4. Rituals

In awe, Marlena stares at the ghostly figure for a few seconds. After all, this is the first person she's ever seen from beyond. However, she snaps out of it when she realizes the name the figure just gave. "Eryndel? You're Eryndel? The Oracle who left those prophecies about... the dungeon?"

She steps closer. "If you're truly the same Eryndel, then could you tell me more about the dungeon? Just who created it? What forces wait down there? And the Chosen Ones, who are they? Did you ever manage to glean anything about them and when they'd arrive?"

For a moment, Eryndel simply looked at Marlena, her form rippling slightly as if caught in a draft that no one else could feel. Then, with a breathless stillness, she turned her head and cast her gaze across the circle, seeing not just the gathered students, but through them—through time, through fate, through memory.

The feeling that washed over her was not shock.

It was inevitability.

She had seen this moment once, in a vision carved out of starlight and fevered dreams. At the time, she hadn’t known what to make of it—only fragments. Faces she couldn’t name. Voices calling her back. A circle of magic laced with both recklessness and luck.

And now... here they stood.

"So," she said softly, more to herself than to them, "it came to pass. The seal has weakened. The echoes have grown loud enough that even the dead are summoned to answer."

Her eyes settled on Marlena.

"Yes. I am Eryndel."

There was no pride in the statement, no mystique. Only weariness. A profound and quiet grief, like that of someone who knew too well the weight of her warnings unheeded.

"The dungeon was not built during my time. It was uncovered. A thing ancient beyond kingdoms. Before Misthaven. Buried by hands who understood that not all power was meant to be harnessed. I wrote what I could. The visions came with blood and fire—pieces, never wholes. But always the same refrain: ‘Seal it. Guard it. Wait.’"

The flickering of her form intensified briefly.

"You ask of the Chosen. I saw no faces. Only lights, five of them. Each born of different stars. Different wounds. Each with the potential to awaken what sleeps beneath and to survive what follows. I did not know when they would come, only that when they did... they would summon me, back from the dead."

Her voice caught, just barely. Emotion—soft but real—touched her next words.

"And now you have. And now I know..." Her gaze lifted, scanning each of their faces. "The Chosen have arrived. And you are not ready."

The air seemed to constrict.

"But you must be."

Well shit.... Kiraen exclaims
How do we get ready?
Ready for what?
And what are these dungeons you are talking about Marlena?

"While I was looking into the incident," Marlena leaves the Hollow Quill part unsaid to maintain secrecy, "I happened upon information about an oracle named Eryndel. She left a series of prophecies about a dungeon that laid underneath Misthaven," she explains to Kiraen. "I admit, I was skeptical about it until now. Least of all, I didn't think we'd be the chosen..."

She looks up at Eryndel. "Do we need to go into this dungeon? What are the potential consequences if we refuse the call? On a more minor note, what's the dungeon's name? We can hardly keep calling it 'the dungeon', now can we?" Marlena smiles, trying to inject a small bit of humor into this grand moment.

Eryndel’s form wavers like a flame caught in a breath of wind, her translucent eyes locking onto Marlena’s.

"You ask if you must go into the dungeon," she begins, her tone sorrowful yet steady. "But understand this: when a great wave rises, it matters little whether you walk toward it or wait on the shore. The dungeon will find you. It will find all of you."

She lets the silence stretch before continuing, her voice weighted with certainty.

"The Chosen Ones are never volunteers. It is not called ‘the Ones Who Choose.’ Fate does not ask permission—it binds. I have seen it."

Her tone shifts, becoming hushed and reverent.

"The place you call a dungeon was once the heart of all things—a sacred beginning. The dwarves say the god Murad gave their ancestors a single stone. Small, perfect. Along with it, he gifted Creatio—the first school of magic—and a command: build."

She lifts a ghostly hand, as though cradling something unseen.

"And so they did. They lit their forges. They sang to the stone in the deep tongue. Layer by layer, they built outward from that pebble. What began as a fleck became a chamber, a cavern, a vast hollow—and still they built. Their chants molded the world’s very fabric. They didn’t just dwell beneath the earth. They made it. Shaped it. Expanded it."

"According to this legend, the world beneath your feet—everything you know—was once no more than that divine stone, grown by dwarven hands across generations. They dreamed of a perfect sphere so vast it would one day reach Murad’s fiery hearth in the sky. Like all gods, he watches by night—not from temples, but from above. He is the red star. The one that never blinks."

She pauses, the weight of myth thick in the air.

"To the dwarves, he is the Maker of Deep Things. The Furnace Heart. The Whisperer in Stone. But the humans… you gave him another name."

Her gaze sweeps the circle, her eyes smoldering faintly.

"You call him Ares, the God of War."

---

After a dramatic pause, she continues, her voice now gentler.

"The elves, in turn, were given dominion over the surface. They planted the forests, summoned rain, softened the land—preparing it like wood for joining and growing the next layer. They, too, had a divine task. For them, that same red star is Coretta, the mother goddess—the blood of life, of birth."

"And we, the humans?" Her voice sharpens. "We came later. We were not named in the grand shaping. And yet we endured. We multiplied. We conquered. We ruled. Mutatio. Dominatio. We discovered and perfected those schools."

Her form dims, flickering with strain.

"But now… something stirs beneath. What lies below is no longer the womb of the world. The forge has been tainted. Its songs have turned sour. And now that forgotten cradle beats once more—not with Creatio, but with something else."

She leans closer, her voice a whisper made of wind and ash.

"Excidium. Death. Decay. Rebirth. "

Turning her gaze back to Marlena, she offers a faint, sad smile, and finally answers her question about the name:

"The dwarves once named it Ghal Maraz—the Deep Anvil. A place of making. A place of prophecy. But names lose power when purpose is lost. Now… it may answer to none."

"There are 6 of us that means 1 will not be a chosen one who?", he asked. Of course he was hoping that he would not be one. And pretty much knew he wasn't. The rest knew something beyond him. He was just an observer. An outsider and out cast. Had the teacher not said groups of 6 he'd have wound up trying to figure out this project alone.

Oh not this, not destiny again. I should double my efforts in learning fatecraft and ensuring I'm not snagged by the web of destiny ever again. Though at least this thing mentioning five chosen is a sign that maybe the prophecy might be about someone else. If I'm to face an ancient threat, then I'd rather do it on my own terms, not at the nudge of destiny!