Blue Nexus: Dark Souls Pt. 3 - The Sins of Man

Previously in "Blue Nexus: Dark Souls": Kyle and Brenda explored the lower levels of the Halls of Penetonan and met an ethereal entity named She, who informed them that while there are a great many treasures in the halls, they wouldn't find what they were searching for down there. She also points them toward the Dark Soul and to deal with that immediately; while they decide what to do, they encounter a young Corbin Alkeste, and then the two are ambushed by a demon. They get separated, and Brenda finds herself in a strange, dark world, where an old man who claims to be their friend Andreus greets her. 

            Brenda and old man Andreus stood in the middle of an absolutely desolated marshland. There were no signs of life around them for miles, not even of any tree or plant life. Small splotches of water appeared with little bubbles boiling out of them. The ground was dirty and mushy. Worst of all, though, was that hollow feeling she’d never felt before.

            The Earth had always seemed so abundant when it came to its magic. There was a natural source of it, a never-ending wealth that, recently had been exploded all over the world for anyone to gleam onto, apparently. Going from that to this place was an utter reversal, one that jarred her. Perhaps that’s why Andreus seemed so old.

            Despite her poor vision that still didn’t seem the case. He was wrinkly, his body caught in a constant hunch. He had to support himself with a breaking metal cane. Though it was difficult to distinguish the exact color of his eyes, it was clear enough that they’d been glazed over. Was he blind, or perhaps just weak of sight?

            Unfortunately, the world around him seemed in little better state. A hollow gray had settled around them quickly. Brenda absorbed more of the world through her senses as they continued to catch up with her. Lifeforms, distant and faint, appeared in her magical senses. There was little magic to tether her to them, and she was really only able to pick up the fact that they were organisms with some form of energy latent within them. Andreus wasn’t even giving off any power, immediately worrying her.

            “I…I still don’t understand at all,” Brenda said. Andreus sighed.

            “You’ve missed a great deal, my old friend,” Andreus said. He turned away from Brenda. She reached out and grabbed his shoulder, where his Power mage mark once was, and felt nothing. He turned toward her, glaring. “Best not to go looking for magic in this world, Shindari. You’ll be gravely disappointed.”

            “How can all the magic in the world be suddenly purged?” Brenda called.

            “In an event called the Purge,” Andreus said. “Come, I’ll explain it to you at our cove. We can be safe there until the morning.”

            “Safe from what?” Brenda asked. Andreus started, heading away from the entrance to the Halls. Brenda whirled around, to see if they were still open. Instead there was nothing there, not even a semblance of dirt. She grimaced and held her hand out. A red platform appeared in her hand and she blasted it down against the ground.

            Andreus roared in defiance and the booming sound echoed all around them, stretching far and wide. Brenda watched the dust and debris settle around nothing more than dirt.

            “The Halls of Penetanon were destroyed,” Andreus said. “I checked just after the Nucleon War was officially considered over, but there was nothing there. It’d all been vaporized. That should have been signal that this would all begin.” His old hands reached out and grabbed hers, and he held them firm. “Don’t do that again, understand? He’ll find us, and we won’t even last a second. Nobody else did.”
            “Who?” Brenda asked, and Andreus hurriedly pulled her along.

            “Andreus, I can fly us to your cove,” Brenda said.

            “No magic!” Andreus exclaimed. “No. We’ll be spotted much easier.”
            Andreus yanked her and she followed. He hobbled into a light jog and Brenda followed his direction. They made their way across what had to have once been Magus Forest, now even emptier than it was as Brenda recalled, and toward a small cove that hadn’t existed before. The cove was naturally formed, somehow, at the edge of the massive lake near Magus Forest, where Kyle and Brenda fought against the shadow-demon named Faustuss.

            There were two boats, neither of any particularly great stature or size, docked along the muddy shores of the lake. Jagged, weather rocks jutted out of the ground and water to form a small barrier into a tiny cave, one with an entrance that could possibly fit two side-by-side. She and Andreus stopped at the top of the hill overlooking the cove for just a moment before Andreus tapped his staff three times, and a hollow ringing echoed.

            The ground beneath them suddenly shifted, and the ground began to spiral down. Andreus did not move and Brenda anchored herself so the rotation did not throw her off. It was a slow rotation, and they just as slowly made their way down a small metallic tunnel. The ground above closed in at the doorway, and faint, buzzing lights came on all around the two.

            “I didn’t expect there to be running power, given the state of things outside,” Brenda said.

            Andreus grimaced. “Then don’t. We have so little energy left, it’s a wonder this contraption still works.”
            Brenda tried to give her old ally a warm smile. “Andreus, what happened?”

            “A great terror,” Andreus said. “It all seemed to come down in an instant. Just as I believed we’d finally gotten over such squabbles that only mankind could contend with, the darkness came and destroyed everything.”

            “The Purge?” Brenda asked.

            “I wish,” Andreus said. “The Purge had been going on for much longer under our noses. What happened in Adelita still gives me nightmares. It was unfair to all of them, and it was that incessant fear of mages that brought it all to a boiling point.”

            Brenda steeled herself. The fear of mages? That wasn’t far off from what the world was going through as she remembered it.

            “How long has it been?” Brenda asked. “How far forward in time am I?”

            “Over ninety years,” Andreus said.

            “Do you have any idea how this could’ve been possible?” Brenda asked. “I had no idea that I could be flung through time within the Hall of Penetanon. I’m sure Kyle didn’t…” She paused. “Oh, no. Where is he? Where is Kyle?”

            “He vanished the same time as you,” Andreus said. “Never to be seen again. The Earth lost it’s Nexus.”

            “Brian?”

            Andreus looked away from her and the lift came to a stop. Andreus stepped off and gestured for her to follow. They walked through a long stone corridor that lead to a small opening with four doors; one was open behind them, and then one for each adjacent wall. Andreus followed the door to the right.

            “You have no need to see the wounded,” Andreus said.

            “I can heal them,” Brenda said.

            “You’d only get them killed,” Andreus said. “They’d be granted a few more moments before he arrives.”

            “Andreus, whom is this menace you speak of?” Brenda asked. “You have to tell me eventually.”

            “I don’t,” Andreus said. “I just need to discover a way to get you back home to fix all of this, thought Lord knows we have certainly tried to send our own back. Every member of the Trandelia failed, leaving just me.”

            “What is the Trandelia?” Brenda asked. “Don’t you mean the Zanderia?”

            “I meant what I said,” Andreus said, and they two walked through an open, and busted, metal door. Brenda stole a look over her shoulder to check it out again and then continued forward. They were in a large room, filled with men and women in shambled armor. None of them seemed to notice her.

            “When will you just give me an explanation, Andreus, I grow weary of these games,” she said.   

            “When we can have a moment to be safe, away from any dangerous ears,” Andreus said. “Some rooms at the end of the hallway should do.”
            Brenda’s gaze flicked around the room, desperate for any familiar faces, though none arose. They were all tattered with dirt and soot and battle scars. Their eyes screamed of vengeance and weariness. Some of them met Brenda’s gaze and stiffened at her presence. She strode through their halls, clean and not battle-worn.

            One of the men they walked by stood all the way up and reached for something along his belt. “Sir! Andreus, get out of the way!”

            Andreus spun around. “What?”

            “Mage!” the man exclaimed. “The woman with him is a mage, just look at her hand!”

            “A Shield mage!” one of the others shouted, a woman this time. Brenda spotted half a dozen men and women reach to their sides and brandish crossbows. Others had rusted blades.

            “You fools, put your weapons away!” Andreus shouted, but it was far too late for any of that.

            Brenda shoved him out of the way at the sound of a crossbow being fired. She willed magic to her hand, but stopped it and instead just swatted at the bolt and chopped it in two. Another twanged from the crossbow and she managed to catch the bolt just in front of her chest and use her superior strength to snap it in two.    

            “I am Shindari, of the Zanderia!” she exclaimed, but another bolt was headed her way. She blocked this one but the fourth bolt came and snagged her across the side, springing blood. She seethed but controlled herself. Andreus said no magic, and she had to honor her friend’s wishes.

            Two more crossbowmen were at the ready but Andreus stepped in her way and held his arms out to shield her.

            “You fools have only known magic as a malevolent force,” Andreus said. “But as I’ve told you countless times, magic was once a force for good and peace! This was one of those mages.”
            “She can’t be from the Zanderia, just look at her,” one of the crossbowmen said. “You said they died off before the Nucleon War.”
            “The Zanderia are all gone?” Brenda muttered.

            “She has passed through time to come to us,” Andreus said. “Though I do not know why.”

            “She was probably sent here,” another crossbowman said. “A spy from…him!”

            “I was sent here after trying to find a way to leave the Halls of Penetanon, to find the Dark Soul,” Brenda said.

            Andreus froze. “Do not speak of it here, Shindari.”
            “Why?” Brenda asked. “Why are you all so afraid? You fear some force? What, are they a War God? Or just a villain too powerful for you to defeat?”

            “I told you I would explain!” Andreus roared, half-turning to face her. He returned his attention to those in front of him. “Put down your arms unless you intend to fire them through me! See how well that goes.”

            Everyone in the room hesitated. Brenda looked to each one, and all of them were glaring deeply at her. She made no noticeable reactions. What could have driven these people so mad? Who was the mage that did all of this to these people?

            Andreus didn’t bother with them any further. He started again toward the other end of the room, beckoning for Brenda to follow. She did, though not after taking one last look at the crowd, all of which still had their hands upon their weapons.

            He tapped his staff to the wooden door in the far back and it creaked open, slowly revealing just a simple bedroom with an ailing man sitting in the bed. He was strapped down, even though he looked to barely have any muscle on his bones at all. His hair was long and thin. Brenda stepped into the room, catching a foul whiff of it.

            “How long has he been like this?” Brenda asked as the door behind them closed.

            The aged body of Brother Time stared back at them, eyes unmoving and unresponsive. Andreus stepped to the side of the bed and tapped Brother Time on the shoulder. Nothing happened. He sighed and placed his hand upon Brother Time’s chest, then pushed and Brother Time heaved in a great big gulp of air and settled back down.

            The damages of time wore away as the thin hair and flimsy skin began to toil away and give back to what Brenda was used to seeing in Brother Time. His youthful persona and aura slowly returned. Brenda felt a smile touch her lips. It was relieving. She looked to Andreus, who also had a slight grin on his face. Reliefs must not be common in this world, she thought.

            “What is it?” Brother Time asked, his voice old and cracked for a moment before he coughed and it was back to normal. Andreus gestured, and Brother Time looked up to Brenda. “Shindari! Oh, Shindari, it is you, truly!”
            She stepped to the edge of the bed and patted Brother Time’s legs. “Indeed. It’s good to see you, friend. I’m not sure when the last time we spoke in person was.”
            “I can’t seem to recall much either,” Brother Time said. “The shattering world seems to have obscured my thoughts and memories. I see pieces now and then, large fragments of the world before the beginning of the end.”

            “The world is not ending,” Brenda said. “Things may look dour, but we can rise up and defeat this foe that Andreus keeps speaking of.”
            “You think that Hanzo is the cause of this?” Brother Time asked, and Andreus lowered his head.

            “Do not speak his name,” Andreus said.       

            “What’s he going to do, kill me?” Brother Time asked. “He can’t find us, Andreus. He would have by now, for certain.”
            “Or we’ve had luck on our side,” Andreus said, finally meeting Brother Time’s gaze. Brother Time scoffed and shifted in his restraints. He didn’t seem to mind them much as he nestled against the back wall.            

            “It wasn’t just a War God that did this,” Brother Time said.

            “But Hanzo is a War God?” Brenda asked, and Brother Time slowly nodded. A pit formed in Brenda’s stomach where hope once resided.

            “It was the Dark Soul, of course,” he muttered. He spoke up. “The Dark Soul…it waited, if you can believe it, for just the right moment to strike.”

            “As if it had sentience?” Brenda asked.

            Brother Time nodded. “I’d seen premonitions of these events before, but, there was nothing I could do about it. It all came together so fast. It was only around a year after you and Blue Nexus went missing that Corbin Alkeste declared himself a new mage and ushered in a clan of mages to become a new terrorist organization that attempted to overthrow the United States government. They were crushed, utterly, but not before they could make a devastating attack against Adelita. Fifty people were destroyed, but that was only the beginning.”

            “This was only a year after we left?” Brenda asked.

            Brother Time nodded. Brenda braced herself against the bed, that pit of fallen hope now reshaping into one of despair. She clutched her chest. Brother Time sighed, and continued,

            “The Dark Soul made its presence known, but only in a small way. It festered in Adelita, in the destruction, having escaped from wherever it was kept by Corbin Alkeste. The world continued to reach boiling point. Mages and regular humans were never allies again, not even in the war that truly ended all wars. The Nucleon War.”
            Brenda bowed her head, starting to feel sick. “How could so much hatred seep into the world so quickly?”

            “It’s the sign of the end of  civilization,” Brother Time said. “Unfortunately, this despair and hatred we felt, and feel?”

            “It was destined to happen,” Andreus said. “Because the Fourth Civilization had to end sometime, right, Brother Time?”

            “The Dark Soul is the bringer of doom and life,” Brother Time said. “So when the Nucleon War consumed the Earth and left so few without power and everyone with fear, the Dark Soul’s purpose was reborn, and it consumed the hearts and souls of many mage and non-mage alike. The Earth soon fell to chaos, and then, here we are, with the dust settling and with no signs of hope to defeat an enemy in the caliber of a War God.”

            “And this Trandelia?” Brenda asked. “How…who were they?”

            “The second generation of heroes, after the Zanderia all fell dying to destroy a monster Corbin had unleashed from deep within the Halls of Penetanon,” Andreus said. “All of the Zanderia was wiped out, and then the Trandelia rose up. But they were all crushed, one by one, throughout the Nucleon War and then Hanzo’s rise to power. We just gave up; we sank the Cube, destroyed the Moon base, and are now here. I’m all that’s left of any generation of heroes, and I have no magic.”

            “The Dark Soul is in its final stages of renewal now,” Brother Time said. “Magic is gone from this world, meaning there is nothing, not even Hanzo, left to stop it.”

            “So why am I here?” Brenda asked. “I must be here for some purpose.”

            “I believe you are,” Brother Time said. “I believe you are here to understand the nature of the Dark Soul before it destroys us all. There is always one who remembers, and destiny, it seems has chosen you, Shindari. You can flee from this world and return, maybe in a few decades, as humanity attempts to rebuild.”
            “Humanity will rise up as it always does,” Brenda said.

            “Not against a force that even Hanzo will be nothing compared to,” Brother Time said, bracing against his restraints. Brenda felt her body lock up and she gripped the end of the wooden bed tighter. “We only have one hope, and unfortunately, it’s a long shot.”

            “What is it?” Brenda asked. “We have to take this risk, Andreus, Brother Time.”

            Brother Time sighed. “My body will periodically go catatonic. When the Dark Soul began to fracture reality, my own perceptions and abilities were splintered. I’m aware of where I am now, as well as then. I can learn the secrets of the Dark Soul, but only when my past self does. I now sit in a limbo of time, waiting for two paths to cross, like stars aligning just properly in the night’s sky.”
            “How long have you been waiting?” Brenda asked.

            “Ninety years,” Brother Time said.

            Brenda sighed and shook her head. A sudden weight began to settle upon her soul. Her breath caught and she felt her legs almost give. Her teeth gnashed together as both rage and sadness washed over. She sighed through trembling lips and had to look up to the ceiling to try and fight the tears back down. Neither Andreus nor Brother Time spoke.

            “This is all impossible,” Brenda muttered. “The Earth can’t fall. It’s impossible.”

            “There’s no way to break the cycle unless the Dark Soul is taken out of the game, but I’m afraid it’s too late for anyone here to do anything about it,” Brother Time said. “We have to find our way back to the past, soon, to stop Corbin.”
            Brenda nodded. “Was he infused with the Dark Soul in anyway?”

            “I have no idea,” Brother Time said.

            “And what are we to do while we wait for you?” Brenda asked. “What if the Dark Soul completes its destruction upon the world before you get your answers?”

            “I don’t believe it will,” Brother Time said. “Though I can no longer see ahead of me, I can sense hope now, a faint one. A magical one.”

            “She can’t use her magic,” Andreus said. “If she does we’ll all be found and destroyed!”

            “Shindari, we must leave this forsaken temple,” Brother Time said. “I don’t believe either of us are meant to die below ground, groveling at the feet of some War God.”

            “I can’t abandon these people,” Brenda said. “What if we can’t win, and this Hanzo comes looking for them?”

            Andreus glared at Brother Eye, but his expression softened and he just sighed. “We’re doomed anyway. We’ve been scavenging for items or weapons we could use with any possible chance of facing Hanzo, but, it’d be no use. Without the Nexus, we’re lost.”
            “Nobody from Nexus has come to Earth?” Brenda asked.

            “The Earth as a power in the universe vanished the moment those fifty people in Adelita were killed,” Andreus said. “As far as the galaxies were considered, Earth was under permanent civil war. We got lucky that only Hanzo decided to arrive to clean up what was left.”

            Brenda shook her head, not bearing to even look at either Andreus or Brother Time. She only saw sadness in their faces, despite Brother Time speaking of her as some kind of hope.

            “Magic is the key, Andreus,” Brother Time said, somber and slow. “Perhaps it’s magic that we need to see the light. The Purge wiped the world clean of magic, but we’ve been given a great gift from the past to contend against it. I’m sure the previous Civilizations could have used some magic on their side.”

            “Isn’t magic the entire reason we’re in this mess?” Andreus asked. “If there were no magic in the world before Corbin, wouldn’t we be just fine?”

            Brother Time couldn’t speak. He just glanced to his hands, shaking his head and shrugging.

            “It’s worth the risk,” Brenda said, finally staring Andreus in the eyes again. “I’m here, and I want to fight this War God.”

            “You’ll be destroyed,” Andreus said.

            “It doesn’t matter,” Brenda said. “If I have to be the sacrifice to give hope and magic back to this world, then I will. I can’t bear to see another home of mine be destroyed by an overlord War God. I’ll face Hanzo.”

            “We need to get moving, then,” Brother Time said. “Andreus, my restraints.”

            Andreus didn’t budge. “You’ll only be a burden to her, Brother Time. Don’t go. If you die, then this is truly all worthless.”
            “Shindari is the best defense this world has ever seen,” Brother Time said. “And I must be at the battle. Something calls me to it. Destiny? Death? No idea. But I have to go. Either I die out there or I die in here, Andreus, and I want to die on the battlefield.”

            “You’re an idiot,” Andreus said, and stood. “I won’t.”

            Brenda slid forward, placing her fist just in front of Andreus’s gut but not actually punching him. He froze, not even seeing her move that fast. He might not have even during his younger days, as Brenda remembered him, but as a withering old man? Not a chance.

            He grinned and turned back to Brother Time. “I see. I forgot how feisty the Zanderia can be. Always kind of pissed me off.”
            “Sorry,” Brenda said.

            “Don’t be,” Andreus said, fiddling with the restraints around Brother Time. He sighed and sat up when they were gone. He stretched his wrists around, cracking his muscles.

            “Haven’t stood up in ten years,” Brother Time said. “Feels…weird.”
            “Where do we need to be?” Brenda asked. “I won’t fight Hanzo near here. I don’t want to put anyone in danger.”

            “We need to get to Washington D.C.,” Brother Time said. “Or, what’s left of it, anyway. It was hit the worst when the Dark Soul started making its rounds, and then when Hanzo arrived, it only got uglier.”

            He braced himself against Brenda and she helped him out of the door. Andreus led the way. Those in the other room were still tense, with their hands on their weapons, and looked in curiosity as Brother Time walked through the room with Brenda’s support. He had his eyes closed, trying to gather up strength on his own to walk. Andreus moved slow, so there was plenty of time for him to regain feeling in his legs.

            They followed Andreus to the lift. Brother Time removed himself off of Brenda as a crutch and stood of his own power while Andreus had someone activate the lift to take them back to the surface. He couldn’t bear to look at either of them, and Brenda could find no fault in that.

            She felt her magic start to course through her body much faster. She hadn’t used much in the battle against the shadowy demons beneath the Halls of Penetanon but had been wounded a bit by its attacks. Her injuries were all healed, but, still, for some reason her magic hadn’t been all that reactive. Was it just the dour nature of the world?

            She turned to face Brother Time and Andreus. “So has the Dark Soul, like, consumed the world, or just lain waste to it?”

            “Hard to say,” Brother Time said.

            “I’m asking if it’s magic has infected what magic is left in the world,” Brenda said. “The natural magic, the natural energy of the world.”

            Andreus shook his head. “I think it just wiped it all out, with nothing left.”
            “I find that hard to believe,” Brenda said. “Magic isn’t just something that’s willed away, it has to be destroyed, or forcibly drawn.”

            “Or suppressed,” Brother Time said.

            Brenda opened her mouth to speak but there were so many possibilities to what could be the case that she couldn’t properly formulate words for what she believed to be true. Instead she just balled her fists and felt the crackling magic energy within. Andreus eyed her, but said nothing of it.

            They reached the top of the cylinder and Brother Time and Brenda stepped off. Brenda cast a platform in front of them and Brother Time stepped on. Andreus snarled, but Brenda turned to face them.

            “You’ll be safe,” Brenda said. “I’ll draw Hanzo to me, and defeat them.”
            “He’s a War God,” Andreus said.

            “Rafael said the same exact thing,” Brenda said, and smiled. “You still remember all of that, right? Rising up, using your magic for good?”

            “When I had it, yes,” Andreus said. “The best days of my life.”

            “We’re going to make sure they stay the best,” Brenda said. “We’re going to save the past, and do whatever it takes to bring magic back.”

            “I’m telling you, that might not be the best idea,” Andreus said. “They may have been good years, but, if some good times come at the cost of the end of the world? That isn’t right, there’s something clearly wrong with that.”

            Brenda just smiled and rested a hand on his shoulder. He glared at her, and she used no magic on it. Instead, she just embraced him.

            “I’m sorry for all you went through,” Brenda said. “I would have done everything in my power to stop it then, and I’m going to make up for it now, I swear.”
            She felt Andreus nod and then mutter, quietly, “If you return to the past, keep your eye on the new girl.”
            “The new girl?”

            “I never learned her name, but, watch out for her. Please.”
            Brenda nodded back, squeezed a little tighter, and then stepped back, away from Andreus. He made nothing of it, just looking to Brother Time, who was balancing on the platform. Brenda stepped back onto it and raised it into the air. Andreus just raised a hand in goodbye, and Brenda did the same before blasting the two off toward Washington, D.C.

            “It’s been so long since I last flew!” Brother Time exclaimed while they cut through the air at an incredible speed. “It feels amazing!”

            He stood and Brenda created four walls around them so Brother Time wouldn’t go tumbling off the platform. He hollered in excitement. Brenda stooped a bit lower to physically attain more magic and then washed it over more of the square, pushing them along through the sky with a slight red streak.

            Andreus’s presence was still with her, though. Not in a magical sense, of course, but she couldn’t get the old man from her thoughts. His scorn for magic burned inside her. She realized that her fists were clenched tight, and when she filled them with magic, they relaxed a bit. But still, this magic…could it have saved everyone?

            Fear seeped back into her thoughts. What truly was the Dark Soul to be this ferocious to the world of magic? How could thing do all of this?

            “Brother Time,” Brenda said back to her ally. “If we find the Dark Soul, do you think there’s any chance I can use my magic to destroy it?”

            “I have no idea if the Dark Soul even exists now,” Brother Time said. “I believe it would have been used to usher in the next Civilization, expelling any power it has to bring about the end of this Civilization as we know it, including Hanzo and any life left within it. Then it’ll reform.”
            “Are you basing any of this off of fact or speculation?” Brenda asked.

            “A part of me believes to somehow know this already, but the logical part of me believes that this is all speculation,” Brother Time said. “We should just continue on to the city. I believe we may find clues to following Corbin’s footsteps there.”
            “Did he unleash the Dark Soul there?”

            “No, but he did make his call to arms there, and the most potent evil power showed up there. Perhaps you’ll be able to find a trail we can trace across the world, or wherever we need to go.”
            “I just hope it isn’t the Halls of Penetanon,” Brenda muttered, and they continued along.

            She flew faster than she normally would across the Virginia sky. She didn’t dare steal a look to the ground to see what the decimated world looked like, though it was hard not to as she gazed up ahead.

            Washington, D.C. was upon them within a little over an hour given her speed. She initially tried to find any landmarks, but none were distinguished until a statue came into view: the Lincoln Memorial, broken in two with overgrowth crawling all over it. The Reflecting Pool was much larger than she recalled, too, and loads of algae was spread out within.

            She carefully lowered them as she circled the historical part of the city. Brother Time led her to what they remembered once being Capitol Hill but was instead mere rubble cascaded across the city with more heaps of overgrowth stretching out across it.

            Brenda dissipated the platform and took one more look around. The sky was indeed darker in this part of the city. The streets were vacated not only of any signs of life, but of any vehicles or technology at all. Hollow emptiness filled the void of sound. Brenda cracked her knuckles and heard a little bit of rubble tumble over as a breeze swept through, slow and chilly.

            “This is terrible,” Brenda muttered.

            “This is normal, if what Andreus has told me is to be true,” Brother Time said.

            “Do you remember any of the disasters?” Brenda asked.     

            “I only heard about them,” Brother Time said. “After the Zanderia fell and the Trandelia began its rise, and quick fall, I was placed in the bunker. They feared that myself and some others would be taken and used.”

            “There were others?”

            “Hanzo got to them as they tried to fight back. Brave, but dead.”

            Brenda shook her head. “That won’t be us, my friend. Let’s go, show me where Corbin made his big stand.”

            “Right away,” Brother Time said, and started off down the street. Brenda followed, keeping her magic at her fingertips.

            More rubble dropped away as another breeze picked up. Brother Time glanced over his shoulder at Brenda but said nothing. His expression had a bit of worry on it, but he was no doubt just sad to see the state of the world once again. Brenda knew she would be.

            Her chest still ached to see all of this, and to have Andreus’s words ringing in her ears incessantly, without pause and with such a vehement tone.

            They stopped at the edge of the street, where a massive black crater was at the corner, and a pristine charred skeleton was placed against a pure, marble wall of the Capitol building, as if it hadn’t been touched at all. Brother Time stopped the two of them, and it was only when Brenda’s eyes came upon the skeleton that her magical senses flared.

            “This isn’t possible,” Brother Time said. “I thought he’d been incinerated in the flames, but…”

            The skeletal head turned to face them. “Brother Time, Shindari. You’re here.”

            “How is this possible?” Brenda muttered. “How long have you been here?”

            “I’ve always been here, since the end began,” Corbin said. “And I shall remain until the Dark Soul returns anew with the new world.” The skeleton looked back to the sky. “And the same for the next civilization, and the one after that. We’re one in the same now, the Dark Soul and I. Any who wish to have its power keep to this fate.”

            Brenda cast a barrier around him and immediately tried to draw any Demon magic from him, but black lightning crackled across the shield and broke it. The skeleton just turned to look at her with blank eyes.

            “Magic is no use anymore,” the skeleton said. “The world has already begun to destroy itself, there is no need for the vessel of its own destruction.”

            “Magic is not a destroyer,” Brenda said.

            “You know nothing of the Dark Soul, then,” Corbin said. “And I will not tell you.”
            “You will!”
            “Or what? You just proved you can’t kill me, and I shall return again when the Fifth Civilization arises, as one with the Dark Soul.”

            Brenda smiled. “I’ll leave this planet and return just to crush you, Corbin.”

            “How long are willing to wait me out, Shindari?” the skeleton asked. It meekly raised a hand out to her. “We can wait together. I have all the time in the world, for soon, time shall be endless.”

            “Where was the Dark Soul?” Brother Time asked.

            “You seek to return to the past to stop me?” Corbin asked. “You cannot. There is no force on this Earth that can stop what is to come. No matter what you do in the past, destiny awaits. It is an endless cycle.”

            “Perhaps,” Brenda said. “But you have an end! You’re only human. You think you’ll just reform with the Dark Soul?”

            “I know I will,” Corbin said. His skeletal form went limp. “I’m just glad I could see the Zanderia one last time, just to tell them that I did, indeed, beat them.”

            Brenda held her hand out. “You didn’t, Corbin, because we still stand!”

            Corbin didn’t respond, but Brother Time did. His body locked up and he dropped, hard, to his knees. He slammed back onto the ground. Brenda whirled around, and his body was beginning to wither again.

            “No, not now!” she exclaimed, dropping to her knees. She pressed his hand to his chest and tried to bring him back, but there was nothing. She swung her hands out and formed a small barrier around him.

            His eyes shot open and he sucked in a deep breathe. Just as he smiled up at her, though, his eyes rolled to the back of his head and he locked up again. His body shook, spazzed, and then stopped.         

            “It…it’s happening!” he exclaimed. “The temporal alignment is about to begin! Shindari…Shindari!”
            “What, what?”

            “Hanzo!”

            “Han…zo?”

            A powerful presence descended around her. Brenda’s whole body went cold and a chill slithered up her spine. A long shadow loomed over them, and more winds started to sweep through the streets. Brenda stood and turned to face the ten-foot humanoid monstrosity of a beast that stood there, all four arms raised radiating pure cosmic power. There was no aura around this monster, but the power was practically palpable.

            At just the touch of their feet, the ground disintegrated. Brenda formed a barrier in front of both of her hands and wanted to get into a fighting stance, but Hanzo snarled with large fangs.

            “You are dead,” Hanzo said. “All of you are dead, crushed under my heel or the pure might of dark power!”
            “You suffer the same lies as Hanzo, then,” Brenda said, her voice still shaky.

            “There is great fear, Shield Mage,” Hanzo said. “Good. I draw your fear into my power. Perhaps I’ll make an example of you.”
            “It won’t last,” Corbin said. His skeletal head faced Hanzo. “You will be wiped away as well.”

            “Silence,” Hanzo said. “The one thing I cannot destroy. How annoying, but it’s not matter. In my new world, one voice will not make a difference. There’s none left to oppose me, and no War Gods or Nexus to contend with. Earth is but a speck of dirt on the cosmic scale, and it shall remain as such until I have the power to contend with those that must be slain.”

            “You won’t a new world,” Brenda said. “I’m going to fix this, and defeat you. You’ve destroyed a world I’ve come to love and call my own, and for the sake of the Zanderia and the Trandelia, you’re going to die!’
            “I did nothing but kill those who would stand in my way,” Hanzo said. “The Earth was on a collision course with the destruction even before my arrival, what with their petty magic squabbles and their wars of science and destruction.”

            “Your presence is an illness,” Brenda said.

            “And you, as a Shield mage, wish to cure the world of me?” Hanzo asked.

            “Precisely,” Brenda said, and blasted toward Hanzo.

            The War God was completely caught off-guard and Brenda slammed her fist into his face, shattering the barrier completely. Hanzo roared in anger and swung up at Brenda, missing as she flipped away. She tried to catch him in a barrier but he vanished and reappeared behind her, slamming her from behind.

            Brenda bounced once on the ground and then caught herself. Hanzo once again vanished but the shifting in the wind gave him away. Brenda blocked his attack with surprising ease and then flung a barrier between them, blocking the next attack. The barrier still shattered, though her magic remained. In fact, all of her magic still remained.

            Odd.

            She willed it forward seemingly out of nowhere and launched it, from an ethereal nothingness, at Hanzo, who could not block the massive square of magic attacking him. He blasted back against a building, and a second voice beyond his own filled the sky with a scream. Brenda landed, confused.

            Hanzo once again reappeared behind her, and Brenda dodged, though there was no sound in the shifting of the wind. Brenda tucked forward, rolled, and blocked Hanzo’s next attack from ahead. The barrier shattered once again, and this time it was for real. Still, Brenda managed to catch Hanzo’s eyes. They blinked between pure black…and a familiar tinge of green.

            It clicked inside Brenda’s mind just as the next attack swept by her but she felt no change in pressure or anything actually move near her. Brenda sucked her belly in and avoided the attack, but skirted back to gain distance. She placed two squares on the ground, anchoring the magic in her hand to only one.

            Hanzo waited for her, trying to bait her. Brenda flung the left-handed one at him, and he blocked it without moving. Brenda faked anger and flung the second. Hanzo did the same, but at the last moment, Brenda expanded it to a full cube and surged power through her hand, catching Hanzo by surprise. Red and green lightning scorched the desolated city streets as Hanzo roared, his voice changing from a deep male’s to a deep female’s, and Hanzo dropped on both knees to the ground.

            Steam rose from the form. Brenda stepped toward the Reality mage, her fists tight.

            “You think you have the power of a god?” Brenda asked. “You’re nothing but a pathetic terrorist trying to gleam other’s fear into your own pleasures!”

            The Reality mage laughed, and Brenda stopped. That voice. Her magic fell from her hands and the Reality mage managed to get the jump on her, leaping forward and kneeing Brenda right in the guy. She felt a surge of magic enter her body, and explosion of pain dropped from her mind down through the rest of her body. Brenda stumbled back, coughing up blood.

            “That’s no way to talk to an old friend,” the woman said, and held Brenda’s face up to stare into her eyes.

            “Tania, you’re alive,” Brenda said.

            Tania, scarred, pale, and much bulkier than Brenda remembered, grinned. “Indeed.”

            “This shouldn’t be possible,” Brenda said, and Tania’s grin faded. She tossed Brenda aside, and then an overwhelming amount of pressure descended around the Shield mage.

            “The Dark Soul is a great deal more powerful than anything I thought possible,” Tania said. “If you thought Rafael’s Awakening would be the world’s final one, you were completely wrong. And this time, I was the one brought back, and given abilities  comparable to the Pillar of Reality, and then some. I took them and ran, afraid of what I could become. Ashamed to show my face.” She clenched her fist, touching a scar on her face. “Then the war against magic began and I slaughtered as many as I could that would stand against mage kind. I fought in the Nucleon War to save the mages that I considered my friends, and drew from their power when they died to protect those that lived.”

            “You would never,” Brenda said, trying to get up. “You would never betray your allies like that!”

            “You wouldn’t know,” Tania said. “You left us all to die.”
            “Kyle and I aren’t that important!” Brenda exclaimed. “We alone don’t hold the fate of the world in our hands!”

            “You’re right, you’re not,” Tania said. “But neither was I. When I returned I was met with nothing but hatred. Everyone wanted me dead. Magic was a threat to mankind, and you know what? They were right.”

            “You killed innocent humans, Tania,” Brenda said, still struggling. “You made them afraid.”

            “After they took everything from the world of magic!” Tania exclaimed. “There was no safe haven, no Magus Forest to return to. Where was Sandy, where was Brenda? Dead, and missing.”
            “Sandy, dead?” Brenda muttered.

            “I did what I could and soon I found myself as alone atop the power ladder, the food chain!” Tania exclaimed. “Tania was a broken, pathetic woman, but Hanzo? Hanzo was a god among men, a force to be feared. My magic wouldn’t be taken from me, not by the thing that granted me new life! Corbin is not the only one bound to the Dark Soul, and he has no power to draw from. Me? I have decades of power that you can’t dream of, Shindari. I could easily defeat Rafael now.” She chuckled, gazing beyond Brenda. “That was so many lifetimes ago, now. Our pathetic war against a true villain. After that there were no true heroes, only a world where the heroes were dying.”

            “Then let me go back to that world, to save the heroes,” Brenda said, managing to get to one knee while her magic pooled up from her legs to her hands. “To save you, to help you!”           

            “They’d hate you, too,” Tania said. “It’s the fate of those that aren’t what people want, or what people like. They’ll destroy what’s different because that it isn’t deemed safe.”

            “Not if they have someone to show them a new path,” Brenda said. “I will help them!”
            “You won’t,” Tania said. “I’ll kill you now as a mercy killing, Shindari, for aiding me so many years ago.”

            Brenda’s body shook as she resisted the pushing from Tania’s magic. Tania’s body also twitched and she began to assert herself against Brenda. Brenda’s aura started to take hold and the red lines along her hand started to crack apart more. Her eyes flashed red.

            “You won’t stop me from saving this world,” Brenda said. “Tania!”
            She roared and her power exploded around her, breaking a small green veil around Brenda and allowing her aura to wash over the streets. Small bits of red lightning arced away from her body and aura. Brenda sighed, feeling her magic flowing freer than it had all day. Tania glowered down the street at her.

            “So be it, then,” Tania said. “I kill you as an enemy.”
            “Tania, stand down,” Brenda said.

            “The time for that has long passed,” Tania said. “Make peace with yourself in these final moments of life you have!”

            That overwhelming presence surged forward and Tania reappeared in front of Brenda, this time clearly there. Brenda braced herself and blocked Tania’s initial attack, though was still blasted down the street from sheer strength. Brenda caught herself and then blocked Tania’s punch and kicked her away, catching her in a red cube and casting her to the ground.

            Tania warped the ground around her so she didn’t crash and flew back up to Brenda, who cast four more cubes at Tania. The Reality mage weaved through them all and then vanished. Four versions appeared around Brenda, all of them seeming real. Brenda threw up four barriers and all four were broken, but Brenda used the residual magic to blast the four back, all dissipating save for the one to Brenda’s right.

            She kicked out and a red platform flung at Tania across the sky. Tania shattered it with a single look. Brenda soared across the sky and kicked out. Tania vanished and Brenda swung her arm out behind her and blocked Tania’s oppressive assault of magic. Tania flew for a moment, stunned, and Brenda whipped around with her cracked hand and punched Tania across the face, sucking some of the magic away from Tania.

            Tania roared and pushed forward, barraging Brenda with more pressure. Brenda tried to stop it with a barrier, but Tania dropped down and broke right through it, punched Brenda so hard she almost punctured her skin. Brenda crashed through the remains of a building, and held her right arm back.

            She whirled around, holding up a barrier behind her, to punch through a fake Tania. The real one appeared behind Brenda and punched at the red barrier. Brenda surged her power forward and the anti-magic abilities took hold, blasting Tania back through the rubble again. Brenda followed her out and then punched Tania hard across the face, snapping her neck to the side and levelling a building behind them with the sheer force of the attack.

            Tania fell back onto the ground, her body and spirit clearly broken. Brenda touched down next to her, sighing. She could only hope that Tania didn’t get back up; the sudden surge of magic power she exerted was going to come at a severe price in just a few minutes.

            “E—even if you return to the past,” Tania said, not looking at Brenda. “You cannot stop the Dark Soul from doing as it pleases.”

            “Then I’ll destroy it,” Brenda said. “I’ll change the fate of this world to a better one.”

            “You have no idea if that will make it better or worse,” Tania said. “Will destroying it unleash its malic onto the world? You cannot win, Shindari. You should have allowed me to just kill you.”
            “There’s still hope,” Brenda said. “Therefore, I can’t die.”
            Something shifted behind them. Tania spat more blood and just chuckled while Brother Time, healed, stood up. His body began to glow, and the air crackled around him.

            “I’ve figured it out,” Brother Time said, and the air suddenly started to split between the two of them. “We have no time to lose, Shindari! Time itself is preparing to unravel if we do not move quickly, and if we miss our opportunity, the world may yet suffer a fate worse than this.”

            “Tania!” Brenda shouted. “If this is the last time we’re going to see each other, I want you to know I how proud I’ve always been to fight alongside you against Rafael. You were an inspiration to all mages. I’ll continue the legacy you had, not the one you have.”
            She didn’t let Tania get a word in and dashed for the tear in space-time. Brother Time did the same. Brenda coated herself in a thin aura and leapt through it, letting the blinding white light of the ether consume her.

Next time: Time to find out what’s going on with Kyle and Aequitas, as Kyle discovers the nature of the world in a previous Civilization, as well as the nature of the Dark Soul in “Blue Nexus: Dark Souls Pt. 4 – The Prayers of Gods”