The relic

"Is that?" I asked and he cut me short even not finishing my sentence.

"Yes, this is the shrine and this is the mountain." His ghost explained and then the action under us started going forward.

"What is this?" The woman named Famia asked the younger version of the man standing beside me. "It looks like a pile of stones or something." She added while he was holding his chin with a thinking look.

"It's not just some stones if it's protected by a forcefield. Remember that. This seems to give out some very weird magic waves… Do you feel it?" The man looked at his student while I was looking down at the two of them.

"I do actually… It's something very disturbing… I don't know why." She answered and looked at the stones more interested, slowly approached it, and touched the shrine. That moment went on for a little longer not knowing why, the stone shone red. The man with a name I couldn't pronounce pulled her out of it.

"Famia?! Are you okay?!" He screamed almost and the shrine went back to the blue, passive color.

"Aaaaaaaah!" She screamed really loudly and started going backward just like Estel did before. Crawling backward with her legs.

"What happened? What did you see?!" He was trying to get the answer out of his student to try and help her in any way he can.

"Demons… Monsters! That's hell! It's like… Images of hell appeared in my mind, when I tried to pull out of it, I just couldn't. It was taking me back inside to see more. Like… People, children, and women. Like… Children then went to some insane people trying to kill each other, afterward people eating so much that they would just blow up from the amount. I-I-I… can't put it in my words. It was just pure hell!" She was screaming everything out, pulling the lungs outside.

"Are you okay? That's what I am asking. I will have a look at it myself, if you saw demons it certainly won't affect me. I am a demon myself." He answered the elvish woman laying right before his eyes.

"Yes, I'm good now…" She took a very deep breath. "I will make a barrier around us since you want to check it out yourself." Her hands with the wand made a great stomp in the ground, vines, large vines started surrounding them in a dome, one layer, second layer, and third layer. The first one is made from very thick vines, the second from already a normal barrier instead of vines actually and on that, the third layer, made of small vines, very small vines.

"Very nice barrier. Haven't seen you protect yourself for a long time but I see that you were able to make a spell yourself. Great!" He told his apprentice and she made had a smirk on her face. It disappeared instantly though as probably the demons she spoke of appeared in her mind.

"Made a spell?" I asked him because everyone until now told me that only imagination keeps us down.

"Oh, right, you don't know that. When you get to those higher ranks in power it's not just that. I can't exactly explain it because we don't have much time to talk just like this, but it just takes a lot more to create something when you want to use all power or a lot more than usual." The dark mist answered my question while making a gesture to watch what is happening under us.

"Thank you!" Famia made a very nice gesture, leaned down with left hand up and right hand on her heart, very pleased with the compliment.

"Okay, here I go." He also touched the shrine now, but the color didn't change to red. It stood blue and passive and even some glows of green were trying to punch through. It seems that the stones accepted him because of his demonic origins. He was standing there for a long time, maybe a day even. The whole day just to see what that 'artifact' whatever it means, does. In the meanwhile, the woman was looking at him and reading a book that manifested in her hands out of nowhere at one point.

When he finished, the man stood up and took a deep breath then gasped loudly. He looked upon his palm and the pile of rocks with a light above itself turned green.

"What did you see?" Famia asked, wondering if he saw what she saw or he was affected by it. He didn't seem so.

"The same things that you did but because of me being a demon already, it didn't affect me. It wasn't scary for me nor was it anything bizarre. Just a trip home hahaha." He started laughing out loud and the woman looked at him a little disturbed but still joined him.

"And? Do you know what it does?" Another question came out of her mouth that even made me interested.

"I don't know actually, but I know that it's surely under my influence now. No matter who comes here and tries to take it won't make it." He explained to Famia about what would happen and for me, it sounded very anticlimactic, for her, apparently as well.

"What do you mean you don't know. You are the great mage, the one of the ancient. How do you not know how it works after touching it?" Maybe he will come up with a good answer to that, I want to know what that relic does.

"Even though I am old and you don't have to remind me of that, it doesn't mean that I can know everything about the world you know. It's not like I can do and know everything." That is a pretty well done answer but it is just so anticlimactic that it made me yawn.

"What? Is that answer too boring for you? If you saw the shrine, that means you probably know what that shrine can do… It just contained my soul right after my death that came to me not too long after finding the artifact. It was a year after when we were still in those grounds training, the mountain and everything on it was so old… A great thing but now is a curse." This answer is more suitable than the one before. A little more specific and a lot more interesting. "And I am now here… For a very long time, a time I don't even know." He added and again pointed at what is happening under us.

"Why do you have to be so smart! I hate that sometimes… But that's why I chose you as my teacher. You are smart, humble, and at least not like those other old pricks. Ugh…" She nodded and made a gesture of disgust.

"How did you know that I am not like the others haha." He again burst out laughing and looked at the woman who was trying to hold herself from shivering.

"Well, I knew you for some time when I was still a maid. You weren't doing some weird things to me and not trying to rape me or something like that." Is he a lord? A demon lord? Or what is he then… Who was he…

"Who were you before death?" I asked now with a very bad face, looking at him as an enemy. The royals… Disgust me at this point, I am bored with their plain existence.

"I was one of the mages in the old times that was in the council of the world, it consisted of the most powerful mages of the world, all races, and their kings. Most of the kings, not all." He is a royale… He is someone I shouldn't listen to… "I also know about your hate of royals. I know some of that since I got in touch with some of your thoughts and memories. I am not going to lie… You went through a lot of stuff. Even for me, a man that has lived for so long. You already lived through a lot. And I understand that hate… I wasn't born a royale out of any means, no. I achieved royalty from almost zero or even minus. I was a child from slums… But it's not the time for that now. Watch what is happening here." So he wasn't a child with a golden spoon next to him. That's a relief… But it still was very… Weird.

"Oh! I got something. I think that something will happen after my death. But what it is? No clue." She looked at him a little more interested but of course not wanting to see it for herself as he was her teacher. That makes sense.

"Let's go back to training. I don't want to be next to it anymore, it makes me feel sick…" When she finished the sentence, they left the place, flew away. The whole world then again changed to the red one and only me with now the dark fog and not just voice were left there.