A dark figure stood over him. It's overly long black arms reached for him.
It's time to come home, Enderborn.
He awoke in a cold sweat. His body was rigid from the nightmare. He looked around and took in his surroundings. Blackrock. The master bedroom. He looked to his side, but Zoey wasn't there. She's just working on the nuke. He reassured himself, but his paranoia already had him out of the bed and heading towards the mineshaft trapdoor to check on her.
She was there. Asleep and drooling on the stone below her, but there, nonetheless. He gently scooped her up and carried her back to bed.
He didn't sleep at all the rest of the night.
When Zoey woke up, she was surprised to find Rythian already up, and pacing the floor, deep in thought.
"Rythian?" she murmured groggily. He froze, mid-step.
"Oh, you're awake." he responded.
"Yeah, um, what are you doing?"
"Nothing." He hurried out of the room.
The Queen will get you, Enderborn. The voices persisted. Finding it impossible to shut them out, he instead started to respond.
Shut up! he'd yell in his head, All of you! I'm staying here! Shut up!
Zoey grew more and more concerned, and Tee slowly became easier to talk to than Rythian, ironically. She couldn't quite articulate a decent way to ask what's wrong. What's wrong doesn't quite fit, it doesn't answer all of her questions.
The Endermen started showing up all around him, inside the castle, outside the castle (it wasn't as secure as it used to be, and it was even easier for them to invade). He started using Enderbane constantly, even sometimes on mobs that weren't Endermen, solely out of paranoia. His hands were covered in welts and scars from holding the sword constantly.
Zoey gathered the nerve to ask about the scars on his hands, but his response was null.
"Nothing..." he'd say and walk off. Even when it didn't make sense, his answer was always "Nothing.". Zoey gave up on saying anything to the crazed mage.
