Wandering Soul

You wake up in a small room. You can't see anything; the walls around you are completely unlit. Strange! You remember seeing a bit of light when you were taken to this place. You could see the walls and knew there were other people here. Now? Nothing.

No matter, you suppose. It's not as though you could do anything being so weak. For what seems like hours, you lie on the floor, still and silent. There doesn't seem to be anyone around, and so you stop to rest a moment.

"Ah, you're awake, I see."

You start, a cold sweat coming over you as you hear something. You spin around on the floor and begin to see that a large orb of light is floating in front of you. It looks as though it was just lit, and you can now make out that you are in a stone room with a high ceiling.

A tall shadowed figure steps out of the darkness behind the light and approaches. The light reveals him to be a rather old man, with long flowing robes and a handsome face. His eyes shone black as he looked at you from beneath his hood.

"Don't worry, young champion. I know what you may think, but I am not here to hurt you. Quite the contrary. You seemed quite comfortable on your sand-strewn floor, and I was almost about to leave you there, a little forlornly. But you heard me coming, and I believe we can do business."

"What do you mean?"

"Hearing you speak, I have already been through your details and know you to be a particular person, unless you wanted it that way."

"I mean, what is it you wish me to do?"

The old man simply smiles. "To be honest, I have a task for you, but you will not be paid. You will earn your money. Now, I know your story and know that you have faced many a challenge and survived. Surely you have faced enemies that have laid you low. Come now, have you?"

You hesitate. You have faced many horrible and evil beings that have laid you low, both in your mind and in your body. You have always had your will to fight back and to live. But you don't give him any details.

"Well? You've lied to me, and I don't appreciate it."

"I... No. I never really faced a challenge." You then wait for the old man to do or say something. Instead, he just stands there and stares you down, into your very being.

"I'll give you two guesses what I'm here for. There is a creature, they call the Adversary. A fiend in the form of a human. It haunts the darkened places of hallowed ground, waiting for a soul to wander through so that it can torture them. This creature's reason for existence is to tear apart the fate of a certain kingdom. The creature, they say, exists in the darkest corners of your castle, waiting on its prey."

You begin to get a feeling that your mind is being read by the creature in the shadows. You feel that it is still a part of your mind, and you can't control what it says. It goes on, as if powered by some dark force that is beyond your understanding.

"With it, it uses its powers to control other facets of magic and trickery, breaking them and breaking them again to their desires. It was in this way that it manipulated the fate of its prey, turning them against the very things they hold dear. It was the darkness consuming the soul of this kingdom that held it in place, creating a cloak of shadow that kept the creature in place. You are the savior of this kingdom, the last hope to release this kingdom from the clutches of this fiend. You are the only one who can free this kingdom from the dark power that has taken root. Only you can survive. Come, it is time to leave."

You find yourself body-less again. You fear this creature must be able to manipulate your mind, to force you to do things that you may not be capable of. But as you feel yourself in your body again, that you-ness returns, and you are no longer afraid.

The being in front of you vanishes into a cloud of smoke, and you move over to a spot on the wall that was clear the whole time. The wall ripples and fades away, revealing a blackened stone area, and some light shines through the cracked stone.

You see that it's the next day again. You look down at yourself and you are now clothed in worn clothing. You knew it was the next day; it was a feeling of you knowing, not of something that you were told.

You began to walk out the tower. As you got close to the castle, the rock began to crumble. You looked around at the broken rock and the strewn rubbish, and you knew that you would need some sort of long, stout stick or pole to clear a path through here. You run along some nearby houses, looking for something suitable. You see a long, golden broom, but you know that farmers don't use a broom - they make people do the work. It would have to be a tool of some sort. You see a shovel and you run over to it, grabbing it. It was large, but sturdy, and you figured that it should be able to clear out enough space to walk down the castle's pathways.

As you make your way out of the area that the old man came from, you look up to see a lone silhouette standing at the top of a tower, its form outlined against the sun. You stare for a moment, seeing a silhouette of a tall man, his robes flowing in the wind. A ghost? It would be of no harm to you. You shrug, and begin to walk away as the light glances off of the shovel. The owner of the shovel is startled from the noise and glances at what he had picked up. The thing you used to clear the path looked like a stone mason's tool, but you saw no reason why you should walk around with gravel in your possession.

You glance over at the castle, and notice that the lone figure had disappeared. You realize this must be the figure that was speaking to you the night before. But why that person came to you and spoke of such dark things is a question that will not remain unanswered. As you survey the surroundings, you are astonished to see a ghost standing in front of the castle doors. It waves at you, but you wave back, continuing to explore the castle. You know in the deep of your heart that all is not lost. The light-being had spoken, saying that there would be a time of darkness in the history of this castle. The ghost appears to be a remnant of that darkened time, and as you walk around its time, you know that you will pass this test.

A ghost has inhabited this place for far too long, and it is time for him to leave, to be sent on. You walk along, almost subconsciously, and begin to gather the things you will need. Don't ask me why, but I knew what I needed. I walked over to the pathway that led to the castle, and stood in awe of the beauty in front of me. A powerful elemental of Fire had countless histories to tell, and it spoke to me of a time long ago where giants roamed the earth and their colossal bodies of rock moved along the landscape, their occasional eruptions sending pieces of earth at the enemies of the giants.

The power of fire resides here, beckoning the passing of the ghost. With a mighty sweeping motion of the arm, I let the blade of the shovel soar and land inches from the ghost. It couldn't possibly sense the shovel, being that it wasn't really there in the first place. As if by magic, the shovel went from a static object to a soaring object, striking the part of the ghost that I knew was its body.