Last Quest

Chapter 2: The Sorcerer

Two weeks before the drunken escapade, some eight days west of Oakliff, in an even smaller village named Udrael, an old sorcerer called Maldric, a tall and thin man in his sixties, had been having problems getting a good night's rest. But what haunted his mind were not questions about his past or lonely feelings of hopelessness, as he remembered all of his past adventures, had a family, and was very well liked by his neighbors, using his skills to help the folk with laborious daily tasks. The sorcerer's life had been nothing but peaceful since he left Lanmort many years ago; instead of advising the crown as the Crowned Sorcerer, a title given to only the most powerful and capable. He preferred to spend his nights in his study, learning the true, uninfluenced histories of the land he called home.

But when the dreams started, he was not satisfied with his wife's suggestion of them being the ghosts of the stories he read day and night, creeping into his mind even as he slept. The dreams of a sorcerer were rare, believed to be messages from the world surrounding them. Maldric's were worrying, as they depicted a hellish landscape, torn by a new war, much more cruel and despicable than the last one. Some depicted the return of the Cranonian Lord that started the old war. His name was Thalon Leonart. It is said that he believed that Cranonians and their dragons were gods. Thalon was disgusted by the way his people ruled, and believed that they should be conquerers. In order to gain power, he would discover a new, otherwordly source of magic. He was successuful in utilizing the Forsaken Magic, but its use opened a rift in Lanmort. After he was defeated, the Trosun appeared, turning him into a religious figure called Dov Troso, and swearing to cleanse the world of all Cranonians before his return.

Maldric woke up, sweating and gasping for air, while his wife, Ayna, was trying to comfort him, startled herself, from being awoken this deep into the night. All he could recall from this dream was him standing on top of the wall in Lanmort, looking down at the once-lush green grasslands, now charred and filled with burnt corpses. The city behind him was in ruins; he watched as the castle in the distance fell over the courtyards and gardens around it, sending a thick cloud of dust towards him, blinding him for a moment. Opening his eyes, he was now on the battlefield; the thick cloud only allowed him to see a little. He looked around at the dead bodies surrounding him. Some of them were soldiers; he could see the remains of their armor, but some of them were smaller—children that failed to escape the flames. The ground shook. He looked up; a shadow taller than the wall moved towards him. He stood still as it walked out of the fog. Its many faces stared down at him. Its body was that of a dragon, but the faces had humanity in their eyes. The jaws were still animalistic, protruding from the face; the horns on the back of the heads were short and sharp, and long human hair hung from its neck, swinging as it twitched. The creature opened one of its jaws; a light emanated from its throat. As it was about to expel the flame, a light came from the hill above, covering the creature in white flames, and as Maldric looked up, he saw a being only mentioned in myths and prophecies of old. When Maldric finally calmed down enough to take a slow breath, he looked at Ayna, who was trying to hide the worry on her face, as he had never been awoken from the nightmares before. "Another dream?" she asked, already knowing the answer.

"This one was different," Maldric responded, barely mustering the courage to talk in the quiet room. He looked to the window beside their bed, almost as if to confirm there were no massive three-headed shadows looking down at him. "I saw someone else this time... I was not alone anymore." He tried to come off as sound and skeptical, but he knew that he failed; he could see in his wife's face that she had come to the realization that he did not believe these dreams to be the product of his mind, but instead the stories of what is to come. He was overcome with fear as he realized what that actually meant. If these dreams were to be believed, neither Vorhlom nor any other kingdom, empire, or distant land would be prepared for the horrors to come. He knew that Forsaken Magic dwelled in these dreams; he could feel its presence from the start, the magic he hadn't felt since he left Lanmort. The rift was closed at the end of the war. And if this magic could be felt this far from its origin, it meant something was loosening its prison's gate, and if that something was to return, Vorhlom would need more than armies of men to stand against it.

Maldric watched the sun rise that morning; his mind seemed to run on its own as he began his day as usual, taking the walk downhill from the house to pick the fresh ingredients for the breakfast his wife would make while his son made his way down the road to retrieve water from the nearest well. As the sorcerer made his way up the hill, back to his home, looking over to the lush, dark green forests basked in the cold morning fog, he realized he had a decision to make. The family sat down to eat. A well-seasoned vegetable stew, and a piece of fresh bread with a golden steaming crust baked that morning was set on the wooden plate before him. Maldric and Ayna's daughter, Emira, made her way downstairs, having slept in as usual. She greeted the three and sat next to her father to begin her feast. Maldric could not eat, but instead stared at the meal before him; his eyes felt warm, and his own body felt distant. His face felt foreign and thight; he had a feeling of impending doom that appeared in front of every thought. He looked at his children, obliviously planning the rest of their morning as if their days would be infinite. He realized then that there was no decision to be made; an evil wished to return to his home and bring with it death to all he loved. He looked at Ayna, who wished so hard for none of it to be true that she had tried to make herself blind to it. Maldric got up from the table, and without a single word, went up to his study. The histories could not tell of the future, so all he had to turn to were myths and stories, specifically those of Cranonian descent. He hoped to find anything in them that could resemble reality, but most of them were written a long time before the war. Some spoke of Varatrosun, Dragon Fire, how it was a flame brighter than all the stars above, a weapon capable of conquering or saving the world. It was a Cranonian myth, but as people do, they spread the stories of it through the land, embedding it in its culture. But there was one myth made after the war, one crafted in despair and sadness by the surviving Cranonians. It was never written, but sung and told in the cold ends of Vorhlom, far from the crown's influence or Trosun's swords. The story told of Dov Troso's return, even more powerful and rageful, but this time there would be someone to challenge him, an all-powerful figure bearing the power of Varatrosun. The hero was a Cranonian, and in all iterations of the legend, he stood against Dov Troso, on a dragon. The name was told in the dark and sung in a whisper; in the common language, it meant "son of fire," but the Cranonians called it Trosun Eldro.

With only myths to guide him, Maldric sat alone on the bench set in front of his house. The day was coming to an end, and he did not have answers—maybe there were none, he thought. Maybe faith would not guide him, and the world as he knew it would come to an end. "Does a world need to be killed in order for a new one to flourish?" he asked himself, looking at the silent horizon as the sun sank into it. His peace was broken by a pair of soldiers pestering a local man for answers about something. He did not care much at first, but his interest was piqued when he heard mention of a dragon near Oakliff. People did not talk about them much; they feared them. They believed that the serpents lived deep in the mountains and would be summoned upon the mention of them to blast their crops and livestock into dragon flame. As Maldric heard this, he knew what he must do. He went to the house to pack food and find his cloak, making his way to the study to retrieve his staff, which he had stored away behind the wardrobe, wrapped in white cloth, thinking he would never need it again. It was a stick taller than him, made from the wood collected from the deserts across the sea, far east of Vorhlom. It could not be burnt and would take great strength to break; it would help him use more complex magic he would need in the journey to come. He said goodbye to his wife, who only wanted him to stay but knew he could not. His son and daughter were both old enough to understand his leave but were much more open in expressing their fear and sadness about it. As the night set and stars shone upon Vorhlom, a sorcerer left his home, with no promise of return, in search of Trosun Eldro.