The Secret in the Forest

The traveler walked for several minutes through the great forest and was already quite far from the capital. The dense vegetation acted only as a small obstacle to the traveler, who covered great distances even on that rugged terrain.

Pagui remained on his shoulder, despite taking flight a few times to hunt something hidden in the bushes.

After a long time, Sariel found the place he was looking for. Before him were the ruins of what had once been a city of the kingdom in the forest. Due to neglect, the vegetation invaded the houses, and enormous roots grew under the streets, damaging the stone paths.

"Great, now... where was it again?"

The traveler headed towards the center of the ruins and entered several houses, examining the walls, floors and objects he found.

As he approached, Pagui became increasingly agitated.

"No need to get nervous, friend. I'm here to protect you," he said, stroking the bird, which calmed it down a bit.

After a few minutes of searching, Sariel entered a small house and investigated all four corners. It was then that, upon lifting a large, old, dusty rug, he found a diamond-shaped hole in the floor about a finger thick.

"Found you..."

Then he took the silver stone he had found earlier and inserted it into this hole.

In response, the floor began to glow intensely in a silver light, and several lines formed around the stone. From each of its four vertices emerged lines that created the shape of several rectangles, as the floor gradually descended, revealing a staircase to the basement.

Sariel looked suspiciously at the path before him.

"Hmm, this is too ingenious to have been built by the inhabitants... Especially considering that they mainly possessed the Reanimation and Nature element, and not Sealing," he murmured. "Pagui, you'd better stay out here. Stay somewhere high, and if you see someone approaching, hide."

In response, the bird left the traveler's shoulder and disappeared into the forest.

"Here I go."

Sariel descended the stairs slowly, carefully observing the structure of this underground hideout.

As he went deeper, the darkness became more and more absolute. However, this was not a problem for the traveler, as he raised his right hand, emitting a brown glow, and condensed all this glow into a small sphere the size of a grain of bean. As the light concentrated, its color changed gradually, leaving the brown tone and becoming purely white.

This light floated just in front of Sariel and illuminated the path well. Nothing happened during his descent.

Finally, the traveler reached the last step and found himself in a room small enough to be fully illuminated by his light.

At first glance it seemed that there was nothing interesting, just some stone tables with old papers on them.

The traveler approached a table, picked up the nearest paper and read it.

"...However, we observe that the Nature Element and the Reanimation Element, although present in humans, are much rarer among the twelve elements compared to us. The most widely accepted thesis at the moment is that... "

Sariel narrowed his eyes, but the rest of the page was completely burned.

Looking closer, he realized that all the papers were scientific materials written by Angels. The subjects they dealt with were broad and varied and were mostly torn or burned.

There was another sheet that caught his attention, written in the language of Angels.

"What is this?" he asked himself while struggling to translate the text. "Di-Dies Irae?"

Dies Irae, was the title at the beginning of the page. Reading what was written was an extremely difficult task, as the sheet was very damaged.

"Qua-Quantus tremor est fu-futurus... When iudex est ventu-venturus... Cuncta stricte dis-discusurus..."

The rest of the sheet was illegible.

"What does this mean?" Sariel was confused. Most angelic texts found in the human world were translated into the general language of Vilon, so texts written in the language of Angels meant that they were of extreme importance.

As it would be impossible to decipher what that text would be about without being complete, Sariel examined the room more carefully. The whites of his eyes emitted a brown glow and scanned every inch of the place.

And thanks to his attention, he found several interesting items: An angelic sword with a chipped blade, remnants of an Angel statue, overgrown plants that did not exist in that region, and even shards of magic stones.

In addition, he found items left more recently: food leftovers, bowls and cups, clothes from the Scorched Mountain and fragments of a dark purple stone.

Finally, he found a secret passage. Yes, a secret passage hidden in a secret passage.

The passage was a large block of stone that was cut millimetrically to measure so that it was not even possible to see its outline on the wall.

After pushing the stone for a few meters, it caught on something and made a sound, as if it had activated something. Then the stone fell to the ground, revealing a corridor.

The moment he saw the corridor, Sariel felt a magical energy that he knew very well.

"Conjuration, huh?"

He then extinguished his sphere of light and advanced completely into the darkness.

When he was near the end of the corridor, he realized that it opened into another room, from where he could hear voices conversing and some lights. The traveler decided not to take any chances and, by enveloping his body in a pink light, became invisible and entered the room.

What he saw next was dozens of people focused on different activities such as reading, arm wrestling, and eating.

Most wore the clothes of the Scorched Mountain, however there was one person with a large black cloak and a hood sitting at the end of the room and in front of a table. On this table, there were dozens of purple stones, dark-colored weapons and corpses of animals and humans.

Sariel didn't think twice and immediately undid his invisibility and advanced towards those who were closest to him.

His first victims were two men who were sitting at a table talking calmly. Both died before they could even feel the blade cutting their heads.

Next, he charged at a woman and kicked her in the chest, throwing her against the wall. Upon impact, all her ribs broke and pierced her lungs and heart.

Then, he pierced the hearts of two men, and with one punch he exploded a woman's head.

It was only after killing six that people realized what was happening. Those who were closest tried to draw their weapons and cast Fire magic, but were killed before they could do anything.

After killing almost half of those present, they finally counterattacked by launching a storm of purple fire at the traveler. The flames seemed capable of consuming everything and plunged furiously into the invader.

Surrounded by fire, the traveler was soon completely burned and charred, falling to the ground defeated.

A man approached the charred body and kicked it.

"Aha! Did you really think you could-"

Boom!

Suddenly, the man was hit by something invisible and had his lungs crushed by what appeared to have been a punch. The force threw him against another, who failed to dodge his partner.

And it didn't stop there, Sariel's body had disappeared from where it was, and then everyone started being thrown, cut and pushed by something invisible.

People tried to defend themselves, predict and attack the invisible target, but failed miserably and died uselessly.

Everyone died except for the one wearing the dark cloak. His attacks seemed random, but they targeted someone that only he could feel.

However, being able to see and being able to hit are two completely different things.

Since there was no longer a need to remain invisible, the traveler dispelled his illusion and advanced towards the man, grabbing him by the neck and suspending him in the air. The man tried to injure Sariel with his dark flames, but a golden barrier appeared around him and blocked all magic.

"Are you the leader? I expected you to be stronger..."

"Die! You cannot resist the power of Elgor!"

The man's face was old and full of wrinkles, and his eyes had a glint of evil.

"Be quiet..." Sariel brought his hand to the man's face and touched his forehead.

However, this time he only invaded his mind for a few seconds and was expelled immediately afterwards.

"You won't be able to get anything from me! Elgor is absolute!"

The traveler stood still, closed his eyes for a few seconds and, when he opened them again, touched the man's face once more.

The man couldn't resist this time, and his entire life was revealed to Sariel at once.

The contact lasted only a few seconds, but it was enough to completely scramble the man's memories, who almost fainted from the invasion. He felt dizzy, and his head ached so much that it felt like it was going to explode from the inside out.

Without lingering, the traveler grabbed the man's upper and lower jaws with both hands, and in a single pull, separated them from each other, leaving his head without the upper half. Due to the brutality of that execution, his face was drenched in the man's blood.

Sariel dropped the body on the floor and looked at the top of the head he held in his hands. It was possible to clearly see part of the cervical spine, whose vertebrae were still connected to the skull.

"Elgor... The God of Combat Elements..."

The traveler then discarded the head as if throwing away a ball and destroyed all the items that were on the table, being even more aggressive with the purple stones, being satisfied only when nothing remained but dust. Then he took one of the torches that was on the walls and burned everything, including the bodies, food and any loose papers.

Then he turned and walked back to the surface.

"The mountain..."

As he returned, a persistent question repeated itself in his mind.

"This underground hideout... was built after these houses... It's definitely a sanctuary of the Angels..."

The traveler passed through the corridor and headed for the stairs.

"And this kingdom was destroyed by the angels decades ago..."

He was halfway up his climb.

"It's another place the Angels decided to destroy after building, for some reason..."

Sariel reached the surface and removed the silver stone from the hole, causing the passage to hide again.

"The inhabitants knew about that place and even visited it... That makes no sense at all..." He was silent for a brief moment. "Hey! Pagui!"

But there was no answer.

"Pagui?"

Sariel focused on listening, when he noticed the cry of a bird approaching slowly. Therefore, he ran towards the sound and came across a familiar figure grabbing Pagui by the neck.

"Hunac? What are you doing here?"

The general approached with the bird still in his hands.

"Preventing what you want to do!"

"The mountain..."

"I know very well what you want to do with the mountain, so I'm going to stop you!" Hunac said confidently. "I also know what you did with Sak-Lu and Ti-Chaak, you can be sure that the whole kingdom will hunt you down!"

"Let go of Pagui. Now."

The bird struggled, flapped its wings and made a heartbreaking sound, but the general's grip was firm and would not allow it to escape.

"Oh? Okay."

Crack!

A loud sound of something being broken echoed in the traveler's ears. The bird, which until then had been crying in pain and asking for help, became motionless, with its head dangling limply.

"Here." The general threw the bird towards the traveler.

Pagui's body flew towards him. However, instead of falling to the ground, the corpse floated gently to Sariel, who held it with one arm in the same way that a newborn is held. He watched the bird in silence, and did not move.

"What was that? Are you sorry? He would be alive if you hadn't manipulated him!"

Sariel did not answer.

"I see you're not willing to talk, in that case" The general's entire body was covered in intense purple flames, "I'll kill-"

Whoosh!

The traveler disappeared completely from his field of vision. This time it was different from when he pretended not to have seen him moving when they faced each other in the arena.

Thud!

Hunac felt an impact on his back, followed by something wet running down his chest. Looking down, he saw a hand piercing his chest and holding his heart with the veins still connected.

"Wh... what?"

In a single motion, the hand retracted and ripped his heart out through his back. With the lack of the organ, the general felt his body weaken and fell to the ground.

The traveler stood beside him and dropped the heart in front of Hunac's face. Then, he stepped on the organ, squeezing all the remaining blood out of it - like wringing out a wet cloth -, painting the general's face with his own blood.

"You... You won't stop me..."

Sariel turned and disappeared into the forest, with Pagui still in his arms and the sunlight beginning to illuminate the tops of the trees.