Immediately, the old wizard’s eyes locked onto captain Lirya, who’d already risen from her seat and drawn a weapon. I could see her eyebrows scrunge up in confusion. “Archmage Dreyfa, what is this commotion?”

“Oh shut up. Take the stick out your ass and tell me who the adventur-” he stopped as he caught sight of our table, then vanished. “You. We’re gonna have a talk.” I felt something tap my shoulder, and then the world around me twisted and disappeared.

The lurching sensation was so much worse than any gateway, and I was retching when I came out the other side. The patterned floor was different now, full of clutter and junk and… colourful little drawings?

No, not drawing. Magic circles. Dozens upon dozens of them, each interlinking. As I slowly collected my bearing I took a deep breath and coughed again, stunned by the amount of energy buzzing in the air. My ears popped, and I suddenly heard static, that slowly died down as I got used to the area.

The amount of Qi and Mana slamming into me didn’t exactly help my disorientation, and as the sound slowly lessoned, I scrambled for something to hold onto, crashing into a table before I found a cold stone wall to hold onto. My eyes began focusing again, and I saw the old wizard’s beard only a handful of inches from my face.

I flinched back for a moment as he tapped my stomach with a long, wooden staff. “Hm. You hardly seem like someone a gateway would be entrusted to,” he muttered to himself, then turned around and disregarded me entirely. Somehow, his silly wizard hat stayed on top of his head even as he turned to look at different bits of the room.

Whatever he was saying, I couldn’t make it out, all the energy in the room pressing down on my senses. But as the nausea from the teleportation faded, I at least gained enough of my senses back to thicken the Qi around myself. The static lessened, then disappeared, and I suddenly felt like I could trust my feet again, pushing off from the wall and knocking more things off the table I’d half-fallen over.

“What the hells is this about?” I asked the older man in a panic, grabbing his shoulder and spinning him around to face me.

His eyes were blank, then grew into focus and he suddenly recoiled away from me. “AH! Why are you so damned close to me?! Take your hand off my shoulder!” He knocked against my arm with the strength of a grumpy grandpa.

“Where is this?! Who are you?!” I asked him in a panic, squeezing tighter, and I actually saw his face scrunch up in pain.

“AH! Ow, owowow, stop that! Stop it you idiot! I’m old, for the love of the divines!” he called out, once again tapping my arm. Somehow, reluctantly, I did let go. “Goodness! Look at the mess you’ve made!” he then yelled, pointing his staff at all the nicknacks on the floor.

I blinked at him slowly, my mouth open like a fish. “The mess I’ve made? Maybe you should’ve considered that before teleporting me!” I told him.

For a few seconds, the old wizard at least had the decency to look embarrassed. “Fine, yes, I’m a rude and grumpy old bastard,” he admitted, raising his hands. “Look, lady, I think we got off on the wrong foot. What’s your name?”

“What’s my name? What is yours?!” I yelled at him. I felt panic bubbling up now as I looked for a door. There was a large window to the sky, standing open with a comically huge telescope pointing out of it. Scanning the room, I did end up finding a trapdoor.

“Me? Well, of course you know who I am, right?” the old man asked incredulously.

“No! No, I fucking don’t!”

“Ah, shit. I would’ve really expected captain Lirya to tell you. I’m archmage Orvan Dreyfa. I’ve kept this castle safe for the last couple decades, and I’ll keep doing so until I fall over dead at my desk,” he said, surprisingly seriously. “And somehow, you seem to have dragged a damned gateway right into my castle! Which should not be here mind you!”

For a few seconds I was stuck blinking again. This was what an archmage looked like? I suppose if he didn’t speak the robes, beard, and steely eyes were enough for a presence, but I struggled to take him seriously at the moment.

“Well, archmage, would you mind telling me why it’s such a huge problem?” I asked.

“Ah, yes, sure, certainly. See, the further out into the frontier you get, the more monsters there are. Sure, there’s the ones that are just native to Eden, and the ones that’ve been spawned from some silly mages experimenting with forces well within my comprehension, and well beyond theirs. And then there’s ones that spawn from corrupted gateways.”

I could feel Cass recoiling at that thought, and a flood of information suddenly poured into my head through the link.

I’d always known that we were summoned to Eden because of the monsters. The endless, mostly mindless hordes that would come from the frontier and aim to end civilization. We were called as a stopgap measure. Fill in the spots left open by dead Edians. Fight back against the creatures, and be rewarded.

We made money from this, usually by selling services to conglomerates on Earth, but also by simply bringing items across. Most of them were minor, but many of the larger companies would use plants from Eden, then engineer them, and put them into fancy luxury products. There were plenty of people on the other side who would pay for work done on Eden as well.

But at the core, we were here to help the state of the world. We knew monsters came from nests, which were breedings grounds for them. But I’d never even heard of a corrupted gateway.

[General keeper collective requesting access. Access denied. Bell, I think they don’t want people to know about this.]

It clicked. The danger Cass had felt hadn’t been real at all. That was something the keepers instilled in her. Fuck.

“Yeah, fuck is about right,” the old man said. “You didn’t say that out loud, but like, you’ve been staring into the air for about ten seconds straight. You good there, lady?”

“Fuck,” I said, out loud this time. “No. This isn’t okay. What the blazes are corrupted gateways?”

Orvan sighed. “Well, that’s what happens when a keeper goes rogue. Or when the world it’s connected to falls. Or when usurpers happen to get a hand on them,” he explained neutrally.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

“What’s a usurper?” I asked, sitting down on the table where I’d knocked things off before.

He scoffed. “Fucking hell, they really tell you nothing these days. Damn keepers and their restrictions. Usurpers are the things that can corrupt gateways. Special monsters that hunt them down, and look to eat them. Recently, one of them was nearby, and I don’t want it marching on my fecking castle.”

“Fuck,” I muttered.

“Yeah, fuck’s about right. So, what now. Need some space? Want a bit of ren juice?” he asked.

“Fuck.”

“You said that bef-”

I slammed the table as hard as I could, the wood splintering underneath my fist. “FUCK!!”

The old man flinched, a frown on his face. “Hey, lady. You gotta-”

I turned to him, my face flushed with anger, and grabbed his beard. “Be quiet for five fucking minutes, will you?!”

“Ow, ow!! Fine, yes, fine! Fucking shit let go!” he said, smacking my hand away with surprising strength and turning around. I heard him grumbling to himself quietly, but couldn’t really understand what he said. Which was good, I needed to think.

‘Cass.’

[Yes Bell. I have just received a general information package on usurpers. It appears that the Edians are privy to the true reason their world is in need of help. This makes recovering lost gateways even more important.]

‘Then why did the goddess let me live? I’ve… just become a danger to this place. If one of those usupers gets to me, then…’

‘Child, it is not so simple,’ I heard Lurelia say in my mind.

It didn’t help my panic. ‘What is this? Is my head just a playground now?!’

‘Apparently,’ another voice spoke. It had a similar hum to it as Lurelia’s, but was deeper.

‘Brother, please, the child…’ Lurelia pleaded.

‘Since when do we coddle the outworlders, sister?’ the other divine responded.

“GET OUT OF MY HEAD!!!” I screamed, only wanting to think it.

For a moment more voices joined the chorus, then it suddenly broke apart with the soft thump of wood against stone. “Hmph,” I heard the old wizard huff. “Damn divines thinking they can yell in my tower. I’m old, not hard of hearing. There, have a cup,” he said, unceremoniously slamming a bit of ren juice down on the table near me. “I’ll be out, informing your companions for a moment.”

And with that, he vanished, leaving the room, and my head, silent.

Tentatively, I leaned back, feeling the cold stone through my armor. I took a few deep breaths, the air seeming calmer, now that I shielded myself from the energy in it. Slowly, I brought the cup of juice to my lips.

It was sweet, but not too sweet. I liked ren. It was a good fruit.

Drinking another few sips, I let my thoughts slow a bit. “Fuck,” I muttered again. “What the hells is wrong with this place…”

Corrupted gateways, with monsters pouring out from them. That was… insanity. And now, what, those things also wanted the gateway in me? Then why did the divines keep me alive? I was now more of a danger than I should be worth.

What about the keepers, then? They also wanted the gateway. Maybe giving it to the usurpers was better than to them? And how was I supposed to know any of that?!

I pushed my hands up against my face and screamed. “AaaaaaaAAGH!”

This was so stupid! Why couldn’t I just… just… Ugh!

Feeling myself get more frustrated, I drank another bit of the juice and breathed in as deep as I could. Fine. This was just fine. I clenched my teeth, hard, breathing through my nose.

Whatever. I was gonna make it through this. Shitty fucking gateway stuff. I was gonna make it through and come out on the other side.

Slowly, bit by bit, I let that thought sink in. As the minutes passed, I felt myself grow a bit calmer. Eventually, I heard a tapping against the bottom of the trapdoor.

“Yes?” I called, my voice more bitter than I expected.

The door swung open, and I saw a head full of red hair charge at me to wrap me in a hug. For a second I froze, then the tiniest smile found itself on my face. I hugged Ann back.

“Thanks,” I just whispered. She squeezed me tighter as a response.

A few, long seconds passed, before I heard something else. Orvan cleared his throat at us, and Ann wrenched herself free, sitting down by my side.

“Are you feeling better, lady?” he asked calmly.

I just nodded.

“Good, then. We should have a talk. Perhaps you would like to introduce yourself now?”

“Yeah. Okay, I’m Fio,” I said.

“Well, Fio, I’m Orvan Dreyfa, archmage and astronomer,” the old man said. “The redhead, Annabelle, I believe, told me she would like to be present for what we will be talking about. Is that fine with you?”

I looked at her for a few moments, then nodded. Not like I was going to keep the whole gateway thing a secret from the guild for long anyway. Even though I told Cass not to automatically activate the gateway prompt whenever I touched someone, many of them could feel Qi.

“Good. Then, Fio, Annabelle, I will once again give a quick summary of our situation. Eden’s really quite a fucked up place. We’ve always got monsters. Then those monsters multiplied. Suddenly, Edians died. So our divines opened gateways, boom, we got you guys. Adventurers if I’m nice, pawns if I’m honest. You’re like little teeny puppets strung along by the keepers to do the things that it is you like to do. Follow me so far?” he asked.

Begrudgingly, Ann and I both nodded.

“Good,” he continued. “So, the reason we were first overrun by monsters was because of a silly little event we Edians like to call the eclipse.” We shuddered at the word. “You’re familiar! Good, good. So, pop quiz, what caused the first eclipse then?”

“Not the slightest idea,” I answered for the both of us.

Orvan clicked his tongue. “Well, the first eclipse happened when Eden gained its second moon. Something something the sun is the grace of the divines and the night is dark and all that. I’m not here to fucking give you the censored version, shut up in there Argus!” he smacked his own head with his staff.

“Apologies, divine intervention is a hassle. Right then. Essentially, the gods continuously erect a shield around Eden because the inbetween is terrifying. And by that I don’t mean space, I mean the magical folds between realities. What else do you call it? Void? Abyss? Fucking hell or something? Don’t matter. It has real crappy monsters, and whenever the moons position in just the right way, namely overlapping each other and the sun, we get a little bit of fucking trouble.”

Once again, both of us nodded, though with grimaces this time. The eclipses were… terrible times to be on Eden.

“Yes, that’s about the right face to be making, it’s a really shitty spot to be in. Thousands, if not tens of thousands of us Edians died. So then our gods contacted the keepers, we got them to open a couple gates. Couple eclipses go fine, then usurpers show up. All shapes and sizes, all horrifyingly strong. One eats a gateway, and hundreds die again.” He pauses to take a rather displeased breath, and taps the staff on the floor again.

“Time goes on, we get pushed back, some of you fucking outworlders decide it’s time to party on our corpses, we get stronger dimensional sanctions. No more conflict, but the damage’s been done. Now you fuckers are mercenaries, and most Edians fear you. And that’s the status quo we’re at, losing more and more ground- I’m fucking getting there, Lurelia!!”

Orvan cleared his throat. “Yes, at any rate, you got a gateway, so you can reclaim the corrupted ones, we hope.”

That was… a lot to take in. “So, what now?” I asked, after a few moments. Ann was still sitting there, chewing on her lips.

“Now, the divines are politely requesting I release the communication block I placed on you. Some are being more polite, some less, and I’m highly considering telling them to take a divine stick and shove it up their blasphemy!” he yelled at the air.

I chuckled for a moment, then braced myself. I looked at Ann. “I’ll be right back, bae. See you on the other side.” Then faced the old wizard again. “I’m ready.”