Everything was dark, a large fireplace with a black flame boasted at the end of a huge hall, a huge dark hand shape with a green vortex drew attention from the monochromatic rest that dominated the place. Wearing a gray cape, pants and hat with red details, there stood Ragna the traitor. A huge figure appeared in the center of the hall, he did not have a form, but looked like the darkness itself materialized, it was Variphor, who soon spoke:
- "Ragna! I need to know what Fardos and Valiant are planning, I will give you protection so that Fardos can't find you, do what is necessary, but only come back if you get more information. Convince Valiant to come to this dimension and we will kill him."
- "Yes Sir, Valiant still has hopes in me, it will be easy to convince him..."
- "HAHAHAHA, he won't stand a chance if you bring him! Go on, break into the library of Fardos, you know where to get the entrance key!"
Ragna went into a whirlpool of darkness and soon disappeared.
Meanwhile..... In the Library of Fardos:
- "Valiant, I will begin by explaining the plan, hold tight to your seat..."
- "Variphor's followers are in this dimension working to activate the godbreaker in its reverse mode and allow them to bring Variphor here by firing the apparatus' energy on some object created and belonging to him... This is one of the ways of dimension transition, but obviously, he is totally dependent on his followers being successful."
- "Our role is to prevent them from succeeding, for this we must find where they are. It would be easy for a god like me to find them, if not for one small detail... They are protected by Variphor and their tracking in this world is impossible by any of the gods."
- "Obviously in Variphor's dimension there are clues and even means of transportation to their hiding place, be it spheres, vortex or the like. Just as Variphor cannot enter our dimension without a lengthy process, for me to enter their dimension is not a simple task either, therefore, at the moment, not feasible."
- "Here you enter Valiant...", he upon hearing his name already sensed what the direction of this conversation would be, Fardos knew that the words he would say would disturb him, but he continued:
- "You shall enter the Variphor dimension, I will give you my protection and you will not be tracked, your golden set will help you a lot in that place..."
- "It reflects what is inside, the light, wisdom and struggle for freedom, in material form it appears to pure, shining gold. None of what I spoke about exists in Variphor's dimension, so in this way you will be invisible to their eyes... But be careful, you still have your material form, and you will produce noises depending on the circumstance, allowing someone close to you to find you."
- "Getting caught in that dimension is a terrible thing, besides ending our plan once and for all, it will mean that Variphor will be able to enter our dimension and that will mean the end of everything... If you are killed in Variphor's dimension, you will be lost forever, I won't be able to rescue you..."
Valiant removed his helmet, he was pale. He looked around somewhat slowly, and finally directed his gaze to Fardos, he seemed to be in shock at all this information. After a while of silence he said:
- "Okay Fardos, I will go as far as it takes to save this world!"
While they were both talking, Ragna was south of Thais heading towards the Inquisition headquarters, the door was closed. In order to keep a low profile, Ragna preferred to ring the door and wait. Henricus was alone, as usual he went to open the door thinking it was one of the guards reporting some strange activity, at this moment Ragna pushed him, Henricus almost fell to the ground but was able to regain his balance, soon he stopped and looked at her, who slowly locked the door.
- "What is it? Who are you and what do you want?" quickly asked Henricus.
- "Don't you remember me Henricus? The 8 adventurers you received in this very place, I am one of them... I need your help."
- "What a terrible way to introduce yourself, why did you push me, and why did you lock the door?"
- "I need discretion, I don't want you to interrupt us, if you know what I mean", as she spoke, Ragna moved closer to Henricus, the latter backed away slowly, she continued:
- "I need one of those staffs that lead to the library of Fardos, I need to talk to him immediately."
Henricus was very strange to this request, and without hesitation replied:
- "The only one we had is with your companions, there are no others..."
- "I imagined it would be like this... Henricus... I know there are others, you would never be without contact with him, if you delivered one to our team it is because there are others, give it to me soon, or there will be consequences."
Henricus, furious, approached Ragna and said:
- "I don't know who you think you are, but breaking into the headquarters of the inquisition and threatening its boss is not a smart thing to do, you could be sentenced to death for this, my answer is final, leave before I change my mind."
Ragna then sketched a slight smile and directed her right arm to his left shoulder, where she reached for her arbalest, cocked an arrow and aimed at Henricus. He quickly wielded a dagger that was hidden in his desk, but that didn't seem to stand a chance at an arrow from a distance. Ragna then spoke slowly:
- "Give me the staff now, or I will kill you, I know you bless all people, but you visibly forgot to bless yourself, maybe you have the staff with you, I can get it from you or collect it on your corpse, you choose..."
Henricus, visibly in a mixture of fury and fear stared at Ragna, walked 2 steps closer to her as she brought her finger closer and closer to the trigger. He knew that whatever he did, he could never hand over a staff like that to an evil-minded person, she would kill him anyway.
A noise and lights started coming out from a strange floor in the room, it was Lesly coming back from one of her rounds around the continent, Henricus at this moment started attacking Ragna, who quickly deflected and shot an arrow at him, Lesly drew her sword and screamed, she started towards Ragna who seeing his plan failed broke the door and ran away through the city. Lesly, losing sight of Ragna, returned to Henricus who was still alive, however not for long.
- "My daughter Lesly...", Henricus coughed up blood and could barely speak, "Something is wrong... The adventurers... She betrayed us...", Lesly could not hold back her tears, these were the last words of her father, Henricus.
Immediately she alerted all the inquisitors of Henricus' death, becoming the new head of the inquisition. Before long the headquarters was packed with them, including some royal guards who arrived to prevent a new onslaught from Ragna, while others searched the city for her.
Lesly knew she should search for Fardos, she collected one of the staffs from the inquisition vault and headed for the temple in Thais, in a blink of an eye she was in the library, where she could see Fardos and Valiant himself in the background.
- "Lesly! I know what happened, but it was late..." spoke Fardos, as he shifted his attention from Valiant to Lesly.
- "My father is dead...", Lesly spoke and wiping still tears, she took a deep breath and continued, "It was all very quick, I didn't have much to do, but I know who killed him... It was Ragna"
Valiant jumped up from the bench in fright and started looking directly at Lesly. Fardos said:
- "Ragna has a Variphor protection, I can't trace her, in fact, it is the same kind of protection I created for you, Valiant. Lesly, Henricus was killed by an artifact from another dimension and this means that he is in a space that does not belong to our dimension or Variphor's, but in a place called limbo. After neutralizing this threat from Variphor we will rescue him", Lesly nodded as Fardos completed his sentence.
- "It is clear we have no time to waste, Ragna has been sent by Variphor and so will I do with you Valiant, I need you to find something in that dimension that indicates the exact location they are in ours, with the exact location we can attack and destroy them."
- "Fardos, we have information we received from Spectulus and Sinclair from the icy waters of Svargrond, the reports were left on my father's desk, I have seen them and need to know if any movement by the inquisition will be necessary."
- "Yes Lesly, perfect timing for this... According to the information obtained there is a large area under the waters of that place that presents an anomaly: there has been a process of rupture between the edges of the 2 dimensions and the realities of both seem to merge in a turbulent process, it is there, with the wand of dimensions... Valiant, you will be able to control this turbulence and pass through the rupture, but be careful, the crossing can be disturbing and consume a lot of your energy."
- "Okay Fardos, I'll be ready", as he spoke, Valiant placed the wand of dimensions in his backpack.
- "Lesly, take Valiant to the indicated location, he will need soldiers from the inquisition and a ship just for this purpose", requested Fardos.
Lesly nodded in confirmation and left to make the preparations. Valiant was still packing his backpack when Fardos spoke to him:
- "Your 6 companions have been protecting Spectulus and Sinclair for a while, they will be vital that no follower of Variphor tries to kill them, we need to detect any anomaly, just like this one found in Svargrond, they do not know what you are about to do and nor should they... Valiant, you will not be able to tell them about this, Ragna could at any moment find them and if any of your companions reveal this countless guards from that dimension will make your job impossible."
- "Understood, Lord Fardos, I will not tell them, I will be as discreet as possible."
Valiant left the library and met Lesly who was waiting for him at the port of Thais, his journey to the icy waters of Svargrond made him uneasy, as he would have to succeed in something that no one was able to do: break into Variphor's dimension.
To be Continued...