“I grew up the son of a wealthy family. My parents founded a company that soon grew to be the largest producer of paper scrolls in all of Kanarth. My father invented a magical spell that allowed for the paper we made to be much more durable which made it highly popular among mages, who often had to rewrite their complicated spells because the paper was tearing, dirty or just too crumpled up after carrying it with them. Their books were more hardy, but there were certain benefits to having spells on a loose piece of paper too. I digress, but basically I grew up with a lot of money and parents who were closely working for the Kascoma. That was the name of a magical society that trained young people into mages. It was at Kascoma where I first learned about magic. It was also where I met my wife, Linia and her younger brother Sorda. Sorda and I became quick friends. I had the intelligence to come up with new things and he had the natural talent to master almost anything instantly. I distinctly remember visiting their house early on in our friendship and being quite shocked. Sorda’s parents were of the lowest class in Kanarth. Wealth was everything back in those days and if you didn’t have anything to provide to the city then you might as well not exist. It was such a different upbringing from my own, but we felt like we were such close friends from the very start. It was also that visit to their home where I first met Linia. She was the most beautiful young woman. Short red hair, those little dimples and just a mischievous look in her eyes. She did not care for me one bit. Called me a stuck-up loser and left the room shortly after I introduced myself. Sorda said that was a good first impression but I didn’t buy it. Still, we would hang out almost every day back then, and I would regularly visit their home. I would always bring something to eat or drink as that felt appropriate. I was definitely trying to flaunt my family’s wealth if I’m being perfectly honest with you, but a young man would want to impress a girl in any way he could think of, you would understand. After a few months, I invited Sorda, Linia and their parents to my house for dinner with my family. Sorda and I had just finished the first stage of our education and it was worth a celebration. Because my family had the means, we invited their family over. It was after that dinner, when I showed Linia my study, that she started to open up to me. I was obsessed with nature and specifically trees. A big part of Kanarth’s culture was about longevity and trying to create a state so rich and powerful that it would last forever. Some of the trees that stand here in this very forest are older than any of us alive. If you want to live forever, just look at the world around you and you’ll find plenty of examples of those who have figured it out. It was also around this time that Sorda and I started realizing that our end goals weren’t fully aligned. I was happy being just another mage in the bigger picture of it all but Sorda had a hunger. And that hunger could not be satiated by simply living a single lifetime.” They looked at Teddy and Rolin. “Us elves live a much longer time than many of the other mortal folks, but even we feel the passing of time get faster and faster as we age. There’s an old wisdom about the passage of time, are you familiar with it?”
Teddy nodded. “I think I know what you mean. Say you’re a ten year old boy, and you have to wait for something for an entire year, that is one tenth of your life. That’s a lot of time. But if you’ve lived for three hundred years, then that same year is a third of a percent of your lifetime. It will feel like it goes by in a flash.”
Karnisal nodded approvingly. “Sorda had not experienced that feeling himself when we were at Kascoma, but he had seen it in others and he feared it. Fear of death and the passing of time is normal, most of us experience it at some point in our lives, but Sorda was obsessed with this fear. And he knew it too. He talked to me about it at length and I tried to comfort him, help him out. Linia did the same. The two of us spoke at length about the joys of living here and now, and not the fears of what might come but the anxiety he experienced was indescribable. There was a point in time where his fear of death got so bad that he attempted suicide. It’s almost ironic if you think about it, but my friend was so scared of death that he couldn’t live with himself. Linia and I sought comfort in each other’s company at the time and before we knew it we welcomed our first child into the world. Kaishi. We named him after Linia and Sorda’s grandfather, who had passed away at a young age during a pilgrimage.”

Karnisal took a sip of their drink and stared into the distance for a while. On their face was a mix of melancholy and regret. Eventually they spoke again. “It was during these few years that I think we lost sight of Sorda. Of course we still kept close watch on his moods and made sure he wasn’t getting into anything too serious, but taking care of a child is hard work and I have to admit that our priorities weren’t always with him. When Sorda started dating a fellow student at Kascoma we figured that he might finally be able to get rid of some of his anxiety. We didn’t anticipate that his new partner would be a terrible influence on him. Sorda’s partner was a charismatic man, handsome as they came and with a witty sense of humor. Darovin was his name. To this day I do not believe that Darovin’s intent was to send Sorda spiraling deeper into his anxiety, but their relationship did not go well. Where Linia and I had tried to focus on the positives of our long life and the opportunities that still lay before us, Darovin was far more focused on sheltering Sorda from the world around him and instead having him focus on their relationship. This seemed to work well for a few years and they got married not long after Linia and I finally married. I remember that Kaishi was just old enough to walk by that point and he brought the rings forward. Sorda looked good at his wedding. He’d grown out his hair, the same pretty red hair that Linia had, and he started wearing a suit at every opportunity. We still kept close contact and to this day I regret not realizing that things were worse than I thought. Darovin had found an alchemical substance that helped Sorda calm down a bit and let his anxiety fade. A drug of sorts that relaxed the mind. Now I’m no stranger to drugs either, it was actually a pretty common habit back in Kanarth. Makes sense right? A society of mages and sorcerers would definitely experiment with everything they had on hand. There were mixtures that helped you focus or allowed you to skip sleep for much longer than would normally be healthy for you. There were also relaxants like the one that Sorda started taking. What no one accounted for was that the potency of this particular drug was much higher than he intended. One night, Darovin suddenly knocked on our door, with an unconscious Sorda in his hands. He had taken too much of the Nasfarweed, the drugs in question, and was unresponsive. We managed to get him back to his senses by administering a combination of herbs that were known to force the toxins out of the body quicker. A rather unpleasant experience that left him sweating out the toxin through his skin, which probably felt awful. After that episode, we made sure that Sorda’s drug usage was monitored closely. But by this point, it was already too late and Sorda’s downward spiral had already started. What made things worse was that Darovin was racked with guilt for letting this happen to his husband. Both men changed and there was nothing that Linia, myself or anyone else could do to make things better again. Sorda’s fear of death got worse and he would bounce from being high on drugs to being torn apart by anxiety. He’d stop eating for days on end and would go into fits of rage. We even had to break contact with him for a while when he almost hit Kaishi in his anger. He divorced Darovin, who eventually recovered from what had clearly become an abusive relationship and started teaching classes at Kascoma. Sorda eventually left Kanarth behind to see more of the world. I didn’t know at the time that his aim was to find a way to make himself immortal, but in hindsight it’s not strange. Someone obsessed with death would want to be immortal to prevent death altogether. I bet he thought he would no longer be anxious if he knew he would not die. Despite feeling worried about Sorda being left to his own devices, life went on and Linia and I had our second child, a girl called Sarina. We were a happy family. I had taken over my parents’ paper business although it mostly ran itself by this point and we’d started building a communal garden in Kanarth. The city had always been focused on magic and towers and building more and more modern structures that it felt peaceful to have a garden that anyone could visit. It was our pride and joy and we would spend much of our time taking care of it.” There was a soft smile on Karnisal’s face as they recounted this part of their past. “At a certain point we had mostly forgotten about Sorda. Sad as it sounds, that was the reality of things. He had decided to disappear on his own and he had never bothered to contact us. We wouldn’t see him again until our children were both adults.”
Karnisal looked at the door and then rang a little bell on their desk. Mirgia had been there to respond to this bell many times so it felt weird to sit there and wait for someone else to show up and help Karnisal.
The door opened and the familiar face of Larf, a fellow guard, appeared. “What can I do for you, Lord Karnisal?”
“Larf be a dear and fetch us some wine. I need a drink if I want to continue this story.”
Larf nodded. “I shall be right back.”
Karnisal looked around the room. “I hope I’m not boring you with too many details about my youth,” they said apologetically.
“It is hard to tell a story if you can’t tell it from the very beginning,” Rolin said. “I for one am quite interested in hearing your story, if it brings you even a little bit of relief to tell the story to someone.”
Karnisal smiled. “You are a very kind person, I am glad we got to meet”
“I appreciate that very much, and I am glad too.”
Larf returned with some drinks and a platter of fruit as well. Mirgia poured everyone a glass and then returned to his seat. They waited patiently while Karnisal drank their wine before the story continued.

The journey from Morpezo to Milinia was a quick one. Mirgia knew the forest well and although it wasn’t a route he was personally familiar with, the signs that his brethren left behind along the trees were enough for him to bring his companions through the most efficient routes. Still, even knowing exactly how to travel it took them a little over five days before they reached the edges of Milinia. Mirgia held up his hand and they waited for the guard to appear. When he realized that Mirgia was a familiar face, the two elves shook hands. “Pazil, good to see you.”
“Mirgia, you as well. I thought you were with the prince of Blueyerd?”
“A lot has happened, it’s a long story.” He pointed at the others. “These are my companions, Kimi’thania has been here before, but Rolin and Teddy are new companions.”
Teddy chuckled. “You can call me uncle Teddy.”
Pazil frowned. “I’m well over three centuries old.”
“Uncle is a state of mind.” Teddy replied before laughing loudly.
Pazil couldn’t help but smirk. He turned his attention to Rolin. “Pardon me, but may I ask about your eyes?”
Rolin smiled and nodded. “I received a blessing from a woman recently who gave me this sight after I was blind all my life. We are now here to see what this power really means.”
Pazil exchanged a look with Mirgia who nodded. “We came here to see Karnisal, and quickly if possible. I have much to discuss with him.”
“Very well, go on. And friends, welcome to Milinia.”
“I know,” Rolin said. Pazil gave him a strange look but moved back into the treeline.
“Explain what you mean,” Mirgia said.
“The trees, they’re different. Their color is a deeper green. At least I think it’s green, I know trees are supposed to be green so the color I see on them is what I’ll call green.”
“Man, it has got to be weird to deal with whatever you have going on,” Teddy said. “You just need to have faith that whatever colors you see are the colors you think they are.”
“Not necessarily,” Rolin said.
“What do you mean?” Mirgia replied.
“We use the word green for things that we perceive to be green. If a tree looks red to me, then it doesn’t matter if I call it green when it looks green to everyone else. We are all thinking about the same thing.”
“It does get tricky if your tree actually looks red, but something else that is green looks blue.”
“Hmm, I didn’t consider that. I suppose we should take some time to test that out.”
“Alternatively, you’ve ascribed emotions to the colors you see in us, but perhaps we can also figure out what colors they relate to.” Mirgia suggested.
“Interesting idea. I do not know what that would help though.”
“Maybe you can correlate certain people to certain things with that color.”
“Does a thing get imbued with the color it is?” Rolin asked.
Kimi shook her head. “This is getting far too philosophical for this early in the morning, shouldn’t we just get on with it and worry about this later?”
Teddy chuckled. “The lass is right, let’s talk to your elven leader first and worry about the colors of the rainbow later.”

Knocking on the door of Karnisal’s office, Mirgia felt nervous. It was an unusual feeling for him to feel nervous in Milinia. It was his home and he’d grown up being very comfortable with the place. And as a guard, he’d made reports to Karnisal many times, but having to talk about something so intricately linked to the old elf’s past felt almost rude. Still, a familiar voice responded from the other side of the door and the familiar sight of Karnisal’s office was there when he opened that door. “Mirgia, I didn’t expect to see you so soon. I only just got your letter the other day.”
“Karnisal, it is good to see you again. I have come here to introduce you to some friends and talk about some things, including what I wrote in the letter.”
Karnisal smiled. “I see a familiar face there and some unfamiliar but very interesting faces.”
Teddy chuckled. “People say that I’m interesting a lot.”
Rolin nudged him in the side. “I think he’s talking about me.”
“I knew that.”
“Oh.”
Karnisal laughed. “Kimi’thania, good to see you.”
“You as well, Lord Karnisal.”
“And you are?”
“Theodore Pasture, but you can call me uncle Teddy.”
Karnisal raised an eyebrow but nodded. “And?”
“Rolin Fiedser, a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
Karnisal looked into Rolin’s eyes, clearly studying them. “What do you see in me?”
Rolin looked back at Karnisal, a bit taken aback. “I see conflict. I see a clash of colors. I see what looks like how I imagine a sunset to look but at the same time there is a stillness like a pond in a forest clearing. It’s definitely different from the people in my village.”
Karnisal pondered this for a moment. “Could you tell me a little bit about yourself?”
Rolin nodded and proceeded to give Karnisal a quick recounting of his youth, how he had no sight and spent much time at home, learning how to help out in the inn without eyesight. Then he talked about how Brela showed up to the village and gave him this strange gift of sight. He then told Karnisal about how Mirgia and some Sahilid showed up and how they then discussed their options before heading to Milinia. It was at this point that Mirgia took over.
“So we met a person who is the leader of the Sahilid unit in Severanti. This person initially introduced himself as Ankh and seems to be a powerful sorcerer. Then when he needed my help he explained that his name was Sorda’Thun the wanderer. He talked about the fall of Kanarth and how he and you are both originally from Kanarth. He told me that he cannot keep control over these buildings from Kanarth that have been appearing without your help. And when we went to Morpezo we met Rolin after which we decided that we might need your wisdom on location to open the tower outside of town.”
During both stories, Karnisal sat in their chair, no reaction on his face besides sometimes nodding along to show that he was still listening. When Mirgia finished his story a long silence filled the room. It would be more than two minutes before Karnisal gathered his thoughts and spoke.

“There are a few things that stand out to me from the things you all have told me.” He looked at Rolin. “I will need some answers from you if I am to figure out what to do with this situation.”
Rolin nodded. “I trust Mirgia’s judgement in people.”
Karnisal smiled. “I’m glad to hear that, that makes me happy.” He looked at Mirgia. “First things first, this Ankh person is lying to you.”
“To what extent?” Mirgia asked. “I have little trust in the man, but it’s been very difficult for me to figure out which things are true and which things aren’t true. But considering that you call him “this Ankh person”.”
Karnisal nodded. “Exactly. I don’t know who this person is, or what their relationship to the flying city of Kanarth is, but that person is not Sorda’Thun. At least I would be very surprised if they were. Sorda’Thun hasn’t shown himself in several centuries and his abilities as a sorcerer are so incredibly dangerous and so beyond anything I can do myself that he would be able to clear out or destroy every single dungeon on this side of the Feral Wildlands without even breaking a sweat. However what worries me most about this situation is how you described this person when you were inside the dungeon in Redsan.”
“How come?” Kimi asked.
“The appearance he took on while down there, the one you described to me with the lack of eyes and the floating gemstones around his head, that appearance does match that of Sorda’Thun in his prime. It’s a visage he doesn’t take on very often so whoever this Ankh is must know Sorda’Thun personally or at least have done his research. Not to mention, I don’t quite understand why he would take on that appearance inside the dungeon. Even if it makes him look like Sorda’Thun himself, you would have no idea that this is what he looked like.”
“You’re right, that is weird.”
“So with all that in mind, I think I want to meet this person. It’s risky, since I don’t know what reason they have to try and get me to come to them instead of visiting Milinia, but I am also worried that leaving this person without oversight is equally dangerous. Now,” they turned to Rolin, “let’s talk about what might be happening with you. And I will warn you that a lot of what I am going to say here will be speculation. I have never seen this phenomenon before although I do believe I have heard about it a long time ago and I will now tell you what I remember.
If this is what I think it is, then there is a very good chance that this Brela woman came out of the tower to speak with you. This means she didn’t go in there to explore the tower, but she instead went back into it because she had done what she needed to. She had given someone the key to entering this tower. The tower itself is what we call a Vincula. It’s a prison made specifically for spirits.” Karnisal looked at Kimi. “Think of it like the realm you were locked in, but in a much more powerful capacity. Still, when a spirit is powerful enough and stuck in this Vincula for long enough, they can figure out a way to get the lock opened. You said that the keyhole in this door looked similar to the kaleidoscopic look in Rolin’s eyes, correct?”
Mirgia nodded. “It definitely looked like the two were related in some way, but we couldn’t figure out how and what to do.”
“Then that probably means that the spirit locked inside this Vincula gave the key to Rolin and had faith that he would be able to figure out how to open the tower.”
“But you have no idea how to help us then?” Kimi asked.
Karnisal shook his head. “I will however go with you to see if I can be of help when I see the prison for myself. I’ve read a lot about magic in my time and perhaps there’s something we can all figure out together. Besides, I also want to figure out who this Ankh person is and why he is impersonating one of the most dangerous sorcerers that have ever walked this realm.”
Teddy sat down, cross-legged. “Can you tell us a bit more about this Sorda’Thun person? I’ve heard from different people now that he’s dangerous, but besides being a weird chap and him looking very strange through Rolin’s eyes, he didn’t seem all that unreasonable nor powerful.”
Karnisal pondered this. “That just adds more credence to the idea that this was not Sorda’Thun but some sort of imposter. But in the event that it is my old colleague, let me tell you a little bit about my time in Kanarth. Do promise not to freely share this information with other people, I’d like to keep any knowledge surrounding Kanarth to not be commonly available. Let it stay shrouded in mystery.” They sighed. “Although with this sudden appearance of relics from the past I don’t know how much longer it can stay hidden. Let me tell you a little bit about myself then.”

The tower looked bizarre. Mirgia struggled to even figure out for himself what he was looking at. At first glance it looked like a normal stone tower with some strange design choices, but the more he looked at it, the more he started to doubt what he saw. After talking to Rolin and Mel in the inn, they decided that Kimi and Teddy would return to Ankh and the Sahilid at their camp while Mel, Rolin and Mirgia headed straight for the tower. The tower was only a few minutes outside of town and Mirgia was worried that during their talk in the town, Ankh would have moved to the tower himself, but upon arrival it didn’t seem that way. The design was strange starting with the material. What he had initially assumed to be stone seemed like it might be a form of hardened wood instead. It looked like it had grains to it like a plank of wood would. It also curved in strange ways as if the entire tower was somehow woven out of strings of hardened wood. Putting it into words in his own mind didn’t help much with making sense of it. The door looked strange too, almost like a coiled snake. When Mirgia carefully put his hand on the door it even felt like a snake too and after he followed the pattern to the center he realized that in the center of the door was the mouth of a snake, fully opened. Looking into it, Mirgia saw a kaleidoscopic view of what looked to be a theater performance where the moving parts were so abstract and confusing that even though his mind registered it as a theater performance, he couldn’t actually make any sense of what was going on. He shook his head. “I have lived a long time and although I’ve spent a lot of that time near my hometown, I have seen some strange sights throughout the years.” Mirgia looked at the other three. “I have never seen anything like this, not even remotely close. This makes the dungeon we saw in Redsan look like a regular village house.”
“Well,” Mel said, “That doesn’t help settle my nerves one bit.”
“You say this Brela went into this tower then? How did she do that?”
“I didn’t really see it for myself,” Mel replied, “only Rolin was present to see it and his vision is a little bit special after all.”
“She held my hand while looking into the kaleidoscopic view that is in the snake’s mouth. When she uttered a few words, that’s when my eyes started to flare up and turn into what they are now. I think that I somehow have something to do with getting into the tower, but beyond that I don’t have the faintest clue what it could be.”
“I think I might have some guesses as to that,” a familiar voice said as Ankh approached the tower with two of the Sahilid as well as Kimi and Teddy behind him. They all turned to face him and Rolin seemed to visibly shrink. “You are unpleasant,” he said to Ankh.
“I get that a lot, but it still hurts when you say it out loud.”
“Apologies, I’m still new to this.”
“New to what?” Ankh asked.
Rolin opened his eyes and Ankh gasped audibly, the first time that Mirgia had seen him shocked and out of his element.
“What are you?” He asked.
“Usually people ask me who I am before asking what I am, stranger.”
Ankh struggled to regain his composure but ultimately did. “I’m sorry, who are you?”
“I am Rolin Everglade, I’ve lived in this village all my life and I was effectively blind until a little while ago. I already explained to your companions here that I gained some form of sight recently when I came into contact with a woman named Brela, who then headed into the tower.”
“Fascinating,” Ankh replied. “I go by Ankh and I am here to figure out what part of the city of Kanarth this is and what valuables might be inside. If I deem them important, I will claim them for the emperor.”
“We’ll see about that,” Mel replied.
“Either way,” Ankh said, “I would love to work together to figure out how to get inside this tower.”

Mirgia sat down a little ways away from the tower. Looking at it too much was giving him a headache and he definitely wasn’t the one who would figure out the secret to opening this tower. Kimi, Ankh and Rolin were having a discussion about their options while the other two Sahilid were instructed to inspect every part of the tower meticulously in case they’d missed anything. Mel and Teddy were sitting down with Mirgia.
“You doing alright?” Teddy asked.
“Me?”
“Both of you,” he looked at Mel as well. “I can imagine it’s a lot to take in that a stranger suddenly gave your brother sight.”
Mel nodded. “And not just any sight, but this strange sight that allows him to see colors and emotions. I was worried about what he might see in me.”
Teddy nodded. “Aye, we all have our darker thoughts from time to time, so I get that that is a scary thought, but you have to understand that our darker thoughts aren’t what define us as a person, they are only a momentary lapse in judgement. Who we really are shines through in our actions and I’m sure Rolin can see that.”
Mel smiled. “Thanks Teddy, I get what he sees in you.”
Teddy chuckled. “I just do what I can.” He looked at Mirgia. “Worried about your friends?”
Mirgia nodded. “I’ve ended up staying in Redsan longer than I wanted and now we’re making this detour too. I’m worried about setting up this meeting between Ankh and Karnisal as well.” He looked to make sure that the sorcerer was out of earshot. “I don’t trust his intentions one bit. I bet he’s only working with us to get to this meeting. But what is he planning?”
Teddy shrugged. “As long as you work things out in a way where you keep the upper hand, then surely nothing truly bad happens. As unpleasant as Ankh can be at times, I doubt he has any truly awful intentions with Karnisal, right?”
Mirgia nodded. “I hope you’re right.” He looked out around him. The forest here felt familiar, though he hadn’t been to this part of it, he knew this was his home. The Liriath forest was a large forest, going from the shore to the center of the Feral Wildlands while also going north and south a fair bit. And Milinia was located more or less in the center of that forest. The trees were the same as home and it put him at ease. It also reminded him of the duty he had to Karnisal in protecting the prince of Blueyerd and how painfully absent he was from that role. He hoped that his letter reached Karnisal properly. After what felt like an hour but was probably closer to half that time, Ankh sauntered up to the trio sitting on the ground. “I think we’re stuck.”
“What do you mean?”
“We believe that to enter this tower, Rolin’s power is needed, but it also requires someone to know how to wield that power. This Brela person seemed to know how to use this power and thus slipped into the building, but Rolin has no idea what to do, and neither do I.”
Mirgia considered this. “So what’s your plan?”
“I have two thoughts.”
“Share with the class,” Teddy said.
“The first one is that we try to brute-force it, just figure out a way to break into the tower. Rolin was opposed to this because he believes it might hurt the woman who went in before us.”
“And what’s the second plan?”
Ankh looked at Mirgia. “If there is anyone who could figure out how to deal with something like this, it would be Karnisal.”
“You’re joking.”
Ankh shook his head. “I know this might sound like me trying to get my end of the bargain quicker, but I truly believe that Karnisal with all of his council is the most likely person to actually solve this.”
“And then what, you expect me to go fetch him for you?”
“I would have phrased it differently, but let me alter expectations. I’m not saying you have to convince him to come over immediately, but there is a lot of wisdom in Milinia. Your people know these forests better than anyone and unless you know of any ancient spirits that could help us, I can’t think of a better person to come help.”
“What about Kimi?”
“The spirit of music? I mean no disrespect but she’s a child. She has barely lived for two centuries. This magic is ten times as old as her. She’s talented but this is beyond her scope. The powers in Kanarth were incomparable to that of mages now.”
Mirgia thought about this for a little bit. “I will travel to Milinia and talk to Karnisal. I will take Kimi and Teddy with me and you will stay here in Severanti. If you want to deal with other business in the meantime that is fine, but I have two demands for you.”
“Still so hostile,” Ankh scoffed.
“Are you listening?”
Ankh seemed like he wanted to comment something else but then stopped himself and nodded.
“Good. First is that your cronies leave this town alone.”
Ankh nodded. “Done.“
“And the second demand is that you tell me why you are so desperate to get into this tower. It’s a difficult task from the looks of it and these dungeons have been popping up everywhere. You didn’t seem as invested into the dungeon near Redsan, so why would you go through such lengths for this and to meet with Karnisal?”
“I’ve told you already, he’s the only one who could provide some serious help in this messed up situation, and this tower might contain something dangerous.”
Mirgia shook his head. “Not enough, I need you to be a little bit more specific.”
Ankh sighed. “Look, I don’t know for sure what we can find in this tower, nor if there is anything of value in there. But I know one thing. This tower is not just any old building. This tower is a prison. And I want to know who or what would be dangerous enough for someone in Kanarth to lock them up in a prison this complex.”
“May I join you to Milinia?” Rolin asked.
“Don’t you need to stay here?” Kimi asked.
Rolin shook his head. “Mel will keep an eye on things here and it seems like Ankh will continue investigating the tower. I assume that your city leader will be more capable of assessing the situation if I’m present. That’ll make his decision on what to do easier and maybe he can even explain things to us without having to come along.” He smiled. “Besides, having lived on the edge of the Liriath forest all my life I can’t say I’m not at least a little bit curious about your hometown. Especially now that I can see.”
“Well, you’re welcome to come along with us.”

After writing chapter 24, I wanted to include this little bit below at the end of chapter 23. For now I’ll include it here.

“I’m sorry, but who are you?” Mirgia asked.
“I am Rolin. Mel’s my sister. I have been caught up in the things that happened here in a way that might explain things a little bit and hopefully convince you and those people that harassed the village the other day to leave us be.”
“Well by all means, go ahead,” Teddy said, “I’m happy to find a solution that everyone can agree on.”
Rolin opened his eyes, revealing kaleidoscopic eyes.

“To tell you the entire story, you need to have a little bit of a background on me. As you can see, I was not given the gift of sight. At least it might not be clear to see now, considering how my eyes have started looking recently, but until very recently I could only see the world in vague blurry shapes. As they always say, you’ve got to play the cards you’re dealt and despite my lack of vision I’ve not had a particularly difficult life. We’re a tight community here in Morpezo and people take care of each other. I’ve learned how to be helpful around town and people take care of the rest for me. I’ve been quite blessed to be honest. About four weeks ago, there was a sudden rumbling in the earth and when some of the villagers went to look around for what damage was done, they found a tower made out of stone that wasn’t there before. They tried to get into the tower, but the door was locked and it had no windows. We left a few people to guard it, but after a day or two we’d started to realize that with no way to get into the tower, there was probably also no way for anything to get out of the tower, so we just left it be. Then two weeks ago – when the tower had been there for ten days – a traveler arrived at the village. A woman of unparalleled beauty.”
Mirgia was about to ask something but Rolin beat him to it. “Of course I had no idea of knowing that, but that is what everyone kept saying about this woman, so I assumed it was true. It didn’t matter to me anyway, beauty isn’t something you can see after all. Or at the very least, it’s not something I can see.” He chuckled.
“Either way, this woman stayed in the tavern and I made sure her chambers were ready. I know this space well enough to get around and many of the simpler things I can do without much issue. It’s a great way to prevent myself from getting bored. When I was changing the sheets, she came back early from whatever she was doing and we talked for a bit. She told me her name was Brela and that she was here to look into the tower that had suddenly appeared. So I told her what I told you guys just now about how it appeared and that we couldn’t enter it. She explained to me that she knew a trick to get into the tower, but she would need my help. I wasn’t really sure what I could do to help her, but she’d been friendly enough that I told her I didn’t mind helping her out. She then asked if I could come to the tower with her the next day and I told her that if she helped me navigate the path there and back it would be fine with me, although when she found out I was going, Mel insisted she would have to come along as well.” Rolin paused for a moment and looked around the room. Mirgia looked at his eyes, mesmerized by them. They seemed to hold your gaze and almost put you in a daze if you kept looking at them and it was hard to look away again. Mirgia wondered if that was why he kept them closed when they first entered. Rolin’s eyes lingered on Kimi. He smiled at her. “You are a spirit, correct?”
Kimi nodded.
“Does the name the woman gave me ring a bell with you?” He asked her.
“What did you say it was again? Brela?”
Rolin nodded.
Kimi considered it for a moment. “It does have a familiar ring to it, but I can’t say I really recognize it.”
“Alright.”
Rolin continued his story. “While we walked to the tower, she told me a little bit about it. Apparently it belonged to a city that disappeared a very long time ago, and she was trying to get something that her ancestors had left behind in this city.”
Mirgia nodded. “The flying city of Kanarth.”
Rolin shrugged. “She didn’t mention the name of the city and I didn’t ask for it since it wouldn’t have meant anything to me either way, but you sound like you know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, more of these dungeons have been popping up around the country and possibly in other places too. We came here after dealing with another one near Redsan.”
“That’s right, you mentioned something like that earlier.” He frowned. “But there was no one there claiming the things, right?”
“No, at least not besides the Sahilid people claiming things for their own.”
“Right. Either way, when we got to the tower, Brela said she would perform a ritual that would allow us to enter the building. I was still unsure as to why she needed me to be there, but Mel and I sat in the grass and listened as she performed this ritual. I obviously couldn’t see what she was doing exactly, maybe Mel can tell you later, but it sounded quite strange. She was using her voice to make sounds that were similar to singing but different. It wasn’t music per se, but I also wouldn’t describe it as speech.”
“Spirit magic,” Kimi said.
“That’s what I thought too when I heard it, thank you for confirming it.” Rolin took a sip of his drink. “After a few moments of this, I felt a warm glow coming from the woman and she asked me if she could borrow my sight for a few moments. I thought she was making a strange joke so I told her she was welcome to do so. She then put her hands on my cheek and put her forehead to mine and when I blinked I could suddenly see something. It wasn’t something normal, at least not how people had described sight to me before and after comparing it with Mel later on it confirmed that the sight I gained in that moment wasn’t normal.” He smiled. “It’s a wondrous feeling to be able to see and it’s a magical sight for sure. I suppose any kind of sight would feel magical after spending years not being able to see more than vague blurs, but the colors I can see are so vibrant and magical that it still brings tears to my eyes at times. But it’s not a particularly useful kind of sight for your everyday life and as you might have noticed, it has a strange effect on the people around me which I do not know how to turn off. But it does allow me to see certain things. It allows me to see people’s emotions and intentions. If someone has bad intentions, their colors turn unpleasant. It’s hard to explain it since I have nothing to compare it to, but I can just tell. It also allows me to see magic and manipulate it. We’ve been trying to figure out how to deal with this entire situation for two weeks now and during that time these Sahilid people came by. They had a real nasty look to them, so Mel and some of the villagers chased them off.”

Quiet filled the room for a few moments while Mirgia pondered the questions in his head. “I have two immediate questions for you.”
“Please, go ahead.”
“One, what happened to this Brela woman after she changed your sight?”
Mel sat up. “I can answer that one. Her eyes turned into a similar kaleidoscopic color and she simply walked through the door into the dungeon. We didn’t see her again after that. I still don’t understand why she did what she did to my brother and why she told him that he had to be there for her to enter the tower.”
Rolin chuckled. “I wanted to go in after her but Mel forbade me from doing so.”
“Can you blame me? It didn’t look like anyone else could have gone with you and maybe something dangerous is happening in there.”
“And if that’s the case, the poor woman is in there alone,” Rolin said.
“Well, she should have brought backup then. She knew what she was getting into and she didn’t explain what she did to you at all. We don’t know if your new eyesight is dangerous, what the limitations of it are and if it’s a temporary measure or if you permanently have these strange eyes now.”
“I hope so, it’s been rather pleasant,” Rolin said. “But it does seem to take a toll on me. I get tired very quickly when looking at things, so I am keeping my eyes shut a lot of the time.”
“Perhaps time will help you get more accustomed to this new sight,” Teddy suggested.
“I hope so. What was your second question?”
“Why are you telling us all this?” Mirgia asked. “I appreciate it because now we can figure out where to go from here, but we arrived to Morpezo with not just any member of the Sahilid but their leader. Why not just tell us to leave too? You don’t have anything from the tower and from what you told us no one can go in.”
“That’s two questions, but I’ll gladly answer both. As for why I didn’t want to just send everyone away, there’s not much stopping other people from going into that tower. Of course we couldn’t figure it out, but we all know the might of the Sahilid and their magic research. There’s a very good chance that some of their more practiced mages – and definitely the leader of the entire organization – are able to force themselves into the tower. I don’t know if Brela will be safe when that happens. When you all entered town the way you did, we saw it as an opportunity to deal with this ordeal in a more organized way. If we work together and set clear goals then maybe we can all get what we want. And as for why I decided to put my trust in your group,” he looked them all over. “Each of you have very pleasant colors to you. Mirgia, your colors are muted and calm, like you live a life of watching over others while having no problems with being the patient person on the side, enjoying the way things happen around him. Kimi’Thania your colors sound beautiful. I don’t know how to explain what I just said, but the colors that you send out into the world are like music to my ears.”
Tears welled up in Kimi’s eyes. “As a spirit of music, this might be the single kindest and most beautiful thing anyone has ever said to me.”
“I’m just telling you the truth of how I see the world, and I am thankful for seeing all of you.” He turned to Teddy. “Teddy.”
“Yessir.”
“There’s a golden color to you. Not gold as in the metal, at least I don’t think so, but when I look at you I feel like I’m flying over and endless field of grain, the sun just bright enough to be pleasant, the smell of flowers, grain and grass in the air and the sound of people enjoying themselves filling the air all around me. Out of all the people I’ve looked at – which admittedly aren’t that many – you are by far the most beautiful.”
“Stop that, you’re making an old man blush.”
Mirgia laughed. “You don’t have to be able to see colors the way you do to tell that Teddy is good people. He’s the kindest soul you’ll ever meet.”
“Come on man, I’m trying not to cry in front of people I’ve just met.” Teddy stood up and gave Rolin a hug. “I want you to know that in telling people how you see them, you can make them feel incredibly seen and heard and that’s very powerful. I pray you use this ability to help those who look like sadness and encourage those who need a little brightness in their life. And I will help you with this tower thing in any way I can, you have my word.”
Mirgia smiled. “Couldn’t have said it better myself. I only wish you could see how proud your parents are looking at you right now.”
Rolin smiled. “Trust me, I can see it very clearly.”

They were on the road towards the capital for no more than three days before a messenger intercepted them. Apparently the emperor had a task for Ankh. A town in the southern part of the Severanti empire had apparently been hiding another one of these strange dungeons from the crown. The source said that it was a much smaller dungeon, only a singular tower with three floors in it, but the village had been overtaken by greed and didn’t want to share with the emperor. At Ankh’s request, they were making a small detour to check out this village and deal with the problem. Their travel troupe was not very large. Ankh had sent two of his companions onwards to deal with some other mission while he left two of them behind to keep an eye on the dungeon in Redsan. So right now the sorcerer was only accompanied by Teddy, Kimi and Mirgia. Doroly had opted to stay behind and take care of Birdie while Teddy was away. Surprising everyone, Teddy and Ankh were actually getting along really well. It wasn’t surprising to Mirgia that Teddy was being friendly, but he never thought it would work on the sorcerer. With the two talking a lot, it left Mirgia a lot of time to think about the future. He wasn’t keen on talking about his bond with Karnisal. To him, Karnisal was just a guardian who had raised a young boy with no parents and Mirgia had no real thoughts about taking over the city. There were several better options among the town leadership anyway. But Ankh put the thought back in his head. Maybe he could talk to Cobal about these feelings, perhaps the young prince would understand. Cobal wasn’t in any position to become a king anytime soon, but he was still in line for the throne. And with his older brother missing, he was closer to this position than before. More than all of this though, Mirgia was curious about Karnisal’s past. He knew a little bit about how Karnisal originally came from a country that no longer exists and he lost a friend in the process, but he didn’t know that Karnisal came from Kanarth, nor did he know that this Sorda’Thun figure – Ankh – was the one that was Karnisal’s friend. He wondered what happened between the two that had made it so that Mirgia was warned to not get close to him. Besides being a bit abrasive – which had made Mirgia careful at first – the sorcerer had helped them out when they were in need and given no reason for distrust. Maybe Karnisal would tell him a bit more about his past if he were to come back with the sorcerer, or maybe he would be incredibly angry.
“If we go on this detour, I think I’ll pen a letter to Karnisal to inform them of our arrival.” Mirgia said to the others.
“That’s a good idea,” Ankh replied, “perhaps it’ll make things less awkward at the border.”
“You’ve really pissed them off badly, haven’t you?” Teddy said jokingly. “What did you do?”

Ankh’s expression turned pensive. “I’m afraid that’s not something I’m willing to talk about with people I only just met.”
Teddy slapped him on the back. “That’s quite alright, stick to your own pace.” He pointed up ahead. “Look, that’s a good please to sleep for the night and maybe you can send that letter of yours, Mirgia.”
Ahead of them was a neat looking roadside inn that seemed to put function over form. It was a simple brick building with a stable on the side. They paid for rooms and Mirgia went to write his letter.

Dear Karnisal,

Things have been hectic since I departed for Saphestan. After meeting up with prince Cobal and Lady Mana we traveled north, toward the kingdom of Rilodar. We encountered strange pirates and cultists there and during a scuffle on an island off the coast I ended up being caught in a strange magic spell that sent me to Redsan village in Severanti. I don’t know exactly how it happened but I believe it had to do with the same magic that we found in Milinia during the harvest festival as well as in the palace in Saphestan. Near Redsan there was a strange dungeon that suddenly popped up and to help out the locals I decided to explore it. I was promptly joined by Kimi’Thania, who was sent to this place with the same sort of magic. Inside this dungeon we found even more magical circles, all similar to what happened when Milinia was attacked. What worries me the most about it is the fact that a sorcerer who came into the dungeon with us was able to identify where this magic likely came from. This sorcerer presented himself as Ankh, but I later found out that he was in fact the sorcerer that you warned me about all those years ago; Sorda’Thun the wanderer. I know very little of your history together, but the sorcerer told me that this current situation with the suddenly appearing dungeons is more dangerous than he initially thought and he is seeking your counsel. In exchange for helping us get out of the dungeon safely, I promised I would arrange a meeting between him and yourself. I hope I haven’t overstepped my boundaries in doing so. We are heading towards Milinia after dealing with another problem in a village nearby. We should be arriving there in early winter. Please inform the guards north of town with what your decision is so they can relay it to me, but I urge you to at least hear out the sorcerer. 

Best,

Mirgia.

Mirgia folded the letter neatly and stamped his seal on it, before going downstairs and handing it off to the innkeeper. There was a messenger that would come through somewhere this week that would be able to bring the letter to the outskirts of the Liriath forest and from there on out an elven messenger could take it the rest of the way. With that set, he went to join the others for dinner in the common room.
“Mirgia, come join us,” Teddy invited him. “The food here is surprisingly good. The innkeeper told me that his father was a famous chef in a restaurant for some nobility, and he learned some good tricks on how to season food to make it taste much better with little effort. It really shows.”
“You can talk to literally everyone, can’t you?” Mirgia said as he sat down.
Teddy chuckled. “Talking to folks is easy. Just open your mouth and let the brain do the rest. Now swinging around magic or cooking dinner, that’s difficult stuff.”
“I’d argue one is more difficult than the other,” Ankh remarked.
“Sure, but I didn’t want to make you feel inferior to the cook,” Teddy jabbed.
Mirgia was almost certain he heard the sorcerer chuckle at the joke, but the man was hard to read.
“So, can you tell us a little bit more about this new job request the emperor gave you?” Mirgia asked. “I’d like to know what we’re getting ourselves into.”
“As I already told you, these strange dungeons have been appearing in different places. We call them dungeons to scare off your average wanderers but we have since learned that they are simply pieces of the flying kingdom of Kanarth. Kanarth did a lot of magical research in its time and even built entire structures on islands that would tether to the main flying city. In some occasions they would even take a chunk of land from the surface and attach it to the flying kingdom.”
“That sounds crazy,” Teddy remarked.

Ankh nodded. “The things that Kanarth was capable of makes you wonder how it was ever possible for them to fall from grace so fast that everything was lost. I was there myself and I still don’t fully understand a lot of it. I know more than I’m telling, of course, but you’ll have to take my word for it. Either way, after Kanarth fell, it fully vanished and I speak truth when I tell you that I do not know where the missing land went. My guess has always been that it landed somewhere on the continent in a region that’s hard to reach. But as time went on and I was unable to find it, I started to doubt this theory. I’ve considered the thought that it might have vanished into another realm. It seems far-fetched but considering that your friend Mana and the emperor of Severanti were both brought here from other worlds, why wouldn’t Kanarth be able to send themselves to another world as well?”
Mirgia considered the idea. It made sense on paper, if the city was never found by either Ankh or Karnisal. He knew that Karnisal spent a long time looking as well before he settled down and founded the city of Milinia, ditching the “wanderer” moniker.
“To return to the assignment at hand, there were four dungeons that appeared at the same time, if we include the one we sealed the other day. One was close to the capital, and I dealt with that one myself, which is why it took me a little while to appear at this one. Another one was dealt with by the emperor, located to the north of the capital. The fourth one that was reported was to the south, not far from the border with the Liriath forest, and was dealt with by some of the other Sahilid members. Members that worked directly for me, and were quite capable. Despite this, we’ve learned that they failed in their mission and were unable to retrieve any of the valuables in the dungeon. Apparently another group of people had already gone into the dungeon before they arrived and dealt with the problem, refusing to hand over the artifacts.”
“First come, first serve,” Kimi said.
Ankh nodded. “Of course that’s how the world works, but with how dangerous these objects from Kanarth can be, it is important that the emperor and I make sure that what these people have found won’t lead to disaster.”
“Is that your excuse for monopolizing all the valuables?” Mirgia asked.
“Call it what you want, the assignment stays the same. We’re to go to this little village of Morpezo and figure out what treasures they found. If they’re not of particular value to our research, we’ll gladly leave them with the people who found them, but if I deem them too valuable, I will be seizing them.”
Mirgia wanted to argue, but he knew the sorcerer wouldn’t listen to him anyway. Knowing what they were setting out to do in the village made him much more nervous than before. This could turn violent pretty quickly. If only the sorcerer wasn’t so closely linked to the mysteries surrounding the Blueyerd royal family, then he wouldn’t have to deal with the arrogant man. But he needed to learn as much about this special magic that these cultists were employing as he could to help out Mana and Cobal when they reunited. He’d already decided to go and meet with them after they finished the meeting with Karnisal. Hopefully they were safe as well.

After the survivors emerged from the dungeon, the two arcanist members of the Sahalid went to work on sealing the entrance to the dungeon. Mirgia stayed to watch the process while Karal, Kimi and Ankh went to report to Captain Arios about what they encountered down there. The rest of them took care of the fallen and the wounded. With some help from the priests that stayed after burying Quint and Danil they managed to at least get the wounded Fezel to be in a stable condition. What Mirgia really wanted to see was how the magic that these arcanists used looked but despite his expectations it did not resemble the foul cultist magic they had been dealing with. It seemed that whatever Ankh was doing, he hadn’t spread this magic to everyone around him. The process instead involved a complicated mix of writing different spells onto a piece of paper before sticking it onto the dungeon. Once the entirety of the entrance was covered, the papers started to emit a bright light and threads of magic started to move from one of the papers to the other until an entire web of multicolored lights covered the entrance. It flashed brightly once and then dimmed until a thick layer of some material covered the entrance completely. “Only one who knows this magic can open the door now,” one of the two arcanists said to Mirgia. Mirgia nodded approvingly. Sealing off a dangerous place like this seemed like a good idea to him. Something that they all could agree on, he supposed. He turned around to find Ankh walking in his direction. Kimi was floating behind him. “Mirgia, would it be alright to speak in private?” Ankh asked.
Mirgia looked at Kimi who nodded.
“I suppose so, did you have a place in mind?”
He followed Ankh a little ways outside of the camp, leaving Kimi behind in the camp to go and talk with some of the others that came out of the dungeon with them. Eventually they reached a quiet spot where they could speak. Ankh looked at him over and seemed to hesitate for a few moments before he started talking.
“Listen, I recognize we got off on the wrong foot. I suppose I could have been kinder towards you.”
Mirgia narrowed his eyes. What is he playing at?
“As I’ve told you already, I am working together with the emperor of Severanti to discover more about the magic used in the time that the flying city of Kanarth was still dominating the sky. There are many strange rumors about the magic that they had, some of which includes the ritual magic we saw in the dungeon. I believe that specific magic was to be used to summon more of those insectoid creatures.” He looked to see if Mirgia was still listening before continuing. “These dungeons have been appearing at a more rapid rate than before and this change has been worrisome. If we get to the point where more of them appear at once, it will become difficult to figure out which ones are dangerous for regular adventurers to tackle. To deal with this problem, there’s someone’s help that I need.”
Mirgia sighed. “What are you playing at?”
“I need to speak with Karnisal the wanderer.”
Mirgia chuckled. “And what do you need me for then?”
“You know who I am, don’t you, Mirgia?”
“Well, I had a hunch about your identity, but yeah, I’ve heard stories. Karnisal taught me when I was only a boy to never get involved with a person called Sorda’thun the wanderer.”
The sorcerer grinned. “Good advice.” He stood up and let his glamor fade, revealing the visage he had taken on when they were in the dungeon. His eyes turned into black voids as if there was a magical nothingness there while around his head appeared several floating gemstones that seemed to look at Mirgia. “Allow me to properly introduce myself. My name is Sorda’Thun the wanderer, I am one of only two survivors of the war between Venoria and Kanarth. Your guardian, Karnisal, is the other.” He narrowed his eyes at Mirgia. “But you knew that already, right?”

Mirgia lay on his bedroll, staring up at the stars in the sky. The reason that Ankh wanted to talk to him was because of his connection to Karnisal. It was common knowledge in Milinia that Karnisal wished for Mirgia to take over the role of Milinia’s leader when they retired. Even the council seemed to be relatively positive about the idea. Mirgia himself had never wanted much to do with the job, but since Karnisal was the one who took care of him when he was an orphan, he did feel like he owed the old leader of the village a lot. Not enough to give away his entire life, but still enough to feel bad about wanting to find a way out. And now Ankh wanted him to set up a meeting between Karnisal and himself, something that Karnisal would not be happy about. The truth was, Sorda’Thun the wanderer was indeed a name that Mirgia had heard when he was younger. The person who was now going under the name Ankh was an ancient sorcerer who was once a member of the Kanarth royal guard. The flying city kingdom of Kanarth dominated the continent in its time. Long before the humans came to this continent, and when the entirety was still considered to be a wilderness, the people that called the continent of Palaria home were fractured. Small villages, cities and settlements dotted the landscape and trade and contact with others was relatively limited. It was in this world that the sorcerers of Kanarth figured out how to make an entire city fly. Not only that, but their study of magic had advanced to such a point that they could dominate the sky and the people they came across. An era of dominance arrived for them and for the span of fourteen years they ruled much of the continent, flying across the sky. Villages would be destroyed if they didn’t listen to the demands of the emperor of Kanarth. Kanarth ended up falling due to a grave miscalculation. In the south of the continent – only a few days north of what is now considered to be the Ravadier Peninsula – was a kingdom called Venoria. The people of Venoria were serpentfolk, part snake, part humanoid. Their ancestry granted them access to poison magic which they managed to develop into all sorts of things, but most impressively was their ability to make their targets hallucinate. Their leader was always a witch woman accompanied by two familiars. The twin snakes of Venoria. The southern snake was able to charm most people by holding eye contact with them while the northern snake could kill a man with a single bite in less than a minute. The emperor of Kanarth wanted the snakes for himself. A party set out to steal them, torching the capital of Venoria in the process. The party returned victorious and the twin snakes now belonged to the emperor. With Venoria in flames, there were very few left who could still oppose the emperor and their domination of Palaria was all but settled.

Except things never go as smoothly as you would like, and the entire infiltration party has been compromised. Using their hallucinogens, several of the elite mages of Venoria had infiltrated the flying city alongside the kidnappers, without them ever realizing that they brought them along. From there the downfall of Kanarth started slowly. Water wells were poisoned, town officials were found hanged or decapitated in their homes and blood flowed through the streets. And throughout it all, not a single one of the infiltrators was caught or spotted. The situation drove the emperor mad. Eventually, two of the infiltrators managed to make their way to the emperor’s chambers. With the help of the twin snakes they managed to charm the emperor into a state where he couldn’t move, and then cut off his head. With the emperor dead, the city lost its direction and the chaos turned into all out violence on the streets. Karnisal never told Mirgia what happened next, or at least not any details of what went down, but the result was the destruction of Kanarth with only two of its sorcerers surviving. With no home to return to, the two each took on the moniker of the wanderer. 

Mirgia woke up when the sun peered over the horizon. While thinking over what Ankh had said, he must have fallen asleep. He knew that Karnisal would be unhappy about talking with Ankh, but he also knew that the sorcerer had a point. The return of artifacts from Kanarth was a dangerous sign. He just didn’t know what the sorcerer was planning. Assuming that the magic from Kanarth would be returning, wouldn’t he want to work with the emperor of Severanti to reclaim it and start his own flying kingdom? What benefit would it have for him to talk to Karnisal who very clearly had different ideas about what to do? The only thing Mirgia could think of was that it would be so dangerous for everyone involved that Ankh had no other choice. He let out a deep sigh before getting out of bed. It was quiet in the camp, almost everyone was still asleep with only the few that were standing guard already up. Mirgia took this time to walk out of the camp and have a look at the nearby desert. The red sand looked even more eerie after all the bloodshed of the past couple of days. To his surprise, he was soon joined by Teddy.
“You’re up early,” the smallfolk remarked.
“I got a lot on my mind,” Mirgia replied.
“Anything you want to share?”
“Well, there’s a lot I don’t want to talk about, to be honest, but I’m currently in the middle of deciding if it’s worth breaking bread with old enemies in the face of a bigger danger.”
“That’s a tough one. How bad of enemies are we talking? Like, did he punch your grandma in her face or did he look at you funny once?”
Mirgia laughed. “A little bit worse than either of those options.”
“I don’t know, punching a grandma is pretty high up on the list of things you shouldn’t be doing.”
“Sure, but it’s a very long list.”
“Ain’t that the truth.” He sat down in the sand next to Mirgia. Mirgia sat down as well, so as not to tower over the smallfolk farmer. “I think he’s right. I think I should at least let the two hear each other out.”
“So what’s the plan then?” Teddy asked.
Mirgia looked at him. “What do you say, want to come to Milinia with me?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”

Ankh crossed the distance towards the magical barrier within a few steps and plucked one of the floating gemstones that had been orbiting his face out of order. A humming sound filled the room as the rest of the gemstones adjusted their positions to be equidistant as they continued their orbit. The bright green gemstone that was now between his fingers pulsed with light as he held it against the barrier. From the gemstone a small bit of green sprouted. It forced its way into the barrier itself, rapidly growing vines along the barrier’s inside and outside. After a couple of seconds, the magic finished and the barrier shattered. The vines withered and Ankh stepped towards the priest that was helming the ritual. The priest put up his holy symbol to defend himself. It was no longer the symbol of Owlana that the priest had worn on him when they entered this place, but it had been replaced by a strange looking coin that had the design of a coiled snake. The head of the snake flared and shot towards Ankh. Before it could hit him, the snake that was on Ankh’s book stirred and jumped out to intercept it, swallowing the attacking snake whole. The priest looked mortified at this but kept trickling blood into the ritual.
Despite asking the sorcerer for help, Mirgia was far from completely helpless and was already flanking the priest, readying an arrow. With the barrier gone, he could hit the person even with a sore shoulder although it would hurt. The only reason he hadn’t yet was because he couldn’t help but want to see the extent of what Ankh could do. Kimi was using her magic on Salandi and Krashid who were desperately heading towards the priest. Karal could do nothing but look on in horror.
The priest at the center of the ritual changed tactics. From a pouch next to his weapon he pulled another strange looking coin that resembled the first one he’d thrown at Ankh but had some different designs to it. It was only for a split second but Mirgia noticed some writing on the back of it. This was likely the magic circles they’d been encountering. He mumbled something and threw the coin down with a quick motion. Lines appeared on the ground that expanded rapidly, pushing Salandi, Kimi, Mirgia and Krashid away as if a wall was pushing them back. Yet somehow, Ankh looked completely unaffected by the magic. The walls crashed into him and visibly shattered into pieces before dissipating.
“You came well prepared, disciple of Shifeth, but nothing could have prepared you for me,” Ankh said. He grabbed the book at his hip, where his snake had now returned to, looking a little bit bulkier than before, and flipped to a seemingly random page. He then impaled his thumb on the tip of the snake. He put his thumb to the paper and with swift motions he drew several symbols before tearing out the page. “Now, unfortunately I have just promised to stop this ritual, so you will have to die here.” Ankh smiled before the paper in his hands turned to dust. He grabbed the dust and blew it forward. It floated gently towards the priest, then picked up speed and within no time it reached max velocity, blasting a hole through the man’s face. Where his face was damaged, his skin and flesh turned to dust until his entire body collapsed into a pile of grey dust, no sign of life left. The dust then touched down onto the ground, drying out the remains of the ritual. All that was left now was the unconscious body of Fezel as well as a small pouch filled with something. Ankh scooped up the pouch and put it onto his belt before turning to face the others. “She’s all yours.”

Although Kimi’s magic had many soothing properties, actually healing severe wounds wasn’t something she excelled at. Her magic was versatile, sure, but versatility came at the cost of expertise. Still, she managed to calm down the emotions rushing through the body of the slowly dying adventurer which let her body focus on recovery. Karal came rushing over, having snapped out of the initial shock of the wild scenario they found themselves in. He pulled out his holy symbol and started healing Fezel. Mirgia and Krashid had to work hard to keep Salandi from flying into a rage. She was furious about what the priests of Owlana had done to her and her partner and didn’t want to have Karal anywhere near Fezel. Krashid and Mirgia recognized that Fezel wouldn’t make it without divine healing and Karal had proven himself trustworthy. After a tense few moments, it seemed like Fezel was out of the worst of danger, but they would still have to bring her up to the surface to let her rest properly. Karal offered to heal Salandi as well, but she refused his help. Krashid also refused, but he explained it was just because none of his wounds were serious enough to waste energy on. While the small group made sure everyone was going to survive, Ankh and his two assistants scoped out the rest of the ritual chamber and eventually came back with two strange looking objects. “We will be taking these,” Ankh said to Mirgia and the others. It wasn’t a question and Mirgia didn’t feel like questioning the sorcerer after the display of power he had just shown them.
“What are they?” Kimi asked.
Ankh held out the first of the two objects, a large glass disk. “This is a very potent catalyst for magic. It was used by the rulers of Kanarth to imbue with a magic spell and then placed upon another magical artifact that projects the spell over a large distance, both transporting and enlarging the effect. Both halves of this artifact were considered lost to time, but with finding this half, I have faith we will be able to find the second half as well.” He then showed them both a dagger. “The lost dagger Kebala. This was used by the royal spymaster of Kanarth back when they were still in power. It has the ability to read someone’s blood. If you draw blood with this dagger, you can read the intentions and some of the memories of the person you draw blood from. Both of these are very valuable.”
“Did you know these things would be here?” Kimi asked, rightfully suspicious.
“I did not. I have been researching the fallen kingdom of Kanarth for many decades now, and I had some hopes of the things we would find here, but as the technology from this kingdom was completely lost to time, there was no way of knowing what would show up here. But I’ve read up on these items enough to know one when I find it. The emperor will be disappointed that there was no sight of the more valuable things we’ve been looking for the past few years, but this is still a nice haul.” He looked at Mirgia. “We’ll discuss our little agreement once we leave this dungeon but I would like to relieve some of your tension and let you know that I have no crazy or impossible requests for you. As much as I do not care for you and your aims, I have no intention to make an enemy out of you either. I hope you understand that.”
Mirgia nodded. “I appreciate your help. I understand that risking yourself for someone else is not something that should be asked for free.” His eyes narrowed. “However, I do not think I like you.”
Ankh chuckled. “That’s perfectly fine.” He motioned for them all to follow. “If you have nothing else to look for in this place, I suggest we get ourselves back to the surface so that Gariya and Besil can close up this dungeon to avoid anything dangerous spilling out of it. I’ve left them instructions to seal this place in a week from now regardless of if we make it out.”
“That’s a risky command to give,” Krashid commented.
Ankh shrugged. “If something bad enough happened in this place that even I wasn’t able to make it out in a week, then it would be better to seal this place off than risk it coming out into the world.”
At least that was something that everyone present could agree on.

Two slightly shorter chapters in a row and I do apologize for that, but I think it was good to split this part up into two chapters instead of forcing it into one. Normally I would take a break next week as it’s been five chapters, but since I took a hiatus a while ago, we’re not taking a break yet. Join me next week for chapter 21!

“Now hold up a minute, I’m sure this is all some sort of a misunderstanding,” Ankh said. “You said something about a creature in Milinia? Would you care to explain to me what that is about?”
Mirgia narrowed his eyes, Kimi hovering a safe distance behind him now. He had not yet removed his knife from Ankh’s throat, but he also got the feeling that the threat wasn’t having the impact it should have, as if Ankh was not feeling in danger whatsoever.
“Last harvest festival, a witch attacked our town with a similar magic summoning a fiery creature like the one you just took out. And prior to that, one of my friends was also hurt badly by another similar creature. We have been chasing leads on this magic ever since and now you dare show yourself in front of us, casually casting ancient magic.”
Ankh listened intently to Mirgia, which only served to irritate him more. “I see, that explains the hostile reaction.” He flicked his wrist and Mirgia’s knife went flying off into the distance. With a glare on his face he looked at Mirgia. “I understand your anger but if you point a weapon at me again I will leave no trace of you, do you understand me?”
Mirgia felt the force behind the comment and suddenly realized that the eyes in Ankh’s face looked more like voids to him than eyes. He blinked and the sorcerer’s face was back to normal. An illusion?
“Then explain yourself, for I did not point my weapon in your direction without good reason.” Mirgia had lost his weapon now but he held steadfast, knowing that cowering now would be a sign of weakness.
Ankh motioned with his hand again and the other two Sahilid fighters that had accompanied him each sheathed their weapons. “I suppose things down here will go easier if I explain myself.” He took out his book again and showed some of the pages to Mirgia, flipping through it. Each page had drawings of a magical circle on them, but they all looked slightly different. They had different rings, just like the ones they’d encountered before, but there were also much simpler ones and even one that stood out because it looked far more intricate and difficult to draw than the others. “The magic of drawing these circles is a relic from the flying city of Kanarth. I assume this explains to you why myself and the emperor are so interested in finding out more about the city. When I was younger, I took on several apprentices, some of which I even taught this magic to. One of these apprentices was a young woman who at the time went by Adaine Solin, although I believe she goes by many different names. After I taught her the basics of my magic, we each went our separate ways. I suspect that this woman was the one that went after your town.”
“So you are essentially responsible for what happened in Milinia?”
“Is the martial artist responsible for the acts of his students? Is the swordfighter responsible for the actions of his protegé?”
This gave Mirgia pause. Kimi fluttered back onto his shoulder. “And how do we know you’re not involved with what this woman is doing?”
Ankh chuckled. “You’re just going to have to take my word for it. Besides – and I mean this with all due respect – if you wish to exact any kind of revenge I would suggest you let it go for now. I have no intention to hurt any of you as you have not given me any reason to do so, but know that I could wipe out everyone in this room with my eyes closed.” There was a truth to Ankh’s words that made Mirgia’s hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He nodded. “Very well, let’s drop the subject until we’re back above ground.”
Ankh smiled. “If you prove to be of use during this excursion I will gladly take you back to the capital and tell you what I know of Adaine. I have no obligations towards her either way and I taught her how to fend for herself well enough.”
“I’ll keep you to that promise.”
It wouldn’t take long after leaving the room with the raised platforms before they found the first body. Mirgia didn’t remember the name of the person, but it clearly belonged to one of the Sahilid adventurers that continued deeper into the dungeon after Mirgia and his party headed back outside. Mirgia confirmed to Ankh that this was one of the members of their previous group and after checking for wounds they moved on. It looked like one of those insectoid creatures got to this particular person and there was no real need to keep investigating past that. If Ankh was to be believed, they were in a hurry to stop whatever might be happening further down in the dungeon. They came through another room not much later, where signs of blood covered the room. There were no bodies here which was peculiar. Two doors led onwards, a trail of blood leading towards the left door. It was a small trail, likely from a cut of sorts, but nothing truly horrendous. After a moment of discussion they traveled into that door. At the end of a long hallway, they found a staircase down. The circular staircase seemed to go on forever and before they made it halfway down, the trail of blood had stopped already. There were still no bodies, so perhaps no one died during whatever they encountered in the previous room? The eeriness of the situation didn’t help Mirgia’s tension and the air was getting more and more stale as they went down, making it difficult to breathe well. After what felt like hours, but was probably closer to forty minutes, the group of six made it down to the bottom of the staircase where a hallway similar to the one they traveled through at the top of the stairs appeared. Towards the end of the tunnel was a light and as they got to the end, they were faced with a sight completely beyond anything else they could have possibly expected.

Five bodies were slowly turning the shallow layer of water that was laying in the room into a red shade as their blood mingled with the stale water. At the far end of the room, the mixture of blood and water funneled through a trough into a carved magical circle that was slowly filling up. Standing next to the circle was the one surviving member of Danil’s group of priests, now showing nothing of the calm devotion to Owlana that was a carefully crafted part of his demeanor before. The man had taken off his robes, revealing a body scarred by flames with a large chunk of one of his forearms completely missing, exposing the bone below it. From a cut in his hand, more blood flowed into the watery mixture on the ground. Laying on the ground next to him was one of the surviving Sahalid members, Fezel. Fezel was one of the two women that he encountered in the Green house for tall folk when he first arrived in Redsan. Both Salandi and Krashid were attacking what seemed like the air, but was probably a magical barrier of sorts.
Paralyzed by the uncertainty of what to do, Mirgia stood there for a few moments before darting after Kimi who was more clear of mind. Ankh and his people walked towards the ritual as well, although there seemed to be very little sense of urgency to their pace.
“Isn’t this really bad?” Karal asked Ankh.
Ankh nodded. “Yeah, this looks pretty serious.”
“Then shouldn’t you do something about it?”
Ankh shrugged. “It’s probably not going to be bad for me, and I’m quite curious to see what will happen next.”
“You’re insane,” Karal replied, with his eyes wide open.
Ankh’s eyes dimmed and several floating gemstones appeared circling around his head. “Tell me something I don’t know.” He pushed Karal off to the side and walked forward towards Mirgia and Kimi. “I can help you stop this ritual, but you’ll owe me,” he said.
Mirgia glared at the sorcerer. “You came down here knowing something like this might happen, didn’t you?”
Ankh shrugged. “I’m not involved with what is happening here, I’m just here to do recon for my emperor. I don’t mind helping you, but it won’t be for free.”
Mirgia weighed his options. Things were looking quite desperate and although Kimi had access to some powerful magic, he didn’t know if she would be able to make it past this magical barrier. It looked like Fezel was still alive as she was moving ever so slightly despite blood trickling from one of her wounds. Mirgia saw the desperation in Salandi’s eyes. “Fine, please help us.”
Ankh condescendingly patted him on the shoulder. “As you wish.”

Mirgia woke up early that morning, not having slept particularly well. Quint’s face kept flashing through his dreams and the maniacal look that Danil had haunted him throughout the night. At some point during the night his dreams were interrupted by some calming music and after that he managed to sleep a bit better. By the time he woke up, the sun was already out and he had to hurry to get ready in time. With how badly the previous expedition into the dungeon went, he didn’t feel great about bringing other people with him, but both Kimi and Karal had insisted on joining him. He did manage to convince Doroly to stay behind, although she didn’t seem happy about it. He asked her to go back to Redsan and tell the villagers to be prepared in case things went really wrong. He thought about Birdie and Teddy and how kind they had been to him and all that chaos that had now appeared on their doorstep without them having a say in it. He shook off the dreading feeling and focused on the now. The man named Ankh – which he had guessed wasn’t his real name – seemed at the very least difficult to trust. They met in front of the dungeon, where Ankh and his two companions were already investigating the entrance. “I thought you had brought more people with you?” Karal asked.

Ankh smiled. “We’ve decided that three of us would accompany you inside, less people means that there are less things that could go wrong.”
Mirgia nodded. “I like that.”
“Shall we go?” Ankh looked at everyone gathered here. Six people in total. Kimi had taken on a different glamor from normal and was sitting on Mirgia’s shoulder as an owl. Karal still looked quite distraught about the events of the previous day. The two Sahilid that came along with Ankh were hard to read, not really showing any emotion. They were armed quite well. It didn’t escape Mirgia’s gaze that they had two expensive looking swords each and several daggers hidden among their clothes. Ankh didn’t have any visible weaponry but held onto a black leather book with red details on it. Along the spine of this book was a red serpent. Mirgia took the lead on the expedition, explaining their descent in detail to Ankh and his people. They took an extended break at the writing they first discovered, with Ankh going over it in detail, even explaining some of his own hypotheses to Mirgia. “I believe that these ruins belong to the ancient flying city of Kanarth, and that the people of Venoria dealt with them before putting a warning here. The people of Kanarth were a warlike people that studied magic with the sole point of creating a world where they were in control of everything. Their flying city was the epitome of their might and also their downfall as when the magical engines were destroyed during the great war, the city came crashing down into the depths of the Feral Wildlands. This brings me to believe that the people of Kanarth probably mostly died out during that war although with the might they had, it wouldn’t surprise me if some of them survived.”
They moved on, deeper into the dungeon and quickly found the room with the musical trap that seemed to still be deactivated. Mirgia recounted what had happened to them here and the two people that came with Ankh did some investigating around the room, confirming that Mirgia’s story lined up with what they saw there.
“Interesting,” Ankh said, scanning the surroundings. “It’s a trap laid by a spirit, most likely.” He looked at Kimi. “Any ideas you might wish to share with us, wise spirit?”
“You certainly know how to flatter,” Kimi replied.
Ankh smiled. “It gets you a long way.”
“Well, unfortunately I don’t really know anything that you don’t already know. This magic could certainly be spirit magic, as it is quite tricky and doesn’t seem to follow any clear laws of magic. But that’s also where the parallel ends for me. I don’t know of any spirits that wield this type of magic and as a spirit of music myself, I feel like I’d be aware of them.”
Ankh pondered this for a few moments. “And what if this is the work of Seraloka?”
Kimi laughed. “Seraloka died a long time ago, and he wasn’t known to work with anyone. Could he cast something of this power? Certainly. But would he? I doubt it.”
Ankh shrugged. “I suppose you’re right.”
Mirgia looked confused. “Who is Seraloka?” he asked.
“Abreloka’s offspring,” Kimi explained. “Seraloka was a powerful spirit of music that lived in the time of the Arpentara’s stay in the mortal realm. The flute I own was made by him or one of his direct students, he was that powerful.”
Ankh nodded in agreement. “Seraloka is a legendary spirit that did many great things in his time in our world.” He sighed. “I wish I could have met him.” He shrugged off the feeling. “Let’s move on.”

“Strange,” Karal said. “It’s different.”
Mirgia agreed. They were standing in the room where Quint and priest Danil were killed. The different platforms were all at different heights before, but now that they returned to the room, they were all at the same height, only a slight bit above the ground. The blood that had been flowing off the central pillar had all but dried up by now and the room was deserted. The bodies of the insectoid creatures were still where they had left them.
Ankh lowered down to the ground and touched the sand that covered the floor. “This is peculiar.” He turned to Mirgia. “Can you tell me what this room looked like before and which things have changed? Please give me what seems like important details, but don’t waste time, I have a feeling something bad is about to happen and the faster we travel through this place, the more chance we stand at stopping it.”
“You’ve got to stop being so vague,” Kimi said, clearly getting irritated. “I get that you’re used to these things, but you keep hinting at something going wrong without telling us anything. How are we meant to do anything in that situation?”
Ankh raised his eyebrows. “I suppose old habits stick. Fine.” He stood up and addressed the three. “I believe this place to be a relic of the ancient city of Kanarth. It is supposed that the ancient city held many strange structures and during the disaster that crashed it, some of them were transported away, out of our realm. Why they are suddenly returning to our realm we do not know, but the emperor has decided that the technology that could be hidden in these dungeons is of high importance. Whenever we suspect that a strange dungeon is one of these shards of Kanarth – as we’ve come to call them – I travel there in person to check it out. The reason why I believe we need to hurry is that whatever magic is being cast in here, was clearly activated between the time that you left this room and we returned to it just now. That means something is happening and with what I know about the ancient magics found in the previous dungeon we encountered, it could be quite dangerous.” He looked agitated. “Is that enough?”
Kimi nodded. “Thank you for sharing that, let me show you what this room looked like when we left it.” She took out her flute and played a strange song that was both entrancing yet also kind of offputting. By the end of the song, there was a translucent vision of what the room looked like before, overlaying the current room.
“Impressive,” Ankh said. “Let us move on, I can see what this magic did. It was a complicated locking mechanism that unlocked something on a lower floor, which is presumably where the rest of your previous party is headed. We should make haste and follow them.”
“Boss, we might want to deal with that thing first,” one of the other Sahalid newcomers said. Neither had bothered to introduce themselves to Mirgia and the others and even when Mirgia had introduced himself to them, they’d only nodded but said nothing in return. He followed the motion the man made and saw that from a crumbling hole in the wall came another one of those insectoid creatures. Mirgia reached for his bow but felt his shoulder sting and hesitated. He could not fight well in his current state. He cursed and pulled out a dagger instead. Kimi flew up to a safe height and took out her flute. Another creature skittered out of the hole and then two more followed. Four of the insectoid creatures now came charging at them. Amidst the rising panic, Ankh held out his arms. “Be not afraid, I will dispose of these creatures.”
“Are you crazy?” Karal yelled, “we struggled taking out two with a much larger group, taking out four on your own is madness.”
Ankh smiled. “I mean to say this with as little arrogance as possible, but I am not to be compared to your average adventurer.” He turned to face the creatures. “Let me give you a little demonstration.” He pulled out his book and flipped through the pages until he found something he was looking for. He then pushed his thumb into a sharp edge on the black ring he wore on his left hand and then wiped the blood over the page. The page glowed crimson red and then something jumped out of the page. Standing between Ankh and the monsters was a fiery beast. It looked like a stag beetle but it was the size of a house and it immediately gave the charging insectoid monsters pause. The beetle raised its antennae and fire shot at each of the four creatures, setting them ablaze. Terrible screeching was heard across the room until the creatures collapsed into piles of ash, not being able to even come close to the party. Ankh then tore out the page and the fiery beetle vanished immediately. Before Ankh had fully turned around, Mirgia and Kimi were upon him. Mirgia’s dagger stopped near his neck and Kimi hung closely above them, her flute at the ready.
“What is the meaning of this?” Ankh asked.
“You’d better have an explanation ready or things are about to turn very ugly.” Mirgia said. “Did you send a creature like that to attack Milinia?”