The circles of Infernos. Never in a thousand years would he wish to set foot in this place, but this was not an ordinary occasion. To clarify, he wasn't dead, but the ensuing chaos that took Adeluna by storm was enough to garner his concern. After collecting as much information as he could about the situation, he found the Harbinger had given the people a chance at redemption. If at least one person managed to pass through all the nine circles of Infernos without losing their lives and reached the Domus Tenebris, the goddess of death was willing to reconsider. It was a hard bargain, but a bargain nonetheless. He had come through great lengths to enter the first circle–aptly called Purgatory. It was an endless abyss of black, with an unusual quirk. 

When he first entered he saw the darkness, and the deafening silence. It was as if he had truly stepped into the void, without a single spot of color or sign of life. He tread carefully, until determining that it would be best to find a way to keep his mind off the lack of sound by playing something on his violin. He drew the bowstring across, notes of a mournful melody fitting for this area of the Infernos reverberating across the endless plane. How would he find his way the the second circle, or better yet–how would he know where the exit was? As his mind wandered, he suddenly found himself back at the shores of Jasumin Lake. He was standing knee-deep in water, with his trouser legs rolled up and his sleeves folded. The scenery was in the eternal autumn of the lake, and it was like he had been here the whole time. Gerard blinked, confused. What? When did he-?

"Was…was I dreaming?" He stammered. This couldn't be true. He knew that just a moment ago he had been in an abyss of darkness, with no one else around. It was impossible that he had been transported across the continent and the sea. He had spent all that effort to enter the Circles, regardless of the risk. Had he merely imagined it? The call of the waterfowl of the lake was heard in the distance. Continuing to walk forward, reeds brushed against his calves. This was…surreal. "Gerard! Catch!" A familiar female voice exclaimed, as he turned in the direction it had come from. He instinctively ducked as a large glass sphere flew over his head and splashed into the water. "Hey, no fair! You're supposed to catch it!" Meters away in the water a woman with long, wavy golden locks and sea-blue eyes pouted.

"That's your fault for throwing it at me without a fair warning. Lorelei, how many times have I told you to stop acting like a child?" This woman in the water was a water nymph, a casual acquaintance of his. Even though they knew each other for over fifty years, he still wouldn't call her a 'friend'. Not because he hated her, but on account of her antics and personality. She was air-headed and careless, though not inherently malicious. In fact he doubted she had the mental capacity for it. The most she could be was childishly selfish and impractical, but she didn't hold grudges or offenses for long. That was probably why she continued to hang around him in spite of his sharp tongue and sardonic attitude.

He vaguely felt a sense of déjà vu as he spoke with her; as if this had happened before. There was something off about all this but he couldn't put his finger on it. To someone else, he was walking about as if in a daze, having stopped his playing.

As if being in hell, getting water splashed at him by an air head water nymph wasnt bad enough. He would be in for a real treat when he figured out she wasnt alone. Soon he could feel a shift in the water around him, upon looking down he would see the mermoron swimming circles around him like a retarded blue koi carp, the difference was that her fish tail was flat whereas a koi has a straight tail. Not a problem though, she just swam sideways around him. Not only was this annoying because her presence ment having to take care of two morons but with her swimming circles around Gerard made it easy to trip over her. Her reeeeing was muffled by the water, in fact everything she said was muffled when she realized the one she was swimming circles around was the same man that helped her get treasure. She suddenly emerged out of the water quickly splashing alot of it into his face. "HIII, It's the ruin bard!! HOw Much Treasure did you get in the meantime? I made a new friend!" It was quite obvious that by friend she was refering to lorelei, it was amazing that both of these airheads would remain underwater mostly and not have their heads float…

Gerard soon recognized that floppy tail and high-pitched voice. No…it couldn't be. That made no sense! How on earth was that fish-tailed fool here in Jasumin with Lorelei too?! Then it hit him. Actually no that was the water moving around that smacked him in the face. It was that gibbering fool of a loon who had accosted him from arriving at Endapano posthaste. As his anger was rising, he took note of a glaring contradiction. This was supposed to be an old memory, far back before he had made his place in the Highlands. That meant everything he was feeling, seeing, hearing–wasn't real. He was still in Purgatory.

A wry smirk crept over his face. "…What a dirty little trick. And to think I'd let them pull the wool over my eyes." Unbeknownst to Vicyeth, she had just helped him out of being trapped in an endless groundhog day loop of reliving moments of his life. Funny how she managed to achieve this in ignorance. The illusion dissolved, leaving only the water which was probably from the flopping fool. He had seen her conjure waves of water when they were back in the ruin. Lorelei and the golden glow of Jasumin Lake dissipated, returning to the empty blackness of the circle's true form. A little less irritated by her rudeness earlier, he replied. "So you do remember. I didn't take anything, I'll have you know. I had more urgent matters at hand, so I left all of it for you." Not that he needed any of the treasure when the potential disaster of a riot in Endapano was looming overhead.

During Gerard's dialogue she was making spit bubbles with that signature fish/cross eye look on her face, nothing out of the ordinary for her really since looking like an idiot was like a dayjob for her. After he was done talking she visibly processed his work, her head almost produced the sound of an outdated dell computer. "But treasure? I couldnt fit it all in my bag! Now we need to go back to get the rest!" She whined at Gerard with that high voice of her that could break glass in the good way if she had more text than "REE". While one's mind could open a theory on how to get her into opera without drowning the audience and forgetting the script and go with whatever pops up in her mind wich could turn drama into comedy she suddenly jumped up and jumped around with her newest gift she has gotten from her other friend. "Look what Sylvia gave me! It's a staff to cast spells and make me into a wizard!" She cheerfully shouted while waving a mop around wich was fitting seeing how she usually used water based spells. But the thought alone of Vicyeth wielding an actual wizard staff or her being actually powerfull in general was nightmare inducing at best. And speaking of nightmares, it was about evident that she would stick along with Gerard through this hellpit. And as undesirable of company as she was, perhaps her ability to summon a litteral rogue wave and her ability to heal could be usefull as looping memories definetly werent the only threat ahead…

Gerard visibly cringed and covered his ears as the high-pitched noise was like nails on a chalkboard. It was even worse for him than for other people due to his hearing sensitivity, and he was inclined to smack her over the head for that. "What do you mean 'we'? You're going back to get it, not me. I'm not going back in there again! It was a headache trying to get out, I'm not putting myself through a second run." That sound which had come from her mouth was almost as bad as Lorelei attempting to hit a high note–minus everything shattering.  So that was why he disliked her so much; she had too much in common with a certain blonde someone who also had a habit of not leaving him alone. Why was it always the imbeciles that were drawn to him?

Then the fish-folk fool began brandishing a mop like a banner-bearer waving their colors. He had to step backwards and keep at least one hand up so it wouldn't hit him in the face. She claimed it was a staff, when it obvious was a ratty cleaning tool. "Stop waving that around! Who knows where that thing has been?! Don't you dare even think about letting that filthy rag on the end touch my face or I will make you eat it." 'Wizard staff' his foot–she'd likely put someone's eye out with her wanton flailing.Which, if directed properly would be beneficial as opposed to detrimental. If he could get her to actually follow directions, that is. As Gerard walked briskly ahead of Vicyeth, he saw only an endless blackness stretching around in either direction. Were they even going anywhere instead of walking in circles? The entrance to the next Circle had to be somewhere.

As he continued on he swore he saw the image of a small ghostly figure flicker out of the corner of his eye. He was hallucinating. Yes definitely hallucinating. The illusions were gone, so he didn't see anything. The only thing here was him and that mop-wielding buffoon and that was all. Just the two of them, alone. The bard convinced himself that it was just a trick of the mind and nothing more. To further ingrain his rationalizing, he took out his violin and began playing to keep those other thoughts at bay.

Vicyteh stayed close to Gerard as her friend Lorelei wasnt here after all wich saddened her a bit if that was even possible. Not that it was very visible as she was still overjoyed to see Gerard. Happy and bubbly as usual, there would be something extremely wrong if she wasnt smiling. Like now, there was a big shadow cast over the two ad Vicyeth had a terrified expression on her face. And there is NOTHING more terrifying than Vicyeth legit scared by seomthing. Upon turning around Gerard could see a reincarnation of the massive knight creature that almost squashed them last time. This time though, the random response generator that acted as Vicyeth's brain chose to be scared of it now. WIth a loud REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE She grabbed Gerard and tried to run from the knight, a surprisingly sensible thing to do.

Then she started screeching in his ears, and the sound was driving him up the wall. Out of patience he yelled at her, "What is it now you shrieking–AGHH!" His anger turned to terror as he caught sight of what was making her scream and shoved Vicyeth away, pushing himself backwards as well–just in time for both of them to dodge the stone contraption's downswing. "Oh you've got to be kidding me?! First the lake, now this too?!" He cried as he scrambled to his feet and started running. This was like some awfully constructed joke about being haunted by one's past, minus the joking part with lethal implications. Running as fast as his legs could carry him, he was hollering at the top of his lungs: "It's not real, it's not real! It's just an illusion! IT'S JUST AN ILLUSION!" Meanwhile behind them the thundering footsteps of the stone guardian shook the immediate area. 

This one had appeared after he had dispelled the mock-up of Jasumin Lake, therefore if he didn't cause it to disappear maybe it would 'stick' with this one until they could reach the exit to the Second Circle. Gerard was hoping he was right, or else it was only going to get more crowded with phantoms of yesteryear. As much as he tried to convince himself it wasn't real, the lumbering footsteps sounded more than that. Hopefully Vicyeth was getting out of harm's way too. 

It seemed the contraption recognized both of them and chased them down with a personal vendetta for being defeated last time. "REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE RUN FASTER. HE'S STILL ANGRY AT US BUT AGAIN THIS TIME!!! REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE" She shrieks almost into Gerard's ear. The thought of going on a journey with a screeching Vicyeth almost made getting crushed under the boots of the giant metal monstrosity the better option. The beast seemed to be genuine however as he seemed to crash into the environment of the hellish pits wich slowed him down, this gave the mermoron and the bard a little more space to run away from it. Luckily the contraption despite it's size didnt improve on athletics.

Gerard was still maintaining the distance between him and the phantom construct as he scanned for any signs of an exit or alternatively that ghostly figure he swore he'd seen just out of the corner of his peripheral vision. He began to think of the riddle the goddess of Death had spoken when the people of Adeluna cried out in supplication. 'Defeat the the Pale Death and find your Gods.' That was the first line out of the ten the Harbinger had given. It had to hold some kind of significance, some kind of answer in solving Purgatory's quirk. The stomping slowed its pace, but he still threw a nervous glance over his shoulder. So they had to defeat the 'Pale Death' in order to leave… But what were they supposed to do? He was very sure that this metal monstrosity was not what they were looking for. The next half told them to find their gods. This was more easier to guess. It meant to show actual belief as opposed to being atheistic or agnostic. But how was that supposed to combine with defeating this 'Pale Death' in granting them passage into the next Circle of Infernos?

Again Vicyeth screeched in fear of their persistent pursuer, but this time Gerard was going to test his previous theory. "Can you conjure up that wave again like you did last time?" He shouted at the merfolk. "If my memory serves correctly, if this contraption was created based on our memories of that previous fight–then it should still fall if we use the same strategy!" Their own minds would now be used for them instead of against them, he hoped.