When word got out about what had happened in the palace, a massive uproar swept across the land. It was a massacre. Entire parts of the palace had been reduced to rubble and ash; corpses were strewn everywhere. The walls were smeared with blood, and the doors were destroyed.
The remains of the king and his consort were found in their bedchamber. Down in the basement, deep within the mines, the corpse of an unfamiliar man was discovered, but there was no trace of his killer. That was the strangest part—the entire palace looked like an army had stormed through, yet no one had noticed anything. No bodies of attackers, no clues, nothing. It would have taken an entire army to capture this fortress, but there was no sign of that. In fact, the entrance gates and doors were all completely intact. And none of the surviving guards noticed anything. Those who had survived in the fortress reported loud explosions and tremors, but never actually saw anything.
Rumors spread quickly across the land and beyond. Some spoke of the Sun God's wrath for sins committed by the king; others whispered about interference from the God of Shadows because the king had been too righteous. Some got surprisingly close, speculating that it must have been one or more demons. Others blamed the man in the mines.
But no matter what rumor you heard, no one had a definite answer. And no one knew where the perpetrator was. Fril had retreated into the castle after the fight, into a secluded place, waiting for his wounds to heal. He hadn't expected to actually be injured. But he wasn't even close to being finished with his task...
A few weeks later, the Church released its official version of the events. After a lengthy investigation, they claimed that the man in the mines had used forbidden magic.
According to the Church, he was to blame for the massacre, but the Sun God had punished him by sending a warrior to kill him before he could escape. That explanation calmed the people—for a time.
But only briefly, because just a month after the palace massacre, the king of the neighboring country was found dead in his fortress. This time it wasn't a massacre. In the middle of the night, someone had slipped in through a balcony window, killed two guards, and then the old king and his wife. Not even three days later, it happened again. And then again. And again. Soon, not only kings but also nobles and respected individuals were being killed in their sleep.
The world was thrown into turmoil. One king after another was slaughtered. Paranoia gripped the land—no one knew who would be next.
Windows were barred, guards multiplied, and the security around rulers intensified. Every stranger in town was inspected, and mass executions were held. The People desperately searched for the culprit. However, they found nothing. No one knew anything about him. It was as if he didn't even exist.
The world descended into chaos. Power vacuums formed wherever the unknown monster had been. Wars broke out, battles raged, fields were burned—but the assassinations continued. The pattern was always the same: in the dead of night, someone—or several people—broke into a fortress, a villa, or some other residence, killed the ruler, and vanished.
No one ever survived to tell the tale.
The people grew increasingly convinced that this was a divine punishment. Some even began to view the unknown assassin as a liberator—a savior freeing them from corruption and greed. They began to cheer for him.
Kings stopped leaving their castles. They walled themselves in and started praying for forgiveness. They offered sacrifices in hopes of appeasing their god. Nobles who saw opportunities for power spread the rumors further and stoked rebellions.
In less than half a year, the entire power structure of the world was shattered. The only thing still keeping the world from plunging into complete chaos was the Church of the Sun God, though even it was rapidly losing power. Cults and splinter religions began to form, and fanatics found an audience. In normal times, such people would never have dared to speak openly, but the Church was overwhelmed.
The last refuge untouched by chaos was the capital, the seat of the Church's power. Only here, guarded by the powerful Lightweavers of the Church, had there not been a single assassination. But the gates of the beautiful city were closed to outsiders. No one was allowed to enter or leave the city without permission. Patrols roamed the streets constantly. A curfew was imposed, and anyone caught outside at night was immediately arrested and taken to the dungeons for "questioning." Very few ever came out alive, and those who did were broken people. As a result, the market collapsed—and with it, the economy.
And Fril watched it all with satisfaction. But it was becoming more and more dangerous to move through this world. Now that the Church had retreated into its city, magic users were beginning to surface. The remaining kings were hiring them as guards. As much as Fril would have liked to continue sowing chaos, he knew it had become too risky. He reminded himself of his highest priority: to deliver all information to his Duce.
And the second: to remain undiscovered. He could no longer justify putting himself at risk. He had stirred up enough chaos. The Church's power had been the greatest threat. It had been the only institution capable of uniting the world against the army of Polykenas, but now no one trusted it.
Many even blamed the Church itself for what Fril had done, claiming it had forgotten the ways of the Sun God and used his words only to gain power. Which, of course, was true, as it was so often with religion.
So Fril withdrew to the place where the Duce would open the portal once more. Nearly a year had passed, and it was time for Fril to return home and report. Fril was definitely satisfied with his work. He hadn't managed to kill the topmost leaders of the Church, but he had reduced their power to a grain of its former size.
----
Nero exhaled deeply as he slowly knelt down. He was once again on the tower that marked the center of his fortress. So high up, the wind was fierce, but Nero didn't mind.
Slowly, he tapped his fingertips on the symbol embedded in the middle of the dark stone. He focused his magic and carefully activated the symbol. Immediately, thousands of images, sounds, smells, and sensations flooded him.
It almost overwhelmed him, but over the last year, he had grown more accustomed to the feeling and was prepared for it. He had gotten much better at it.
Still, Ramor was there just in case. Beside Ramor stood another Polykenas with white skin. He was smaller and moved on four legs. He was covered head to toe in dense fur, making his white skin barely visible. Out of his white pelt, rows of long horns protruded from his back, and his yellow eyes glowed. Like every Polykenas, he had three long claws instead of fingers on his front limbs. It's strange how the Polykenas, a species born of pure chaos, still have constants. No matter how grotesque they are, they all have three claws per hand, yellow eyes, white or black skin, and horns.
The Polykenas, who looked more like a deformed wolf, was named Krell. Along with Krell and Ramor, Xersies and Shire were also present. Ester was busy with some experiment, and Nero didn't need him at the moment.
Slowly, the fortress's power began to gather, along with that of all the Polykenas channeling their magic into the walls. Nero stood up while Ramor remained kneeling, taking full control.
Nero looked up and saw a gigantic beam of chaos energy blasting upward, through them, into the sky, and then into the portal. Krell growled with satisfaction as he was pumped full of chaos energy. He looked at Nero, "Now," he growled.
Nero nodded and grabbed him. The wolf squeezed his eyes shut in concentration, and then the world around Nero trembled. First, it blurred, then everything went black. And in the next second, Nero was no longer on the high tower of his fortress, but in a vast, flat world.
The ground was a dull red, and the sky was a massive gray cloud. The entire landscape was barren and empty; there was nothing, except far in the distance.
There stood a gigantic tree, bare and colored a sickly brown. It stretched all the way into the clouds and marked the center of this dimension. If you looked closely, you could see thousands of tiny beings buzzing around the tree like bees around a hive.
But Nero knew they were all Polykenas. He sighed as Krell collapsed beside him, panting heavily. Blood flowed from dozens of gashes in his skin, spreading dangerously close to his magical heart. But Nero ignored him. He was finally back. He was finally in the dimension of the Polykenas again... after so many decades...