The sky over Drosven Hollow was gray and cloudy. The mountain air made the desolate landscape even colder and more hostile. The crowd gathered in the prison courtyard dispersed throughout the village, spilling into the streets in disbelief at what they had witnessed.
Kaen and the Archmage stood facing each other. At last, there were no more obstacles; it was time to avenge his brother. Kaen trembled with the urge to attack his enemy.
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[WARNING]
[Mana Density Nearby: VERY HIGH]
[Recommended Action: Run/hide]
[Actual level of Resonance: too low]
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"Stop it! Turn off that damn interface!" Kaen thought, slapping his face and scratching his forehead. "I can't wait any longer, I can't escape! If I have to die, then I will die, but I will take this bastard to my grave!"
Every time Kaen thought about deactivating the interface, the HUD disappeared from his view. After a few seconds, however, it would reappear flashing. The word 'Warning' was highlighted more and more.
The Void System not only increased the physical strength of his body and allowed him to break magic, it also preserved him. Kaen was the new recipient of the Void, a dormant power that had finally awakened; he could not die without first accomplishing its will.
Suddenly, a voice broke the silence.
"The Vessel has awakened! The prophecy has begun!"
A bald man dressed in threadbare rags similar to those worn by Kaen and the other miners knelt in the center of the square. Unlike the ordinary citizens of Drosven Hollow, he wore no shoes. A strange symbol had been carved in flesh on his head: it was a hexafoil, a geometric figure representing a six-petaled flower.
As soon as he uttered the phrase, two other figures, a man and a woman, knelt down.
"The Vessel..."
"The Vessel walks among us" the woman announced, stretching her arms toward Kaen as if she were looking at a divine entity.
Kaen, however, was not distracted from his goal. Ignoring the Void System's warnings, he sprinted toward the Archmage. For a moment, the darkness around his eyes expanded, growing in proportion to his anger. The Archmage remained still, the purple eyes of his mask glowing beneath the hood.
A moment before Kaen's fist struck the glass mask, the Archmage vanished.
Nimbly, Kaen planted his feet on the ground, though he was off balance, and turned his head, sensing the enemy's presence again.
As his instincts had revealed, the Archmage had indeed teleported behind him. He was holding Riven's severed head in one hand.
"You bastard! Don't you dare!" Kaen shouted, filled with rage. The grim scene only increased his fury; his fists were so tight that the nails made his palms bleed.
Once again, ignoring the warnings of the HUD, Kaen launched a furious attack. Kaen's fist struck nothing but air: the Archmage was gone again, but this time his presence was more distant.
"You possess a power you do not understand, in a world that does not belong to you" the Archmage stated. He was now standing above a stone balcony of the prison, several meters off the ground.
In addition to the strange figures kneeling in the square, repeating the word 'Vessel' over and over, Kaen could sense rivers of Grey Mantles entering the place to reinforce and capture him.
"What will break first? Your body or your mind?" the Archmage continued. His purple eyes seemed to glow with more intensity than usual.
"What? How does he know?" Kaen thought as he looked helplessly at the blood dripping from Riven's severed throat, his brother's face disfigured and swollen, his expression one of pain and suffering.
For a second after those words, the only sound was the wind blowing through the streets leading into the square. The Archmage had already given an explanation for what he had seen; he had somehow attributed Kaen's power to the Void.
He was reminded of the conversation he had had with the demonic voice on that strange other plane. The Void had told him that he and his brother had been tricked by the Archmage, and that the strange mana crystal had served as a catalyst to awaken the Void System.
But how did the Archmage know all this? How could he know the Void if he was an avid disciple of magic?
"There is no need for me to kill you, boy."
"You will be consumed, piece by piece, until you cease to exist."
With these words, the Archmage grabbed a flap of his cloak and brought it in front of him, enveloping his body, which instantly shrank.
"Noo!" Kaen screamed in panic.
The Archmage was gone, and with him the head of his beloved brother.
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[Mana Density Nearby: ZERO]
[Void Resonance: 1%]
[Humanity: 99%]
[Fragments of Mana: 4]
[Fragments of Null: 1]
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The HUD began to display all the parameters of the Void System again. Kaen stood still, motionless, his gaze downward. The darkness surrounding his eyes gradually disappeared, absorbed by the pupils. The black stain receded from his eyes and cheekbones, and his face returned to normal.
A tear fell to the dusty floor of the square, between his feet.
Again the resignation, the feeling of helplessness. He had been unable to save his brother or even avenge his death. He had great power in his hands, and perhaps he had figured out how to increase it. But that would not bring Riven back.
"Vessel..."
Kaen remembered that he was not alone in the square.
His blurred hearing suddenly became clear. He turned around: one of the three figures that had been kneeling before was now standing a few meters away from him.
It was a woman with long gray hair. On her forehead was the symbol, the carving of a six-petaled flower.
"The Vassal will walk among you, he will manifest his power and everything will be clearer" she continued, whispering words from memory as if she had repeated them hundreds of times in her mind.
She looked at Kaen teary-eyed. He could sense a strange feeling in her gaze, a hope, an innate sense of trust.
"Who the hell are you? I have no idea what you're talking about. The Vessel?" Kaen asked .
"Nihra. Find Nihra. She will know the way" the woman replied. As if seized by a sense of relief., she knelt down and took Kaen's hands.
The woman's hands were wrinkled and thin, with a layer of dirt and blood under her broken nails. On her wrists and forearms were clearly visible cuts, scars with strange symbols and tattoos of all kinds.
"The power has been awakened. The world will never be the same again!" she shouted, clenching her hands tightly.
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[WARNING]
[Hostile presence getting closer]
[Mana Density Nearby: ZERO]
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Kaen immediately lifted his gaze to the main road leading to the square. The armor of the Grey Cloaks made a metallic sound. They were coming, armed to the teeth.
"What did you sense?" the woman asked, fascinated by Kaen's sixth sense. Without letting go of his hands, she began to look around compulsively. The other two strangers were still on their knees, repeating the same word.
"Guards!" she shouted. "They're coming here, they're coming for you!"
"You have to go, you have to run!"
The woman let go of Kaen's hands and returned to her knees, like she was worshipping him. Her forehead touched the floor. "Oh, Vessel! You must find Nihra! Use your power, let chaos rule the world! Find Nihra!"
"Nihra..."
"Find Nihra!"
"Chaos... will rule the world."
The other two strangers with the symbol carved into their skin began to whisper the woman's words in chorus, as if hypnotized.
Kaen kept looking at the interface. There was no more time. He had to run, but where? All the streets were surely guarded by the Grey Mantles who had given the alarm. The mustached guard was also somewhere around the street corner, ready to point his finger at him and order his execution.
He took a step back and began to look around.
"Where the hell am I going? There is no way out!" he thought. His heart began to beat faster with agitation.
"Into the prison! Into the prison! The mines and the prison speak to each other!" the woman cried, speaking in metaphores and pleading with Kaen on her knees.
Kaen turned and began to run.
Perhaps all the years of working with Riven had paid off. The mines held no secrets for him.
Maybe he knew where to go.