NOT AGAIN!

[Cassius Promen]

Cassius was just getting settled into his old life with his newfound self. Away with the awkward quite kid that stays quite in class and avoided partying like the plague and in with the new and improved Cassius with newly found confidence who is actually proud of his unique name. Fighting off an evil king hell bent on corrupting the land really does wonders for one's self-esteem. As exhilarating as doing magic and fighting off mind controlled zombie, the quiet life on earth was nice to return to.

A few weeks in and he was just getting re-adjusted to life on earth again but he did notice that he kept some things from his adventure in Kelram, notably his ability to sense magical energy. He noticed that the earth he knew was a bit more magical than he first thought, was it because of his adventures that a bit magic leaked? or was it always like this but he only realized now? Either way, that is a non-problem for another day. Today, he had to go meet with Fae on campus to go to class.

After a short walk, he finally saw Fae sitting on the bench on a patch of grass, "Morning Fae!"

"Dude!" She practically jumped up and ran to him, "Duke's party Sunday was sick, huh?"

"Totally, how's your hangover by the way?" He put his arm around her and they started walking through the campus grounds, "Can't believe you managed to do a keg stand."

She chuckled a bit, "You underestimate me, my friend. This girl ain't a lightweight, I can drink those jocks under the table any day." She put her arm around his neck, "So, are you actually going to tell what medieval convention you went to that day or are you sticking with the whole, fantasy realm, evil king, and wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff story?"

He sighed, "Believe whatever you want, I was telling the--" In the corner of his eye, he swore that he saw a cloaked figure going around the corner. He took out the hilt of Hope from his backpack.

"Still, really cool that thing retract. How much did you get it for?"

"Fae, quiet for a sec. Come on." He took her by the hand and towards the corner where the cloaked man disappeared to.

He lead her to corner, activating Hope he got closer. They turned around the corner slowly, Cassius hugging the wall while Fae looking at him with both disbelief and slight confusion. As soon as he peeked around the corner, several things became clear, one the air suddenly became thick with magical energy, two the blade of Hope started resonating with the energy, and most of all three, THE SURROUNDING SUDDENLY TURNED INTO A DENSE JUNGLE, "Oh no, not again."

Fae then caught up with Cassius, "not again? what are you--" She then realize the town has disappeared and replaced by the jungle, "What?" She looked behind the wall and the town disappeared behind her as well, "What?!" She looked all around her and everything was all green, "WHAT IS GOING ON?!"

This was the start on their adventure at the Crossroads.

 

[Cassius Promen]

"Where are we?!" Fae was continuing to freak out, "Where's the campus?! Never mind that, where's the town?!"

"Fae," Cassius feign attempt to call out to her, "Can you stop for a s--?"

"I don't get how you can be so calm about all of this!" She continued to pace around while mumbling to herself, "We were on campus, going to class, a-and then you dragged to chase this weird hood guy or whatever and and now we're in the middle of nowhere?! Have I gone crazy? Have you gone crazy?! I--I.."

"FAE!!" Cassius grabbed her by the shoulders and proceeded to shook her a bit, "Get! A! Grip! I know that all of this is weird but this is exactly what I was talking about, we're on another realm from earth."

"Wait, so this is Kelram? That made up place that you keep talking about? You're telling me that we're in your made up fantasy world? For real?!"

"One, yes, I wasn't lying about Kelram but no, I don't think this is Kelram." He raised Hope in the air, the sword vibrated for a moment before settling back down, "Yup, definitely not Kelram. The magic feels different and Hope is acting weird." He retracted the blade of Hope back into its hilt, "Right now, we need to find shelter, food, and most importantly water. If this is anything like Kelram, going back home is not going to be easy. Might be weeks before we find a way back." He walked off to hike up a small hill to get his bearings.

"Weeks?!" Fae ran up to him, "But- but you were only gone for like a day?"

"For you it was a day but I was actually gone for about a month on Kelram." Seeing that there really wasn't anything other than trees for miles, he decided to climb up a tree in hopes of getting a better view and there he saw some old ruins on a clearing up north, "Looks like there's something going on up north but it might take a bit until we get there, though. We're going to be roughing it for a bit."

While Cassius was busy scouting, Fae was occupied trying to get her phone to work, "Fae, let me save you the trouble." He grabbed her phone and threw it far away.

"Hey!" Fae became visibly angry, "What did you do that for?"

"Magic basically ruins any technology from our world, plus you're not going to get a signal here anyway." In the distance, they can hear beasts growling, snarling, and hissing in the distance, "Okay, this place might be dangerous. Let me try something." He sat on the ground and closed his eyes.

"Um, what you doing dude? Meditating or something?" Fae asked.

Cassius tried to analyze how the magic in this new world works, attempting to manifest the magical energy in a more tangible form. First, a ball of flame, which quickly fizzled out, "Rats." Second, a concentrated beam of magic, which didn't even manage to do anything other than be a really bright stream of light, "Damn it. Okay, let's try something different." He focused his mind towards hope, luckily it still had traces of Kelram magic, which he used in conjunction with the new magic of this world in an attempt to create a copy of Hope. With a flash of light and natural materials from the area came flying around. A copy of hope with a hilt made of stone and wood and the blade made from a physical manifestation of Kelram magic from the original Hope has been formed in front of him, "There we go." He picked it up and gave it a couple of swings, "Not as well balanced but good enough. Hey. Fae." he turned his head to Fae, who had her jaws firmly on the floor, "Fae, you okay?"

A quick head shake later, Fae finally snapped out of it, "Y-you just did magic. You m-made a fire ball like whoosh.. An-and a light beam like bzzztt and you just casually made a new sword out of thin air like that?!" she said in both confusion and slight frustration, "How come you did not tell me that you can do this?"

"I did tell you, multiple times."

"Oh yeah... Sorry, I didn't believe you."

"It's cool, it's pretty hard to believe. Anyway, here." He hands her the copy of Hope, "Not going to be easy to use this thing first time but it'll useful if we come across any wild creatures."

She gave the sword a few untrained swings, "Cool. Wait, what's this button do?" She pressed a button in the middle of the hilt and the blade retracts into the hilt, "This is so awesome!"

"I know! But be sure to stay close to me. Since that sword is made out of Kelram magic from Hope, the swords are eternally linked. If you go too far from me, that thing will literally disintegrate."

"Noted, capt'n." She pocketed the hilt and saluted Cassius.

"Right, let's get going. We're burning daylight and we've got a lot of ground to cover."