CHAPTER ONE:

PART ONE:

The city of Stonehelm… It lay in ruin.

This great fortress town may have been broken through multiple times since it's construction in the forty eighth year of the Seventh Dragon, but never had it been brought to the point in which it was that day.

It was morbid.

The army of Nar-Heresh had been brutal throughout its attack. Many mangled and ripped fleshy bits lay scattered in the corners of all streets, the most intact ones having been turned to undead.

If that wasn't enough, necromancers used their black magic to piece together severed body parts and create unsightly abominations of flesh and bone.

Countless lives were lost that day. What few survived could not have seen darker times.

Clear lines of smoke rose from the city, markers of hellish fires soon to come, and a deathly silence. Such was the destruction that the undead legion wrought.

That had been without a doubt Stonehelm's darkest hour.

Sareth saw all of it.

From the decrepit gateway of an entrance into the lower tomb, he witnessed Stonehelm in it's worst state.

The young man stood as rigid as a statue when his eyes fell upon the city, without a single hint of what to do.

'What... Am I fighting for?' This question rang multiple times in his mind, each time striking deeper and deeper towards the one undeniable truth: he didn't know.

Sareth reached the end of his journey. It was relatively over, so to speak...

His father, Kha-Beleth, had been found, as per the original goal of his mission. But... Unlike what Sareth's previous master set him out to do, Phenrig could not have possibly foreseen that his pupil would go against the demon sovereign.

The Dark Messiah sealed his monster of a father forever in Sheog, or, delayed him further. He didn't know which.

'Sareth?' A voice rang telepathically through the young man's mind. 'Sareth answer me...' The clear longing in it made the prince finally snap out of his trance.

His left hand raised itself at forehead level and indicated a headache.

'I am here, Xana.' Despite having been in clear pain, Sareth responded to the woman he loved so much, the one for whom he renounced both father and heritage.

'Are you alright? Perhaps you should seek a place to fall asleep.' That day had been horrid...

Sareth had to fight his way through a city under siege, kill an undead cyclopes and descend into an abandoned necropolis.

Once there, more nightmarish foes awaited in the dark. His adversary, the one who orchestrated everything, Arantir, summoned a skeletal dragon through which the young man had to go through in order to reach the necromancer.

And after it was all over... The altar revealed itself... Sareth had to use the Skull of the Seventh Dragon and shatter the prison which held his father and his kin.

But he didn't.

He did not do it.

The man clad in armor, with a sword which literally ate souls, whom killed so many larger than life beasts and bested death numerous times, could not do it.

The reason was simple: Sareth was naive.

He permitted his lack of knowledge and experience to get in the way of things.

Sareth simply could not comprehend in that moment, the consequence of destroying the prison of Sheog.

The prince shook his fists. He had too feeble a mind to understand the meaning of fulfilling his role as the Demon Messiah.

Yes, Sareth was the Messiah prophesied by the wizard Sar-Shazzar so many centuries ago. He was aware of that.

"Milord!" Once more, snapped from his trance.

A single moment of looking around, Sareth spotted, and was approached by, a man clad in armor.

"Duncan? You are still alive?"

"Yes and not just I. The undead suddenly dropped, so a part of Stonehelm's populace might have survived. I don't know how many though."

Sareth sighed a breath of relief and smiled. His part to play in this appeared to have ended.

"Milord, was it your doing?" Sareth nodded. "Praise Ylath! Its finally over!" Duncan celebrated.

But Sareth didn't.

"Duncan, let's search for whoever survived."

"Right."

"And be prepared should we encounter any undead still standing."

PART TWO:

Sareth and Duncan settled on making for the main building in the center of the city, all the while searching for any survivors along their way.

In the middle of Stonehelm stood Menelag's mansion, the previous ruler of the free city. Sareth recalled the advent which caused Menelag's death: slain by the filthy claws of Arantir's ghoul over a Shantiri crystal just so that the necromancer could open a portal to Nar-Heresh.

Another reason why Sareth put a blade through Arantir's gut.

They chose to go there specifically because the building was fortified. It was well known to the populace that if the city was to be under siege, Menelag's mansion was the most secure area for the citizens to seek refuge.

As the two walked on bloodied roads amidst burned houses, Duncan drew Sareth's attention: "Milord! Look there!"

What they saw was a group of survivors which were exiting a relatively undamaged stone building. They consisted of two swordsmen clad in armor just like Duncan, a wizard dressed in blue robes with a wooden staff and four villagers whom were equipped with their regular work clothes, but also had knives, hammers and broomsticks as means of defending themselves.

Having seen each other, the two parties approached. There was absolutely no hostility between them, but rather, they were rushed by the same joy as that of seeing friendly troops on a chaotic battlefield.

It was a sense of friendship one would find only amongst members of the same species in very dire situations.

"Thank Ylath!" A soldier had started.

"We thought for sure we won't find anymore living people around." The other one continued.

"Consider the Dragon Gods to be on your side today lads." Duncan said and raised a hand to point at Sareth. "Cause this here is lord Sareth, trusted friend of lord Menelag, hero who killed the necromancer that assaulted our fair city!"

Sareth felt he might dig a hole and bury himself underground due to the embarrassing exposition Duncan just cooked up for him. And the other party? They gasped a silent 'Holy Ylath!' at what they'd just heard.

After a moment of silent admiration, one of the villagers managed to ask:"Is it true?"

To which Sareth silently shook off his embarrassment and nodded. Someone might have gulped.

"To be fair-" Duncan began. "-an actual demonstration would be more believable I'd say."

'Ugh, please. You could turn them all to cinder in a second if you wanted.' The voice of Xana echoed through Sareth's mind, but he saw no reason to agree with what she had just said.

"There will be a time for such bravado Duncan, but right now, we need to see to the city."

"Ah, spoken like a true hero. Lead on Milord!"

Their group now numbered nine people which marched in union towards Menelag's mansion. That place also acted as a headquarter of operations, much like a castle did in many other free city of the Empire.

And as such, the main building of Stonehelm was protected by a secondary wall, which served as a 'last line of defense' kind of thing. During a siege, villagers were brought to safety within those walls.

They just had to hope that the garrisoned unit there still held.

PART THREE:

Several minutes later, they had reached the second line of defense and to their dismay, there was no sign of there ever having been a gate.

"What on Asha's green earth..." The voice was silent but had been heard amidst their group, from farther back.

Sareth, positioned at the front, with Duncan at his side, stood speechless, much like everybody else there. They were all in awe at the supposed last 'line of defense', having been broken through, with no portcullis or recognizable gateway anywhere in sight.

In equal manner, the ground was surprisingly not covered in blood or corpses and the mansion looked to still be intact.

They stood nary a moment, before life showed itself in the form of a wounded guard. The man slowly approached them through the breach and clung to the wall.

When he fell down, one of the soldiers from Sareth's group and the wizard rushed at him. The guard drew his weapon and scanned the surroundings whilst the sorcerer casted healing spells upon him.

"Clear!" The soldier who stood watch spoke.

The remaining seven approached.

"Can you tell us what wounded you and if its still around?" Duncan asked the one that was healed. Since the wizard removed the helmet and lowered the chainmail protecting the head, Sareth could see in that moment just how young the wounded one was.

He was surely an adolescent. That meant he was even younger than Sareth.

Phenrig helped the demon Sovereign's son to come of age just so that Sareth could fulfill his role as the Dark Messiah. Such world shattering actions were usually left to those who had more experience in their life, were older and wiser...

But not with him.

Sareth had been raised till the moment he was destined to reach his full learning potential and then sent into the world to change history forever.

It surprised the Dark Messiah that one much younger than him was assigned as a guard and given adult responsibilities so soon.

'I don't see why you're making such a big deal out of it.' Xana added.

"A-" The boy began, clearly in pain. "A ghoul."

"And is it dead?" The boy used his head to indicate a 'no'. "Is there more than one?" He then nodded, causing the interrogator to silently curse.

Duncan then turned to Sareth for leadership, who in turn, gave a 'what?' look.

'He's asking you what they should do!' Xana enlightened him.

"Ah, we should search the mansion for any more survivors. You and I." Duncan nodded. "The rest of you remain here and be on the lookout for-"

Sareth interrupted himself because he thought he heard a noise. The noise repeated itself the next second as a stomp sound, which only then alerted everyone else.

Their heads scattered in all directions as the continuous stomp noises became increasingly louder.

And then it showed itself.

Out of the corner of the path way that they had just transgressed, came hideousy made manifest.

An unsightly abomination.

It was an aberration. A pile of incomplete corpses forced to fit together to make a bigger monster. This one was surely as big as a cyclopes.

It approached on three main limbs. Two in the front and one in the back. Its loud moans of pain scared the villagers and made them run to the far back of the group while everyone else held their ground.

"Gods..." One of the villagers had whispered in fear of the bitterly ugly misconception of a being.

'Ugh, disgusting! Even for servants of the spider goddess!' Xana thought she was going to puke inside Sareth's mind.

Sareth swallowed his fear as he had done many times in the past and stepped forward. Having seen him advance, no one else there felt like doing or saying a single thing.

The distance between the party and the beast was a solid thirty meters.

The moment Sareth pulled out his sword was the moment the aberration increased its pace into a three limbed charge.

Having enough time, Sareth raised his left hand and pointed it at the thing.

"Lightning." Was all he needed to say before his hand instantly shot a bolt of blue hot energy in the approaching thing's body.

The impact the spell made was evident as the hideous mass of flesh slowed its advance considerably. But that was by no means enough to put the beast down for good.

The next second however, the aberration resumed charging at full speed as if nothing ever happened.

Sareth brought his left hand below his chin in the form of an upright sign and whispered: "Sanctuary".

Immediately after, magic surrounded him in a transparent bubble. This spell was designed to protect the user from enemy attacks for a limited time or until it could no longer bear outside pressure.

Next, he charged at it.

When the distance between them was of three meters, the aberration slowed down and raised one of its forward limbs to squash Sareth. But being a cunning warrior, the young man fucked forward and beneath the beast so as to both its attack as well as launch one of his own.

His blade, Soulrend, pierced till the aberration's core and buried itself in the thing up until the hilt.

The limb it previously raised to attack crashed to the ground behind Sareth, seemingly lifeless. The warrior then focused for a second and channeled magic into his blade.

The next instant, the beast was encased in a torrent of vigorous fire that burned furiously, leaving naught but ashes and cinder in the wake of its devastation.

The onlookers were flabbergasted. The talk about lord Sareth killing the enemy necromancer leader seemed far more believable now.

PART FOUR:

Sareth calmly returned to the group, all of which were in awe… Except Duncan.

Duncan held a look of 'I told you' towards the other guards, the mage and the villagers. He happened to see Sareth's martial prowess and magical expertise before, during the expedition to get a hold of the Skull of Shadows.

He knew better than anyone there that Sareth was fully worthy of leadership over Stonehelm. Over… What remained of Stonehelm.

"Milord." Duncan started. "I've looked through the main door of the mansion. Everything appears to be clear. No sign of the enemy or our own."

"Let's enter." Sareth replied firmly, his composure regained since he killed the aberration.

Admittedly, the young man's spirit nearly faded away after his battle with Arantir, more specifically, upon returning to the surface.

Now that Sareth had killed something, his demeanor as a man returned, which allowed him to impress Xana once again and proceed farther in his journey.

'Huh... My journey... Where will this one lead?'

'Have you become an adventurer?' Sareth nearly forgot that Xana lived inside his head ever since he left Phenrig's mansion. But unlike Menelag, his master's house was not located in the middle of one of the free cities.

So as not to offend Xana by having done monologue, Sareth shut up.

The first time he entered the mansion was due to the privilege of a private meeting with the lord of Stonehelm. Second was when the city was silently infiltrated at night by Arantir's black guard, a thing which resulted in Menelag's death and the loss of the Shantiri crystal.

Fortunately, Sareth was able to recover it later down the road.

The interior was extravagant, just as Sareth knew it would be. Upon having entered, two sets of stairs to the sides led up to a throne room, a place where Sareth once broke a massive chandelier's suspention chain to make it come down and swing back and forth until it killed either him, or the black guards of Arantir he happened to be fighting at the time.

Since his last visit, the chandelier had been brought back up, with hardly any signs that a battle ever took place there.

"Duncan, where are the safe shelters?"

"At the lowest level. We'll need to walk quite a bit until there."

"Lead the way."

"Hope there's no undead along the way… Wouldn't want to see them anywhere near out peasants!"

After what seemed like a dozen rooms and coridors empty of any form of human presence alive or dead, the two arrived at the safe shelters.

They were essentially large reinforced rooms which could even withstand earthquakes if the need arose. They were beneath the mansion.

There was a great moment of suspense and fear for the people and guards within when the stone door machinery activated and granted access to the outside world.

And then it all calmed down as Duncan and Sareth entered.

"Here you all are." Duncan began. "The enemy's been defeated!" He had said earning a cheer from everybody there.

But Sareth felt unsettled. The young guard back at the second line of defense was attacked by a ghoul. The prince kept his eyes open so that no undead sneaked up on him.

"And this here is our savior!"

"Wh-" Sareth dumbfounded looked back at the crowd.

PART FIVE:

A deathly silence permeated the air.

Down there, in the crypt beneath the city, a bald, middle aged man in a gray coat looked with disdain at what was the corpse of a necromancer.

"Is this what the Demon Messiah is capable of?" His voice contained fury at the sight of the decapitated body.

The man's right hand extended forward and caused the head of the necromancer to levitate up to him. Its expression was one of regret and sorrow.

"Awaken Arantir." With commanding words the head regained consciousness, even separate from the body.

"… My master…" Arantir began, setting eyes straight. "I... have failed you..."

"So you have." The man's reply showed disappointment. "I do not recall teaching you how to fail."

"The demon bastard… He was stronger than we anticipated."

"Is that so? I remember your bravado when speaking of how you will ensure that Sar-Shazzar's prophecy would never come to fruition."

"I assure you, I will finish the job."

There was the sound of footsteps coming from behind him.

"Your defeat has caused me to already set new events in motion."

"But-"

"Perhaps your very own apprentice will outperform you."

"No!" Was all Arantir could speak before his head was turned to dust…