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The problem with building shrines by hand is that it’s a lot harder when you haven’t eaten in a few days. That, Ayche thought to himself as he stepped back from the final shrine, and it’s a lot harder when you don’t have proper tools. Numerous tools and weapons were piled to the side. A warhammer, twisted longsword, a spear, broken crossbow bolts. Anything and everything that he’d stored with Translocation, any item of potential use that had been kept in his Void Pocket. Not that chipping away at stone with crossbow bolts or a sword had helped, really. It’d been an act of desperation and grief, at some point during day two. It’d been nearly three days since he was saved from certain death. Three days since the others hadn’t been. He stared at the stones marking his friends’ lives one last time, and turned to leave the valley. — It had been intended as a scouting mission. A quick trip to explore the Hollow and gather information that could help cleanse the land. They hadn’t expected the dwarves to charge into the epicenter of the entire Hollow. They hadn’t expected the ground to crumble beneath them as they stood on the edge of the crater to shout warnings, leaving them trapped as well. It wasn’t long before large, beating wings were visible through the clouds, and the chanting, featureless silhouettes appeared behind pillars of glassy mana. Their voices echoed through the hollow in a distorted, incomprehensible language. Ayche had realized then, with a sinking feeling, that they were all going to die. The figures grew closer and closer, expanding without expanding and shrinking the world around them. An unshakeable feeling of scrutiny filled his mind, as if eternity itself were looking him in the eye and trying to decide if he was worth the effort. The figures eventually spoke, a single word somehow comprehensible by Descendant minds. “̷̛̙͓̝̜̱̯̩̜̺̈́̈́̃͊͊̔̔̄̄L̶̳̖̥̍̚é̸̡̨̛͈̤̤͔͎̬̗̠͈̈͗̐̃̉́̀̕͠ä̴̢̛̤́̽͋̂̕͜v̵̙̭̲͎̮͇̼͈̫͍͕̋̏̚e̷̗̐͂̈̒͆̐͊͋͘̕͠͠ͅ.̸̡̡̛̪̗͕͈̙̮̠͖̳̬̻̜͛͑̎̿͛̌͛̃͜”̶̦̯͍̟̀̐̈́͜ ̷̧͓͈̗͈̗̺͇͉̦̤̝̃͆͋̓͆̓͗̔͆͗͛̏́̍̕ͅ The Ireheart - Balor, maybe? He hadn’t had the chance to learn names - replied with a single word. “No.” The Stormheart, Kronk, had a different response. He stared the horrors in their eyes - well, where their eyes should have been - and spoke. “Maybeh oi will leaveh, oi tink yer mum es seein' someoneh elseh at taeh moment anehways!” The grey-haired Archmage Scholarch kept staring, fascinated. “Perhaps it is they who seek to leave. Horrors… perhaps are not at comfort within this realm. It is anathema.” Eliza had always been too much of a scholar for her own good. Ayche positioned himself next to his old friend. “Elves, ye gonna shoot 'em or keep givin' us poems?” Another Ireheart called. Some name with a G, Ayche thought idly. Mystery’s grandson shouted to the Horrors. “Do you want us to leave, or do you want to leave?” “Why don’t we just start leaving and find out?” Ayche called. He grabbed the Archmage and turned around, dragging her behind him. There was a spot to the south where the crater’s walls were less steep. It was their only chance. Odysseus was next to react. “Llir, we should leave now. I don’t see them giving us another chance.” The other ‘ker sprinted up the rough landscape, scrambling for the top of the crater. It was already too late. The heavens shook and the ground trembled as lightning crackled around the glowing maws of the three-headed winged monstrosity above them. Then, like falling hammers from angry gods, three glowing pillars of voidal lightning slammed down onto the party, landing with deafening explosions and blinding those near. If the circumstances had been different, Ayche might have stopped to watch properly. He hadn’t thought it was possible anymore - but in the Hollow, anything was possible. It’d been so many centuries since he had last been able to throw lightning of his own. Ruina and Beranabus were launched like ants before a tornado. Balor wasn’t so lucky - his left arm was incinerated instantly, and the entire group around him were thrown onto the ground. Ayche and Eliza narrowly avoided the worst of a strike, but were sent tumbling deeper into the crater. He pulled the frail Archmage to himself as they fell, shielding her with his own body. It was, he thought, convenient timing that he’d been able to negate his voidal poisoning not many years before. His armor blunted the worst of the fall. Ruina, who’d had the same ritual performed, was also wearing armor. She pulled herself to her feet, though Beranabus was nowhere in sight. There wasn’t time to worry. Ruina could protect Beranabus. Ayche’s job was protecting the Archmage Scholarch. He dragged her to her feet. “Eliza, are you-” “The towers…” she muttered, barely coherent and gaze distant. “Mode of travel, perhaps… Betwixt realms.” Not the time for hypothesizing, Ayche thought, but he hadn’t the breath to voice it. The Uialben disappeared with a flash. He’d tried to cast a minor teleport, further up the edge of the crater to escape, but never arrived. He disappeared and was simply gone without a trace. As Ayche dragged Eliza along, he caught sight of Ruina’s armor. A small measure of relief filled him. The other Scion was half-pulling, half-carrying Beranabus along. “I said this was a bad idea,” Ayche muttered as they went. His old friend didn’t respond; she was still staring at their surroundings, utterly entranced. No doubt her ancient mind was working through magical theories and explanations for what they’d seen. Another blast of lightning sent Ruina and Beranabus flying, and this time, the two landed not far from a dozen of those shadowy silhouettes. It wasn’t long before they were dragged away. It was clear they weren’t getting out by climbing the sides of the crater. Shadowy horrors had surrounded the edge. “We’re out of options,” Ayche stated bluntly, and his eyes flared with a pale, nearly-white blue light. The ring on his hand - a focus he’d needed to wear ever since the ritual that had returned his strength - lit up in unison. His aura extended over the Archmage beside him as he prepared a group teleport, shrouding them both in pale blue. Air had the same idea, somewhere up the crater walls. The other mage cast his own shifting spell and promptly disappeared. For a moment, Ayche thought that Air simply wouldn't reappear, much like the Uialben. That probably would have been kinder. His gut churned as he saw where Air had landed. The other translocationist had reappeared inside a solid object, one of the nearby crystals. It'd filled all of the empty space in his friend’s body instantly. A gruesome, sickening death. There wasn’t time to mourn. Ayche met Eliza’s eyes. Finally, she seemed to have some measure of coherency again. The spell was nearly ready, and there was an unspoken question in his eyes. Do we try, like he did? Is it worth the risk? Her gaze was as steady as he’d ever seen it. Better to try than to give up, her eyes seemed to say. As the shifting spell neared completion, Eliza cast a stone wall to hold off the advancing horrors. But the spell, like all the others, grew wildly out of control. It trapped her within her own spell, a prison of quartz. Odysseus reached out for Ayche, perhaps hoping that he could be taken along too - And then the world went white. There hadn’t been time. Ayche reappeared alone nearly five hundred feet in the air, above the crater and the battle below. And in the split second before he started falling to his death, his life flashed before his eyes. He saw his first magic lessons in Anthos at the docks of Abresi, over four hundred years ago. He’d chosen lightning evocation as his first art, taught by Gauldrim Irongut. He still remembered the proud smile on the old Dwed’s face, the first time he’d been able to call a bolt of lightning from the sky. He saw his journey through the Fringe, then Thales. His life with the potato farmers. His first trip on a sailing ship. His first ship of his own. His shipping company. His fight against the Devourer on the open ocean. Athera, Vailor, Axios, Atlas, Arcas. He’d fought a thousand battles in a thousand places, evaded the law as a thief and a thug and a pirate - then centuries later, stood with the Crimson Edict and their goal of justice and unity. He still remembered when he and Eliza had both been novice magi, when the ancient Archmage Scholarch had yet to master even a single magic. Even then, she’d always had an air of dignity and self-assurance and poise. The images flashed faster and faster as he fell. A field of wheat, an endless sea. A city shrouded by trees. A battlefield covered in bodies, lightning coiled in his hand. A wave of falling arrows. A kiss on a snowy mountaintop. A feast in a stone hall, a funeral in an icy city. The swearing of an oath in a cavern beneath a keep. A wedding in that same keep. A shimmering portal. A broken mask. A thousand journeys. A thousand adventures. Enough for a dozen lifetimes. It seemed he’d never make it to a thousand and one. What must have been five seconds felt like an eternity, and in his final moments, Ayche found peace as he fell. He’d lived more than he’d ever had any right to, after all. He closed his eyes. And then a bolt of voidal lightning, one that far surpassed that first strike he’d called from the heavens all those centuries ago, struck him as he fell. The world went white once more. When he opened his eyes again, it was quiet, cool, and sunny. He’d landed on a floating white platform, high above a lake. A gentle breeze swept across his skin. He was on his back. Alive and untouched, but for a lightning-scar along his spine. He did nothing but stare upward for several minutes, and then the enormity of everyone he’d lost hit him all at once. And something inside him shattered. — He’d spent hours that first day simply sitting on the platform, unmoving. By the time he’d managed to pull himself together enough to find a way down, he’d decided. He would not leave until he’d made a shrine to each of his fallen friends. He would not use magic. This was something he had to do by hand, no matter how long it took.