A centaur, a human, and a dwarf climbed through the broken parts of the keep, ready for action. Only to pause, confused at the sight awaiting them. Two revenants stood guard over nothing, vignt and unmoving, over nothing.


    Before acting, the trio had waited until Theas had recovered. His battle with the lich having drained most of his mana and, in fact, he had taken some significant damage. While waiting for him to recover, all that Vivian and Myropsis could do was pray that Eldrian would be able to hold out until their help arrived.


    They had consoled each other by mentioning that this was Eldrian they were talking about. If anyone could survive against a lich in a battle of the souls, it would be him.


    Their confidence had been high. They believed that even after the hours it had taken for Theas to recoup, that Eldrian would still be fine. However, they had not expected to find the lich gone and Eldrian''s charred corpse lying on the ground, quietly. One could not call the sight peaceful, but at least it did not appear like an intense battle for a continued existence was going on.


    At first the two girls had panicked, thinking that the lich had taken his soul and escaped. But then they noticed the pile of bones under an old robe between the revenants. After which, Vivian confirmed that there were no souls in the area. Besides them, the revenants were the only ''living'' things inside the ruined keep.


    "Did he...?"


    "That''s Eldrian for you..." Myropsis replied with a twitching smile. All their worries had been for nothing. If what they were seeing was correct, then he should be fine. Already in the realm of souls and soon to resurrect in some temple or another like any other Chosen.


    "Should we try to?" Myropsis left the question unspoken. She wasn''t sure if it would cause problems. But she knew that the standard resurrection of the Chosen came at a cost.


    "He gave each of us one potion... Would it work?" Vivian asked.


    "I think if we first repair his body, it should..."


    "Aren''t youdies forgetting about two very important problems?" Theas interrupted their little discussion, feeling that they were getting ahead of themselves.


    "That will be up to you, won''t it? Doesn''t seem like any other enemies survived." Myropsis replied, her tonemanding.


    "Up to me?"


    "You just need to distract them." Myropsis looked towards Vivian, who readied herself to rush forward and throw Eldrian onto Myropsis'' back. "Ready? Go!"


    The twodies rushed forward, not giving Theas any time to argue. Gritting his teeth, he hefted his halbert and started a battle against the two revenants. Comining internally that they were being unfair.


    ...


    The rescue mission went off without a hitch. Theas sported a few new wounds and needed to recover once again, but that wasn''t a big problem. The important part was that they had Eldrian''s avatar and Myropsis was currently using abination of water healing and divine through runic casting to repair all the damage.


    His avatar was in a dreadful state, and this would take a while. As Myropsis worked, she could only hope that Eldrian would take his time to resurrect, so he didn''t need to waste his levels on rebuilding his avatar.


    Vivian, on the other hand, was dealing with her emotions. She had suppressed them for as long as she could. She had long since epted that her dad was dead, had prayed that he could make it to the afterlife.


    They had seeded, and she couldn''t confirm that he was at peace.


    All she had to go on was Theas'' report, which wasn''t muchfort. She knew that the lich had targeted Eldrian, but she couldn''t confirm if this was because of fury or because her dad''s soul was already too far gone.


    "I''m sure they''re both fine." Myropsis took Vivian''s hand and poured some refreshing mana into her. A warmth filled Vivian''s body and brought her out of her reverie.


    "Thanks, I''m sure you''re right." She replied with a fake smile, hiding all her insecurities and praying that it was the truth.


    Myropsis easily read through Vivian''s smiled and didn''t let go of her hand nor did she cancel the light trickle of mana. By now most of the healing was being done via the runes she had drawn all over Eldrian, fueled by a blessed crystal. All she had to do was maintain her focus and let the magic do its work.


    ***


    "Do we have confirmation on this?" A rather young individual pared to the rest sitting around an old stone table- asked. Her appearance belied innocence, and her beauty could stop the beating heart of an eager young man. But none in the room were taken in by her appearance. They knew it wasn''t normal.


    And no, not because of cosmetic surgery or anything. An aura of allure surrounded the youngdy, making her appear ideal to the beholder—should they not have any mental defenses. To those with such defenses, she still appeared beautiful, but not to a degree to move their hearts.


    "We''ve confirmed that an individual who was in contact with him reached Tier 5. Considering that even we struggled to aplish that, we believe he must have been responsible."


    "Did you not look at the recordings?" The youngdy questioned. The recordings didn''t show how Ilmadia had aplished her breakthrough, but it showed her using the magic which Eldrian discovered. Runic casting was extremely rare in ANW, so much so that it had almost died out.


    Outside of the high elves, she knew of no other kingdoms still studying this form of magic. And from what she knew, they had included it only recently. (Recent on an ANW timescale.)


    There used to be far more kingdoms that practice runic casting. Sadly, because of the constant invasions, a great deal of knowledge was often lost as kingdoms and empires were wiped from the face of Gaia.


    The pressure ced on the surviving kingdoms made them prioritize an easy to hand down type of magic system. Dynamic casting would have been preferable, as it was a casting method without fault, but the talent required and time to master it made it unrealistic to bemonce.


    Only long lived races like the elves could attempt something like that, and even then only high elvesmonly showed the talent to seed. The other elven races would only introduce dynamic casting to their most talented children. And the same held for other long-lived races.


    This left the short-lived races with static magic, with nearly no one ever capable of picking up dynamic casting. While there are various variations in static casting, the mostmon currently was spell module casting. A pre-defined mental image to gather and focus mana to form and control spells.


    It was easy to start and required little to no talent up—until Tier 4. To reach Tier 5 required some talent or a great deal of effort.


    Runic casting instead took a long time to pick up, and it required a certain amount of talent from the get-go. While not to a to a degree that dynamic casting required, one must be able to guide mana through the rune. Guiding mana, a step only required to reach Tier 5 with module casting.


    It was likeparing a bow and a crossbow. One required years of training (or exceptional talent) to master, while the other could be learned within weeks by just about anyone. And in times of war, speed and numbers were preferred over slow steady growth.


    And while the world had seen peace from invasions for a long time, wars between kingdoms had not been umon. Thus, this preference had prevailed.


    AN: Remember to vote andment if you are enjoying the story.