CHAPTER 4: SPELLBOOK IT (DEATHBORNE)

DEATHBORNE SECRET BASE, MIDTOWN, NEXERIA

“Urrgh… that sucked.” Lyligan says, heading in through the door to the secret base of the Deathborne; a small, abandoned grocery store. It used to be a smuggling ring for illegal creatures; which soon ended when the Deathborne introduced the smugglers to their blades. She stretches her back, wings, and arms, trying to relieve her body from the all aches and pains fighting the ghouls caused; she can feel the soreness from her toes to her wings.

“I can’t believe that got away from us.” Vamyn sighs, following behind her. He sits down at their meeting table, looking over at Itellier and Lyligan. His mind still frazzled from all the chaos in his life that brought him to this moment, especially the last few hours.

“Itellier, what the hell happened in the mine? Why did it explode? What aren’t you telling me?” He put his hand against the side of his face, leaning into it. His pride hurt along with his body after this latest fiasco.

“It was an unforeseen accident; we closed the portal to the Land of Ghouls and then it became unstable.” Itellier says defensively. He sits down across from Vamyn at the table. His mind was on other things: what he found in the mine has not escaped his thoughts since he obtained it. It was just step one in his plan to achieve his dream. It wasn’t until he felt his sister’s hand smack the back of his head that he stopped daydreaming about it.

“Unforeseen accident?! The portal closed without problems; then you ran off by yourself in the mine and did Abominus knows what!” Lyligan stares at her brother fiercely; with her arms crossed tightly. She knows he’s hiding something and wishes he would be more open with them.

“Calm down, Lyligan! He’ll tell us whatever he’s planning, eventually. I trust, like every other cockamamie scheme Itellier has, that it is for our benefit.” Vamyn says, also looking at Itellier.

“If not, then I’ll send you to the Land of Ghouls myself for these messes you’ve put us through.”

“Don’t worry, Lylie, Vamyn. This is all for the benefit of The Deathborne.” Itellier looks back at his sister and his father figure, with hopeful eyes.

“As for what happened with the mine; I didn’t want to mention anything yet till I was sure, but here’s what happened.”

INSIDE THE GREAT MINE, OUTSKIRTS OF NEXERIA, THEN

Itellier recalls to his family what happened in the mine: His contact gave him information that the mine was going to be attacked by the Circle. Said the mine is full of the bloodphires that they export; making it a very important piece of Nexeria’s economy. Itellier entered the mine, just to scope the place out, hoping to get there before anything bad happened. The mine is gigantic and home to unknown treasures in it; so, you’ll never know who or what you might find there. He went up and down the seemingly endless pathways of the mine and ended up where Lyligan and himself saw the Ghoul portal. He noticed a cloaked figure with a book in his hands seemingly casting a spell. Itellier noticed that the figure had what looked like a Circle insignia tattoo on his hand. The spell and the insignia raising a bunch of red flags made him jump into action. Itellier approached the cloaked figure and closed the book on him, interrupting the spell.

“YOU STUPID PIECE OF DUNG! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT YOU’VE DONE!” The Cloaked Figure exclaimed.

“Well, that it pissed you off so much, I’m going to guess stopping the Circle’s plans for this mine.” Itellier responded flippantly.

“This really burns me up inside, so why don’t you feel the heat!” The cloaked figure throws a fiery punch at Itellier, their fist blazing with fires of unknown energy.

Itellier dodged out of the way of the oncoming fiery fist of destruction; he fired his own blast of spiritus energy in return.

“I see you also appreciate puns as well. It’s a shame we meet as enemies here.”

The Cloaked Figure barely avoided the oncoming blast himself, but accidentally dropped the spellbook. The spellbook opened to random pages and glows with unknown energy.

“ARRGH! This can’t get any worse for me! I’ll remember this, and I hope you survive the catastrophe you just caused, because I want to turn you extra crispy myself!” He created a giant wall of fire between himself and Itellier.

“What do you mean by catastrophe?! It’s just a book! What harm can a simple book cause?!” Itellier asked, seeing the Cloaked Figure escaping his view. Before Itellier could give chase; a giant portal was summoned from it. Ghouls rushed out of it by the lot.

DEATHBORNE SECRET BASE, MIDTOWN, NEXERIA, NOW

“Then I rushed out of the mine, sending a message to everyone in our group about what happened; and you know the rest from there.” Itellier says, done with his account of what happened in the mine.

“If that’s what really happened, then maybe the portal closing did have a side effect because of the spellbook. If there really was a spellbook.” Lyligan says skeptically.

“Also, why did you accuse me and say it was my fault if you knew it had to do with the spellbook?”

“Well, for one, you accused me first, and two, it's fun to mess with you, Lylie. You really need to chill out; you always seem so angry lately. We're not in her dungeon anymore; not chained to any walls like we used to be; you're allowed to get out of survival mode.” Itellier says with a smile. Even though underneath it, he is concerned that his sister is still trying to do too much, since the darker times.

“Urrrgh! I am just trying to protect you, brother; I want you to become your best self, so I don’t need to be your protector anymore. But you're right, I'm sorry for always yelling at you, being frustrated by you, and always being worried about you. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt, even if we end up in another chaotic mess. You’re my brother, and I trust you. And yes, I can take some time to relax and not be defensive all the time; I don’t know how you seem to be more well adjusted since then, but that is a strength I admire from you.” Lyligan responds, uncrossing her arms. Sometimes, her brother shows her he’s more than just a chaotic mess, and it’s lovely to see.

“I am glad to see you two bonding instead of bickering. However; we can have more family time later; we still have this Circle problem to deal with. Especially; if they have spell books that can open portals to the Land of Ghouls. However, I wonder what the primary goal was if you didn’t stop him, Itellier.” Vamyn says, happy to see them communicating and understanding each other.

“That worries me too. I knew I couldn’t let him finish whatever he was doing. It might have been worse than the ghoul horde.” Itellier replies.

“Ugh, the ghoul horde sucked. I’d hate to imagine there could have been more trouble than what already happened there. But, did they want to destroy the mine in the first place? Because this might have indirectly hurt them too.” Lyligan adds her conjecture.

Vamyn brings out some folders and places them on the table. He opens them, revealing information they already know about The Circle.

“We need something that can give us an advantage against the Circle. The intel for the mine you got was good. We just need better execution next time and fewer explosions of important places.” Vamyn says, eyeing Itellier with a look that screams, be better.

“As long as I can help it; I’ll do my best to not blow up the next place.” Itellier says, giving a return look of confidence to Vamyn to calm his doubts in him.

“Our connections with The Dusk Clave might help us.”

“He’s working on it. If my great nephew can get a task force approved, we can have even more help against the Circle.” Vamyn says with a hopeful smile.

“Don’t worry, Vamyn, I’m sure Valien will do what he can to get it approved. I hope the info from Itellier will help push it in our favor.” Lyligan replies. She goes over towards the information that Vamyn put out about The Circle.

“This is a secret organization that we barely have any evidence of existence at all outside of today. We only had rumors, myths, and secondhand accounts. So, anything we can come up with to get help with stopping them would be great. Until then, unless someone has either an ingenious or insane plan to find them; all we can do is keep digging and hoping they make a mistake along the way.” She takes a deep breath to gather her thoughts about The Circle.

“Ingenious?! Insane?! My specialties are being called upon.” Itellier gets a wide grin on his face.

“Oh, the hamster wheels are spinning. This is going to be special.”

Vamyn and Lyligan both look at him with scared and curious looks.

“Abominus! Why the hell did I have to say something like that.” Lyligan shakes her head, filled with disappointment.

“This is how we got into this mess; and this is how the mess is going to get bigger. However, we’re low on options; so go right ahead, Itellier.” Vamyn shakes his head as he hears the words leave his mouth with regret. If he could reach for them, he would pull them back and throw them in hole never to be heard from again.

Itellier stands up with excitement, raising his hands in the air. “Yaaasss! You’ll love this; I’ll let you know when it’s in action.” He sprints out the door with excitement. Thankfully for the other two people here, he actually opened the door and didn’t crash straight through it. He’s done that a few times before.

Lyligan gives a deathly glare to Vamyn.

“Why did you let him do that?! We still have plenty of places to go look for clues of the Circle; he’ll just go kaflub the whole mess!”

Vamyn glares at her.

“Calm down, there’s a method to my madness. Itellier is a bit of a wildcard; which is his strength, and we need to use all of ours right now. He can do his outrageous plan while we go get more evidence ourselves.” He smiles at her.

“Now, I’m gonna go visit Valien; The Dusk Clave has a meeting today. I’m going to see if it turns out well. I know some of them don’t like me there, so I’ll try to be discreet; but you know how Val is.”

Lyligan laughs and smirks back.

“Sometimes, I don’t know which one of you is worse with your crazy plans. Yeah, I know how Valy gets; be careful there. He might be too enthusiastic when he sees you.”

Vamyn laughs, knowing how his great nephew is like a ball of sunshine.

“Haha, that’s true, but we can all use a little enthusiasm in our lives now and then.”