Southern New Spain (Colonial Mexico) - 1691


    The sound of horse hooves marching across dirt and gravel, along with the excited voices of several dozen men filled the evening as the sun began to set behind the nearby mountains they were hiking up through. The men were known as bandits to the populations of nearby villages, but they saw themselves as freedom fighters. They were all either mestizos, people with mixed Spanish and Native ancestry, or pure Natives to this new continent. Either way, both groups were looked down upon by the criollos, those with full Spanish ancestry who were born in Mexico, and the Spaniards themselves, who had been born across the ocean and traveled here to take up leadership positions. The further removed you were from true Spanish origin, the worse you were treated. These thirty or so men and half a dozen women were all seen as the lowest of the low, aside from the few slaves imported from the dark continent. None of them had been allowed any respect throughout their lives.


    But that would change. They were already building names for themselves, already striking fear in the hearts of the come mierdas (shit eaters). Soon, they would drive those bastardos out of Mexico and convince their own people to fight for independence. It had to start somewhere, and they would be the ones to start it.


    Especially now that they had almost finished uncovering their secret weapon.


    It was that weapon, a thing which would completely change the playing field of this war they were trying to start, that they were heading toward at this very moment. They had left a week earlier to make their latest raid on the village where the local governor kept his Hacienda, both to keep the man from getting too comfortable, and to grab all the supplies they would need to finish digging out their new weapon.


    As the group neared the spot where they had left a couple lookouts to guard their treasure, several of them raised their voices to shout an announcement of their arrival. The men watching from the hill about fifty meters away would easily hear them and call back their own greetings. Or they should have. And yet, though the group waited in eager anticipation for several long moments, no answering call came. They were greeted with equal silence after trying again, even louder that time.


    Something was wrong. Their lookouts should have answered, should have been ready for their arrival. The men exchanged brief glances with one another before immediately kicking their horses into a gallop. They raced right up the partially-hidden path and went between a couple stands of trees to reach their camp on the far side of the hill, high in this mountain range. On the way, pistols and swords were drawn as they readied themselves for whatever they might find.


    And yet, despite what the men might have tried to prepare themselves for, they never could have anticipated the truth. Months earlier, when their group had been scouting these mountains for a decent place to set up a camp, they''d come across a small cave. Upon exploring that, several of them had discovered some sort of weapon. It looked like the cannon off a ship, except it was much larger, several times the size as far as they could tell. It was attached to something that was buried deep underground. The part of the cannon they had been able to brush off and dig out in those early days was at least three meters long and a meter wide.


    So, they had set up a dig to uncover the rest of what the cannon was attached to. It was all far beyond any technology they had ever seen, and they were certain that once they dug it out, they would be able to use it to utterly annihilate any defenses their enemies set up. There was some worry about using the weapon belonging to one of the gods, of course. But that was outweighed both by the certainty that they would never have been able to find it if they weren’t supposed to use it, and their hatred of the local Spanish leadership.


    Over these months, they had managed to dig out what they believed was most of the cannon and a good portion of the vessel it was attached to. The vessel itself was about fifteen meters long, eight meters wide, and painted a dark red. It was an encased metal structure with a strange glass window covering what appeared to be a single seat and set of controls within. Despite seeming like glass, however, none of them could work up the force required to break that window.


    Soon, they had uncovered what appeared to be another cannon on the far side. This vessel was intended for someone to sit within that structure and control the two cannons. The vessel was almost free. But they’d needed new supplies, after breaking their last few shovels and running low on food. So, leaving those few lookouts, most of the men had conducted their latest raid.


    And now, here they were, returning to what should have been a quiet camp to finish digging out their secret weapon that would lead to inevitable victory. But when the men came through those trees and into the clearing, they found the vessel itself already sitting where their camp should have been. Their tents, their crates of other weapons, their defenses, all were missing. No, not missing. They were smoldering piles of ashes. And in the distance, what had once been the one-meter wide entrance to the cave where they had been digging out this vessel had been completely blown wide open. The roof of the cave was gone. It was like the vessel itself had ripped itself free and flown straight up out of the cave.


    Even as those thirty-six bandits brought their horses to a stop and stared in disbelief, they saw the lookouts they had left behind. Or the remains of them. All five men who had been left to watch over the camp were dead, their skeletons scattered throughout the camp all that remained of them.


    Only then, once they had taken all that in, did the group realize that the camp wasn''t entirely devoid of life after all. A single living figure sat cross-legged on the far side of the vessel, under one of those cannons. Their weapons were all abruptly aimed that way, even as they took in the fact that the figure''s eyes were closed, his hands resting in his lap. Once they had him in their sights, the leader took a breath and loudly demanded the stranger tell them who he was and what had happened.


    Only then did the young man open his eyes. He took in the assortment of guns before him before slowly rising. They could see his dark suit with gold trim and white shirt, so out of place out here in the wild mountain desert. They saw his black hair, distractingly attractive features, and the blue-lensed monocle adorning his left eye as he gazed at them in silence for a brief moment. He spoke, but the words were in English and none of them understood. So, the stranger raised a hand to gesture for them to wait a moment, looking away.


    Murmurs spread through the group. The man was responsible for this, the deaths of their people. He had to be. They should cut him down right now. But the leader ordered them to stop. He wanted answers, the truth about what had happened, how this vessel had moved, how their people died, all of it. And they wouldn’t get that from a corpse.


    Finally, the stranger straightened a bit more, speaking in their native Spanish without a trace of an English accent. “Sorry and apologies about that. The name’s--well, technically I’m called and known as Wordsmith, but the name you should remember and retain is Jacob. And what you should also know and be aware of is that your friends here accidentally triggered the defense system on this fighter. It thought and believed they were attacking it, so the thing defended itself. Seems like they were trying to surprise and amaze you by getting it dug out the rest of the way while you were gone. They tripped and triggered the defenses and it… uhh… reacted.”


    Their leader narrowed his eyes, dismounting his horse to walk forward with his pistol raised. “You,” he snarled. “You killed our people, you seek to steal our bounty. Now you’re speaking oddly, trying to delay us with your repeated words.”


    Rather than look intimidated or cowed, the stranger shifted just a little, his demeanor seeming to relax somewhat. Now he spoke a bit more slowly, as though he had to think about every word before saying it, and he had a definite accent. “Sorry about that, Wordsmith spent a long time with people who tend to repeat the same point using different words, it’s just how their language works. This way is slower, but maybe better. But no, I didn’t kill your people. And I didn’t uncover the ship. It uncovered itself when it thought it was in danger. Which is why you should put those guns down. I haven’t totally finished disabling the defenses yet, and if it thinks you’re about to shoot it with those things, it might react.”


    Instead of following his instructions, the assembled bandits prepared to open fire. Before they could, however, a familiar voice called out, “Wait! He is speaking the truth!”


    It was one of the men they had left behind. One of the dead men. His ghost appeared between this ‘Jacob’ and the armed troops.


    That… caused a stir. The assorted bandits leapt from their horses. Some fled, others dropped to their knees and began to pray, others aimed their weapons but couldn’t bring themselves to shoot. Not even when the rest of their dead companions appeared in ghost-form, pleading with them to listen to this Jacob.


    Raising his voice into a loud shout, the leader of the group bellowed for everyone to be silent. He was staring at one of the ghosts, his own son. Tears filled his eyes, as he stepped forward and raised a hand in an attempt to cup the ghost’s cheek. But his hand went straight through the figure. A mixture of prayers and pleas for answers fell from his lips.


    “Okay, you want answers?” Jacob quietly murmured in that slow, accented voice. “I’ll tell you what I can. And I’ll help you say goodbye to the people you lost, before you forget all of this happened. I’m here for the ship, and as far as I can tell, helping you get out of this alive won’t change too much.”


    The bandits were confused about those words. Of course they wouldn’t forget any of this. And yet, most of them did in the days and weeks that followed. They forgot what was said and about the vessel itself. Those who remembered any of it only retained bits and pieces, and were incapable of convincing their companions that it was real rather than a dream. It became a campfire story to tell their descendants. And those descendants soon embellished details, changing the facts of exactly what happened. But all retained that key point. The bandits and their secret weapon had been found by a man known as Jacob. They were allowed to speak to the ghosts of their dead companions. And then Jacob took the secret weapon away, before it could cause any more harm.


    Story Three - A group of Mexican bandits fighting for independence from Spain found a buried starfighter. While some remained to dig it out, they set off its security system and it killed them. When the others returned, they found Jacob there, who gave them the opportunity to say goodbye to their dead companions/family members before taking the starfighter away.


    Crossroads-Accepted Corrections - The ‘weapon’ these bandits uncovered was part of Jacob’s own arsenal, as they found one of his buried vaults. The men who uncovered it were killed in retaliation before they could expose his secrets to anyone, and those who survived were left to spread the story in order to scare others away from the area. Crossroads Heretics scoured the area, but were too late as he had already removed the rest of the weapons.


    ********


    London, 1756


    It wasn''t the largest orphanage in the incredibly busy city of London, with its thousands of unclaimed or unwanted children, but it was the most secluded. Situated on the outskirts of the city, the orphanage had stood for almost fifty years, begun by its current matron’s mother near the turn of the century for very altruistic reasons, the orphanage had once been a happy place. Or at least as happy as its inhabitants could be given their situations.


    But that happiness had dissolved entirely with the death of its founder. Her daughter was much more miserly and saw her charges as little more than assets to be used and profited from. The quality of life plummeted, and the children who went through the orphanage in those days over these past two decades of her rule were treated as slaves at best.


    One of those latest orphans was a boy named Amias. His parents had been killed in strange circumstances when he was only eight years old, five years earlier. The boy insisted that they were killed by witches, but no one listened to him. He was, after all, a traumatized child. He was ignored and put in the orphanage, where he had spent these past five years working until his fingers bled. The orphans were expected to not only take care of the building and its surrounding grounds, but also had to build toys. Not for their own use, but to be sold in town. Madame Hilda Downere, mistress of the orphanage, called them her little elves.


    But Amias had not actually spent all of his time working. He had been telling the truth about the witches and how they had killed his parents and sister. What he had not told anyone was that one of those witches had painted his face with her blood for their interrupted ritual. Blood that he had tasted. Blood that had given him some of her power.


    Over those five years, he had explored those new powers secretly, learning how they were used and what he could do. He explored the magic that had been opened to him.


    Finally, on this night, he was going to put that magic to work. In the two decades since Madame Downere had taken over the orphanage, over twenty children had died under her merciless care. He had spent all this time using his newfound magic to speak with those dead children, and now he was going to help them, and those who still lived, get their revenge.


    Several of the other orphans knew about this plan and had seen what their friend could do. They helped as much as they could, gathering supplies and distracting the staff. But the time for distractions was over. Now it was time to finish this.


    It began just after midnight, in the basement of the orphanage as Amias knelt in the center of the elaborate set of spell forms he had drawn across the dingy floor in a mix of ink and blood. Blood from himself, his fellow orphans, and several animals they had captured and drained for this purpose.


    Amias himself was a small, clearly malnourished figure. He had brown hair that was worn long, and an almost unnaturally pale face with a light dusting of freckles. His clothes were rags, and he had a long, handmade cape that he only wore in secret, at times like this.


    Kneeling there, surrounded by his spell forms that he had put together over the past several years thanks to scraps of paper torn from one of the witches’ books while they were fleeing from the strange man who had shown up to interrupt them before they could sacrifice him as they had the rest of his family, Amias chanted. The power of his words made the few friends who were cowering on the far side of the room hunch on themselves even more. Something seemed wrong about this, but they were too determined to ask him to stop. This was their best chance to end Madame Downere’s reign of terror.


    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    The ground opened up beneath him, as a hand punched its way through the dirt. The children screamed, but their friend continued chanting. Another fist appeared, followed by another, and another. Soon, dozens of dead things were crawling out of the dirt. Energy from the spell was pouring into them, making them stronger.


    The rotting corpses began to spread out, several of them marching towards the cowering orphans. As they reached for the children, Amias ordered them to stop. Unfortunately, though the dead stumbled slightly, his control was not perfect. These undead had been summoned to kill and destroy. His spell was not exact enough to differentiate between targets, and he lacked the ability to change the terms of the spell after it was cast. They resisted his control and began to reach for his friends again. Already, more screams began to fill the orphanage from upstairs, as the creatures who had made their way up the steps encountered children and staff alike, and failed to make any distinction in their targets.


    Then a new voice filled the basement room, a sharp, “Enough!”


    Instantly, the creatures halted, one of them releasing the arm of one of the children just before it would''ve torn the limb from its socket. The creatures who had made their way upstairs began to trudge back down mindlessly.


    Standing beside Amias, a dark-haired man in a black suit held his hand out toward the undead creatures. His voice remained firm. “Come back here before you do any more damage.” The power of those words filled the entire orphanage, forcing the creatures to return and stand before the figure in silence.


    Once they were back, the man turned to look at Amias, who immediately recognized him. “You were there,” he breathed in a shaky voice. “You killed the witches. You''re the man who saved me.”


    The man exhaled. “Just call me Jacob. And it seems like I probably should have paid a little more attention to how you were. Sorry, I didn''t realize they changed you. I thought you''d be okay here.” He looked around, then grimaced. “Apparently I was wrong. Good thing I had a little friend insist we check in with you.”


    By then, the shouting upstairs had reached a fever pitch, just as several of the staff members came charging down the stairs. They barged into the basement room with weapons drawn but, before they could do more than take in the scene in front of them, Jacob disappeared from where he was standing. He appeared behind the armed men, reaching out to touch them before vanishing again. The children and the assembled monsters waited almost twenty seconds in silence and fear before Jacob reappeared once more. “Okay,” he announced, “all the staff in this place and the lady who owns it are cooling their heels a few hundred miles north. That should keep them out of our hair long enough for you to tell me the truth. Why did you summon those creatures? What were you trying to do? Why were you trying to kill people?” His voice was a bit hard, but not unreasonable.


    Amias, his friends, and the rest of the orphans who soon joined them, told Jacob exactly what happened, how many of them have been worked literally to death, how they were treated, and how little hope they’d had that anything would change.


    When they were done, Jacob gave them an offer. He said he would take them with him, to his own home, a school he had set up somewhere very far away. It would be dangerous, and probably hard in some ways. But they would be fed and taught, they would be given opportunities they couldn''t get anywhere else. Or, Jacob would take them anywhere in the world they wanted to go, and give them money to start new lives.


    About half of them chose that option, too terrified of what they had seen to want to be any part of it. But the other half, Amias included, chose to join Jacob’s school.


    That was the story of how the most secluded orphanage in London was found completely empty when the staff finally made their way back from their strange and unexplainable trip. An investigation was launched to find the missing children, but none were ever located. None of the living anyway. In the course of the investigation, the bodies of unreported dead children were found spread through the orphanage, and its staff and owner taken into custody.


    Sometime after that, the building was purchased by one of those missing orphans, though he went by a very different name in those days. He had created a whole new life for himself over the intervening years, thanks to the money and opportunities he was given. He returned to the place where Jacob had appeared that night and saved them from Amias’s mistake, and used the building to create a new orphanage that was more in keeping with its original purpose.


    And, over the following decades, his stories of what happened that night were passed on by every child who lived within its walls.


    Story Four - A young boy in a very bad London orphanage was bonded to a witch of some sort when his parents were killed. Traumatized by the conditions in the orphanage, he used Necromancy magic learned from pages taken from the witch’s spellbook in an attempt to summon zombies to attack their tormentors. The spell went wrong and everyone in the orphanage was nearly killed, before Jacob arrived to calm the situation and take some of the orphans with him to a school.


    Crossroads-Accepted Corrections - There is no Necromancy school. This is absurd. Both Amias and all his friends were taken to be sacrificed, after Jacob allowed the boy to ‘marinate’ for a few years to gain the power necessary for the sacrifice spell to take effect.


    ********


    Germany, 1917


    His name was Karl Haas. At the beginning of this great war that had spread over the entire world, he had been a young, idealistic soldier fighting for his Fatherland. That had lasted all of a month before he saw so much death that he just wanted everything to end. But it didn''t, and a month after that, he was found in a pile of bodies, the only survivor of his entire company. He himself would have died as well, languishing away in the hospital tent he was taken to, but he was found by a woman posing as a nurse. She was far from a healer, however. Whatever she was, the woman had been feasting on the flash of the recently deceased. She had thought that Karl was one of those, given how silent and still he was in his trauma.


    The woman went to bite his throat, but Karl reacted, fighting her desperately. Her teeth still bit into his shoulder, but he bit her ear off in return. Screaming in some unholy language, the woman had fled. Yet something had changed in Karl after biting the woman. He healed very quickly, too quickly. And he possessed the ability to manipulate the earth itself. He could create deep fissures in it, raise up hills and tear down the structures upon it. He could create incredible quakes that would ravage the countryside.


    He didn''t understand these gifts, but he knew how to use them. He was going to end the war and bring about a victory for his people. Over these past few years, since that night in the hospital tent a few short months into the war’s beginning, Karl had been training himself, getting stronger and more capable. But more importantly, he had been gathering allies, others with unnatural abilities like his own. They all come from different parts of Europe, each with their own varied stories of where their gifts had originated. But all of them had the same goal, to hand the war to the Central Powers. There were thirty of them by this point, the strength of their powers varying, yet each capable of doing vast damage to any mundane army.


    And now, they were finally ready. Karl would open an enormous hole in the Earth and dump much of the Allied forces within before covering them up once more. His partners would use their own gifts to spread even more death and destruction. In the span of a single night, they would devastate the Allied forces and hand a victory to the German people. The Allies would die, and the Central Powers would march on to true domination, the likes of which the world had never seen.


    They would end this most terrible of wars by ensuring that no one could ever stand against the Fatherland and its allies again.


    And yet, even as Karl raised his hand from atop the hill that his group had settled on, pointing toward the lights of the nearest Allied encampment, an unfamiliar voice spoke up to interrupt his attempted command to start the attack. “You really don''t want to do that.”


    All of their eyes snapped behind them, toward the single figure standing there next to their campfire. The dark-haired man was alone, dressed in an old suit and holding a staff. He regarded them through a strange blue monocle set against his left eye, and seemed to be taking each of the men in one by one and mouthing a few things to himself.


    Karl snapped that the man was clearly a spy, given he was speaking English, already making a sharp gesture to open the earth below the man and send him deep underground. But before he could, the stranger vanished from that spot and appeared slightly further away. “I''m telling you,” he insisted, “you really don''t want to do this. If you attack those people down there, you will all die. Let''s just say they have guardian angels looking after them, making sure this war continues. They won''t allow you to mess it up. You''ll either die or be enslaved and sent to the front lines of a much worse war very far away. That won’t go well for any of you.”


    One of the men snapped that there were no other wars, that this was the war to end all of them. That made the stranger look at him and wince. “I wish that was true, believe me. But it''s not. And the angels looking after the soldiers down there aren''t going to waste time explaining it to you. If you try to attack them, they will stop you permanently. I have another offer for you. I have a better way you can all help. If you just--”


    And that was when Karl and his people stopped listening. They wouldn''t allow themselves to be tricked like this. The stranger was clearly someone like them, another person who had gained strange gifts. But he was only one man, while they were thirty strong. They would put him down and then destroy the allied soldiers in the distance. Between all their various gifts, the stranger didn''t stand a chance.


    Except he wasn''t alone, a fact they soon discovered as the dead themselves intervened. Whether they were Central Powers or Allies, whatever side they had fought for in life, didn''t seem to matter. The dead bodies and ghosts of thousands of soldiers rose between these men and the stranger. A terrible battle was fought, arousing living soldiers from the distant armies, both of whom believed the other side was attacking. Soon two separate battles raged, that between the entirely human forces, and that between Karl’s people and the stranger’s undead.


    Those two battles could not remain separate for long, after beginning so close to one another. Soon, they had merged, forcing the human soldiers to fight against things they were woefully unprepared for. And, just as promised, other forces made their presence known, as beings who were as unnaturally handsome as the Stranger himself used incredible technology, weapons and magic that had never been seen before. They killed Karl''s men one after another, despite their power. It was the worst massacre they had ever seen, despite this long war. Fire, lightning, earthquakes, all of it proved useless against the onslaught of magic and strange weapons. While the larger battle between both sides of human armies raged, the unnaturally beautiful people hunted down and killed Karl''s men.


    And yet, it would''ve been even worse if not for the stranger and his undead. They intervened where possible, slowing the fighting down, putting themselves in the path of every attack they could. Karl saw several of his men saved that way. But he also saw their own targets saved. The stranger was doing everything he could to stop anyone from dying. He wasn''t successful, of course. There was too much going on, too much death being flung around. But he slowed it down, delayed it. Those who died would have been torn through much earlier without that intervention.


    Finally, Karl found himself face-to-face with the stranger, who grabbed the front of his shirt and snapped at him, “Call a retreat! Order your people to get the hell out of here while there''s still any of you left!” Even as he said those words, the man was pointing over his shoulder with one hand. Karl could see the effort on the man''s face as he focused on something. That something turned out to be an enormous creature tearing its way out of the ground. It was a beast, standing almost 14 feet tall, a monster on two legs with a single eye in the middle of its head. Its body was half-decomposed, and yet enough remained for it to let out a deafening roar while charging straight into the middle of the worst of the fighting.


    “I can''t keep this up forever,” the stranger snapped at Karl. “I''m going to lose it pretty soon, and when I do, everything standing between what''s left of your people and those soldiers are going to disintegrate. You will all be killed. This is about something bigger than the country you''re loyal to. You can do so much more with your power. I can show you how. But you have to stand down now. You and everyone left need to retreat. I can get you out of here. I can show you something much more worthwhile, something better than throwing your lives away here and now. I can take you somewhere better. Give me that chance. I promise, you will see a better life.”


    Karl froze for a moment. He saw another of his people die. There were only seventeen of them left. Thirteen had already been killed in the short time despite their powers. Another two died in the time he was contemplating that. Half of them were gone. Half of the people who were supposed to win this war for Germany had been wiped out that easily. The undead who were trying to keep the sides separate were faltering. The Stranger was right, it wouldn''t last much longer. In a few seconds, they would fall, and everyone would die.


    “Who are you?” he demanded. “Who am I surrendering my people to?”


    The stranger smiled, and raised his hand. In that motion, another couple dozen ghost figures manifested. They grabbed Karl''s people, those who were still alive, and picked them off the ground. Before they knew what was happening, all of them were clustered around Karl once more. Only then did the stranger speak. “The name’s Jacob,” he informed them, “and you made the right decision. But this isn’t a surrender. It’s an alliance.”


    He looked over his shoulder, gazing at the strangely beautiful figures marching toward them with weapons drawn. “Sorry!” he called to them, “I''ll catch you another time!”


    With those words, the largest of the figures began running toward them, voice raised in a bellow. At his voice, an incredible vessel appeared in the air several hundred feet above them. It was long and sleek, a red metallic form over two hundred feet long and seventy feet wide, hovering in the sky with dozens of cannons aimed toward Jacob.


    Karl and the rest of their group froze, gaping in disbelief at that. Jacob, however, simply lifted his staff. The end began to glow, before the man slammed the weapon down into the dirt. In that moment, just as the cannons adorning the ship hovering over them began to glow, half a dozen bright lights came streaking out of the sky to slam into one side of it. The vessel swerved, spinning through the air before catching itself. Those weapons all turned to face whatever had attacked it.


    Another vessel, far above them. Almost twice as long as the first ship, and far different in shape. While the original vessel that had appeared was wedge-shaped, this one looked like a flying skeleton, or at least the top half of one. Its central part was a long shaft, like a spine. At the end of that ‘spine’ was a skull where the bridge clearly was. What appeared to be a glowing red ‘cloak’ created from light itself fluttered in nonexistent wind, stretching back over the ship’s spine/central shaft. Two bone-like metal arms with attached hands stretched out diagonally from the shaft, with the skull between them. It was a giant, flying metal skeleton spine, skull, arms, and hands all laid out horizontally.


    The first ship started to turn toward the intruder. But that ship only fired twice more before vanishing. It had done its job, distracting the enemy vessel.


    Realizing the mistake, the Seosten in charge spun away from the sight in the air, orders on his lips. But Jacob had already brought the others close enough. He gave a quick salute. “See you soon, Abaddon.”


    With that, the man grabbed Karl and those around him, the ghosts appearing to shove them as close as possible in a tight huddle. Then, they were gone. Jacob and the survivors of that group who had attempted to end the war, but only managed to trigger one of the worst and most costly battles of its late stages, were gone. All, that was, aside from a single member of their group, who had been thought dead but survived. That man was interrogated thoroughly by the Seosten, yet insisted he knew nothing about the stranger other than his name and what the man had overheard him saying to Karl in those moments while he was drifting in and out of consciousness.


    Soon, his memory of those events, and his involvement with Karl’s army, were erased from his mind. But the records were retained. Records that had recently been found within the Fusion School computers thanks to a search Avalon had conducted for the name Jacob.


    Story Five - A German Natural-Heretic during World War One organized a group of others with powers and set out to end the war by killing as much of the Allied forces as possible. Jacob attempted to convince them that was a bad idea due to the presence of Seosten forces, but they thought him a spy and tried to attack. A battle ensued, which drew in the Bystander armies as well as their Seosten observers. Jacob escaped with what remained of the Natural-Heretic troops, just before the Seosten, led by Abaddon, could reach them. Aided by a skeleton-shaped ship.


    Crossroads-Accepted Corrections - No official ‘corrections’ for this specific story exist, as most of the details were erased by Seosten. There are SOME stories about a powerful Necromancer named Jacob appearing during the war to recruit legions of the dead into his own army.


    Five different stories about the Necromancer known as Jacob, with seemingly no pattern between where or when he appeared. No way to guess where he lived or where he might appear next. He always looked the same, always dressed identically, and never gave any indication of where he’d come from. One thing was certain, he was building an army for something. But why? What for? What was that about a school? Why did Rasputin insist that Jacob could clear his name and give the others all the answers they were looking for? The most important questions, however, were seemingly the simplest on the surface.


    Who the hell was Jacob, and where was he now?