Warrior of the Void Book 1, Chapter 26

“That insufferable–!” Lalaladee shouted while smashing her fists against her desk, her small frame full of fervor and anger, “Does he no– Bah, nevermind…”

And just like that, all of her fire was gone, “Get out of here, apprentice. It’s far too late in the evening for me to explain our illustrious Guildmaster’s idea, return here tomorrow at one past noon.”

“Will do. Sorry for the trouble. Goodbye.” Muur said in a rush, wanting absolutely none of that. She was worn out enough as is, it’d be enough of a trial to drag her scaly ass to the Ossuary, nevermind keep herself from conking out in the bath.

Scampering through the door, Muur was left to traverse the guild’s winding corridors under the illumination of purple crystals on the wall. Thankfully, she knew exactly where to head to to get to the stairs and to the exit from there. The stairs felt a bit longer than before on the way up, but after the six stories she had to endure getting to the Guild, any amount of stairs would have felt long.

Readjusting the carrying case of her alembic with a shrug of her shoulder and a pull of the strap looping under her armpit, she stepped out into the ‘ground’ floor corridor and – crunch – onto something apparently.

Muur looked down, blinked. Rubbed her eyes, blinked again, looked down again. No, still there. “...Why is there a skull here?”

In lieu of an answer, she felt a cold draft brush past her. Pulling her attention away from the skull– she wasn’t in the Guild anymore. The ruined hallways of a rich imperial palace greeted her. Shattered masonry and ripped, fluttering drapes were all around her. A glance behind her showed nothing but smooth stone where velvet once covered the brick wall and a fallen painting.

“So it isn’t just when I meditate, huh?” Muur muttered, patting her side where there was a conspicuous lack of sucking wounds full of goopy selfhood. A swing of her upper torso and she had the crate that supposedly held her alembic in front of her, but a bit of fiddling with the top told her that unfortunately the unnatural strength she’d enjoyed the first go around in the Void wasn’t there for her.

The way ice sprouted from her palm with ease she could only imagine in meatspace, sculpting itself into a thick dagger with little more than a bit of pinching and pulling from her other hand, though? She could work with that. Doubly so as the ice had no trouble wedging the top of the crate open.

It opened with a quiet snap that nonetheless echoed down the hall like a clap of thunder. Opening it just a crack, Muur saw that it was filled to the brim with skulls made of glass, each filled with a crimson, blood-like substance that flowed like a thick syrup.  She grabbed one without any hesitation, holding it against the light for a moment before nodding to herself, “Fuck it, may as well.”

A flick of her knife and the very tip of the chin was cracked off into a novelty bottle, a quick puncture on the right eyesocket making sure air could come in as she tilted it back to drink.

First was a sweetness like honey, yet magnified a dozen times. Enough that she made a face even as the first gulp went down her throat. Second was the metallic taste of blood, that familiar iron-y, copper-y flavour from a split lip. All around lovely. Then the ammonia aftertaste hit her tastebuds like the ass end of a particularly repulsive god. 

Suffice to say, she was chewing on a fistful of magically conjured snow in short order. Still better than the time she’d eaten ants and spiders as a child. In the time she’d swallowed the mouthful of disgusting blood and created the snow, the sound of twinkling glass caught Muur’s attention.

Turning back to the case, she saw the pile of skulls rise above the walls of the case. Almost like they were multiplying and pushing each-other upwards. ‘Or something is reaching out from there, pushing the bottles away as it does’ – a small part of her mind whispered.

Which was why with a clench of the hand not holding a mostly full glass skull, she wove dense blue ice to glue all the ‘bottles’ and the crate itself together. Then she turned on her heel and jogged away before the inevitable fireworks kicked off, ducking into the nearest door.

What laid behind it had once been something of unparalleled splendor. A great feasting hall adorned with magnificent tapestries and paintings– Alas, they were far too moth-eaten for Muur to be able to make heads or tails of what they’d depicted in the time where they were whole. The rest of the room followed in the same wake, furniture once pristine and grandiose laid broken and ruined across the floor.

Planks of wood and ceramic shards there, a twisted and scattered suit of armour here. Even a shattered cabinet, its make stained by the spirits and wines it had held once.

Not everything had suffered whatever ravages had visited the room however. For one, standing silently on a wooden presentoir, the armor’s twin kept a guard as it surveyed the room with its empty, lifeless gaze.

But what stood out, and told her the room’s role, was the massive dining table that sat in the middle of it. Both it and the white table cloth covering it were shockingly intact– as if time and the dreariness of this castle had no hold on them… The same couldn't be said of the seating arrangement that surrounded it though. From where she stood, Muur was able to see numerous chairs. Some in a state that mirrored the cabinet’s, others completely intact– baring a coat of dried black ichor.

Only two of these seats seemed to be truly pristine. The Au’Ra found herself growing, something about this scene tickled her memory. But she couldn’t quite put her finger on it as she turned her attention to the last seat. If it could even be called that.

Cast in ominous light by the unnatural purple that filtered through the decaying curtains draped across grand windows, stood a throne. Not a royal one though. No, rather than being something you would see in a fantasy castle, this one belonged in a greco-roman temple. Sculpted marble columns and all.

Hazarding a step forward to get a better look at everything, the thaumaturge caught a glimpse of a man-size silver platter on the table. Wait, was this where–

BANG

The sound of ice and glass shattering came from behind her, telling her that her ice had give way and that— 

“▅█▛┫” A rumble like a million of teeth grinding against each other came from the other side of the room, where something that Muur had thought to be a shadow stirred from its slumber. At first, Muur couldn’t quite get a good look at it from where she stood, but as the thing blearily got up, parts of it filtered into the light. First it became obvious that it was massive, maybe as much as three times her height, bulkier than even the roegadyn she’d seen in Ul’dah. Second was that most of its skin seemed to be a deep blue, with a lighter blue-grey underneath. 

Leaning forwards, it sniffed at the air, revealing a maw of mismatch razor-sharp teeth set in a decidedly shark-like snoot. Rather than notice her though, it turned towards the another set of doors that led to the corridor, “┉┉█████▕” Letting out another deep rumble, it lumbered in its direction which brought it fully into the light.

The monster was a gigantic mutated shark person of some kind. As it walked, she saw no less than six toothy maws. One on each palm, another two cutting in its shoulders. A fifth was right on its blubbery guts, though here it was more of an educated guess than anything, she could see a thick tongue dangling past its knees so there was probably a mouth to go alongside. The sixth was the first she’d seen when it had smelled the air like a bloodhound, and was placed right beneath blood-shot, beading eyes that were deeply recessed into the head.

Like a shark, it had a dorsal fin. Two actually, one on top of its head, and the other in the middle of its back. They and the abomination against good taste that was its tail flopped side to side with every heavy step as it dragged itself towards the door.

Muur’s fingers ghosted over the glass skull, ice sealing up the holes so it wouldn’t drip and give her away by sound or smell. If the big guy wanted to head right on out, she wasn’t going to stop him.

The beast didn’t even pause to open the door, instead throwing its shoulder into it and sending the ancient wood to the floor. Three steps later, and it was out of Muur’s sight- though not out of earshot, since she could hear it stomp towards the bloody mess that the box must have been.

Which left the lizard wizard free to pad over to the windows, because like hell she was going into that hallway. Moving their way, Muur caught sight of a thing that sent shivers down her spine laying on the table. A massive, man-sized silver plater. This really was the place of her first vision, when she’d been brought to Eorzea.

The sound of crunching glass quickly snapped her attention back to the windows. There were three of them, each set in the walls at about a meter above ground and reaching all the way up to where the domed ceiling and the wall joined up. Shockingly, none of the individual glass panels that made them up were broken.

As for the outside– She was back in the same realm she’d fallen through, broken landmasses, floating island, endless void and all. Unfortunately, she was both on the fourth floor of the palace she was on, and it seemed to be floating by itself, with no castle grounds to speak of. Fortunately, the ledge on the other side of the glass was large enough that she’d be able to shimmy along to get to other places. 

It took working the hinges very gently to avoid a godawful squeak of rusted metal, but soon enough she was in business. Doubly so as she started to gather frost on her hands, soles and tail to stick to the walls.