For the 4th time that month, gnomes were gathered to discuss revolution, taking over the world and dealing with heroes.
The normal gnomes had taken to Peter and Asmodeos so, as if the two were houseplants.
The dark gnomes had not really cared about Peter and Asmodeos much but had just wanted to get their share of the hot chocolate and cookies.
The imp gnomes had tried to attack them just to get the hot chocolate and cookies, which were apparently a gnomic currency.
Those shape-shifting imp gnomes who were in the training pendant, however, actually had a plan.
The only thing they needed was for them to hijack the training pendant, get Asmodeos to get them out of there, and they could descend upon the world.
But there was a slight hitch in the plan.
"Asmodeos is strong, the strongest mage ever," he was not, but the poor gnomes had lived their entire lives with only Asmodeos as an example of power.
They didn't know any better.
"We can make a deal with Asmodeos! We can be his army, his legion, we can…" the gnomes had the tendency to be dreamers.
That wasn't something that the gnomes did consciously. They were, as any of the small creatures who had numbers but not strength, driven to prove themselves.
Driven to carve a little piece of heaven for themselves.
"Asmodeos is not someone who is going to just take things lying down," which was also true for the most part.
But what the gnomes didn't know was that if Asmodeos was too weak, that is to say, if they all came in their shifter forms towards him in force, they could make him run away.
Once they caught him, they could get pretty much anything from him.
"And that warrior, that warrior ran from us," that was the deer gnome who had later turned into a cockroach just to listen in on Asmodeos and Peter.
He had his suspicions about Asmodeos' power, knew for a fact that Peter was not exactly strong.
And so, he decided to step up.
"I say we ambushed him, sent a few bears and a couple of packs of wolves. Who is going to stop us? We are predators. We are gnomes!"
That was the truth, of course. They were gnomes and predators, and most of them could just trample Asmodeos if they wanted to.
But they didn't know one thing. One thing which would put all of their efforts into jeopardy.
"I know a secret," the gnome who had spoken had a long white beard, looked to be about 150 and was sitting in a chair bundled up with blankets.
The topmost blanket was orange because the gnome liked the color.
The ones under it were black, black like his soul, black like the war crimes he had committed during the gnome-goblin war.
"I know how to get out of here, but it will cost you all. Will cost you your hopes and dreams. It will cost you your good karma points," the imps knew this old general.
Knew that he was going to force them into a war. Knew for a fact that if they didn't act according to his plan, he was going to lie to them, lead them into a disaster and then let them all die.
To listen to Marek, speak, one could think that he was just an old man. An old man who wanted for the gnomes to have a bright future, but he was not just an old man.
No, he was a prehistoric, ancient man.
He had been there while the earth was young, and he had been there as the first fish got out of the sea.
He knew, for a fact, that the gnomes were the oldest race in the world, and he also knew, again for a fact, that they were going to be the last one.
"I don't know. I mean, yeah, you say that, but I think we shouldn't push it. We're living a good life here. Asmodeos gives us mana, and we get the mana from the pendant as well. If we get out of here, if we go to the real world, how are we going to get mana?"
That was the deer turned cockroach gnome.
He didn't believe in the old gnomic general. Knew for a fact that the man had a lot of dirty shirts in his closet, blood-stained ones.
And yet, he was the only voice of reason for the gnomes.
And as imp gnomes who could taste a little bit of freedom, a little bit of being big and strong and healthy, they wanted that for themselves for the rest of their lives.
There was one thing the general knew that all the gnomes didn't know, but he kept it to himself.
As a crown was laid upon his brow, finally, after so many centuries of trying to get one, he smiled.
The gnomes were going to find out the truth about their species on their own, but for now, he had a task ahead of him.
0000
"Peter, I'm telling you, if we don't get out of here, the gnomes are going to attack us. They might be immortal for all I know! But that doesn't mean they're going to forever remember the fact that you attacked one of them…"
Asmodeos could feel the tension in the air. He could cut it with a knife.
He knew he was being watched. Maybe some people would say that he was paranoid, but he was not.
Every butterfly which tried to land on his shoulder could be an imp gnome, and every ant which came too close to his boot could also be an imp gnome.
He had given the gnomes this ability as a joke, back when Nestor was actually letting him practice the SSS ranked spells.
That had been a mistake on Nestor's part. The good necromancer had long since forgiven Asmodeos, but he didn't give him back the books.
Asmodeos was now, lacking anything better to do, supposed to be the nanny of countless gnomes.
He had given the gnomes in the pendant a good life. They had lived without worries in a bountiful forest, and they didn't even have to go through the dunes of the desert which hugged its outskirts.
But that didn't mean that they were happy, and Asmodeos knew that if they became even more distraught, they were going to take him out and go into the real world.
But if didn't leave now, the gnomes were definitely going to follow.
Peter knew that, too, but refused to follow his and Asmodeos' good sense.
He prepared for a fight.
The first of many.