Andius had no idea where he was or what had just happened. All he knew was that the words he had spoken held a lot of weight to them, and he didn’t like the fact that it felt like he had been forced to say them.

“Well, I might have had something to do with that.” A familiar voice said, so close to Andius’ ear that he jumped into the air. Try as he might, Andius couldn’t actually see who had spoken… actually he couldn’t see anything but complete darkness in every direction. “Relax, it’s me, Umbris.” The voice chimed out, sounding far more stable and far more smugly amused than Andius would have liked.

A groan escaped his lips as he closed his eyes, no point in using them if he can’t see. “Umbris, right. We never got to talk much, but I guess shadow Elementals have better things to do than follow me around all the time, right?”

“I’ve literally just been watching you this entire time. Kind of disappointed that you never tried to get in contact with me.” Umbris said, sounding a bit too pleased with himself. If Andius could see him right now, he would be glaring daggers into the creature. This just made Umbris laugh, but he eventually continued. “Anyways, you just initiated a trial of favor with that overly flamboyant tin-can, and you should probably know the rules.”

Andius’ frown deepened, it seemed to be his permanent expression since logging into this game. “Hold on, you said a trial of favor? Umbris, she serves the Lord of light! I’m pretty sure those are like gods, right?” Dread was starting to fill his entire system, Andius knew that Umbris was probably more than a lesser elemental but what could he do against a literal god?

“… Oh, I totally forgot!” Umbris began, sounding jovial and carefree, “I lied to you when we met, I’m actually the Lord of Darkness, Noctus. Elementals aren’t a thing anymore.” Andius’ jaw dropped like a bag of rocks.

“y-you…..” Andius tried to speak, but his hands were trembling, eyes wide with emotion. Noctus laughed in the darkness and sounded like he was about to speak, but Andius spoke up again, “You manipulated me? Are you kidding me?” the surprise in his voice was replaced with a shrill anger. At this point Andius was more than fed up with people walking all over him like this, and in this world he didn’t need to just take it lying down.

There was a long and drawn out silence in the darkness that they pair found themselves in, but Eventually Noctus spoke up, sounding unsure with his words, “Uh… right, Andius I wasn’t trying to manipulate you. I just had to be sure you were someone I could trust before revealing myself to you.”

“I don’t care.” Andius said, eyes brimming with purple light dancing like flames in the darkness. “Swear you won’t keep things I need to know from me, right now. If you won’t I’ll break out pact right now.” It was a bold move, but Andius refused to be someone’s puppet.

“Andius, are you sure you want to do th-”

“Swear it.” Andius cut off the god-like being with no hesitation, anger certainly impairing his judgment.

There was a pause and a sigh, before Noctus spoke up, “I swear upon the seat of my power and the names of my siblings that I will no longer hide important information from you.” The words didn’t sound bitter or angry, in fact Andius swore they sounded prideful.

“Twice more.” Andius said, getting a joyful laugh from Noctus in return, who happily repeated the oath twice more. When that was done Andius was just confused, “Why aren’t you mad? Aren’t gods supposed to get angry when people try to push them around?”

Noctus just clicked his tongue and patted Andius on the shoulder, “Some might, yes. But I am the lord of knowledge, secrets and freedom. That’s why I chose you.” He paused for a moment before pain similar to a flick sprouted to life on Andius’ forehead. “And don’t think of us as gods, we are much simpler than that… or perhaps more complex?… How to explain… We aren’t some cosmic entity that was created to make balance, we are simply beings that ascended far enough that mortal men see us as gods.”

This was all actually surprisingly making sense to Andius and he wanted to talk with Noctus more, but he knew the urgency of the situation he was in and needed to get things moving. “Alright, but I still need to know about this Trial of Favor you were talking about.” He said, voice a lot more even now.

Noctus completely stalled, sputtering on his words and sounding like he tripped for a moment before he cleared his throat. “R-right, definitely didn’t forget about it.” He paused for a moment and when he spoke again he sounded almost nervous. “We’re almost out of time, but all you need to know if that you have to embody your element, okay?”

Andius wanted to ask more questions but before he could open his mouth the space he found himself in shifted. No longer was he in a completely dark void, but instead standing on a ring. The ring itself looked similar to the Yin and Yang symbol, but in their centers were strange sigils that looked like the ones that were being used to cast magic.

“Took you long enough. Was starting to think you got lost on the Astral plane.” The woman’s voice called out, standing there in her armor on the other side of the ring. Her voice seemed more filled with emotion than before, almost mocking. “Surprised a lowly shadow mage like you had the courage to invoke Aak’Al, everyone knows that light beats darkness.”

Something about her tone made Andius angry, and he found his mana-form coming over him without even needing to call for it. “The brighter the light, the deeper the shadow.” Andius said, a grin spreading across his face, “Then again, you don’t seem like the kind of person to think beyond murder and violence, Philosophy really doesn’t suit you.”

The woman sounded like she was growling beneath her helmet, a sound that brought joy to Andius’ ears. “O’ Lord of Light, he who brings the dawn and expels the darkness, shackle this sinner so he may face your divine judgment!” As soon as the words left her mouth chains made of golden light wrapped around Andius’ body and held fast. The pain that flared up in his body wasn’t the worst he had experienced, but it was definitely bad enough to make him cry out. The woman chuckled and started to slowly walk forward, “Just a boy.” Her voice was so condescending that the shadows around Andius’ body flared. Even through the numbing effect of his mana all he felt was rage, he needed to bring her down and teach her a lesson!

The woman clicked her tongue at him, “My, you just don’t know your place, do you?” She let out a laugh that made his blood run cold, “Let me show you.” She held a hand out towards Andius and began to speak once again, “He who’s light gives life to this world, bring this blasphemer to his kneels so that he may bow to your glory, let him see the light and know his evil ways are through!”

Once again the place they found themselves in responded to her words, a great force pushing down onto Andius and forcing him down to his knees. How could he fight back in this situation, was she just praying to her Lord? Andius wasn’t exactly the religious sort, so he didn’t know what he could say here, but it wouldn’t hurt to try something. Either way he would probably die here again if he did nothing. “Noctus,” The first word left his mouth with incredible force, a shock wave pushing the woman back and causing the chains to loosen, “Break my chains and release me from my prison.” Just speaking those words made his throat hurt, but the chains shattered like glass and the pressure lifted.

The woman who had seemed so confident before took a step back, “W-what? This is some kind of joke, you can’t just speak a lord’s name aloud! How do you even know it!?” Andius’ grin grew to manic levels, he was in control now for the first time in his life, he was the one who held all of the power in this situation.

He took a step forward, holding a hand out to the woman with wild eyes, “Noctus,” Once again causing force to crash out in a wave from him, “The tongue of the snake speaks of lies and false teachings.” Philosophy was something Andius had a fairly decent grasp on, and he knew words had power here so he would use it to the best of his ability. “The warden jails an innocent man and gives lashings for sins not committed. Cut loose the tongue of the liar and shatter the Warden’s cage.” As soon as those words left his mouth, the woman cried out as blood fell from her helmet, but it didn’t last long as her own armor started to crush in on herself.

Andius had to turn away as the sounds of bones and flesh being pulverized filled the space they occupied, even he couldn’t handle that kind of gore. After a few more seconds of this, the world shifted once again and he found himself standing where he once had, Amira and Raizus standing more than a few arm lengths away. He blinked and wondered why they would be standing so far away, but a simple look down told him the answer to that; the ground where he was standing turned completely black and dark barbs had grown out of the ground.

A loud crash made Andius look over to where the woman had been standing, the ground around her was charred and blasted away as if a bomb had gone off right where she was standing. She simply lay there unmoving and for a few moments no one else did either. The first to make a move was the knight who had come with her, which was to jump on his horse and immediately turn tail and run. Andius frowned but he didn’t really care much, he wanted to know what was up with this woman.

The group walked over to where she had fallen and Andius reached down to remove her helmet, inside was a horrifying appearance, it seemed as if all the life had been sucked away from this woman, the sight reminding him of the horrifying creature he had seen in his dreams. Andius jumped back a few feet and yelled in fear, only to realize a second or so later that this wasn’t that thing; she had a mouth.

Amira snickered at Andius and reached down to grab the gauntlet she wore, “Not sure what you two did, but it didn’t fun for her.” She turned the large item around in her hands a few times before shoving it into her bag. “Either way, she seemed pretty important so I think it’d be best if we moved on.” Everyone nodded at that idea and started to walk down the path they had been traveling before, Andius moving to check his notifications.

——————

Congratulations, you have reached level 10! You now have 10 attribute points to spend across your stats, and 6 skill points to spend on your skills!

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Hidden Skill Shadow Summoning Level: 12

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(S)Spell Summon Pack(Shadow, Lesser) Level: 5

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Congratulations on surviving your first Aak’Al! This duel is one that is held by those who follow the elemental lords of this world, the states of which being the participants souls. Luck you that your patron is a cheater, huh?

You can now see if someone is a follower of one of the lords, how this knowledge comes to you is unknown and unique to you.

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Congratulations on reaching level 10! As you have already met the prerequisites for opening your next mana-gate, it has been opened automatically. Enjoy your newly enhanced magical capabilities!

——————

Andius was about to scream out into the forest about how Noctus had nearly gotten him killed, but an overwhelming sensation of bliss enveloped his body as the gate in his head opened. A massive amount of mana flooded into his body, causing small changes here and there that made him feel more complete, like he had been poorly built before. After a few moments of standing still and being stared at like he was a lunatic, Andius gave both of his friends a big grin, “Guess who just unlocked a mana-gate!”

Amira and Raizus stopped to look at Andius at the same time with an expression that could only be described as disdain, Amira taking initiative and saying, “Don’t suppose you could be convinced to not use your magic?” The tone of her voice only seeming half joking. Raizus nodded alongside her which just made Andius frown.

“Did something happen while I was out or something?” He asked, not all to happy to be the only one who didn’t know why everyone seemed so tense.

“You kind of just turned into a big ol’ ball of nope dude.” Raizus explained, getting a look from Amira. “One second you were shouting a weird word, the next you were covered in this black stuff that slapped me pretty good. The lady did something kind of like it too.” Amira nodded in agreement with Raizus and held up a hand.

“From what I saw you were channeling a lot of mana. Normally that’d be fine, but since you two were off who knows where, it was just going wild. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t cast near me anymore.” Her words were harsh but fair, so Andius nodded with a sour expression and the three got back on their journey.

After a few hours of walking, the group left the forest into a field of rolling grassy hills that seemed like something from a movie or an old computer screen. The sight was so stunning to Andius - who had rarely seen nature in his day to day life - that he stopped on the spot and looked around slack-jawed as the morning sun began to illuminated the land. Amira and Raizus looked back at their companion and shared a look with one another, before Amira grinned and said, “I think we should make camp, I know the sun is just rising but I think we’re all exhausted and ready to get some shuteye, wouldn’t you agree?”

Andius’ mood flipped like a switch and his face paled immediately, “U-uh, no I think we can keep going.” He said, voice unmistakably filled with fear. This made Raizus tilt his head with a completely confused expression but he made no argument, it seemed he was content traveling for a bit longer if it came down to it.

Amira was less pleased with this idea and crossed her arms in a way that made her look just like Charla. “Alright, now you’ve got to tell me what’s going on. Why don’t you want to set up camp?” Her voice was neither impatient nor compassionate, she simply wanted to know.

Andius hesitated for a moment, should he tell her about the creature in his dreams? Doing that would mean he had to tell her about the dreamer skill, and he wasn’t exactly fond of that idea, it was one of his hidden skills. Andius shook his head and gave a small smile, “No, sorry, I just wanted to see a bit more of this place, it’s gorgeous. We can set up camp if you like.”

Amira gave him a bit of a look but decided not to pry any further. In the next few minutes the camp had been set up, really just a few sleeping furs they had taken from the camp, and everyone got ready to sleep for the first time in ages.

Andius lay there in his furs thinking about what was about to happen. He could stay awake and be exhausted when everyone awoke, or he could face the thing in his dreams. Neither really sounded like a good option, but he knew that eventually sleep would find him, so it would be best if he did it now rather than later. He closed his eyes and let himself drift to sleep, thinking for a few moments that everything would be okay. Then he heard the sound of metal against stone.