Chapter 1:

“Irshon? Who is Irshon?” Petor asked, turning slowly in the foreign water plane. Just a few weeks ago he’d never left his continent, now he’d been reincarnated, thrown onto a different planet and dragged through two planes.

He was stronger than he’d ever been in his previous life, but he’d been reminded repeatedly that there were always stronger creatures out there.

His body-covering armor still showed the signs of magma he’d been smashed into, the Mithril metal hadn’t even warped in the temperature that had burned his inner layers and skin-now fully healed.

Petor kept his spear at the ready, Valter’s sword drawn at his side. The mountain of a man watching the area warily. Also adorned in Mithril armor. His runes glowing like burning charcoal as Petor’s glowed with and ethereal emerald.

Mya took in a deep breath, her eyes closing as she held her ship captain’s tri-corn hat in-place as her red curls spilled back over her shoulders. She wore the light leathers and waistcoat of a lifetime sailor, reinforced with sewn in sections of metal, pistols crossed over her front, while a cutlass hung from her hip. “Going to take a boatload of rum to help with this headache,” Mya muttered. She held a flintlock pistol at the ready, carved and lovingly maintained. “You alive Petor?”

“Yeah,” He grunted, the wound that would have killed a mortal man sealed, the bones roughly reknitted. He used his spear to push himself to his feet.

Mya clicked her tongue. “You woulda been one tough undead bastard. Ah well, there’s always later. Have I talked to you about Mya’s after-life care policy?”

She wheedled turning to her ‘trader voice.’

Petor grinned and stood straighter. “Ain’t dead yet.”

“Smells different than Irdun’s oceans.” Mya reached down and put her hand into a puddle as she raised her pistol in her other hand to keep it out of the water. “Damn I’ve missed the water.”

“We should contact Limos,” Petor said.

Desari held her head, her eyes dark brown instead of glowing purple. She wore a fine sword at her hip, a book hung from the other, glowing with purple runes. She wore medium armor that appeared to be tight fitting clothes, leaving her movement free and clear.

She drew back her cowl, revealing her hair pulled back tight, the purple within her eyes fading to brown.

“I don’t think he’s going to like what we have to say,” She waved off Valter. “We’re safe here.”

“You sure?”

“On my life.”

Valter hesitated and then slid his sword away.

“He’s not going to like what?” Petor asked.

Desari rested her hands on her hips. “The fact that the Duke was the one behind everything.”

Mya clicked her tongue. “Would make a certain amount of sense, better to issue a mission, blame someone else till he got what he wanted.”

“The fire elemental, he said that he was summoned there and bound to the location,” Desari said.

Petor grimaced, they’d lucked out that such a creature was physically bound in position. He’d seen the size of the sword it dropped.

Petor shifted in his armor as the shiver ran up through him.

“Pretty perfect cover. Say that someone is messing around with things. Get others to look into it, anyone that reports to you can have an accident.” Mya shook her head.

Petor grunted, the Duke’s attack had ignored his armor and pierced through his body. Driving his mana through his body it stimulated his natural healing, working with the healing potion to pull himself back together as he surveyed the forest before them.

A water plane. Every material plane had one. A plane that had been but a myth in his last life. His second life was coming up with hit after hit.

He’d assumed everything would be well… blue. The plants were every color imaginable, most looked wet, or were surrounded by nebulas of mist. They drank from the air and from the ground.

He pressed against the ‘ground’ finding it spongy. A mat of roots drinking deep of the plane’s ocean. Glancing at the cut crystal floating infront of Desari.

Purple, red and brown faded into a kalediscope of colors that dulled and muted.

Bands of polished silver, gold, a black and white material orbited and spun around the many-sided gem, like rings still spinning as they landed on a table. Leaving the flat bottom and pointed top unobstructed.

Desari stored it away.

“So, Irshon, teleporting and what just happened?” Mya asked.

Isn’t that what I asked?

Valter grunted in agreement.

“Irshon is an old friend. The crystal thing is a component of a teleportation formation. I used it to jump to I think the Duke’s office.”

“The guy who shot me?” Petor muttered, shifting his shield arm around against the tugging itch of muscle knitting back together.

“I think so.” Desari took in a breath. “I think he knew about the gem, the dungeons and their connection. I’m not sure his reasoning for what he was doing. Rebellion against the king, mistake, whatever. I used all the cores from the dungeon beasts and bosses. The power that it contained and then barely guided it here to Irshon.”

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“Then the whole request was a lie,” Petor said.

“Covering his tracks,” Valter said.

“Come, Irshon will have answers and help,” Desari walked between Petor and Valter into the forest. “Coming?”

“Just a stroll in the water plane lads,” Mya grinned as she walked past them, though kept her pistol pointed to the sky and ready.

Petor caught Valter’s eye and shrugged.

He heard Valter’s sigh as they followed after them.

Petor glanced back out over the brilliant turquoise waters, in the distance thunderclouds unleashed their lightning and rain.

He turned into the forest and followed after the others, scanning the plants and the area.

Wonder if there are any plants I could use here?

Green flames shimmered through the runes on his spear, his shield and his armor.

Desari paused occasionally, checking the ground before moving off again.

Creatures flew through the forest, moved in the brush.

Unlike a forest in the mortal realm, each and every plant was filled with a heavy water element. Petor sensed it, it would be so easy to reach out and draw it in, just beyond his fingertips.

“Here we are,” Desari said.

She pushed away leaves twice as big as her.

A stone hill, green with a blue patina, smooth in places lay in the midst of the clearing.

In the hill was a double sided door, runes scrawled up the doorway, glowing a faint blue.

Desari walked across the clearing and touched the worn brass knob.

“What is the greatest power of all?” A voice asked.

“Knowledge,” Desari answered.

The doors cracked and opened, magical lights glowed a soft reddish white, even flickering like a candle would, running down the slanted hallway among bookshelves.

She stepped through.

Petor and the others followed after her.

“What is this place?” Petor asked.

“Irshon’s library.” Desari said with a fondness that he hadn’t heard in her voice before. The kind that cast back to an old memory.

They reached another door.

“What does knowledge teach us?” The voice asked.

“That there is always more to be learned.” Desari said.

The door cracked open.

Desari walked through, as if she knew the place like the back of her hand.

The floor was broken up with shelves spread out in a grid.

Desari led them to a staircase, down ten levels, each as big as the first.

A new door awaited them.

“What if there is no more to be learned?”

“Then we must set ourselves to discover new truths,” Desari said.

She stepped through the door. A boat awaited them, carved from polished wood, inlaid with accents of pens, of paper and books. The blue runes interplaying with the carvings. Seats faced one another. Desari stepped aboard.

The others followed.

“Nothing will attack us here. Well not if we know the answers to the questions, and we don’t harm the books here,” Desari said.

Mya slid her pistol away.

“The heck is this place?”

“Irshon’s library,” Desari said.

Petor stored his shield and spear. Valter did the same.

“Water’s weird,” Mya grimaced.

Petor stepped on the boat, it didn’t shift or move, it was like stepping on a stone road.

Valter followed him, his eyes glancing back at the shelves beyond the door.

As he sat the boat moved, moving down the slip. A new boat breached the surface behind them, water draining out of it as it waited.

They exited the slip into a cavern. Magical candle-lights flickered throughout the cavern. Pillars rose up from the water to reach the ceiling a dozen floors above.

The walls around the cavern were covered in books, bridges of fine wood strung together with rope hung over the canals between the pillars, connecting islands around the pillars covered in rows of books.

Boats moved through the water and skies holding books, their runes a soft blue.

Petor looked into the water, the pillars extended into the depths, illuminated with the same magical lights, covered in even more books, their covers made from more esoteric materials.

“Books under water?”

“There are many races throughout the planes and worlds, many that live in the waters of their respective worlds,” Desari said.

He drew his mind back.

“The books, have they been changing in different rooms?”

Desari favored him with a soft smile.

“Within each library one might learn greater knowledge. Knowledge in its many forms are building blocks, each advanced and grown to the next. The first hallway contained the simplest texts, each book a primer on different areas of study. They built upon that and went down different possible information paths. Then again in this room.”

Petor looked at the shelves, some were books, other scrolls. In thousands of colors.

A humanoid creature formed of flowing black gelatin touched a tentacle to a shelf and drew in a book to its center, the pages flipping over.

A feathered creature, that looked like an oversized chicken but with a rainbow of plummage turned pages with its beak, pausing to re-read something and then look to the ceiling in thought.

Its eyes rotated to Petor, his core shivered at the power contained with the gaze. He bowed his head the ‘chicken’ it turned back to staring at the ceiling.

There were sentient creatures of all kinds throughout the library.

The boat came to stop at a dock. Desari stepped off, walking down the dock to touch the door at its end.

“What truth have you learned from knowledge?”

“Knowledge may be hidden, but it cannot be lost,” Desari said.

“What is the right and wrong way to use knowledge?” The door asked.

“Knowledge does not have morals, thus there is no wrong or right.”

A blue light fell on Desari.

“What will you do to gain knowledge?” The voice made Petor’s mana shake.

“I will seek out new information, new experiences to shape new ideas and pursue new paths.”

“Do you seek power, or do you seek knowledge?” There was no inflection but Petor felt its weight.

“Knowledge,” Desari said.

“What have you learned?” The door was curious now.

“That there is more to be learned.”

“What knowledge do you seek?”

Desari brought herself up fully and looked at the top of the door.

“Where lies Ilus Irshon?”

A presence spread through the area, like a giant sitting on Petor’s chest.

“Ah, Desari,” The cold voice changed into one filled with warmth.

“Irshon.”

“And you brought friends, interesting.”

Blue light wrapped around them as the door opened, beyond was a city of books and shelves.

“Irshon has us now,” Desari said.

They appeared inside a room, a small quaint library with two stories, a rolling ladder and crackling fire in a fireplace. Music played from somewhere unseen. Plush chairs lay in the room.

The carved doors opened. A man walked in, he had grey pebbled skin with a green tint, his eyes were blue with swimming motes of green. His beard was manicured and white, his long hair pulled up into a topknot with a pin driven through it.

He wore a light blue silk shirt a white sash at his waist that spilled down his leg, a deep blue almost velvet material and deep grey boots made of a leather that reminded Petor of some that Mya had worked with.

The most shocking was his features, his facial structure as similar to Desari’s they could be called cousins.

Unlike her, his ancient eyes were wide with amusement, a smile spread across his lips.

“Hah!” He gave her a sweeping bow, barely stopping as he stretched out his hands to either side, moving forward to wrap her in a hug and lift her.

“It worked! By the lords it worked!” He let out a laugh that rang in Petor’s stomach.

“Will you put me down Irshon,” Desari thwapped his shoulder.

“Ah as serious as ever,” He gave her another squeeze, pulling glasses from a pocket, a chain running connecting them to the pocket. Runes like fresh ice upon a glass pane glowing slighting as he studied her.

“What do you mean it worked and why are you studying me like I’m a new alchemical process?” Desari demanded.

The doors that had been slowly swinging back, clicked closed.

Irshon pulled off his spectacles, biting the inside of his lip. He tapped his spectecales against his hand and stepped over to a chair and fell into it.

“How much to tell and how much to hold.”

“None of your games Irshon and, what happened to you?”

He raised his eyebrow.

Desari stepped forward, frowning as she studied him. “There is no bond, no tether, no connection.”

Irshon raised his eyebrows and looked away. “No there wouldn’t be. For there is no bond between us anymore.”

He turned his hand in the air, a rounded blue glass of twisted glass appearing in his palm as he held it out to her. Desari took it and sat in the seat opposite.