I stared at the scribe for a moment. If anything he said was true, the sentence written on the black knight's shield would be "The Nether Wolf, Destroyer". So now I am become Nether Wolf, destroyer of worlds? But there is a saving grace; the translation is heavily debated after all.

"You said it was debated, how and why?"

"Well, when one looks through the other letters and their meaning, like the letter for a lion that can be promoted to a king, one can see that the letters were made using similar thought process to ours. Then there are the letters for down/under being demoted to mean the Nether, an underworld and the letter for up/over being promoted to mean the Ether, a heaven atop the sky, one can see logic behind the promoting and demoting rules. But the letter for man/human becoming the letter for savior when demoted and destroyer when promoted breaks both of those earlier findings."

"So how come you ever got the savior and destroyer out of it anyway?"

"We compared the letters to the myths about the Nether and Ether, as those were beliefs in power during the period of time these letters were used. The word used to signify the man following his loved one to the Nether and rescuing her soul from there was always written with the demoted form of letter man. Now, this alone meant nothing, as he could have been seen as a fool or a blasphemer according to their religion, but the problem was that the word was used when the subject were war heroes and people in stories that saved princesses from dragons, so it was decided that the demoted word would mean savior or a hero. Similar process let to the destroyer."

"What were the myths about the Nether and Ether in essence?"

"I'm not a scholar of that kind, but I have told you that as a scribe studying the particular letters, I'm somewhat familiar with those myths. The short version is that the Nether is an underworld where the souls of the dead went to be purified; the more the person had sinned, the longer the purification took. When the soul was finished with that task, it would be taken to the heaven above the sky, the Ether, where it would stay in what is called a paradise in the myths, till came the time of rebirth that occurred when the world ended."

I fell in thought after hearing that. If he is right on all accounts, it seems that it is my destiny to... End the world. Not really the path I would have chosen given the right to do so. But maybe there is something to discourage that in the myths?

"Is there any mention of a wolf in those myths?"

"There are 12 animals mentioned in the myths..."

"Tell me about only of the Owl and wolf, if they're mentioned at all. Also if you know anything about the temples, the forbidden areas and their placement by the compass, tell me those too."

"Yes, the Owl is seen as a kingly animal, the mortal king as he is called. It is his duty to lead the men of mortal realm to enjoy life and stall the rebirth. The wolf is an animal that worked as a guide for the fallen souls; he was the one that took them to the Nether. I don't think there is any significance when it comes to the locations of the temples, as no animal guards or comes from any specific direction in the myths"

"Thank you, I no longer need your services, please tell all of this to Lewin when he wakes up."

"Yes, I will take my leave then."

As the scribe walked towards the chamber's door, I leaned further back to the chairs, staring upwards to the ceiling. Hearing the quiet click of the door's bolt snapping to its place made me realize that I was alone in the room. In the befalling silence I began to go through all that I learned today, about the wolf, the owl and what they meant for me and Ollie. It seems I was the villain of this story; it was my purpose to burn the world of men so something could be born from the ashes, while Ollie would be the hero, rallying the men against me. But maybe there was a purpose in the destruction, I mean according to Lewin and the scribe, the world has shrunk in to a size of a small empire, with lots of people, civilizations, culture, resources, plants, animals and races dying out completely, to only be found in the history and story books. Maybe there was need for the world to be reborn... But that would mean me killing millions, and all that man has built that still stands would be torn down, all the knowledge they have gathered to be lost and all they have created from nothing, the art, stories and wisdom would be destroyed... By me. I spend the whole night alone, just going over this in my head, trying to find an angle I can work this one through.

Lewin comes and greets me on the morning, followed by a servant carrying plates of oatmeal and cups of wine. Alcohol as the morning drink? Just what I needed after this night. We finish the meal while talking about recent breakthroughs we had, me with my destroyer theory and him with his theory of the calamity clouds, which he now knows to be caused by the possession process. The scribe joins as by the end and tells Lewin his findings and our earlier conversation in detail.

The breakfast didn't help with my decision, but it did make me realize that I can't sit here all day doing nothing so I ask Lewin a question:

"Does this place happen to have any weapons of historical value in the study, or weapons for studying purposes kept in the premises?"

"Why yes, we have historical weapons from many different cultures as ornaments and for studying purposes."

"Perfect!"