Many call me Gifted. After three hundred years, I am yet to answer the question of whether I am Gifted or Cursed. Not knowing death, am I truly living?

I have poured three hundred years of this "Gift" into the accumulation of knowledge of the Void. And there is more to do. Yet, I am apprehensive that when the day comes that there is nothing more to be done, I will try to seek the solace of death and not find it.

-Venerable Void Arch Magus Clement Tiberius

As quoted from his Book "Peering into the Void Gate"

(All three copies lost)

Trance held his breath as the endless gray desert that bordered the west of the empire stretched before him.

It wasn’t even a week since he had promised himself that he wouldn’t be found anywhere near the frontlines no matter what. He knew that the West System was the first line of defense of Krysperia against the remnants of the Blight but he never imagined that there would be any reason for him to be at the first wall.

He hoped that he would be assigned in the fourth wall, which was the last wall.

“Looks like I’m breaking my promise,” he mumbled under his breath. “Was this the right decision? Though, I wasn’t in any position to refuse that job offer. Or order, more like it.”

“What’s with the frown, young man? You should be excited to be here. Many men have dreamed of fighting for their empire and for the eternal God Paximillon!”

Trance turned to face the person who was assigned as his mentor. Graham Faber, once was a head manaforger with his own workshop in Krysperium, now the attending manaforger to the knights in Lord Jaguar’s retinue. He wasn’t the forger that maintained the equipment of their boss Devastator Knight though. Lord Jaguar has a different personal manaforger, someone Trance was yet to meet.

“I just didn’t imagine that…that I would need to fight someday,” Trance replied.

Graham laughed with his deep, throaty laugh. His large, callous-covered hand patted Trance’s back. “What did you expect, young man? You’ll just wait around in the workshop? Wait for the battle to be over and then fix the equipment that they hand to you?”

“Er…yes. That’s what I had in mind.”

“Hah, that would have been your job if the Lord Boss didn’t take you in. But not anymore. You’ll have to jump into battle sometime. You’re just having a look today.”

Trance and Graham peered above the battlements of the first wall. It wasn’t exactly just one wall. It was more like a long line of castles in the opinion of Trance.

The defensive line appeared to be made out of different walls of ascending height that were placed next to each other. It also wasn’t merely a straight line of fortifications. Massive towers, actually clusters of towers, with their own curtain walls, were jutting out of the main line of walls. Layers of angular walls connected to these outcropping citadels. They covered all lines of approach to the first wall. Interlocking fields of fire mowed down all who dared attack.

Behind these walls were long-range psybatteries protected by shield domes, showering all attackers with energy balls. They were tasked with destroying the long-ranged attackers and siege creatures of the Blight.

Trance couldn’t believe that anything could get past such a formidable defense, but, Graham told him that in the past the Blight nearly breached the second wall. But he assured Trance that there was no need to worry. No Blight has gotten past the first wall after Lord Marcus was assigned at the helm of the West System.

“Huh, all the other soldiers are just watching,” Trance said. The black armored soldiers of the West System lined up behind the battlements. They showed no signs of concern as a battle raged on the level below them. Perhaps this was an everyday occurrence. Or perhaps they were not worried since two Devastator Knights was above them, floating among the clouds. They were so high up that he could barely make out their forms.

“They are probably talking about that Death Sprinkler,” Graham said when he noticed Trance squinting at the sky.

Trance’s face grew solemn at the mention of the monster that massacred the town of Liftersville. He didn’t really know what he should think. Revenge was out of the question. He only knew those people for a few days. He wasn’t out on a journey to become a hero like the popular stories in the capital.

The Death Sprinkler was captured by Lord Jaguar and was being kept somewhere in the vast West System. There was no need to worry about that thing, he reminded himself.

There was no sign of the void mage. But that wasn't his problem.

For now, being a good employee was the plan. That’s it. In addition, it was imperative that he should survive and make it home after he has enough saved up to open a small workshop in the capital city. The safest place to be for his brother and grandmother would be Krysperium. Nothing would be able to get past the defenses placed by the First Emperor KrystFallen and Emperor Malvar.

If he had brought them to Liftersville…

“Quite a sight, huh? Two Devastator Knights in one place. I wonder what it feels like to be inside that armor.” Graham stroked his braided brown beard flecked with grey. “I always dreamt of being able to forge something as powerful as that someday.”

Trance couldn’t stop himself from snorting at what Graham said. He quickly apologized with his head down.

Graham laughed it off. “I know, I know. That’s just like some wild dream that’s never going to happen. Still, the fact remains that someone was able to make those masterpieces. It means that it’s not impossible to make something like them again.”

Nodding, Trance thought about his own goals in life. Aiming to forge a Devastator Amor? That was probably too much. Living a normal life was his goal. Not that there was anything wrong with that.

He had never dreamed of getting under the employ of a Devastator Knight. Yet, here he was. Maybe, he should dream higher now. But not high enough that it would get him killed.

There were shouts below them. Metals clashing. Spells let loose. Shardguns fired.

Trance leaned down to watch the intense fighting on the wall below them. “Damn, shardguns. I can’t even buy one of those if I worked for a decade.”

“You could probably buy them now after a couple of years pay. I don’t know what your actual salary will be but the Lord Boss pays well.”

“Yeah, I can see that the salary will be high. Even my new equipment costs a lot! The value of what I’m wearing now is probably more than everything that I have worn before!”

“I made that chainmail that you are wearing.” Graham beamed and puffed out his chest. “You can’t even feel it’s on your body!”

Graham was the one who made it? Awesome craftsmanship! Trance wore the chainmail over a high-quality leather vest. His mentor was right, only the leather vest weighted down his body. It was as if he wasn't wearing the chainmail. This was definitely something that he should learn to forge. He could sell something like this in his dream workshop.

The two forgers grabbed hold of the battlements as the wall vibrated. Small explosions punctuated the battle below. Black masses moved towards the wall and climbed it effortlessly. A revolting pile of black slugs that stuck on the wall and slithered upwards.

All of the cannons of the forwards towers and the walls were silent. Not one soldier of the West System moved from their spots to meet the incoming threat. They observed calmly while on alert.

About a hundred fully armored knights defended a wide stretch of wall where the waves of Blight creatures attacked. Their armor was plain, unlike most armor designs in Kryperia that have decorative dragon flairs. They sported no insignia but their armor had a distinct bluish hue. Each of them wielded a huge claymore single-handedly while their other hand clasped tightly around the grip of the shardgun.

“Is this normal?” Trance asked Graham with an incredulous look. “They just let the Blight get near to have some practice?”

“Lord Boss wants to do it, so we do it,” Graham said with a shrug. “Nice idea, if you ask me. With that Death Sprinkler that found its way on the wrong side of the wall and all.”

“We?” Trance asked with a slight shock on his face. “You also fight?” He thought that Graham was only joking earlier when he said that they would fight along with the knights.

Ruffling his hair, Graham laughed heartily at Trance’s expression. “Lord Boss wants all in her retinue to fight. Even the healers fight! But fir now it’s only the knights. And there are only a few of the Blight attacking.”

Few? The number of Blight creatures climbing up were certainly not few. Trance estimated their number to be at about a couple of thousand. Twenty to one? The knights under Lord Jaguar were surely powerful and could cut down more than twenty ordinary men with one swing of their sword, but they are up against a small splinter of the damned Blighted Multitude.

Trance checked if Lord Jaguar was watching her men fight. He couldn’t tell which one was Lord Jaguar, and even if he could, they didn’t have heads so he wouldn’t know where they were looking at.

A dozen colossal Blight creatures, even larger than the Death Sprinkler he encountered, made their way to the front of mass. The slugs ran away as their gigantic brethren stomped on several of them. With one bound, the humongous abominations were able to latch onto the walls.

They opened their mouths wide enough to swallow a house in one gulp and began to disgorge scores of smaller Blight creatures. Smaller than the giant Blight that vomited them out but each one of them was thrice larger than Trance.

A small hint of bile played on his tongue as he suppressed feelings of repulse.

Bloated centipedes that walked on slender multijointed hands climbed out of the stomach of the towering Blights that were hanging on to the wall. Those giants were doing the work of siege towers, he observed.

“Grubs,” Graham said. “That’s what we call those things. Annoying grakking buggers. Don’t let them get their numerous hands on you, they will rip you to a hundred pieces in the blink of an eye. And even if they look squishy, they are harder than steel. They also explode and shower acid on everything after they die. Grakkin grackers of abomination.”

The Grubs were slowly filling the wall-walk with their numbers, cramping the space with their bulk. They moved faster than Trance could follow them, scuttling along and jumping on the defending knights.

Dancing among the Grubs, the knights sliced and blasted them with precision and ease. Every swing of the blade cut a Grub into several pieces, each shot of the shardgun blasts a Grub into smithereens.

Trance imagined himself wielding a shardgun. The crystal shard forming the core of the weapon was mined somewhere near Krysperium, although he does not know its exact location. It’s an intensely regulated item with yearly mining quotas decided on by the Emperor himself. Two years of saving to be able to buy one? He'd rather stick to building his own workshop.

One of the knights sliced off the hands of a giant Blight that was hanging on to the wall. The earth slightly trembled as it fell back and slammed on the ground, squishing some of the Blight creatures beneath it. Another knight focused his shardgun and let loose pure mana energy, obliterating several Grubs along with the head of the Blight that was spewing them out.

All of the knights moved gracefully, their swords like strands of silver streams that flow and dice up all the Blight that it met.

Trance was spellbound by their movement. Not one Blight creature was able to graze the blue armored knights.

“Amazing swordsmanship, right? They are all 8th rank Swordmeisters, fully accredited. Their enemy today does not do their skills justice. It’s absolutely normal for groups of Blight numbering a few thousands each to visit the West System. Other segments of the wall are probably smashing them with cannons as we speak.”

“You said that they nearly breached the second wall before? How did they do that? All the mana cannons and psybatteries would have destroyed thousands of them before they even reach the wall.”

“Every several years or so they group together into very, very large hordes and throw themselves on the wall.”

“How many?”

“A couple of million,” said Graham, nonchalantly.

“What!”

“Yep.” Graham shrugged and said, “Don’t ask me why they do that. I don’t know.”

Trance stared off and imagined two million horrors making their way across the gray desert and attacking the walls. It was not a pretty sight. When that time comes, he hoped that he would not be anywhere near the wall.

“It’s also during those times that the powerful types of Blight show themselves.”

“After all these years of killing them, the Blighted Multitude just doesn’t run out of monsters?”

“Who knows how many of them are there. They probably reproduce or something,” Graham replied nonchalantly. “The Death Sprinkler, for example. Giving birth to those wriggly things. But I don’t know what gives birth to a Death Sprinkler.”

“So this is just a normal occurrence here?” Trance gestured to the attacking Blight creatures. He never knew that everyday, the warriors of the Empire have fought an ongoing battle that would probably never end.

“Yes, it's normal, young manaforger.”

Trance instinctively knelt down on one knee when he heard the voice inside his head. Being forced to kneel was something he did not want to experience again.

Lord Jaguar was standing on the battlements in front of him.

Graham and all of the soldiers of West System that were with him on that part of the wall also showed their respect.

Two metal fingers thicker than his necked picked him up by his collar and hoisted him high like a flag.

“Buff this young one,” Lord Jaguar said to the troops stationed on the wall.

A tingly sensation ran through his muscles. Different colors of aura wrapped his body. It was overwhelming, the feeling of having your body bathed in multiple spell buffs. He stared at his hands and momentarily forgot that he was hanging dangerously near the edge of the wall. He also forgot about the Blight below. Strength, like nothing he has felt before, coursed through his body. There was nothing that could kill him, he thought while grinning.

The Devastator Knight lowered him to eye level or at least somewhere where the eyes were supposed to be if their armors had heads on them. “My knights need their equipment buffed and repaired while they are in battle. Why wait until after the battle to repair the armor? They could already be dead at that time.”

There was a sinking feeling inside Trance’s stomach as Lord Jaguar held him over the raging battle.

“It’s a waste if you don’t use your new hammer,” Lord Jaguar said. Her two fingers parted, letting go of the poor manaforger.

“Aaaaaaah!” Trance firmly grasped his hammer and waved it wildly as he fell towards the lower level of walls. All thoughts of invincibility left him as he saw the Grubs looking up at him.

“Graham, go help that kid.”

“I obey, Lord Boss.”

Garett was watching the setting sun while absentmindedly scratching his head. It has not been a good day at all. It was also not a good week. The thief who stole the Dragon’s Heart was most likely looking at the same setting sun.

He suddenly slammed his fist on the table, startling a squire who was standing at attention by the door.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he told the lad who was wearing training armor. “Can you check if the high priest is coming? He should have already known that I’m here.”

“Yes, sir,” the squire answered, bowing on the way out.

“Dammit,” he muttered while looking out the window once again. “For the last hundred years, nothing has happened. But now, it seems a lot of things are going wrong.”

Setting his feet on the table, Garett deeply sighed. He took a swig of his wine, hoping that it would lighten up his mood. Unfortunately, it wasn’t of any help at all.

He placed the cup on the table and stood up.

The door opened. A harried-looking hunched man with long flowing white beard and gentle eyes slowly shuffled his feet and entered the room.

“Garett Berklaw, thank you for coming on such a short notice,” he said. His long beard covered his smile but more wrinkles added to his face as his cheeks moved.

“This is in the service of Paximillon. I am ever ready to serve, High Priest Gerhard.”

The high priest carried with him a crooked wooden staff topped with a complex structure of crystals that looked like a violet frozen fountain. The “Kryphaetallis”, personal weapon of the strongest battle priest, High Priest Gerhard. The old man left the staff floating in mid-air as he sat down on a chair.

Garett acknowledged the strength of the high priest in front of him. Most high priests focused on healing and light magic, never imagining a life on the battlefield, which wasn’t a problem since if they were helping in battle they stay well to the back of the lines.

This particular high priest, on the other hand, especially excels at close-range combat, which was peculiar since he was a mage. He does not have a government certified rank but Garett would place him at around low Archmagus level- that was without the immense power of the Kryphaetallis. With the staff, the old man surely was among the strongest in the empire. Of course, that does not include the monster heads of the five martial noble houses. And the Devastator Knights. No one really counts those fighting gods when talking about the strongest in the empire, Garett thought with a smile. They were an unreachable pinnacle.

Garett knew that he would most assuredly lose in a fight against the high priest even if the latter does not wield the Kryphaetallis. The healing power and defensive capabilities of High Priest Gerhard are too great. Perhaps if he could get a fourth beaststone he might stand a chance. If the high priest wields the Kryphaetallis then Garett would be defeated rather easily.

High Priest Gerhard said, “I’m glad that you also have arrived, Pyre. Take a sit.”

From the shadows cast by the low sun, a hand emerged, then a head, followed by a body. The man was wrapped tightly in black bandages, including his head. The mask of bandages had two small slits for the eyes.

Garett and Pyre stared at each other while they both took a sit.

“Garett, I am sensing you are not bringing good news,” Gerhard said.

“We have no leads as to the shape-shifting intruder who broke in,” Garett replied with an impassive face. “The four Draconyx Discipulus that stood guard, along with the twenty or so of our brethren that were there, were examined. All of them had depleted their mana during the robbery. The examination took some time because the results needed confirmation.”

“Why?”

“The cause of their unconsciousness was due to depletion of their mana, that much is certain. The healers easily confirmed that part. Now to the bizarre part. According to the healers, the loss of mana looked like it was caused by excessive spell casting.”

“What’s the problem with that?” Pyre asked with his thin wispy voice. “They fought against the intruder. And lost.”

Garett eyes narrowed as Pyre stressed the word “lost”. He was sure that the shadow bastard was sneering beneath the bandages.

“Was the Vault of Inheritance damaged?” Gerhard said. He paid to mind to the veiled hostility between the two before him.

Grinning inside his head, Garett admired the intelligence of the high priest. He asked the right questions, unlike the shadow bastard. “No damage whatsoever. My men swore that they were not able to use any spells at all. They were barely able to react after one of them fell. After the four Draconyx Discipulus fell…well, we really can’t expect those priests to hold out.”

“What did the priests say?”

“Most of them didn’t even know what was happening. A few of them said that the last thing they remembered before losing consciousness was that they were touched by the thief masquerading as a priest.”

Pyre threw his hands up and exclaimed, “Stop making excuses for your men. They lost. That’s it! Those high priests who opened the Vault should also be punished. What’s the point talking about their mana being drained?”

“Mana drainers are extremely rare. People that could take control of other people’s mana while it is inside their body…”

Garett hesitantly nodded. “The examination by the healers showed that their mana was-”

“Drained extremely quickly.”

“So our intruder is a mana draining, shape-shifting thief. I reckon there are only a few of those around,” Pyre said while leaning back in his chair. “I can easily find someone like that. Although, his power of changing his face would probably stall me for a few days. ”

“That’s the problem. Their mana wasn’t drained in the normal sense.”

“Oho?” Gerhard raised his brow.

The bandages of Pyre also moved. Garett assumed he had a questioning expression beneath the weave of worn out cloth covering his face.

“Being drained of mana is very different from exhausting your mana pool due to casting too many spells. At least, that was what our head healer told me. It’s a very subtle difference.”

Gerhard rubbed his temples with his long frail fingers. “Have you compiled the list of people with Bloodlines that could mana drain? I doubt that would be a long list.”

“Yes.”

“And the Gifted?”

“There are currently only three recorded Gifted that are variants of mana drainers in Forkspear, only one of them is in Krysperia right now. Nowhere near the capital.”

“Find those people!” Pyre said. “If I was the one doing your job I could have killed all of those people!”

“I have investigated them! But don’t you see the problem?” Garett retorted while adding “shadow bastard” in his head. “Those are mana drainers!”

“And this doesn’t look like mana drain? Mana drain. Such a fearsome power,” Gerhard said while twiddling his fingers. “And this one is not like that?”

“The healers say that they are ninety-percent sure that it wasn’t a mana drainer. The head healer is experienced and has dealt with actual cases of exhaustion as a result of mana drain. We could take his word on the matter. Nevertheless, I do not leave any rock unturned. The location of the mana drainers inside Krysperia are accounted for.”

“The government’s record on that are usually accurate,” Gerhard said. “They are very important military assets.”

“I agree. The possibility that there is an unrecorded mana drainer wandering around our capital is very slim. But our target does not appear to be a mana drainer, so-”

“So just find this guy! Is this person even a guy?” Pyre said. “Why am I even here? I hunt void mages! Unless, I’m the one who will replace Garett?”

Garett gave Pyre a smile but his there was nothing friendly in his eyes. His fists were tightly balled up beneath the table. The metal plates of his gauntlet scraped against each other.

“Pyre, did you even read the data orb transmission I sent you?” Gerhard asked with a hint of amusement in his voice.

“Um…no.” Pyre reached out to the shadows behind him and pulled out an orb from out of nowhere. The black holes he had for eyes slowly expanded as he examined the projection on the orb. “Traces of void energy here in Krysperium!”

“High Priest, are you suggesting that they are connected to the robbery?”

“Yes. Now that I have heard your report it might be the case that the void mages are starting to move. We are facing unknown powers…”

Garett’s expression became grave as he thought about the theory of the high priest. It was plausible, he admitted. Who would be brazen enough to dare take the Dragon’s Heart?

“There’s also something that you need to know,” High Priest Gerhard said in a soft voice. Garett and Pyre leaned forward. “This news is heavily suppressed, but there are rumors a Blight has attacked a town far to the west.”

Glowing coals seemed to burn in the eye sockets of Pyre. “Void mages,” he hissed. “Those traitors of humanity are finally making their move, huh? We all know that those traitors of humanity are the cause of the Blight! I’ll kill them all!”

Garett was surprised at the news. He mulled things over before asking, “The walls have been breached? Are the Blight upon us?”

“No. West System still stands. No breach of any kind. While Lord Devastator Knight Marcus is alive, West System will stand. Which presents the problem of where that Blight creature came from.”

“It’s them! The void mages! Let me call all our assassins! Work for Paximillon needs to be done! Weed out the dregs of humanity!”

“Calm down, Pyre,” Gerhard said. “Do not act rashly. That information shouldn’t be available to us. Don’t forget that. The official story was that there was an enormous explosion engulfed the town due to a spell going awry. The military is drawing responsibility to themselves.”

“We haven’t heard any news like that.”

“The government is also repressing that story so that it would look authentic. A military blunder that the government wants to hide. A perfect cover for the disastrous truth that a Blight has set its abominable foot on Krysperian soil!” The High Priest laughed softly while shaking his head. “I would wager my staff that it was the idea of Lord Devastator Knight Jaguar. That woman is very cunning.”

Struggling to keep himself calm, Garett clenched his jaws tightly until it hurt. The Dragon’s Heart was stolen right from under their noses now there’s a news of a Blight that somehow was able to bypass West System. There were also some traces of void mage activity in the capital. Garett glanced at Pyre. His eyes turned to slits again. Garett wondered at what the shadow bastard was thinking.

“There’s another matter.” High Priest Gerhard produced a data orb from inside his robes. “I wasn’t able to send this to you earlier since we had to check the energies our sensors detected.”

That’s the energy of the Dragon’s Heart,” Garett said in a low growl.

“Faint traces. Very faint.”

“Look at this! It’s the same location as the void energies!” Pyre looked at his own data orb then back to Gerhard’s orb. “Those filthy void mages have the orb!”

Garett firmly gripped the rests of his chair. He closed his eyes then said, “It’s all clear now. The peculiar circumstance of how mana of the people inside the Vault disappeared was probably due to the accursed void magic! These energy readings confirm that at least one of them has the orb!”

“That’s the same conclusion that I have reached after I heard your report about the mana drain issue,” Gerhard said. “This unfamiliar magic is certainly void magic. The Blight plus the loss of the Dragon’s Heart…I fear for whatever the heretics are scheming.”

“We should inform the imperial officials that we lost the Dragon’s Heart! Let us consult with Lord Malachi Fahllyr. This is a very important piece of information. Those void mages probably plan to use the Dragon’s Heart in some unholy ritual of theirs that involve the Blight!”

“We can take them out ourselves,” Pyre said. “The heads of those void mages are ours! We swore to Paximillon that we will kill them all!”

“We must tread carefully, Garett. If we inform the government that we were robbed of such an important relic, they will try to wrest control of the Church! Look at what happened to the adventurer’s guild after the authorities discovered that one of their members carried a blade with a demon spirit inside.”

“The fool who got possessed? Wasn’t he also working for us?” Pyre asked while folding his arms.

“I had to threaten and pay off those brainless members of the council of the guild to shut up regarding the connection of Sicarius with us!” Gerhard then turned to the head of the Draconyx Discipulus. “Politics, Garett! There is always politics. Even inside the Church. Both of you know that. I gathered the three of us here today because I know that all of us that in this room have nothing in our hearts except for the destruction of those that are abominable in the eyes of Paximillon, the everlasting existence. Praise be unto his name.”

Frowning slightly, Garett couldn’t help but agree with what the high priest said. People always had selfish desires in their hearts. Even among the clergy, there are those that only want the promotion of their own interests.

“Not a word to anyone outside the Church. Although, Lord Malachi will probably know of the robbery eventually, we will keep quiet for as long as we can. We do not want the imperial authorities meddling in our affairs. I am sure that the city guards also have picked out the signature of the void magic. They will be looking for the void mage, but they will do it discreetly to avoid panic among the people.As for the energy of the Dragon’s Heart, it is most likely the case that they haven’t detected it. Its energy signature is quite hard to find unless one is specifically looking for it- like our brethren that are tracking it down.

“We will volunteer our services to aid the city guards or whoever will be assigned to hunt for the void mage inside the capital. They have no reason to reject our offer. Both of you will use all of the resources of the Church to find this person. You need to find him before the city guards or the military does.”

“Yes,” Garett said firmly. “We need to thwart the plans of the void mages.”

“The moment we have received those reports,” Gerhard said, “I immediately ordered all the gates of the city to be closely monitored. We don’t have enough men but many religious city guards volunteered to help. Of course, they do not really know what they are looking for.”

Pyre leaned forward. Some of his bandages that hung lose fluttered as the wind blew in from the window. There was a hint of glint in the deep abyss that was his eyes. “Am I needed here? I will leave a few squads; however, I think that I should go west.”

Nice plan shadow bastard, Garett thought with approval. Meet the void mages on two fronts. More opportunities of stopping them.

“Go West and eliminate every void mage that you encounter. Use Mandolin City as your base. Our Church has firmly established its hold there. Sweep downward from the northwest down the whole line of the West System. Ask assistance from local followers.”

“I intended to do that.”

“Pyre, take care that you do not establish a religious militia when you call for the aid of our religious brothers and sisters.”

“The Emperor would not like that at all…I know. Such narrow-mindedness.”

“Pyre, the Emperor is a descendant of the First Dragon Emperor. The blood of the foremost servant of Paximillon runs in his veins. Take care of your words.”

Silence trailed as the three ardent followers of Paximillon collected their thoughts. Their strength was for Paximillon. To follow the footsteps of the First Emperor Krystfallen was their vow. Fight against the Blight, fight for all of existence, fight for the everlasting existence that was the God Paximillon.

Void mages roamed the Empire, sowing the seeds of some insidious plot. Doubtless, they want the Blighted Multitude to taint and corrupt the legacy of the First Emperor. Garett was confident that he could count on the High Priest Gerhard and the shadow groofshit piece of a human, Pyre. They were the persons that would gladly offer their lives in battle while taking down as many heretics with them. He was sure of that. Even Pyre.

The imperial officials were not to be trusted. They have their own agenda. While their interests might coincide in the ultimate goal of defending the Empire, Garett was apprehensive about such cooperation because he knew that disagreements regarding which path to take to achieve the goal would be detrimental to such achievement.

The betrayal of the Union when the First Emperor still sat on the throne…a story that many Krysperians have forgotten. Or do not know.

“Another matter,” Gerhard said, snapping Garett and Pyre from their thoughts. “It has been a difficult and delicate procedure but the tests conducted were finished awhile ago. That was the reason why I was late for this meeting.”

“The miracle of the claw chip?” Garett observed that the high priest smiling with eyes slightly watery.

“It was a miracle. The lightning came from the claw chip itself.”

There was a warm feeling in Garett’s chest despite the problems that were confronted him. He slowly clasped his hands together and bowed his head. “The First Emperor is with us.”

“Yes…yes…we are not alone,” Pyre said. His thin voice was cracking slightly.

Was Pyre crying? Garett could not see any tears but he knew that the shadow bastard felt the same way as him.

Affirmation of their faith! Divine providence comforting them!

Tears slid down his cheeks. He did not wipe them but continued to tightly clasp his hands. His shoulders heaved as he whispered a prayer to Paximillon. He could not deny that there were doubts in his heart as to the authenticity of the miracle. There was a large possibility that it was only a ploy of the intruder.

The high priest has confirmed that the miracle was real.

It was certainly a divine message, a warning that they did not heed. The miracle warned them that orb was about to be stolen! The miracle warned them of the future evils that the void mages planned to unleash on the Empire.

They were not yet worthy enough to instantly glean the message of the First Emperor.

The dead bodies of the void mages would be his offering to prove to Paximillon that he was worthy of his miracles. Garett wordlessly swore on the sacrifice of the First Emperor that he will exterminate all the void mages.

“This is war,” said High Priest Gerhard. “The beginning of a holy war. Worry not for Paximillon is with us. The First Emperor Krystfallen is also with us. For his blood was spilt.”

“That our blood might flow.”

After the high priest and the shadow bastard left, Garett remained on his chair, staring out the window, watching the night fall on the great and impregnable city of Krysperium.

The fight of Maurice and that man who called himself BasketSlayer played once more in his mind. During the final moments of the match, the two fighters stood their ground and engaged in a ferocious brawl. Garett did not know what the powers of the Roghinian were, but he was very tough.

Just as Garett had predicted, Maurice lost.

There was no problem with that. There was nothing shameful with losing to someone stronger.

However, Garett thought that Maurice fell down faster than he should have. The healers of the arena said that he run out of mana to sustain the Terebro Bear beaststone.

“A full Terebro Bear Forge Spirit should have lasted longer than that,” Garett said. He stood up and walked towards the window. “Yet, Maurice did lose his mana during the fight. All of it.”

It was quite idiotic for a void mage to waltz in the arena and participate in the tournament. Even the heretics had enough brains to keep themselves hidden. The chances that the BasketSlayer was a void mage was extremely low. There was no indication of void magic about him. But Garett does not leave any stone unturned.

“That Roghinian has been winning all his fights. At this rate, we will eventually meet in the tournament. That would be an interesting fight,” he said with a smile while looking outside a window of one of the twelve spires of the cathedral. The moonbeams washed the pearly white surface of his armor made out of an elder dragon’s bones. "An interesting fight indeed..."