C'Saarg spoke, his voice, once oily and slick now reeked of panic and fear. His usual demeanour of calm, collected hostility was replaced by desperation. It fitted him poorly. "Humans, creatures, kin... We must stop N'Lok before he gains too much power, and to do that, you will need us. You cannot defeat him alone, not with your strength, not after you gifted him so much..."

The head turned to face his ruined domain and you would all feel a not so gentle tug as the demon's telekinetic grip tightened around you waist to drag you behind him like kites tethered to a moving barge. His pace was slow but unstoppable and you would find yourselves going along for the ride whether or not you wished to do so.

As you travelled, you were brought over the crumbling walls of his domain to look down at the sea of ash and rubble below. The cataclysm seemed to have hit this district hardest of all. "When the spires were corrupted, when their powers failed... the runes in this land splintered along with them. The things we had developed for the betterment of our cause... turned against us all."

The slow, powerful pull of the demon was pulling you towards one destination, the only destination in the land. A large, ivory white dome sat squatly among the ruins.

"Illyotha was never idyllic. There was always a war going on, one way or another. We demons are predators as you've no doubt come to learn. And we fought like machines over the spires. Even by the end, only one nation controlled the majority... Ours. But, given that we each held an equal number of the spires, or as close to equal as we could get, we never quarrelled with one another."

"But now that one has a very clear advantage... who knows." The head stopped before the only entrance into the dome. To giant doors barred your pass, no unlike the two that held the entrance to Illyotha proper all those miles above the surface. This one, however, was more than just carved. The whole thing looked like a solid mechanical marvel.

Even in the still air things turned and whizzed, whirring about. Mana flashed across the metal in rushes of silver, gold and teal. Even for a pair of doors standing 30 feet tall and 10 feet wide each, they held such intricacies.

C'Saarg looked at the locks for a moment but seemed to nod to himself. "I was... paranoid about the other two. I believed they would try to steal the secrets I was developing, steal the only thing I had to ensure I was never ganged up on... though looking back I'm quite sure they were both too pre-occupied concealing their own perceived upper hands..."

"Regardless, in the event of a disaster, as one did befall. My domain was to go into lockdown until I returned. But... I don't believe it recognises me in this form. My mana signature has... waned over the years, having been intertwined to finely with the other two for far too long." And it was true, the doors did not seem to react to his presence at all.

"I'm afraid you will have to enter on your own. Once inside I will contact you again, but I must return to Y'Thon, we have our own plans we need to enact upon in the mean time. It'll be the only way you'll get the time you need." The face grimaced at the prospect. "I know at least one of you is well versed in runes, the other two never cared for the art and neither did their people. I'm quite sure you will be able to find you way in."

And with that, C'Saarg vanished, leaving you alone in this ashen land with nought but the entrance before you.

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The door itself is a wonder, one that seems beyond anything seen on any of the mainlands or agartha. Runes feed into mechanical systems which feed into further runes. Each one containing a failsafe against any number of dispelling magics. Each spell woven into the fabric of the door, each metal pin placed just right to allow for the mana to run smoothly. It looked delicate in its complete balance of mechanics and runes.

And yet, from what the runescribes could tell, there were backups upon backups, systems within systems behind systems that would trigger traps, alarms and who knows what else. From the studying, neither of the pair could find a weak link in the system, nowhere where runes didn't quite meet, or anywhere mechanisms could be jammed.

If a lot more time was given, eventually a solution would be found, some way of unlocking the door safely. So perhaps more study time was needed, or perhaps more haste was needed. Whichever was decided, a decision did need to be made. A compromise between safety and time. Things that Illyotha seemed to lack in equal parts.

Nyphadora would feel her magic seep into the metal and nothing else, whatever systems were in place were doing their jobs and the dispelling magic fizzled out quickly. Nothing triggered, thankfully, but no progress was made, either. However, Qi Lan's rune, at least, would aid in something, the systems were not flawless. And there was a single point in it where excess mana needed to be exhausted.

About mid way up the right hand door there was a gap, barely big enough for even a fae to fit through and one of Nyphadora's size would struggle even further. But, it was a way into the system, one that could be exploited.


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The tyrium, placed snugly into the slot, began to drain away at the mana of the system. It was slow going, the exhaust wasn't very strong and it was like trying to drink from an ocean with a straw. Eventually, the tyrium had absorbed enough to be saturated with mana. And even the mana deadening metal was beginning to falter somewhat.

The systems held, however they were now much less robust in the magical department. The mechanical components still whizzed, whirred and whistled as those failsafes came online. Where magic failed, craftsmanship came to bolster it. Steam and pistons came to the aid of the failing magical systems, picking up the slack and keeping certain... mechanical traps activated.

Across the door, small holes began to appear, the hiss of steam slightly escaping from them. Hundreds of these holes opened all across the front of the door. And as time passed, the whistle of steam got louder and louder.