Death, Devotion, Dissonance

This tree was much taller and more majestic than the tiny one at Lord Kena's place. It was at least three stories tall and it even had dark blue flower buds were growing on it. One weird thing was that its trunk was not one giant branch, but a swirling combination of many, which took on the shape of a tree as a whole. It looked like braided hair almost.

But the tree wasn't the only thing that surprised Evin.

Next to the tree, a large three-story house made of stood. It seemed quite extravagant, but Evin was more concerned with why such a building was there in the first place.

There was a long-haired, dark-skinned man chopping wood next to it, throwing the lumber into a metal basket. He was wearing long white robes that covered practically all his body, leaving only his face visible for others to see.

Evin then noticed that the ground surrounding the tree was not the gray of ketricite. Instead, there were grass growing all around it and even some tiny dots of blue and yellow could be seen.

This haven of normalcy looked so wrong in the otherwise gray world.

Looking at the scene Evin realized that aside from the tree and its surroundings, he could only see three colors: gray, blue and white. Although he was standing atop the peak of a small hill, he could not see the end of the Ashen Battlefield.

The tree was located right in the middle of a large concave, surrounded from all sides by a great lump of ketricite.

Evin thought that perhaps it was a coincidence, but the hills surrounding the tree were so level in height, that he couldn't help but think the landscape was manmade.

<I guess Aspects can control ketricite,> Endra reached the same conclusion. <Well, let's get going.>

Evin nodded and slowly made his way down the hill.

As they got closer, the man chopping the woods noticed them and walked inside the house. A moment later, a girl who looked not much older than Evin himself walked out of the house. Perhaps only 13 or 14. She was wearing clothes similar to Evin's own, a trouser and a shirt, only in complete white. She had long black hair, which hung freely down to her waist.

'What's wrong with her eyes, though?'

There seemed to be a dark blue void where her eyes were supposed to be, and it even seemed to be glowing somewhat.

As Evin wondered who this girl was, she casually approached the Soul Tree next to the house. The tree shifted at her touch. The thick swirling branches that made up the trunk started folding themselves over each other in a much tighter way. At the end of it, it turned into a diamond-shaped structure, with only its front side open, making it look like an artfully made box.

Evin struggled to process what was happening, but the girl was not finished. She flicked her hands almost off-handedly and a surge of bright blue energy started pulsating at her hand. Evin could not fathom what the energy was, but he did know one thing. The amount the girl was holding was enough to obliterate Evin a hundred times over. Its pulsations emitted shockwaves through the air and even Evin could feel them coming despite being 50 steps away from it.

All that energy, the girl directed into the Soul Tree. It trembled at the sheer weight of the power it was forced to hold, its frame glowing brighter and brighter, threatening to explode at any moment. But nothing of the sort happened. Instead, something completely mind-boggling occurred.

When the energy inside the box started to become dense, it turned liquid. Not only that, the liquid seemed to harden once more, considering how it stopped slushing around and stood still inside the box. The shockwaves coming from it also stopped, so did the pulsations. The Soul Tree, which was turning bright blue due to the energy, also lost its color and turned to its original blue green.

The girl, undoubtedly Lady Twelve Jokes herself, looked at Evin and beckoned him over. Evin ran over, feeling he shouldn't keep an Aspect waiting.

"Lady Twelve Jokes, I came here on Lord Kena's words. I-" Evin began, but was interrupted.

"I know," the girl pointed at the box. "The answer to your problem, you'll find it inside there."

"So I enter that?"

"We'll enter together," she said. She looked at the man. "I've seen nothing amiss happening, but protect the Soul Tree with your life, Relain."

"Yes, Mistress," the man, Relain replied in accented imperial.

"Good."

Saying so, she grabbed Evin's hand and jumped into the viscous liquid in the box.

The next thing Evin knew, he was lying on the ground.

"Where am I?" he was muttering when someone held out a hand to him.

Evin grabbed it without much thought and let himself be pulled up.

"Every time something like this happens you somehow end up unconscious," a familiar voice said. "You're really prone to a dizzy spell, aren't you?"

Evin looked up and saw Evan's face smiling at him. But it was accurate to call him Evan. This was Endra without a doubt. Evin didn't know whether it was possible that two people with identical bodies could differ so greatly, but the proof was in front of him.

Compared to the slouched and fidgety Evan, Endra was a completely different person. He stood with his head straight and his gaze invincible.

"What's going on?" Evin asked.

"Look around you."

Evin did as told and noticed he was where he was before, with the Soul Tree, the house, and the ketricite field… but there was something off about everything. The colors of his surroundings, the sounds he made, the smell of things, the feel of the ground beneath him, the air… All of it felt lacking to him somehow.

"What's wrong with this place?" he muttered.

"Well, welcome to the World of Souls," Endra gestured grandly.

"The World of Souls?"

"I don't really know anything about it," Endra shrugged. "Lady Twelve called it so."

"Where is she? By the way."

"They," Endra corrected him. "They're inside the house… though, you'll only be seeing Twelve, I presume. Let's go."

The man turned around and walked into the three-story house.

'That can't be Evan…' Evin decided.

The two people were simply too different. Evin never had these thoughts when Endra was inside his head, but now that he saw him with Evan's face, it was getting confusing for his brain.

'Endra and Evan are two different people,' Evin said to himself again and walked into the house.

He was met with a rather strange sight. The inside of the house was mostly hollow. There was a large empty space in the middle of the house and three stories were built around it. Each floor had four doors, all of them identical and all of them equally uninviting.

In the empty space, were two smaller Soul trees growing in a vase. Two couches were placed below each respectively. Endra was sitting on one couch, while Lady Twelve Jokes sat on a chair nearby.

They beckoned Evin over.