DD5 ~ Chapter 1!

While he knew that the delegates of the various races hadn’t exactly been on good terms, walking in on a full brawl wasn’t what Dale had been expecting. He opened the door to the council chambers just in time for a spray of blood to splatter on his face, the first blood drawn in the rapidly escalating conflict.

Dale stood in shock for a long moment, but The Master stepped in authoritatively and bellowed, “Hold, you fools! What is happening here?”

“Master!” A black-robed necromancer limped over, grimacing from both pain and anger. “Our undead have been constantly under assault, being attacked or destroyed!”

“So, you found and confronted the person doing this?” The Master looked around the now-silent room menacingly.

The necromancer seemed pained. “Not… quite. A few of us came in seeking information, but they are all denying that they-”

“None of us are attacking your disgusting meat puppets!” An Amazonian woman kicked over a table and stalked over. “We don’t care at all about them! We have our own issues to deal with!”

“The issue is not one of us attacking you!” Another man stood forward, his quartz-lens spectacles gleaming. “There has been a shift recently, and as far as I have been able to determine, it began with the fall of Valhalla.”

Dale grew concerned, this sounded… familiar. The unknown scholar continued speaking. “I'm uncertain what exactly happened there, but as soon as the City was destroyed... the energies of the world began to change.  This is what I have been trying to tell all of you.”

“Oh, stop it already! We have heard your insane conspiracy theories, we have discussed them, and we have dismissed them. A single City could not have been the key to the entire world's supply of Essence.” This time, it was an Elven man who spoke, his scathing tone forcing the unknown scholar to wilt and slink away. “When someone knows what is actually happening, or has a theory that is not impossible, we will discuss again. Until then we have more pressing issues.”

This time it was a Dwarf who took the reins of the conversation, glaring at the necromancers and gripping a double-bladed axe. “Like the fact that these filthy necromancers attacked us without provocation? I feel that we need to remind them of their place."

“I said enough of this.” The Master looked at the person who had been struck, noting that their wound was already healed. “No lasting harm has been done, and this will not happen again! Now, as for what we are going to do about the fragments falling to the earth-”

"Not our issue."  The Dwarven delegation stood as one and began moving toward the door. "My people have already begun our retreat to the deeps. So long as the planet itself is not cracked in half, we will have nothing to fear."

He paused, hesitating at the door. "We are not uncaring of the plight the surface dwellers face, we will accept any who wish to flee the surface… as indentured servants. Unfortunately, we cannot allow the secrets of our people to see the light of day, and this is a rule that we must enforce.  The doors to Centrum in Domum Suam will be open for one week, after that… we hope your ancestors will accept you with honor."

Dale looked over at The Master, confusion written large on his face. "Are you just going to let them go without saying anything?"

The Master wore a pained expression, but simply nodded. "As powerful as I am, right now I cannot devote the power that would be required to press this issue. If I am correct, we have less than a month to save as many as possible. We do not have the time to save those who do not want to be saved. In fact, as we do not know how we are going to save ourselves, their plan may turn out be the only viable one."

“It won’t help.” Dale’s prophetic words rang into the suddenly silent room. “At best, it will only prolong their deaths as the world dies around them.”

Silence reigned for a long moment, but then Queen Brianna of the Dark Elf nation added her voice. “Dale… what are you talking about?”

Put on the spot, Dale told the gathered people what he knew about the recent shift in the world’s Essence. To be on the safe side, he left out the parts about it being the dungeons fault. To the gathered group, not having information about the source of the issue lent credence to his ideas only being a wild conspiracy theory.  A majority of them ignored his words, but Brianna seemed troubled and approached him, asking for a private conversation.

“Dale, my people are far more sensitive to the fluctuations of Essence then even others within our own species. We have trained our bodies and our constitutions to feel the slightest difference, always in the mindset of finding a new home or finding a scrap of Essence-rich Silverwood pollen. Some time ago, we felt that dense zones of Essence were being directed to flow in new channels.” Brianna paused, watching Dale’s reaction carefully. “What do you know of this?”

“More than I want to.”

~ Cal ~

“Cal, can I make a request?” Dani’s tone, more than the words, worried me.

<What’s up?>

“So, you know that there are things that I keep from you. Things like the training that Grace has to go through.” Dani trailed off uncertainly.

<Well, now I’m really interested in seeing where you’re going with this.> I chuckled at her wry groan.

“I just needed to mention… if there isn’t a way to divert this disaster, I might need to ask that we go to…”

<Ye~e~es?> I drew the word out, but stopped trying to make jokes when I saw how uncomfortable she was. <Dani, what is it?>

“If the world is going to die from Essence reduction, I need to ask you to bring us to the Will-of-the-Wisp homeland and save anyone that might be there.” Dani finished her thoughts in a rush. 

<Wait… hold on a moment.> I tried to mentally adjust. <I thought there was no information on your origins. I thought that anything you knew was passed down from previous generations. Any time we came close to anything that gave you a clue, you about lost your mind!>

“I know, I know.” Dani let out a long sigh and bobbed in place for a few long seconds. I wisely gave her the space she needed. I didn’t mind as long as I got to hear about what she was hiding. “So… Wisps are typically bound to a single location. We can’t generate our own Essence, and we can’t really grasp what is around us. We need a partner that can devote power to empowering us. This mean… almost certainly that my race is a created race. We are not natural creatures. Even symbiotes in nature have some self-sustainability.”

<Right, I’ve figured that much out.> I was glared at for my interruption, even though she had stopped speaking for multiple seconds.

“This is known information, but over the centuries… other aspects became hazy. Nothing can be perfectly described thousands of times. But, one thing that we all know is that if there ever comes a time where our species would be wiped out, we need to do everything possible to return home.” Dani would be hyperventilating if she had lungs. “Whatever the secret is, all I know for sure is that there is there is a powerful guardian protecting it. Powerful enough that there has never been a Wisp that violated the taboo of making the journey.”

<So… let me know if I am getting this correct. You want us to make a trip to your extended family as the world is ending, find a way to get past something that nothing has ever survived since the very beginning, and… what? Save it? Figure out your history and preserve it when no one else can?> I loved the mystique, but I had a Runecrafted multi-alloy bunker I had already made plans to visit for a few millennia. <Can I interest you in a ‘not a chance in the Abyss’ during this trying time?>

“I understand that it seems like a bad plan, but I think it is something I might have to do.” Dani stopped me from speaking, finishing her thought. “Not something we need to worry about right now, just something you need to be aware of.”

<Alright, I guess.> I cast about for something to focus my efforts on. <I’m going to go tweak my elementals. I think I found a way to increase their Mana output, and I want to see if it works.>

“It’s good to stay busy.” Dani announced breezily. I tried to determine if she was teasing me, but after eyeing her suspiciously for a few moments, I let my attention move to other things.