////////Azazel////////
I was in a void. I had no shape or form. I simply... was. In this void, there were voices. Voices I've known for ages. The souls damned to serve me for all of eternity. The souls I had consumed.
They know not who they once were, not anymore; but I do. Thieves, murderers, and misguided fools who had attempted to kill me. I still remember it, the first time I killed. I was only twelve when it happened. The world around me shifted and without me noticing at first, I began to relive my past.
I was traveling with my father when that stupid trio of thieves surrounded us as we walked our way back home through the dirt road that connects the cities of Moonshine and Tamriel. My home was in a section near the center of the Ursan forest which divided the two cities. My father had been teaching me how to cast one of the most basic offensive spells in the school of necromancy, Tactus Dolorem. The spell of pain.
There were three thieves, and my father had used an invisibility spell to make himself scarce. I was still unaware of the danger that untrained magic casters pose on others. The three thieves had no idea that it is not wise to provoke a greater Incubi, even if they're a half-blood and a novice spell caster.
The combination of having my father "abandon" me while also getting attacked by three armed strangers in the middle of nowhere made me very irritable to say the least. In a violent explosion of energy, I cast the spell I had learned only a few hours prior. The grass and trees near my immediate area barely moved from the ethereal blast of magic, but my assailants did not share the same fate.
I had used so much magic in the spell that I sent them into shock. And as they lay there, twitching on the ground, my dad emerged from the darkness.
"Good. Now, you will take their pain away."
He stated with an unsettling amount of calmness.
"H-how?"
I stammered, unable to tear my eyes off of the convulsing thugs.
"You will focus your power onto your hands, and say these words. 'Tactus Mortem'. Then release your magic, understand?"
He ordered, placing his hand on my shoulder. This snapped me out of my dazed stuper and made me look up at him. I knew that this was his way of teaching. Cold hearted, but effective.
Ironically, I think it was in those moments that we were the closest. He was passing down his knowledge onto me. The knowledge that would grant mastery of life and death. I looked back down to see the fruits of my outburst. They had attempted to kill me. And father was standing close by. He would've kept me safe. I now knew that they could not hurt me, but their attempt on my life would not be ignored.
It was in that moment that all hesitation in my mind was washed away, and I knew with absolute certainty what I wanted to do. I raised my then scrawny arms and opened my hands.
"Tactus Mortem..."
They died in agony, and they would only be the first. As I reveled on the screams of those moronic rats, my mind drifted and came to contemplate my reasons for being out on that fateful day. The spells of death and pain were not the only thing I learned that day. My father had left out home along with me to a remote village near the base of the Black Mountain of the East.
He disguised us to travel relatively unnoticed using an illusion spell of my mother's arsenal of spells she's crafted over her long life on us. He used the alias of Elijah Gustav, a wandering human healer of Ahr City that traveled with his adoptive son, Fentazan being my own alias. The first spells I learned were spells of healing and restoration. And my father would use these visits to the village under the Black Mountain's shadow to teach me, as much as he would use them to trade and earn coin for services or materials.
The village, though still apprehensive about me, did not want to slit my throat every time I went there after putting my gifts to good use. I healed the sick and mended the injured with magic. Argent energy allowed me to save those on the brink of death, and in one occasion allow those that were too far gone enough time for them to say their goodbyes.
I only did that once... and I don't know if I'll ever do that again. Holding someone's soul in a body that's begging for death's release... It felt... wrong... As the memories now formed part of my train of thought, they too materialized and began to happen before me like a play.
"How in the nine hells can you be a necromancer and not know how to cast a simple healing spell!?"
I heard my father's voice echo through my mind as the pleasant memory soon faded away and bled into the night of my parent's murder. The world began to take shape around me as familiar sights and sounds began to materialize. A beautiful night sky with a full moon and a masterful tapestry of stars and constellations. They painted the sky and illuminated the small clearing I like to go to so I could stargaze. The sound of the gentle breeze caressing the trees and ruffling their leaves accompanied by the gentle chirping of crickets and other insects played nature's ballad. A song of birth, life, and death.
I would sit by myself or with my mother and enjoy the stillness. As the world finished taking shape, I too wanted to have form. However, something was restraining me, I couldn't take shape. I began to focus harder on my body, and visualized my appearance. Magic was trying to stop me, and when I realized it, I became frustrated. That frustration soon turned into anger. And that anger gave me the strength I needed to form my body.
I began with a humanoid build. A torso, a head, two arms, and two legs enveloped in a bright red on their knees. As I tried to assume my more demonic features, I felt the magical force trying to restrain me grow stronger. It was crushing me from all sides with the weight of an elder dragon. The pain that coursed through my body was not enough to incapacitate me, it only fed my growing fury.
I forced myself into existence with every last ounce of will power I had, eventually overcoming the force enough to finish forming my rough shape. My inverted wings, my tail and horns shot out from my radiant frame as crude silouhettes of hellfire that contrasted the rest of my luminous figure. The magic quintupled in strength, now having eyes of my own, I saw a golden aura that I recognized all too well.
The mere thought of Celestia sent me into a frenzy of hate fueled rage that forced my body to take it's usual appearance after shattering the magical grip that bound my body with a blast of argent energy that erupted from my fully formed form in every which way. Once free, I began to look around in a wild attempt to find something or, preferably, someone to take out my anger on. After wheeling around, I saw the whore of the sun standing there with a stoic face that simply demanded I burn it off.
Focusing my pent up aggression into an unholy jet of hellfire on the object of my ire, I let loose a torrent on the traitorous bitch until I could no longer hold my flames. She did not attack or try to defend herself, she only closed her eyes and let herself be destroyed. To be honest, I could not have been more ecstatic over burning something if I wanted to. As a final show of strength I let out a roar of demonic fury that would've made my mother proud.
"A demon's roar is their testament to the world. You have power, and you are not afraid to use it. If you're going to roar, whether it be to blow off steam or to show off, let those who hear you cower by it's power!"
My mother's words reverberated in my head as I let out my primal war cry. As the smoke and dust cleared from the targeted area of my flames, I saw an equine form, albeit smaller than Celestia. I stood there, waiting expectantly to see her charred remains. As hellfire destroys the soul of those burnt by it, it can sometimes result in the hollow shell of the victim being left frozen in their place as a statue. However this only happens with beings of great magical power. Weaker life forms tend to be completely obliterated by my fire.
To my horror, before me stood a living being. Unscathed by my fury, stood the princess of the night where her sister should have been. Her eyes were closed and her horn was glowing with a powerful azure light. My confusion as to how she survived the attack was only doubled when I saw the grass beneath her hooves.
Her immediate area was left untouched, a green circular patch of still living grass in a larger, cone shaped stretch of dead flora. Her magic dropped and she began to walk towards me.
"Azazel. Please do not-"
She tried to ask in a polite, yet firm tone. She didn't get very far as I had already charged another stream of hellfire.
"T̸̻̃R̵̭͠A̵͈̓Ạ̷͛A̵͓͊Ȁ̶̖Ȁ̷͕A̷͖͆I̵̻̐Ḭ̴̌Ị̸͂Ǐ̴̬I̵̗̊Ì̴̠Ì̷͍Ȉ̷̫Į̸̕Ṭ̸͆Ö̵̺O̸͔̎O̶̤͋Ö̸̬́Ô̴͚R̷̘͒R̴̦̀R̴̖̚R̸͕̍R̸͓͘Ȑ̶̩!̶̝̄!̵̧̏!̶̥̈́!̴͉̍!̵̹̈́"
(TRAAAAAAIIIIIIIIITOOOOORRRRRR!!!!!)
I tried my best to out roar the torrent of pure malice leaving my throat. Now having my full attention, she raised a shield that encompassed her body and she walked through my flames like a breakwater parting an onslaught of waves from the Western Sea. My disbelief of the scene before me only enraged me further. My flames grew in power, and the fire being deflected by her magic began to destroy the trees and subsequent forest around me. Soon, the once beautiful land around me resembled the charred wastelands my mother once called her home. The sky above us was obscured by the ash and smoke that rose from the blazing inferno I had created. When the princess stood two or three meters in front of me, she unleashed her own magic against me. She fired a blast of magic at my face, and a muzzle made of a silver metal that burned to the touch materialized onto me. Distracted by this, she enveloped me in a cool indigo magic. I was hoisted onto the air, forced onto a position on my knees with my arms and wings pressed firmly against my torso and roughly lowered down to the ground. When I caught my bearings I saw her, looming over me with a silent glare that reminded me of my father.
"Do not make us do something we will regret Azazel. Still your anger or we will use force. Please... we simply wish to know what happened."
To say I was furious would have been an understatement. For the second time in one day I had been prostrated and treated li- Wait. This place... We were in my head again. I must've fallen unconscious after freeing the manticore of it's flesh or having completely exhausted myself running from whatever atta-
"...do we have a parlay?"
She was standing before me with a look of apprehension seeping through the cracks in her mask of stoicism. I remained restrained, but the spell binding my mouth shut faded away to nothing in a matter of seconds. Whatever she had said beforehand I did not hear. Frankly, I was too irritable to care either, so if she wanted to talk, she would get little out of me. After some time of me trying to kill her with my glare alone, I thought it best for it me to stall for time so I could free myself and break her neck later.
"W̶̫͌h̷̤͑a̸̩͠t̸͉͊ ̸̝̑d̵̞͋ó̸̦ ̸̪͂y̷̺̌o̵̠͑ú̸̜ ̷͔͌w̵̼͛ą̷͆n̸͙̓t̷̥̄?̸̧̀"
(What do you want?)
I asked, pouring as much malice as I could muster into those four words.
"We want to know what happened from your point of view."
She stated. Try as I might, I sensed no malice in her. For all I knew, this dream world could have been interfering with my senses. She had not lied to me yet, but my trust in these sentient, chromatic horses was non existent. I was in no mood to confide anything with her, much less be polite.
"A̴n̴d̷ ̶w̶h̵y̶ ̸w̸o̵u̸l̷d̶ ̵y̶o̵u̴ ̶c̶a̸r̷e̸?̸"
(And why would you care?)
I asked skeptical of her intent. Seeing that I was not immediately attempting to maul her to pieces she relaxed and assumed a posture befitting royalty.
"Because our sister told us you attacked her without reason."
She explained. The anger that one sentence produced in me gave me the will to ignore my magic bonds. As I rose to my feet, I could feel the familiar heat of hellfire charging within me. I was tempted to open fire on her again, but this time I would test her shields ability to withstand my grip as I strangled the life out of her. Luna's eyes went wide at the sight of me standing up. I felt her magic trying to force me back down to my knees, but after hearing of Celestia's continous acts of treason, I would not be subdued so easily.
"W̷̮̿ï̸͚̦t̵̲̺̊̆h̵̛̞͎o̴̪̐ủ̷̡̂t̴͎͒ ̷̠̰̌r̸̢͈̐ẽ̶̞ͅa̷̛͎̍ṣ̸͘ơ̵̙̭̇n̷̜̈́!̶̙̗͐̓?̵̤̈͆ ̴̹̤͠T̶͓͍̎͝H̴̪͗Á̸̩Ť̶̜̬ ̶̳̬̋͒L̷̝̑͗͜Y̶̲̔̕I̷͋͜Ṇ̵̓̈G̴͍̿̉͜ ̵̥͕̓͝W̶̮̳͒̓Ṛ̸͖̆Ê̷̥͒T̸͖̮̚̚C̶̪̀̊H̶̫̩̃͠ ̶̫͛T̴͖̖̅R̵͚̀̂I̶͛̅͜E̶̫̍D̵̖̎ ̷̼̑̽T̶͕̫̽Ỏ̴̗̒ ̷̲̌K̷͍̈́Í̵̯̓L̶̗͈̎̉L̸̢̜̆́ ̷̗̑M̴̰̈E̸͇͑̓!̸̡͖̒!̸̲͎̓̀!̴̝̅̑"
(Without reason!? THAT LYING WRETCH TRIED TO KILL ME!!!)
I roared furiously as I directed my magic onto my hands. Luna tried to back away, but I was already upon her. Just as I was about to wrap my claws around Luna's neck, I felt something cold clamp down on my wrists.
//////////Luna////////////
It was foolish of us to think that Azazel would be willing to speak just after fleeing for his life. It took us little time to find his mind in the dream realm. It was clouded by anger and tormented by fear.
If he were a pony, he would be having nightmares that would scar even the most battle hardened creatures. But Azazel... He was a creature that grew stronger from feeding on fear and suffering. Granted, the fear and suffering of despicable souls, but still.
Just as his claws were about come down on us, he stopped. The magical flame that surrounded his hands discipated as his arms were being held back by something. We moved back in shock to find shackles of ice and metal. Electrical bolts of teal, cyan, and electric blue magic coursed through the chains with a vicious crackling sound.
Azazel noticed the shackles too late, and before he could react, the bolts of unstable magic ravaged his body. He screamed in agony as his body tensed and convulsed, his bones were visible for as the energy seeped deep inside and revealed his skeleton for brief moments in flashes of blue and white light. After a few seconds of this, the energy ceased it's onslaught of the half demon's body. He fell backwards, and when he did, I received an unobstructed view of who was responsible.
A bipedal figure dressed in black and face identical to Azazel's that seemed to be made of polished marble was looking right at us. It's glowing turquoise eyes scrutinized my very soul. I froze under it's gaze, but not because of it's sudden appearance, but rather because who this creature was to me...
It raised it's hand and pointed at me with one of it's ice covered fingers. With a flick of it's finger and the pulling of it's outstretched arm, I was raised from the ground in an invisible aura of magic and was levitated towards the creature. Once we were close enough that our muzzle was within it's reach, we took a better look at it's face.
It's "face" was actually a mask, the furless flesh around it's small eyes was visible through it's cracked and splintered eyeholes. It wore a crown with shimmering white runes bound tightly around it's hooded head. The creatures "jaw" moved separate from the top of it's flat face for a bit as if stretching after not being used in Faust knows how long.
"Mother..."
It spoke in a near whisper, their voice reverberating unnaturally so. We... I had not made the connection until it spoke. I know this creature, one I raised as my own in secret and saw die... it... no, He... He was my son... but how was he her-
"Forgive us..."
He whispered, wiping tears that were streaming down my face. I didn't know when I started to cry, but I could not restrain myself. My train of thought was abruptly stopped as I was hurled backwards at breakneck speed. In the few seconds I had a clear view of my son's apparition, he shot bolts of lightning that impacted Azazel's prone form.
As I sailed through the air, I saw Azazel begin to glow and then light up in a bright flash that put my sister's sun to shame. I heard a deafening explosion as I was surrounded by a swirling mass of black and red smoke with bolts of azure lightning, forcing me back to the land of the living.
I awoke screaming and drenched in sweat. Our thestrals barged in, spears at the ready to defend us. We were taking shaking lungfuls of air as we tried our best to not break into tears before them. The captain of my guard, a young and dedicated thestral mare named Silent Breeze came closer to us and looked us over.
"Princess, are you alright? Is there anything we can do to help?"
She asked in a concerned tone.
"We are fine... P-please leave the room.. We... We need a moment."
We managed to say. Silent Breeze nodded and ushered the rest of my night guard out. Once my door was closed, welet out the painful tears we had been holding in. There is no way or reason for my son to have appeared in the dream realm, much less Azazel's dream unless he were alive... If our son still lives... Then our dearest sister has a great many things to answer for...
//////Azazel//////
Fear... I have experienced it before, just like anyone else. But it was at that moment that I felt true fear. Very rarely do I have nightmares. Seeing the planes of hell at a young age and the never ending torture of souls and the monsters that lived there while traveling with my father and mother had desensitized me to many things others would find horrifying. However, this was different.
The fear I felt... it was... familiar somehow... As my mind raced to find out why I was so scared, I remembered the day my mother taught me how to cast Aura di terror, a fear spell. Whatever did this was enough to apparently scare Luna half to death. I would need to find a way to isolate it.
"People have a tendency to project a false sense of superiority when they don't know where they are on the food chain. It is our job as the architects of fear, to show mortals that do not know their place. While a mirror can show you what you look like on the outside, fear allows us to see the souls of those we terrify for who they are."
My mother's voice resonated in my head as I was now in another void. Simply existing, the only sound being that of an incoherent whispering. Not unlike a soul driven to madness... I've heard of their kind, and had the chance to encounter one.
As my mind began to recollect the memory, the void around me was replaced with a medium sized hut. I saw my younger self inside a bedroom. It was the soul of a human... the orphaned son of a mother who was dying. I had to keep her soul tethered to her body while numbing her body enough for her to say her goodbyes to her son without going into shock...
"I love you... I always have... and I always will... I'll... always... be with you..."
She spoke, taking weak and shaky breaths. Those were her last words as I could no longer sustain her body. The woman's soul travelled to my hand as it condensed into a sphere of white light that almost resembled to be made of silk. I found myself captivated by it's beauty. And to this day, I have yet to see another soul so pure as that human mother.
My trance was broken by the muffled sobs of her son. He was crying into her chest as he held onto her lifeless form. Seeing his soul... it made me feel awful. The soul of any one creature will manifest in one of two ways. It will either encompass the owner in the color of their aura, or it will condense into a sphere made of "silk" somewhere in their body and resemble a bright star. The boy's soul, it encompassed his body... but it was broken.
Through the cracks in his silhouette I saw his life force leave him like a glowing mist and cover his mother's lifeless body. I didn't understand why that was happening then, but I know better now. He wanted his mother back more than anything in the world. The strain he was placing on his soul to try and wish her back to life was breaking him, the life force that once dwelled within him was being transferred to the body.
Unbeknownst to him, it is possible to die of a broken heart and a deficiency in life force. He was going to die of grief and I could do nothing about it. A fracture so deep into his being that no godly amount of magic could put the pieces back together again. The loss of one's parents... I understand it.
The human woman, who appeared to be in a peaceful sleep, had nothing on her but her clothes and an earing. I saw a smaller version of myself with shorter hair and a robe that covered my body. My wings, horns, and tail were all still there, though to the unaided eye, one could say I looked about as normal as any other human, save for my legs of course. My younger self could only shed tears at the sight while my father stood behind me with a calm and solemn expression.
He took the soul from my hand, and walked over to the boy. He then gently pressed the mother's soul through the boy's back. The child's pained sobs begin to die down as the mother's soul fused with her son's. The cracked and splintered soul began to repair itself, and the boy, now with a face of serenity, fell into a deep sleep. My father turned to face my younger self.
"Stay here. I'll let the village elder know so we can bury her."
He ordered. Wiping his tears, my past self nodded and watched my father leave. I had been so fixated on this small exchange that I didn't notice my body was given form. When my father closed the door to leave, I stood there, silently mulling over the things I witnessed. I had no concept of time, so to say that I was there for a few minutes could be equally valid as saying that I stayed there looking at the wooden door, frame and wall of the small, empty room I was in for hours.
As I stood there, I could vaguely pick up the sound of... whispers... Familiar, but not quite. It wasn't the souls within me. The incoherent whispers came from one voice alone... a voice that was behind me. I turned around to see the source of the sound was casually sitting on the bed where the mother and child should have been. It seemed to be a human of average height and judging by it's relatively flat chest and broader shoulders, it was a male.
Dressed in a dark blue shirt with a white design in it's center, vaguely resembling the sun with it's center being a crescent moon. It had black trousers that I only noticed because the worn onyx cloak that he wore over his shirt parted enough for me to see it. The human was wearing crude sandals made of wood and fabric that wrapped around his feet, ankles and disappeared further up his calves.
His hood hid most of head from view, and the cracked porcelain like mask he wore obscured his face, only his cream colored neck with mild stuble on the underside of his jaw was visible. His turquoise eyes glowed with more power than I sensed he possessed. Noticing this, I looked him over to find his soul, and sure enough it was a splintered orb resting just above his heart. Were his soul intact, I would have been VERY afraid, but seeing as how broken souls are not very pow-
"You elude us..."
He spoke, his voice a echoing unnatural around me in a posh, and cultured baritone. Not enough for it to be annoying, but clearly there. His sudden comment caught me off guard, and he noticed.
"You are a being that thrives off the suffering of the souls you consume... And yet... when you see innocents in pain... you shed tears... Hmm. We mean you no harm creature. There is no need for violence here."
He explained, cocking his head to the side. He was making no attempt against my life, but I would have to make sure if his words could be trusted. Grasping the medallion that senses lies in my hand, I made my question.
"Who are you?"
I asked.
"Who? Who is but the form, followed by the function of "what?". And what I am, is a creature in a mask."
He knew what I was doing, and by avoiding mentioning of his name, made me wary of him.
"I can see that creature. Tell me your name."
I deadpanned. He didn't even flinch, simply looking at me with those eyes... He was casting Aura di terror. He was trying to intimida-
"Of course you can, but we are not questioning your powers of observation. We are simply contemplating your reasoning for trying to ask the paradoxical question to a masked creature, who he is."
He answered quickly. I must think fast lest he try to confuse me further. I squinted my eyes at his proposition, which made enough sense for me to keep my composure.
"Riiiiight..."
I muttered, more to myself than anything. He then stood up, brushing non-existent dust off of his cloak.
"And on this auspicious circumstance that we find ourselves, we ask that you allow us to answer your query regarding my name with a tale of who we once were and how we came to be what we are now."
He explained with a small bow. In any other situation I would've found this amusing, but frankly I was not feeling sociable. However, my current understanding of my situation was very limited, and this human was my only good lead. With a heavy sigh, I looked him in the eye and nodded.
He raised his hands together and clapped his hands twice. Only now did I realize that he had wrappings of a strange blue fabric that bore stars and constellations that shimmered with the same turquoise light of his eyes. As the figure clapped his hands, the world around us exploded outwards and left us standing in a forest. Unlike the Everfree or the Ursan forest that surrounded my family's plot of land, this one was much more inviting.
There was no sense of dread or danger to be felt, it was peaceful. It was early in the morning, the sun had risen high enough to let me know it was around seven in the morning. The cool breeze of the night resisted the morning sun's warm rays, but that would not last. Birds we chirping and off in the distance, through the trees I spotted something.
It looked a navy blue wagon with no horses or a place to tie them on. The human walked towards the vehicle and I followed behind him. As we drew closer, I could make out it's streamlined shape, it's glass windows, the metal hull that looked to have been crafted by the gods themselves. The sides of the carriage had written text on a language I did not understand. It had wheels with ridges for a better grip and it was made of an unfamiliar material that seemed to bend and flex to provide better stability.
The front and back of the vehicle had black ridges that shielded the metallic sheen that the alien wagon was made of. I circled towards the front of the strange carriage and found it had a grate with more of the strange writing from before. On either side of the grate, were strange objects that vaguely resembled eyes protected by a transparent shield made of something that felt like glass.
Walking around to the middle, I took in the inside of the carriage through the window of what I would later find out to be a door to then find two leather chairs, buttons, levers, a whole menagerie of strange contraptions that I did not understand. Walking towards the rear, I gazed upon the box shaped area that seemed to be used for carrying cargo.
It was large enough to fit me and two more people comfortably and seemed to be carved out of rock into small grooves and patterns that allowed for a relatively decent grip on whatever was placed inside it. On the walls to the sides of the vehicle were two large bumps the formed part of the space where the wheels on the rear were.
"You are looking at the cargo bed of a Toyota Tacoma 2017 pick-up truck. An invention by a nation from our world known as the USA. Vehicles like this were the kind our father adored, and as such bought one like this. This machine can carry the driver and approximately five more people if you count the cargo bed. It can travel for hundreds of miles before it needs to be refueled. It's... one of the few things we remember from our old home..."
He explained. As he began talking, I wheeled around to find him standing behind me, running his hand along the metallic machine until it came to a stop on a handle of the same blue coloration as the rest of the strange machine. He pulled on the handle and with a muffled click, the door to the side of the vehicle opened.
He looked over to me for a moment before shutting himself inside. I looked down at this "cargo bed" and hesitantly clambered on. The carriage dipped down and bounced a bit as it suddenly accepted my weight without breaking. Whatever this thing was, it was sturdy. As I settled down and coiled my tail around my crossed legs, I folded my wings as closely as I could. I looked over at the figure inside the azure contraption I was on through darkened glass. The wide window on the back of the box where he sat had an opened, rectangular space in the middle.
"Are you comfortable back there?"
He asked, turning around to look at me. I was more confused than anything, but seeing as how this person was not hell-bent on killing me or treating me in any disrespectful manner, I nodded.
"Good, now do not be alarmed. What you are going to hear is the sound of the engine. We would appreciate you don't destroy our truck, it takes a while to create them from scratch... even in here."
He explained, turning back around and inserting a strange metallic rod into an unseen orifice underneath a ring held my a "mast" with levers. I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion only to then have them be raised as a sound unlike anything I had ever heard caused the vehicle to vibrate and shake with life. I gripped on firmly into the sides, digging my clawed fingers into the metal for better support lest the thing decide to throw me off.
The loud roar that came from the machine's front died down and settled down on a low rumble. I turned my focus onto the figure who was now working a lever onto a labeled glyph. The lever slid down with two heavy clicks and the machine's rumbling slowed down considerably.
He pushed another lever directly next to his chair before the machine rumbled loudly and we suddenly lurched forward, beginning our traversal over to a dirt road not so far ahead. Once we were out on the dirt road, the figure gave me a sideways glance before focusing back on piloting the odd vehicle.
"If you would be so kind as to give us your name, we would gladly give you ours."
He explained. Weighing my options for a few moments, I relented.
"My name is Azazel. What is yours?"
I stated. He stayed silent for a moment before answering.
"You may refer to us as Saros Cycle. Now-"
He started, throwing his right arm onto the head rest of his neighboring chair while his left hand steered the helm of the self propelled carriage.
"Time for a story."