The voidness that blanketed the world seemed like hell for most. Deprived of their basic feelings of love and happiness, the people afflicted were no better than corpses. Well, except for that at least the latter got to rest. Aimless and lost little sheep they were and yet Asher loved every single moment of it. The taste of despair flickered against his tongue as he drew closer to the camp where those capable of fighting gather like rodents when danger was afoot. He knew not what was being planned out, but he had several hunches over with that spire not too far. It unnaturally stood against the rest of its surroundings. Hidden beneath a tattered cloak, he continued down the route and made it to the foot of the camp where one of the guards greeted him so kindly.

Flash a light smile across his face, he pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket. “I was to deliver this to the camp from Ejgora. My lord has sent for reinforces to rendezvous with the rest of you. This explains it in further detail.” When the guard reached for the note, Asher stood by, waiting for the absolute moment when their fingers fell upon it. His excitement filled to the brim right as he took hold of the man’s arm and pulled him in. Before a sound could be made, his fangs dug right into the throat and slowly process the memories that were locked away into his own mind. He learned a good deal, especially when it came to the reason why the plight was occurring. The precious little goddess was dying from the eldritch, oh woe was this world indeed. He savored the blood for a few more moments longer than he should have before he reeled his head back and took a good chunk of flesh out Spitting it out, he pulled the dying man’s body away into the treeline. Gods, the sound of gurgling blood was thrilling for him.

Asher ripped at his own cloak and wiped his face clean of it before dropping it on his victim. Whatever these fools were planning, he didn’t really care. Should they all perish, then he would welcome oblivion with open arms. If they saved themselves from this, then it would only lead to him having more fun in this realm until he was the only one left. He already deduced that he’d win no matter what happened. He ventured into the camp as if nothing happened, his eye ever watching and his motives unclear from most that crossed his path. Even if they found the dead body, it would be like finding a needle in a haystack in order to locate the murderer here.

The forces of Light were out in the tent city themselves, though they had set up in one area together more or less away from the rest of the people. Even still those who were healers helped wherever they were needed, setting aside any possible bias they might have for anyone they found themselves healing. This was a situation where differences had to be put aside for the sake of the lands, even if deep down some of these people Sirona would just as soon leave for dead to remove their sin from the world.

Perhaps another time.

For now, Lady Glory and her clergy were busy getting things ready for their push into the wastes to the Spire. Admittedly Lady Glory had shown up perhaps a bit later than expected to help, mostly because she had been dealing with her own issues in Onnen were things weren’t that much better. She wasn’t at full force here either, between leaving people at the Cathedral to keep an eye on things and to look after those suffering from the draining affects of whatever was going on, Sirona was down to less than a third of usual people. They had been hit hard, but Sirona knew her clergy were well trained to handle thing, she had faith in them as they had faith in her and the Light, it was part of their Strength.

So it was horrible news that came when one of Sirona’s scouts who were wondering the area of the camp keeping an eye on things came to her with a report of a dead body. The body lay just outside the camp, though still within the protective barrier, with its throat torn out. ”Stay here and keep an eye on everyone, I’ll go investigate. This is the kind of Sin and Evil that we need to cleanse from these lands, it has gone on too long.” She blinked into a ball of light and sped away leaving her clergy to look after their area.

Sirona appeared again near the corpse and it was a grisly sight indeed. Inspecting the corpse Sirona sighed, vampire, the body had been almost drained of blood before the throat had been torn out. Beside Sirona appeared her Light elemental, a griffon of pure golden light with large wings like Sirona’s. Sirona looked to it and placed a hand on its muzzle, it was about twelve feet tall so it had to lower its head a bit. ”Go, hunt this beast so that we may destroy it.” Sirona instructed and the elemental huffed and turned to dash into the camp, meanwhile Sirona opened her wings and took into the air to make a slow over head survey of the place.

So many new people, so many new experiences for him to delve in. It was like a buffet that he could feed on literally in this cramped area. They swarmed about, believing that they could end the realm’s current woes and to him, it didn’t matter which way the judgment swung. He lived for the now and the now was speaking to obliterate as much as he could. Asher though was a patient man, or at least enough to explore some more before he started doing what he did best.

To most, he’d seemed ordinary and reeked of poverty. He kept the hood of his tattered clack over his head as he made his way towards the healer’s tent. The blood memories made him recall that the redhead goddess was in a tent of her own, busy with working on a solution for the spire. He’d have to make sure to avoid her at all cost lest he’d have his fun to come to an abrupt end.

No, no that simply wouldn’t do. Not when he just got here. But he had to wonder if someone had stumbled about the body just yet. It was an aching thought but one necessary as he pondered to turn heel and check himself. Asher decided against it and take his chances. Who cared if some random guard died? There were plenty of lackeys that could easily feel the void. To that, he let out a dark chuckle among himself.

“Hey, what’s so funny?”

He ceased a little to turn and see some man in armor, arms folded tightly. “Get serious now, there’s a battle to be thought for the sake of our realm. We don’t need runts like you carrying on like this is some sort of play.”

“Play?” The word echoed in his head several times as it flowed from his mouth repeatedly. “Play? Play. Play, play, play, play, play.” His smirk grew widely as his demented mind explored the possibility. All caution was thrown out the window by now. “Why yes, this is a play and you didn’t make the cut. Sorry, try again later.”

The knight was growing agitated and moved to step forward when he felt something clawing violently against his mind. In pain, he screamed out and others turned to see what was going on. Asher, though, merely looked on with a crazed smile across his lips before turning away. “He’s right. This is a play.” There was a very bad vide about him; even if the people didn’t see what he did, they felt as though he must have done something to the poor knight as he crumbled onto the ground. His mind being assaulted ruthlessly until he was left without a thought in his mind.

Broken.

“Oh boy, now I’ve done it!” The giggles couldn’t be contained for long on his person as he picked up a torch and without care, chuckled it onto one of the camps that tended to the freshly wounded to set it aflame.

At the sound of the scream from the man, Sirona’s elemental turned and loped into that direction. The distance it had to travel made it arrive just as Asher was walking away, so the elemental padded over to the man, using its mental connection to Sirona, still in the air, to let her know what had happened. The elemental stepped back to let others help the stricken man and looked around.

Meanwhile, in the air, Sirona wheeled around to head to where her elemental was. As she was closing in smoke from the fire started to rise from the wounded tent. Eyes widening the angel folded her wings and dropped like a stone to land near the tent as the fire started to rage and people were yelling. Having no need to fear being burned Sirona dove into the tent and started to quickly but carefully bring the wounded out one at a time. She brought them to waiting healers while others started to work on making sure the fire didn’t spread. Sirona would help with that but only after everyone was out of the tent.

While Sirona worked her elemental had picked up on Asher’s scent and had spotted him near the scene as well. Without a lot of trying to hide the light elemental started to follow in the direction that Asher was heading in.