Lance and Ben walked the trail for a few hours. Lance had already begun to regret not bringing his coat with him. A sudden gust from the deadlands had come without warning, turning the bright summer day into a cold and infuriating experience.

Lance’s head dropped to the ground as he squinted his eyes. his face contracted into one of anger. Parts of him that were in the direct sunlight were hot and uncomfortable, while the shaded areas of his body were shaking from the chill winds. It all made him very nauseous.

“Blast that wretched sun and that horrible wind.” He said through his teeth, his voice almost a low growl. Ben was walking with his back straight and head high. It was as if he deeply enjoyed this strange weather and was amused by Lance’s annoyance.

“Very ungrateful of you. Where else in the world can you experience such a beautiful phenomenon.” He took a deep breath, and let out a sigh of relief as if the now cold air was a much-needed relief from the past few hot summer days. He then turned to face towards the Frostspire mountain. “I bet you are going to miss that magnificent view once you are in Aether Reach. There is not a lot of mountains in that region from what I have seen on the maps. Very flat it is.” Added ben.

Lance also turned to face the mountain his eyes drawn to the white tip and the strange dark clouds that creep from the land beyond.

“One of the first things I will do if I am accepted, is to find out what exactly is going on in the deadlands. There must be much more knowledge about it in the pre-war archives.”

Ben also lifted his gaze to look at the clouds. “I keep wondering why hasn’t anyone tried to conquer the peaks. I would imagine it to be a very exhilarating adventure. If I was braver and valued my well being less, I would definitely climb it, specially to see what lies beyond.”

Lance looked at Ben, his brown eyes narrowing. “Some have tried. But there are no records of anyone returning from the higher peaks. It is said the higher, and closer to the Deadlands you get, the colder it gets. The furthest someone has climbed and returned alive is of a Dwarf named Barrad. From the accounts, the tears in his eyes froze solid and he became permanently blind.”

“Still, I think some powerful sorcerer would try to climb it. Don’t they have those magical shields they can cast to protect them?” Asked Ben, his curiosity peaked at the mention of Barrad’s tale.

“I don’t know. I thought about the same thing. But I could only scrape so much about that place. All of the maps I could find leave that region completely blank. I suspect there are people in high places that do not want people to know what lies there. But Aether Reach is a place of its own. Hopefully its free of the central censorships.”

When they finally reached the town, the sun had almost reached the horizon. The darker skies allowed the starts to slowly appear. But the brightest object at sunset was a red dot. When Lance saw it, he quickly pointed his finger at it and called out to Ben “There is Golgotha.”

Ben looked at the bright red spot. As always, it made him feel a very slight sense of power. Most people did, specially those with a strong affinity for magic.

“I wonder what is going on over there.” Said Ben, looking at Lance in hope of him having some satisfying answer.

“I don’t know. Every time I look at it with the telescope, I just see a red, smooth ball. Recently I read a new book on it from Scanto Mano. The great druid Aussenwelt says it is orbiting our sun, and has phases similar to the moon. But I can’t observe them with my grandfather’s telescope.” As Lance said this, his heart began to beat faster as he imagined himself in the great observatory of Aether Reach. He was already day dreaming about looking at Golgotha, Lich, Mordigian, and Roshan. The 4 known planets.

When they reached the city, it was already dark. Lance’s walking pace had slowed down substantially as the fatigue set in. The sight of the gray and dull buildings did nothing to cheer him up.

“I can’t wait to get out of this place. I need some color, some variety.” Said lance, his voice was tired and bitter.

As they made their way into the city itself, its flaws began to highlight further. The buildings were built with no particular planning in mind, leading to jagged streets and corners. They passed through a section of the town that had 6 different blacksmith shops near each other. They were all side by side and the inside appeared disorganized and messy.

“I still don’t know what were they thinking when they set up shop here. This place is not that big, not even this district need so many blacksmiths.” Said Lance as he almost snarled at the sight of the shops.

“They are actually 6 brothers if you believe it. The Arakichi family if I remember correctly. They appear as 6 different shops, but they are actually more like a single one. Its really more about having a bigger presence, and to exploit some old zoning laws.” Responded Ben, his time on the farm and with his new coworkers had granted him a fresh perspective on the politics of the city. He would hear a lot of gossips from them about the internal affairs of the city.

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Lance looked a bit disappointed that Ben didn’t reaffirm his comment, and got a bit angrier when he heard that this whole thing was just a loop hole that exploited the old and outdated laws.

“You would never see something like this in Aether Reach.” He claimed.

“You have been there for only a day, and Aether Reach is a big city, much bigger than Tarranvale. How could you know if something like this doesn’t happen there?” Asked Ben with a smirk on his face.

“I may have been there for only a short while. But there is no city as beautiful as Aether Reach. You should have seen it. There were buildings so tall that I couldn’t believe my own eyes when I first saw them. The streets were clean, the air smelled pure. Every building seemed to have a perfect reason for being placed where it was. I had never seen streets so straight in my entire life. Never would something like this happen in that place.” Lance described with a new found vitality in his voice, as if the memories of his visit burned like a cozy fireplace, warming his heart.

They reached Lance’s house and saw a lot of people gathering and talking in front of the entrance. Lance winced as he knew this crowd was there for the mysterious stagecoach. Most of his neighbors were present, and he could see his mother speaking with some of them.

“She has probably told the whole town about this thing.” Said lance to himself. When the crowd saw Lance it burst into a roar of applause, and they all came to greet him.

“There’s our genius!” roared Mr Ostokhar, He lived in a house near them and had a big bushy handlebar mustache. Lance didn’t know much about him, other than he is good friends with his father.

The crowd surrounded Lance. They were very excited for someone in their far-off town to be accepted into Aether Reach. It filled them with a certain pride and felt Lance’s achievement would partially reflect on them.

Lance smiled nervously. No words came out of him except “Thank you.” He tried to say something else, but each time all he could mutter was the same phrase. Every time he said it, his face contorted. He felt very embarrassed that he couldn’t come up with a grand speech or anything besides Thank You.

Merylyn, his eldest sister, ran up to him and planted a kiss on his cheek. She seemed to put a lot more effort into her appearance today. She had turned her long black hair into a single braid that laid on top of her shoulder and chest. She was wearing one of her favorite dresses. She wore a gown of deep black velvet, the fabric rich and heavy, clinging to her form like shadows at dusk. Red accents cascaded from her shoulders, where intricate, feather-like embellishments spread outward, as if dark wings had been folded into the dress. The neckline plunged off her shoulders, leaving her collarbones bare.

“Our baby brother is going to Aether Reach.” She almost screamed in excitement.

Lance looked at her with a suspicious glare. But he quickly pieced together that her attire served to impress the mysterious messenger coming from the city.

“Is that what this is all about? How could you know if I am accepted or not? Did the results came while I was away?” Lance exclaimed, his heart almost stopping as began to think that he had missed the messenger.

“No, but there is no way that they wouldn’t accept you.” She couldn’t finish her sentence before his other sisters joined in and flooded his face in kisses.

Lance’s heartbeat began to quicken, a cold sweat began dripping from his brow. All these people had gathered based on an assumption. His mouth dried as the anxiety began to take over him. He imagined the worst, they would come and give him the rejection letter, and he would disappoint everyone there.

He opened his mouth to scold them for causing such an upheaval based on nothing, sentencing him to months of embarrassment. But before he could say anything, sounds of cheering came from down the street. They all turned to face the direction of the noise, and saw a lot of people hurrying towards it. As the moments passed the sound of the crown became closer and louder.

Lance’s lips parted slightly as the reality began to set it, this was probably the stagecoach. This was the moment where his destiny would be shaped.

It was as if time itself had slowed down. Lance’s gaze was locked onto the street corner. Slowly a crowd of cheering people rushed out, all facing the same direction, and then it appeared. Slowly two horses showed their heads, their mane was as if it was made out of fine strands of gold, and their hide was as white as snow. Their figures towered over everyone; they were the biggest horses that lance had ever seen. And then the wagon appeared. There were intricate designs of gold on the doors and body of it. The wheels looked like they were made out of pure glass, yet the sound they made on the cobblestone streets were more akin to stone. He couldn’t see through the windows as the glass appeared frosted over. Driving it was a very tall figure, clad in a sharp blue and gold suit, white gloves, and a strange mask that appeared to resemble the face of an owl. His hair was short and dark.

The crowd around Lance erupted into cheer. Lance recoiled from the sudden noise. The wagon stopped in front of them, the driver got down and went to open the door. Inside was a somewhat old looking man. He had a bald head and a gray goatee; he was wearing a fancy blue cloak and a red leather belt. There were fine designs and symbols weaved in a deep and beautiful shade of red. Lance thought he looked exactly like what anyone would expect a professor to look like, which unsettled Lance. To him, his features looked designed and sculpted. As if he was a face a master would carve on a piece of marble.

The man stepped out of the wagon and stood tall, there was a big smile on his face as he looked at Lance. He enjoyed his smile very much, too much. He felt as if the man’s smile was also perfectly designed for him.

“There you are Mr Chrysallis. My name is Professor Mathias Arclight. I am pleased to announce that you have been officially accepted to attend the Techno-Arcano university of Aether Reach.”

The crowd went into a loud applause once more. While Lance froze. His face didn’t show any emotions. As if he still didn’t believe what had happened.