With a small gesture and a tiny trickle of power, I sent Eri’s soul back a century to her younger self-successfully merging her two souls together. As a part of that cost to send her back a full century, her body faded from existence and the river ran clean as if the blood never tainted it. It is a normal occurrence when someone is jumping back in time and changing their past. That also meant now she-and hopefully by extension her village-were safe from potential human hunters or walking an alternative path in life.
I kept dreaming more after that with vivid imagery of life moving on through time and little idea of how long I slumbered for. Kingdoms rose and fell like tides of an ocean on the beach while life moved on. Humanity continued to create and destroy its creations while longer living races like elves and dwarves lived in peace. Things appeared to be just fine until I suddenly felt a warning from my resting caverns-informing me I had intruders.
In a quick motion, I returned to my antechamber to find a familiar soul with two friends. Eri looked worn over decades of fighting though still retained elvish beauty like the rest of her kind do, but her two friends looked to be interesting in nature. One of them-a mixed blood of Human and Elf-wore wizard garb and seemed to have a penchant for storm magic considering the damage his body sustained from extreme voltage. The other friend of hers looked to be a dwarfess with a giant warhammer nearly twice her size and heavily imbued with some kind of earth magic-a branch offshoot of life magic I assumed. I called up their profiles using System commands.
<~-(+)-~>
{Profile: Eri Sundancer}
Age: 250 (true age: 350)
Level: 120
Tier: Diamond
Class: Blade Mistress
Titles: [Fatebreaker], [Heroine of the Sun], [Bearer of the Crux Heart], [Time Traveller]
---
{Profile: Damien Horde}
Age: 150
Level: 115
Tier: Diamond
Class: Diviner
Titles: [Archmage of the College], [Arcane Scholar of Storm], [Voidwalker]
---
{Profile: Hestia Orebreaker}
Age: 200
Level: 118
Tier: Diamond
Class: Warsmith
Titles: [Grandmaster Blacksmith], [Sunforger], [Enchanter Genius]
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<~-(+)-~>
Their profiles were impressive and clearly shows the experience of skill over a whole century could do, but I had to wonder why they came here or even how the three of them knew about these caverns. I made sure the caverns had no entrances to the surface though instead of getting into a fit over it, I decided to listen in on their conversation since they began conversing just after their profiles were pulled up for me.
“Are you sure that whatever you are looking for is down here, Eri?” Damien asked in a slightly deep voice that echoed through the caverns. They carried no torches, but appeared to be navigating the underground caverns quite easily. Perhaps some kind of night vision ability?
Eri nodded. “I’m sure, Damien. I do not know what it is, but-”
“You do not know what you will find down here?!” Hestia grumbled towards Eri in a less than sultry female voice. “Bah, these caverns alone are an enchanter’s wet dream! I can sense powerful enchantments woven into the bedrock of this place which alone could be worth thousands of platinum!”
The dwarfess gestured to the cavern around them. “They are far more permanent than those written into Deepholm by twenty grandmaster enchanters over three centuries!”
“We could stop and set up camp in a couple yards anyways, Hestia. It doesn’t appear that this place is some kind of underground dungeon since we had to find a way to shape our own entrance. Dungeons do not do that,” Damien commented with a slight nod towards the dwarfess. “Besides, I agree with you. The ambient energy in this place is high quality-too high for dungeons and easily surpasses the Mage College like comparing an ocean to a puddle. I do not think there is anywhere on Altaron that is like this.”
That got the other two’s attention quick and my keen interest. Clearly, I knew my resting chambers drew in a tithe of ambient energy and worked to amplify the surrounding environment with a higher degree of energy to compensate for the loss though I did not expect for it to possess a higher quality.
“So, what does that mean? Out of all the kingdoms and villages in our world, this place is effectively a hotspot of mana?” Eri asked Damien.
Damien nodded in response. “More like a wellspring. Perhaps this place is what made the ancient kingdom of Farest so prosperous in the first place.”
I tried to ponder Damien’s meaning about an ancient kingdom, but before I could, the conversation continued.
“No one truly knows what caused their fall outside of the elves and any first hand accounts have long since been gone from mortal memory, Damien,” Hestia grumbled as if annoyed with the archmage giving them a history lesson. “Farest is merely a legend retold in third hand accounts at best.”
I watched the trio continue delving deeper into the caverns until they reached the center of the complex-deep below the surface of what I understood to be called the Aetherium Fields-and where all three of them stopped to see a single stone door in front of them. This door appeared to be finely designed and built to withstand nearly anything due to heavy warding inscribed into the very structure itself. None of them understood what it was doing in a place without breathable air or what lay beyond it, but I knew that this party of adventurers somehow found out about this cavern-making me feel irritated since the safeguards I wove should have kept anyone else out while I recovered. No doubt that after they found this place, these adventurers were going to try unlocking the door.
Deciding to not spend another moment watching them, I moved back into the chamber beyond the door. Upon entering the chamber and knowing how much time was left before the adventuring party unlocked it, I immediately started the forging process. I received a System notification in my vision once the spell started-which at this point couldn’t be stopped.
<~-(+)-~>
Beginning Character Creation…
---
System Administrator permissions detected!
Enforcing Temporal Lock.
Suspending Local Time (Altaron).
---
Vessel Slots Available: 3/3
<->
Please select a race type:
* Mortal Race
* Ancient Race
* Mythical Race
* Elder Race
<~-(+)-~>
I did not want my vessel to be an Elder Race on this world-System enforced or not-since the dominant species seem to be a trifecta of Elves, Humans, and Dwarves thus far. There were other possible race types out there on the surface though nothing made by the Elder Courts at the very least which meant no really overpowered races for this vessel. That left Mortal, Ancient, and Mythical races as possible choices. I did not want to appear as a human or register as one on Altaron-though I might have to on worlds where humans are the only dominant species-so mortal types were out. Ancient races like elves or faeries were considered “long lived” by humanity though not with higher tier races like various types of undead or supposedly mythical races.
Without much more thought into my decision, I chose the Mythical Race option.