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  Voi'Shek was also often referred to by the name of the Dreamer. They called him that because he had a great vision, a colossal dream: the dream of immortality and limitless magical power. Upon constructing the Sphere, he pretty much fulfilled this dream of his.

  The creation of the Sphere marks the beginning of the golden age of magic in Arghard. It increased the magical power of the members of the Brotherhood many times over. Some records suggest that the power of these mages was a hundred times greater than the power of mages today. It's easy to believe. Look at that painting!'

  He motions towards a painting showing a dragon on a leash, surrounded by mages.

  `There, you can see a dragon, with a lace around its neck, the end of the lace being in the hand of one of the mages. This symbolizes what the Brotherhood did after they constructed the Sphere.

  They traveled to Draconia and used the power granted to them by the Sphere to magically enslave all the dragons with mind control. They kept the dragons as their pets, and over the centuries, they made them breed on a larger scale. Dragons still only counted at around a few hundred at the time, but as centuries passed, the Brotherhood increased their number to tens of thousands. So, they became the greatest power in the world of Arghard. They had the kind of magical power that was unmatched by anyone else, and they had tens of thousands of dragons to serve them and do their bidding.

  They renamed themselves to the Draconian Brotherhood, and declared themselves the supreme rulers of all Arghard. In reality, their empire was quite formal. True, nobody dared question their reign in Ess'yer, but the Brotherhood never really made their presence felt in Ess'yer in the first place. They stayed in Draconia and tried to increase their power even more. The Sphere had already granted them a greatly extended lifespan without using black magic. In fact, it seemed that the Sphere would potentially grant them eternal life. Some rumors say that Voi'Shek even used the Sphere to grant true immortality to select few members of the Brotherhood. The power of the Sphere gave the Brotherhood untold power. But they wanted more, much more.'

  `Most wizards have an unquenchable thirst for power...' says Jason, no doubt speaking of Jenathar.

  `Sadly, that's true. Many of them lack any self control. But let us look at the next painting!'

  The next one shows a human mage resembling the one who was shown close to the Sphere earlier. He stands in front of a thick, foggy mist, and looks like he is about to walk into it. The cat continues.

  `Voi'Shek himself was already five hundred years old when the Sphere was constructed, and he lived on to reach the age of two thousand and five hundred years. Unprecedented for a human mage! Then, he disappeared. No-one knows what became of him. Unless perhaps the Librarian himself. Perhaps he didn't want to depict it in a greater detail. What is certain, is that five thousand years ago Voi'Shek vanished without a trace, never to be seen again. Ever.'

  `How does a mage so powerful just vanish? What do you think happened?' I ask.

  `Good question. I do not know. One possibility is that his underlings killed him. He was so powerful however, that this could hardly have been done unnoticed. So... hard to say. Now, let's move on! You must see what happened afterwards.'

  The next painting shows flames. Nothing but flames...

  `Here you see what followed Voi'Shek's disappearance. Some members of the Brotherhood attempted to increase the power of the Sphere, something Voi'Shek was always reluctant to do. He felt that it was too dangerous to attempt it. As you can see, he was right. The mages failed, and their attempt resulted in the destruction of the Sphere of Power.'

  `It must have been quite the explosion...'

  `Yes, it probably was...' he nods to my comment. `Now check out the next one. You can probably guess what's on it.'

  The next painting shows a small group of mages battling a large group of dragons, with the mages clearly losing the battle.

  `I guess I needn't comment much on this one. With the Sphere destroyed, the Brotherhood lost control over the dragons. The dragons, after two thousand years of slavery, wanted revenge. And they were at a huge numbers' advantage. The dragons counted at tens of thousands, while the Brotherhood counted at less than a thousand. The wizards never had a chance.

  Once they realized this, they decided to save what they had achieved over the course of two thousand years, and flee. They fled to a place they had created with the help of the Sphere shortly after they came to Draconia. It was a small plane of existence, a pocket plane so to speak, which they had used to conduct magical experiments in perfect isolation. After the Sphere was gone, they decided to flee to this place. There, they built a city, and named it Re'Cas.'

  `The City of Mages...'

  `Precisely! Re'Cas was built by the survivors of the Brotherhood. Much later, after the Great War between Ess'yer and the dragons, they also created a single Gateway leading to Re'Cas in a small town in the heart of Delamar, which we know today as Gatestown.

  In Re'Cas, the surviving members of the Brotherhood built the Great Library, meant to house the tomes containing their vast knowledge they had accumulated over the course of two thousand years. Its secrets were left in the care of their then greatest member, whose name has since been forgotten. He is now simply called the Librarian. He guards that library to this day.

  With the Sphere destroyed, the power of the Brotherhood was gone forever, and so was their would-be immortality. The aged Librarian died just a century later, but the remaining survivors of the Brotherhood brought him back by conjuring a manifestation for his dead soul. He could return as a powerful ghost mage, and since then he's been standing guard over the Great Library. It was after the death of his last brethren that he decided to create the Chamber of History, in part to serve as a reminder of the mistakes the Brotherhood had made.

  It was the Librarian who opened the doors of Re'Cas to other mages, the ones who eventually repopulated the city and made it into the great metropolis that it is today.

  Now, this whole fiasco with the Brotherhood and the Sphere had two far reaching consequences. One was the rise of the Naguahl, the other was the Great War between the dragons and the lesser races. Strangely, there are no paintings of the Naguahl in the Chamber of History. Neither their ascension nor their fall is depicted within.'

  `Why?' I ask. `Was the stupid mage too ashamed to paint it?'

  `I do not know. It is possible.'

  `Who are the Naguahl?' asks Jason. I look at him with great surprise.

  `You... You don't know of the Naguahl?' I ask him.

  `No.'

  `How can that be? Well... Perhaps it is understandable. Humans have been trying to forget it all.'

  `The Naguahl were the sixth intelligent species of Ess'yer.' says the cat. `They were in a sense the product of the magical power of the Brotherhood. They are extinct now, sadly.'

  `What happened to them? asks Jason.

  `I'll tell you about it later, Jase. My people remember those times well. It is a dark stain upon the history of Ess'yer...'

  Jason nods. He should learn of this. Although...

  I'm not sure he will care... We'll see.

  `Well, let me show you the paintings of the Great War and its aftermath then.' says the cat.

  Skipping some paintings about the wars between Delamar and Ordhiar, we go to a series of paintings which show just about what I expected. Dragons fighting a group of different races. The last of the paintings shows a figure reminiscent of Kurt Aurach fighting the dragons.

  `Here it is.' says the cat. `The Great War. One thousand years ago, when the Dragon Lords descended onto Ess'yer with their army, and attempted to enslave the lessers the same way the lessers enslaved them six thousand years prior to that. As you know well, and as you see it on the painting, the dragons were eventually defeated.'

  `There...' I point to the last painting.

  `There is the victory, yes. A black magician, the Master's mentor, defeated the Dragon Lords.' says the cat. `He was the one who eventually killed the three
Dragon Lords. He dealt the killing blow to all of them. Even to Meliorath.'

  `So, she really was one of them.' says Jason. `Do you know how she returned to life?'

  `There was something with a pact she made with the Princes of Fire, the immortal rulers of the Elemental Plane of Fire. Ask the Master, he knows more of the details. I think.

  Well, let's move on.'

  The next painting depicts a dead dragon, surrounded by its slayers. Men of various races.

  `The next picture shows perhaps the most shameful time in the history of Arghard. The so-called Time of Retribution. When over three thousand dragons were massacred by the Alliance.'

  `Don't you think they deserved it?' I ask. He turns to me and looks at me like a teacher at a very dumb student.

  `Sweetheart, you hurt me so... Why do you think they deserved it?'

  `They started it! They came to Ess'yer and killed thousands of people during the Great War!'

  `No, they did not.' he shakes his head. `It was the Dragon Lords and their two-three thousand followers who invaded Ess'yer. In the wake of the final battle, nearly all of them were killed. Only a few hundred survived, and flew back to Draconia. Just a few dozen of them survived the long journey, the rest were too weakened after the battle to make it. The dragons that were killed in Draconia during the Time of Retribution were nowhere near Ess'yer during the Great War.

  You see, the dragons are a peace loving race at heart. Most of them despised the attempt of the Dragon Lords to conquer Ess'yer, and decided not to take part in it. That is why the Dragon Lords only had an army of a mere two-three thousand dragons, instead of tens of thousands that they potentially could have had.'

  `Then why were those dragons killed in Draconia?'

  `Why indeed... They were killed simply because they were dragons. The masses, the fools as the Master rightfully calls them, wanted retribution for what they suffered. They didn't care, or didn't want to acknowledge, that their death wish would lead to the death of those who had nothing to do with their predicament. They didn't feel compassion for them, since the dragons were not like them, they were a different race. A race they envied, and feared. Feared. They feared them because they knew nothing about them. The ignorance, the pride, and the bloodlust of the masses are what lead to this shameful massacre.'

  `I never knew of this...'

  `Of course not. Not many do. History books are written by the victors. All the time...'

  `Is this why Kurt Aurach left Ess'yer after the fall of the Dragon Lords?' I ask. The reply, strangely, comes from Jason.

  `Yes. Precisely. He did not want a part of this. He did not have the power to stop it. Thus he decided to leave, even feeling ashamed, he regretted so much that he could not stop this. It was a kind of self imposed exile.'

  `But he came back, didn't he, Jase?.'

  `Yes. He did. But not for very long.'

  `Indeed,' says the cat. `The Master's mentor did not stay long. Things didn't quite go well when he returned. He hoped to change the way Ess'yer was evolving, but history repeated itself. Eventually, he left again. But that's a different story. Maybe your friend will tell you later. Let's go see the...

  Wait...'

  The cat suddenly jumps off my shoulder.

  `The Master tells me that the Portal should be ready in a minute. Let us return to him. You can see the rest of the paintings later.' he says. He walks out of the room and we follow him.

  *

  Back in the room where we arrived, Zack greets us before a huge, reddishly glowing Portal.

  `There you are! I was thinking you changed your mind, heh! How did you like the Replica Room?'

  `Amazing...' I tell him. `That Librarian is good with a brush...'

  `He painted it with magic, as I know.' he replies.

  `The chamber should be seen by all.' says Jason. `It reveals many things that have been hidden from the light of day for far too long. The people should know these...'

  `Well, while the Supreme Council rules in Ess'yer, that will not happen.'

  `You could show them these replicas.'

  `Ha! What do you think my place is? A fucking museum? No way! But you're welcome to create your own Replica Room anywhere you wish.' he says, frowning.

  `I have no time for this.' says Jason coldly. `Take me to Re'Cas...'

  `As you wish, kid! Step through the Portal, I shall be right after you!'

  World of fire

  Somewhere in the Elemental Plane of Fire, present day (1 year, 1 month, and 7 days before Twilightfall)

  Stepping through the Portal feels alien, yet this is not the first time I used one. It is the fourth, if I am not mistaken. But compared to the other three, this seems very different. Previously, stepping through a Portal felt like stepping through water, but this time there is more to it. For a moment I feel like falling through and endless void, and then everything gets back to normal. We step into the Plane of Fire, and survey our surroundings.

  I don't really know what I was expecting, but what I see does not seem out of place. A hot environment, a wide field with thin paths of rock in a seemingly endless pool of boiling lava. In the distance, I see volcanoes.

  `Welcome to the Elemental Plane of Fire!' says Zack. `Yes, I know, feels hot as Hell. I hate that, too.'

  He quickly closes the Portal behind us while Jase and I look around. He seems much less amazed than I am.

  `Where is the Gateway?' he asks.

  `Not very far, but first, let's check out something over here!' replies Zack, and he walks off in some direction. We follow him.

  `While we find what I'm looking for, let's use our time.' he says. `Let me tell you a little more of the nature of Spiritual Planes. Are you not surprised at what you see here?'

  `Should we be?' I ask.

  `Why yes! This is after all, a Spiritual Plane, which has no extension materially. A world with no material component. Yet, we tread on rock and are surrounded by lava. Does it not strike you as odd?'

  `Well, now that you mention it... but I still don't understand what this is all about.'

  `You do know what we are, right? We mortals consist of our body and our soul. The body is a material thing, while the soul is purely spiritual. It is immortal, but it cannot exist in a Material Plane without a body to which it is bound. When our body dies, our soul is expelled from the Material Planes, and it enters one of the Spiritual Planes. Typically the plane of dead souls, which we call Afterlife. Worlds like the Afterlife, or like this world, exist only on the spiritual level. As for what that truly means, well, it is difficult to comprehend. Let me give you an allegorical example!

  Think of the Material Planes as the ground on which we walk. Think of the Spiritual Planes as the air that we breathe, and think of our soul as a breath of air. The air is free to whirl around above ground, but it cannot be grounded for long, for nothing holds the air to the ground. But the breath of air which is our soul is bound to our body, and is therefore able to walk on the ground. When we die, it is released and is returned to the air around us. It becomes a part of it, and can travel with it on the winds in a way that we cannot. It can mix with the rest of the air, it can be split, and it can eventually become whole again.

  Now imagine that you, while being a mortal, exit the Material Planes, and enter the Spiritual Planes. You leave the ground, and become a part of the air. But not as let's say a bird, forget that birds exist! You can be taken apart and mix with the very air around you. Be a part of it. How can that be? When your body is unable to do so?

  Simple. Your body does not truly mix with the air. No, instead, the breath of air that is your soul leaves your body, and becomes a part of the air.'

  `Are you saying that our souls have been separated from our bodies?' asks Jason. Well, at least he understood some of this babbling...

  `Not exactly, but you're on the right track!' replies Zack. `What you ask is something which I only meant to explain at a later point. I'll get to that soon, but first let me carry on with the allegory.
As I said, your soul can't be a part of the air if it doesn't leave your body. But it can still be a part of the air even if it stays in your body, in a way. Let's say you are given a... flying vehicle. A mechanical dragon, or a flying ship, or something. Something that you can get into, and use it to fly high above. Then your soul need not mix with the air, your soul need not leave your body, and it can still become a part of the air.

  Well, something like this happens when one enters a Spiritual Plane. When we entered this world, we entered a world which has no material component. No ground to walk on, so to speak. We still comprehend it as if it was a Material World however. That's because a protective magical husk was formed around our bodies when we stepped through the Portal. This husk keeps us alive, and it is maintained by our own life force as long as our soul is in this world. If we encounter a native creature, we will not see it as the spiritual, bodiless being that it is. The husk will make us experience these creatures like the material manifestations they have when they enter a Material Plane. If we fight them, our weapons and spells will harm them, but not quite in the way that we will experience it.

  For example, let's say you behead a creature with your sword, and it dies. What really happened, is that the sword altered the husk around your body, allowing it to harm, and eventually kill the creature. The more powerful the weapon used, the more powerful this effect. The same goes for magical attacks as well.

  Now, what if there was no magical husk surrounding us? Well, while this husk protects us, we are able to exist here. If we end up in a fight and suffer too much damage, the husk will be destroyed. If the husk is destroyed, our souls are ripped out of our bodies, exactly as you understood from my allegorical example a minute ago. If that happens, we will die. Just like that.

  So let me put it this way, returning to my allegory. For creatures like us, entering a Spiritual Plane is like stepping off a cliff. If we have a means to fly, we live. If not, we die. Plain and simple. We need this magical husk to protect us, otherwise, our soul will be ripped out of our bodies, and we will perish.'