Chrysalis

Marvel. Wonder. Architectural triumph. One of the great achievements of the age. The Twin Cities have been described in such glowing terms for over a millennium and truly they are deserving of their reputation.

Situated on the same mountain, Mt Atraem, they can be seen many kilometres away, glittering like matched jewels in the distance.

Dressed in peerless Soul Silver, the lower city gleams like the finest polished swords. Home to several million citizens, the Silver City is the beating heart of a great and enduring empire. Its six walls and twelve towers are so heavily enchanted with wards and protections it can be painful to look at them with the naked eye.

As impregnable as it is beautiful, visitors have so many sights to take in, one simply cannot hope to catch them all.

Yet it is above that the true vision lies. Carved from pure Heart Gold, the Golden City glows radiant from the upper reaches of the mountain, a glimpse of a luminescent heaven.

Palace after palace, castle after castle, each one a peerless work of art such that the finest carvers and builders weep to look upon them. The Scholars’ tower, rising like a spear into the sky, a house of learning and knowledge unequalled in all the realms.

For those lucky few who are able to catch a glimpse, the Imperial Compound, home to the Child-Emperor himself, is a sight so rare, and so marvellous, as to be without equal in all Pangera.

The Twin Cities of Silver and Gold. Seat of the Emperor and Capital of the Atraem Empire. Truly a wonder of the modern age, may they stand forever.

of the Fourth Stratum -

Odin Malum, and he had learned to be hard in return. Carving a bloody place in

or be killed. Fight to live, surrender and die. These were rules that

Rather than kill for others, or to make himself useful, or defend that which wasn’t

him of that illusion. Being in that presence, he couldn’t bring himself to believe that he had any alternative but to obey. It was normal, in a dog-eat-dog world, for someone to be the alpha. Odin had bowed his head to

older than he, and had been lost for a time. The lure of Arconidem was so seductive, so powerful. His demon body craved indulgence, it needed to kill, to revel in death and destruction. The Demon God whispered

was sure. The great demons had been with him at times,

Until now.

that?! Some sort of

he had no idea what they’d been chasing. Then it had…

one brief, horror-stricken moment, he’d thought the world had simply ended. The howl of the wind, the groan of the

to shock his mind out of

would be dead, without a doubt. Lashing out with

enough. Before he could escape its pull, he’d been caught. In that terrible moment, he’d lifted into the air, losing his last grasp to the ground and began to fall toward the

before he’d