"The engineers Queek and Rasneek are asking the help of master Agnil. The plasma generator is overheating once again."

Many races were conquered and were now working for the Demonic Empire. The first two names were part of the ratmen while the latter part of the dwarfs. Unfortunately, master Agnil died a month ago in the explosion of a frigate. Nonetheless, the Death Corps managed to retrieve his soul and allowed his survival. Not even death could free them from the clutches of the demons.

Soon, a small blue light left the shadows and began to spin. As it kept doing that, the light began to dim and the original small ball of light turned into a humanoid form. Barely five seconds later, a small human could be seen in the middle of the room. With a height of 1,20 meter, a huge beard, and a strong body, master Agnil was awakened. He turned his sight toward the shadows, bowed and looked at Akama. Of course, he was not naked, he was still wearing the clothes that he had when he died. An armor of a metal similar to the one that the red demon was wearing, but covering him entirely. It even had an armor specifically for his beard.

"You can go now."

The young voice resonated in the room, and the two guests quickly left after that, closing the door behind them. Both will be very busy in the incoming day. Silence reigned supreme once again, but the small silhouette still had this uneasy feeling that something bad will happen. Worse than this move done by Candaith. He was the mage manipulating time and s.p.a.ce, so if even him wasn't able to detect anything she shouldn't be able to. Maybe if she ate something, that feeling will disappear.

She opened her bag and entered inside. Unlike some of the inferior spatial bags, hers was bigger than the room she was in the real world. A lot of things were stocked inside, things that shouldn't be available to anyone without an explicit order. And who will dare to steal something from her?

She began to roam toward a precise location. All around her were locked chests, sets of armors and her personal collection of robes. Near that and behind the crates containing numerous weapons, she found her stash of food. Preserved in vials, the souls of many races was awaiting her. To sustain her body, she needed to eat the lifeforce of many creatures. Of course, everyone had a preference. Akama loved the elven flesh while the red demon only ate humans. As for her, only souls were sufficient to appease her hunger. She began to rummage through her stash and finally found what she was looking for, the soul of a nymph. It was the most peaceful one, maybe that will reduce her feeling.

She opened the bottle and the shadows surrounding her immediately entered the vial without even letting the numerous souls inside make a move. Soon, her hunger was gone and even the feeling was reduced, but not completely dispelled. Eating again will be wasteful and she disliked that, and now it was possible for her to just ignore it. She left her bag and looked at the window again. She was fairly certain that right now she could see a.r.s.ene where this d.a.m.n b.a.s.t.a.r.d was located. Her troops were ready and will conquer her targets but she hoped that he will fail to do so. She didn't survive all this time just to be made a fool by some weakling barely 400 years old.

She was born as the daughter of some peasants on a planet that was now destroyed. If everything would have been normal, she would have died young anyway, but maybe after marrying the local apprentice blacksmith and having a child or two. She had no regrets about not knowing what happiness was. She had lost those sentiments a long time ago. When she was still a young child. The only memory of her old self was that blurry image in a pond. She remembered her brown eyes and her short blond hair.

Even now, she still wasn't sure when exactly that event happened. When she was four or when she was five? Anyway, on that planet, magic existed and where magic existed, bad people with magic too. She was kidnapped, along with many other young girls and boys, most of them were the children of peasants. Only one was the son of a n.o.ble. At their arrival, they were labeled as a number. Hers was 32.

She was one of the youngest and none of them were older than ten years, so they were all easily controllable. They were locked in different rooms, and the only light that they could see was coming from the torches outside of their cells. The first week, like everyone, she cried a lot and since she was a weak girl, had a very hard time fighting for the food. That was what saved her. By the end of that terrible week, nearly all the strong boys were taken for many experiments. Few returned.

After that, it became a clear rule that the healthier you looked, the more chances you would be taken. But as a child, none of them were able to resist the call of the food. And the time where their abductors were random. Sometimes, none of them came for a few days or many in the same hour. It all depended on what they were testing and how many test subjects they needed. After a few months, everyone was meager and weak, not posing a single threat to those dark mages. She was already part of some experiments, that turned her eyes totally green and her hair white. On her arms, she would see some scales appearing. But she still survived and was not made a target of a new spell.

This kept going for a few years, or at least that was how she felt it. She saw a lot of new faces, and the batch of young people that originally came with her was reduced to the n.o.ble son and her. He was number 2. None of them talked to each other, but they were always side by side. They were both already broken, he had an arm covered entirely in fur and even his hand was turned into a paw. She discovered one time that her eyes were now entirely black, like her hair. The scales were gone, but her flesh turned black in many spots. During those years, the two of them still learned a lot of things. Who is the kindest, what they were expecting from them. They even learned how to read, or at least, how to p.r.o.nounce the letters.

This would have continued until she died, but one day, she heard a lot of shouting. Like her, 2 didn't even bother looking through the bars of the cells, but the other children rejoiced. They talked about how someone was rescuing them. She thought it was impossible but they were right this time. The Knights of the king finally found the lair of those renegades and slaughtered the dark sorcerers. In the process, they saved dozens of young boys and girls. Those that arrived the last month all jumped at their saviors. The rest didn't even bother looking at them. Only after she was forcefully taken did she realized what was happening.

After that, they were taken to a local church, where many peaceful and caring sisters washed us and comforted us. She could hear the cries of the others, but she had fewer emotions than a statue. After that, she heard that they asked any family that had lost a kid to come get them. No one showed up for her. Even number two was in the same case. After nearly a week, they were the only two remaining children, the two that still weren't capable of talking. They just sat close to each other on the floor, as they used to in their cell.

One day, she got to her spot and waited until she heard the scream of a woman. It was coming from the chamber of number two. Before the only survivors were 32 and 2, now only 32 remained. She decided to escape this church, before she suffered the same fate. The only place she knew was where she was locked up. And so, she returned to where her life was destroyed. It took her a few days where she was starving, but she was capable of enduring it. Alas, when she arrived, the entire cave was burned and even still burning in certain locations.

She finally had the chance to see everything in detail, but most of the instruments and books were destroyed, to prevent anyone from learning their dark secrets. It was certainly not the work of the mages but that of the knights. As one of the oldest prisoner, she still knew some of the secret stashes where her abductors kept their treasures. In one of them, she found the food and drink needed for her survival. She could still see something thanks to the sun, but she needed a torch to enter the deepest part. This was not something that difficult to find and after that, she returned to where she lived.

The cells were entirely destroyed by the knights, probably in their anger. One could still see the rotten food laying on the ground, the meal that everyone was scared of. Even there, she still felt nothing, only emptiness. Not knowing what to do, she began to exit the cavern, without a purpose. On her way to the exit, a book suddenly fell in front of her. He was partially burned, but on the first page, she could still see part of the t.i.tle. Using her voice for the first time since a long time, and with a very coa.r.s.e tongue, she began to read it.

"DARK MA…THE DUMMY: THE BONE ARROW

BY LEILADE OCTAVIUS"