A day ago, across the far ends of the ocean towards the north of the continent, a large rift opened up in the sky as a skeletal dragon moved into the rift disappearing from the realm.
A half-decomposed animated corpse was riding the undead beast. It was fully clothed in the light blue robes of a wizard and had a creepy looking staff with a skeletal hand at its top. The only thing that hinted him to be an undead is the partly rotting skull like face beneath his hat.
As the lich moved through tear in the sky, he found himself in a pocket dimension as he was informed. The place was filled with rotting smell and fire spouts all around the ground. Everything on the ground looked evil or undead as he was informed. Even the skies had no clouds but there were no stars or any source of light except for the lava and fire spouts on the ground. The place also had vegetation, but it was all rotting and looked extremely queasy.
"This must be the place," thought Lord Hartley as he saw land and a pitch-black fort on a tall hill across the horizon. A pale fire burned in his eyes as he was relieved to find that he had managed to reach the right place.
He had been one of the greatest magicians on the continent of Brindadvipa for a century before he had decided to lose himself in the dark arts for the sake of living longer. Unexpectedly, he had received help from an unknown entity a few years ago allowing him to become an immortal lich.
Somehow, he became a subordinate to this entity over these years as he lost himself. He had been following the entity's orders and plunged his nation into a state of chaos to fulfil his master's orders, but his attempts were thwarted by the combined efforts of the magicians among humans and high elves who rallied to suppress him. His only supporters were void elves who lived in the forbidden regions of which he didn't know much. On failure, he was advised to go to this place. He immediately decided to go as he wanted to meet this person for a long time.
"I hope that Master Nihilius is here," thought the lich as he flew forward towards the fort. Hunted by high elves whose means and methods he didn't know or understand, this was the only sanctuary for him as the void elves refused to harbor him as they intended to maintain a temporary state of peace. Only when they denied him protection, he realized that he was a disposable piece in their plans, but he couldn't do anything other than continue to support them.
As he came close to the fort a troop of void elves flying on a large black hawks came to surround him. These hawks were able to move at an extremely fast pace despite the higher gravity and the hot atmosphere of the place. He hadn't expected this place to be filled with void elves. It didn't make sense to him that they denied him refugee and sending him to another place controlled by void elves. He immediately realized these were the hawk guards that he heard would be protecting the royal family.
"I was sent here to meet Master Nihilius by king Volvanser," shouted Hartley as they surrounded him. They quickly made space as their leader moved out of the encirclement to meet Hartley.
"Prove your identity," said the void elf as he came close and jumped on to the skeletal dragon landing just a feet away from Hartley. Hartley quickly pulled out a small ring from a pocket in his robe and gave it to the void elf. It was a small black ring almost transparent and had small black spiral at its head. The elf took it and placed in on the lich's finger as he placed his hand which had a similar ring into the other hand of the lich.
"Inject mana into the ring," said the elf as he recited a spell. A few seconds later, he nodded to the other elves. "He seems to be legit. Let us get him to master."
"What does that do?" asked Hartley as he was confused by the way the elves confirmed his identity.
"If you weren't the owner of the ring you would have been deconstructed and pulled into the ring," said the elf as they landed at a courtyard on top of the fort. "Leave the dragon here and follow us. Our men will take care of it."
A few seconds later, Hartley was brought into a large hall illuminated by dull purple light. Three people were arguing as another one sat on a throne sipping wine as he was unperturbed by their discussion. Hartley only knew one of the three elves, Rasteu who was his point of contact with the void elves.
"I was waiting for you," said the void elf on the throne in euphonious voice causing the other three to immediately quiet down. "They were too. This is the lich that I have told you about. He was the one who caused all the mayhem on the Brindadvipa continent," said the elf as he signaled Hartley to come forward.
Hartley moved towards the throne quietly a bit afraid and confused. As he moved closer to the throne, he saw a red-eyed pale-faced void elf without a nose but thin slits for nostrils and long white hair that fell on his shoulders. He quickly realized the face as he had previously seen those eyes and nose in a crystal ball before.
"Master Nihilius. I am extremely glad to see you. I apologize for the circumstance in which I had to see you. We never expected that the high elves would intervene in the matters between humans. I am ready to accept any punishment that you think I deserve," said Hartley as he bowed down on one knee as he saw the elf.
The three other void elves grunted in displeasure as Nihilius started laughing. A moment later, he stopped and took a deep sip of the drink in his hand. "You don't deserve to be punished Hartley. You did everything that I asked and more. You even put the human and the high elf forces in dire straits that they decided to form a coalition to oppose the void elves advances."
"If anything, it is these three moron that need to be punished," said Nihilius in anger as black particles suddenly emerged around the three void elves and started to lift them in the air while constricting their windpipes.
"These three have confused being born as void elf royalty to be a pass to escape consequences after being stupid. They indulged in the fancy that they wouldn't be punished if they failed at their responsibilities," he continued as they began to struggle.
"Rastue was in charge of providing adequate support to finish the Nature Palace and affiliated organizations at Jambhudvipa. Daltreu was responsible for intelligence gathering and propagating wrong information. Laltue was to just fight with the High elves and keep them busy. All three didn't really serve as expected of them and they dared to excuse you and requested that I punish you for their mistakes. So, I am angry. Very angry."
"Tell me, Hartley. Who among these three you think has failed m? Wait all three were actually lousy. So, let me rephrase that. Whose is most responsible for our failure?" asked Nihilius.
"My lord," faltered Hartley on being questioned to find fault with one of the three elves suddenly. He knew that they were important people in the kingdom of void elves and finding fault with one would put him on bad terms with many elves. It would have been different if Hartley was also another elf but being human he would been excused indiscriminately to have falsely excused one of their own.
"Don't worry about repercussions. It is just a small query. No one here or among the rest of the void elves would dare to find conflict with you based on it," said Nihilius understanding Hartley's misgivings but the lich was still stuttering.
"They don't have much time, you know. If you don't answer fast, all three might die," laughed Nihilius. The three of them also turned towards Hartley with pleading looks in their eyes.
"Sir, the main reason for our failure is that someone in the academy had managed to meet with high elves and convince them that they need to fight us together. If they had been intercepted as we planned, we would have managed to stabilize our reign there and provided support to our forces in Jambhudvipa and finished our objective," said Hartley.
"Good, you're right on point. So, who was the fellow who was responsible for this? Daltrue. It is you right?" asked Nihilius with a smile as he came closer to the three. The force he exerted on the other two disappeared, but it got worse for Daltrue who lifted much higher and his started to bulge out.
"You two have anything to add to Hartley's words?" he asked looking at the two elves that he released. The frantically shook their heads as they fell down on the asses and started to hold their throats checking themselves while they took deep breaths.
"In that case, I no longer require your services Daltrue," said Nihilius as a large cut was made across Daltrue's throat and he started to bleed out as he was held in the air by those dark particles.
"Hartley you will take his position from now on. I hope that you three will not make such mistakes again," said Nihilius as he made sure that the elf was dead. "Inform King Volvanser that Daltrue of the Void Mansion had taken his life as recompense as he considered himself responsible for the failure of the mission."
None of them made any comment as the two elf royals along with Hartley were taken away from the hall be one of the guards. "Imbeciles, the whole lot of them," thought Nihilius. "If only I hadn't been stuck in here due to that damn high elven queen Kailandri, the whole lot of them would have been at my mercy. I hope Volansver would learn to be more useful from now on or I will have to make a couple more examples."
Taken out from the hall, Hartley was given ugly looks by both Rastue and Laltue. Though the pair of them managed to survive only because Hartley implied that their brother was responsible for the failure, the pair of them were angry that their brother died, and he was the only one they would vent against.
Seeing them angry at him, he felt that he was being wrongfully accused. He initially was angry at the pair of them, but then realized that he was angry at the wrong person. Nihilius was sure to know about their reaction and still did it. It then dawned upon him that Nihilius was yet again using him to teach the void elf royals a lesson and he had become a scapegoat. The situation is much worse as he had to stay among them from now on and had no idea how they would plan against him. Even if they didn't hurt him outright, they would make his life extremely hard from behind the scenes. Never before had he regretted listening to Nihilius as much as this. Even when he lost the fight, he never felt such fear and regret.
"Only be making myself useful to the Nihilius, can I put myself off this predicament," thought Hartley as he went into a room assigned to him. Reminiscing of the old days of his fame and glory, he went to sleep disheartened and in repentance. If he hadn't been a lich one would have seen tears of remorse on his face.
At the same time in the palace of the King Volvanser a scream of anguish sounded as his second wife held a few piece of broken blue crystals to her heart. "My Daltrue, my dear son. My only son. How did this happen?" she grieved as she looked at the life crystal of her son in pieces. The news that one of the princes died quickly went through all of the castle.
The king and his guard soon arrived to the life crystal hall where the life crystals of a number of void elves were kept safe. These were imbued with special magical runes and a small amount of life force of a person and are used to determine the state of life of a person.
King Volvanser caught his wife in his embrace as he tried to console her, but she quickly pushed him away. "Fine me the one responsible for his death before you get near me," she yelled in pain.
At the same time, a messenger came running to the king. He came to inform him of Daltrue's death as notified by the guards of the Void Mansion. "He died by suicide?" inquired the king in a low voice looking towards the messenger as his eyes popped in surprise.
Death by suicide was considered a shameful event by most of the elves. Having extremely wrong lives, they had chances to rectify or recompense for their mistakes most of the time. So, committing suicide was considered an extremely cowardly means of escaping responsibility and a shameful way too. Such people wouldn't even be allowed to be buried in the family crypts among the royal and noble families of the void elves.
"No. No. You are lying," said the queen horrified as she heard from the new from the mouth of the king. "Who told you that? Who told you that?" she screamed as she pulled the messenger towards her by his collar.
"Lord Nihilius, madam. It was his guards who informed us that prince Daltrue had killed himself for his failure in the mission," said the messenger loudly in a hurry as he saw the queen shout at him with red eyes and a demented expression.
"That bastard, Nihilius. He is the reason. He is the reason. He is just doing this to punish us for not giving him adequate support. You should have never sent my son to his aid. You should rescind any support you provide him," yelled the queen pointing at the king. Seeing the situation and realizing the direction of the conversation most of them tacitly left the king and queen alone.
"He is my ancestor, dear. He build this place and know everything about the city. I cannot break things with him completely. He could destroy the family from within the banished world," said the king as he tried to take her in his arms.
"My son is not a coward. He made my son a coward in the everyone's eyes," yelled the elf hoarsely as her eyes rolled over and she fainted in the king's arms in her anguish.
He carefully caught her and pulled her to the side. "Sorry, for this my dear. I never thought that he would be so ruthless to his own kin," said the king. "I swear that I will make sure that Daltrue's name will be cleared and he gets the honor he deserves. This is the least I can do for him and you."