Falling descending far below the Earth, I held Aella tightly. I summoned up what little energy I had and formed a protective barrier around us just before we crashed and hit the ground, a loud crunch echoed as we landed. We had fallen on something crushing it under us. My back was covered in a slick goopy foul smelling substance. The smell was akin to rotten eggs, and death.

  “Aella, hey are you alright?” Gently I slid her from on top of me, the kids a lot heavier than she looks.

  Aella was out cold, because of the blast would have been my guess, but otherwise she seemed unharmed. My left eye twitched violently looking in every direction. Horror seeped in as I realized what had made those Miners run in fear so many years ago. The crack I heard as we landed was eggs shattering under us as we fell atop them. Along the walls dozens of six foot long caterpillar like creatures moved towards us with great haste. “Carrion Crawlers.” I gasped. Quickly I picked Aella up, slung her over my shoulder and started running down the closest path I could see.

  Everything around was black a pitch, if not for my left eye I would have been completely blind. Letting my eye guide me I ran dodging the Crawlers at every turn which was not easy, with a 150 pound child slung over one shoulder. They nearly grabbed hold of me or Aella on several occasions. Ahead I came to a dead stop as I reached the end of the line. Before me an endless void at the edge of a cliff that seemed to go down right to the very pits of hell, behind me Carrion Crawlers that were far from happy about us crashing in on top of their nest.

  From below the faint sounds of salvation could be heard. “Water. No wait, that sounds more like an underground river. Sure hope it’s deep enough.” I with Aella in my arms leapt off the edge and into the void below.

  “What’s going on?” Aella muttered as we were falling. Did not take her long to realize what was happening. “ What’s Going on! Why are we falling?” She shouted scared, as she gripped me tightly.

  “No time to explain, I hope you can swim.” I said just seconds before we plunged into the icy cold water of a swift moving river.

  “Aella!” I shouted as I came to the surface, gasping for air.

  “Over here.” She called back, with a cough.

  Taking her by the hand we made our way to a nearby shore. Tired from the running and fighting with the current of the river we both laid there taking a moment to catch our breaths.

  “Hey kid you ok?” I asked in between breaths.

  “Aye I think so.” She responded sitting up.

  Aella took a look around the blackness of the underground shore. “Looks like we are about two miles underground.” She said with a matter of fact tone.

  “That’s a Dwarf’s sense of direction for you.” I said, sitting up myself.

  “Do ye think Mama and Papa are ok?” she asked, her voice cracking with worry and the cold.

  “I may have just met both your mother and father, but I can tell those two are both a force that one should not take lightly. I have not a single doubt that both of them are just fine, and are more than likely looking for you as we speak.”

  Aella seemed to cheer up a bit with the reassurance that her parents were indeed ok. With that taken care of, it was on to the next problem. We were both soaking wet and getting colder by the second. From my pack I pulled out one of the carefully wrapped Sunstones, a bundle of now wet firewood from my pack and set them on the ground. Taking a look around I spotted some cave moss growing along the walls of the cavern we were now in. After gathering some of it up I placed the firewood down, placed some of the moss over top of it and after putting the gloves on unwrapped the sunstone and gently touched it to the moss. The Sunstone sparked and crackled as heat from the stone transferred to the moss causing it to smoke, and after a few moments the moss caught fire.

  It did not take long for the wood to dry out and catch fire. Sitting back the two of us rested warming up and drying off next to the roaring fire.

  There was a long silence between the two of us for what felt like an hour or more but was really only a couple minutes, then Aella chimed in with a round of twenty questions.

  “How long have you known my Papa?” She asked, happier now that she was warm.

  “Truthfully I barely know him, we just met about a week ago.”

  “What’s your home like?” She asked, slipping her shoes off so they could dry as well.

  “Here hand me your shoes, I’ve got a faster way to dry them. And to answer your question, I don’t have a home…Not anymore anyways.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry I didn't mean to make you sad.” She said sweetly as she handed me her shoes.

  After removing my own boots I removed four smaller Sunstones from my pack, carefully unwrapped each and placed one in each boot and shoe. “There we go, the heat from those stones will dry our boots and shoes in no time flat.”

  Aella had a look of melancholy painted across her face, I could only guess because she felt that she had upset me in some way. I thought it best to change the subject.

  “So you’re half Dwarf you got any good ideas on how to get out of here?” I already knew the best thing to do was follow the underground river, but I thought it best to give Aella something to focus on, and maybe cheer her up.

  I was right her eyes lit up like stars in the night sky as she spoke her words were filled with all the joy and confidence she had in her. “If we follow this river it should lead us outside.”

  “That’s a great idea. How about this, when our shoes and the two of us are dry let’s start walking that way and see where it leads.”

  Aella really seemed to cheer up greatly with that.

  After drying off the two of us put back on our shoes and moved on. Aella held my hand skipping as we walked. Leave it to a child to take a bad situation and somehow put a positive spin on it. I mean here we were walking deep underground Carrion Crawlers out on the hunt for us and here Aella is just skipping along with little to no care in the world.

  “Hey, can I ask you a question?” Aella said, looking up at me.

  “You just did, but sure let’s hear it.”

  “How did you get such a pretty looking eye?”

  I had not noticed until just now, but I no longer wore my eye patch. It must have come off during our unscheduled bath. I had not noticed because even with covering or closing my left eye I could still see just fine as if the covering was not there at all. Truthfully, there was little that could block my left eye's sight.

  “You’re not scared of it?” I asked, covering it with my hand. Aella smiled brightly and shook her head.

  “No, I think it is very pretty. It shines like a well polished jewel.”

  “Well let’s keep this between us ok. Sometimes people who see my left eye are not as happy to see it as you.” I said as I tore some cloth from my shirt and wrapped it around my head covering my eye again.

  An hour passed before we both heard a rumbling sound coming from behind us. “What’s that sound?” Aella stopped and looked behind us as did I. A look of terror gradually formed on our faces as we both came to realize that a whole army of Carrion Crawlers were charging towards us.

  “Run!” I said as I grabbed Aella’s hand, pulling her along. We ran frantically, ahead we could see the opening of a cave. “There quickly, a way out.” I shouted.

  As we reached the opening another sound flooded our ears. It was the sounds of water crashing down, we came to a sudden stop at the edge of the cave opening. Before us a 300 foot drop next to us the river cascaded outward into a massive waterfall. From behind one of the Crawler’s tentacles lashed out grabbing Aella by her ankle, She fell to the ground hard as the Crawler started pulling her in. Lunging forward I grabbed Aella’s hand. “Hold on!” I shouted, from my side grabbed the long tooth dagger and tossed it at the Crawler who grabbed her. The blade hit its mark piercing one of its large right eye. It screeched in agony as it withdrew its tentacle.

  “Time to go.” I said, as I snatched Aella up and into my arms . “Hold on tight.” I shouted as I redirected the flow of energy into my hands and legs, as well as wrapping a rope of energy around us to keep Aella tied to me.

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  “Hold on tight this will get rough.” Aella put a near death grip on me as she wrapped her arms tightly around my chest . “Now then here we go.” I said jumping straight down. Falling down along the side of the waterfall I looked up keeping my eyes on the cave. The Crawlers came to a dead stop at the edge of the cave, Carrion Crawlers hate bright light.

  Once I knew we were safe from the Carrion Crawlers I channeled energy into my fingertips as well as my feet, and started to dig into the cliff side to slow our descent. Even with the extra layer of protection and my quick regen my fingers were ripped to shreds by the time we came to a stop. clinging to the cliff side still 150 feet above ground I found my footing and slowly began to scale down to the ground, Which was not easy with an extra buck ninety pure muscle weight clung to my back.

  After setting Aella down and getting her to a spot where she could sit down, her leg paralyzed from the Carrion Crawler’s attack. Slipping off my backpack I pulled out a small first aid kit, after cleaning her leg I wrapped it up.

  “You ok.” I asked, wiping tears from her face.

  “Yes, I can’t move my leg though.”

  “That’s to be expected. A Carrion Crawler’s tentacle is like one really long whip coated in a super sticky goo and lined with hundreds of tiny needles that when they latch onto prey inject a paralytic that stops your muscles from moving, but does not affect the lungs or heart, it just prevents you from being able to move for awhile.”

  “How long?” She asked a look of concern upon her face.

  “Well normally it would be a couple hours at the least, but you being half Dwarf and all. I’d say maybe an hour or so. Still you should not be walking around on that ankle, it squeezed you pretty tightly, it’s not broken, but it’s definitely twisted.”

  “What about the Crawler should we not get out of here before they find a way down after us?” Aella glanced back up at where we just came from.

  “Oh no need to worry there, Crawlers hate bright light, anything brighter than moon light hurts their eyes, blinding them. They're not coming after us anytime soon.”

  Aella let out a sigh of relief, and I collapsed on the ground next to her, I was completely spent. We both sat there for a long while just catching our breath after everything we both had been through so far. From the pack I grabbed a flask of water and handed it to Aella. “Drink you’ve got to be thirsty by now.”

  “Thank you.” She said, taking the flask and taking several long sips.

  Depending on the realm you are in, the method to recover one's mana or magical power as it's called in some realms is a breathing technique called Mana Breathing. Even though I can’t use magic as being a Null Void my body naturally repels or rather negates all forms of magical energy, however I’ve learned that Mana Breathing has more than one use. I’ve learned to use this technique in order to recover my own energy by drawing in the natural energies around me and converting that into power I can use. Sadly sealed as I am, my max capacity is nowhere near what it once was, but by using this technique combined with a few other power cultivation techniques I can raise my max power level over time. This is however a slow process, to try and raise my max level too quickly will only serve to do more harm than good, as my power could surge out of control and do harm to my body.

  Aella sat quietly as I sat up and began using Mana Breathing to recover my lost energy ... .Well she was quiet for all of about five minutes.

  “What are you doing Mr. John?” Luckily this technique does not require nearly as much concentration as trying to undo Seven Seals of Binding, so responding to her did not hinder me in the slightest.

  “Well unlike most people in creation I can’t use magic. I am what some call a Null Void, but I’ve learned how to manipulate natural energy through force of will alone. Doing so is very draining on my own power so I’m using a breathing technique I picked up to help recover my power faster than just letting it recover over time.”

  “Oh, I see, but what is a Null Void?” I guess her parents had not told her about my kind yet. After all, in her realm a person like me is seen as no better than a monster and is to be treated as such.

  “You may not know this but every living thing in creation has an affinity for magic, which if you were to rate it on a scale it can be rated on a scale from 0% to 100%. In order to be a mage of any kind your affinity for magic has to be at least 20 to 30%, and that’s just to learn the most basic of magic spells.”

  Slowly I could feel my power returning to me another twenty minutes of this and I would be good to go.

  “Your average joe ranges between 10 and 20% while a Null like myself ranges between 0 and 9%.” I explained, and though I had my eyes closed and was concentrating on recovering I could tell Aella was listening intently to my every word.

  “You see a Null is anyone who’s affinity for magic is so low that they may as well not have a magical bone in their body so to speak. Mind you nothing is set in stone a person can raise their affinity for magic, but the lower you are at birth the harder it will be to raise it to a level in which you can begin to cast spells. So most don’t bother. Now I myself have an affinity of a whopping 0%, so it is safe to say I never had a chance. Understand Nulls like me are rare to say the least, maybe 1 in a 100,000 are born a Null and really most of them are right around a 5% affinity.”

  “What about a Void?” she asked, I was not sure if she was intrigued by what I was saying or if she just liked listening to me talk, but I carried on nonetheless. Truth be told, I kind of enjoy sharing things that I know with other people, partly because I like teaching people things, and partly for my own ego. I do so enjoy being the clever one, better than being the potato one if you understand what I mean.

  “Voids are harder to explain, to put it simply Voids are those who magic has rejected, whether it's a curse from the gods and goddess of magic or whether we are just freaks of nature no one knows for sure even I myself am not really sure what I am. Being a Void does have its perks though, such as I can not be deceived or controlled by magic of any kind no matter how powerful the spell might be as the Void in me just negates the magic used in the spell. However I can still be harmed by magic, well the non magical aspects of a spell anyways. what I mean is let's say someone cast a fireball at me.”

  “I’m following.” Aella said eager to learn.

  “Right, so the Fireball hits me I would feel the impact of it hitting me, the intense heat from the flames, I can even be burned by the resulting explosion. All these things I would feel, but they would do little to no damage to me in the long run.”

  “So you can’t really be hurt by magic at all, that sounds great.”

  “You would think so, but there is a downside to it as well. You see that whole negating magic thing is a double edge blade. I can’t benefit from magic either, meaning spells that heal or buff allies I negate those as well. On top of that I can’t even use the most simple of magic items. In my hands they will not work.”

  I stood up recharged and ready to go. “Now then that’s enough about that, let's go find your family.” I handed Aella the backpack she slipped it on, picking her up and giving her a piggyback ride as we continued onward.

  As we walked Aella told me stories about her home and about Thorngood and Fenrika. She told me about a time when her Papa nearly set his face on fire while lighting his pipe, or how she once watched her Mama wrestled an Owl Bear to the ground with her bare hands. She also spoke of how beautiful the mountains where they lived were during the summer, about how crisp and clean the air was, and about how she seemed so so close to the night sky some nights that she could almost reach out and touch the stars.

  The more she talked, which by the way was near non-stop. The more I thought about myself, and what it was I was really doing. This right here helping this girl or even helping Thorngood and company, went against everything I said I would not be doing while I was here. I told The Lady in White I didn’t care about helping anyone and that I would be doing no such thing. Yet here I am with an abnormally heavy child on my back and my only thoughts were of getting her back to her family safe and sound.

  One might think that deep down I am a kind and caring person who in the end truly cares for the world and those who dwell within, well they would be wrong. Frankly I could not care less about this world or any other for that matter, nor do I really care what happens to the countless nameless faces that now walk this world. Yet at the same time I can not simply turn my back when someone is in need right in front of me.

  “Mr John, are you ok?” Aella said, tapping me on the shoulder.

  Her words snapped me back from my thoughts which were starting to turn darker than the blackest night. “Yea I’m ok, just got a little lost in my own head. Sorry if I worried you.”

  “It’s ok.” She said then pointed ahead of us. “Look ahead, I see a building of some sort.”

  Up ahead we both could see what looked to be a strip mall in the middle of an open plain. “This realm just gets weirder and weirder.” I smirked as we made our way to it.

  As we approached we were stopped by two men, one dressed in full plate steel armor that tightly fitted to his body with spikes protruding from the shoulders, knees and elbows. The armor was an ashy grey in color under his armor he wore an even more form fitting pale blue bodysuit. The other man wore a long ash white robe with an equally ashy grey breast plate. “A Paladin and a Priest, but of which god.” I thought. As they got closer I could clearly make out the symbols on their armor. The symbols were of a body being burned in a funeral manner under a night sky.

  “Welcome, we saw your approach and came to offer aid.” The Priest said as we came face to face. Aella sunk into my backside afraid of the Paladin’s intimidating looking armor.

  “Just to be clear, what god do you serve?” I asked, trying to confirm what I suspected.

  “The Ashen Goddess Lady Twilight.” The Paladin replied proudly.

  “So Lady Twilight is still around, good to know.” I thought. “Thank you, we are both in need of help. My name is John, and the wee one on my back is the child of a friend, her name is Aella.”

  “You must be tired, come this way we have food and shelter.” The priest said as he motioned for us to follow them to the mall.

  “How long have you two been here?” I asked. and they both turned back and gave me a look of surprise.

  “”You know something about all this don’t you?” The Paladin asked.

  As we walked I began explaining everything as I had before, neither of them seemed to understand what I was saying. Not really that surprising, if I’m being honest. Most realms can’t grasp anything beyond their own tiny little world let alone a whole MultiVerse. Nonetheless I kept talking as we walked. Getting closer to the Mall I could see several dozen makeshift huts scattered about the east side of the mall. On a rough count I counted around a 100 or so people, A mix of Human, Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, and several other humanoid races. There were even Orcs and Lizardmen in the mix.

  More importantly as we got close I came to realize that the Strip mall was in fact a Caretaker just like the B&B where I met the others.

  “So about that Mall.” I started to say then the Priest chimed in.

  “Oh! so you noticed. Yes we are aware that it is something called a Caretaker the clockwork women told us as much. The Caretaker is the whole reason we made camp here.”

  “Wait, the Interface is working?” I asked, a little shocked. He nodded yes.

  “I need to speak with her right now. Before we got separated from our party we were staying at a B&B that was also a Caretaker, and Caretaker’s all have a kind of communication device I can use that to contact Aella's mother and father and let them know she is ok.” Of course I was running under the assumption that Thorngood and Fenrika returned to the B&B after fighting off the Goblins and perhaps the Carron Crawlers.

  “In that case let us not waste anymore time, come this way.” With the Priest's words we all picked up pace and made our way to the Caretaker.