Olaf Brightfingers hustled into the River Caldera. He had been skeptical of the silver devil. The boy was the evil of legend , after all. Olaf had intended to take the information of the Silver Devil straight to Shadow Fist, only to find that that the new leader of the Caldera mortals had been stolen.

His faith in Lord Ajax was shaken when he slaughtered everyone in the Stone Caldera. The tier zeros wouldn’t even create elementals. That was when Olaf realized he was backing pure evil. He chose to side with the silver devil and the silver devil had given him a mission. Tell Harp where to hide and tell Siren where to hide.

Olaf, or Oaf as everyone called him, had chosen the one named Harp. Maybe she was his wife or lover, that had to carry more goodwill than some old man. He looked down at his pig, smiling as he remembered that day. Of course, he had lied about having a wife, women weren’t attracted to men named Oaf.

His life had been spared by a devil so he decided to spare his pig. It had grown in the last few years, it was nearly big enough to ride. Oaf had given up much, bacon mostly, to spare her life. It was a worthy sacrifice. Entering the city, Oaf realized that he might have a problem. The river Caldera was large and nearly empty.

He wandered around for nearly thirty minutes with no luck before heading towards the Elder’s mansion. That building at least had guards, though there were so few of them that Olaf could have probably snuck through with his pig. Looking around, he finally decided yelling would be in his best interest.

“HELO!” Olaf yelled, cupping his hands over his mouth to amplify his voice.

At least the guards weren’t deaf. One of them rushed around the corned. He was a tubby man with a gambeson and a short spear in his hand. Looking at his wispy hair and double chin, Olaf felt some kinship with the man. Olaf waited for the man to arrive, it was quite a wait.

When the man arrived, he puffed out, “This is the Elder’s estate, permission is only granted by invitation.”

“Oh, I knew that, pig and I need to deliver a message,” Olaf smiled, “And I have no idea where anything is.”

“To the Elder?” The guard asked.

“No to Harp,” Olaf smiled. He assumed that someone would have been alerted of his arrival. Olaf frowned, feeling like there was a flaw in that logic. He mentally shrugged and pushed it out of his mind.

“Who?” The guard asked.

“Harp, she is important to my employer,” Olaf tried to emit an aura of nobility. The bards said it was possible to motivate people with an aura like that. With his back straight and nose pointed at a slightly upward angle he nodded, “The silver devil who defeated the Forest Caldera!”

Noble people always name dropped their backers. To Olaf’s amazement, it actually worked. He would need to tell Old Hermit Crack-Pot thank you.

The guard’s face paled and he stammered, “You mean the devil house. The one full of captive children.”

Olaf nodded, “Yes that's the one.”

It was fitting for a silver devil of Tristan’s standards to keep a house full of children. Actually, it was quite nice of him to care for his victim’s families. Something was off with that thought as well. Olaf was distracted by the guard spitting out a few directions. He was surprised to learn that he had walked past it on his way in.

He racked his mind, but he simply did not remember walking by a castle made of black stone. Olaf imagined it would have lightning in the background and a gate with a skull in it. Still, he took the instructions and made his way back towards the gate. Glancing up at the clear blue sky, he sighed, there probably wouldn’t be any lightning.

Olaf ended up at a house with a sizable yard. It probably had grass in the summer, but not this upcoming summer. Several children were digging a pit in the yard. It was also not made of black stone. Wooden slats kept the rain out, all of them painted a baby blue. Olaf couldn’t imagine something less silver devily.

After a few minutes, he worked up the courage to ask the children if this was indeed the correct location, “Hey does Harp live here? I have a message from the Silver Devil.”

Once again the name drop succeeded. The children stare up at him in awe. Yes, even children understood.

“Mom said we shouldn’t talk to strange people,” A young boy said.

Olaf spluttered at the indignity. The grace of the silver devil knew no bounds if he had to put up with these rude, ungrateful. His mental monologue was interrupted.

“You know my big brother,” a little girl with reddish eyes bounced up and down in excitement.

Of course, they weren’t impressed. He had tried to impress the family he served with their own name. Pride thrust aside, Olaf bowed, “Indeed, he asked me to take a message to a woman he knows by the name of Harp.”

“OK, I’ll go get her,” The devil’s younger sister dropped her shovel and ran inside.

Olaf patted himself on the back. At least until a pair of people exited the building. One was unnatural looking, with glowing lavender eyes and what looked like permanent tear tracks running down her face. The other was in chains, his dark purple eyes scanning Olaf. Shadow Fist, the Silver Devil’s woman was able to keep Shadow Fist in chains.

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Olaf’s mouth flopped open and closed for long enough to make Harp prod him into action, “You said you have a message.”

“Oh, uh, yes ma’am,” Olaf stammered, “The Silver Devil asked me to relay this message,” at Harp’s raised eyebrow Olaf rushed his explanation, “He wanted me to let you know of a bunker location under the temple. He felt that in the case of an emergency, he wanted you to know where it was.”

Harp and Shadow Fist exchanged a look, then she looked at Olaf, “What bad thing was he expecting? The elementals were routed just a day or two ago.”

Olaf paused. What was the threat? Obviously, the Silver Devil had been referring to the elementals, but he could not make his employer look foolish.

“I do not know, but he has most likely foreseen a greater danger,” Olaf said drawing again on his noble aura.

Shadow Fist sighed, “Greater danger? My son has already dealt with a tier nine elemental lord, what could be worse than that?”

The Forest Caldera exploded. The already bright midnight was washed white as a wave of pressure rolled across the Caldera. Blind gods! Did the Silver Devil have the gift of prophecy?

-Shadow Fist

A streak of red light connected the Forest Caldera and stopped over the middle of the River Caldera. Shadow Fist had a bad premonition. He inspected the messenger again. The odd man appeared to be fanatical about his eldest son, which was good.

“How long would it take you to get all the women and children into the temple if you left now?” Shadow Fist asked. There was a speck in the sky, dropping quickly.

The oaf thought for an infuriatingly long time, “Hmmm, fifteen minutes, depending on how well the children listen, it could be less.”

“Do it,” Shadow Fist turned to his family’s long term babysitter, “Harp go as fast as you can, your lives may depend on it.”

“What will you do?” Harp asked.

“I’m going to see if I can’t get you those fifteen minutes,” Shadow Fist said.

With that, he broke his bindings and stepped out of the house. Tristan had been so on guard against Shadow Fist’s consumption force that he had forgotten that mundane ways to remove restraints existed. Namely acid and files. Sure it took a long time, but the next strongest person around was his wife, and she was two tiers higher than the next person.

His kern still felt empty, like he had gone on a long fast. There was no way for him to use dark essence, but he suspected anything that could create a pillar of light like that was not going to be affected by a dark construct. The speck was now close enough that it appeared to be human, though that did not mean it was human. There had once been a ghoul with metal bones that nearly breached the ramparts a few years ago, it looked human as well.

Thankfully the landing zone was obvious. It was the Elder’s estate. Shadow Fist started sprinting at top speed, there were no pedestrians or carts to avoid, allowing him to cut loose. In less than half a minute he had arrived at the estate to find a few piles of ash and a large man in blood red armor holding a fat guard by the neck.

Shadow Fist took a moment to get a feeling for the interloper. The armor was of an odd design, almost more a ceremonial set than a combat suit. It was such a foreign thought that it took Shadow Fist a moment to accept it. Who had the spare resources to create a full set of ceremonial armor?

The bracers were exaggerated, with the elbow facing lip jutting back into a spike. More spikes ran along his knuckles and his knees were protected by plates molded to look like fire. His boots were modeled after the talons of a beast, though they still had room for standard sized human feet. The helmet was not open face or closed, instead, it had a ‘Y’ shaped gap where glowing silver eyes glared at the man he was holding.

Despite the flamboyant nature of the armor, the most shocking part was the oversized pauldrons. One was an obvious counterweight to the cannon resting on the other. Shadow Fist did not see how the weapon would function, but the glowing runes running up and down its barrel suggested it was essence powered. That alone let Shadow Fist know that he could not match this man. A half-ton weapon treated as little more than an accessory was so far beyond anything Shadow Fist had expected. This man had to be tier nine, or maybe even ten.

Shadow Fist ran through some scenarios, he only needed to buy a few minutes. Most men could have their egos stoked for that long. That was how he had handled Elder Forest.

Firming his resolve, Shadow Fist stepped out into the open and nodded to the man, “I see, you have met the lessers,” He made a show of looking the man up and down, and muttered, “I see, not many around here would have equipment like yours. I assume you are looking for something if you bothered wasting your time with this Caldera.”

The man stopped, taken by surprise at the savage’s forthrightness, “Yes, you have read the situation correctly. Are you not from around here? Your kern is quite a bit stronger than these savages.”

With a flare of essence, the guard burst into flames. Shadow Fist did not let himself flinch. That was an absurd amount of heat.

“Yes, I am local, I simply know what polite society entails. The strong get stronger, the weak serve, or get crushed,” Shadow Fist wiped a bit of guard off his shoulders, “And I take it from the events happening at the Forest Caldera, that I won’t survive.”

“If you give me the answer I want, you may,” The man lied. Whoever he was, concealing body language was not something he had much practice in. Shadow Fist saw right through the falsehood.

Instead of thanking the man, Shadow Fist laughed, “I am no fool, you will kill me, I would just like to request how you do it. Men like us, exact a price on lessers that waste our time.” He glanced meaningfully at the piles of ash on the ground.

“Fine. Tell me about Vulcan,” the man sneered.

Shadow Fist almost lost his composure. What did this man want with his son? He had done too much to keep the boy out of the fighting to send this monster after him.

“I assume you are talking about a man with a metal and fire kern?” At the intruder’s nod, Shadow Fist continued, “I have never personally met him, but from my network, he seems to be powerful. A magnitude greater than I. Though he seems more focused on building up a powerful force. He made a man by the name of Siren the greatest warrior this civilization has seen in generations.”

“Why does this matter?” The man sounded bored.

“Talk to him. Siren should have the location of this mysterious benefactor,” Shadow Fist smiled and explained in detail the abilities Siren possessed. He played up the man’s strength as much as possible. Relief flooded in when he felt the fifteen minutes pass by, “And now time for my request.”

“your request?” The man seemed surprised.

Shadow Fist strode around the man and picked up one of the guard’s spears. He leveled it at the intruder, the temple was to the man’s back, keeping his family as safe as possible.

“I practice a martial art where the practitioners trade a single blow, the weaker then submits to the stronger,” Shadow Fist rolled his shoulders back and set his stance, “Show me the pinnacle of this world.”

Shadow Fist charged and the world went white. The last thing he saw was two silver eyes, mocking him for his weakness.