The children began to ask Pitris what they should do next, but he was silent and did not give an answer, because he also didn’t know what to do. His face looked serious, but there was no hint of fear nor excitement. Then he said:

"I think we should wait."

“Did this ever happen before?” Malum asked.

“No. Usually Perun was escorting the people from the threshold to the threshold.”

Then Malum came closer to him and asked in a low voice:

"Is it because of me?"

Pitris thought about it and after a few seconds answered:

"I don't know. I hope not.”

"So, what do we do?"

“Nothing. The only thing we can do is wait.”

Malum first looked at the mountain and saw only sand and huge stone boulders, no trees or bushes grew on it. Then he looked at the top of it, where the castle was built, consisting of many long layers. The dust had cleared away, and he could get a better look at it. The lower tier was located directly on the cliff, and was partially shrouded in sedimentary rock, as if nature itself was retaking its territory. It seemed strange to Malum that there was a small opening for entry and exit. The middle tier was covered with buttresses, connected by flying buttresses. Thus, creating small side naves, similar to a balcony where, theoretically, guards or watchers could walk. The castle stood on one of the highest mountains and it is difficult to imagine what an incredible view opened from those places. In the darkness of passing clouds, several towers with long spires were visible in the upper part of the castle. And the pinnacles at the top of the buttresses, as well as on their ledges and pillars of the walls, ended with statues of some people, but Malum could not make out any details. The southern facade of the building was covered with lancet window frames and rose frames (located mainly on the towers), completely hollow inside, without any glass or stained glass. On the roof of the building, apparently, a huge dome should have shone in the sun, although it was not completed. Instead, there were huge portals and dilapidated support pillars connected by decrepit nervures. On the South-East Central tier was an open terrace, enclosed only by small merlons of the parapet.

As Malum thrilled with delight, he saw in his peripheral vision that the children were staring off to the right. He turned his head. There stood a humanoid creature, dressed in a red rag robe, torn and uneven at the ends. A rope was tied to the body around the pelvis. The sun's rays glinted off the iron mask on its face. There was a Carolingian-type sword on his back. Malum's gaze dropped, and he saw a pair of gauntleted greaves protruding from beneath his robe. The creature examined them and informed them that Perun had left on urgent business and asked him to escort the group to their apartments. They all nodded in agreement and moved across the sandy arena to the big gate following the new guide.

The portal that held the doors was tight against the rocks, without a single gap. The gable is adorned with kreuzblumeand, crockets, and flames were engraved on the sides. On the gate at shoulder level was a small mysterious sign that looked like several connected alchemical signs. The creature folded its hands in a prayer pose and uttered a few words that even Malum’s sphere could not translate. The circle lit up with blue flames and the gate opened without anyone's help. The group entered a narrow canyon surrounded by sharp curves of mountains and headed forward.

After a while, the sound of thunder was heard, although there was not a cloud overhead. The air was slightly drained. The children looked at the new guide with interest. It slowly moved forward, without turning its head, and some of the children's faces were clearly filled with delight. Pitris approached the creature and said:

“Who are you?”

It stopped and, turning half a turn, answered:

“Why do you care, old man?”

“Interesting. I haven't seen you here before.”

“Where have you seen me then?”

“I haven’t seen you anywhere.”

“Then you're in luck.”

“Why?”

“If we’ll meet under different circumstances, you’ll find out.”

He shrugged, and the group moved on. After a few kilometers, they came to a cave passage, they entered. The smell worsened. Drops of water were falling somewhere. Along the entire tunnel hung lighted torches, evenly distributed among themselves at a distance of five meters. A wooden spiral staircase appeared at the end of the path. The group squeezed together, and the children took turns climbing up one by one. There was a creaking sound of planks buckling under their feet. They climbed for five minutes, and then came out of the cave. A bright light blinded their eyes and they heard the boys’ voice:

"Oh, my!”

"Look at this!”

“Amazing!”

As soon as Malum's eyes adjusted to the light, he saw a huge stone bridge decorated with various drawings. And behind the bridge, the first houses of the local residents appeared. But that wasn't what surprised the children. About a kilometer away, in the huge walls of the fortress, which were entirely covered in Egyptian hieroglyphs, was a passage almost three hundred meters high. Malum was surprised at how accurately all the ancient traditions of “Logography usable as an abjad” were preserved.

In front of the entrance itself were two statues of similar size. They depicted two humanoid creatures. They tilted their heads back a little and looked up, their right arm at chest level in a benediction position, and their left arm stretched out in front of them. Torso and the legs were covered with a layer of iron armor, on the head was a lobster-tailed pot helmet with an iron mask. There were twenty other statues further down the corridor, but they were smaller, about two hundred meters in size, and also no different from each other. They depicted ordinary people standing at attention, with a bare torso and long skirts.

The group moved forward. The children could not hide their delight at what they saw and constantly ooh-ed and whoa-ed, pointing their fingers at everything that only caught their eyes. On the right and left sides of the road were statues (as tall as a man and inlaid with diamonds) of various, probably sacred beasts that Malum had never seen before. The houses were stacked on top of each other, clearly saving space. They were made of tura limestone or sandstone and had a maximum of one or two rooms at first glance. There was no glass in the windows. On the tops of some of the houses were small altars in the form of a rectangle and consisted of several columns and a roof.

The local population itself was absent. There was silence. The group seemed small and insignificant against the backdrop of this grandeur. The girl ran up to Pitris and asked:

“Why do they have such large statues?”

“With the size they try to compensate for their shortcomings.”

“This ... which ones?” She giggled.

“Intellectual.”

“Hmm. It’s hard to please you.”

“It's true.”

The guide asked not to stop and move at a quicker pace. Somewhere in the distance, the sound of thunder was heard again. The corridor seemed endless, and the excitement of what they saw began to subside a little. However, several paintings on the right side of the wall caught Malum's attention. They no longer depicted majestic and graceful creatures. There was something demonic about them. In one painting, a man with a spear defeats a cat with butterfly wings and a unicorn horn. On the other half-bird-half-man in a cardinal robe, on skates and with an inverted funnel on his head. A little further ahead, he saw a creature with a Golden crown on its head; human face, with an expression of anger and aggression; teeth like lion’s; iron armor; tail like a scorpion’s. Malum decided not to pay any attention to them.

The group went out into the small paved deserted streets of the fortress. The castle on the cliff was behind them. They moved forward, turning left and right. As a result, the group came to a small building that looked like a Palace. They went inside. Everything glowed in Golden colors.

- Everyone will have their own private room. But I'll lock you in.

The children nodded. We went up the carpeted stairs to the second floor. Malum looked at his watch: 15: 48. After that, everyone went to their room. Pitris remained.

“Old man,” began the guide, “you are returning to Tuhinmua.”

“What?” he answered with obvious surprise. “You won't even let me rest?”

“Rest outside the castle. I have an order to not let you in.”

“Give me at least an hour to catch my breath.”

“I can’t. To the exit.”

Pitris didn’t move.

“I have a son here,” he continued coldly.

“I don’t care.”

“I want to see Irin-Ajo, my son is here. He’s my only heir.”

The guide drew the sword from his back.

“Oh! How scary!” said Pitris.

“I'll give you five seconds to head for the exit.”

“What are you going to do to me? Will you kill a weak and feeble old man like you killed refugees from Alaval?”

“What?” The creature asked with horror and swung a cutting blow.

Only the creature was late. Time stopped. Pitris at the same moment transformed into a stocky man, with a bald head and vagrant rags in black and white colors. Then slowly, without haste, he took the sword out from the guide's hand. He picked the guide up and dragged it into the farthest free room. Pitris checked to see if anyone was inside. It was empty. He sat it down on a chair and hit the armor with a click.

“Piece of shit.”

Then he aimed the edge at the stomach so that the guide did not die immediately from the wound and very smoothly pierced the flesh without touching the spine. Then he sat down on the bed and turned left and right to stretch a bit. His back cracked slightly. Then he turned his head from side to side, smiled, and was just about to snap his fingers when he changed his mind. He got up from the bed, went to the creature, and took off its mask, looked into those blue eyes full of determination; then he took off its hood and helmet. Her hair was long. It was a woman.

"Well, Colonel-General of the army of thugs, shall we begin?"

Pitris sat back on the bed and snapped his fingers. The flow of time has been restored.

***

The night of the same day, Ismila was sitting in her office, nervously turning the pages of her diary. Then she wrote something down and started flipping through it again. There was a knock at the door.

"Come in," she said.

A militiaman came in. His forehead covered with perspiration. His hands were trembling.

“What are you waiting for? Tell me what you found out.”

"You'd better see this."

“I'm starting to like that phrase less and less.”

She got up from the table and ran after him. The street was lit only by torchlight. They ran for twenty minutes, and then turned into a narrow courtyard. Ismila felt persistent smell of death. She took out a handkerchief and covered her mouth and nose with it. There were sounds of flies and people talking softly. She saw five more militia standing between two small houses. Under their feet lay two bodies, covered with corpse stains and already half-decomposed.

“Fuck! Shit!” Ismila vomited, and then vomited again. The militiaman held her hair; someone stepped aside, because they could not watch all this.

“What's wrong with you?”

“Unlike you, I don’t see corpses every day.”

The militiaman shrugged. A little later Ismila took ahold of herself and examined the body with the corner of the eye.

"Malum’s not here.”

“Yes. But look who's here.”

“By the way, are the locals asleep?”

“As soon as we found the bodies, we immediately moved the citizens to another place.”

She squatted down and, very reluctantly, looked at the faces. Then she screamed:

"Damn… Are you kidding me?”

In one of the bodies, Ismila identified an old man who she thought had gone to the capital as an interpreter with the group of chosen children. The body next to him was his son. On the face was a mark in the form of a seven-sided circle, on which was written "Lux in tenebris et tenebras in lucem".

"Then who went to Strota? And what does this inscription even mean?”

"How do we know? We are not literate. Your Malum must have gone to the capital. He killed two people, found a front man to act as an interpreter, and left.”

“No. You're wrong. I saw this old man the night when Perun came for the children." She turned to the others with teary eyes. “How is this even possible?"

All shrugged their shoulders. Ismila examined the dead again, covering her nose and mouth with a handkerchief.

"I can see the wound on the boy's body, but I can't see it on the old man.”

There was another person who had not spoken before. He stepped out of the shadows into the torchlight and said:

"I examined both bodies. The guy definitely didn't die of natural causes, but the old man did. And no signs or tattoos were found on the old man's body either.

Ismila thought:

Whatever happens, but when it comes out, I'll be dead. Damn! Malum! What are you doing? I need to flee from this planet, although it's easier to kill myself, then “They” definitely won't get me.

A clap of thunder. Ismila stood rooted to the spot, wondering what to do. It started raining. When she realized what was happening, it was too late. The sound of Perun was heard. It fell from the sky right on top of them, this time about the size of a man. Ismila drew a knife from the scabbard of a nearby militiaman and tried to kill herself, but did not have the time. Perun knocked the knife out of her hand, grabbed her by the neck so that she could not do anything, and she, in turn, did not try, just whined a little. The militia was ordered to remove the bodies, but not to bury them yet, and even more so not to burn them. Then he turned around and dragged the tear-stained and exhausted body away into the darkness.