Five days later, Evren was sitting on the wall surrounding St. Gloria with his feet hanging over the edge. As Captain Galand and the troops stopped by the closed gate, Evren cast, ‘amplify’ and said in a calm voice. “I see you tore up my request.”
Captain Galand shouted up to him, “By order of the Pope, throw down your weapons and surrender.”
Evren shook his head, “Pope Disgusting Slob the First is dead. So’s everyone else. You’ve got no authority here. As a matter of fact, I think it’s you who should throw down your weapons.”
“The holy church bows before nobody!” Captain Galand retorted.
“Oh hey, remember these guys?” Evren said as the summoned people from his company stepped forward.
Captain Galand frowned, “What are you going to do with those puppets? Return them immediately.”
Evren said, “Yeah, they’re not puppets anymore. And we’ve had a talk about you all for the last couple of days. Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. You all have done some really rotten stuff. Especially with the women.”
Captain Galand called back up, “Those puppets are property of the holy church. We are allowed to use them as we please.”
Evren shook his head, “As I’ve said before, they’re not puppets. They’re people. What you did to them is repulsive. I’m going to give you one last chance to throw down your weapons.”
Captain Galand said, “Prepare to fire!” The soldiers lifted their bows and drew back the arrows.
Evren called out to Harley and chanted ‘squall’ the same time she did. The arrows were fired at the command of Captain Galand and flew to the ones on the wall, before they reached them, the arrows were blown back to fall upon the troops and the ground. There wasn’t enough power in it to cause injuries greater than a cut here and there.
Evren said, “Back up guys.” To the summoned on the wall and then chanted ‘salvo’ with Harley. A halo of fireballs appeared over Evren and Harley’s head. One by one they splashed down on the fields to the left and right of the troops. Each flaming explosive hit getting closer to them than the first.
Captain Galand called out, “They can’t cast two spells at once, fire! Fire! Fire!
A volley of arrows came flying towards Evren and Harley, but they seemed to have hit a wall before reaching them, falling to the ground harmlessly. The fireballs on the left and right were getting closer and closer.
Evren smiled and called out, “Drop your weapons.”
Captain Galand said, “Don’t listen to them, fire!” The arrows still hitting a wall before their targets.
Evren dispelled his ‘salvo’ and said, “Harley, call up an ‘efreet.’”
“Yes Mr. Evren!” she replied, dismissing the ‘salvo’ spell and summoning an ‘efreet.’”
As the ‘efreet’ came to life, Evren cast a ‘tempest’ air elemental to occupy the same space. The ‘efreet’ was empowered by the ‘tempest’ and grew in size and temperature. It started moving towards the troops and several dropped their weapons and ran.
Evren asked, “You ok Harley?”
“Yes Mr. Evren.” She said with all seriousness.
Evren gestured with his head, “Go get him.”
The ‘efreet’ flowed forward towards Captain Galand and threw a flaming fist down at him. He raised his sword in protest, but the sword went right through the flames. The fist hit him and his horse, setting both on fire. The ‘tempest’ inching forward of the ‘efreet’ to accelerate the process. Both man and horse screamed and fell to the ground. Moments later, they stopped moving. The ‘efreet’ and ‘tempest’ stood on top of the corpses, burning them faster.
Some of the soldiers stopped, when they noticed the ‘efreet’ wasn’t following them, watching as their captain burned on the ground. By the time Evren and Harley dismissed their elementals, only charred bones remained. Evren cleared his throat and cast ‘amplify’ once again.
“Drop your weapons and surrender.” Those who could hear Evren came forward to drop their weapons in a pile near the charred skeletons. As they raised their hands and dropped to their knees, Evren said, “Damn shame the horse had to go too.”
He looked down and saw weird looks on the faces of the soldiers looking at him after that comment. He said, “The horse was a better soldier than any of you.” He chanted ‘rock lance’ and a meter long spear of rock stabbed into the ground before one of the soldiers. “Don’t try anything. I’m a better aim than you think. Now, drop all of your weapons. Several soldiers tossed their daggers to the side as the east gate began to open.
Doyle and a team of guards exited preparing to shackle the remaining soldiers. Some of the soldiers grumbled about the guards being the one to lock them up until Evren said, “Quiet.” really slowly. A few of the guards cast some worrying looks at the skeleton of the former captain and the horse.
Evren slipped forward off the wall and cast ‘levitate’ on himself, gently landing on the ground and then dispelling it immediately. A few of the soldiers opened their eyes wide at his uninjured drop from ten meters. He walked over to the horse’s remains and cast ‘excavate’ opening a hole under the remains and then burying them in place. He didn’t do the same for the captain’s remains, instead he opened a large sack and using telekinesis, put the remains into the sack. The soldiers didn’t see what he was doing, but the guards did, and many were surprised.
Evren walked through the gate with the remains and one of the soldiers said, “What will you do with him? The Captain?”
Evren looked down at the bag and back to the soldiers, “I’ll bury him with the rest.”
The soldier said, “The rest?”
Evren nodded, “Yeah, the pope and them. You have to bury them properly or they come back as undead.”
The soldiers said, “The pope? Are… are they really dead?”
Evren raised his eyebrows and turned around, walking away. He walked around back of the cathedral where there were patches of land that were overturned. He used ‘excavate’ to open a hole in the ground and unceremoniously dropped the sack of bones into the hole. He pulled a card from his pocket and said, “In the name of Ethelia, go forth to your final resting place. As you once did in this world, go forth and live in the other.” He put the card away and used ‘excavate’ to bury the remains and return the land to what it once was.
He stared at the other patches of land for a while before tilting his head back and looking at the sky. “Ethelia, right? I hear you’re pretty nice. I know you’re not the reason they’re in this world, and you have no reason to do anything, but look over the summoned, please. Give them the strength to survive one more day.” Evren nodded as if to end the conversation, turned around and headed back toward the front of the cathedral just as a new group of summoned were entering. Ellis and Karina were already at the doors to the cathedral, holding them open for the summoned to enter and sit down. Evren looked up and smiled, then headed to the cathedral to free the next batch of summoned.
Two days later, Walter and Evren are talking in the cathedral after the daily meeting with the summoned. Walter asked Evren, “Where do you think the next batch will come from?”
“Probably Arlingswell. That batch from Sanddale has to go to the crossroads and then through Apotoyuca to get here.”
It was at that time the door to the cathedral opened and someone entered and sat down. A few more followed and eventually approximately fifteen individuals were seated in the pews, staring forward blankly. Evren grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil from the first pew and went to the first summoned, copying down the number tattooed on their arm. When he finished, he said, “Let’s go find where these ones are from.”
They went down to the depository, Evren opening the way, and they grabbed the assignment book, flipping through it to find the first number. “Huh, Sanddale. I thought they would take longer.” Evren said. They went into the depository and Evren called out a number to Walter. They would find and shatter all the crystals before heading back up to cure them. They just sat in the pews while they were cursed anyway, so there was no need to do it one at a time.
When they finished, Evren crossed the numbers off the list in the assignment book and locked up the depository. They came back upstairs and noticed Karina and Ellis were already there waiting on them.
“Are they done?” Ellis asked.
Evren nodded his head and went to the first one he had gotten the number from. A woman sitting in the second row. He walked up to her and cast ‘cure curse.’ The tattoo on her chest faded away and she blinked her eyes. She looked up at Evren and he gave a pleasant smile.
He said, “Hi, you were asleep for a while, but you’re awake now. Ok?”
The woman nodded and looked around. Evren said, “Wait here, I’ll be talking to you all in a minute.” He then stood up and moved onto the next one. A man sitting in the row behind her. Just like the woman before him, Evren removed the curse, and spoke gentle words to him. When the last one was cured and was confirmed to be awake, Evren went to the front of the nave and said, “This may be hard for some of you to take, but those dreams you’ve been having, they were real. For some of you, they may have been a nightmare, for others something even more stressful.
“I just want you to know, you’re not alone. We have people here who want to help you. I’m Evren, this is Walter, Ellis and Karina.” Evren said while gesturing to his friends. “You’ve all been summoned to another world.” Voices rose up as people began questioning Evren’s words, some to themselves, others to Evren.
Evren raised his hands to get everyone to calm down and said, “I know it’s hard to take. I don’t know what led you to be summoned here, but I know if it was like me, something painful happened and then you died. Since you’ve been here, you’ve been controlled by the people who summoned you. But now, you’re free.
“I know how hard this is for all of you. But before you hurt yourself, find someone to talk to. Anyone. Compare stories. Laugh. Cry. Listen. Talk. Anyone of those things is better than hurting yourself. It breaks my heart every time I bury someone who can’t stand the pain. Let me tell you about myself.”
He turned and cast ‘image’ of himself as a coaman. “You see this? This is me.” More coamen were added to the image, “And this is my family. Everyone of them died of old age before I did.”
The image changed to one where he was missing is left eye, left ear, left arm and both legs. “This was me after my one hundred and thirty-one years of military service. You see, there was an explosion and I barely survived. To be honest, I could have stayed in the military.” The image changed to him wearing a power suit. “I could have fought like this. But I chose to get out. To take a break from all of that.”
The image faded away and Evren turned around. “For the next thirty-eight years I watched as one by one, my children died of old age. In fact, it was during the time of mourning for my daughter that I got kidnapped. I was then tortured for two weeks. And I was sexually assaulted during that time too. And then I died.”
“Just like you all, I died. Somewhere between my world and this world, a man calling himself Anomaly grabbed my soul and spoke to me about what’s going on here on this world.” Evren turned around again and cast ‘image’ to show Anomaly sitting in his chair with slippers on. Without turning around right away, he said, “He wanted me to end the summonings.” Evren turned around to face them again. “He wanted me to save you. All of you.”
Evren itched his nose and said, “When I got to this world, I was naked and alone.” The image of Anomaly faded behind him. “Oh, did anyone want to see me naked and alone?”
A few people chuckled, “I spent over a year alone before I finally met another person.” He gestured with his head to his right. “This guy was one of them.”
Walter said, “Actually it was Ethan and Liam.”
Evren said, “I know who it was. This is my story. Damn it, where was I?”
A voice from the summoned said, “Naked and alone.”
Evren chuckled, “Thank you. It’s been, I don’t know, a year and a half since then? I finally did it. I got to free people from their nightmare. And now that you’re free, I want to see you live a long life. So please, before you do anything like hurting yourself. Talk to someone.”
Ellis said, “I’ll help.”
Evren said, “Except for him.”
