“You have no idea what you are dealing with. If you unleash that amount of energy, it could be catastrophic,” Norman tried to reason with the man.

“More catastrophic than the end of the world? I don’t think so. But either way, I won’t be here to witness the aftermath. If it fails, you and your little kingdom go down in flames. If it succeeds, well… I get to claim credit for saving the planet. It’s a win-win.”

“You still die if it fails,” Norman shouted.

“Hardly. I’m perfectly fine to sit in my little orbital fortress waiting for the dust to settle. It’s not ideal, but that leaves humanity as the last species standing. I can live with that.”

Norman pounded on the barrier, but there was some sort of weird feedback that zapped him away. The armor absorbed most of the damage, but it didn’t redirect the force. When he glanced at the array, he saw a weird shine emanating from the blocks. He had missed it earlier because he thought it was just the gold catching the light.

Donovan must have noticed his attention, he chuckled. “I couldn’t have you screwing with the array before the fun begins. Speaking of.” The man looked at a pocket watch. “Any moment now.”

Soon another weird rift tore open and out stepped Vincent. Norman’s eyes went wide when he saw who he was dragging behind him.

“You sick bastard, let my wife go this fucking instant!” He knew this was Kalia and not one of Donovan’s shapeshifters the moment she stepped out. He could feel her heart rate spike through their shared connection with the ring.

His wife spotted him and managed to free herself from Vincent’s grasp to run toward him, but she was jerked to a stop by the short rope tied around her arms.

“Norman! They attacked the castle.”

That was all she got out before Vincent gripped her chin and ran his tongue along her cheek like some lecherous pervert. He did this while staring Norman in the eyes.

“You will fucking regret that,” he growled.

“Oh, and how do you plan to do that from inside there,” Vincent taunted. “You thought you could steal my woman from me and brainwash her. She belongs to me,” He snarled.

Norman snapped his fingers and the ring on Kalia’s hand uncurled and launched itself at the unsuspecting necromancer.

Vincent screamed and fell back from Kalia as he tried to fight off the tiny golem. But it dug into his flesh and started making its way to his heart before he could bat it off. He dropped the rope holding Kalia and began to roll around on the ground screaming and tearing at his skin. Served the bastard right.

Released from her shackles, Kalia sprinted toward the glowing dome before she suddenly stiffened as a magical blast impacted her after Donovan spoke some magical words.

“Idiot fucking boy,” Donovan cursed. “I told him not to mess around, maybe after this, he will finally learn to listen.”

Vincent’s screaming continued for a few minutes, Donovan doing nothing to stop or slow his own son’s agony. Eventually, the golem reached the man’s heart and Vincent died.

The tiny golem wasn’t done though, it burst from his corpse and flew at Donovan, but the man waved his hand and the golem flew through another rift.

After the rift closed Donovan adjusted his jacket and cuffs. “Despite what you may think, I am not a monster. If Vincent followed my rules, your oh-so-precious son and daughter should be fine. If not, well, I think this was a fitting punishment for him. As for your wife, I’m not going to lie to you, and promise I won’t kill her. I doubt either of us would believe that. My son was supposed to bring her here as leverage and then leave, but I’m afraid that is no longer an option. She is about to be privy to knowledge far too dangerous for her to know.”

“You’re not a monster, you’re the fucking devil!”

“You have an option here,” Donovan continued as if he hadn’t heard Norman. “I will give her a quick death. Just tell me, is this the real you? Or one of your little dolls?” The man walked up to his still-frozen wife. He could see tears forming in her eyes. She was aware of everything going on around her, she simply couldn’t move.

“Would you even believe me if I told you?”

The man stopped behind Kalia. “No. But I already know it’s the real you. You would never have let Vincent take your wife if you were still inside the castle. But it never hurts to double-check.”

After tapping her with another soul trap, the man pulled out a knife and pressed it against her neck. “Say goodbye to your wife, Lord Norman.”

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

He couldn’t say anything. He could barely get a sound past the lump in his throat. Donovan must have grown impatient by his silence as he began to cut. Norman forced himself to watch.

As soon as the blade so much as nicked her skin, there was a flash of energy that sent Donovan flying away. The knife impacted the barrier and Donovan was on the ground, screaming as ethereal white lines began to sink into his flesh, leaving scorching trails.

Released from the holding spell, Kalia crashed to the ground. She heaved in deep gulps of air as she crawled the rest of the way toward the barrier. Once there, she pressed her hand against the dome of magic, ignoring the screaming and thrashing man behind her. The barrier didn’t repel her on the outside like it did for him.

Their touching reunion was broken by an agonized cry from Donovan. “You may have gotten this one over on me, but I will get the last laugh!” With an effort of will, the man tore another rent in the world and managed to crawl through. Kalia was too focused on trying to break the barrier to go after the man, not that she had the magic to stop him anyway.

“Don’t worry, Norman. We will get you out of there. I’m sure people are already looking for us. What did you hit Donovan with?”

“It’s a spell I created called Curse. I placed it on you back when you were first pregnant with Caleb. It would attack anyone who harmed you.”

“What? How? When?”

He shook his head, “It doesn’t matter, Love. The man will never be able to get rid of it as it is anchored inside his soul, and it will slowly get worse over time. It is truly a horrific spell that lives up to its name.”

“Good, I hope he suffers for a very long- What is that!” Her eyes widened as she pointed behind him.

Norman knew what it was, but he still turned to look. It was the spell form he had built so long ago to crack open a soul or at least a form of it. Whatever Donovan had done, seemed to have triggered it to start manifesting. He had known how his end would come about as soon as Donovan had revealed his knowledge. He only wished Kalia wasn’t here to suffer as a prisoner to that deranged idiot.

It seemed fate was listening as there was a pop, and Grobert appeared standing next to Kalia. The man took in the scene before him. His eyes glanced over Vincent’s corpse and then stopped on the discarded soul trap… The soul trap? It must have been knocked out of Donovan’s grip when he activated the spell. That means Kalia would be safe.

“The children are safe,” Grobert finally spoke.

That sentence took a huge weight off of Norman’s shoulders.

“Break the orb, please, Grobert.”

The man nodded solemnly before crushing the orb.

“Was this Donovan?” The gruff older man asked.

Norman simply nodded. Meanwhile, Kalia hadn’t given up attempting to break the barrier. But Norman knew it was too late. This barrier had to be linked to the spell otherwise it would have failed when Donovan lost focus.

He turned to his long-time friend and mentor. “Get her out of here.”

“What! No, We can save you.”

He shook his head sadly. “You need to be there for the kids.”

“No,” she screamed as Grobert dragged her away.

Once she was gone, Norman let out a sigh of relief and slid down to the ground. “Well,” he said to himself. “You really fucked it up this time.” He had been so careful for so long. But it had been over seven years since the last sighting of that damned man. At least he would go knowing the spell would be powered.

He chuckled. It was a bit ironic, really. His whole purpose of coming out here to the array was to see if he could connect it to his soul-breaking spell and siphon the power before the released soul energy destroyed the array. He hadn’t been planning to use his own soul to do it though. He wasn’t that selfless.

As the spell built, he could feel its energies begin pulling at him in ways he only ever felt when binding to a phylactery or soul trap. Norman closed his eyes, waiting for the end to come.

A voice broke through his final contemplations. “So this is what you were playing with in the jungle?”

He opened his eyes and looked at Grobert standing outside the barrier.

“You figured it out?”

The ancient gron shook his head. “No, only saw the damage. Aye figured if you didn’t wanna discuss it it was probably for the best.”

“You should go,” Norman urged.

The man harrumphed and sat down outside the barrier. “I don’t think I will. Nobody should be alone when they pass.”

Norman smiled sadly at that.

The two spent the next few minutes chatting about mundane stuff. Most of it meant to occupy his mind. It didn’t really work but he couldn’t fault the man for trying. Soon the hum of the spell built to a point Norman was finding it difficult to concentrate.

“You know, I’m not afraid of death. Not anymore at least. I’m more curious about what comes–”

All of existence was pain.

The pain was inexplicable, far worse than Norman had experienced when he overdosed on mana so long ago. But despite the pain being all-encompassing, it was over in an instant.

He didn’t know how long it was until he realized he could still think, but that thought was a revelation that kicked his mind back into motion.

He wasn’t in the immaterial. He had died enough times that he could tell the difference. There was no sense or thoughts in the immaterial where souls resided. There was no time either. And as Norman pondered this he looked around. Or he tried to.

Everything was a matte featureless grey. It made his mind recoil as he realized he was part of this grey expanse of nothingness. Hadn’t John, the man he first tested Soul Communion on talked about a place like this? As he thought this, he realized he could feel his mind unraveling at the edges. Like his consciousness was the last thing to go before complete oblivion. There was no pain associated with this process though and it was sort of comforting in a way.

As his mind began to drift and scatter, he felt a yank. The yank was painful.

The grey nothingness around him shuttered as a tiny pinprick of black started to suck it in. Norman got to experience something he very much hoped never to experience again so long as he could form rational thought. His memories swirled around the tiny black dot before being sucked inside, the remaining vestiges of his consciousness going with it.

When his thoughts stopped doing their best rendition of a blender he tried to focus again. He was in a new place. Unlike the grey nothingness from before, this looked like the inky blackness of space, but there were no stars. There was however a weird-looking tower in the distance. As he tried to get a better glimpse of the strange structure, it zoomed toward him, or he toward it.

Soon what he thought of as a tower, resolved itself into planets. Planets stacked on top of one another until they passed beyond his line of sight.

“It’s quite something, isn’t it?” A voice suddenly spoke.