Echoes of War, Ch 27: Passion's Gate (Patreon)

Sam and the nagas were the only ones on the Ice Drake as the prow pointed to the east. The peaks of the Western Reaches flashed by below in a blur of white and blue gray, their snow-covered slopes shining in the sun. It reminded him of his travels in the Void with the nagas and a smile crept across his lips.

Ayala was staying with her father at the relic and Krana had decided to keep her company, so he didn’t have to worry about protecting them as he explored. It worked out well. In time, his friends would grow stronger, especially with the Dimensional Convergence flooding them with monsters and Flaws for experience, but it would take a little while.

Even the World Core’s bonuses for those who helped it wouldn’t raise someone to the Third Evolution immediately. At the rate they were going, however, it would only take them a couple of years, and that was a speed that would leave the galaxy staring in shock.

“One of the advantages of the World Core,” he said as he looked forward. The words flowed away in the breeze.

Many things would be easier if his friends and family reached the World Limit, so he had every intention of pushing them along the way. He’d handed out a good amount of equipment and scrolls for them, and while he was investigating these ruins, they could continue pushing hard against the Flaws around Highfold.

Sometime in the next month or so, he expected most of them would reach the Second Evolution, and then they could pick up the pace in destroying Flaws on their own. The nagas had already been instructed to act only as backup for them. The level of the Flaws was rarely above 200, but the bonus experience from the World Core for closing them would be enough to keep them moving forward.

The ship was condensing a trail of sparkling ice behind it that glittered in the sunlight before it disintegrated back into mana. It wouldn’t take long to reach the central plains and the gate like this. He could have teleported toward it, but this was more pleasant and the Ice Drake was fast enough.

The ship was much slower here on the world’s surface than in space, but it could still circle the world within a few hours. It just took a little time to build up speed. These short hops weren’t much different for it than flying to one of the moons, which were much farther away.

It didn’t take long before the mountains turned to foothills and then to the red gold of the central plains. The long stalks of wheat and other crops were visible far below, divided into thousands of fields. This was the breadbasket and prime region of the kingdom, a land that had few monsters to bother it. Its rich soil was divided among dozens of noble families.

Life here was much more regimented by class and status than in the Western Reaches or the wild Western Province that held the Storm Plains.

Sam tilted his face back and closed his eyes as he let the breeze wash away his thoughts, basking for a moment in the flames of the sun. Eventually, a fluctuation of dimensional energy caught his attention and he opened his eyes again, looking to the south.

“A Flaw in the central plains?” He frowned as he followed the thread of energy back toward the source. It was just over a hundred miles away, well within range of his senses. Fortunately, it only looked like it would be around Level 80. “A small one, but that’s still rare here. The church or the nobles would be able to deal with it quickly enough, but it seems they haven’t noticed it yet.”

Whether it was due to the flow of dimensional energy or the relationship of this area to the World Core’s structure, the central region of the kingdom didn’t have many Flaws. Even a small one like that appearing was strange. This one was isolated in a deep ravine that was distant from any villages. While it would be noticed eventually, there was no reason to let it grow.

“Sleset, I’ll be right back,” he announced. Then he disappeared in a wave of silver light. A moment later, he was standing in the air above the Flaw.

The familiar gash of rainbow light was swirling near the bottom of the ravine, about thirty feet below the plains. It looked like the ravine had been carved out by the slow trickle of a stream that poured through the center and headed away down a gentle slope before disappearing into an underground cavern on the far side.

He studied the area, noting the low-level beasts that lived nearby. They were only around Level 30 and would be easy prey for the monsters inside the Flaw. A classic example of a problem that would become worse over time, especially since Flaws were easy to miss in a remote location like this one. If it were ignored, it might go unnoticed until the monsters advanced and destroyed the nearby villages, and by that point the area would be devastated.

The rainbow destruction of the Flaw was just beginning to warp as it opened, so he studied the process as he waited. This was what had caught his attention. A Flaw released a unique dimensional wave when it appeared, which was glaringly obvious to him. It was like an explosion suddenly appearing on the horizon.

He folded his arms as the Flaw tore open and a horde of two dozen lizard-like monsters swarmed out. Their levels were between 40 and 85, which was nothing special, but they would certainly destroy the local villages if they reached them. As they were gathering, Sam peered through the dimensional veil that covered the Flaw and studied the interior.

It was a small space, roughly circular with a fragmented stone floor and broken pillars inside. The sky resembled a kaleidoscope of swirling red and yellow, the colors mixing like an artist’s palette that had been thrown against a wall. It was some part of a dimension that had been torn away and captured inside the Seal.

Most of the Flaws he’d seen since coming home were like this, fragments like bubbles that had broken off from their origin. The Seal had crushed the connection to many nearby dimensions when it formed, slicing away the part that touched Aster Fall. Those fragments floated around Aster Fall now, sometimes merging or breaking apart on their own while being drawn to this dimension by the force of the Nexus.

Theoretically, some of them were still connected to their home dimension, and new fragments were capable of making the journey and coming here if someone tried from the other side. Once they tried to enter the Seal, a new bubble like this would form and they would be trapped until they touched Aster Fall and a Flaw formed.

A true bridge was rare. That type of Flaw had one side planted on Aster Fall and the other in the Outsider’s galaxy, and it had to borrow the power of the Nexus to exist. Before the First War, that was how dimensional transfer across the Nexus had happened, but that was a distant topic from these Outsiders.

The Will of the Path had explained the basic structure of the Seal and the local dimensions to Sam, but the main point was that the structure was complex and there were a lot of areas where things could go wrong. Flaws could appear from half a dozen different interactions, both accidental and deliberate.

Sam’s expression was stern as he raised his hand. A swirling starstorm of golden light gathered around his palm, condensing into a burning image. Then he brought his hand down. A massive golden hand smashed down through the air toward the Flaw.

The hand was a hundred feet across and it slammed down on top of the Flaw like a Titan swatting a fly. The lizards were all gathered around it, their tongues flickering in the air as they searched for prey, and they were caught in the explosion that followed. When the hand struck, it left a twenty-foot deep impression, compressing the ground below the Flaw.

The lizards that were directly in the hand’s path exploded into a mist of scales and blood. The ones farther away followed an instant later as the shockwave from it tore them apart. The wave of air rolled outward, shaking the entire ravine as the walls crumbled and the stream at the center jumped into the air, its waters twisting around like a serpent. It was like an earthquake had suddenly appeared and shook the entire area.

Then the hand disappeared, breaking apart into a mist of golden light that faded into the surroundings. The only thing left below was the Flaw. A mist of aura rose up from the lizards, flowing toward it, and the rainbow gash flickered as it began to seal over again.

He waved his hand over the field, collecting the fragments of essence and weak auras from the Outsiders. One of the things he’d learned from the Dream of the Void was how to use aura abilities better. It was no longer necessary for him to physically touch every corpse from which he wanted to reclaim an aura.

He waited until the Flaw closed over completely, and then he turned away, disappearing in a flash of silver light. It took him two teleports to catch up with the Ice Drake, which was continuing on its path two hundred miles away, but when he reappeared on the prow, only ten minutes had passed.

A notification from the World Core was a minor voice at the edge of his mind, telling him he’d been assigned 50,000 bonus experience and a Mark, which brought him up to 94, but he waved it away. He hadn’t expected much from a Flaw of that level, but the World Core still liked to hand out rewards.

This was the type of Flaw that was keeping his parents and the Ice Sylph hunting teams busy. Small, dangerous if it grew, but not too difficult if you caught it in time. Thankfully, ones at the Second Evolution were still rare.

He returned to his position on the prow as he looked ahead, his attention drawn to the dimensional layers of the world where the Flaw had appeared. That Flaw was almost directly on top of the route from Highfold to the gate, which got his attention.

After a few moments, he frowned as he located two more nascent Flaws along the same line toward the gate. They were harder to spot, but once he discovered them, they were as clear as day, even if they were beyond the range of Astral Focus. He could only sense them as part of his innate dimensional awareness.

“That answers that question,” he said as he marked the spots for later. He’d have to get rid of them once they finished forming, but for now they were just points of dimensional energy that were slowly building.

“What question, my lord?” Sleset asked cheerfully from where he was standing nearby. The naga was pleased to be traveling, his head turning from side to side as he studied his lord’s homeworld.

“The gate ahead of us has a direct link to the Dimensional Convergence,” Sam replied, “and dimensional fragments are gathering toward them both. I just don’t know if it has a controlling influence yet.”

“If you break it and it stops, then you’ll know, my lord,” Sleset said confidently. “Should I call the Silver Army to test it?”

“No, they need to guard the relic.” Sam waved the question away. “Dangerous forces will be coming there as word about a way to leave Aster Fall spreads. The relic can protect the top three layers, and the Ice Sylphs are safe enough within the valley, but the Silver Army will be needed if the Cabal tries to cause trouble in other places.”

The contingent of golems that he’d left behind would be useful too, even if they were only Level 325. As for the gate, Sleset’s suggestion was basically the same as his. Break it and find out what happened.

It didn’t take much longer before the Ice Drake reached the location above the gate. The surface here was covered in the same rolling plains and fields as the rest of the area, but it was even richer with crops. Some boundary stones in the distance marked the region out as belonging to a Duke Aloso of Veritas, which was a few hundred miles to the north.

“This duke’s naming rock is offensive in your presence, my lord,” Sleset said as he looked at the boundary stone with narrowed eyes and let out a short hiss of displeasure. “Is he some powerful figure on this planet?”

“Never heard of him,” Sam said as he waved his hand in a throw-away gesture. “He’s probably at the First Evolution.”

“First Evolution warriors are allowed to name rocks after themselves, my lord?” Sleset looked more annoyed the longer he studied the rock. “Do the Second Evolution ones get a hill? This world is your territory. They should not be placing their names on your rocks.”

“You should know how it works, Sleset,” Sam said with a chuckle. “You’re becoming more fierce the longer you follow me.”

“I am only upholding your honor, Silver One,” Sleset replied with an assertive hiss. “It has been time beyond memory since an Oathlord lived among us. This world must also follow the traditions.”

“Leave the rock alone, warrior,” Sam said as he hid a bigger smile. “It’s just a name and we’re going to do what’s necessary here anyway.”

“Understood, my lord,” Sleset hissed in acknowledgement, but there was a fierce gleam in his eye as he continued to stare at the stone.

“Stay with the ship and keep an eye on things from here,” Sam added as he looked down to where the gate was. “The ship’s defenses are stronger than any temporary base we could build below. I don’t know what will happen when I approach the gate, so keep the enchantments powered until I come back. If anyone bothers you, tell them you’re here on behalf of the World Law. Ignore them unless they attack. Defend yourselves as necessary, but don’t carry the fight back to them.”

“Understood, my lord,” Sleset agreed with a bow. “I shall prepare the mana cannons solely for defensive onslaughts.”

Sam only nodded before he teleported away. Telling the nagas to behave was a futile gesture, but he did it anyway out of a sense of responsibility. The nagas’ definition of defense meant chasing the enemy down until they couldn’t attack any longer, but if anyone bothered them, he didn’t have any sympathy. The nagas wouldn’t attack someone unless they were attacked first.

This teleport was different than usual and he was being careful, so he didn’t reappear immediately. Instead, he waded through the eddies of dimensional space like a ghost that was half there as he headed toward the gate. His presence was invisible from Aster Fall’s dimension and the bedrock that surrounded the gate was no obstacle, but the orange energy around the gate was like a tide that pressed against him as he came closer, permeating through all the local dimensions.

It was full of hostile essence.

Curling illusions appeared at the corner of his eyes and a voice whispered in his mind, rising and falling as it moved from rage to endearing words and then to babbling madness. It made him halt in an instant, his attention blasting outward as he raised a mental barrier against it. A layer of silver light covered his body as he poured his essence into Astral Shield.

He had two traits that guarded his mind and with his racial ability Strength of the Sun, his Strength substituted as Wisdom to block mental attacks. All of the mental and spiritual attributes were useful against this type of attack, but some abilities could target the weakest link. With his Strength at almost 12,000  and his Intelligence and Aura over 21,000, he was able to maintain his presence of mind.

It didn’t take long to shut out all of the influence, which was only around the middle of the First Evolution or a bit stronger, but he frowned as he studied the effect. It was coming from the orange essence, and his expression was graver than it had been since he saw his family in danger.

He wasn’t sure if the mental attack was a defensive enchantment placed around the gate or a natural effect of this particular brand of Outsider essence, but if he couldn’t recognize the origin of the power with all of these clues, he would really have been a fool.

“The Demon of Demented Passion?” he muttered as he thought about the third great enemy from the First War. “How is this here?”

She was the most famous Outsider power with this brand of orange essence, and the mental attacks on the mind and emotions fit the description. There was no mistaking the signature.

He was more familiar with the energy of the Demon of Shattered Skies, which was related to his own Path of the Elements, and he’d faced lieutenants of the Demon of Sundered Blood several times over the past years, but this one was still easy to identify. It was hard to forget a legendary enemy of the world who had driven entire races into madness.

“Is this energy not intense enough to trigger the wards on Amaris?” Ideas flooded his mind as he studied the orange-tinted essence around him. “Perhaps because it’s hidden underground, it hasn’t been noticed yet?”

While that was possible, it wasn’t a good answer. Amaris, the Moon of Passion, was designed to block this type of influence on Aster Fall, just like Silvas and Caelus were designed to block the other two demons, but this essence was still here. If it were truly present, Amaris should have discovered it. He frowned as he considered the issue.

Something strange was going on.

The mental influence in the essence wasn’t strong enough to affect him, but if any beasts or local villagers touched it they might fall under its sway. That meant it was a massive danger to the area. It might even be possible for the essence to be spread out farther once this cave was opened.

That also assumed the essence was just a type of dangerous energy. If someone was deliberately controlling it, it would be even more of a threat. And beyond that, if the gate was linked to one of the three demons...things were much more serious than he’d thought.

He stood there cautiously as he studied the area, examining it with every dimensional and astral sense he had. There was a stark line of energy extending back along the route he’d come, heading toward Highfold and the Dimensional Convergence. It felt fairly quiet and there was only a faint trace of the orange essence in it. It was definitely connected to the convergence, but the effect remained to be seen.

For now, it seemed to be waiting, but if this gate had some influence on the convergence, the essence’s influence might appear there and throw the valley into chaos. It would distort minds and warp emotions, driving people to madness and encouraging them to fight one another. That would be a disaster.

He had to find a way to block it or to destroy this gate.

He wasn’t far from the cavern where the gate was now, and his senses swept ahead of him to investigate every detail. He was much more cautious as he continued on. It only took a minute before he arrived at the edge of the cavern and stepped into the open space.

The demented essence was even thicker here, twining through the cavern like a dense fog. At the far side, the gate stood a hundred feet high. What was gathered around it made him freeze in surprise, since he hadn’t sensed them before. They were only present in his sight.

The gate was surrounded by dozens of half-present Outsiders whose bodies flickered in and out like they were illusions projected into reality. There were gaps in the ranks that suggested the formations were incomplete, but there were nearly a hundred enemies gathered there.

They stood there silently, with their gazes fixed on nothing.

He watched them for a while, but they didn’t move at all. It seemed like they weren’t aware of the world around them. Each of them was giving off a weak trail of orange essence that matched the gate behind them, making it clear that they’d just come from it, but their essence was otherwise obscured, perfectly blended into the overall aura of the cavern. What was more, there was no trace of Aster Fall’s auras on them, which usually marked out an Outsider as having broken through the World Seal.

The last time he’d seen something like that was from the Outsiders trapped in Asenya’s prison on the Wild Spirits’ homeworld. They’d come through the Nexus before the World Seal was created and also hadn’t had any sign of breaking through on them. He hadn’t been able to reclaim any auras from them since they’d never stolen a local one.

These Outsiders were different. They didn’t have Aster Fall’s aura on them, they did have an intense aura from elsewhere, one that felt uniquely foreign compared to what he was familiar with, like it was created from a separate dimension. The prisoners hadn’t had that, but the prison they’d been in had been trying to convert their essence, so there was a chance it had been wiped away.

He analyzed all of them, which fortunately worked. There were ten different types of Outsiders here, with levels ranging from 91 to 257. They stood in separate ranks, but they all had the same ghostly appearance as if they were only half-there.

The first Outsider type was an Illusory Heartrender. It was humanoid but strangely distorted. It looked like a gorgeous woman on one half with a curving body and a lush figure, but the other half was a geometric horror of jagged spikes and bladed claws that seemed to break the laws of anatomy with too many joints and limbs that suddenly turned on themselves.

Not far away, there was also a male version of the Heartrender, whose body was lean and muscular on one half and just as inhuman on the other. If you only saw one half of them, you might be tricked into believing they were harmless and let them get close.

After that, there was a group called Bane Shadows that resembled wraiths with long claws and tangled hair. Their eyes glowed red and orange and their hair hung in long snarls down ridged spines. Beside them was another group called Grimgaren that was similar, except they were a faded grey color and their faces resembled howling wolves with oversized yellow fangs.

The next group was made up of Horror Wraiths and Mindwarp Shades. The wraiths resembled a cloud of jagged spines that formed into screaming faces and then dispersed into acidic black droplets before reforming again. The shades looked like translucent cloaks that had a pair of small, child-like arms at the top, ready to clasp around someone’s neck. On the inside of the cloak, there was a nearly invisible fanged mouth.

Sam couldn’t help a shudder as he turned away from those and looked at the next group. This one was a rank of beautiful women called Lust Renders and handsome men called Spirit Charmers. Except for their appearance, the group looked almost normal, but when they moved, their bodies rippled as something inside tried to escape, pressing upward from beneath their skin like miniature hands and faces, and their hands occasionally shifted into sharp claws.

The last group was made up of three types of Outsiders that were more monstrous than the others. The first type was called a Shade of Torture. It was a large, dark shadow wrapped in chains that shifted as it moved. Jagged hooks and spikes covered its body, some of them stabbed into it and others facing outward. Its arms ended in serrated bone blades that glowed with a dull red heat.

Beside that thing, there was one called a Longing Soul that looked like a floating white patch in the air. It was giving off the faint crying sound of a child. Lastly, there was a giant toad-like creature called a Gluttonous Spirit that had a grotesquely distended belly and a massive mouth with an oversized tongue but no teeth.

Sam shuddered again. All of these things were clearly designed to prey on the mind or emotions, tempting or deceiving those they latched on to until they finally killed them. They were probably also able to turn into spirits or energy forms that couldn’t be easily seen as they traveled from place to place. They were probably part of the Demon of Demented Passion’s army.

All of them were nightmare fuel.

Compared to the forces of Blood he’d met, these were a lot more unsettling. He’d much rather deal with a blood elemental trying to kill him than one of these things. If they’d been fully present, he would have destroyed the entire room without waiting any longer.

Incineration was the best solution.

The problem was that they were only half there. They were standing between dimensions in a way that was similar to what he was doing, but it was clearly not under their control. The flow of energy around them came from the gate, while they seemed to be passively waiting on it.

Were they in the process of breaking out from a dimension on the other side of the gate, or were they some projection from the past?

The gate wasn’t fully open yet. Only a sliver of orange light was shining out from the center, which was what was filling the room with essence. Either it wasn’t fully active and this army was just biding its time or something else was keeping them from interacting with Aster Fall, like the Seal itself. Perhaps it was difficult for them to reach this dimension.

The Outsiders didn’t seem to be aware of anything around them, so he went closer and studied the gate. It was carved from an ornate stone arch that was all a single piece, as if it had been cut directly from the heart of a mountain, and it was sealed by a heavy stone door with a weathered surface. There was an iron ring on one side of the door that was five feet across, almost making it look like it was designed for a titan to open it.

The gate was massive and gave off a sense of great age. The door and the stone archway were both covered by a latticework of orange essence flows and spidery Outsider runes. The symbols burned with a brilliant orange light. His familiarity with the runes gave him some ideas as he began to study the arrangement, but almost instantly a sense of queasy nausea slammed into his mind and drove him back as the runes seemed to crawl out of sight. He blinked away tears of silver flame as he tore his gaze away.

It had been a while since a rune did that, and these were much less pleasant than the ones he was used to. It took a few minutes for him to settle his essence and recover. The runes were obviously beyond his current ability. He sent a careful look around the room to make sure the Outsider phantoms hadn’t changed and then he continued to study the gate.

Instead of looking at the runes again, he turned his attention to the web of essence that cut across the surface, hoping to gather something from the whole picture. The essence was linked to the runes, but it was less intense, like a result rather than the origin. It didn’t take long before he began to swear under his breath.

He had planned to destroy the gate, but there was no way to do that from here. The gate wasn’t even really present in this dimension. Similar to the phantoms, it was a projection from elsewhere. It was just that its power was so much greater that it felt more real. The only thing that was really present in this cavern was the stone archway to anchor the gate and the essence it was leaking, but breaking the archway would require destroying the entire dimensional portal.

He couldn’t do that from here. It would be like trying to lift an entire mountain that had been compressed into the size of a gold coin. Even that wasn’t a perfect comparison. The archway was protected by the dimension it was linked to. Every single stone in the archway had the weight of an entire reality behind it. He couldn’t break it without breaking that dimension.

He was strong, but that wasn’t something he was capable of right now.

The only other method was to go through the gate and to try and find the enchantment that created the anchor, and then to destroy that.

There were two problems with that though. First, that dimension looked like a stronghold of Demented Passion, so going there meant walking into whatever defenses she had left behind. The three demons had been at the Sixth Evolution, similar to the greatest of the Astral Titans. The war never would have gone on for so long if they’d been weak and easily defeated. Going into any area they’d claimed would be incredibly dangerous.

It might even be something like this that had injured or trapped Asenya.

Second, the gate wasn’t open. It was still being suppressed by the World Seal, and that meant traveling through the World Seal to access it. It was possible to do that, since the Astral Guardian was able to throw people into the Seal as a prison and theoretically also retrieve them, but he wasn’t sure how to go about it himself.

The World Core might allow him to do that with the authority that Asenya had granted him, but even if he could, it wouldn’t be easy. Even then, he’d have to find his way back from the subdimension after breaking the anchor, and that wouldn’t be easy.

More than that, this entire thing could be a trap, something left behind to tempt him or another Astral Titan. That was just the type of thing that Demented Passion would have found amusing. He stepped back from the archway as he shook his head.

He wanted to destroy this gate, but right now it wasn’t doing that much. It was better to think of other options besides going inside and potentially being lost or killed. Repairing the relic and the World Seal from this side was still a better option. If he got more information, that might change, but he had to be sensible. His family was depending on him.

He hadn’t come back from the Void just to get himself randomly killed.

More than that, there was no guarantee the gate was useful. Even with the connection to Demented Passion, it might just be some remnant subdimension full of Outsiders, similar to a Flaw.

He looked around the cavern, studying the Outsider forces as plans flickered through his mind, and eventually, he came to a decision. He turned his eyes up through the stone ceiling of the cavern to where he could sense Amaris in the distance. The moon was circling Aster Fall in its patient orbit, waiting for its old enemy to appear.

For now, Amaris could deal with it.

The gate was a danger, but it wasn’t open yet, and the wards on the moon were designed for this type of thing. As best he could tell, the gate would continue to grow in strength with the Dimensional Convergence. At some point, that might be enough to alert Amaris and the problem would solve itself.

The moon’s wards were around the Sixth Evolution in strength, so if Amaris couldn’t handle whatever appeared, he wasn’t going to have a chance.

With a grimace, he looked at the runes on the gate again, memorizing as many of them as he could in an instant before nausea struck, and then he turned away. A moment later, he disappeared in a flash of silver light, heading back to the ship above.

When he reappeared on the prow, he had to close his eyes for a moment and gather himself. The Outsider runes were crawling in his mind like giant spiders that were trying to escape and it took some effort to force them to be still again. They were a much more unpleasant series of concepts than the ones he was familiar with, but eventually, he managed it.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw Sleset standing beside him. The naga looked oddly pleased with himself, but he pushed it aside. Plans for how to deal with the gate were spinning through his mind. He might not be able to close it right now, but he definitely wasn’t going to just leave it like this.

“Sleset, we’ll be here for a little bit,” he said decisively. “I need to set up a defensive enchantment to keep people away and station some golems here to guard the area.”

Hopefully, he could isolate the essence here as well and keep it from spreading.

“Understood, my lord,” Sleset hissed in approval. “You are claiming this land as yours, then? The people will rejoice. Please note, I have already prepared a fitting tribute to alert the inhabitants of this region about your magnificence.” The naga raised a hand and pointed toward where the duke’s boundary stone had been.

Sam furrowed his brow as he followed Sleset’s gesture, and when he saw what the naga was pointing at, he couldn’t help but close his eyes and wince. This time, it had nothing to do with the runes. He’d told Sleset to leave the boundary stone alone, but it seemed he should have been more specific.

The duke’s boundary stone was about six feet tall and a few feet wide, little more than a boulder. Behind it, there was now a towering cliff of stone that was fifty feet tall and half that wide that Sleset must have raised with his Earth manipulation ability. It dominated the rolling fields like a massive stone plaque that had been slammed into the ground.

It was a giant cliff among the green fields and it towered threateningly over the smaller boundary stone like a wolf looming over a mouse.

Inscribed on the surface of the stone in the jagged runes of the naga race were the words “Domain of the Silver Lord.”