System Change

“So… that is your home country?” Derek asked. Both he and Alanah were already wearing cloaks, covering them from head to toe to hide their identities as a human and a half-elf once they passed through into Linderis. Currently, they were still on the Vorandell side of the border, but when they wanted to, it would only take them mere moments to move to the other, less accommodating, country.

“Yeah,” Alanah replied. “That’s it… the country where I was born, and where I spent the first decades of my life. Though, the vast majority of those years were spent trying to survive The Echoing Abyss.”

“Do you remember how to get to the abyss that you were talking about?” Derek asked.

“I don’t need to,” Alanah answered as she flicked her wrist and pulled out another map. “I thought it would be a good idea to ask about a map of Linderis when I was in that shop in Kyllar, and to my surprise, they actually had one.” She unraveled the map, then she pulled out another, and held them up together. “This is the city we just came from, so we would be somewhere around here,” she said as she nodded to an area on the map of Vorandell.

“I see,” Derek said. “So that would put us… there?” He pointed to a spot on the Vorandell map just a short distance away from the city of Purna. “Then…”

“Then that would put us right around here.” The map of Vorandell disappeared, and Alanah pointed at a spot on the Linderis map to the far east side. If they crossed the border where they were, then they would step into the boundaries of the map and they would be able to go from there. Alanah then traced her finger to the west until it landed on a dark spot near the bottom-middle of the map. “This is The Echoing Abyss, and our destination.”

“Got it,” Derek said with a nod. “It doesn’t look too far away… at least it isn’t on the complete opposite side of the country.”

“And there most likely won’t be many settlements near it,” Alanah explained. “The village where I lived was an exception, and its proximity to the abyss is one of the reasons that it was invaded in the past. Since it was so close to the dangerous area, the humans who raided my village—who killed my mother—were most probably traveling through that area to avoid any of Linderis’s major cities or soldiers. Not many people go through that area, after all. Other than raiders, only some either brave or foolish people will take that as a shortcut. Even our village was built on the far edge of what could be considered part of the area around the abyss.”

“And why do people avoid it? The surrounding area, not the abyss itself,” Derek clarified.

“Because, occasionally, a high-level monster that was driven insane by the Echoing Abyss will escape and wreak on anyone around. However, in the years that I was in my village, one never attacked us. I believe we were just far enough away to not have to worry about it,” Alanah explained. “I believe that, before the creature would arrive close to our village, they would have turned back to return home to the abyss. You see, once it grabs hold of you, The Echoing Abyss is very hard to escape.”

“I see…” Derek said. “And you don’t think we’ll have any problems there?”

“I know for sure that I won’t,” Alanah said. “I already escaped its control—escaped its control while being in the abyss. And you… well… I don’t think you will have a problem with your wisdom stat and your willpower. After all, you can all but ignore my attempts at controlling you.”

“I think you would be able to at least stun me for a moment if you tried,” Derek said. “And that instant of unguardedness is all it takes for most people to die.”

“Most people,” Alanah said with a chuckle. “But you… you are not most people, are you?”

“I guess not,” Derek laughed. “Still, I would rather not find out.”

“Same,” Alanah agreed. “Now, shall we make our way to the abyss? The second most dangerous place on the continent.”

“The second most dangerous place?” Derek asked with surprise in his voice. “If it’s the second most dangerous place, then what’s the first?”

Alanah paused for a moment, then stared seriously into Derek’s eyes. “Nick’s Knick-Knacks.”

The duo was able to pass over the border without much of a problem. To make things a little less of a hassle, the two had journeyed along the border between the two kingdoms until they got to a point where going to The Echoing Abyss would be a straight shot from where they crossed over. Along the border, they received many gazes of suspicion from Vorandell guards at multiple outposts, but since they never stopped and kept moving, the guards never got close enough to the duo to ask them any questions. It also helped that, though they were traveling on the ground, Derek and Alanah were setting a blistering pace.

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Once they made it over the border, they followed their map closely so they would be able to avoid any cities or larger settlements. They made sure to steer clear of any of these by at least a handful of miles to not be discovered. To Derek’s surprise, the plan worked, and it worked well. It wasn’t until they were closing in on the border of the danger area that they found trouble.

“Is that normal?” Derek asked Alanah. In front of them, there were what looked military-looking encampments or settlements all around the border of Linderis proper and what was supposed to be the beginning of the danger area—the area where it was considered possible for one of the beasts inside the abyss to escape to before being forced back.

“No,” Alanah said, her brow furrowed. “This is definitely something new.”

“I would say that we should ask them all what is going on, but…”

“But there is no way for us to ask anyone without revealing that we are a half-elf and a human… neither of which they will deign to answer, and one which they may try to kill on sight,” the siren said, completing Derek’s sentence.

“Right…” Derek muttered.

“I… I’m not sure what to do here,” Alanah said. “I’d say we could just take to the sky and go over, but I’m curious as to what’s going on. I wouldn’t want us to go in if something strange is happening. Sure, we can probably survive the abyss rather easily, but there are other possibilities that could be occurring. I certainly wouldn’t want to go inside just to get trapped.”

“I’m pretty sure that can’t happen,” Derek said. “At least not with me here. Even if we were to get separated or something, I don’t think I would have any problems getting to you.”

“That may be so, but what happens if we run into a phenomenon with some insane time dilation? Where you take five seconds to get to me, but for me and everyone else, those five seconds are days or weeks, and I’ve ascended by then? For all we know, a new dungeon has spawned and taken over the danger area.”

“Have you ever heard of something like that happening?” Derek asked.

“Not that phenomenon specifically, but dungeons randomly spawning… even you know about that,” Alanah said. “But there are much stranger things that happen in the world every day, so we can’t rule anything out… After what you’ve learned of the system… or systems, what do you think is possible? And it has to be something major for so many settlements of such caliber to be here.”

“Hmm…” Derek rubbed his chin. He thought about Dave and how the elf had basically just kidnapped him right out of a dungeon and into a room with a crazy amount of time dilation. Finally, he sighed. “I guess that makes sense,” he said. “We could look for an opportunity and you could just quickly interrogate one.”

“We could, but the encampments seem to be quite well guarded, and I haven’t seen anybody move by themselves—even the guards move in groups of a dozen or more. We can definitely try it if we can’t come up with something else,” Alanah explained.

“True…” Derek said, then an idea struck him. “Wait… I think I know what we can do.”

“You do?”

“Yeah…” Derek said. “We just need an elf, right?”

“We do…” Alanah answered.

“Any elf?” Derek asked.

“Well… oh…” Alanah said with half a chuckle. “I see. I suppose it would be better if the elf was at least moderately strong.”

“I know just the person,” Derek said, then he and the siren took off—moving to a place far enough away so that nobody would be able to see him and his skill or sense him or the dreadful aura that may be released.. “I’ll be right back.” With a quick rip in space, he stepped through his portal, closed it behind him—the longer it stayed open, the more risk of someone finding it. Derek then pushed his Void Sense to the max and began searching. Dang… that’s a bit further away than I was thinking it was going to be, he thought. Oh, well… here goes.

While waiting for Derek to get back from fetching whomever it was he was going to get, Alanah sighed. Her time on the planet and in her current system was almost up. As someone who was great at hiding her emotions and showing restraint, it was all she could do to not appear a mess on the outside because of her internal anxiety. The time it took to cross the sea took longer than she had expected—she honestly thought that, with their speed, it would take no more than a few days to make it across.

That was naïve, Alanah thought. It’s been ages since I made the journey. I can barely remember the events on the sea, much less how long it took me to make it across. Especially when one day begins to blend with another… she thought, but would she have done anything differently? No, most likely not. I shouldn’t have looked for Void Beasts, she thought. No… then I would have never met Asher, and I wouldn’t have learned so much about Void Beasts.

It doesn’t matter, Alanah thought. If I don’t make it, I don’t make it. I don’t even know if anything is still there. It’s my fault for putting off this trip for so long… but how was I supposed to know I would end up having a time limit? She sighed aloud. I could always try to take one of the guards while nobody is looking and command him to tell me what’s going on. It would be a little risky, but if it’s nothing major, we could just brute force our way through. We won’t be followed deep into the danger area, and if we are… A glint of ruthlessness flashed through Alanah’s eyes. There is no love lost between me and the people of this country.

About that time, the same dreadful sense appeared out of nowhere. That was fast, Alanah thought. I wonder who he got. I hope it’s not that cranky old man. He’d start a fight trying to find out with his crassness.

She turned to where the sense was the strongest and waited a couple of seconds. Finally, a rip in the space in front of her appeared, and Derek stepped out carrying a man. Oh… I guess he’ll do, Alanah thought, then said, “Duke… it so nice of you to help us in our time of need.”

“What? Why… Ms. Swan?” Ryven muttered, apparently shocked at the events taking place.

“Did he… did he just snatch you up without saying anything?” Alanah tilted her head and asked.

“They all seemed busy,” Derek said as he closed the portal behind him. “I didn’t want to distract them when I only needed one, and there were so many to choose from. I just grabbed the one closest to me. To tell you the truth, I was going to bring back Osian, but he seemed to be the busiest of the bunch, so I fetched the next to the best thing… his brother.”

“Hmm…” Alanah muttered. “Osian would have been better,” she said. “He is much more diplomatic.”

“That’s what I thought,” Derek replied. “But I figured a duke would do.”

“A duke would do?” Ryven asked, confused. The man was obviously still trying to wrap his head around what was going on. “Where are we?” He looked around. “And what is this duke supposed to do?”

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