"How many times do I have to say that I'll go alone?!"

With that below, Tristessa believed she was going to subdue the three warriors standing before her. She was wrong, of course. A naive illusion when faced with a numerical disadvantage, three to one. And they didn't seem like they were going to stay silent.

"And I told you, stupid girl, that you're insane."

"Damn it, lady… How can you even consider that option? You're going to put your head in the varg's mouth without even knowing if you'll have the backing of your lovely living shadow. It's suicidal!"

"I'll go with you. With me there, you'll avoid arrest and be able to leave the castle when they deny you passage. And you know I'm right, Tristessa."

Severus, Auron, and Astoria proclaimed their opinions. Three voices wreaked havoc inside Tristessa's already overwhelmed mind, echoing throughout the room next to the nave of the former Vel'Moran church. Used as a warehouse for inorganic supplies, the place was almost pitch black, were it not for the small orb of light the blood elf conjured with an Ord Lumen spell.

They had arrived at the Fireclaw Company headquarters when the healers managed to save Bran from succumbing to cardiac arrest. He didn't wake up again, and it didn't seem like he was going to, given the extensive thaumaturgy they used to keep him unconscious and stable.

Only Tristessa had heeded his warning, and she had been forced to bring her companions into that room to speak in privacy.

She wanted to convince them that she alone should go to the Lord's Castle for an audience that Stormcrow had surely not yet managed to arrange. Her companions' fierce glares intimidated her; that Stranger who was currently drowned in a sea of ​​apprehension.

"It will be very suspicious if you come with me, please understand!" Tristessa tried to make them see. Pleading, frightened by the terrible fate that could befall them if what she planned to do went wrong. She absolutely refused to put them in such obvious danger… She didn't want to see them die again. "If I go alone, maybe… Maybe Aurelia will listen to me."

"You can lie to yourself all you want; it won't change anything. I know that woman, and she won't even agree to give you a second of her time." With that sober, cold hardness voice, the platinum-haired knightess sought to break her delusions. Firm, towering, it even seemed as if she wouldn't allow Tristessa to leave that room alone. "Unless Lady Eramisaptor is waiting for you, there's no way you'll cross the castle main hallway on your own."

"M-maybe if I arrive there and admit that I'm a Stranger…!"

"And you think the Imperial Guards protecting the place will take you to her?" Auron retorted, disbelief thick in his words. "Most likely they'll arrest you and throw you in a dungeon. That way, not even the Wraith will be able to help you… If she decides to help you at all if she finds out you're not from this world."

"We understand the urgency, after what the mercenary told you. Damn it, I understand, and I'm the one most on the verge of losing my fucking mind here!" It wasn't an exaggeration to say that Severus was a nervous wreck, on edge. To the point where he was dripping with sweat, even though the cold prevailed, especially in that warehouse, the church, and the outside. "I'd love to get out there, wake the mercenary, and get any information he has about my friends out of him! Even if it ends up killing him!"

The elf pointed his staff at Tristessa. Not with the tip of the catalyst, but he wasn't far from threatening her with thaumaturgy, if necessary.

"But I won't do that. What I will do is immobilize your body with a spell until you give up on this idea of ​​going alone. You're my ticket to saving the Mercer-Archeos and killing the fucking Shadow Queen! Do you understand?!"

Auron and Astoria didn't intervene. The complicit silence screamed that they agreed. After all, they too had dreams to fulfill, and without the help of a Stranger, those couldn't be achieved.

It wasn't formalized, but the relationship between them was purely business. Tristessa was the only one who didn't see it that way... And she couldn't do anything about it but suffer in silence.

"So, what do we do? Do we all go together and force our way through the castle?" Tristessa asked, exhausted and at a loss for what to do. Unable to access her mind palace and meditate. Unable to think clearly with so much sleep deprivation and insomnia weighing like lead inside her brain. "And whoever makes it to Aurelia alive will convince her that the Coven is about to arrive in Entrana?! Tell me, what do we do?!"

At that moment, someone knocked sharply on the door twice, attracting everyone's attention.

"Didn't you enchant the door with non-elemental thaumaturgy, Severus?" Astoria asked.

"Of course I did, you saw the glyphs." Grumbling under his breath, the elf went straight to the door and opened it wide. "Y-you…!"

More than surprised, he stepped back and allowed the visitor to enter the storeroom. Before the astonished gaze of everyone present, the person joined the conversation and closed the door behind them. Only the sound of the hinges echoed throughout the nave, attracting no attention from the healers.

No one could hear what they were talking about inside.

Two hours later, Tristessa, Astoria, Auron, and Severus stood in a row in the middle of the plaza of cobblestone and travertine floor. The composition perhaps contained another mineral that reacted to the light of the stars and the Twin Moons, emitting a peculiar, beautiful, but ghostly glow. Aside from them, that plaza was empty, not a soul in sight. In that antechamber that promised salvation or damnation. Construction or destruction. Life or Death.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

The Lord's Castle was now a colossal titan, dark and visible at night thanks to the spectral blue illumination of the crystals scattered along the walls, faithful to the style of the city walls. The entrance, its elevated portcullis inherited from the Age of Kings, invited the four of them into the darkness.

Into the mouth of the beast. To that lair of spiders that Tristessa had learned to fear on her daily expeditions to the Upper Ward of Entrana.

"Are you ready?" Astoria asked the gray-eyed girl, whose gaze was lost on the castle towers. Imagining beyond, behind all that structure, that land where she had met her final Death.

"Now that I'm here… No, I'm not," was her response, as well as the first to take the first step into the darkness.

Step after step, the dark abyss enveloped them as they entered the main hall. In a twist of irony, the shadows were banished by the faint light of four candelabras as soon as they crossed the threshold. That place spanned dozens of meters in three dimensions, with stone pillars arranged according to architectural strategy and carved with the humanoid representations of the Gods. Several of these pillars had been chipped away to erase Vel'Moran's image, leaving only the uneven, battered surface of the stone as a sign of rejection and memory.

So that they know that there was once a God of Chaos who was worshipped, until the Dark Lady rose as an enemy of the world thanks to His blessings.

Then, every two pillars and every several meters of wall stood an Imperial Guard. Still, motionless like statues, wearing heavy armor of black steel, and all, without exception, carrying a dark shield. The quintessential representation of the Empire of the Night's Watch, a permanent defense against the evil that comes from the north.

"How the hell did they get to the execution yard in the other loop?" Tristessa thought, unable to figure out, or even imagine, any scenario of extreme violence in which Auron, Astoria and Severus could have made their way through so many soldiers in an uncoordinated manner. It wasn't possible, under any circumstances. "The only way is that they let them through… They had help that allowed them to get inside."

That was the only theory that made sense, and it no longer mattered. It was the past, one that no longer existed. The present was the here and now.

"Welcome to the Castle of the Lady of End-World." One of the dozens of guards there, positioned in front of one of the pillars representing the God of Balance, stepped away to block their path. "What is the purpose of your visit?"

Neither Astoria, nor Auron, nor Severus said a word. Everyone stared straight ahead, waiting for the evening's main guest to step forward. She did so, and taking a deep breath, the black-haired girl said:

"I am Tristessa Irandell, and with my companions, we have come for an audience with Lady Eramisaptor."

"…"

There was no way to see under the visor of the helmet the guard wore. His shield was his main weapon, making the mace hanging from the opposite side of his waist the secondary one. It was terrifying, on purpose, to instill fear in an enemy who also used fear as means to warfare. Fire against fire, the Empire's centuries-old tactic against the Shadow Realm.

"…of course. Lady Eramisaptor is waiting for you. Follow me, please."

Silent, her insides melting into a sea of ​​lava worthy of the caldera at the center of the world, Tristessa obeyed. Along with her companions, walked behind the guard. The gazes of the other soldiers followed them, she could feel it, dozens of eyes feeding her dread and injecting intrusive thoughts.

Repeating over and over again the images of all her dead allies. Shattered bones, torn muscles, organs bursting and spilling contents everywhere, along with pools of blood that kept getting bigger…

Asking herself how deep that spider lair went, and when they would inevitably crash into the web of shadows and become trapped. Being at the mercy of the mother of all spiders.

"Are you alright?" Severus whispered in her ear, noticing the girl's distress out of the corner of his eye. His words made those horrible memories disappear for the moment. "Focus. This is when you need to keep a cool head the most."

"Y-Yes… Thank you, Sev."

"Don't call me that."

That made her smile. Indeed, her love for that blood elf was a good placebo to fool her tormented, terror-ridden heart. Enough to stop her from feeling like insects were crawling under her skin, burrowing into every corner of her limbs and intestines.

She managed to stay calm in the walk through the cobblestone corridors, metal supports, and long carpets that ran from one end to the other. Not to mention that besides to patrolling soldiers and guards, there were perhaps Wraiths lurking in the shadows, watching their every movement…

Silas Roy Khan, the deadliest and most veteran of all the assassins in End-World, charged with protecting the Lady of the Dominion.

And that other assassin…

"Stormcrow…"

While thinking of her, Tristessa suddenly looked ahead as the imperial guard stopped in front of two large ivory doors and opened them wide. He didn't step under the threshold into the hall beyond, but he did step aside to allow them passage. He didn't say anything else; as if merely entering was more than enough. A picture worth a thousand words.

That hall was, without a doubt, what a throne room would be in the castle of any medieval kingdom. Spacious, with a marble floor that reflected the nightlight from the Twin Moons that passed through the massive windows. Ten flags bearing the symbol of the Empire of the Night Watch, the Shield Against the Darkness, hung from the ceiling beams, five in two parallel rows. The smell of cold iron was powerful inside, emanating from suits of armor scattered along the walls and modern torches with lit power crystals inside, casting a ghostly veil of ethereal illumination. Creating shadows that hid in corners, behind armor, and beyond, where a throne was supposed to sit on a platform.

Neither one nor the other. If that had existed before, it was no longer the case. After all, only the Emperor was worthy of sitting on a chair that represented power. No one else had the right to sit on a throne, and in the case of the most powerful person in End-World, this was no exception.

Aurelia Eramisaptor stood next to a round wooden table covered with countless documents and lit candles. Wearing her armored trench coat with dark steel plates, she was reading, pacing back and forth, and not looking away either when the doors opened or when they closed again, with the guests inside.

"GRAA..."

Emerging from the shadows of the west side of the room, the aracross Mystia appeared as Aurelia's sole protector. Growling menacingly, a demonic beast larger than Vergil, whose absence weighed on Tristessa, blocked the four of them. The countless sharp teeth and blood-smelling hot breathing were two clear warnings of what would happen if they dared to take another single step.

"My girl doesn't like you." That familiar female voice echoed through the hall, fading as it reached the thick, blackened walls. "I don't blame you: Mystia has a temper with people she doesn't know. More than anything, someone with so much Discord emanating from her soul."

The black-and-blue-haired woman placed the documents on the table and gave the four of them her full attention. Those violet eyes, attentive and highly analytical, cast a perfect vision that fell upon each of them.

"As a formality, I will introduce myself. I am Aurelia Eramisaptor, the ruler and Lady of the Dominion of End-World."

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