You wake up in a golden sheet on a single bed with a golden headboard and foot-board. Two voices mumble back and forth over your body. You squint your eyes to see who they are and their words become clearer to your ears. "Overseer of evil, I have to inform you about the trespassing of the Grim Reaper on your property. I believe Ether sent him to spy on you, sir." Morgan says to the overseer of evil. "Is that what he told you?" The overseer asks.
"No, he would not divulge his reason for being at your manor.I knocked him out temporarily but that does not stop the impending threat, sir."
"If he did not say anything, don't make it out to be something it may not be. The young boy is probably bored and wandered into the manor. Ishin does tend to leave the doors open."
"He attacked us, sir."
"What do you expect from the youth these days? They don't respect others and are always ready to brawl."
"Would you like me to tell Ether about his misconduct, sir?"
"Why should we go that far in punishing him? It is sad that all of this happened to you and your lover, but I assure you that this is not a problem. In fact, I will have a word with him on matter."
"Thank you, sir."
The overseer leaves and Morgan looks at you. You open your eyes fully and pull Morgan's arm down until Morgan sits on the bed next to you. "Something is not right. I feel it in my gut." You say. "If my overseer says that he will deal with it, then it will no longer be a problem." Morgan says.
"Where is the baby?"
"Ishin has the baby. She said something about being able to watch the baby but the children can't."
"Oh, I think we should leave. Ishin brought the topic up earlier but I thought we could stay at your overseer's manor without having to deal with danger. It is not safe for us there."
"What did Ishin tell you that is making you think this way?"
"She gave me an ultimatum. The two options were: respect her wishes or leave."
"We had an argument about the twins watching the baby. The important part is that it made me think about our little family. I thought that we would be too weak to leave and deal with the atrocities lurking around every corner in this world, but we are not safe there either. We are not safe anywhere! We should at least be in a comfortable place before we must face are inevitable demise."
"You don't have to worry about death in the existence. The only thing that signifies your end is destruction, here. Look at me, I am not leaving my overseer. I can't do that. I am like a lieutenant under his command. Working for him is my duty."
"Your duty is more important than your family! If that is the case, I will take the baby with me away from you and this madness."
"Where would you go? How will you protect the baby and yourself? You could not even defeat the Grim Reaper and he is a teenager."
"I am not staying with any of them anymore. You cannot change my mind."
"Don't do this. I don't want to hurt you."
"It would not be the first time."
You throw the covers off of you and run out of the room. Morgan follows you down a golden hall with a golden runner. You run to the patio with open glass double doors and golden frames. You run off of the edge of the balcony and Morgan continues to follow you. Your tree stems quickly protrude from your sternum and break until you land on the dirt safely. You run past colorful feathers on bird headed women and weave through a crowd of creatures with horns on their heads looking at these women dance. You run to the edge of the greenhouse. Two shadows stand by the entrance guarding it from the wolves trying to get in. You can't find a way around the shadows. You run through the wild green plants to the rusted frames holding panels of glass in the greenhouse. Your stems will not grow back to their massive sizes no matter how much you flex your upper body muscles. You slam your arm against the glass and it cracks. Morgan pulls you away from the glass panel and kicks you to the ground. Morgan squats over your laying body on the ground. You slap Morgan twice with all the strength you have left. Morgan pins your arms down with strong hands. Morgan's face hovers over yours and you head-butt it. Morgan releases you and you squirm from underneath Morgan's body. You crawl to your feet and run through some short trees and bushes. You hear voices coming from ahead of you and stop running. You drop to your knees and crawl along the ground. You see teens with silver, white hair standing on the other side of the bushes facing you. Their eyes are red and they all are looking at a guy with back length white hair and a long black trench coat.
"I am not here to hurt any of you. I just want your mother. So, you all can just move out of my way." He says to them as he waves his left hand in the air, which is signaling them to move. "You will not take Ishin away from me." A heavy voice echoes throughout the greenhouse. The overseer of evil appears before the teens with Satan and the Grim Reaper at his side
"Ether, our days of fighting common enemies together are over. The only serious enemies left for us is each other. I have taken your best soldiers and I think you know that your defeat will surely follow."
Ether pulls a cloudy, grey orb out of the inside of his coat. He eats the orb and a strong wind blasts from him and breaks all the glass panels in the greenhouse. The shrubs momentarily bend to the blasts strength. You move to crawl out and Morgan pulls you back. You find the strength to jab one of Morgan's eyes with your elbow and run out. The blast is gone and Ether's presence seems heavier and stronger. "I am on Ether's side!" You yell at the opposing side as you stand firmly by Ether. "You are going to stand against me, tree. I must admit that this does not surprise me." The overseer of evil says. Morgan tries to grab you. Ether breaks both of Morgan's arms and throws Morgan out of the greenhouse through a rusty framed space above the ground.
"This is just the beginning of our battle. I will leave but do not get used to my absence. I will surely return with a vengeance. To the traitors, I do not want to see your faces on my land ever again."
You and Ether are bathed in a white light before being placed on his ice land. You follow him to the frigid tower and as you get in, the icy door shuts behind you. Another layer of ice seals it shut. Ether stalks up to his bedroom and you hear the door slam. The wind howls as a blizzard wreaks havoc on the barren terrain outside of the tower. The lights in the tower blowout and the ground shakes. You hear ice braking just outside the tower. Growls and roars echo through the air. The cloudy, ice covered window glows a dim, light green. You run through the dimly lit room up the stairs. You knock on the wooden bedroom door. "Leave me alone!" Ether yells exasperatedly. "I want to talk about a battle plan!" You yell back.
"What can you help me with? You are just a tree!"
"I am a tree that has seen a lot."
"What are you talking about?"
"Open the door and I will tell you!"
Ether opens the door and looks down at you. "What?" He says with a tired expression on his face. "The overseer of evil has many enemies. If you become their ally, you can take him down." You say.
"He has powerful soldiers. What can small enemies do to them?"
"Are dragons small enemies to you? They don't look small to me."
"Dragons are against him because we obliterated their overseer. I helped him do that. Would I not be considered just as much an enemy to them than he is?"
"Do they know you had a hand in defeating their overseer? Did they care as much about their overseer as your best soldiers cared about you?"
"I do not know."
"Then we need to find out. They could really help us defeat the overseer of evil. What about the wolves? They seem to be against him."
"They fall under his command."
"Hopefully, we can get them to not fight in this impending war, which would be helpful. Do you know anyone else that does not like the overseer of evil?"
"There are only two other groups that are not fond of the overseer of evil. They are the dark fairies and the sea monsters. We defeated their overseer but that is not the only reason they dislike him. To please their overseer and prove that he was better than her husband, the overseer of evil killed a mermaid princess and beheaded a fairy king."
"Why was he fighting to prove he was better than her husband? Isn't he married to Ishin?"
"Yes, we both are married to Ishin, but he was betrothed to my cousin via my uncle's orders. At the time, my uncle did not know he was giving his daughter to an overseer close to his age and that the overseer was already married. When he did not marry her, she became bitter and her older brother married her instead. When he devised the plan to trick her to make her let her guard down, he had to do what she told him to do."
"She told him to hurt those creatures and he just did it?"
"Yes, he is older than me and he has overthrown many overseers in many dimensions. So, how do you think we are going to defeat him?"
"It would be best if he underestimates us, then we can gain the upper hand and have a better chance of winning this war. What do you both do with the overseers you overthrow?"
"We eat their souls and give the excess energy to our offspring by impregnating Ishin."
"I am sure we can find some more creatures out there against the overseer of evil. Hold on, what happens when you don't release the excess energy to your babies?"
"A clone detaches from our current physical forms taking the excess energy with them. The clones are weaker than us but they can be useful."
"Didn't you eat an overseer's soul not too long ago?"
"Yes."
Ether walks down the stairs and you follow him. He breaks the frost around the door with a flick of his finger. Hopefully, he is not as bad as the overseer of evil. I don't want to regret joining his side . He walks out of the door into the blizzard outside. The wind whips your face as you both leave the Ice Tower. You both walk on black ice to a white light that engulfs your vision.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Author's Note: This is the book before "Rituals of Destruction"