”Your target is on the move.” Hivir informed Reginleif. Hivir was the tracker and hunter of the group of Valkyries, and her Authority allowed her to locate and keep track of anyone, provided certain conditions were met.

“Finally!” Reginleif exclaimed. “I was getting a little worried she would never move.” It wasn’t just a matter of patience, though the Valkyries were not known for that quality. Hivir’s ability to track beings or people was powerful, but it could only be used for a limited time before it had to be reapplied.

Brynhildr, who was sitting on the other side of the room drinking with Sigrun, looked at her younger sister currently guzzling from a mug of what Brynhildr hoped to be ale. You were never entirely certain with Sigrun, and you didn’t want to ask. You definitely didn’t want a taste. “Gather the others. Tell them to be ready to move in twenty minutes. Also, you better be sober enough to fight.”

Sigrun’s gale of laughter sounded as she rose from her seat. “I’m always sober enough to fight. It’s hardly my fault none of you can fight while hammered. Skuld will not be happy though. She was planning on preparing some magical items for future use, and you know she doesn’t like being disturbed while working.” She muttered before vanishing in a puff of smoke.

“Skuld is never happy. That’s why I sent you instead of going myself.” Brynhildr muttered to herself.

“She will be even less happy once she finds out where we are going.” Hivir piped up from where she was sitting and meditating, keeping track of their target. “I’m pretty sure our target just left the city.”

“I don’t understand, don’t we want her outside the city controlled by the Four Winds? I don’t fancy facing their immortals.” Brynhildr asked confused.

“I meant city, as in the Day city. And she didn’t go to Night city either.” Hivir muttered with a grimace. From this distance, it was impossible to tell exactly so she had to guess. They would have to get closer to get a more exact destination.

“She went into the wilderness?” Reginleif asked incredulously. “Why would she do that?” Her voice sounded suspicious.

“I’m sure she has her reasons. This can actually work to our advantage. We can fight without care for the surroundings.” Brynhildr pointed out.

The three exited the keep that was their current home and found the others waiting in the yard of the fort. The fort and many like it were all controlled by their community. The Valkyries were a single race community in the fourth circle. They had the power to challenge for a spot in the third circle, but with the recent news coming from their informants, the idea seemed better put off for later, which had been done several times in the past already.

Unfortunately for the Valkyries, being a third circle community was about more than just strength of arms. There was also a logistical issue. The Valkyries didn’t produce anything. They were all warriors and war-mages. They were not traders either, although they did have the social graces to at least manage. The fourth circle was already rather unfriendly when it came to business as the communities eyed each other with hostility, but the third circle would be even more so. The Valkyries were a little different in that they didn’t want the spot due to the abundant natural resources of the third circle. Instead, they wanted the glory and the stronger enemies that came with the territory.

They were currently selling their services as warriors and mercenaries, but would they have that luxury under the pressure of the third circle? Mystifyingly it was also easier to sell their services as a fourth circle community because everyone was afraid of the third circle communities. That seemed like something that would be useful for a mercenary, but less so if their clients were also too scared to piss them off. Those clients would rather hire someone easier to manage.

‘Oh, Skuld looks really unhappy.’ Brynhildr looked at the frowning face of her eldest sister. ‘She must have been right in the middle of an experiment.’

The twins Friadul and Herja, on the other hand, looked rather cheery at the prospect of a coming battle. It was obvious that the two would look identical aside from their gear and hairstyle, as not only were they twins but all of them looked almost the same thanks to the Authorities they possessed. Skuld had originally been dark-haired and Sigrun had been a redhead, but their hair had turned into the same golden blonde color they all now sported in various styles. Friadul’s long white spear and light armor made it easy to tell her apart from her heavily armored and shield-carrying twin.

“So where are we going in such a rush that it couldn’t wait for just a little.” Skuld asked crankily.

“Skuld my dear sister, your experiment would not have ended for several days. They never end in a timely manner.” Sigrun pointed out playfully.

“The question stands.” Skuld repeated, ignoring the playful Sigrun.

“Into the great wilderness. I won’t know the exact location until we get closer.” Hivir decided to answer in an attempt to pre-empt an argument. Not that they wouldn’t argue anyway due to some other reason.

“And why exactly do we care so much about this being that we need to go all the way to the great wilderness?” Skuld asked. She’d heard the story about their fight earlier, but unlike most Valkyries, she didn’t really appreciate the glory of combat. That was partly because her Authority took the fun and excitement out of it.

Brynhildr noticed Reginleif was about to reply but decided to interrupt and do it herself instead. “Regin would tell you that it’s because our target is a blackguard and needs to be dealt with. I’m not so sure about that, but I want to face her in a battle with our full strength. It should be a worthy fight, as most of you already know from what you saw in the arena.”

“Right. About that. She didn’t look all that much like a blackguard to me.” Skuld pointed out the obvious. In fact, their target had projected an almost paladin-like air. That said, some of her abilities did have a certain sinister tone to them.

“She’s hiding her dark ways!” Regin huffed. “You should know that the face of evil can be alluring on the surface but dark underneath. You didn’t see what we did.”

Bryn shook her head a bit. Regin’s emotions were not entirely founded on facts, but then again Regin had always been the quickest to jump to the defense of those weaker than them. That also included fighting evil where evil was found. A blackguard was exactly the type of enemy that would rouse Regin’s ire. “Regardless, our target also has a rather sizeable bounty placed on her head, and I’m pretty sure our community would welcome the proceeds from that. Also, the news about us taking down the new arena darling should also bring us new contracts, so we can afford to be a bit more picky. I’m pretty sure none of us want to return to work as the pawns of the freelancer’s guild.”

“Let’s get to it then.” Skuld commented, still not pleased but at least going along. “Friadul, use your gift to locate the closest teleportation gate to the place Hivir senses our target at. There should still be some gates in the wilderness. I’ll take it from there.”

Part of Friadul’s Authority was a Gift of Knowledge. She could find out all sorts of things she focused on. She could find out random but useful information like the location of teleportation gates, but she could also find out the abilities and weaknesses of their enemies, within reason. Unfortunately, the ability had a very limited range when used on a person, so they had not gained information on their target despite seeing her in the arenas. That said, trying to find knowledge on vague instructions like ‘closest to our target’ was beyond the abilities of Friadul’s gift. That’s where Skuld came in.

Part of Skuld’s abilities was telepathic communication. Although Hivir could not give a precise explanation of her feeling on their target’s whereabouts, Skuld could pass on the feeling to Friadul, who could then, in turn, use her gift. They had done this before so the process was quick. “I got it. There’s a gate rather close to her actually. I suspect she used the gate herself.” Friadul said after her gift provided the answer.

They ran into another problem when they tried to use the nearby teleportation gate to get to the gate pointed out by Friadul. “It seems there’s some kind of barrier blocking entry.” The Valkyrie mage responsible for the gate explained.

“Herja.” Skuld commanded. She was the commander of their little unit. Once she took on the mission, she would do her best to see it succeed and her abilities almost necessitated she was in command. She was also the eldest sister, so the other thought it was best to just go along with it.

Herja marched up to the gateway and let her own power flow into the portal that had trouble forming. She had the ability to break any and all barriers and suppressions. Or at the very least, they had so far not run into any barrier she could not break. That in itself was somewhat ironic since Herja’s other abilities were mostly defensive, but such was the way with their Authorities. They had a weird mix of abilities and those abilities worked best when used together with the other members of the group.

The group found themselves at very high altitudes where the air was thin. They seemed to be close to the edge of a cliff, and a single glance told the group they were far above the clouds. There seemed to be an endless line of stone steps that disappeared downwards into the clouds below them, as well as continuing towards the peak of the weird mountain. It seemed the place was not entirely abandoned. Someone or something had to have made those stairs. “Which direction?” Skuld asked, alluding to their target.

“That way.” Hivir pointed away from the weird mountain and down towards the clouds and the eventual ground below.

“Well, at least we’re going down.” Sigrun said with a chuckle.

“Well, I wonder about that.” A firm male voice sounded out of nowhere. They all whirled around trying to find the speaker and found themselves looking at a man covered in tattoos. Only his grey hair and beard told of his age, and the antlers and almost elfin features signified his race as Alpyran. “Now why exactly is there a group of Valkyries on my mountain? Uninvited and breaking through a barrier that was put in place for a reason I might add.”

-----

“Why exactly are we here?” Croestia asked, observing the dense forest surrounding them. Normally Dee would fly above the trees, but in the great wilderness it was dangerous to do so. Who knew what could be attracted to such an obvious target. It would be hard to be stealthy when flying in the clear skies with the sharp eyes of the predators looking for any prey.

“The Threads of Fate told us my transition would be explosive, remember?” Dee pointed out, a bit confused by the question. Surely Croestia could not have forgotten?

“No, I mean why are we here? There are plenty of deserted areas inside Day city. Besides, you could’ve used this to your advantage. If there’s going to be explosions, why not go somewhere where those explosions would do some good? Like somwhere with a lot of our enemies.” Croestia specified.

“I thought of that, but there are too many things we don’t know. First of all, who exactly would we target? I’m having problems with the elves and Sidhe, but I don’t want to destroy them. The angels? That might work, except we have no idea what kind of strength they have here on Pantheon. We also have no idea how large of an area this will affect. From what I heard, the embassy of the angels is surrounded by a city full of other beings I have no beef with. I’m not fond of the idea of killing all of them just to blow the angels up. Not that I wouldn’t do it if it was necessary, but I don’t think it is. I’d rather kill the pigeons myself while looking them in the eyes and making sure they all know why they die. I have no idea whether the angels could survive the damage, and I have no idea what condition I would be in during the process. Too much risk for too little gain.” Dee explained her reasoning.

“Is that why you didn’t just pick a deserted spot in the outermost circle of the Day city?” Croestia asked. “You’re not sure how large of an area will be affected?”

“Well that, and I don’t even know how it will be affected. The whole area might turn into wasteland for all I know. That won’t matter if we’re already in the great wilderness. Besides, if the old man happens to get affected, then that would not be the worst thing in the world.” Dee said with a smile. She didn’t really want to have the old man die, but a little revenge for everything that happened during her training was warranted.

They went rather deep into the wilderness. Dee didn’t want to accidentally blow up the volcano temple, which was luckily heavily protected by both the barrier and the volcano itself, but she stayed close enough that the old man could intervene if things went badly. She had informed him of her plans, and he had promised to keep an eye out. Eventually, she found a spot she was happy with. Mainly that meant that there were no powerful beasts in the immediate surroundings. She had no idea whether or not she would be incapacitated during the process, hence she needed some space. There she settled down in a meditative position and started to wait for nature to take its course.

The Crimson Path had long since come through on their promise on providing information on soul spaces and immortality, which Croestia had studied fervently. Normally there would be a slight explosion of power and other related but flashy phenomenon when a soul space was created. Usually, that explosion would be no larger than something just enough to wreck a room or a large building at worst. That was with a normal soul space though. Domains were rare enough that there was little actual information on the process, but it was said to be significantly flashier. And that again was the case with a normal Domain.

When someone became an immortal, almost always that included opening up a tiny soul space or Domain that would then later on expand to become much larger. In some cases, the soul space stayed small and the immortal barely qualified as such, but eternal life was still theirs for the taking. During the process, the person might start laying the foundation for their totem, but that only held true in about half the cases. Many started creating their totems much later, either because they were not entirely sure what the totem would be like, or because the first steps of creating the totem were too hard to take at the same time as creating the soul space. The starting size of the soul space or Domain had very little bearing on how large it could become later on, though of course, it would not shrink down from the starting point.

In Dee’s case almost none of the information held true. She already had a Domain, and it was large. She was not entirely sure how large, but it was big. Far bigger than most soul spaces ever became. She also already had a half completed totem in that Domain. There was one good thing Croestia had learned from the information though. She had found out more about the differences between a soul space and a Domain, though it remained to be seen how much of that would be useful in her case.

As she felt her body connecting with the Domain, she felt that something that had been missing had suddenly been recovered. She had not even known that something was missing, but now she could not fathom how she could have lived for so long without that something being there and leaving such a gaping hole inside her. She briefly opened her eyes and truly saw the world for the first time. She had always been able to see the power within every being, but now she could see it everywhere. She understood the power. She also felt she could take that power away if she so desired, and make that power her own. Her ability to see and feel that power also extended so much further than before! It was completely incomparable. She could feel everything around her for such a long distance that she wasn’t even sure how far it extended.

She suddenly felt the power from the something inside her flowing into her. Earlier she had felt little tastes of the power, but that had been a drop in the ocean. Now she felt truly alive. She knew that strikes that had been dangerous earlier would bounce off harmlessly now. She felt that obstacles that had stood in her way could now be swept away effortlessly. She watched as a tiny leaf fell from a tree due to the wind that was for some reason picking up speed around her. That falling leaf seemed to be frozen in the air, and she wasn’t even trying to use Lumen’s blessing for slowing things around her.

She could feel the fire burning within her, waiting to be let out. Almost without thought her form shifted to her kitsune form and the flames were suddenly there. They surrounded her, caressing her fur ever so gently, like the touch of an adoring lover. She had connected with the flames before, but she had only borrowed them. Now the flames were part of her. She was part of the flames. She was one with them.

Without her realizing, her entire form took the quality of the black flames that started to consume the surroundings. Her entire body was made up of the black fire, flickering back into solid form and then back to nothing but flames. Suddenly there was a change in the air around her. A hunger started rising inside of her. That power around her, if she could make it her own, why shouldn’t she? If the current power within her made her feel this good and powerful, what if she added to it? It’s not like those puny beings that were busy trying to escape really deserved to keep it, right?

Her eyes changed. Where before they had the feline pupils with golden iris of a wolf, suddenly the pupils became the narrow slits of a hungry reptile. Then they seemed to disappear completely as only a dark shadowy purple glow took their place. Her form started to slowly shift. This time the dragon was not ethereal anymore. The dark scales were as black as night and a ridged row of spikes sprouted along her spine. Normal Abyssal Dragons, as much as one could call an abyssal normal, had a red glow coming from between their scales, as if their inside were made of molten lava. In Dee’s case the glow seemed to be the same dark purple seen glowing in her eyes.

“Yes, surely the little creatures won’t begrudge me taking just a bit of their power.” The dragon muttered, drunk on power, completely oblivious to the devastation already surrounding it.

-----

“Let us go!” Skuld demanded. “You don’t have the right to keep us here.” The group of Valkyries was forced to the ground as a heavy pressure seemed to have settled on them, stopping them from moving. The pressure was formed by the mere presence of the old man revealing his power.

“Little girl, you should already know that even if I didn’t have any right, in places like this might makes right. As it happens, I do have the right considering you forced your way into my home, and by the looks of things are planning on threatening my disciple. Besides, you will be rather thankful I stopped you soon enough.” The old man said. He could sense more of what was going on than the Valkyries.

“What do you mean?” Hivir asked. She was perhaps the calmest of the group because she could feel the man wasn’t actually antagonistic towards them. Many of the Valkyries had also noted the word ‘disciple’ he had mentioned earlier. That was not a good sign.

“You will see soon enough.” The man said, and with a gesture from him the cloud cover below them seemed to be dispersing. As it did, they could all see a storm of power flowing towards a single location where it created a giant vortex. Even from this distance, they could see the amount of power was condensing into localized devastation in many places. The vortex seemed to be siphoning the power downwards to the ground. The vortex alone was thousands of kilomels large in all directions, and the only reason they had not felt it before was because of the barrier surrounding the enormous mountain and the height they were at above the storm. Now the barrier was buckling and bending under the pressure.

“What in the name of all that’s holy is that?!” Reginleif asked with terror in her voice. There was no doubt that they would all be dead if they had been caught outside the barrier. Her own protective field would not be able to withstand that level of power no matter how much of an Authority it was.

“That? That’s my disciple becoming immortal.” The old man said a little smugly. The Valkyries stared at him in disbelief. There was no way all that was because of a soul space forming, was there?

Suddenly the vortex of power seemed to calm down and for a moment the whole area seemed to quiet down. Then the beasts below seemed to sense something and screeched as they tried to run away. Few of them made it before a wave of black fire erupted from the location where the vortex had been centered and consumed everything in the surroundings. The earlier area covered by the vortex was now turned into a hellish inferno that ate all the life in the area.

“Don’t destroy my mountain dummy disciple!” The old man suddenly yelled and seemed to be directing the barrier that was already on its last legs to suppress the incoming wave of fire. The barrier seemed to do nothing to stop the fire however. In fact, the barrier seemed to have been consumed just like the life in the area. Suddenly a large portion of the side of the mountain seemed to have disappeared, but luckily the fire stopped as well as if reaching some invisible boundary.

Suddenly they all felt more than heard the deep growling roar of a dragon looking for prey. “Uh-oh, that’s not a good sign.” The old man muttered, suddenly a little apprehensive about the whole thing. An immortal dragonized Dee didn’t sound like something fun to fight against.

Suddenly a huge portal which the old man recognized to be just like those Dee used, and he hated, opened above the center of the devastation. A long serpentine dragon that radiated power, the likes of which even the old man had felt only once before, flew out of the portal and crashed down on something on the ground, binding it in place. The serpentine dragon must have been at least a kilomel long as it wound around something like a python strangling its prey.

“Was that supposed to happen?” Skuld asked, suddenly really scared. The earlier events had made her already feel frightened, but now the serpentine dragon that had appeared made her instincts scream that she would die horribly. She suddenly felt like an ant before a dragon, despite the distance between them. The Valkyries were not strangers to the terror aura of dragons, but this was something new.