Everyone was dead.

Everyone who hadn’t gone out before hell opened, was dead.

Everyone except him, who couldn’t die.

Dianthus looked at his hands. Bloodstained, filled with cuts and bruises who were slowly healing.

Knock, knock.

He wasn’t able to stop it, nor stall it enough for help to arrive.

The devil was simply too strong. Too strong for him, too strong for everyone.

Click.

Who could mess up so badly? Who-

“AH!” Dianthus woke up suddenly, screaming. A sharp pain had pierced his stomach, all the way across.

He reacted fast, grabbing the weapon’s handle before Igern fully nailed him to his bed. Once he felt resistance, Igern removed his hand from the lance.

“The Opening starts in half an hour.” He said, as he left his room, going downstairs.

You didn’t even bother to pull out the weapon…

“You fucking asshole…” Dianthus complained, slowly pulling the ice spear out. At least he hadn’t pierced his spine.

Igern was one of the mages who were going to die today. Not one of the firsts, the guy was too stubborn to even die fast. And his death wasn’t even noble, fighting to protect someone.

No. He fought the devil, he lost, he died.

Dianthus finally got up from bed, going to the bathroom. As gruesome as prophecies were, they still didn’t prevent certain needs.

After using the toilet, he cleaned his hands, face and blood remains, dressed up and went downstairs with the rest.

All of them were already up, and had been up for hours, getting ready. He was the last one to arrive. Dianthus had even managed to oversleep Nereus.

One does not simply wake up during a prophecy. Unless Igern is close, of course.

Thinking of the guy, he had gone back to his seat, and was enchanting an ice blade. He didn’t even raise his head to look at him.

Another future corpse, Creftalia, spoke, pushing a box towards him. “Your things. I’ve put several charms inside…”

How did she even die? Her death was too fast, Dianthus didn’t even remember it.

“And here are Nereus’.” She pushed another box towards the guy, who raised his head from the table, glared at the box with suspicion, and put his head back down.

Someone is a bad morning person.

Nereus also died. Dianthus remembers his corpse among the others, but he didn’t see how.

Every Queen’s Selected died except him.

The consequences of being the strongest team. They lasted too much and lost the opportunity to escape.

All the strongest novice mages would die today, while the weak, cowardly ones would survive. That was what the prophecy announced.

Now, Dianthus thought, how do I change this?

He had a plan, one involving something he had been warned not to poke.

…

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After having breakfast, a rushed breakfast, since Winter kept on hurrying him, Dianthus and company entered the Selection room.

The portal was open, and the mages were entering already.

The Queen was there, in one of the formation points, but she didn’t acknowledge their presence, busy with keeping the portal going.

Once all the mages were in, she would close the portal and rest, but not now.

Oh, there she is. Dianthus found his target. The last survivor. The last escapee.

The last mage who managed to escape the pocket dimension, before it became impossible.

Velvet was the name.

In Dianthus' memories, she had separated from her group to bait Igern, after crossing paths with his team and getting in trouble.

It was normal, Igern was the strongest mage after him, and he alone could take on whatever ragtag team he wanted.

Even so, Velvet was just running away, she wasn’t so stupid to fight him head-on. Her plan amounted to:

One: Use herself as a bait to separate Igern from his group, so that her group could deal with Creftalia.

Igern wanted to defeat Velvet as some petty revenge, so he fell for such bait extremely easily. Cons of being too strong, you get arrogant with time.

Two: Use any means to get away from Igern. Also doable, Igern was a combat mage, not a tracking mage.

Now, why was she the last survivor?

Because she got ‘unfairly’ kicked out.

The reasons in which a mage could consider to have lost, getting expelled from the pocket dimension were this ones:

Getting knocked out, hard to do in combat, but several mages simply took vials of poison with them, drank them, fell unconscious and lost instantly. The coward’s way out.

Having received a wound that could cause long lasting damage or death. The common way out for mages who were willing to participate.

Crossing the safe threshold of miasma accumulation. If a mage started giving signs of losing control, they were out.

This was the Opening, not a battle to the death. Even when it was going to become a massacre in a few hours.

Back to the point.

Igern wouldn’t manage to push Velvet into any of the previous categories. But, he did manage to harm her once.

Not a life threatening wound, just a plain cut.

And still, that was enough to kick her out from the Opening. Just seconds before it became impossible to get out.

Why?

Well, in the why, no, in the who, did lay Dianthus’ plan to change the prophecy.

And who used some papercut excuse to kick Velvet out from a certain death? The one who had her marked, of course.

Dianthus' plan was easy to follow.

Wait for Igern to chase Velvet, swoop in to save her, and ruin Lothrigern’s plan, so that He had to do something.

It sounded perfect, easy to do, and he could test if the warnings about Lothrigern had some real weight.

He just had to wait for the perfect moment.

…

Ignorant of someone’s plights that certainly didn’t involve her, Velvet entered the portal.

After a few seconds of dizziness and multicolored lights which forced her to close her eyes, she found herself next to a tree at the verge of a cliff.

In that position, she could admire the immensity of the pocket dimension, together with the variety of zones.

Scorching, volcanic zones, mazes with stone crafted roses, a forest so dense she could only see the tree’s tips, a river deep down the cliff, a desert in the middle of a sandstorm, a small, dense and liveless city, a frozen lake…

Each zone had a size around three square kilometers, in hexagonal shape, which mixed seamlessly with the next, like a puzzle with blurred edges.

With so much variety, no mage could complain that they were dropped in an disadvantageous terrain. They could just walk to their preferred place.

Velvet waited. She, Drifa and Skugol entered first, so, once Syon entered, they all could move instantly, reducing the time he was alone.

She checked the ring. Nothing yet.

Mages appeared separated from each other for at least one kilometer, even if they were moving, so ambushing someone who just entered wasn’t possible.

Ten seconds passed. She checked again.

There. Syon was in the city, moving west. She wasn’t that far away.

Once he entered the pocket dimension, Syon would go to the middle zone between the three, unless he was almost next to one of them.

I can join him in the forest. Velvet decided, before jumping from the cliff.

Using the earring, she reduced her body weight, and floated down to the river. Before touching the water, she pulled out the umbrella, pointing down.

She opened it; using the handle as a helm, and the canopy as a hull, she now had a makeshift boat.

The river waters moved fast, and, the best thing, they went towards the forest.

So for now, she was getting Syon.