1000 YEARS AGO
Godric Gryffindor lowered himself from a rocky ridge and stumbled upon a dying Agarat. Its smoldering corpse still groaned and smoked as it tried to drag itself across the ground. It's body was made completely out of scorched rock, around ten feet tall, and cracks revealed magma underneath – its veins and lifeblood. It bared its spiky teeth, and smoke came out of his triangular mouth, then it spit fire.
Godric Gryffindor raised his sword. He spun and waved his weapon in a swift form. Even though past his prime, his movements were determined, powerful, like that of a hardened war general. Through his motions, he summoned his protective shield, a deflective bubble around him. The Agarat's flames split as they reached him, avoiding him. Then, he jumped high and spun out of reach, crimson cloak fluttering around his golden armor, and took the demon's head clean off.
He ducked as magma hissed and spit from the demon's severed neck. Its great spiked horns stopped its head from tumbling further and even with its dying breath, the demon looked at Gryffindor and tried to envelop him in flames yet again. Only black smoke leaked out. The flaming light from the Agarat's eyes finally blinked out.
Godric Gryffindor breathed a long sigh.
Even after all these years, seeing Aragats made the wizard's skin crawl. Its hands were as thick as tree trunks, and its molten blood could produce such heat, it pulverized everything before it. He'd had to withstand that heat before, and it hadn't been pleasant.
He rounded the head, picking his way more carefully across the battlefield. Five years ago, this land was lush, rich, fertile. Good people used to raise cattle and sheep, grow crops. Now, their villages had been leveled to the ground. The earth was scorched and hardened, with blown-out sections and cracks. Smoke curled from occasional patches. Few plants were left alive.
Bodies littered the ground: human, elf, goblin and beast.
He spotted a tall figure on the battlefield, wearing a green cloak. Salazar was fighting an Uvall. It looked like figments of shattered glass, almost imperceptible if one had no experience in spotting them. The colors darkened around it, and it made ripples in the air where its contours broke and cut through reality. When the wizard rammed his spear into one of the not-glass shards, it shattered further, then dissolved into smoke.
Salazar was losing.
Gryffindor angled his own sword like a spear, and threw it. It streaked right through the creature's center. Shards dissolved into smoke, lines rippled, and the figment fled. It had been only weakened, not killed. Uvalls could not be killed, as far as they knew.
Salazar removed his silver helm and breathed deeply. He had a face like a vulture, long and narrow. His arched eyebrows and pointed beard only accentuated this. In contrast, Godric was built like a bear. Square, wide and muscled.
The wizards shared a look, then Slytherin spun his spear and rammed it point-first into the ground.
"Salazar?"
The man shook his head. "We can't keep fighting Godric. We lost. We've lost years ago. And we know it."
Gryffindor felt a sharp stab of horror. "And what will you have us do?"
"You already know." Slytherin said. "The Numens will destroy each-other, and the Division will be consumed. This is the only way, Gryffindor, we must preserve what precious little we can."
Gryffindor looked in the wizard's eyes. Groans of the dying haunted them from behind. There, in Salazar Slytherin's eyes, he saw anguish and terror. This was a man hanging off a cliff by a thread. Godric Gryffindor did not want to accept it. He would not allow it.
