[THE NORTHERN BORDER OF TERRA SANCTAEFI]
Mercurius and Leznar arrived in a snowy glade. After almost two weeks of traveling since leaving Xastol, they had at last made it to their home base, the Eclipse Guild headquarters. The trees and flowers were of a strange sort. They were not your typical plants with stems, nor saplings with wood branches or the like. No, everything was made of ice here, down to the very snowed-over dirt below them. The area of Sanctaefi was reputable for its eternal winter and harsh climate capable of easily killing anyone who was underdressed for the weather in mere seconds, which made it the perfect place to hide from the watchful eyes of the Church of Gabriel.
Ahead, near the end of the glade, stood the great Bridge of Frozen Echoes, carved from the very bedrock of ancient glaciers and suspended impossibly high above a sheer chasm. Wind howled through the arches beneath, carrying a haunting resonance that echoed like distant whispers of the dead. Monolithic cliffs of ice-flanked stone rose on either side, carved smooth by centuries of frostbite winds. A lone guard stood at the edge — small, unmoving — wrapped in a frost-lined Eclipse Guild cloak, with a burnt and faded banner of a dead kingdom snapping in the gale above them.
Their face was haunting: bearing a matte black mask stylized like a razorbill's beak, the chin and edges gleamed with an otherworldly sheen. At its center sat a gaping, singular eye socket filled with darkness. It was lined with rings, like it had been transforming into an actual solar eclipse. Even their robes, which had the dark green sheen of the Eclipse Guild as well as the emblem printed over their neck, felt muted and made of a different fabric. They draped and fractured like cracked porcelain edged with fine, golden struts that resembled exposed bones. Twisting dry ice branches crowned the figure's hood like a throned halo, echoing martyrdom.
Leznar watched as the masked operative held their hand up in front of Mercurius, forbidding him to advance without a single word, and stared at him silently.
"As thorough as always, eh?" Leznar whistled with mild amusement. "Though that's to be suspected from someone foolish enough to take up a post as the bridge's guardian." Mercurius smiled and raised both his arms, allowing the inspection. It was routine at this point.
"Don't bully Lucielle, Leznar. She's just doing her job."
Lucielle stepped aside, ignoring the lieutenant, and lowered her head in respect for her leader. "Good… hunt… Mercurius…?"
Her voice sounded scratchy and broken, like her vocal cords had not only been snapped but possibly drowned in blood, as a gurgle sounded after every word. Mercurius gave her a smiling nod. "I told you not to bow to me, you know. We're all equal here."
A sound escaped Luicelle's throat; something like a scoff. "I," she croaked, "...Will do what I want."
Mercurius went forward, continuing down the path with Leznar. "Of course you will," he said, holding up a peace sign. Their guild was not meant to be an organization like the Church or any of the other governments in Sanctaefi. Eclipse promoted a system of freedom that the outer world could never provide to people like them. Everyone here was free to do as they liked.
Guarding the approach like a sleeping behemoth, the Outer Fortress of Kaelthrim rose from the tundra — an obsidian mass embedded into the glacial cliffs. Great ramparts of blackened metal and ancient stone jutted like broken teeth from the snowfields. Frost clung to every edge. Massive gates, wide enough for siege engines, loomed half open as if yawning to devour intruders. The sound of distant machinery throbbed beneath the ice. This was no ordinary gate — it was a war-engine designed to withstand empires.
Cresting the ridge at the bridge's end, Mercurius beheld it: Verglas, a bastion of winter and iron will. The kingdom spiraled like a dark crown across the snow-caked mountainside, tiered in layers of spires, towers, and black stone halls. The old banners still flew — arctic and admiral blue, cold silver-threaded, bearing the kingdom's insufferable emblem: a gorgeous white stag eating shards from a broken crown.
Snowfall drifted like falling ash, flooding the air with the smell of old smoke and chilliness. Shadows moved quietly behind the dead city and vanished along the battlements lined with ice. Below, curling roads wove through the frozen villages — trails of long-gone fires and melted houses spread amongst the ground, forever marking it with the memory of the Eden Search. In the far distance, where a hive of lights, smoke, and steam could be seen, stood the citadel, stabbing at the storm-wracked sky. It was majestic. Cold. Untouched. Just as they'd left it.
"Home at last." Mercurius joked.
-------🅰🆂🅷🅵🅸🅴🅻🅳-------
[VERGLAS, ELYS DOUR — A FEW MOMENTS LATER]
From high atop a parapet, another operative watched as Mercurius entered the inner city, Elys Dour. Had more people lived here as they once had years ago, the kingdom's heart would have been pulsing with life. Instead, Elys Dour sprawled below, its twisting alleys and market lanterns flickering, its rooftops bowed under heavy snow, and the once towering cathedral of Solomon — its rooftop blasted away long ago — loomed over the mass of smaller buildings on the far end of the city, a bit removed, but still casting long shadows over the cobbled roads closest to it. Statues of forgotten kings and queens watched over the city, snow frosting their stony shoulders, but unable to turn them into ice after all this time. Such was the power of Verglas's old ability. The air hung thick with the weight of secrets and memory, but it didn't bother Mercurius one bit. He just continued down the streets, his coat flapping in the cold wind as he made his way to the citadel.
Funny, he mused to himself. It hasn't been that long since I left, and yet every time I return here, I find myself missing it more and more. Funny that: this wretched kingdom that caused everything… making me nostalgic? Runnulf and Malik would have had a laugh at that.
Then, the climb began. A long staircase — narrow, ancient, and treacherous — cut into the mountainside like a scar. They both ascended in silence, their boots crunching over the rising snow. Above, the Snowcryst — a castle of Iron Frost grew — larger, rising from the peak like a crown of shadow. Through the windows, Leznar noticed watchful eyes.
"It seems your men have been waiting for your return for some time now."
Mercurius lifted his head and looked at each of the spectators, flashing them a smile. "I guess I should be happy to be so loved."
As he said it, they'd finally come upon the top.
The bastion's summit held the Snowcryst like a shrine. Spires curled like claws around the structure, and icy banners whipped against its frozen ramparts. The great gate stood tall and shut, wrought from blackened steel and ringed in ancient runes. Ice coated their hinges, thick as armor. The crest above the arch — the kingdom's crest — was blotted out and destroyed. He'd taken great pride in doing it himself long ago.
Mercurius raised a gloved hand to knock on the door, but before he could, the heavy outer gates ground open, the cogs brushing off the frost and revealing a dim blue antchamber decorated with walls of black ice and veined with pale quartz. The ceiling rose high enough to vanish into the shadows, and the only light came from the chandeliers above that crackled with blue fire as they hung from thick, old chains.
Standing in the center of the chamber, just as Lucielle had done at the bridge, stood another operative: a handsome man with short, greyish hair and a thin smirk that only stretched to the left side of his face.
"So," the man said, eyeing them both. "You've returned safely at last."
His outfit, like Mercurius's, was customized for the snow. It was sturdy; more made of leather than cloth, and had fur rings around his collar, cuffs, and waist. By the right side of his body hung a hooked blade — a shotel sword.
Leznar walked inside and patted the snow off his shoulders. "What's the matter, Nauruan? Did you miss your leader?"
Mercurius followed after Leznar, clearing his hair of snow and hail as the gates shuddered to a close behind them. "Lieutenant, I told you to stop teasing everyone." Leznar waved his hand, uncaring, and smiled.
"You forget yourself, boy. I am not one for orders."
Mercurius gave him a "what am I going to do with you" sort of look and stopped in front of Nauruan. He looked him in his peach-colored eyes and smiled. "How have things been here?"
"Boring," Nauruan said with a flash of teeth. "I've been itching to cut something interesting for some time now." He rubbed his sword through the sheath. "Liberia is hungry for blood."
"Is violence all you know?" Mercurius groaned. He walked past him and placed his hand on a slot in the wall that read his palm signature.
DWRRRRRKKKK
The wall transformed into a thin barrier of ice and then slid into the floor. On the other side, a long ascending corridor lined with partially destroyed statues led to the heart of the keep. There were no handrails.
"Come," Mercurius said. Nauruan's lips parted in disbelief for a moment.
"Me?"
"Yes," Mercurius smiled. "I have need of you, comrade."
Nauruan's eyes sparkled with sadistic excitement as he left his post, eager to follow after his leader. If this meant what he thought it did, he might finally get a chance to cut something for the first time.
-------🅰🆂🅷🅵🅸🅴🅻🅳-------
The trio walked entered an expansive hall filled with tall, narrow, almost plantlike pillars of crystal, thin and sharp like reeds. Scattered about the hall were tables, bookshelves, windows, and doors. A strange draft of mist coiled at their ankles. Not even the castle walls could fully protect those within from the piercing snow. Within the hall, dozens of men and women in green robes chatted happily amongst themselves; some resting against a window, some up above on the balconies, and others lying on the ground. There were a few older operatives in their forties and early fifties, but most were in their mid-twenties or thirties. As far as the eye could see, the green mark of Eclipse filled the icy hall, but what was perhaps most chilling was that this was merely a fraction of their full force.
The moment the doors behind Nauruan closed, all speaking ceased. Eyes fell on Mercurius like the waves at a beach — heavy and pressuring. But then—
"So you survived after all!" someone jibed.
The room exploded with laughter as Mercurius rolled his eyes. "I told you it'd be a simple recovery mission. I don't know where you lot got it in your heads that I'd be dying."
"Mercurius, Mercurius," a man tutted. From out of the onlookers came out an operative with medium-length, tousled black hair accented with a chrome hue. They were soft looking and slightly messy, but purposefully styled to suit his face and almost hide his left eye to add a sense of mystery as to where he was looking. He wore a lopsided smirk with one eye narrowed in scrutiny and held a chilled drink in his hand. "You were supposed to let me know when you'd be coming back. I wanted to have a drink with you!"
"Maybe next time, Inizio," Mercurius chuckled. "I'm not too thirsty right now." Inizio's eyes twinkled as he sipped from his glass.
"A shame," he said. "You're so very interesting."
He wore a tight, black-green bodysuit in place of his Eclipse Guild's robes, but the emblem tattooed to his wrist made it more than clear how important the guild was to him.
The other followers surrounded him, each person greeting and asking him a question distinct from the last. Mercurius smiled at each one, welcoming and answering when he could. They were not a family here by any means, he knew that. But their kinship in the way of their shared goal brought about a sense of unity very few forces in the continent could match. He appreciated that.
Leznar, unamused by the displays of affection, slipped past everyone and made his way towards the door at the end of the hall where another antechamber stood.
Mercurius watched him go, understanding that he had to follow. There was important business that needed to be discussed.
"I'll speak to you all later, I promise," he said to everyone. "But right now, we have some important work that needs to be done."
He sauntered by the operatives, beckoning both Inizio and Nauruan to follow, and went through the door at the hall's end. In the sleek and circular antechamber, the high domed ceiling could finally be seen. There were marks of an old battle, as evidenced by the holes at the top that allowed small bursts of hail to rush in. Leznar waited for them in the room, resting against a chisled quartz door lined with silver. The other walls had an assortment of war weapons ranging from broadswords to scimitars to rapiers and ceremonial blades.
"As beautiful as always," Nauruan whistled as he inspected the weapons.
Inizio curiously tilted his head towards him, then Leznar, then Mercurius. A fanatic with a penchant for cutting, a strange man who mysteriously became Mercurius's lieutenant twelve years ago, and a ghost the continent believes to have died in this very kingdom during the Eden Search. His eyes shone with a salacious oddness as he licked his lips. Oh, how I'd love to wear each of their faces… even if just once.
Mercurius drew his weapon from inside his breast pocket: a sword handle made of ice and steel without a blade. He lifted it, sliding it into the slot in the wall next to Leznar, and pulled down to open the final door.
But it wasn't just a door. No, as Leznar backed away from the wall he leaned against, it rose into the frame above, opening up a path into the throne room: a vast inner sanctum carved from black ice and white stone, its floor a mirror-smooth reflection of those who stood above it, like a frozen over lake.
Frozen tapestries hung stiff on the walls, depicting forgotten battles and promises of legacy. The throne, raised on nine steps, was carved from a single block of translucent glacial ice so cold that if one who was not powerful enough to sit on it were to do so, they would instantaneously be frozen solid and die unaware of what had happened.
The ceiling was a towering vaulted arch, laced with frost and suspended crystal chandeliers holding long icicles like blades. The windows were slit-thin and high, bleeding pale light down the walls, but not daring to touch the throne. Instead, the two large cavities in the roof, which directly shone on the throne, showcased both the full moon and the morning sun.
This was the only place within the entire country where the effect of having both the brightest star in the Earth's orbit and its largest satellite had a breathtaking effect when reflected against the winters of Verglas:
an aurora borealis that lit up the citadel's peaks, as if blessing the ruined city with an angel's grace. Because of it, the faded portrait of a woman hanging above the throne could finally be seen. She looked stern, wise, and merciless, with a pure ice antler-like crown on top of her braided head.
Mercurius took a seat on the throne and adjusted his collar. "Please," he said with a snap of his finger. "Sit."
Several seats rose from the ground for each of the operatives.
A beat of silence hung in the air as the others adjusted themselves, but right as Mercurius opened his mouth to speak, he recalled something important.
"Nero isn't here?" he asked.
"No," Nauruan answered. "Hasn't been for weeks."
"Maybe he's still on assignment at the Church," Inizio smirked. "Funny that: an Eclipse Guild operative working with the very organization we aim to bring down. I would be worried for him if he wasn't the strongest of us Uppers."
"I'll brief him another time, then," Mercurius shrugged. The Uppers were his four strongest members of Eclipse, barring Lieutenant Leznar; they were his ultimate apostles — anarchists of destruction that he could rely on the most. Nero was ranked first, followed by Inizio, then Lucielle, whom he'd seen at the bridge, with Nauruan being the last ranked.
"In the meantime…" he said, looking to Leznar. "Regarding the Jidan Ore we had sent over a few weeks ago from Xastol… Is extraction going well?"
"Let's see," the lieutenant mused.
He slid his finger along a chiseled snowflake embedded in his armrest and summoned an old, cracked monitor from the ceiling above. It quivered as it came down before all five men, its screen dark and dank. The lights from the aurora borealis above colored it the moment it settled, painting a moving image of another place.
Mercurius and the others watched from a high angle as a long-haired woman in a green lab coat sat in a chair and sipped a plain black coffee. Her eyebags were sunken, and she had a piercing in her lower lip that she kept licking whenever she took a sip. She, like the other assistants who walked around in the background, wore black latex gloves marked with the Eclipse brand. By her side sat a man with a disfigured face, sitting limp in a wheelchair. The woman kept running her hands through his thin hair, humming a lullaby all the while. Behind the two sat four large rattling cages with human-sized shadows behind the see-through curtains they were covered with. Nauruan could vaguely hear the growling of something animalistic behind them.
"Leia," Inizio smiled. "As beautiful as always." He leaned forward and brushed back the bang in front of his left eye, revealing a deep burn mark in his hairline as he met the woman's rising gaze. He looked to her, then to the motionless man. "And Oscar..!" he said with fake concern, "You look horrible!"
From the other side of the cracked screen, Leia finally looked up, seeing Inizio, and fell into a fit of rage.
"YOU SON OF A BITCH! I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL YOU, YOU HEAR?!"
Nauruan's lip curled up into a smile as Leia grabbed the screen and shook it with all her might. Next to her, Oscar moaned in anguish, a tear sliding down his face.
Inizio whistled and forced a twisted smile. "Now, now, Leia. You're still angry? Mercurius already punished me for that, remember? Just look," he said, pointing to his scar. "No need to hold any more grudges."
Leia scowled and threw her coffee at the screen. "I don't care, you imbecile! Goddamn it! I'll rip your tounge from your fucking mouth! I'll murder you! I'll murder you!!"
Mercurius's eyes narrowed, a dark shadow falling over his face as he glanced at Inizio. "Hey," he said with a serious tone. "I warned you to stop provoking her, didn't I—"
"—That's quiet enough, Leia dear." a voice interrupted. The group in the throne room peered past Leia and Oscar to see the newcomer who had entered the frame.
Leia sucked her teeth and turned around to see another woman standing behind her with a cigarette in her mouth and a hand on her shoulder. Unlike everyone else, she was wearing an all-black suit with a collared dress shirt. The tailoring was sharp, yet understated — like she loved fashion, but didn't care enough what others thought of her outfit. Multiple piercings decorated her left ear and left brow, while gold studs had been inserted underneath her left eyebrow. One thing was clear: she was not a part of the Eclipse Guild.
"I thought I told you to leave her alone, Accera," the woman said sharply to Inizio with a heavy accent. "You'd think torturing the poor boy and wearing his face would be enough for you after you got that mark on your head, but you must be addicted to pain, huh, freak?"
Inizio licked his lips and grinned devilishly. "You sure have a way with words, don't you, Maria? Not very elegant!"
Maria took another puff of her cigarette and flipped him off with her other hand as Leia wheeled Oscar away.
"Unfortunately, I'm not elegant enough to mince words either. And I'm being as expressive as I can when I say: eat shit."
A short laugh escaped Leznar's throat as he watched the chaos unfold. It was delightful: the way things could change at the drop of a dime, impossible to track as every second passed. A person's true self was oftentimes more interesting and genuine in high stress than it could ever be in comfort and stability. He'd abhorred the mundane notion of peace. To him, the true core of life was in its unpredictability and the capacity every person had to harness it. It felt more natural than blinking.
"Focus, Inizio," Nauruan grinned. "I sense something much more compelling than your foolish arguments. Something that Liberia is itching to cut."
As he said it, his gaze tightened on the cages behind Maria, transfixed with the otherworldly energies coming from them. It took everything Nauruan could muster not to draw his sword and slice the screen itself.
Maria noticed, took another puff, and pressed a button from her side, prompting another screen to come down in the throne room where the Uppers sat. She adjusted the camera, flicking it on to show them all something that hadn't been visible before.
"So you've noticed it, eh?" Maria asked. "We've finally managed to get a rift open down here. That mountain of Jidan Ore you sent over helped tremendously, but it wasn't enough to do more than this."
Mercurius's eyes met with a black and red breach in the middle of the air behind the cages, monitored by the lab assistants, who were stabalizing it with Sanctum Energy, odd crystal-shaped machines, and a massive generator with a control panel holding two medium orb-shaped balls of Jidan ore bathing in liquid lava that was inserted into the seams of the generator so carefully that it wouldn't melt the hardware.
"Are those all that remain?"
"Those two orbs there," Maria said, putting out her cigarette. "They were the strongest we could extract from the mountain you and your lieutenant sent ahead. The rest of the ore is dead — used to complete the portal to the other end. If we were familiar with dwarven Sanctum-Smithing and the like, we might have been able to recover more, but three is all we could get. And they're on the verge of death, too."
Maria took out another cigarette from a sleeve on her forearm and lit it with a lighter stitched to the inside of her sleeve near her wrist. "An ore that breaks the boundaries of Sanctum Energy and repurposes it into anything the wielder likes… If you told me such a thing existed ten years ago, I'd laugh in your face. It makes it more unbelievable to think the dwarves didn't know about such a life-changing resource. How could they just sit on something so important if they're such geniuses? None of it adds up."
She looked coldly into the camera, past Mercurius, to Leznar as she smoked. "So, how did you know about it, Lieutenant?"
Leznar's blue eyes glimmered against the aurora borealis's sheen and hid a mischievous look. For a moment, a chill ran through Maria's normally unfeeling spine as she blinked. Behind his secretive gaze, she saw a quick glimmer of dark red.
"Nothing you need to concern yourself with, little girl," Leznar smiled. "What matters is what is done with the ore."
"Right," Mercurius added with a yawn. "He's never going to tell you anyway. It doesn't matter. Will those three pieces last long enough to do what we need to do?"
Maria inhaled and held the smoke in her mouth with a prolonged glance at Leznar before blowing it all out, filling the air around her with grey smoke that seemed more than what she had initially taken in.
"Only time will tell in the end, but all tests point to a 100% match in opening a larger portal with the King's Gate. Once that's done, the rest of the plan should be simple to carry out."
"Then they're perfect," Mercurius grinned. "Thank you, Maria. Do your best."
"Of course, Mr.Enigmatic Ram," she joked sarcastically.
"..! So it was you," he grumbled. "I should've known you'd come up with that silly nickname."
Maria snickered and placed her hand over the off button on the other side, ready to end the line.
"Mercurius…" she muttered with a hesitant tone. "Are you sure you'll be able to do this? You know what will happen when the King's Gate is opened. What if things don't go as planned—"
"—They will," Mercurius said definitively. She looked up, finally meeting his gaze, and stifled a grunt. His retinal veins had completely vanished, leaving only his dark green irises staring eerily at her through the screen against the backdrop of his white sclera. There were no shadows on his face, nor was there a single hint of uncertainty.
"This current world… It's a sham perpetuated by men who believe themselves to know what's best for others — convincing themselves of it so thoroughly that it's been passed off as fact — unquestioned and unanswered. The Commonwealth Coalition, the Paragons, the Church… They are all complicit in these sins. We're here to liberate this continent and give power back to its citizens! If I cannot, another will! And if they can't, someone else will carry on my vow! Fate will be destroyed one way or another…"
"...I'll make sure of it," he finished. His expression remained unchanged throughout the duration of his speech. He had made it clear to not just her, but to everyone listening, that nothing would change their goal.
How silly, Maria smiled. She hung her head again and thought back twelve years, during the Eden Search, twelve years prior. She had been sobbing over someone's coffin, an old box of cigarettes in her hand. Mercurius, barely an adult back then, was the only one with her in the pouring rain. The fire, smoke, and lingering Sanctum Energy had ravaged Verglas so badly that the city had to be evacuated after the fighting just to avoid the radiation that had built up in the air. For the first time in the kingdom's long and storied history, the even present winter had become a downpour of rain that ceased to stop for weeks. But Maria hadn't cared about the fighting, nor the damage. The only thing she cared about was the coffin below her body and the woman lying within it; her face and body so mangled that she couldn't bring herself to look at her.
Maria remembered turning around to yell at Mercurius, her eyes red and furious, ready to lash out in anger at everything that had happened. But she didn't. Instead, she was met with the same expression he wore now. She'd never seen him act that way before, nor did she know what would come of it after that day. Maria was sure of only one thing: whenever Mercurius looked at her like that… she could leave the rest in his hands.
I forget sometimes that you're not the shy and quiet kid I once knew, she smirked. You're a man of action now — a leader, though you don't want to be. She would have been proud to see you like this.
Maria raised her head and gave the Enigmatic Ram a look that was in no way inferior to his own. "Mercurius," she said right before she flicked the switch. "I'll be by your side until the end."
KRZT!
The first screen switched off and rose back into the air, hidden by the darkness above. On the other screen Maria had brought up earlier, one of the four figures in the cages screeched, rattling its cage before motivating the others to release their own guttural growls. Soon, "KEEEE!"'s and "KAAAA!"'s filled the air.
Nauruan rose from his chair and stepped forward, stopping right below the suspended screen. He stretched out his arm, reaching for what he couldn't touch, and muttered, "What a beautiful sound…"
"Nauruan," Mercurius ' eyes flitted. He rose, joining him by the center, and watched him, enamored with the deadly savages that sat behind the curtains. He could tell the Upper had a sense of kinship with them.
"I want to entrust you with a mission—" Mercurius began.
"—Time and place," Nauruan responded suddenly. He turned to him and cast him a chilling look. "That's all I need."
Mercurius smiled and stared forward. He knew that Nauruan would be the right man for the mission, and he hadn't disappointed him.
"You'll be boarding a Wyvern Ship departing from Zenica, not long from now. Inizio and I have made the preparations ready for you, as well as boarding passes for your luggage."
Hearing the word luggage, Nauraun grinned, already realizing what he'd be bringing with him as he gave another look to the screen above. "And your orders?"
Mercurius sighed. "I wish you wouldn't call them that. Think of it as a favor."
He lowered his head, a shadow blanketing his face as he closed his eyes with a smile and clasped both hands together like a child. "Just have as much fun as you want!"
OUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
Nauraun's Sanctum Energy howled at the order, unconsciously leaking out as he cackled loudly against the ambient throne room. Inizio's eyes mellowed again, his interest in wearing his face growing with every passing second, while Leznar watched from the background, musing curiously at the emblem on Mercurius's back.
The time will come soon, he smiled. …When all shall be as it was.
[ECLIPSE]