Isaiah’s eyes bawled restlessly as the drops of loose well water dripped aimlessly to the nearby floor but just out of reach of its comforting kisses.

The Darkness was a special sort of Oblivion, and Desna said this world needed saving! Golarion looks no better than the Hell on Earth he and David just left. The guards tossed them into this cell after capturing them at quite literally the first moment they arrived here. The cell reeked of forgotten graves and rotting muck. And all they had to show for their welcome now that their Weapons and David’s Pip-Boy were gone was this annoying azure butterfly that keeps following the Veteran Ranger to his body’s rejective annoyance.

And once more… he sneezed the insect away… yet the little blue critter insists to follow him.

“Whatdowedo-Whatdowedo-Whatdowedo?” the Rookie tongue frenzied as he anxiously tapped his foot at the dirt ground.

“Stay with me kid! Stay with me!” David grabbed hold of Isaiah and looked straight at him sternly. The room may be dark but just a few inches apart from each other, they could see the white of each other’s eyes. “Do what I say and keep quiet. We can get out of this… just wait for a guard or two and we can overpower them. Together” He softly whispered to him.

“I… I…” Isaiah breathed deeply. “Okay.”

Just as he agreed upon David’s plan, the door that led outside of the Dungeon swung open as a bright torch light filled the room with two shadows marking the presence of their new visitors. The clanking of armor palpitated David’s ears: Guards.

“Two. Wait’ll they get close.” The Vet whispered to the Rook.

Once they both overpower the Guards, they should hold a key or something they can use to get themselves out of here. Two figures appeared before them, the faint torchlight in the dark dungeon. Both eyes of searing blue light. One wore over their sky-blue robes a resplendent yet nigh skin-like cuirass. The rest of the soldier’s matching armor: pauldrons and greaves, formed their body into valiant forms. Lastly, the soldier has adorned on their belt a great saber and the same Ankh-like pseudo crucifix adorned on the soldier’s golden breastplate. A valorous uniform of Martialism that if they weren’t prisoners right now would be worthy of an honorable salute. The soldier’s partner however did not share the militaristic disposition however them. It was hard to discern from the other person’s long hair. That is not discounting the rather mutative face this person presented him/herself to David. Their bodies were a human shape, with nails, nose, mouth, and ears with alabaster skin shown just like them.

But the eyes! Oh, the eyes could make any imagination tremble in awe by a singular glance alone. Their eyes were a black canvass decorated warmly with their searing blue irises like the edges of a lighter’s fire burning proudly amidst the darkness of the dungeon. Following above their inhumanly mesmerizing eyes were without any other way for David and Isaiah to describe it: Feathers. Turquoise feathers adorned like jewelry from their lashes up to the tips of where their hairline begins. It was if an Angel descended from heaven to walk on this god-forsaken earth.

“Hoc modo velox fiat. Non placet hic frater. Lacus mehi repit.” A discernably feminine voice spoke forth from the armored individual.

“Eas a nobis custodiat carcer. Cave modo ne nimis prope sis.” The long-haired man told the armored woman teasingly.

The armored woman sighed as she beckoned her hand onto her comrades’ side where her equally-eyed compatriot passed her a scroll sealed with a red ribbon. She immediately unfurled its bindings and opened the scroll. The parchment created a glistening that surrounded them, engulfing the room with magical light.

“Linguae omnium, verba indomita, intellegam te. Patet suus secreta!” the armored woman began her incantations. Each word further, chilling the hearts of the Rangers that they stopped inching closer to their devious plan.

An excruciating headache malformed into both David and Isaiah’s skulls. as they steeled their resolves from interrogation. Was this some kind of mind-attacking magic spell these alien-eyed Golarionites?

“Christ!” David cursed as he writhed on the floor. His head like a nail trying to breach his skull.

“Can you understand me now?” the armored woman looked at his breaking body and addressed him.

Did the woman just spoke English? Something he could finally understand?

“Tomos I thought this spell will NOT hurt them!” the armored woman turned to her compatriot.

“I swear… it's harmless! The Scribe told me it was!” the long-haired man named ‘Tomos’ replied.

“Oh Sun-and-Fury, save me from this bore…” the armored lady grimaced as she turned back to David. “Do you understand me now Outlander?”

“Yes.” David barely heaved out that word as he reeled his head back from the magical spell. His head still lingering from its noxious strike. Isaiah beside him fared better, able to stand back up again to grasp their cell’s bars in a clunky attempt to muscle up from his tall stature against their captors.

“The hell did you just hit me with?” David asked.

“Scroll of ‘Comprehend Language’. Supposed to be ‘Harmless’ the Spellscribe told me… but… oh… you know.” Tomos gave off an amusing chuckle at the two’s expenses.

“Why are you trying to walk across the Plains of Paresh all by your lonesome?” the woman interrogated him.

“Plains of what?” David answered with a confused crinkle of his eyes. He had only been in Golarion for a give or take… ten… thirty or even a few hours and this woman is asking him questions of where he and Isaiah are right now.

“The Plains of Paresh. The northernmost frontier of old Qadira. Do you not know how far you travel here?” she pressed further.

“Travel? I just got here.” David answered. “We… just got here…” he forgot to mention Isaiah.

“Got here? Like you just… appeared in the middle of the Badlands for no reason and you expect me to believe you?” the armored lady scornfully countered.

“Look missy… missy…. Eh… Blue-Eyes… if you can jus’point to’ers where this place call… eh… Cat-Here is then we can jus’ leave y’all nice and dandy. We won’t touch a tinsy tiny sandy or look at another ol’e soul if you can leter’s outta dis place?” Isaiah tried to reason with the lady. Finally, remember a faint hint of where their destination is supposed to be.

“The crass of you!” the lady gasped, her face turning red. “My name is Tutoria Toledo, and you shall address me as Paladin Toledo you barbarous curr!”

“Neophyte Toledo to be exact. Sister, you’re letting your anger get the better of you again! What will Anchorite Ebrahim say if you’re tossing your helmet at me again? ‘It’s a simple task’ he says and you're already mucking it up.” Tomos lashed out.

“Shut up brother!” Tutoria turned to Tomos, taking off her helmet and tossing it in the ground. “Stop trying to ruin my merits with these prisoners!”

Her face unmasked, it was unmistakable that Tutoria and Tomos may not be using honorifics of ‘Brother’ and ‘Sister’ but maybe of the truest sense by blood they are siblings. Twin siblings to be exact by the uncanny resemblance of the two. Tutoria’s feathers around her eyes were of similar color but a differing sequence of turquoise corsage compared to her brother. The only major difference is that while Tomos prefers to keep his hair long and free, Tutoria would rather keep her hair to as short a length as possible to a nigh boyish degree… if it weren’t for her feminine braids giving away her otherwise nigh ambiguous gender. Both of the twins could try the imaginations of those folks who wish to ask of their genders of so interchangeably.

“Look ma’am. I don’t know anything about you and all but all I just wanna know is this… What in the God-Damn hell is going here? Because me and my friend Ice here just want to just get going. We need to travel to Cat-Here right n-n-n- AAACHOO!” David raised his voice but alas, the Butterfly, whose restless wings fluttered around him continued to irritate his nose causing him to let loose a great sneeze.

“By the Dawnflower! This curr has poisoned me! I Smite thee! Smite thee!” Tutoria flailed her arms as she squawked religious dogma upon David and Isaiah. Holding up her ankh-shaped crucifix of Sarenrare Holy Icon on high and thrusting the symbol of her goddess repeatedly.

The Rangers braced for another arcane assault, but no such punishment came to them.

“Your ‘Dawnflower’ got no power over here… on us!” David whooped, turning the tables on the conversation, in truth trying to rile them closer into the bars within both he and Isaiah’s reach for an attempt on the keys, his eyes glancing briefly on the Paladin’s belt. The prize jingling and jangling so tantalizingly away from reach.

“Blasphemer!” Tutoria feverously stomped her foot down.

“Can we just talk? Please missy Blu--- I mean Tutoria… and eh… Tomos that’s yer name? How’bou we go back on it? Look we can be friendly folks! Honest!” Isaiah pleaded with the two. “It’s not like we’re not gonna go anywhere yet…”

“Fine… but do not try anything or I will have you all cut down where you stand… Blasphemers!” Tutoria nodded albeit with her suspicions still held at bay by the two strangers. “Why are you here?”

“We’re traveling to Cat-Here… A friend… told us that we can meet… someone there.” David answered.

“Katheer.” Tomos corrected David’s pronunciation.

“But Katheer is nothing but rubble and mud! Why would anyone want to go there? Unless…” Tutoria scratched her chin. Before she angrily pulled out her large curved sword onto David and Isaiah threateningly. “So, you ARE working for him, aren’t you? That place would be the perfect place for such dark dealings! Those weapons you carry with you? The ones we took away from? Are you planning to sell them to the Sandstorm… these Crossbows?” Tutoria questioned, mentioning their weapons.

It wasn’t unlike anything they had likely seen before given the feudal-esque shapings of this world. The most advanced thing David and Isaiah had seen in this world was the Magical Scroll that Tutoria had used earlier.

“Whose him?” Isaiah scratched his head.

“Sandstorm? Sounds like he’s bad news.” David inquired, his throat clearing to come up his next words carefully.

“Are you even more daft? Going to the ‘City of Mud’ traveler? The Sandstorm is the cruelest marauder in all of the Plains of Peresh. This Fortress Monastery is the only bastion of order… of wholesomeness… of what little justice is left in this world!” Tutoria gave off a glum response by the sheer ‘ignorance’ these strangers have on her.

“Look, if you don’t want us to be here, we can just leave now. No harm done if we’re not welcome here. We got nothing against you.” David reasoned.

“Do not be so hasty Outlanders.” Tutoria dismissed him. “One of two things will happen if we let you out of this cell. Either I am going to be seeing the two of your ax-brained heads coming down the Ladan River the next time I have to go out and fetch water or the Sandstorm and his marauders might try to be friends with you… seeing as the Outriders had caught you with those strange weapons of yours.”

“Quite a curiosity if I may so myself.” Tomos snuck in a complement before being silenced by his twin Sister. “The same can be said for your critter of yours o’er there. A pet of yours?” He pointed to the Butterfly that flew by David’s side.

“I wish.” The Ranger rolled his eyes.

Bandits, this place is crawling with bandits. Just great Desna…

“I don’t want to just sit here all day. Come please…” David decided to switch tactics. “Y’all seem twa-be reasonable folks.”

“Reasonable?” Tutoria’s nerves pulsated. Her feathery brows clinched downward with a raptorial scowl. “There is no more reason! Just little scraps of what little hope we have left here! The Cataclysm had torn the sky and now Magic has gun wild. Fire, Brimstone and Poison and all! I lost three of my brothers and sisters last week to several monsters. And you expect us? To be ‘reasonable’?”

“Hey I didn’t mean that wa-” David retreated his words but the Butterfly whose pollinated wings of Elysian Flowers continued to hover around his nose with its pestering scent. Another expulsion of his sneezing was let loose.

“Sister, I think you should it speak to these guests with some more… tact. We are getting nothing out of them.” Tomos’ cooler head attempted to quench his sister’s fury.

“Blasphemers! They blasphemed her name in front of a Champion of the Dawnflower I tell you!” Tutoria however remained unconvinced, still certain of her suspicions, she turned around against her brother to argue.

Between the twins and David, the Ranger smirked, now finding a solid opportunity to for the keys on the Paladin’s belt. With his panache focused on those silvery trinkets of salvation, he made his play. Once he grabbed hold of Tutoria, he could have Isaiah, a foot superior, to overpower her brother and they could be able to book themselves out of this fortress to get themselves back on the road as Desna ordained. His arms slowly emerged out of the bars, inching closer and closer to Tutoria’s neck…

PING-BONG! PING-BONG! PING-BONG!

It was a bell, its voice bellowing from outside like a mighty herald.

“That cannot be right…” Tutoria stepped further away just as David was about to grab hold of her. Shying away quickly back to the bars with a twitch of his arms before any one of those two could notice what he was about to do.

“What is happening back out there?” Tutoria wondered, as she pulled out her sword and walked towards the

“Oi! You there… stay here. This conversation of ours is not yet done.” Tomos called the still imprisoned Rangers just as he followed suit his sister upstairs.

They closed the door once more, with only just the feint fading daylight left still hanging above them from their tiny window in their cell, but ultimately, they were left in the darkness once again.

“Damnit.” David cursed himself for not being fast enough.

“What do we do now?” Isaiah asked him.

“We can wait Isaiah they should comeback… let’s try this again.” David reassured him again, but his repeating exhalation betrayed an air of uncertainty of how they could turnabout their fate was left in the Ranger.

“Dave…” Isaiah twitched his nose slightly, as if his nose has become alarmed to a unnatural smell. “Do you smell that?”

“Smell… huh… what is that?” David caught on to the Rookie’s disclosure. It smelt like something was burning outside from their small window above their cell. “Hey give me a boost over here Ice.” He ordered.

It was in no-effort on Isaiah’s part that he boosted David up above him towards the window to see only a grisly sight.

The gates and walls of the Fortress Monastery they found themselves been held captive in has been set into a hellish inferno! Painted warriors, of one side of their bodies painted in white intricate runic alphabets clashed... nay… slaughtering the Sarenites. They overwhelmed the white-robed defenders with both spell and blades dying through their flames, their icicles and arcane might and those were the fortunate ones. The rest were cut down like animals readying to be consumed for a feast of murder that the non-magically adept marauders enacted. They care not for prisoners, only for material wealth. Typical of many raiders back in their old world as David attests. More interested in spoils and killing off anyone that they deem unworthy or too weak to be absorbed into their hordes. Smoke and embers began to litter down onto David’s window as he beckoned Isaiah to lower him back to the ground.

“It’s a god damn massacre out there!” He shook his head. Just the sight of those atrocities brought him several unpleasant memories that no amount of alcohol or hash smoke could wash off. The smoke began to rain down on the cell as the Rangers covered their mouths with their shirts in a feeble attempt to shield their lungs.

As the dungeon’s coils began to wrap coil slowly on the Rangers, the door leading outside swung open again. Two new figures emerged, this time to David’s skipped heartbeat for they were dressed similarly to the fortress’ invaders with their half-painted bodies.

“Uhm this is what they call… a Dungeon right?” one marauder scratched his head with his short sword.

“Damn… thought these keys we snagged from that birdie-bitch were keys to an Armory.” Shrugged his companion. “Hey look over there!” he pointed to the Rangers’ cell.

“You got the keys?” David stepped towards the edges of the cell and held the bars tightly. A sliver of hope sprung him back from the abyss.

“Oooh… Fresh Meat… hmm…” the half-painted marauder tantalizingly jingled the keys in front of him.

As the two visitors of their’s inched closer to their cell, the setting sunlight that illuminated the dark dungeon fully exposed the extent of who these marauders were exactly in the flesh much to David and Isaiah’s horror. Or more of lack of flesh. For although half of their bodies were indeed painted with intricate runic alphabets that dotted their bodies, the second half of theirs was pitch black, not of paint but of scorched flesh forcibly infused by their leather covering in a sinister reflection of a once-powerful entity. Only one eye, that side of which remained unburnt glowed a maddening amber of untamed gifts just one twitch away from being unleashed to an unwary world. Their clothes meanwhile were of practical leather armor caked with unwashed blood that tainted their pearlescent runes across their bodies.

Fresh Blood. Awashed in the blood of Lambs.

“W-who are you?” Isaiah asked them.

“We are the Witnesses of the Dead God. Reclaimers of his holy blood for the Great Sandstorm!” the marauder demonstrated his faith.

“You some kind of Cult?” Isaiah asked.

“Nay. Choice, Circle. Not Cult.” The firebrand of the two half-faced cyclopeans insisted.

“The Great Sandstorm of course being our earthly Leader… but our true master is the Dead God, Nethys, the All-Seeing Eye.” His compatriot explained, realizing they are proselytizing to gentiles.

“Still a Cult!” Isaiah shrugged. “Whatevs…”

“Nethys?” David looked at each of Isaiah’s eyes and back towards their unwitting rescuers upon hearing that name.

It was the ‘God of Magic’ that Desna had talked about who had died. Surprisingly for someone dead, he still had a very devoted following of what remains of his followers.

“I heard of him. The powerful God of Magic stuff, right?” David pressed further.

“Indeed, the Dead God of Magic, however. But he in his great sacrifice has gifted many of us our truest potentials. Though many may see us as… untethered, we knoweth the truth of what this Cataclysm had brought forth upon the world. A great reformation has been at hand to dash away from the Old World for the New! We are willing to welcome those whom are lost such as you two into our Circle.” The marauder optimistically nodded.

“Unlike those greedy dogs of the Dawnflower! They do not know what greatness she had neglected the world to enjoy, locked within her vaults of this fortress. Tell me, my good fellows! If you kneel in supplication to the Dead God and pledge your allegiance to us, we shall induct you into our company of such erudite crusaders we shall set you free.” His partner proposed.

Now this is much easier…

“You show nothing but awesome might! Dare I say… you… Uhm… opened our eyes!” David flattered them.

“Dave! What has gotten in ---” the naiive Isaiah was about to protest but he was nudged by his superior with a simple wink and butting of his elbow to his arm.

“Can… I just… have some water and bread first? These Sarenites neglect to feed us anything whilst we rot down’ere.” He beckoned them to open the door.

“We are generous ones to those who seek the Opened-Eye.” The Marauder humbly bowed as he fiddled with the keys into the Cell’s keyhole.

As soon as he flipped the door open, David and Isaiah sprung into action. Catching the Nethysians by surprise and thus easily overpowering them. Ice threw a heavy knockout blow onto his target, whilst David strangled his.

“Don’t let’em get up!” David pulled out one of the Nethysians weapons, an iron short blade, and stabbed it to its owner’s neck, killing him instantly.

Isaiah meanwhile did the same, but he recoiled just as the blood-splattered onto his face.

“Talk’a ‘bout a break huh?” David whistled swimmingly after a clean close-quarter jostle. But his eyes caught Isaiah who retreated a pace away from the body of the Nethysian he had slain, eyes frozen as the blood wetted the stone floor and his hands.

“It hits different isn’t Kid?” David asked Isaiah. “Taking another life?”

“Nothing like’m radroaches and mutties back home.” Isaiah inhaled and exhaled slowly, coughing slightly due to the rising smoke that began to slowly permeate the Dungeon. He wiped the blood off his hands with the dead Nethysian’s robes. “But… I know what I signed up for Dave… thanks for being’ere for me. What Iron these folks packin’ though?” he turned to loot the bodies of the two cultists.

“Strictly small time.” David scavenged the bodies.

It wasn’t much but they found a few bottles of a red liquid on their persons alongside the weapons they held on their hands, a simple Shortsword for David and a Hand-Axe with a crescent-shaped head for Isaiah. The weapons weren’t of the greatest of shapes, the edges were dull and had stains protruding around their edges. But ultimately, they can still bring a world of hurt if they so wish to be inflicted upon what hapless folk comes across them wrong. Additionally, he found a few gibberish scrolls on them that seemed to be of revered quality to these Nethysians, almost similar to the scrolls used by Tutoria to cast her magical spell on them earlier.