Chapter 8: The Harrowing
The Fade was a terrifying marvel. A twisted, frightening world of dark skies, rocks and raw lyrium veins floating everywhere. Pieces of rock from the size of a pebble to the size of a mountain floating in the air, defying gravity. Up was down and down was up. An island with the Black City, a shadowy metropolis with twisted spires seems to be the only constant feature of the Fade, always on the horizon, just out of reach. It was like the premises of a horror game. No wonder many orthodox mages who came here did not like it.
One of the things I learnt from the Circle was that the landscapes kept changing in the Fade. I was currently standing on a piece of a land which I believe was around 2 kilometer radius, floating in the air. I was currently on the edge, and the landscape around me was barren and plain. There was a battlefield in the distance, right in the middle of the island. I started to walk in that direction to find my objective here.
I could see wraiths here and there but none approached me. I had religiously memorized the important events from the game. As I started recalling, I came to a conclusion that the harrowing was a test about the mage's willpower and resistance to temptation from demons.
It was taught to us in the Circle that majority of the spirits in the Fade that we encounter were demons. Demons often want to cross the veil. So they are usually the ones that seek us. Unauthorized research about them was forbidden to apprentices and access to the advanced knowledge of the demons were only accessible only to the senior enchanters.
For now I just needed knowledge to kill demons effectively. Wisps can easily be taken care of by using arcane or fire magic. For Rage demons its best to use ice and earth spells. Since majority of the demons won't engage in melee with me, it would be useless to use rock armor, just an arcane shield or a spell shield would be enough.
As I approached the battlefield, I noticed that the ground was pitch black. It gave off an ominous aura that sent a shiver down my spine. Bits and pieces of human armor were lying around the courtyard along with countless number of bodies. It was as if a battle had taken place and everyone was massacred.
It was horrifying. The bodies had just began to rot. A pungent, foul smell pervaded the area. Feeling nauseous, I used a bit of earth manipulation to move some of the bodies close to me to one end and lit them on fire by a fireball.
I knew that is was just a trick but experiencing it first-hand was different. No wonder many mages succumb to the temptation of the demons after experiencing this. It gave a sense of dread to everyone who approached the battlefield. I felt powerless and humbled from the amount of residual magic lingering in the area. It was depicting the weak power of humans in front of demons.
As I trudged around the area I was not able to find a single soul. I was starting to feel that the longer I will be on the battlefield the more helpless and horrified I would feel.
"What if this was going to happen to me? I was not there in the game. So am I just a side character who will die prematurely? Then what is the point of my survival? May be I should just rest for a while? Think this through after resting a bit?" I thought feeling sluggish and disoriented.