I learned much over the next few days, after the dire warning from whatever Hearth God had communicated that a Keeper was coming in our direction.
Mayer had called a group meeting between myself, Rethi and even Alena, to discuss this new info.
The reaction from Rethi had been that starstruck look he always got when Mayer and I discussed some legend in a realistic capacity. It's frequency was slowly declining, as he got used to the fact that his 'Master' was a bona fide Demigod and ex-Champion, for what it was worth. This moment of amazement was quickly washed away when Rethi started to recount what the Keepers actually were to the rest of the group.
The Keepers were a group aligned with the Court of Mysteries, their sole purpose is to track down and take control over dangerous items, artifacts or even beings within their own purview. They were positively legendary, true fairy tale material, according to Rethi.
Mayer, however, thought differently.
"They are entirely real, and have been around a hell of a lot longer than our records of them show, though they have been busy for the last few decades." He had said.
Alena, who wasn't given precisely clear information on just how I got the information, didn't seem to understand why she was involved in this situation all of a sudden. She simply sat her chair and gawked, being thrust into the presence of Mayer himself and learning that the Keepers are real, and not just a feature of a bedtime story.
"How… close are they to their fairy tale counterparts?" She had asked timidly, unsure of how impolite she could get away with being in front of Mayer. Mayer, however, didn't take note of the girl not referring to him in full politeness.
"Fairly close. Though they are far less giving than they seem in the stories. They do not dole out swords and magic items like a merchant would, asking for something in exchange. They take far more than they give, but when they do give items of power out, it's almost always at the behest of the Gods that they work for. They are also far more dangerous."
Which was about all of the information that anyone got out of those hours of discussion.
Mayer knew more, and I suspected he'd actually met a Keeper before, but he didn't elaborate on any past experience he may or may not have had. Though he had said that he was questioning whether the Keeper was there for him or for me, which I found interesting.
Mayer had all sorts of things that a Keeper could potentially want, like that wand for one. Being as valuable as Mayer had said it was gave it a certain possibility, but he had also alluded to people being able to actually make them and I wouldn't be surprised if they were relatively commonplace amongst certain shifting types in Orisis.
I had learned next to nothing about Orisis during my time with Mayer. Too busy doing literally everything else and devoting my time to making pretty footprint patterns in the dirt. But now that it was becoming clear that the day where I would leave was drawing ever closer, it was becoming a point of interest.
However, the days drew closer to the approximate ten days that the hearth court prescribed before the Keeper himself made it to the small nameless town we were anxiously waiting in.
It was indeed nameless as well, in fact this conglomeration of towns along the road Rethi, Alena and I had travelled along were simply called road towns. They rarely lasted longer than a few decades and there were constant influxes and outfluxes of people due to immigration between towns, most likely because of constant issues with bandits and monsters. I didn't even actually know what kingdom I was in, or if there was a kingdom owning this land at all. Mayer would probably know, but if I asked the man every possible question I had about the outside world, his brain would start leaking out his ears from boredom.
It was day eight of the ten-day approximation when the town was set alight with whispers. Apparently, a mysterious man had rented a room at the bar the night before, which happened infrequently enough that the townsfolk actually cared. Especially when they were 'spooky', as the innkeeper had so eloquently put it.
Rethi had brought that information back with him after he made a trip out to Alena's home, being told by Michael Gram who seemed to almost be the towns secret seller, probably for the man's own amusement if nothing else.
"Well, looks like we'll be having a visitor in the next few hours then." Mayer said calmly. Very calmly in fact. You'd be entirely fooled by Mayer, thinking that he had everything well in hand, but I could see into the man's head, so when I took a peek and saw what amounted to factory creating contingency plan after contingency plan blazing with all the speed of anxiousness, I gave Mayer's statement a nod and pretended I had never looked.
"Rethi, I'm going to ask that you sit this one out, mate." I said, trying to put on a similar anxious less guise. Rethi looked at me, scandalized that he was being sent away.
"What do you mean sit this out? We went and mowed down a forest full of wolves, but meeting one guy is too much?" I was pretty obvious he was just being petulant, and even he himself knew that the two things he was comparing wasn't even remotely comparable.
"You've heard what Mayer told us, Rethi." I said warningly. I wasn't going to let the kid convince me that it was a good idea for him to stay while this went down. Rethi huffed, irate. There was that clear frustration that I could feel, the one that everyone has felt once or twice, exclusion. I just raised my eyebrow and the boy rolled his eyes and walked out of the door, probably going over to see Alena instead.
Rethi was usually respectful and understanding, but I can see why he might not be happy with me excluding him from something so big. But I couldn't risk the boy's life if this Keeper really was just as dangerous as Mayer says he is. Mayer walked into the lounge room and plopped himself down into his chair, reclining into as comfortable position as he could.
"Managed to get Rethi away?" He asked quietly. I just nodded and the room was absorbed with the silence.
There wasn't anything to talk about, just waiting for something to happen. The warmth of the midday sun was leaking through the windows, brightening the magnificently crafted wood structure that was Mayer's home. The small trinkets and warm carpets covered the walls and floors, a bookshelf full of books that I had no doubt contained some advanced knowledge on history, though I had never read then and really should have at least tried to.
This room had slowly become one of the only places on Virsdis that I felt I could relax, if only for a moment. For months I had been so consumed by the need to empower myself, feeling distinctly underpowered and overwhelmed by the new world around me. Maybe the other Champions had made better decisions than me, choosing to read and learn and train all at the same time. But I didn't have the mental capacity for all of them, so I chose one and it was learning the Sharah at the cost of everything else.
The silent relaxation that I was able to experience in this room calmed my anxiousness, allowing me to simply think. I knew that at any moment the man we had been anxiously awaiting would arrive, and with him there would be more craziness thrown my way, and that it may very well be the tipping point that will begin my journey across the worlds.
A nail was put in that relaxation, suddenly killing it when the sound of the front door opening and closing rung out through the hallway and into the lounge where we were waiting. I saw Mayer take in a deep, slow breath and look up towards the doorway.
"Keeper." He greeted. I turned to look and saw a tall man, maybe six foot and a bit tall, entirely cloaked in an exceptionally dark travelling cloak with its hood pulled up.
"Mayer Renue." The man said. As soon as the Keeper opened his mouth, his dry and cold voice ringing in my ears, I could feel something distinctly familiar yet so very foreign about him. As I dug deeper into that feeling, I started to be able to sense a sort of aura surrounding the man. It was quiet and understated, secretive almost, but visible enough to know it was there but not enough to know what it truly was.
"A domain." I said without meaning to, surprised to see another domain so soon. The Keeper's head turned towards me slowly, the face underneath the hood totally obscured from my vision. When he looked at me for a few moment I felt that same domain make contact with me and, as if it were blind, feeling over every centimetre of my exposed body.
I felt the need to make the domain stop, but let it happen anyways. I could tell that the domain wasn't doing anything malicious, just incredibly invasive. The tendrils of the domain aura pulled away from me, but with a whoosh the Keeper stepped closer to me, steeping over me like the towers on a gothic cathedral.
"A Champion." His voice boomed with a quiet might that made every hair on my body stand on end. In that very second I realised just how dangerous this Keeper was. He was, no doubt about it, a Demigod level being.
"Keeper Armament," Mayer said calmly, "what are you here for?" The Keeper continued to steep over me, sweat glands that hadn't been properly used in weeks—if not months—started to fire up again, leaving my hands clammy. I desperately tried to see inside the man's head, see any emotion at all, but there was a shroud covering his thoughts and feelings, and without being able to see his eyes at all I wasn't able to pry any further.
"Many reasons." He said unhelpfully. Mayer nodded, as if the answer was entirely reasonable.
"There are many things that are coming to light in recent months, especially on Orisis?" Mayer questioned and the Keeper nodded, shifting to look at me out of the side of his hood for a moment.
"Some are more secretive than others. One is dead. I have their weapon in my care." The Keeper pulled a hand from his cloak. What caught my attention first was not the weapon that he held, but the hand that held it. It was horrifically scarred, mangled almost. If I had seen anyone with injuries even remotely close to the Keeper's I could only believe that they had been flayed or been tortured.
But I didn't keep my eyes on the man's hand for very long, because I soon saw the crossbow that he held. It was mostly a silver looking metal, covered in runic patterns, and a fine wooden stock that was almost silvery as well. It was almost like…
It was. It was a Soul Weapon of another Champion. One of the other fifty that had been brought over to these worlds and one was already dead. I couldn't help but gawk at the weapon. I had assumed that the other Champions were so smart that they couldn't possibly die so early, but apparently they weren't immune to the dangers of this world as much as I had thought. That just meant that I was even less immune.
"They died to the hands of a death shifter a day after their summoning. The death shifter was summarily killed." Mayer just nodded, hiding his surprise. If a life shifter was as dangerous as I knew it to be plus the stories of them creating living abominations, I couldn't imagine what a death shifter could pull off. Apparently they were dangerous enough the be able to kill a Champion.
"Do you know the locations of other Champions?" Mayer asked grimly. The Keeper was still for a while but managed to shake his head.
"No, they are illusive to us. Except for this one." He turned to me and I swear I could feel a blade slicing through my skin, with the same pain as I used to experience before I had become accustomed to the pain of battle.
"And what do you intend for him?" Mayer asked, his tone darkening. The cloaked Keeper turned to look back at Mayer, and in an instant the air was on fire. As they looked at each other, fire shimmered in the air, becoming by far the hottest temperature I had ever experienced. The two men, however, stood stoic against the fire that hung in the air around them, licking at their skin to no effect.
The Keeper, Armament, took a step forwards toward Mayer and the heat rose even further, singeing my hair and lapping at my skin like a ravenous dog.
"I intend to take his Soul."