Prologue

“The legend says that this world once was a beautiful and peaceful place, filled to the brim with resources and there was only one intelligent species. Standing at the top of their world humanity had no enemies except themselves. But humans do have a dark side and their greed and hunger for power swallowed up everything they could find until eventually all was consumed. It seemed like all the scientific progress and luxurious things humanity had created were lost as there was nothing left. Yes, it looked like doom was certain and inevitable but not all humans surrendered to it.

For other than greed humanity also possessed love and hope, while this might seem silly or stupid to other races, it is the essence of what made humans human, the will to never accept fate and fight against the odds with all they are. And so it would happen that some scientists did not give up, they searched far and wide and eventually found a solution, energy from parallel worlds. As it was their usual behavior they did not worry about the scope or consequences of their actions, few at the brink of destruction would and they started using this energy as widespread as quickly as possible.

Sadly fate would not give them an easy way out and rifts into other worlds started to open, spitting out nightmares and horrors far worse than they could have imagined, they tried to stop their new generators but it was too late.

In a final event, which we all call the Shattering, Earth stopped to exist as it was, but not only humanity’s Earth, all of ours Earths.

This is where the legend ends and all truth around it was lost centuries ago, but looking around I can be certain that at least some aspects must be true.

Our world now is a place filled with danger and challenges, more colorful and confusing than any of our ancestors could have predicted.”

Mishanar took a quick glance at his notes and then looked back at the crowd of aspirants for the Pact army, only a few would pass their training and fewer would survive their first year of service. Again he raised his voice: “This Legend is all our heritage, no matter what species you are from, you are now brothers and sisters of the Pact. We are the guardians for all members of the Pact, protecting them with swords and shields and if must be our own lives. Many of you grew up in cities protected by the Pact, and so far you only have seen a few of the dangers existing in this world. So remember this once your hard training has started, your families and friends are depending on your will to overcome. You are not sacrificing for nothing, but for the lives and future of all who will come after us.”As Mishanar was leaving the stage one of the Pact trainers moved to take his place as the speaker, he would divide the aspirants into groups before they would start their training.

Mishanar had no other plans for the rest of his day, a rare peaceful and lazy day in his life as the Pact leader, “Yet,”, he was thinking, “something will come up that will require my attention, it always does.”This was the way of things, every day had a new event, maybe a new race appearing through a rift, a new natural disaster happening or simply a misunderstanding between Pact races. When he finally arrived in his chambers at the top of the Yggtree he started thinking about the twelve races that made up the Pact.

They were but few in a vast sea of species inhabiting their planet, some allied with them, some others proclaimed enemies. He was not sure why any species would prefer standing alone in a harsh world like this, but he was sure that they had their own reasons for it. He himself was an Avios, a species that was fairly similar to humans in shape but with a proclivity for divine magic and a natural ability to summon wings of light. Avios had always been a kind people, their ability to feel the pain of others had let them down a path of almost self-destructive attempts to save everyone. They knew only little about hate, envy, greed, and the other things humans called sins, no they were created to save others from these things. The Avios were one of the founding races of the Pact and the main force behind recruiting new members, strength through unity was something they knew well. Suddenly, a loud horn sound echoed through the fortress. “A yes, an Ygg-Eater”, he thought as voices of guards started echoing through the air. Ygg-Eaters were generally peaceful creatures, but massive in scale and as dumb as any life form could be.

Chasing the seeds of Yggtrees they would stomp through cities, villages, and even fortresses, wreaking havoc and death wherever they stepped. Sometimes they would simply eat people through their trunks trying to consume some ygg they found near an Yggtree. The Pact was not in the business of killing random creatures for convenience and so they derived a peaceful way of dealing with Ygg-Eaters, a modified seedpod enhanced by magic and technology. All one had to do was attract the attention of the Ygg-Eater with one of these and send it flying into the mountains, the eater would chase it until it's fuel ran out and then simply start wandering again in a different place.

Since all of the more skilled soldiers were surely busy with training Mishanar decided to spring into action himself, he started running and jumped out of his open window. Mid-air he summoned his dark red wings and glided over to the weapon storage, grabbing one of the modified seeds and pushing himself off the ground to fly over the walls. There it was right in front of him, an almost mountain-sized creature slowly moving towards the fortress. The tricky part was getting its attention away from the Yggtree and towards the modified seed, this part was what got most soldiers hurt.

Luckily for him the ability to fly made this a lot easier and safer, activating the first stage of the seed he flew a circle around the Ygg-Eaters head, and to his surprise, the beast reacted quicker than usual. It started inhaling through its trunk, trying to suck in the seed, and the Avios attached to it. Mishanar instantly went into a dive and narrowly escaped the beasts' attempt at an early dinner. He activated stage two of the seed, which would propel it forward once thrown, and sent it onto an arc toward the distant mountain range. The Ygg-Eater played along for once and turned around to slowly move into the direction it came from, surely not a perfect way of dealing with these beasts but a kind one compared to other factions.Looking after it Mishanar was glad that this time it was indeed a peaceful exemplar, as lately modified creatures seemed to appear more and more. While the Pact didn’t know exactly what they were, they suspected them to be corpses reanimated with dark magic and technology, put into a state of rage, and just existing to kill and destroy. He suspected this to be the doing of a new race from a new tear, but he couldn’t be sure of course. A gruesome idea, while Avios certainly did not hold their deceased as highly as other species, they would still prefer for them to be left alone.

He dared not even imagine what some of the other Pact members would say or do to someone committing such a crime. A few of the races kept their ancestors and deceased in the highest regard and even mere insults towards them would create bloodshed. On his way back to the fortress a small falcon came towards him and landed on his shoulder.Avios loved birds as they were one of the few pets that were not scary to others but still able to fly with them. This one in particular belonged to the Avios Mervar, one of the Pact council members, the ambassador for the Avios. Mervar was a bit aggressive and direct compared to other Avios, but he was well respected and knew how to behave properly in his position. Sitting down on the fortress wall Mishanar took a small note from the bird's ankle that read, “Dear Sir Mishanar, our scouts detected a larger group of the undead machines moving towards the human city. We need to have an urgent council meeting, please join us by Proxy-Crystal at 17:00. Yours faithfully Mervar” There was that proactive nature of his again, normally only the Pact leader could decide on such a meeting, but in the end, it was Mishanar’s fault for not being sterner with Mervar whenever he overstepped. That meeting would be in 4 hours, and by proxy no less, Mishanar strongly disliked this way of communication, surely an amazing progress of science and magic to be able to converse over hundreds of miles in an instant, with image and voice no less, but sometimes he felt like this way lacked soul. As it was the way of the Pact he would have the final say on any action, with the council merely being a group of advisors to him, but he already knew what he wanted to do. Keeping this event secret was important as panic would help no one and he was sure that a small strike force of high-ranked guardians was more than enough to stop any group coming their way. “It is decided then!”, he spoke out loud, spooking the bird a bit with his excitement, “You can return to your master.”. As the falcon flew off Mishanar rose as well, moving towards his chambers to contact his team, while not the wisest of paths to take he wanted to fight this group himself. With the training cycle just starting there was little to do but daily tasks Mervar could take care of and nobody would want to follow a leader too rusty to fight himself anyway. Thanks to the nature of this world it had an insane spectrum of power, some individuals would rival armies alone, and thanks to their unique combination of science, magic, and faith the Pact certainly was at the top of the food chain.

All soldiers would start out the same, in a basic training program divided by potential, then after that and a few years of service as guards or in small teams, they would reach the rank of a guardian. These guardians walked the lands fulfilling all sorts of missions and tasks, from grocery shopping for old ladies to fighting magical beasts or armies, all depending on their strength of course.Arriving in his office he swiftly took a stack of enchanted paper, it would copy the message multiple layers deep, and started writing: “Dear . There is an urgent matter brewing at the horizon and I am in need of your help. If your duties allow it please join the council meeting by Proxy-Crystal today at 17:00. Greetings Mishanar”.

After filling out the names on each individual piece of paper and sealing them with a spell, he placed them in the transport box in the corner of his office. This box would teleport the letters into the correct regions for his team members and there a local messenger would take them to the intended recipient. His team was a group of 5 other Pact members, a Wirdle called Liz, a female Beorlinger called Siv, a stubborn dwarf called Burduck, a rather slow Ironide called Lemon after his hue, and an elf called Jiana. A very weird combination of friends, there was no doubt about that, but their past adventures had turned them into a group of friends that could depend on each other and overcome a lot of trouble. Mishanar was sure the council would neither be happy nor surprised about him already having set a course of action, he certainly was not the Pact leader because of his talent for teamwork. But in a world like this, a leader had to be decisive, when not even the next hours are ensured you cannot waste time arguing for hours. The others agreed more or less or they would not have agreed to the structure of the Pact council, this didn’t mean that they wouldn’t argue though. “Ill do something nice for them.”, Mishanar thought, a thoughtful gesture was a common way to improve standing with someone else after all. He then started his preparations for the journey by packing his backpack, a gift he had received from an Inridas friend of his, it was enchanted to have a lot more space by shifting objects partially into a different realm, sadly the weight would remain the same.

A very powerful and useful tool for any long journey, he filled it with some medical supplies, his bedroll, a bit of clothing, and some preserved food. He would also wear his armor and carry his weapons, also gifts from other races. As the leader of the Pact, there were many who were grateful for what he had created to protect others and to not insult anyone he would accept their gifts. That is not to say that some of them weren’t rather odd, some trinkets and even dishes were gifted to him, not really things he longed for. Not that he was complaining either, for a gift the thought was what counted, not the value of it.

After everything was packed he had around another hour left before the meeting, so he decided to take a look at the training that had started some hours ago. Leaning out of his window he was able to see all the aspirants sparring in little groups divided by strength and potential. Because of this, there were a few groups wrestling one on one, some others were dueling with swords, two of the groups were shooting at targets and the last and smallest one was training low-level spells. There were not many spellcasters with potential, and while some of the Pact races were very prone to the powerful magic of certain types not all members of that race were able to focus their energy in this world.

As one magic researcher once told him the magical currents of a world as wild as theirs were too strong and unpredictable, bypassing even some who should be able to feel them. There were a few very gifted wild mages, people who could just tap into the nearest magical current and use it, but they weren’t really party material as you never knew what would happen. Mishanar saw some potential in some of those soldiers, there always were a handful of exceptional candidates, which was very lucky for the Pact. The council was convinced that sooner or later some of the Pact enemies would create an alliance of their own to destroy them to be able to do whatever they wanted again, especially to humans. Since the legend basically gave the sole fault for the Shattering to humanity there were quite a few races angry and it took quite some convincing to get some of the Pact races to join after they heard that humans were a part of the deal. Of course, this was a stupid issue, everyone was hurt the same and any human who could have played a part in the events of the past was long gone, contrary to a lot of other races their lifespan was very short. Understandably other races had members who had lived through the Shattering, and seen all the death, chaos, and fear firsthand, it was really no surprise that those would hold a grudge. Luckily for the Pact, those races usually also were of a more advanced nature, be it in spirit or logic, which made it easier to reason with them once they learned how short humans lived. Any further disputes would usually be resolved in a duel with a Pact soldier standing in for humanity, these used to be common but not anymore. “Time does heal most wounds I guess.”, he thought. Letting his mind wander and churn the time he had left flew past him quickly and once he realized this he moved back to his chair, placing a Proxy-Crystal in front of him. The crystal turned from its vibrant blue into a shining red, a sign that someone wanted to communicate with you, and Mishanar placed his hand on it. Instantly he found himself in a room at a big table, the other council members sitting around it and his friends standing at the sides.

This room was of course not real but a spell that influenced the mind of the user to see this virtual space created by a technological interface, Mishanar was impressed every time he used this technology. “If only they could get the warmth of this place right”, he thought. As for most of the meetings the room had windows all around and the outside was a mountain range, with them being on the highest mountain, a beautiful view that all earth-bound races rarely got to see otherwise.