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Prologue

The thunder crashed outside and the lightning lit the sky as Gibb and his sister Minda sat in the tavern and ate thick stew and drank down their beers. Gibb looked to Minda and said, "We need to leave as soon as this storm abates, the sorcerer is not going to let this insult go and I am no fighter." Minda scoffed at Gibb “That pathetic spell peddler is no match for me, It's not as though he can kill me or you for that matter. Besides if he shows up you just stay in here and I will go play with him before I drain the life from his husk of a body.`` The rain continued to pound the tavern roof as they sat in silence for a moment.

“Minda why must you always force us into these situations? You know I hate confrontations and just want to spend my time traveling and enjoying the world in peace.” Gibb asked resignedly. Minda blinked at him as if he were daft and said “The evil piece of offal was using children to extend his life and increase his power through dark magic. He drained the souls out of those poor children and skinned them alive in order to get the maximum amount of power from their terror. He is just lucky he was able to get away through that strange air hole or I would have killed him slowly.”

With a loud explosion and flash of light the ground outside the tavern lit up like daybreak and there was the silhouette of a man standing there with his hands raised in the air with lightning arcing from his fingertips. Gibb dropped his head on the table as Minda looked out the window and a wicked smile spread across her face. Time to finish what she had started back at his fortified keep. 

Faster than anyone but Gibb could see Minda was standing in the field across from the child-murdering sorcerer. Gibb could see the golden light of Minda's life magic pulsing around her as her body transformed subtly into her preferred battle form. Muscles tightened and grew, veins pulsed a staccato rhythm, her razor-sharp talons elongated to nearly two inches long on each of her fingers and became harder than any diamond. She bolted forward, mud flying behind her, spattering the door of the tavern hanging askew where she didn't quite open it properly and busted the hinges.

Before she got within fifty feet of the evil mage there was an invisible wall and a wild cacophony of fire, lightning, and shards of ice blasted down at her which she didn’t even bother to avoid. As each hit her she allowed them to burn, shock, and impale her in fast succession then shook it off healing in a matter of seconds without showing the slightest hint of pain. As Gibb watched, he saw her hand become engulfed in both her life and death magic, life on her right fist and death on her left. Minda began punching the wall in a blurry flurry of blows so fast even Gibb couldn’t make out individual punches. 

Minda sped up and Gibb saw the anger on her face turn to rage and then full-on fury beyond anything he had witnessed from her in their unknown centuries together. Her magic began to pulse from her chest pushing more and more power into her hands at a rate Gib didn’t know was even possible. The sorcerer began casting faster and faster, never stopping his barrage of the elements, hitting Minda with everything he had at his disposal. The strain on his face was obvious and the battle was heading in an obvious direction and it was not going to be a good one for the wizard of dead children. 

Gibb noticed the sorcerer digging through his robes pulling out several items and preparing them. He didn't know why but Gibb was getting nervous about the things the bastard was pulling out to use on his sister. Gibb didn’t understand it because he and Minda couldn’t be killed. They had tried for centuries to no avail until finally giving up and just accepting their lot in the world was to live on in perpetuity. So Gibb knew there was no way this random half-assed sorcerer could manage to put Minda down. Minda could defeat entire nations if she was sufficiently motivated and they gave her cause. Despite knowing all of this, Gibb decided to go outside and make sure he was close enough to react and shut down the sorcerer's mind if it came to that.

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Suddenly there was a loud crack and it was as if the air itself began to shatter from Minda's hands-on out until it reached the end of the shielding spell the sorcerer had placed. Cracks spiderwebbed throughout until it lost enough integrity that it began to dissipate like a fog and disappeared entirely. Minda began stalking towards the Sorcerer once again with renewed enthusiasm seeing her prey in easy reach. The sorcerer pulled up one of his items and tossed it towards her. Gibb listened to his thoughts and let out a sharp snort. “It’s a Wibbie's Web Box Min, I bet you can’t break it in under 3 minutes.” Minda looked back and said “I will break that nonsense in less than 2.” the box landed near her feet and blew apart in a massive spider web wrapping Minda up like a cocoon. 

“That is only going to buy you enough time to think about the mistake you made by coming for my crazy sister,” Gibb said the sorcerer still stood far out of reach. The sorcerer pulled out another item and tossed it on Minda followed by his last item. Gibb listened to his thoughts again and this time he gasped. “Min get out now he is going to drop a death curse on you and drop you into another plane, I don't know if your magic can survive outside of our world.” Gibb sprinted towards Minda but he was nowhere near as fast as his sister who got the physical gift while he got the mental ones. 

The death curse went off just as Gibb got close enough for its radius to hit him along with Minda draining them both of all the life they had in them. He saw the webbing go completely limp as a hole into blackness opened up and Minda fell through while Gibbs' vision began to blacken. 

Unfortunately for the sorcerer, Gibb was not at all like Minda where his powers were concerned. As the life drained from Gibb and the death curse finally finished running its course, the gift he was born with so many centuries ago came alive with a vengeance. Black shadows began spreading from Gibbs' body and draining life from everything around him. The grass began to blacken while the ground itself lost all bug life and nutrients. The shadow continued to spread out faster and faster, feeling the life surrounding Gibb. The sorcerer saw what was happening and began to turn and run but it was far too late once Gibbs' power activated unconsciously. The blackness swept across the sorcerer and toward the tavern and over and through it like a tidal wave. It was so fast nobody had time to scream or run. It was indiscriminate in the death it dealt, sucking the life from men, women, children, pets, plants, and all other life within a hundred or so yards. 

Gasping for air, Gibb bolted upright looking around his room. The nightmare again. Every night since he lost Minda it has plagued his dreams. Looking towards the window and the faint light beginning to shine through he sat his feet on the floor and said to nobody “Well Minda it's been a hundred years to the day since you fell through that hole in the world. I hope wherever you are the power of our blood has kept you well and one day we can figure out a way back to each other.” Standing up and stretching Gibb headed out of his room to start his day.

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