A New World, An Immersive Game Experience

"How did you-?" Cadriel started to ask, stopping once she saw the terrible grin on Andreas's face.

"Well now, I must thank you for coming to help," Andreas said, licking his lips as if he was about to enjoy something extremely tasty.

Cadriel felt that something was really wrong as she saw Andreas's look. But it was too late, quickly dashing forwards he stabbed his dagger into her stomach. Making sure that it would not kill her, only weaken her.

"This is going to be fun." He whispered into her ears after having made sure that he had enough time to do what he had planned.

...

'Here, the smell of despair is getting stronger!' Elgar's father, Demerian, said to the others who had joined him in the pursuit of Andreas. Their group was not large, only two Unicorns and one Pegasus.

Demerian had asked them to join when he neared their stations, having a clear impression that the devil who had sneaked in was of quite a high standing and would be too much for him, a Tier 5 Ancient Beast.

'Indeed, it is clear that something terrible happened,' The other Unicorn, Leonitus, replied. Soon after they found the place where this terrible smell was coming from.

'Gaia help me.' The Pegasus, Livadia, said, needing time to recover after seeing the state of the poor woman.

'This makes it clear that the devil had hidden from them.' Leonitus spoke, hoping to calm Demerian's fury. He had no way to know if this worked since it seemed that Demerian was becoming more furious.

Cadriel was lying in a pool of blood. Her clothes ripped, shredded, her heart gone. She had clearly suffered greatly before her death. This was clear with only one glance, the only thing which confused the group was how the devil managed to do it so quickly. They could not have been more than 2 minutes behind him.

"You are at peace now," Livadia said, using magic to form her words as she covered Cadriel in a blanket of leaves and grass. The poor girl suffered terribly. I hope she can find peace after this.

She had not tried to revive Cadriel, because of the stories she had heard as a child. Those killed by devils, especially when they were not killed quickly in battle, almost never managed to be revived. Their souls would most certainly be damaged and in some cases even shattered.

Trying to revive them would only cause both the healer and patient to experience the last moments of pain again. Often driving those who tried to help insane.

She had no idea if this was the truth or not, but she felt her parent had shared these stories with her for a reason. The same reason she had shared them with her daughter. It was better to only try it if you knew what to expect and still deemed trying worth it.

'We must hurry, we can't let him harm another!' Livadia shouted as soon as she had covered Cadriel and worked through her own thoughts. A strong one being that this could have been her daughter, the thought frightened her to death.

The group gave one last look at the poor human who had suffered terribly, rushing after the fresh stench of despair and hate; which was growing stronger and stronger.

They knew that the longer they failed to find the devil, the worse things would become. While there was a limit to how much the devil could strengthen itself through these acts, they had no idea how high this limit was.

If it had been hiding between humans for long, then it would certainly be able to grow a great deal.

...

'Elf, explain why you are here and why you brought a devil into our forest!' Agamemas spoke loudly into Eldrian's head.

Eldrian was glad that he had set Sabrea down, else he would have dropped her from the shock.

'Like I told Cephaphyr, I am looking for a friend of mine. She had gone missing a few weeks ago, yet I am certain that she is somewhere inside this forest. I have no knowledge of a devil in our party.'

Agamemas stared sternly at Eldrian, trying to figure out if this was a lie or not.

'Dear, let him continue.' A female voice joined the conversation.

'How can you claim to not know of the presence of a devil? You are a High Elf, are you not?' Agamemas questioned.

Eldrian swallowed in nervousness, he dislikes how this conversation was being held. Worrying that he would share something which he should not.

'Talk!' Agamemas shouted after Eldrian stayed quiet for a bit too long.

'I-I,' Eldrian failed in talking, needing time to reformat his sentence. 'I am not a normal High Elf. I am a Chosen, have you heard of us?' Eldrian answered hoping that they had.

'No, why does this matter!'

'Dear, he is clearly trying to find a way to tell us. Give him some time.' Zamia counseled as she saw her husband growing frustrated at the slow pace of the conversation. This was to be expected, Agamemas did not like dragging conversations and generally everyone would communicate very quickly. Being able to share pages worth of information in seconds.

'Thank you, miss?'

'I am Zamia, and this is Agamemas, my husband. We are the heads of this family and just received news that one of our distant cousins was killed. Certainly you can understand.'

Hearing this Eldrian was both shocked and enlightened. Finally understanding why Cephaphyr's father was so angry.

Eldrian took a few seconds to try and change his approach,  'Coming back to your question, Agamemas... It matters because I am not originally from this world.'

'What!?' All three of the Alicorns asked simultaneously.

'I am also not the only one who has been summoned here by the gods. There are many more which is why this has become common knowledge outside. But I guess you do not believe in gods.' Eldrian spoke carefully, trying to both explain himself and figure out their stance.

'Oh, he is quite smart. Dear, he might just dupe you.' Zamia joked, causing her husband to flare his nostrils. Eldrian missed these visual clues, he was not good at reading humans. He had no chance of reading Alicorns.

At this time their conversation was disrupted as a Pegasus crash-landed into the middle of the glade.

Agamemas immediately went to him, Zamia staying with Eldrian.

'I fear this is not going to be good news. You will have to stay with me until everything is solved.' Zamia said, sending Cephaphyr away soon after. 'Please elaborate, I know you are still keeping things from me. Would you be willing to share more?'

Eldrian was uncertain if he should or not, but he was much more open to talking to Zamia than Agamemas. She at least allowed him time to think of his response. After a few seconds Eldrian agreed but asked how they would do this.

'There are two ways we can go about this. One is linking our minds and sharing out memories, the other is you simply telling me as you have done.'

Eldrian certainly did not think sharing memories would be a good option, he had no idea how she would react to the fact they were inside a game. Or rather that they were created by mere humans.

Eldrian had been starting to doubt if he could consider this a game. He had long since considered those inside to be real people. But he had still believed they were limited to inside the game. Now he was starting to wonder, maybe they were not limited like that.

Maybe, as that representative said, they were rather inside an entirely new universe. And were only able to enter through both magic and science.

...

'What!' Agamemas shouted after hearing what Livadia just shared. They had managed to finally find Andreas after two more of his feeding frenzies.

He had rushed the second but even so, they had reached him before he could fully finish. As such he had cut his feeding short, but it had been one too much. He had already recovered plenty of his strength.

'Demerian was killed in one attack before we could react. I knew as soon as that happened that we were facing a devil royal. Not a king, but certainly a prince. As such I immediately tried to fly off while Leonitus covered for me.'

'He did not last much longer than two seconds, having only managed to block two attacks. Failing to defend himself on the third, which claimed his life.'

'I am only grateful that I managed to escape, else...'  Livadia started shivering, her entire horse body shaking visibly as she thought of what may have happened if she had not.

"Telalios! Bryrus! Xaxus! Daechus!" Agamemas shouted, his voice traveling through the air and everyone managing to hear his anger and fury.

"You each take a cardinal direction, help and detain this bastard! I will chase him towards you." Agamemas bellowed, spreading his wings and taking off mid-sentence. The air around him quaking from his anger.

...

Even with how little magic Eldrian had learned, he could feel the effect from Agamemas, totally disrupting his conversation with Zamia.

Gasping for breath, Eldrian clutched his chest as he looked at Agamemas in fear. For the first time seeing what true power was. Agamemas's emotions on their own were able to do more than Eldrian could do with all his might. Eldrian believed that this was even more than a true mage at Tier 5 would be able to do.

'We will no longer be passive.' Zamia sighed as she looked at her husband and the aftereffect of his fury. Even minutes later the air was still visibly vibrating.