Hello again. I am so incredibly sorry about my waiting an entire month to update, and giving a slightly short chapter. I have no good excuse but saying that school started in between these to updates, and totally threw me off. Now:

To my 4 reviewers of the last chapter, thank you! To the nine of you that looked at the last chapter, but did not review, I am disappointed, but hey, do what ya wanna do.

Chapter 7: The lake

Chapter 4: Falling

Kathline? Nigo asked Kathline. "What's wrong now?" Kathline responded harshly. I think I'm gonna be in a shitload of trouble.

"Why?"

'Cause I'm responsible for ya, and well, I think, I'm not sure but you know, I just, it's that…

"OUT WITH IT!" Kathline bellowed.

I think this portal's gonna explode. A look of horror crossed the young female's face.

End flashback

A moment or two went by before Kathline said something. "Nigo, how sure are you about this?" It was a moment before he responded. You've gotta fifty-fifty chance. "And how long until it happens?" Nigo's reply was instantaneous this time. No more than ten minutes. "And it's going to blow up why?" Well, a portal is supposed to be a magical thing that instantly travels to another place. This, is a time capsule. "Huh?" A time capsule. It stops time every where else, and usually is almost instantaneous in travel, but, as we found, it can be slowed and stopped by someone with enough magical skills. Further more — "You still haven't told me why this thing is going to blow up!" Kathline said, exasperated. Let me continue! Right now, however, this time capsule is running on an engine and the engine is only backup, and can't go for much more than ten minutes on it's own. After the ten minutes it will… well. "So what you're saying is that somebody needs to power the engine, otherwise, it will burn itself, and me up. That doesn't sound like a fifty-fifty chance to me."

Well, you see, the fifty-fifty comes in because I may be able to power the time capsule for long enough so that it will open because it reached it's destination, but then again, don't get you're hopes up.

"How was the capsule running in the first place, and where am I going anyway and how long will it take to get there?"

Too many questions, but they will be answered. First question's answer is, it was powered up with magic before we left, now the magic is gone because of that stupid man. It took an incredible amount of energy out of the pod, because he only redirected, and it ran on its own power. Now for your next question, if you arrive, you should arrive in the study of my master's castle. As for how long it will take to get there, longer than the time the engine has.

"Why aren't you powering the engine right now?" Kathline demanded.

I need to build up energy before I can even try if I don't want to kill myself! Nigo's tone softened, Sorry, I forgot you knew nothing about magic. But anyway, you need to build up energy before you can do something like that, and besides, I'm not even sure I have the strength, or the ability do such a spell as this in the first place. In my trying to do this, I may get killed —

"Well think about it my way." Kathline cut in, "If you don't try I die you continue to live until you confront you're master, and based on you're saying you'll be in a lot of trouble, and you'd prefer to be dead. So think about this. You do it, and succeed, I live, so do you, and you probably get rewarded. You try and fail, we both die. You don't try, I die, you wish you were dead. Base your decision on that." Then focusing her mind on trying to see something in the pitch black time capsule, Kathline unknowingly blocked Nigo from her thoughts.

Nigo started to breathe deeply. He knew that Kathline only had a few more minutes in the time capsule, and he also knew that he couldn't keep the capsule running for more than a minute.

Knowing that he wouldn't have enough time to build up enough strength to run the capsule well, he'd have to go with what energy he had. Nigo focused his mind on the time capsule, and put the strength slowly into the pod. By the time one minute had gone by, he was completely drained. Kathline only had four minutes, max, and he couldn't tell her that, because he couldn't find her mind. I'll he found was darkness. So basically, he thought to himself, she's screwed. Therefore, I'm screwed. Fuck.

Nigoshami tried to think of an alternate solution to saving Kathline as apposed to not trying and, like she said only a minute or so ago, he would wish he was dead. The first thing that popped in his mind was getting the pod open and letting her out before the pod reached its destination. The only trouble was, he didn't make the pod, therefore had no control over the controls. And, unlike the man who managed to move it and bring it, he was not a very powerful magic user. After all, he was human, and in his world, humans were slower than most animals, and weaker magically and physically than all animals, including worms, bugs, and spiders.

However, humans in his world were known for their imagination. This often made up for the fact that they were the weakest in physical, magical, and reflex speed, but, in this situation, what he needed was magic, and lots of it. Imagination would only help if he were to come up with some kind of strange idea that might save Kathline. The chances of some idea he came up with from imagination being useful were very slim. But there was that slight possibility that something in his mind might click, and some great idea would pop up and he would use the idea and save Kathline and his own ass.

Unfortunately for him, Kathline had about two minutes, and no great ideas had come to Nigo's mind. So, Nigo sharpened his knife as he waited for Kathline to die, and to be called by his master so he'd know when to kill himself so he could avoid torture. He then leaned back in his chair — which was mighty hard to do, for it was a wooden chair — and started to daydream away the last moments Kathline would have of her life. Little did he know that something very peculiar would be happening in the next few seconds.

Kathline on the other hand, was not daydreaming. She was worrying. Constantly worrying. Worrying about whether or not Nigo was running the pod. Worrying about how worried others were about her. Worrying about her chances of survival. Worrying about what would happen to her if she didn't die. Though Nigo had told her that she would be in his master's study in a castle, but she didn't know where his master's castle was, so, she worried about it.

Before this moment, she almost never worried about anything. However, she had never really been in danger in her life before either, so now that she was, she had every reason to worry.

All of her worries suddenly focused on one thing when a very loud bang erupted from the pod. Moments later, another boom shattered through the air. Kathline, was completely paralyzed in fear, not even being able to see what was happening around her that would most likely end up in her death. Before she could ponder any longer, she no longer felt the pod's floor beneath her feet, and she found herself falling from what she guessed was 10000 feet above ground, and getting closer by the second.

As Kathline fell through the air, Nigo was still sitting in his chair, waiting for his master to call, and for the knife to then find its way into his heart. Nigo still had not received a message from his master, telling him to come, and Kathline was bound to be dead by now. It could just be that his master was just not powerful enough to know that she had died, the moment she died. He could not be more wrong.

Nigo's master, who at this particular moment was conversing with a magician under his control, knew very well that Kathline was not dead. In fact, he knew that she was no longer in the pod. He even knew that calling upon Nigo would be just as effective as telling a guard to kill him, because he knew that Nigo would believe he was calling on him to torture him for the rest of his life, and therefore he'd commit suicide. Nigo's master knew a lot of things. Most of them he'd very recently learned from the magician in front of him who was under a truth spell. "Yes, Yasthro," the magician was saying, "I am absolutely positive she is the living Marcangin right now."

"Has she already been given a quest by someone? I don't want to have to get rid of an old quest to give her a new one."

"No, unless god gave one to her, she's got no quest."

"Check to see if god's given her a quest."

"Sir, I'm not powerful enough to do that, I mean… it's GOD were talking about here! You can't just go in god's mind and find out if he's given her a quest. He doesn't have what humans consider a mind. Besides, the onlyperson ever capable of doing anything with god was Fyusao, and even he couldn't find out if god had given the Marcangin a quest, because that kind of information god keeps so secret, he himself probably can't find it in his own mind like thing. And anyway, even if Fyusao had a chance, I haven't heard a thing from him in ages. I personally think he's dead but I don't know."

Yasthro sighed a long sigh. He needed Fyusao. Fyusao was in another world, and probably, dead by now because of lack of food. Fyusao was the only one he knew with enough magic to make a portal, or create a time capsule that would go past the world borders, and not evaporate, and then keep enough energy in the pod to not let it evaporate on the way back to the world borders. This was an ultimate catch 22. To get to Fyusao, he needed Fyusao. This was not good, especially since he knew that the time capsule had evaporated at the world border, and that she was in the huge lake where you could get into any of the four worlds or into any of the countless worlds of the dead. If she got into a world of the dead, she would die, and never be of any service to himself, but the only way of insuring that she got through the correct doorway into the right world he needed Fyusao.

So basically, I'm screwed, Yasthro said to himself. Especially because Hysta, and his worriers would be attacking in only a matter of days, and if I don't get a strong magic user and fighter, I'm doomed. However, if I got the Marcangin got under my control, and was given a quest it will be done, but the chances of her finding this world are very small, and even if she did, god might have given her a quest, and though he implied to his best now magician because of the loss of Fyusao otherwise, he wasn't even sure it was possible to give the Marcangin a quest after they've already been given one. Besides, even if she hasn't been given a quest he'd need all of the magic users that he had, including himself, to have enough magical power to give the Marcangin a quest in the first place.

As Yasthro thought, Kathline was indeed in a huge lake in which she could barely see the land that was tens of miles away from where she was. Kathline shivered as the cold water, drenched her clothes and body. As she treaded water, she felt the water begin to move. The current got stronger, and continued to grow, until Kathline suspected the water with her in it was speeding towards the shore faster than five hundred leagues an hour. As the shore became clearer, Kathline saw that there were relatively tall posts of some material spaced about every length of one of the poles. The water's current had sped up again, and her estimate of its speed was now about, six hundred leagues per hour. She was now close enough to tell the poles were made of metal, and about twenty feet tall. The next moment she was out of the water and her momentum caused her to go in between to of the metal poles.

I am sorry again for the REALLY long update, and I'll say again, school started and now I'll add there was Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippor (yes, I'm jewish) so I had many distractions, but I DID eventually update. Just a bit of info, a league is a 1/7 of a mile, so 500 leagues an hour is like 70 mph, and 600 leagues per hour is like 85 mph.

No ancient language guide, and I'm not going to define Marcangin, because someone in the story will do it for me.

And remember…

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