Esderand sighed as the towering white stone walls came into view. He had been away from the Tower for almost half a century, and it hadn't changed at all.
On the outside, that is.
He knew perfectly well that there would definitely be plenty of people he wouldn't recognize, and that there would be some very long explanations due after arriving, but that could wait. Before him was his true home, and he was back.
It was quiet here as a young female moved through the woods. She looked like a normal young girl on the outside. However this was not the case at all. She hid a beast inside of her. A monster creature who fed on those who tried to bring harm to the girl. But for the moment this beast was sleeping.
She now stopped walking as she caught the sent of anouter creature. She was not sure who or what was out here. However instinct made her want to follow the strange smell. So she moved in silence as she trailed the smell. As she found the sorce she have a frown. It was a human. She feared human beings. Even though she looked like one herself.
She growled warning him that she was here. She did not want him to get to close to where she was though. She just wanted him to know she was here.
Esderand glanced over at the edge of the nearby woods, and listened for a moment. He thought he had heard something from that direction a few seconds ago, but now that he was paying attention he couldn't hear anything.
Dismissing it, he stepped forward and passed through the Tower's wards. To anyone watching from outside, it would appear as if he had just vanished.
Vega frowned as she watched the odd human now. Then as he moved he suddenly disappeared. Now that was very strange to her. She moved to where he had been standing. She sniffed the area wondering what had just happened. How the heck did the man just disappear. Then it hit her he must have been magic. Which meant that he could possibly hurt her some how. That was not a one thing to her at all.
When the grass behind him moved, Esderand looked behind him to see a woman standing where he had been a few moments prior. She wasn't part of the Tower, as she couldn't see through the barrier, but she appeared to have been watching him.
A frown briefly crossed his face as he tried to figure out what to do here. Most of the people who lived here held some level of dislike towards spellcasters, a minor inconvenience they had to live with, and whenever the Tower was discovered, there would normally be a large force sent against it.
Weighing the options in his head, he decided on a course of action, and froze time in a small sphere around the two of them.
"Who are you, and why are you here."
Vega was concerned as she stood there . She kind of wanted to run away at that moment. She was not trusting of those that used magic. Though she would never turn them in. She was not human herself. She sniffed the air trying to see if the man was near her . That's when she felt a strange feeling. Magic was being used here.
Vega then frowned as she saw the man again . She growled a bit not sure what to say. She did not talk very often to others. However she would answer his questions. " Vega is name. Vega was here hunting. Vega must feed herself." She said to him softly now.
"Hunting? Here? In the middle of nowhere?"
As far as Esderand knew, there wasn't another city anywhere near them, so her claim to be hunting was unusual. But everything about her was unusual, her actions reminded him of a beast, not a human.
"Then... What are you?"
Vega watched the man with a bit of interest. She was not sure if the man intended to hurt her but he seemed to be okay at the moment. So she was trying to keep herself calm right now. She looked him as he spoke once again.
" Yes Vega hunt here. This is Vega home. " She said to him now. She looked at him as he stood there. She could smell his sent at this range. It was not that bad really. It seemed human to her. Humans though always meant danger for her.
" Vega is a beast. A monster Vega thinks. " She told him with a frown. She never remembered what happened when the monster came out. All she knew was that people died and she had to run away. That was all she knew.
"A monster? How so?"
Though she claimed to be a monster, Esderand couldn't figure out how so. She didn't seem to be magical, and he would have noticed if she was a shapeshifter. She simply looked human.
Vega looked at the man when he asked anouther question. She was not sure what she should say to him. She was quiet for a second as if she was considering his question. " Vega no remember what happens when beast come out. Vega just know that she hurt people. " She said to him. She was not sure how else to explain that to him.
"The beast within, huh?"
From her words, he judged that the "beast" she spoke of was likely Lycanthrope, of a similar condition. It wasn't something he was very familiar with, but he guessed there would be a few books,on it in the Tower.
"Care to join me for a while?"
Vega still was not sure if she wanted to trust this man. Though he seemed interested in her for some reason. That made her wonder why. Though she was one of those creatures who did not ask many questions. She just whent with the flow and let thing reveal themselves in time. Everyone always showed their real intentions .
" Yes that's it." Vega said to his first question. She then kind of smiled when he asked if she wanted to join him. It had been a very long time since someone had wanted to be around her. Atleast for very long. " Vega would not mind that. " She said with a smile.
" What is you name?" Vega asked him softly now. She wanted to at least have a name to go with this man's face.
"The Scholar of Time, Esderand."
He walked over to the woman and placed a hand on her forehead, whispering something under his breath. A silver rune glowed under his hand for an instant before fading, allowing her to see through the Tower's wards.
"Welcome to my home."
Vega listened when the man told her his name. She was not sure what a scholar was our even what time was. She never had the chance to learn such things. "Vega is glad to learn name" she told him now.
She felt the instinct to back away when he came closer. However she stood still wanting to know what he was doing. She flinched when he touched her head. She could feel that he was using magic. That made her a little bit uncomfortable.
She then could see that they were not outside. They were in some sort of building. She never liked human homes. They always felt like cages to her.
" It is very nice home." She said to him with a bit of a nervous tone to her voice. She was not sure what she should do though.
"Yes, that is most certainly is."
Esderand was a little confused at the sudden transition, but after thinking about it a bit, it seemed logical. It probably wouldn't be too hard to make a ward to transfer anyone using magic into the Tower, but he found it nice to know plenty of research had been going on while he was gone. Heasing over to the door, he found it locked.
"Uh, give me a minute."
After calling over to the woman, he pushed against the door some more, then switched to a spell to unlock it. When that failed, he thought over it a bit more, then slumped against the wall.
"Heh, er, how do I put this?"
Looking over at the woman, then back at the door, he revealed his thoughts.
"We, appear to be locked in..."
Vega listened to the man as he spoke. She was unsure of the man still but he didn't seem to want to harm her. She was quite as he moved over to the door. "Okay Vega will wait" she told him softly. What else was there to do?
She watched him noting that he seemed unable to get it open. That was not very good. But why would he have trouble if this was his home? Did he not have a key? She blinked when he seemed to give up. So now she was stuck here with this odd man. Well that was certainly not what she expected.
"So you stuck here with Vega. That not good ." She stated to him. She then gave him a slight smirk . " It kinda funny though." She told him now. To her it was rather funny for the man to be stuck in his own house. Though it did mean that she was also stuck here with him. That was not quite as funny.
"Yeah, I guess it..."
The sound of marching footsteps came from the other side of the door, stopping just outside. The lock clicked, and a man in a silver robe incredibly similar to Esderand's looked in, staring at them.
Why did they change the robes? What was wrong with the old ones?
As Esderand stared at him in confusion, the man pulled a crystal out of his pocket and tossed it into the center of the room before pulling the door shut. A moment later, the crystal glowed amber, and exploded in a burst of arcane energy pulling the two towards it.
A storage crystal!? That usage of those on living being was forbidden!
As that thought raced through his head, the vortex consumed him and everything went black.
[There is definitely a plot here! It's not just because I just really like trapping people in pocket universes!]
Vega frowned as she heard the sound of some walking near the door. So this man living with other people. She wondered if that meant they could get out. As the man entered she glanced at the other man . He was dressed like the other man. Now that struck her as odd to say the least.
Than then man threw something on the ground and closed the door. The loud sound and the feeling of magic really kind of frightened her. She wondered what was going on here. That was when she was dragged into the magic void with the strange man . Now this was a bad situation.
(( Alrighty sounds like it'll be a fun plot))
When his eyes opened, what greeted Esderand was an expanse of greeen crystal. In the distance a giant wall of a similar crystal stood towering into the sky, forming a massive pyramid.
So this is what the inside of a storge crystal looks like. Interesting.
Though this was obviously forbidden research, he still felt impressed at whoever had sucessfully managed this. It wasn't easy to turn an object made for storage of inanimate objects into what could only be called a perfect prison, but someone had, and he had the privledge of seeing it first hand. He came back to reality when he heard someone waking up next to him, and remembered Vega.
Vega was out for a little while. When she finally awoke she blink serval times trying to figure out what had just happened. She sat up a bit and frowned at the strange surroundings. She was aware that they weren't in the same place that they were before. But she did not know where here was. She glanced at the odd man with a slightly confused look.
" What happen ? Where we are? " she asked him. Even thw beast that she held inside was afraid of this place.
"This seems to be the inside of a storage crystal. Basically, another world made for the sole purpose to store things you can't fit anywhere else."
Tapping the crystal below him, Esderand lay down and stared at the ceiling.
"Last time I was here, the research on making it usable for human imprisonment had been underway, but I classified it as forbidden."
His face changed imto a frown as he thought about it.
"I mean, this is pretty much a perfect prison."
Vega frowned at him as he spoke. She was not very happy to hear that they were trapped here. She really did not like the idea of being in this place forever. Though she was human enough to know that panicking would do no good. She moved to where she could wrap her hands around her knees. Something she did when she was upset.
"So what we do? Just sit here?" She now asked him with a frown. She then looked around again. " Such a strange and scary place." She said to herself. Though her words were loud enough to be heard. She curled up tighter as she thought about how bad this situation really was. At least it was bad to her.
"Well, most of the crystal would shatter if they were brought inot the proximity of a Mordecai, or if an excessive amount of Arcane energy was introduced, but since we don't seem to have either of those around..."
He sat up and looked over at the wall, lost in thought.
"Though, since we're inside it, could breaking the walls work?"
Vega looked at the man as he spoke. he seemed to be talking mostly to himself so she just listed and nodded slightly. She was not sure what else to do right then. Then she thought about what he was saying. She wondered if doing something like that could get them in more trouble.
"Think might make it worse?" She asked softly. She did not want to end up in a worse place then this.
"I don't know."
Esderand was torn between the two options. Wait for whoever stuck them there to let them out, or try breaking the walls to see what happened. Safety or the chance to try something no one had ever done before. He was leaning towards the latter, but he felt like that may be an abnormal way of thinking.
"You have an opinion on this?"
Vega looked at him for a second. Then she looked back to the wall across from them. She was starting to think that breaking out might be their only option. After all it struck her that whoever got them here might not ever let them out again. That meant that they could die in this place. She really didn't want that to happen.
"Vega think us should try to break out. Might not get let out. " She told him with a nod. She wondered how much force it would take to get them out of here. Probably quite a bit.
"Ok then!."
Esderand raised his hand and pointed at the wall. Closing his eyes, he called forth an orb of fire, the deadly flames created to blast through all barriers.
Yet it would not come.
Vega was quite as she watch him as he apparently tried to use his magic. But it didn't seem to want to work. She then wondered if this place was magic proof. It was very possible after all.
" Vega think no use magic. Place no let it work." She said softly. Though she was kind of afaid that she'd upset him by saying that.
"Huh?"
Esderand opened his eyes and stared at the wall. There were no markings, magical or otherwise, to hint at his attempted spell.
"Then, brute force? No idea how I'd do that though..."
Frowning, he returned to his seat on the ground, continuing his study of the wall.
Vega herself was not sure how she could help. She did have enhanced strength but she was not sure if she would be strong enough break though there's walls. And she could not let the beast out to do it. It would probably try to kill the man instead.
"Vega have lots strength but no that much. Monster does but monster probably try to hurt you." She said softly. She did want to help but she knew that it was never wise to release the beast unless she had no other choice.
"Well, it's probably best to try at least."
Still staring at the wall, Esderand guestired over at Vega.
"And I have a theory on this "Beast" of yours. We refer to it as Feral Lycanthrope, for the wolf variant at least. Transfiguration into a beast, and a loss of the mind. That sound right?"
What the man said made Vega blink a little bit. She was not used to people wanting her to let the monster out. Though she knew that this was probably a situation that was a little different. They had to get out of here somehow. She then listened as counties to speak. It sounded like he knew at least a little bit about what she was.
" That right. And when beast come out it stay until it get tired. Sometimes lasts for little while. Sometimes last long while. Depend how mad beast gets" she told him now. She figured it was safe to tell him about the monster. He didn't seem to want to hurt her.
"Well, if we play it right, maybe it can break us out of here."
Esderand stood and dusted off his robes, turning toward Vega.
"If you change, I can stop time sround me, and you won't be able to reach me. If trapped in a confined space, most creatures will try to break free, and we can use that to our advantage."
Vega thought about what the man was saying. She supposed magic could stop the beast. She didn't see why it could not work.
" Okay tell Vega when want to have it come out. Just hope you don't get hurt. Would not be very good." She said to him. She wanted the young man to be ready when the monster came out. Because she knew how bad the creature could hurt people. This was why she lived like she did.
"All right."
As he calmed his mind, Esderand prepared himself for what came next. Freezing time was easy, but stopping his own time was a horrifying experience. If anything went wrong, there were no second chances.
"OK, Any time now is fine."
He released the spell, and everything ended as he was disconnected from the world.
[He's gone until the crystal breaks, so everything else is on you.]
Vega nodded when he said that he was ready. She shivered as she felt the monster comming out now. She gave a growl as she kneeled down. The sound of cloths tearing and bones cracking sounded through out the place. Soon the monster was revealed. It was a huge bear like creature that stood on her place.
She looked around growling as she observed where she was. Suddenly she charge straight at one of the walls. Her intention was to bust through it by useing all her strength to ram the wall.
(( Alrighty))
[POV of a nameless and unimportant Scholar of the Tower]
The nameless and unimportant Scholar of the Tower wasn't having the best day. After a catastrophic failure in his laboratory led to an otherworldly evil being summoned onto this plane of existence, research had to be put on hold until an agreement could be formed with the ancient evil.
He had taken this time to stop by the storerooms in the basement, to see if he could find anything else useful for the continuation of his experiments, but had yet to locate anything worthwhile. The basement was just too filled with things, and unless you were willing to spend a few months searching, you would be going purely on luck.
And his wasn't the best. As he cast aside a staff he had been checking, a loud crack came from somewhere to his left. When he looked over, he saw a small green storage crystal, and a small spiderweb of cracks coming from it. As he watched, the cracks spread, until the crystal was completely covered in them.
As he turned away, to report this to one of the Sentinels, the crystal exploded, shards flying throughout the enclosed space. One of them impalled itself in the Scholar's head, and everything went black.
The monster was surprised as she noted that the crystal broke. However there was then a huge explosion and bright light. Then she was out for several moments. While the monster was out it change in to its human form again. However since she had changed into the beast she was now in very shredded cloths. As still out for the moment.
[Omniscent being refered to as narrator POV]
Under normal circumstances, the arcane energy released by the destruction of a arcane crystal would have been obvious to all the Scholars in the vicinity, but by a sheer stroke of luck, as the crystal shattered, a young Divine in the Tower's library unintentionally callled upon a Divine of an ancient kingdom, and was dragged away, while the Divine energy released masked the arcane emissions.
((I think with Convenience on top of Convenience, good time to throw my hat in the ring))
Teleportation, a mages way of travel to those who practice such art of bending space, Sadly Zen's style of spell casting does not involve bending space to end up from location A to location B, but more of momentarily removing the rule of space and distance and just be there. Problem is, without ANY rules of space, the exact location is up to luck. Luckily Zen has found themselves in what looked, and felt, like an Arcane College or repository. Taking in the surroundings, Zen would notice it seemed to be a store room of sorts with a corpse of an unlucky fellow with a crystal in his skull and a girl with shredded clothing.
"First off, Kinky; followed by a question of were am I. I was trying to end up in a library, should have specified, doubt it would have helped. Am I interrupting a murder?"
As Vega came to she blinked several times trying to focus on where she was at. Her head kind of hurt at the moment. She wondered where the strange man had ened up going. The the voice of anouther made her jump and give a grow l.she did not know if the man was one of the ones who trapped them or not.
[POV of the lazy guard who sucks at his job]
In front of the basement, one of the Tower's Guards stood guarding the door. That was his job, and he was good at it, save one minor detail.
He still had no idea what he was guarding against.
The Scholars visited the basement daily, but that was normal. A lot of useful things were stored there, but no real research was done. And that was good, as their research often led to people dying painfully, otherworldly evils being called from their ancient slumber, and the occasional flashy burst of light.
Compared to the Sentinels stationed up above, this job was heaven.
Leaning up agonst the wall, he closed his eyes and took a short nap. After all, what could possibly go wrong?
"No need to get defensive, I am just trying to asset the situation as I have no idea what is going in or even were I am. Can you speak my tounge or can you only growl?"
Zen asked, looking around the place as they slowly moved around the room, slowly circling the girl, trying to show they mean no harm by not making sudden moves, similiar to a wild animal.
"Is it just you, well just you now?"
Vega blinked as she got more focused on what the man was now telling her. She stopped growling and looked at him. "Vega can talk. No very good but some. " She said to him softly. It was then she realized that perhaps her shredded clothes were a bit revealing. She put her arm over her chest as she watched the start person before her.
" There was someone with Vega. No know where him is now." She said in response to the question that was asked to her now. She really had no idea what happened after she had let the monster out.
"Hm, well pray tell what has happened here? From the looks of it either a spell went . . . unplanned or a wizard battle broke out with Gem Head here being the loser. and you do not have to be so modest, I once tried to cast a spell to clean my clothes, messed up my wording and created a new set of clothes on myself. . . from the surrounding cloth. . . so others clothing. do you know were this aforementioned someone is? was it Gem Head?"
The spell Esderand had cast was quite simple. For a period of time, everything within the spell would be frozen, unable to interact with the rest of the world. To any living entities within the area of effect, the return would be similar to a teleportation, except without the change of space.
However, due to the modifications he had made when casting it, the spell had changed slightly. Instead of focusing the return on an empty point of space, he had set it on Vega, allowing him to follow her to the normal world.
Unfortunately, he still arrived at the relative point from where he had cast the spell, which ended up with him unfreezing direcly in front of the basement door, and right next to the sleeping guard, almost waking him up as he quickly backed away.
Vega listined as the man spoke to her now. She was not really sure what had happened herself. So she tried to explain that to the strange man "All Vega know that someone use strange magic to trap vega and man strange place where .could not get out. him told tell vega to let the monster vega held inside out. When Vega woke up was here. " She said to him now.
She then glanced at the dead Man and shook her head " Man is gone no know where him is. That not him though" she to him now. It obviously clear that she was confused.
"Hm, sounds like a similar position I am in, just got here and have no clue what is going on. Shall we leave this room and try to find your ally? he can not have gotten far. . . I hope, My teleportation spell rarely position swaps. like a 1 in 20 chance of happening. I assume you know how to get out of this storage room?"
Zen asked, motioning to the door which they assume was the entrance/exit to the place before seeming to get distracted and began to root through the dead man's pockets and clothing for 'loot'.
"Wonder if the local Magi are the Spell weaving kind or Book casters."