There are three major sources of Hit Points in Annwyn Online: Health Points, Shielding, and Barrier spells. Shielding is applied on top of your health bar and benefits from any resistances you possess. Barrier spells can only block damage directly in front of them, but require less comparative mana to summon and maintain. —Annwyn Online Player’s guide.

  The Archive. Date undefined.

  The Archivist’s form changed. He wasn’t a translucent blue hologram, but a silver, metallic, robot-like form approximating the shape of a man. His body was slender, almost skeletal, with dark blue crystal armor over the top of his frame. A thick band of braided tendrils draped from his helmet and down his back like locs.

  He held a staff in his hands, blue mana swirling around its focusing stone in the heavy implication of a threat. “Who did you steal it from?” He asked again.

  The Archivist’s tone had completely changed from the grandfatherly warmth to a bone-chilling, mechanical iciness.

  Within these walls, I am the master of this domain. His earlier worlds coming back to haunt Sinnamon.

  Sinnamon held her hands up in a placating gesture. “I didn’t steal it! I’ve always had it.”

  The Archivist inclined his head. “Let me see it.”

  “I’m not letting you take it.”

  Saiph had mentioned something about these items being forged from a piece of their souls. Sinnamon didn’t care how powerful this man was, she wasn’t letting anyone touch something that might very well be a piece of her very soul.

  Though, in a compromise, Sinnamon did hold it up. “This is as close as I’m letting you get to it.”

  “Hold it still. I can see it just fine from here.” He lowered his staff. The glowing blue light in his chest channeled up to his eyes, glowing brighter for a moment before dimming again. “Ah, you are telling the truth. It is bound to you and the signature, though similar, is not one I recognize. But you are no Ikhwezi. If you are telling the truth, how did you come to acquire it?”

  Sinnamon quickly returned her Caer Fragment to her bag. “We all have a crystal. Millions of us. That’s what we’ve been trying to figure out. Someone brought us here and gave them to us.”

  “Millions of you?” Something like recognition appeared on the Archivist’s face. He muttered softly to himself, “Yes, this all makes sense now. But why send you here and not come to me herself…”

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  He looked up as though just remembering Sinnamon, Weaver, and AnnaLee were still in the room. “I’m sorry, forgive me. As I said, it has been hundreds of years since I had contact with anyone else. I know nothing of what goes on beyond the walls of my Archives. Why did you not say you were sent by Reylynn?”

  Sinnamon paused. Who was Reylynn? The same person the quest had mentioned? “When that machine lit up, we got a message saying Reylynn was gone.”

  The Archivist pursed his mechanical lips. “What exactly did that message say?”

  “It said it recognized us by name, but that we couldn’t access it.” Sinnamon didn’t add that it had used their real names, not usernames. “Then another message popped up. It was a jumbled mess of words, but it said Reylynn was gone and that we needed to find… something…”

  “Fel!” AnnaLee supplied.

  “And it said we couldn’t refuse the quest to find it,” Weaver added.

  “Are Reylynn and Fel people like you?” Sinnamon asked.

  “Fel is a place. The person who spoke to you is an Ikhwezi like myself. She has been translating for us. If she believes Reylynn is gone, then you need to get to Fel as soon as possible.” The Archivist raised a hand to his chin and began mumbling to himself again. “The fastest way there would be via the way gates, though they may not have sufficient mana left to power them all this time…”

  The man’s abrupt change in demeanor and apparent multi-track mind served only to confuse Sinnamon even further. “Can you slow down? Who is Reylynn? Why did she bring us…”

  Sinnamon trailed off, the gears in her brain suddenly grinding to a halt as things began to click. The leveling. The combat classes. The fact that so many had been brought here. That the Revi, all except one, were gone…

  “Reylynn brought us here as an army.” Sinnamon whispered the words slowly.

  “Yes.” The Archivist answered.

  Weaver glanced at Sinnamon, then to the Archivist. “The message also mentioned an Isiphelo. It said it was coming. Is that the thing that killed the Revi a thousand years ago?”

  “Isiphelo is a powerful Ikhwezi warlord. It took the combined might of the Ikwezi and the Revi to stand against him. But we were strong enough only to seal him away in a desperate act that would only serve to hold him temporarily. That is why you were brought here. Because there is no one left who can stand against him.”

  The weakening barrier. “But why summon and give these powers to us? Why expend the resources to bring us here across space and time and not give them to those already here?”

  “No one alive can wield the powers you do. We, all of us, are tainted with the curse Isiphelo placed upon my kind and it has extended to everyone who draws upon our power. Only you, beings who have never been exposed to his touch, could complete the soul binding without risk of giving Isiphelo a way to return to his full strength.” The Archivist’s chest armor opened to reveal a glowing crystal exactly like Sinnamon’s Caer Fragment. He pulled it from his chest and slammed it into the pedestal beside the Archive. “Come and learn.”

  The Archive began to glow bright blue as it lifted off its platform and began spinning rapidly. The lights shifted from blue to all of the colors of the rainbow and suddenly Sinnamon, Weaver, AnnaLee, and the Archivist were no longer in the Auditorium.