-[Chapter 013]-

The new core of Basil’s dungeon hummed before the steps of his throne, a fresh splatter of blood running down its crystalline exterior. The work of the old dwarven engineer, who had promised Basil the core’s integration into the dungeon’s network, had progresses at a steady pace until just a few moments ago. If all had gone according to his plan, Drum would have welcomed the triumphant return of Lord Doom by reporting on the completion of his work, but that was no longer his number one priority.

The old dwarf felt the chill edge of a blade sliding back and forth between the wrinkled folds of his chin. “Calm down, boy,” Drum said. “You’ve gotten yourself into a big old mess here! If you just lay down your weapon and let me go, we can work something out.”

Aidan held the broad edge of a dwarven war axe to the throat of the struggling engineer. The youth frantically searched the dark chamber around him for more enemies fight or a way out of this hell, but his frostbitten eyes failed him. Shards of ice still held fast to his clothes, but the young man appeared otherwise unscathed by his prolonged stay within the magical prison of ice.

With the unexpected failure of Basil’s [Frost Mine] spell, Aidan and Nadia had emerged from their imprisonment only to find themselves facing a small band of chaos dwarves. The stunted, grey skinned creatures had been working on the dungeon core at the time of the spell’s failure and did not respond well to the twins’ sudden appearance. While they were poor imitations of their namesakes, Aidan and Nadia still turned out more than a match for Drum’s guards and apprentices. The bodies of five dead chaos dwarves now littered the ground around the dungeon core, but the encounter had not turned out entirely one sided.

While Aidan held fast to his hostage, standing tall in spite of his cuts and bruises, Nadia sat atop a pile of crumbling ice—all that was left of their melting prison—clutching a nasty wound on her leg. “I can’t…” she stammered, “I can’t stop the bleeding! Help me, brother!”

Her reserves of mana had been depleted in the battle for the throne room. What little she had recovered during her imprisonment in the ice had just now been spent on killing the dwarves. Thus, with her mana depleted to the point where she could not cast even the most basic of her healing spells, Nadia could do nothing to stabilize her perilous condition. She was applying pressure to the wound in an effort to quench the bleeding, but the cut was too deep and her pain too great to push on it any harder. The pool of ice cold water below her was slowly turning red as her life gushed out of her with every heartbeat.

Aidan was growing increasingly distressed at the sight of his fading sister. In his despair he turned to interrogating his hostage, trying to extort any measure of help from him.

“Where do you keep your healing items?” he demanded to know as he pushed the edge of the axe head deeper into the neck folds of the dwarf. “Do you have any health or mana potions? Any healing scrolls?”

“I have nothing on me,” Drum replied. “We didn’t come here to—” his explanation was cut short as the edge of the blade dug deeper into the folds of his neck.

Left unsatisfied by the dwarf’s reply, Aidan once more took matters into his own hands. He searched the pockets and pouches of the old man with his free hand, but turned up only tools and mechanical parts galore. Drum had been proven right and Aidan withdrew the blade just a little so that he could speak once more.

“I don’t have anything on me right now,” Drum continued. “What I can do is get you the help you need, if you release me.” The old dwarf recognized that he could do little to resist Aidan’s leverage over him, so he was eager to cooperate. After all, he was no fighter or rogue, who could slip out of Aidan’s hold, and his advanced age did him no favors either.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Aidan declared. “WE are leaving this accursed place right now and you will show us the way.”

“What? Do you really think that you can secure your freedom with me as a hostage?” Drum asked.

“The other dwarves died protecting you,” Aidan reasoned. “Your life must be worth something. Help us escape this place and I swear that I will release you. If you don’t resist I will not harm you.”

Drum bared his teeth in a wicked grin. “There is nothing that you can do to save yourselves from whatever fate awaits you once the Master of this dungeon returns,” he explained. “I am not even that bitter about you killing my guards—if anything, you have impressed me, young man—but this is an act of violence on the sovereign soil of House Doom and it will not go unpunished.”

The old dwarf stared deep into the darkness of the throne room and addressed a presence that only he seemed be aware of. “Come on out, Schwartz,” Drum said. “Give the boy a potion to save the life of his precious sister. If we can bring them back to their senses, I am sure that we can come to some sort of an agreement with the poor youngsters.”

Aidan searched the throne room, but sighted no one. Still, he shored up his hold over the old dwarf just in case.

“I am going to step out of the shadows now,” Schwartz announced to the twins. “Please, do not react with violence. I don’t want to see more blood spilled on this glorious day. But if you do harm the dwarf in any way, know that I will make sure that you suffer greatly before we will grant you the sweet release of death.”

To the twins’ great surprise, a tall, black figure appeared not out of some distant corner, but right in front of them. To the sound of a shifting breeze the elusive a man materialized before their very eyes. He appeared a stone’s throw away from them, but, given his imposing stature, the twins found it far too close for their comfort. It would take but a moment for the grim man to be at their throats, should he decide to charge.

Schwartz raised his hands in an effort to express his firm desire to avoid further violence. In the right hand he held a blood red potion. He extended it in an offering to the twins. His hawkish eyes dug deep into Aidan’s terrified mind as he proposed an exchange.

“I am willing to trade,” Schwartz said. “The life of your sister for the life the old man—one to one—would you consider that fair?” He gestured at the dead bodies of the dwarves. “We can discuss the penance for your aggression later. I promise that if you hand Drum over to me unharmed, I will make sure that you will live to see a fair trial. I cannot allow you to leave, however, thus we are bargaining for your lives and lives only.”

The twins had been offered a simple choice, but their confusion was nonetheless understandable. They figured that by killing the five dwarves their fates had already been sealed. Then again, these were monsters that they were bargaining with. Faced with the seemingly impossible odds of escaping the dungeon, Aidan was struggling with the decision to exchange the hostage for the item in the dark man’s hand—the contents of which he was not certain of. In the meanwhile Nadia was slowly succumbing to blood loss. Having resigned herself to death already, she endeavored to advise her brother the best she could.

“Don’t trade both of our lives away,” she told him. “We can’t trust this creature… this shadow man. Take the dwarf and run. I am… done for.”

“I won’t leave you!” Aidan protested. “I can’t!”

“You don’t have a choice,” Nadia said.

Schwartz raised a finger in objection. “Yes, you do. Surrender, please.”

“I won’t leave you here to die!” Aidan declared.

“I know that nothing makes sense right now,” Nadia said. “My mind is a mess, but I feel like I need you to survive. It’s all I can think about right now.”

Aidan shook his head. “You are all that matters to me,” he told his sister. He growled as he tried to organize his thoughts. “My memories are all messed up, but I remember you. I would never leave you behind! Don’t you dare ask that of me!”

Drum was growing increasingly frustrated by the confused rambling of his captors. “Oh, for the love of the Nine Hells…” He rolled his eyes as if he couldn’t believe the unfolding scene. “Chronos, my old friend, would you please put an end to this circus?”

Aidan searched the room at the mention of a second hidden presence, but, once again, sighted nothing. He then heard a loud snap and the entire scene before him shifted in the blink of an eye.

The confused warrior now found himself standing alone, absent the hostage or a weapon in his hands. What he found in his grasp instead was the healing potion that Schwartz had offered in exchange for Drum’s life.

Unable to comprehend what had just transpired, Aidan skipped straight to his number one priority and delivered the blood red potion to his sister. At first, she seemed reluctant to drink from it, but her hesitation was brief in light of her mortal injury. To her great relief, once she had taken a few gulps of the thick red liquid, the bleeding stopped and the wound on her leg began to close. It would take much more than just a healing potion for her to make a complete recovery, but at least she was no longer in mortal danger.

Aidan turned to the black-clad man in search of an explanation and found him exactly where he had last seen him, only now there was an axe in his hand. To the hapless warrior it appeared as though they had instantly exchanged the items by some freak magic trick, but that did not explain the missing dwarf.

To further confound the twins, Drum now emerged from behind a nearby pillar. He was accompanied by an old geezer, dressed in the fine clothes of a distinguished man-servant. The two seemed almost jubilant about the strange turn that this encounter had taken.

Drum bowed his head to the butler. “Thank you, Chronos,” he said. The old engineer rubbed the scratch marks that the axe had left on his neck. “I was starting to wonder if maybe you wanted to see me dead for some reason.”

Chronos curled the scraggly corners of his grey mustache with one hand while he fixed up the clothes of the angry old dwarf with the other. “To be honest, you did leave a rather nasty scene in my halls after you were done with your inspection of the Mansion,” he said. “It is hard to get engine grease out of the carpets, you know. I had to punish you for it somehow.”

Drum nodded. “Next time I will leave the stains under the carpets then.”

“You try that,” Chronos said, “and I will send them to your wife for cleaning. She would love to know that you found the time to visit the Mansion, but couldn’t take her out to dinner for your wedding anniversary.”

Drum’s eyes went wide in horror. “Oblivion, take me! Was that today?”

Chronos stared at him in triumphant silence.

“You’re lying,” Drum declared. “Of course you are lying, you old bat!”

At first, Chronos shrugged, but then, as the corners of his mouth began to crest the edges of his impressive moustache, the old butler’s bluff was revealed in his smug expression.

“Hey! Don’t mess with me like that!” Drum protested. “I nearly died of a heart attack!”

“Well, as long as no one got hurt,” Schwartz commented. He stepped over the dead body of a chaos dwarf on his way to the two bickering geezers. “No one that matters, I mean...”

Nadia could no longer contain herself. “Who the hell are you people!” she demanded to know. “What is this place?’

“Drink your potion, little girl,” Chronos replied. “We will discuss how to punish your misbehavior later, when the Master arrives.”

Schwartz cleared his throat. “Speaking of which…”

With no prior announcement or fanfare, Basil von Doom marched into the throne room. He was followed through the door by Elnora and Scarlet, the latter of which, having sighted Schwartz in the room, elected to remain by the entrance.

“Welcome home, Master,” Chronos said. “I apologize for the mess you must now witness.”

Schwartz, Drum and Chronos all bowed in the presence of Lord Doom. For their part, Aidan and Nadia deigned not to so much as to breathe once they recognized the horrifying monstrosity that the rest of these insane creatures called their master.

Basil walked right past the cowering twins and went straight for the old dwarf. The dungeon keeper took hold of Drum by his shoulders and lifted him up to examine the injuries of his old friend.

“I’m fine,” Drum insisted as Basil noted the shallow cut marks on the dwarf’s neck. “Tis’ but a scratch.”

“Thankfully, Chronos intervened in a timely manner,” Schwartz explained. “I could have done it myself, but you ordered me not to endanger Drum’s life, so here we are.”

“You made the right call by informing me,” Basil declared. “I am happy to see that a tragedy was averted.”

“Now,” he said and turned his gaze upon the twins, “I assume that these two are to blame for the untimely demise of Drum’s servants?” He gestured at the corpses of the chaos dwarves.

“How could it have happened?” Basil asked. “How did they escape the ice prison?”

“I don’t want to condemn myself prematurely, but perhaps my work on the new dungeon core was to blame?” Drum suggested. “As expected, the dungeon experienced power outages all throughout the morning. I recorded several episodes of arcane energies fluctuating within the core during the integration process. While the core is an arcane device, it is more device than arcane—spells cast near it suffer from a higher than average failure rate, if the core is unshielded,” he gestured at the crystalline carge standing out in the open, in front of the throne, “as it is right now.”

“Drum’s work on the core could have caused the magic prison to falter,” Chronos concluded.

“That sounds about right,” Schwartz said. He gestured at the mana infused pillars that ran the length of the throne room. “Maybe the mana-stone somehow interfered with the [Permafrost] spell. This whole chamber is not exactly stable at the best of times, what with all the residue ritual circles and alchemical elements that have seeped into the floor over the years.”

“It would make sense to leave it at that, but why didn’t the other ice prison thaw then?” Drum asked. The chaos dwarf pointed to the frozen, naked body of his common kinsman standing near the base of the throne. “That one doesn’t seem to have been affected at all.”

It truly was a mystery. The group pondered the possibilities for a moment.

Against her better judgment, Elnora decided to speak up. “Umm… I am not entirely sure about it, but…”

All eyes turned to the succubus who now found herself unable to speak. She herself was clearly uncomfortable with what she wanted to say.

Basil emboldened her. “Go on, tell us what you think. Don’t be shy.”

It was obvious that her opinion weighted heavily on the young she-demon’s mind, but she decided to voice it regardless. “Well, umm… I seem to recall that when… When Lord Basil was fighting the twins, he didn’t cast a [Permafrost] spell on the shadow clones after freezing them.”

“That is a serious insinuation, young lady,” Chronos said.

“But not untrue,” Basil said. “I too agree that it was my forgetfulness that caused this debacle. I will compensate Drum for the loss of his servants from my personal coffers.”

The minions all looked to their master with surprise. It was not often that a dungeon keeper was caught willfully admitting to a mistake in his conduct. Methodical planning and due diligence were their greatest virtues; pride was their vice.

“Why didn’t you inform us about it sooner?” Chronos asked. “If we had known…”

Elnora bowed her head in shame. “To be honest, it had not come to my mind until Lord Basil had informed me about their escape.”

“And neither did we realize it,” Basil reminded everyone. “This mistake does not lie with her—it is mine. We shall not discuss it any further.”

Basil placed his hand to his chest. “I accept full responsibility. The important part is that we all learn from this mistake going forward.”

The dark lord’s minions all nodded in agreement.

“Don’t ever be afraid to speak the truth to me,” Basil told Elnora. The dungeon keeper rewarded the bravery of the succubus with a pat on the head. “I will never scold you for it.”

With the cause of the problem established, they now turned to dealing with its consequences. The twins had wisely kept quiet throughout this conversation. Aidan had positioned himself in front of Nadia in a brave, but futile effort to try and shield his sister from whatever horrors would come next. Neither of the two seemed like they had even considered the possibility of running away. To be honest, they probably knew their odds of escaping with their lives, so they had chosen to submit themselves to the dungeon keeper’s judgment instead.

“Well then,” Basil said as he approached the frightened siblings. “What shall we do with the two of you?”

He bid Aidan to speak first. In the meanwhile, Basil went rummaging through his magic pouch for his dungeon keeper’s manual.

“I remember you from before the ice,” Aidan said. He looked around the room. “How long have we spent in the ice?”

Basil nodded. “Yes. I am the one who summoned you. And then I imprisoned you.” He flipped through the pages of his book as he searched for the information on the twins. “As for how long you were imprisoned… well, for the better part of your lives, but for me it hasn’t even been a day.”

“Summoned us?” Nadia asked. “No… that can’t be. It can’t be true!”

“I am not trying to deceive you,” Basil vowed. “You two are mere copies of the people that once were known as Aidan and Nadia,” the dungeon keeper explained. “You were created in their image and from the template they provided.” He tapped to his head. “Your minds—mere imitations of theirs—have drawn upon their experience and memories to fill in the blanks, but you are not really them.” He raised his finger to make a point. “You were created as flesh and blood imitations of far greater kith heroes, but you are also real in every way that matters. You are not who you think you are, but you are very much alive.”

Aidan shook his head in denial. “What you’re saying doesn’t make any sense!” he proclaimed. “I know who I am!”

“Do you now?” Basil asked. “Then, pray tell me, how old are you exactly?”

The young siblings looked to each other to try and estimate their age. They found the demon prince to be telling the truth as neither looked a year past twenty. Their memories of themselves were of a long life and old age, but their current visage ran entirely counter to that.

“You remember having lived a life which neither of you did,” Basil explained. “In reality you were created here in this throne room not that long ago. You were summoned for a singular purpose: to fight and die in service to the dungeon.”

The dungeon keeper showed them the page in his manual that elaborated on their identity. “See this passage here?” Basil asked. “This is the sum total of your existence. According to my manual, you are just under a day old. And look here—it even notes that you were summoned by… me. This is information drawn from the very source code of the universe. It would be very difficult to alter or manipulate such a prime source of information and you two are not worth the time and trouble for me to do so.”

A passage describing the identity of the twins contained a line that read as such: Summoned by Basil von Doom. There were also two prominent status effects listed further down: [Unshackled] and [Unbound].

Basil continued. “Now, with the way that yesterday’s battle played out, it just so happened that you two were defeated, but not killed. At the time of your summoning you were entirely loyal to me, but your original selves managed to break my control over you. Their exorcism unshackled you from my will, which means that, while you are my creations, you now have the freedom to act as you see fit. That, in turn, has opened up a rare opportunity to the two of you.”

“You mean to say that we were created as slaves?” Nadia asked.

“You created us to serve your evil ways?” Aidan asked.

Basil closed his book. “Exactly! And I would be willing to offer you the opportunity to carry on in that capacity. Minus the slavery part, of course…”

“And what if we refuse?” Aidan asked. “Are you just going to kill us like the rest of our people?”

“The kith of this world were bound to this fate,” Basil answered. “But I don’t have the time or the inclination to explain their crimes to you right now. Suffice it to say that your old master, Osran the Wise, came to understand and accept the reasons for your civilization’s fall, even if he disagreed with the nature of the solution to the very end.

“I would suggest that you accept my offer of servitude. It’s not like you have a place to return to anyway. This world no longer needs you. For all intents and purposes, you no longer exist. And should you refuse my offer of servitude, you will cease to exist in the truest sense of the word.”

Aidan placed his hand over his heart as if to check that it was really beating. Having sensed the rhythm of his life, the young warrior shook his head in denial.

In spite of his earlier demand for immediate compliance, the dungeon keeper endeavored to elaborate a little further. The strange circumstance of the twins’ survival seemed to intrigue him.

“Do you know what it means to be [Bound] or [Unbound]?” Basil asked. He then moved to answer his own question. “It is the line that separates those creatures born on a world that are subject to its laws and those who are free from shared limitations. To be [Bound] is to be shackled to the tumultuous life cycle of a world; to drink from its communal well of power and share in the rise and fall of its people. This bondage is not always a form of slavery, but, rather an allusion to inevitability.

“For kith like you, this bond is most often represented in their adherence to their civilization’s rise to glory and fall from grace; in their willingness, informed or otherwise, to go along with either. In contrast, to carry the distinction of being [Unbound] is to know true freedom—to be known as a hermit among your people or an outsider from another world. As you two are now [Unbound], your limits are no longer entangled with the destiny of your birthplace, so you will not be impacted by its ultimate fate.

“My assistant here,” Basil said and gestured at Elnora, “was [Bound] to her world before the Guild came and offered her a place among its ranks, thus allowing her to grow beyond the strict limitations imposed on her by the world she used to inhabit. All of my most trusted minions became [Unbound] in their later stages of life before joining my House. And I myself was born [Unbound].

“The two of you are both [Unshackled] and [Unbound], giving you a degree of freedom not enjoyed by the vast majority of creatures in existence. You have been granted a chance at a life that you were never meant to have, but only if you choose to serve me. I cannot leave you running rampant on this world. Without the limitations imposed on you by your birthright, you would utterly destroy it.”

“You said that we were [Unshackled] by the actions of our old selves,” Nadia pointed out. “But you never referred to yourself in such a way. Do you serve a higher master?”

Basil was impressed by her observation. “Yes,” he answered, “even I am carried along by the strings of fate. You two are at more liberty to act of your own accord, seeing as how technically you don’t even exist. I, however, have the larger picture to consider. My actions shape the universe, so they inevitably create connections. To be insignificant, as you two are right now, is to be truly free; while power serves to shackle us to choices of great importance whether we like it or not. In short: I can do whatever I want, but I cannot do it, in good conscience, without suffering the consequences of my actions.”

The sister carefully considered the meaning behind the demon’s words, but her brother remained steadfast in his defiance. “No, we will not abandon our home and our country,” he declared. “And for what—a monster’s promise? This is nonsense! What you’re telling us is insane!”

“Aidan…” The sister looked to her brother with sorrow-stricken eyes. “We don’t exist. He is speaking the truth.”

Aidan was taken aback by her claim. “What do you mean we don’t exist? I am here and so are you. We are alive! That’s all that matters.”

“All that connects you to this world is a false premise,” Basil said. “But if you agreed to serve me, I could show you miracles beyond your wildest dreams. I can help you forge a new meaning to your existence.”

The dungeon keeper smiled. “I just so happen to have a task in mind that the two of you could help me accomplish. It would be like… honoring the dying wish of your Emperor, if you will. He gave me food for thought and the meal is a little too heavy for me to deal with alone. I would like to share it with you two.”

Aidan and Nadia exchanged confused looks.

“Tell you what,” the dungeon keeper said. “Let’s make a deal right now. If you agree to serve me, I promise to try and find out if there was a way to prevent the death of Empire Solar. Does that sound like a worthy quest? It is an age old quandary and I could really use the perspective of the lesser creatures of this universe.”

For once it was the sister that exploded with indignation. Nadia grinned in contempt for the demon’s assertions. “You would call us lesser creatures?” she asked. The young priestess gestured at the devastated throne room around them. “You dwell in the dark corners of the world while we build our cities in sunlight. Kith have created such splendor upon this world and all that you’ve done is to bring it to ruin. Is this barbarism what you would call greatness?”

The dungeon keeper dismissed her claims with the swipe of his hand. “I have wrestled with elder dragons on floating islands in the Astral Sea,” Basil said with no small amount of pride in his voice. “I have conquered a hundred worlds; defeated kith in their millions. If you truly think that masonry and gold trimmings define one’s greatness, then I have such sights to show you. But you will require some assistance with that…”

Basil pulled the stub of a cigar from his bandolier and placed it in his mouth. At the snap of his fingers a flame appeared and he used it to set fire to the herbs. The dungeon keeper puffed the cigar a few times to stoke the flame before bellowing a thick cloud of smoke right into the faces of the twins. The two youngsters succumbed to a bout of coughing as Basil exposed them to the stimulating arcane herbs of his cigar.

Drum made sure to step out of the way of the spreading smoke while Schwartz gestured for Elnora to do the same. With Aidan and Nadia swiftly falling under the effects of the herbs, the dungeon keeper turned his back on the twins and marched towards the door to his Mansion. The reluctant humans were forced to follow as Schwartz and the rest of the dark lord’s minions took it upon themselves to usher them along.

The golden gate parted and the interior of the Mansion was revealed. A row of knightly obsidian statues moved into position to salute their master as he passed through the threshold of the pocket dimension. Servants flooded into the room and lined up along their master’s path, ready and eager to receive his orders. Maids curtsied and manservants bowed before the Lord of the Mansion and to welcome his entourage.

Their hearts were racing and their muscles trembled, strained to their limits by the potent stimulant now coursing through their bodies, yet their minds were razor sharp. The twins found themselves able to linger on every single item that caught their attention. Time seemed to slow down under the effects of the strange purple smoke, but they could still make sense of the world around them. Their minds were racing along from detail to detail, but nothing seemed confusing anymore. Where adrenalin had heightened their senses in the past, this strange stimulant had sent them into overdrive.

“You now walk the halls of my own little pocket dimension,” Basil proclaimed. “In this place you are the uncultured, uneducated savages that you believe us to be. These ancient walls house a library that holds more knowledge than your precious civilization could accumulate in a thousand years of concentrated academic effort. There are arcane secrets hidden in my vaults that are beyond the bounds of your understanding or ability to create; weapons and heirlooms so powerful and devastating that a single item from my collection could give rise to—or bring low—an empire like yours.

“Oh, and speaking of artifacts…” Basil pulled out the soul stone containing Maiden Solar from his pouch and passed it along to a maid. “Put it with the rest,” he ordered.

The woman curtsied gracefully before disappearing into one of the endless hallways of the Mansion.

“I have an extensive collection of elemental spirits,” he explained to the twins. “Your precious Maiden Solar will take her place next to several other would-be gods and goddesses. Her power now serves me.”

Surrounded by Basil’s servants, the twins could do little other than to look on in terror as the soul stone containing their precious Maiden Solar was carried away like some plain old battlefield trophy.

Having gotten their attention, Basil wisely placed the ultimate fate of Maiden Solar on the bargaining table for the twins to consider. “If you serve me well, we might even discuss her fate at some distant point in time,” he said. “I see no reason why she cannot be returned into the care of her faithful worshippers.”

The dungeon keeper shook his head. “Honestly, why the kith races are so obsessed with worshiping the elementals, I will never understand. Their ability to take on kith-like shapes must make for fine art, I suppose. You can tour my galleries sometime later to get a glimpse of how other civilizations had visualized their relationship with their objects of worship, benevolent or otherwise… Truth be told, the actions of your precious Maiden Solar would be considered rather mild when compared to some of the more blood-thirsty deities out there. You can never know with an elemental…”

The twins walked the halls of the Mansion in sheer bewilderment at the sights they were shown. Not even the splendor of the capital city with its temples and the imperial palace could come close to it. Wherever they went a small army of servants followed. Warriors and mages could be seen patrolling the halls dressed in armor and clothes that even the nobility of Empire Solar would have found hard to afford. And then there was the world outside the Mansion’s walls…

Nadia’s proverbial jaw dropped the moment they entered the winter garden. Through its massive glass panes the deep purple sky of Basil’s pocket dimension was revealed. On the other side of the glass the world reached out far into the distance. Fields of golden wheat swayed in the breeze. Orchards, barns and warehouses dotted the horizon. The Mansion was surrounded by a perfectly functional countryside, complete with ponds, windmills and the occasional hamlet.

It was now clear to the twins that this was a real world in its own right. The dungeon keeper had spoken true when he had promised them wonders beyond their wildest imagination.

Basil led the two youngsters to a tea house just outside the winter garden. No sooner had the guests taken their seats at the table than servants begun arrived to provide them with refreshments.

Given their exhausted condition, the twins were initially brought two glasses each. One contained a healing potion and the other a mana potion to replenish their arcane power. At first they eyed the drinks with suspicion, but when Nadia took a sip from the mana potion and did not suffer any ill-effects, her brother was quick to follow her example. After all, they were in no condition to pass on an offer like this.

With the stimulant slowly wearing off, their heightened senses were beginning to fade, but the clarity of mind that the purple smoke had brought about still remained. They had been fully awakened from their prior daze and no longer displayed signs of confusion. That did not mean that they had become more pliable to Basil’s enticements, but they certainly had a better grasp on their current predicament and the stakes involved.

“Let’s say that we were willing to serve you,” Nadia said. She looked to her brother to gage his reaction. Aidan appeared surprised by her implied submission to the dungeon keeper’s offer of servitude.

“What could a master as rich and distinguished as you possibly need from us?” Nadia asked.

Basil grinned. “I see that I have finally awakened your curiosity,” he said.

The dungeon keeper held his guests in suspense for a moment longer as he gathered his thoughts.

“I have long since wondered about the state of the universe at large,” Basil said. “The quest that I mentioned earlier is very important to me. It has come to my attention that there is a strange avenue of exploration that might yield some answers to some of the questions I have, which we shall not discuss at this time. Suffice to say that I wish to study the kith... in ways not usually considered by someone in my position.

“The two of you have been an unexpected, but a potentially useful asset to come across. It is not your power, but, rather, your understanding of the kith way of life that interests me. Your experience of having served your goddess, Maiden Solar, and her empire is something I could not easily replicate by hiring… more willing recruits.”

“So, you want us to advise you?” Nadia asked.

“Sounds more like you want us to teach you,” Aidan noted. “You want to learn more about your enemies.”

“To an extent,” Basil said. “But I will need your perspective on more than just warfare.”

The dungeon keeper gestured at his minions who were lined up a few steps away from the table. “Chronos, Schwartz and Scarlet are some of my finest servants, but they know not the ways of the kith because of their overwhelming power. Even if I was to send them out to observe a civilization, all that they could gather from their time spent among its people would be the most prudent course of action when seeking to destroy them. They can only see the weaknesses and flaws of the kith, for they are like insects to them. Meanwhile, less powerful creatures, such as yourselves, would be able to recognize the hidden potential and nobility in your fellow kith. I am willing to admit that in matters pertaining to the kith I can be as blind as my servants, so I need you to notice things that I simply cannot.”

“And why should we agree to grant you this knowledge?” Aidan asked. “All that you would do with it is to destroy with more efficiency.”

“Ah, but that is not my intention!” Basil said. “I desire to study your perspective on life so that I might learn from it, not to turn it against you. You already know that I have the power to destroy entire civilizations with the tools and minions currently at my command. I have thoroughly studied the kith races and the fundamentals of civilization, for the purposes of waging war against them, but what I have never done is to explore them for myself.” He pointed towards the twins. “You could grant me the curated access that I seek to such a learning experience.”

“But that won’t change what you are at the core, right?” Nadia pointed out. “You are a destroyer of worlds. Why else would you desire such understanding of your enemies if not to wield it against them?”

Basil sighed. “I am seeking to carry out the dying request of your Emperor,” he explained. “I have my own reasons for doing so, but suffice it to say that I am searching for a better way of dealing with the issue that is civilization at its later stages of development. It is a complex topic that we really don’t have the time to delve into right now.

“What I want is to better understand how you function so that I might possibly glimpse at a way to adjust the cycle of destruction that I serve. I am not doing it because I care for your lives—that much I will reveal to you—but because I am trying to make better use of mine.

“I have questions. I need answers. And I could use you. What do you say—does it sound like we could come to an amicable agreement?”

Aidan and Nadia turned to discussing the dungeon keeper’s offer in private. At times their whispered conversation ranged from bargaining to arguing, but, eventually, they came up with their final answer.

“We will agree to a deal with you,” Aidan said. “But only on the condition that we get to go free once you find that which you seek. And you will release Maiden Solar into our care.”

“And we will not be party to your evil deeds,” Nadia added. “That is not negotiable.”

“Fair enough,” Basil said. “I agree, but only on the condition that Maiden Solar remains locked up in my vaults for now. You must understand that it would be far too dangerous to leave her in your hands, since you don’t have even the slightest idea on how to handle a narcissist, sociopathic would-be goddess—should you actually choose to release her from the soul stone.

“As for taking part in objectionable acts, I don’t intend to use you as some dispensable foot soldiers, so I don’t see it coming to that. I leave your actions up to your own discretion, as long as you don’t break the rules of the Mansion. Besides, it was not my intention to change your karmic alignment anyway. I need you to stay as true to yourselves as possible for this experiment to work.”

“Our karmic what now?” Nadia asked.

“Your general moral disposition which drives your choices,” Basil explained. “It was shown in my book—the book that told of your attributes and hidden powers…”

The dungeon keeper pointed his finger at Aidan, “You are [Lawful Good].

“And you, [Lawful Neutral],” he said as he pointed to Nadia.

Aidan shook his head. “What does that mean?”

“Well, quite a lot, really,” Basil said. “It means that your sister would be willing to sacrifice more people for the right cause than you would even consider. She is far more pragmatic than you and less predictable because of it.”

Aidan looked to his sister with horror. She did not outright deny the dungeon keeper’s accusation. Of all the things discussed today, that realization in particular seemed hard for him to come to terms with.

“And what does this karmic thing say about you?” Nadia asked.

“I am [Lawful Evil],” Basil answered. “It means that I would sacrifice a lot more people for the right reason. The destruction of your civilization stands as a testament to that.

“It means that I give out candy and head pats only when warranted and I don’t suffer fools lightly. But, on the flip side, you can also trust me to keep to my promises.

“But enough procrastination,” Basil said. “Do we have a deal or not?”

With their deepest natures revealed to each other, the twins took a moment longer to come to a final decision.

“We accept,” Aidan said. His sister backed up his words with a nod.

Basil clapped his hands once in celebration. “Well then, let’s seal the deal!”

The twins were brought a tall glass each. The oozing black liquid they contained had no distinct odor, but the sight of its wriggling motion was enough to give them pause.

“Our agreement needs to be made binding by partaking in my blood,” Basil explained. He reached over Nadia’s glass and pricked his palm with his own claws, drawing a single drop of blood. The red dot ran down the bottom of his palm and fell into the oozing black liquid where it was dissolved by it. He then repeated the process for Aidan.

“This is a demonic blood ritual of binding,” Nadia pointed out.

Basil gestured at his face and horns. “Hello? I’m a demon? From the Nine Hells? Of course, the ritual was going to be demonic. What, did you think we were just going to shake on it?”

“If it’s a blood ritual, then what’s with the black ooze?” Aidan asked.

Basil shrugged. “You two are far too weak to drink my blood undiluted,” he said. “The compound is designed to suppress the side effects and to slow down the process of binding so that your bodies have enough time to adjust. There will be the issue of slight indigestion, but most minions tend to find that preferable to having their guts explode… out either end.”

Basil winced. “A messy way to go…”

Nadia slowly raised the repulsive drink to her lips, but Aidan stopped her. He gave his sister a look of concern and proceeded to drink from his glass first. He had to struggle to keep the thick black liquid down, but once the glass was empty the young man appeared no worse for having consumed it. He then nodded for his sister to proceed.

Once Nadia had finished her drink, Basil snapped his claws and the twins suddenly begun convulsing in agonizing pain. “And with that your transition into my service has begun,” he proclaimed. “Your next few hours will test your endurance, but, should you survive, you will thank me for it later.”

The dungeon keeper rose from his seat and left the twins convulsing at the table. “Have these two taken to the hospital wing,” he ordered Chronos. “I want guards posted and healers on standby should their ritual of binding run into complications.”

Basil turned around for one last time to address his minions. “Assemble the staff in the auditorium; I have an announcement to make regarding my plans for our House going forward from this conquest. Overseers and members of my inner circle only.”

The dungeon keeper looked to Elnora. “I am sorry, but you will not be permitted to attend this time. While I did just make you an honorary member, I hope that you understand that this is strictly a House Doom internal matter.”

The succubus nodded.

Having delivered his orders, Basil marched out of the tea pavilion just as the servants arrived to tend to the convulsing twins. With their master’s departure, the rest of his minions set out to organize the gathering of Basil’s household.