2.

Xassin.

Erebus’ eyes are always the first thing I notice about him. They are ever changing in shape and colour, like a kaleidoscope. Today they were slowly drifting between crimson and topaz. He sat on the chair with the two other elder gods, Ra and Zurvan. They were all too composed on those thrones of theirs—the big three, as the others called them. Personally, I had seen stronger gods in my travels, gods that were simply uninterested in this hierarchy that was put in place, and exiles, demons that could make universes tremble with their power. And, of course, the other six heavens above them.

Ra looked at me, his obsidian eyes glaring ”Explain this mage, why is there another shard in this reality, and why does a human, of all races have it?”. The other two were looking at me, waiting for my reply.

Very smooth Ra, very smooth.

“Where is my friend?” I ask, ignoring the question. Ra is taken aback by my disrespect. I could up swear that I saw Zurvan chuckle before speaking. “The boy is being tended to by our healers, he’s fine”. Zurvan would be the only elder I respected. As the wisest of the lot, he was always calm and composed, but I knew he was as ruthless as they come.

“Good, thank you Zurvan”

“My pleasure, Xassin” I catch the glint of mischief in his eyes. “Now on to pressing matters, I’m sure you all noticed that my friend has a shard, which is unusual to say the least. You wouldn’t know anything about that, now would you?”. While saying all this I keep my eyes on Ra. Still in shock, he tries to recompose himself. “No, of course not, are you trying to say we had something to do with this?”

There it was, that slight tremble. “Really? Because that would make it the third time you’ve tried and failed to absorb Chaos.” There is a short silence, and for the first time, Erebus speaks, his eyes are now flitting from green to blue—he’s slightly furious. “Ra, what did you do?”

“Apparently, he took his loss against me too personal and tried to tried to splinter reality to allow a shard from another universe come here. He succeeded, but the shard rejected him, twice. The third time however, it broke free and entered the mortal realm, probably seeking out energy similar to mine, but instead, found Tony whose soul had been bathed with my energy.” Zurvan raised a brow, a weird action go say the least, as he had no face. “ He’s my friend, I spend most of my time on earth with him, he passively absorbs some of my energy.”

Ra was furious now, the whole hall trembled with power as he stood, bathing the room with his light . “How dare you! Accusing me, an elder god! Have you no respect?”. He started towards me, spear in hand. I watched his advance in amusement, knowing what would happen next.

The light died out. I wouldn’t call it dying out, more like it was swallowed by darkness, utter darkness. Then I heard his voice. “Shut your mouth Ra!”. His voice boomed, seeming to come from every direction possible.

“ But brother, he was—” Ra's voice was cut off by a scream of horror as Erebus’ shadow took form and grabbed Ra by the neck. “If you ever try something like that again, I’ll forget the promise I made to mother and end you swiftly. Are we clear!?”. The darkness lifted. Ra's form pay sprawled on the floor, silent. Erebus’ had calmed down significantly, his eyes returning to their normal crimson.

“I apologise for my brother’s misconduct, Arch-mage,”. He paused, fully regaining his composure. “What can be done to salvage the situation?” I noticed Zurvan now also looking at me with acknowledgement. “Nothing can be done, really. The boy will just have to take the shard's place as he is now one with it.”

“That sounds too easy..”, Erebus sounded relieved, but still wary, he never fully trusted me.

“It is, but I’m not going to do that”. The two elders look at me in confusion. “You wish to risk a universe for one human? This is unlike you, Xassin.” He was right. Normally I wouldn’t have cared about sacrificing one human life for the good of a universe. But now...

“I’ll use my shard to keep the balance”, I announced. Even Ra in his weakened state looked up in shock. “Xassin! You know what this means!” Zurvan interjected. Yeah, yeah I know, I lose all of my shard given powers, become the target of a lot of enemies, Yadda Yadda Yadda. “I’m not killing my friend”, I said firmly. Erebus sighed and then nodded. “Very well mage, you may release your shard. But remember, this was your choice”. I nod and form a sigil around my chest, resonating with the shard, and pulling it out. The pain is excruciating, just like the first time. The shard hovers in mid-air as Erebus waves his hand and the shard shoots up into an already open portal in the sky. “It is done”. Ra is still staring at me in surprise. I feel the familiar elven magic surge through me again.

“Good, can I go see my friend now?”. I say this as I turn around and walk away. I feel them still staring at me. Man, I’ve really done it this time. I make my way to the room where Tony is kept. He’s already awake, talking to a female around his age. An Eae huh? He seems really chatty with her and I notice why. She has big boobs. I chuckle softly as I enter the room.

“Hey bro, feeling better?” He looks up and grins.

“Yo, where you been?”, he says as we bump fists. The Eae stands, bows and leaves. Tony’s eyes follow her out of the room. He catches me looking at him.

“What?”

“She’s not human, you know. She’s only being nice because she has to, most divine beings hate humans, seeing them as obnoxious and disrespectful.” He starts laughing, loudly, his whole body shuddering from laughter. “So, I can’t look, why do you think I want smash every female person I see?”

“But you do, so long as she’s attractive”

“And has big boobs”, he added. We both burst into laughter. Tony stops and looks at me in amusement. “Nice hair, your ears are now pointy too”. I noticed the cloaking effects of the shard wearing off. My hair had returned to its usual white colour, and my eyes were also silvery grey. My ears were now pointy, as an elf's should be. “Well, the shard that was the source of my magic is gone, so I look like this for now.” Tony now looked up at me, totally serious. “What happened to it?”

“I gave it away to restore balance”, I started. “And also to save your life”. He looked relieved. How am I gonna tell him that he can never be normal again?

“Save my life how?” he broke my train of thought. “Well, the elders wanted you to take the shard’s place to keep the balance, effectively killing you, since you’re one with the shard.” I paused, and looked at him, gauging his reaction. “I’m one with the shard? This means I can’t remove it, right?”

“Yep, pretty much, sorry man, but you can never be normal again.”

“How are you alive then?” He asked. “You removed your shard without dying, why can’t I?” I sighed, “My shard wasn’t fused to me, I merely drew on its power, you however fused your soul with it, that’s why you were able to kill that harbinger, without any training”.

“What will happen now?” He was surprisingly calm. Well, I wasn’t surprised, he was the most rational human I knew. “Well, I can teach you how to control it, channel it’s energy, and not get overwhelmed by its power. That’s all I can do.”. He stood up and looked at me. I saw firm resolution in his eyes. “Teach me”

Good, he’s taking it better than I expected. “Let’s get out of here then”

 Now, what was the spell for a portal again? Ugh, elven magic is so confusing.

I visualise the elven runes for space 'ᛋᛒᛅᚴᛅ' they appear in thin air in front of me, glowing a bright green. “Huh, that was easier than I thought”. The runes separate and form a circle, slowly rotating

“Now to tear a hole in space” the runes for 'open' appear, ᚬᛒᛅᚾ and circulate around the original rune. The familiar resonating sound of a portal is heard as the two runes start rotating in sync. The portal sigil is formed and I look at Tony. “Well come on, don’t just stand there.” He stands and asks, “where to?”.

“Back to earth, we do have normal lives you know. Besides I’m hungry”. He lets out a big sigh “You and food” “What? It’s the same thing with you and girls, oh and before I forget...” A small sigil floats towards Tony from my hand and enters his chest. “Ow, that stung. What was it?”, he asked, rubbing the marked area on his chest. “A simple cloaking spell, shielding your energy from other beings that might want it’s power.” He looked serious now, “It’s that powerful?”

“I’ll tell you this, it destroyed my universe, yes, it’s that powerful, now let’s go” I didn’t want to remember the how that damned shard wiped out my people, all because of my father’s greed. I’ll always hate him for that. As I walk through the portal, I get flashes of my past. The reddened sky, my mother screaming at me to run as the harbingers destroyed her, turning her into one of them. My father laughing hysterically, completely insane from being infused with chaos. The screams of the people as I ran through the streets, the shard stabbing through my chest. The shard pulling me through a portal as my world was destroyed and overrun by harbingers.

“.......X?”

Tony brought me out of my trance. “Yeah?”, I ask, noticing that we’re back on earth. “Aren’t you going to do something about that?” He points at my hair. “Shit, I didn’t change it back” I quickly run a hand through my hair, turning it black, my eyes turn back to their normal brown colour.

“Thanks”

“You seemed kind of lost in thought” He says, as we start walk towards a lecture theatre. It’s a Saturday, so we don’t have classes. Our friends usually meet up at this building, The Department of General Studies. We game, make noise and have a ton of fun. “I was just thinking about how life will be without my shard” I lie. “I have a lot of enemies you know, people that wanted to kill me, but couldn’t. Now I don’t have the power to protect myself, or at least that’s what they think.” I smile and enter the building.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I open my mouth to answer, but we’re both stopped by a voice. “Yo, Tony, X!” Chris is a dark, muscular, dude of average height. He has been our friend ever since we started college. I give him a warm handshake as I grab his already extended hand.

“Are the rest of the guys here?”, I ask, motioning to the theatre’s gallery. “I don’t know, I’ve been here, just using Wi-Fi.” I start laughing. “Sub finished again?” I ask as we walk up the stairs.

“Guy, WhatsApp is a bastard, I subbed like last week and it was all gone in three days!” Tony is now joining in my laughter, “Well, can’t relate, I use my dad’s router, free unlimited sub” He looks smug now, with a silly grin on his face.

Well, he seems to be taking everything pretty well, I’m surprised he didn’t freak out. “Idiot, who asked you?” I say as I slap his back, but we’re all laughing at this point. We reach the gallery and we’re greeted with the familiar shouts of boys gaming.

“Guy, there are two of them behind us!”

“Someone should collect the flag!”

“Fuck! I died again!”

“So they’re here already” Tony says. He pulls out this phone and enters the gallery. “Tony! Abeg come and enter game, were losing too much.” Tony smiles and asks, “What WiFi are we using?” Nonso, one of my friends, a tall, nerdy looking dude, walks up to me. “X, how far na?”

We bump fists and I look around. “Looks like the whole gang is here...” I walk around, shaking and fist bumping my guys. These guys are the only real friends I’ve had since I came to earth. The only thing I’ve been doing is learning the ways of humans, and magic. The only other person that was this important, if not more is the alien mage that found me, after I came to this universe. Z'ara was her name, she was the Arch-mage of the gentry, a race of magically advanced beings, even more advanced than elves. She taught me magic, martial arts, and was pretty much my mother figure, until her people decided that I was to be used as a weapon.

“Always keep moving, Xassin” Her words were what kept me all these years, I was wary of people after that, never trusting, always on the move. They probably killed her, I never went back there to check, even after I became an Arch-mage myself. Maybe I was scared of what I would find. So I left, to the slums of this universe, choosing to protect them as she had done to me. The backwards galaxies were under my protection, so they were never disturbed by invaders or wars. Earth particularly interested me, the little rock brimming with life and light. Life amidst such chaos, I moved to Earth immediately after, to a city called Lagos. Blending in was fairly simple, a matter of changing my hair and eyes. I was already dark skinned, so I fit right in. It was a normal life for a while, until I got bored and decided to find a place to learn about them, humans. Providing fake certificates was not a problem, neither was passing their exams, JAMB as they called it. I had decided to leave Lagos after living there for such a long time, so I chose to move east, to another town, Enugu. The reddish brown sands reminded me of the desert planet of Iolana, where Z'ara found me first.

Video games had always been my favourite part of living on earth. I was very skilled in the art of crushing opponents, well, until I met Tony. I was alone in the gaming house because no one wanted to play Storm 4.

“Is anyone playing with you?” The single question that led to our friendship. We played that day, until we were tired, and we drew. None of us wanted defeat, so we decided to meet up again. Well, no one ever accepted defeat, We continued meeting up after that. I found out he was the son of the Dean of my department, Pharmacy. Then I started meeting his friends, who later became my friends. That was two years ago, here I am now, with my best friend with a power I once had, and me the target of half the universe.

Man, time really does change people

“I’m going downstairs, I need to buy something to eat.”

“Guy, buy something for me na”

“Idiot, go and buy by yourself”, I say and walk out of the gallery.

A sudden chill goes through me as I sense the presence of two magical beings in near proximity to me. Was that Tony? No, there were two of them, and the energy felt way weaker. So I can assume they’re here for me.

 I touch the back of my neck. “The index isn’t ready yet, this a bad time...Couldn’t they have waited a bit?”

We know you’re here mage, your elven blood is very easy to sniff out. The message broke through my mental wards and straight to me. Whoever they were, they were skilled. I start making my way out of the building.

Run all you want, it makes the hunt easier.

I ignore the psychic message and go faster down the stairs. As I leave the building, I see two people standing some feet away from me. The first one is a man, a tall one. He wore a huge coat, despite the hot sun and a cap over his face. The second one was shorter wearing a white t-shirt and jeans. I realized that they had been waiting for me. No way to avoid a fight now. I shove my hands into my jacket, closing the distance between us. “I guess you’re not here today buy a lacasera, are you?” I say, pointing towards a shack behind me. The short one raises his arm and a blood red sigil appears around his arm.

The sky is immediately blotted out and replaced with a reddish glow. We’re no longer in the school, just a wasteland surrounded by mountain ranges, probably a pocket dimension. I notice their eyes change colour too. Deep purple. Demons, great. They looked the the Kadath, a race native to the fourth Circle of Hell, but I couldn’t be sure. I wasn’t particularly a demonologist. I held out my hand and my blade, Irunyr appeared. “Before we start, may I ask who hired you?” The large demon replies with as swift blow, one which I barely block. He pushes me back a bit, and I unsheathe my sword. He’s strong, and fast too... I was barely able to react, and I don’t know what that other one can do.

The demon tears his coat, revealing a huge broadsword with a jagged blade. I take my classic stance, at the same time, casting a protective spell on my body. “By Fos, I’m going to ache after this.” The demon rushes at me again, sword in hand. As our swords clash, I immediately cast a reflection spell. Isa kenaz hagalaz” The force from the clash rebounds and the demon is stunned. As I dash forward, I run my hand across the blade and whisper “Thurisaz” The blade crackled to life with electricity, and I simultaneously slash the demon across the chest and release the lightning. He drops dead and I start walking towards the other demon. He’s not moving, just watching me. Something’s off, I realize as I turn around. The ‘dead' demon is no longer there. I got cocky, shit. Out of the corner of my eye, I see something above me. His sword comes down with an astonishing speed. I barely have time to cast “Ansuz!” I yell and dash away. The impact cleaves the ground, sending debris flying everywhere. From a distance, I observe the demon again. The wound I gave it was gone. And it looked wilder, it’s eyes more bloodshot and it’s movements animal-like.

“I see, a berserker and a support mage. Good combination” I look at the support mage, thinking of how to get to him first. A sudden blow to my side, sending me flying into a nearby hill reminds me of the berserker demon. “Ow, that hurt” My fortification was broken immediately, I couldn’t even react this time. “How much longer until this damn thing starts working?” I touch my the back of my neck again, this time feeling a faint magical energy. “Fuck this, I’m jump-starting it.” I close my eyes and start chanting “othala ehwaz perthro naudiz”

The sting in my neck increases until it’s burning up. I grit my teeth and wait. The berserker is closing in again. He jumps up and swings. I can’t dodge this...might as well take it head on. I cast another fortification spell and block with my sword. The clash is heavy and I’m pushed back into the hill, the shockwave splitting it in half. The berserker starts running towards me, obviously enjoying the one sided battle. ‘That.... didn’t hurt at all.” My clothes aren’t torn. I notice the pain in my neck is gone. I close my eyes. Knowledge flows through me as the Index activates.

It’s back huh? Finally. My blade reappears in my hand. “Let me tell you something, you all think I’m weak without a shard? Let me clarify, I was made Arch-mage before I learnt how to use my shard. still an Arch-mage, idiot! I raise my hand and the sky is filled with blue sigils. “Thurisaz!” The sigils rain down lightning which the berserker dodges easily, still dashing at me. The lightning is drawn to my blade again this time completely turning white. I absorb the energy and charge at the demon again, cutting off his arm before he can react. He roars in pain and charges at me again, but he’s In range this time. A sigil appears in my palm and I fire a concentrated blast of electricity through his chest, slicing him in half. The beam goes further and slices off the support mage's hand. Then the beam goes past him too, clearing the entire mountain range behind him. The berserker demon is a black charred mass and the mage is on the floor, howling in pain.

“Heh, I overestimated”, I say as I walk towards the mage curled up in a ball, nursing his wound. I’ll ask you again, answer and I’ll let you go with at least one limb. Who sent you?” He turns around and tries a last ditch effort to attack. “Blood Demon Magic: Death’s Grasp” . A black mist covers both of us. “ I’m taking you with me, mage!”. I sigh, and snap my fingers, “Sowilo” A miniature star the size of a soccer ball forms , burning the mist away, and the mage too. The dimension starts fading away, as I walk to go buy what I wanted before.

I touch my neck again, feeling the magic of the index active. I sealed it away after I started using the shard, the shard offered more options and was more powerful. Besides using my elven magic reminded me of my old home and my father, that bastard. But I had no other choice. I had to prepare Tony for the problems ahead. When I get back to the gallery, they’re all still deep in the game, even Tony. He raises up his head. “What took you so long?”

“Nothing important, really.” I say and bite into my eggroll.

Nothing at all.