A humming girl clad in a black dress woven with elegant golden strings ingrained in it, creating patterns of falling leaves, about 5'1 in height and a hairband with seven golden flame-like spikes protruding from the top of her head, was walking through a silent forest, many dozen islands away from the golden city, or any gateway leading there, intent on finally using one of the things she had gained from bargaining with the unknown man that had come to her city a month ago.
The girl, her brown eyes now cooled down from the burning golden flame that followed whenever she used her powers, was lady Crisis, one of the great forsaken lords, the golden queen, the Midas, and one known by many other titles, not that any of that really mattered right now when she was about to finally use the parchment of the dead, only still searching for an empty spot.
She was in high spirits as she easily jumped a few hundred feet into the air, crossing above a great cliff that separated the rest of the island from a single island in the middle, surrounded by nothing of endless air, the fall leading right into the endless nothing, the island looking like a kind of tower inside of the donut-formed hole, proofing to her once more that the chains are truly just for them to wander upon.
Starting to hum she took out a golden compass, one of the sun-dials, just without thr function of a sun dial, that having been added so people wouldn't lose their sense of self from never sleeping in this place, something the first generation of these had often caused, somethign she had never had a problem with though.
It weighed about two tenths of a single pound, was relatively thick, with reinforced inside that moved completely, guaranteeing her to be easily able to see where her home, her city, was, the needle being attracted to a stone she had placed under her very throne... though she had to admit she found that to be quite arrogant herself...
After a single second, having confirmed that she was still in the direction she had once decided to randomly call west, it being opposite to the north, she took out the parchment containing the crude depiction of her new ally out of her bag, a high-quality bag of holding, made from the corpse of a dragon she had once slain, not that slaying a dragon was always a great feat.
The weakest dragon that Crisis had ever met had been at the rank of a titan, but the strongest she had ever met had been at the rank of a god, perhaps even above, be it that he was not in the condition to do much of anything, his mind being broken greatly, having caused her a lot of frustration because many of her people that hadn't had a home back then had always been collapsing because of the mere presence of the god when they had crossed that accursed island of flame.
But now, she had to finally call this 'saint Lawrence' that man had told her about, she finally finished the preparations, having walked up the small hill in the middle of the island, one she had often taken a break atop off, sometimes even a small vacation, despite the rather powerful monsters at the low scribe rank around here, and began the ritual she had long since known already.
She simply ripped it in half, the thick parchment that had been previously rolled up and been slightly damaged in the process, the crude paint slightly cracking at the top layer, causing quite the satisfying sound as it did, the contract of the dead tyrant being called for, the great pillar that was governing the afterlife of where they slept letting him go free without restraints in any way.
As the dead one entered reality once more, though in some ways even the dead were never truly gone from our plane of existence, the pillar's power slightly manifested as well, some of the pebbles floating upwards, others staying completely still, some trees splintering in the distance, most in the near area being fine, the darkness writhing, the illusion of the light under them being broken and revealing humongous fields of land that even a tyrant rarely entered, the reality becoming different from before, the things she knew becoming inconsistent, her hair temporarily becoming a fiery shade of crimson red, her skin pinkish for a short moment, her even growing horns resembling that of a deer's for a single second, though she had to admit that she had kind of liked those.
It took a total of a quarter of a minute but in the end Crisis was very glad she had not done this in the golden city, her body returning to it's previous state only because she had reached the formless rank long ago, learning to easily mould and change her body from that, though she had not liked experiencing the process of becoming a formless...
Forming out of thin air, out of tiny sparks of light and dust, there now stood a 6'8 tall man with lean but very muscular shoulders and stomach, smiling wildly, his teeth looking oddly sharp, his eyes burning in amber orange, his bulging arms holding an crimson-red axe with a dark metallic shaft about as wide as Crisis was tall, about twelve foot long, though he quickly swung it through the air using only a few fingers, turning it into what seemed to be a simple ring, orange with red marks, a rather simple technique once one learned it, wearing a loincloth made of a ripped white robe that must have once belonged to a priest.
He had dark red hair and a elegant nose, his skin was irregular but of a rather palish complexion, parts of it seeming to be red and burned severely, but healing at a rather great pace, and he was looking at Crisis with those burning orange eyes she had just begun looking into, the difference of more than a foot making it rather intimidating, though she did not feel any fear despite it.
The man opened his mouth and instantly, nodding his head, knew what Crisis wanted to task him with first.
"This will be fun." he said, laughing wildly, sparks of fire flying around him, the ground growing hot beyond recognition, and the man sprinting in a seemingly random direction as he went to intercept the arrival of the boy known as Cades, or perhaps Leyk, or perhaps Avere, whatever had been true from what the unknown man had told her.
And indeed, Crisis thought, saying it aloud as well, this would be very fun from now on, the other lords he had made deals with perhaps starting to get involved as well.