Verin's rift closed behind them as they stared down at a completely empty lake and an area strangely absent of the broken ley lines black fog that was normally so prevalent in Thaxium.
"What happened to all the water?" She asked not believing her eyes, as they flew down towards the giant muddy hole that used to be a large lake.
"I don't know," Verin answered as he scanned the area. "Hey over there it looks like two people lying in the dirt."
She curved her flight path and headed in the direction Verin indicated but as she came closer she froze. There laying in the dirt at the edge of the lake was a beheaded headmaster Alton and a few feet away from him was Lord Shan laying in a pool of blood.
"They're dead," she gasped.
"No I think Shan is still alive," Verin said as he dropped out of the air landing beside Lord Shan.
He kneeled down and examined the blood pouring out of the wound in Shan's upper right shoulder. His white magic flared around his hands and he placed them over the wound.
"What are you doing?" XRenia asked as she slowly descended.
"I'm trying to heal him."
"Why? He tried to kill you remember!" She exclaimed. "He deserves to die."
He didn't bother answering as he channeled energy into the wounded man. But she could feel him think, 'because I'm not going to let any man die on my watch even if it is Lord Shen.'
Suddenly the self-proclaimed Lord stirred opened his eyes and looked up at Verin. "Shepherd boy," he breathed.
Verin nodded and asked, "What happened here?"
Lord Shan looked down at his shoulder as the skin around the wound started to knit together and then back up at Verin parroting XRenia's words, "Why?"
"Because it's what Jesus would do," he replied as if it was a perfectly sensible answer then re-asked his earlier question. "Can you tell us what happened here?"
Lord Shan nodded weakly raised his left hand to his forehead and a barely perceptible small flat black object disconnected itself from his temple and fell into his hand. He held it out to Verin than lapsed into semi-unconsciousness.
"What is it?" XRenia asked as she landed next to Verin.
Verin examined the small object with his left hand as he kept his right pushed solidly against the almost healed wound in Lord Shan shoulder. "I think it's some type of memory device."
Headmaster Alton's statement about lords Shan's best trait popped into her mind. "Oh that right he records everything. Can you see what's on it?"
"No but I bet Neo can," Verin said as he drew a circle in the air.
An image of Neo standing in front of four screen showing the fight between the Dragon and the devourer formed at Verin's finger tips and Neo suddenly stopped and turned towards them. "Your Majesty's," he said with a small bow then asked, "If I may ask what is that thing, and where did the Dragon come from?"
"No time to explain," Verin said and pushed open a small rift and throwing the black memory device through it. "I need you to show us what is on this."
Neo caught it as it came through the rift nodded at Verin then motioned to someone outside of their view. A hand handed him a tablet and he pushed the device into its then a few seconds later he produced a fifth screen this one displaying what was on the memory chip.
A third person view of Lord Shan appeared on the screen as he sat on his throne in the giant dome, opening and closing the small ring case just like he had been doing the other day but this time when he opened the case the third time he stopped and fingered the ring he had tried to give XRenia. He frowned and pulled the ring out of its case then looked at the ring on his own finger after a moment he formed two Scryings in the air displaying intricate 3D patterns.
"There different," Lord Shan mumbled out loud. "They shouldn't be." The frown on his face turn into a full on scow and he raised the female version of his ring to the light as he examined. Then he slipped it on his left pinky.
The Lord of Shantopia collapsed to the ground then a moment later jerkily got to his feet and pushed open a rift. He took an oddly forced step forward and fell through it.
The camera followed him as he came out on the edge of the lake where she and Verin now stood. He then once again stood to his feet as if a foreign entity was controlling his body and took several wobbly steps forward towards the water. But right before he stepped into the lake a rift opened up beside him and headmaster Alton flew out of it tackling him and ripping the ring off of his pinky.
"What do you think you're doing?" Headmaster Alton barked angrily.
Lord Shan sat up and looked around apparently very confused. "What?" He muttered then his eyes fell on the lake and he shot to his feet as he shouted, "What is that thing?"
"None of your business," the headmaster said as he took the ring met for XRenia and put it back in its case closing it with a sharp snap.
Lord Shan's eyes darted from the lake to the ring case and back again then suddenly he shot into the air as he shouted, "You used me! You were trying to kill her!"
"I don't have time for this nonsense," the headmaster answered his voice laced with agitation. "I have a war to stop thanks to your failure."
Alton turned to leave but five white strands of magic tinged with orange exploded from Lord Shan's hands and wrapped themselves around the headmaster's upper body like an old fashion lasso.
"Do not challenge me boy!" The headmaster warned turning back towards Lord Shan.
"Why? Why would you use me like this!?"
"Because the girl is an abomination her and her whole family," headmaster Alton declared.
Lord Shan's magical grasp on the headmaster loosened. "What?"
"Archlend was no great mage as history declares. No, he was a Lilliputian a one-of-a-kind magic less runt," the headmaster answered. "And because of his lack of magic the devourer could not detect him so I and hundreds of others helped formed a weapon and gave it to him. He swam through the outer façade the beast used to protect itself and found its core where he was supposed to land a killing blow but instead of killing the beast it he bonded with it! Then he had the gall to produce offspring with it while I and everyone else thought he had slew it."
XRenia stumbled back as recognition of the headmaster's words hit her, that couldn't be true could it?
"XRenia and her entire family line are nothing but abominations that must be destroyed. Now as I was saying before I have a war to stop," Alton said and once again started to turn away.
But as he lifted his hand to brush away Lord Shan's magical rope the young ruler suddenly shouted, "No," and tightened his magical grasp on the headmaster.
"What?"
"I said no!" Lord Shan shouted again. "Mathis his son and even XRenia have done nothing but good for this world. I don't care who or what their parents were. They could be offspring to the devil himself for all I care."
Headmaster Alton stared at Lord Shan as if he couldn't believe his ears. "Boy are you even listening to yourself? They will be the death of this planet do you not understand that?"
"So you say," Lord Shan answered. "But you will have to go through me if you wish to hurt them."
Headmaster Alton scowled at Lord Shan. "Fine then if that's what you choose. So be it." Alton raised his right hand and closed it with a sudden jerk.
Lord Shan screamed out in pain as the sound of bones breaking echoed through the valley.
"I'm sorry but you brought this upon yourself," the headmaster said as he opened his hand and Shan crumpled to the ground. "Now as I have told you multiply times I have more pressing matters I need to attend to," Alton said as he turned to leave yet again.
But as he started to open a rift the land rumbled and a ripple ran across the water. All the blood in headmaster Alton's face drained away and his eyes filled with horror as he looked back at Lord Shan. "No!" He half screamed and half shouted. "Do you realize what you have just done?"
"I stopped you," Shan coughed.
The headmaster grabbed at his chest desperately searching for something as the water in the lake exploded hundreds of feet into the sky. Alton found what he was looking for and tried to slide the small white unadorned ring onto his finger but just as it touch the tip of his finger a tentacle of water whipped out of the lake slicing his head clean off.
The headmaster dropped to the ground dead and both the ring he was trying to put on and the one he had tried to kill XRenia with clattered uselessly in the dirt beside him.
The water in the lake bubbled and boiled churning up the mud and dirt and sucking in the black fog like a vacuum until the whole thing turned a muddy brown color and ever so slowly the brown worm like creature of the devourer formed inside it until all of the water had been transformed.
Lord Shan seeing what he had unleashed paled with fright and try to open a rift but as the portal formed a tentacle shot out of the devourer spearing him through the right shoulder and pinning him to the ground. The eyeless monstrous creature stared down at him as if trying to decide what to do with him but at its mouth open it suddenly jerked its head up and stared at the rift Shan had tried to open.
In that second thousands of its tentacles shot out and slammed into the rift prying it open and it squeezed itself through leaving an empty lake and a dying Shan behind.
Her and Verin stood there silently for some time taking everything they had just seen in until he at last asked, "Do you think it's true? I mean the part about Archlend."
"I don't know. It could be," she admitted. "I mean that might explain how he became so powerful and why he left the earth. But it seems a bit far-fetched. How would they even be compatible?"
"Well from what I can tell we haven't seen this creature's true form," Neo answered from the other side of the scrying. "It hides itself in the water so there's no telling what it really looks like."
"I guess," XRenia muttered.
Feeling her distress Verin said, "That doesn't matter now anyway with the devourer loose like this and no way of stopping it we have to leave earth behind or it will kill us all." He bent down and started pick up the now stabilized Shan as he continued, "Neo get the others ready we're coming to get you."
"No," Lord Shan rasped pointing towards the headless headmaster Alton. "His ring... We can..." Shan swallowed and tried again. "It can.. disable magic."
XRenia walked over and picked up the ring that the headmaster was trying to put on when his head was sliced clean off. She hesitantly slid it on her thumb and instantly she felt completely naked and more vulnerable than she'd ever felt in her entire life as every last drop of her magic disappeared.
She ripped the thing off and tossed it to the ground her heart pounding in her chest as her magic returned. "It seals your magic," she exclaimed.
Verin put down Lord Shan ,dashed over and picked up. "I know I felt it," he answered excitedly.
The scrying grew in size and change position as Neo repositioned it from the other side so he could see them.
Verin slid it on his finger and his presence completely vanished from her mind. He waved his hand around and took a few steps then took it off and put it right back on. "It's like my magic just disappears."
"Sounds like the headmaster has achieved the impossible, maybe we can use that seal this beast power away somehow," Neo said.
Verin shook his head "No that won't work. I can feel if I mentally push against it, the spells in the ring will snap like a twig." He stopped and looked at the plain ring as he used his thumb and index finger to twist it around on his finger. "Though we might be able to use it to get close to the devourer without it detecting us, maybe right up to its core that Alton mentioned."
"Then what?" XRenia asked. "I doubt we have a weapon anywhere on this planet that can damage that thing."
"That's true," Neo agreed. "Anything that uses magic will be ineffective against that beast if it is indeed a devour."
"It is, my grandfather confirmed it himself."
"Wait. What about the one way deep space rift I mentioned earlier. I bet we could suck it straight out into space and it won't be able to find its way back." Verin took off the ring and his presence once again blossomed in her mind and he waved at her as he thought "Its felt so strange not having magic, now."
"It was far worse than strange it was horrible," she thought back.
"That might work from what I've seen with its fight with your grandfathers Dragon it doesn't seem to know how to form spells of any kind." Neo told them through the scrying. "If you can indeed achieve in getting it off this planet it may very well die in space."
"Wait we're not seriously thinking about attacking this thing are we?" XRenia asked in alarm.
"Why not it's better than leaving the planet and Alton all but told us how to defeat it," Verin answered.
"No it's not! Did you see with that thing did to Brokon and Alton? And you're forgetting that things inside a living moving lake! You can't get to even if we can get close."
Verin looked down at the ring and then over at the headless Alton as he thought about what she said. "You're right we have to have some type of non-magical breathing apparatus and a way to stop it from moving or whoever goes in will drown."
XRenia couldn't believe her ears he was seriously thinking about this.
"I think I can help with the breathing apparatus I stole the blueprint for one years ago and I still have it." Neo turned to someone off screen and said, "Irene could you retrieve the palaces blueprint from my quarters and tell the others I need their assistance."
Verin stepped closer and took her hand. "We can do this," he told her. "All we need now is some way to stop it from moving for a minute or two."
"No we can't. I can't swim without magic."
"I know. But I can."
Her eyes grew wide and it felt like someone drove a stake through her heart as she realized Verin was going to try and do this by himself. "No! I won't let you it's too dangerous you could die."
"If I don't thousands will die and I can't let that happen if I have a chance to stop it, you know that."
The memory of him trying to kill himself by flying into space for the sake of the people of Thaxium flood her mind and she tightened her hands around his. "Then have someone ells do it!"
"Who?"
"I don't know Shan or Neo anyone but you."
He shook his head, "They won't be strong enough to open a rift inside that thing only our combined strength will be so it has to be me."
"No no.. No!" she cried.
He pulled her close and kissed her on the forehead.
She tried to pull away but he held her tight.
"It's ready," Neo said holding a tube, attached to a shoulder pack, up to the scrying.
Verin opened the hand sized rift and reach through grabbing the device. "Thank you," he said pulling away from her and putting it around his head.
"You still need some way to stop it from moving," Neo said as the rift closed. "If you jump into it with it speeding across the ground like it is you're liable to end up being ripped in half."
"I know. Could you zoom your middle screen in on XRenia's grandfather?"
"Sure."
"Verin no, don't do this," XRenia pleaded again. "It's insanity."
In Neo's screens the Dragon and the devourer were in the midst of a downright bloodied battle. The devourer endlessly jumped and lept, slicing at the airborne Dragon for all it was worth and the Dragon kept whipping about spewing oceans of fire at it and whipping it with its tail. In the far distance XRenia's grandfather stood back trying to protect the Dragon from the constant slew of tentacles the devourer constantly shot forth at the Dragon.
Suddenly one of the screens zoomed in on the supreme ruler of Terra and Verin formed another scrying of this own using Neo's as a reference point.
Her grandfather glared up at him through it. "What are you doing contacting me like this it's dangerous. If that thing detects my granddaughter it'll forget the Dragon and come straight for her."
Verin ignored what her grandfather said and blurted, "We think we have a way to defeat it, but to do so we have to stop it from moving do you think you can help us."
"How?" Her grandfather asked if his eye's hardening.
"He has a ring that seals his magic and he thinks he can use it to hide his presence so he can swim to the creature's core and send into space," XRenia answered for him. "Please tell him it won't work, he won't listen to me."
Her grandfather jerked to the side and reached out slapping way a spear of water aimed straight for the Dragon's eyes then glanced back at the scrying. "Show me this ring."
Verin held it up to the scrying as he said, "Headmaster Alton made it to hide himself from the devourer."
Another scrying blossomed over top of the ring and her grandfather gazed up at it while he still miraculously and deftly defended the Dragon. At last he said, "Yes I do believe this will enable you to get close to it."
"Good," Verin nodded. "Do you think can immobilize it for about two minutes."
"I do. But the cost will be high if you fail."
"What no!" XRenia shouted. "You can't let him do this!"
"I understand and I won't fail," Verin replied ignoring her outburst.
"All right then on my mark."
Her grandfather reached out and suddenly the Dragon stopped moving as he took a hold of it with his magic. The devourer seized the opportunity and jumped into the air wrapping itself around the immobilize Dragon.
"Now," her grandfather barked.
"No!" XRenia shouted again as Verin opened a giant rift.
Verin turned to her and said, "I love you," as he jumped through the rift and his presence vanished from her mind.
"No please no, it's too dangerous." she whispered as she watched him plummet from the sky and dive into the muddy waters of the devourer then the rift closed.
She wanted to open her own rift and pull him out but such an action would mean her own death and despite how much she loved him she didn't want to die so all she could do was stand there and stare at the air where the love of her life had vanished.
"That's not good," Neo exclaimed several moments later.
She looked up at the scrying to see Neo's screens displaying a horrifying image of the devourer swallowing the Dragon sucking it down into its black hole like mouth headfirst.
"As if I'd let you!" Her grandfather roared and reached out with both his arms. Visible strands of his golden magic wrapped themselves around the Dragon and began to pull him out of the devourer's mouth.
In response thousands of tentacles shot away from the devourer and rocketed towards her grandfather but his eyes narrowed and right before they hit him a wall of pure fire blossomed in front of him evaporating them before they could touch him.
More tentacles exploded from the devourer and curved in midflight coming at him from all sides. The wall of fire expended forming a perfect sphere around him and as the tentacles collided with it they burst into smoke.
But as the thousands of gallons worth of steam rose into the air they suddenly rejoined reconstituting into pure white water that raced down towards her grandfather like a tidal wave snuffing out his flames.
"Arh!" He shouted in anger released his hold on the Dragon and threw his arms upward the tidal wave froze into one massive chunk and her grandfather's smashed through it like a ball peen hammer breaking through glass then immediately reach out to help the dragon again but it was too late.
Having distracted her grandfather for the scant few seconds the devourer sucked down the rest of the Dragon in one giant gulp, inhaling it as if the magnificent beast were nothing more than the world largest noodle. full attention on her grandfather its body slowly coiling as it prepared to launch itself.
"No, Verin needs more time," Neo shouted as the devourer's full attention turned on her grandfather and its body slowly coiled as it prepared to launch itself.
Mathis the supreme ruler of Terra's face turned ashen white and he glanced back at the scrying. "Tell Malthus and Tara, that I love them," he said as he charged straight at the devourer.
"Grandfather no!!" She shouted after him.
Suddenly Verin's presence blossomed in her mind and she saw standing before him a spherical completely opaque black shield. "HELP ME!" He roared as all of his energy came to bear on trying to open a rift into deep space.
She reached through him and poured every last ounce of strength she had into his spell. The black shield spun as if it was a top and a pair of red glowing eyes latched onto Verin but it was too late, reality screamed as the rift to deep space tore open.
Gravitational flux and atmospheric pressure grabbed a hold of the black shield and sucked it through the rift and out to space. Instantly Verin tried to close it sealing away the monster forever but the black fog that comprised the black shield reached out wrapping itself around the edges of the rift. The powerful sucking force came to an abrupt end and the devourer started pull its way back through the rift.
"Oh no you don't!" Verin screamed reaching through her and then through the scrying and pulling energy from the Emundans using it to form a crystal clear blade of purifying magic as he charged. Closing the gap he hacked and slashed at the edge of the rift for all he was worth his crysal blade searing through the black fog loosening its grip. An ear piercing high pitch screech erupted from the creature inside the spherical shield and the water around Verin congealed crushing him like a steel vice breaking his sword arm.
XRenia crumpled to the ground as his pain hit her but despite his broken bone he formed another blade and continued hacking at the rift until the world shifted again and the monster's magic failed.
The powerful force of nature grabbed Verin sucked him out into space and both he and the devourer were launched into the empty blackness as the rift slammed close behind them seconds later.
"No!" She screamed and pulled herself to her feet. "Find out where that rift went now," she shouted at Neo who was staring dumbly at his screens showing the water that comprised the devourer disperse and flow across the land in gentle waves.
"At once," he answered spinning around and scooping up the tablet as he produced two more screens.
Through Verin's eyes she watched as the devourer stared through the water around them at where the rift used to be but as the water started to freeze it turned around and through the black shield she could make out a small head, matted hair, and blood red eyes. The devourer stared at Verin hate and anger pouring off of it.
"Move Verin now!" She shouted at him through their connection.
He swooshed his body bringing himself upright and tried to channel power from the Emundans through her to himself again but the distance was now far to great and only a wave of white magic compressed into a sharp blade shot away and tore into the creature.
Or rather should have but seconds before it hit the shield it dissipated turning into sparkling energy as the devourer absorbed his magical attack.
She stepped forward reach through him and slammed the most powerful magical punch she could form into the beast hoping to send it fly through space and away from her Verin but as her attack hit the black shield it vanished and nothing but a gentle wave rippled through the freezing waters.
The red eyes inside the shield latched on her as if it was looking straight through Verin to see her. The monsters all-consuming desire to feed slammed into her and she stumped backwards.
At that moment realizing any magic they could form would never work Verin tried to bring up his arms and put back on the ring to hide himself from the creature's but the water shifted locking down on him like a clamp till he couldn't even move a muscle. Having secured it's pray the spherical shield around the beast unraveled sending black tentacles towards him. Then in an instant the devourer was on him its claws tearing into him.
For a moment she felt his pain but then it was all gone and Verin's presence flickered and disappeared.
She stood there dumbfounded not being able to believe what had just happened.
No it couldn't be.
It was impossible.
Not like that.
Suddenly the powerful force of her magic returning to her from her bond with Verin slammed into her knocking her off the ground, flipping through the air and driving her back into the muddy hole that had once been the lake.
She laid there covered head to toe in mud unable to move not caring to move for all that she cared about was now gone.
Verin was gone.