet unknown parties who look like they have status," The Bishop said. "However, Lord Gulley isn''t known for his mannerism rather than his ability in battle. That is why he gets along with Lady Hammel. Her Father, Viscount Hammel, is a renowned general - Warden of the East. He is friends with her father, though they have not met in such a long time. Not since Viscount Hammel retired to the Capital."


    "Mm." Cyril was the only response she gave.


    "Now that I''ve answered your question, will you answer my question?"