On the main continent of Halrverold.
In a remote and shadowy cave. A large fire burned at the center of the massive stony room lighting up the entire area with its flickering light while filling everyone’s noses with smoke as it slowly filtered out through small cracks in the stone ceiling.
Over 100 differently dressed and armored people sat near the fire or leaning against the stone wall waiting for something to happen.
Several of those waiting seemed to know each other and while not everyone was friends they were all getting along well enough. There were several groups chatting about random things while they waited. These talkative groups were in the minority as the majority of the people stood around with their guard up as they scanned the room for threats from the others or any unknown surprises.
Another hour passed before something new caught their attention. Six dark-robed figures stepped out from different shadowy dark corners of the cavern and silently joined each other. Everyone gathered near the large fire stopped talking and stood up as they eyed the new suspicious people.
The dark robbed figures paid no attention to the gathered people for several minutes as they talked among themselves before abruptly turning around as one and walking over to the person nearest to them, a slim female with flowing blue robes and a thick tome she used to read off her skills.
The six dark-robed figures were silent as they stared at her in a way that made her feel uncomfortable. It was as if they were inspecting a vegetable for sale at a market stall.
An uncomfortable minute passed before the dark-robed figures moved on to the next person, a man with large muscles covered by leather armor. He was no weakling but their gazes made him shift his footing in agitation as he felt as if he was naked before them, not the normal naked but like they had torn his flesh off of his body and were dissecting him with their eyes.
The uncomfortable silent inspections continued for over an hour and a half with over a third of the gathered people coming under the inspection of the dark-robed figures.
After passing over a third of the gathered people the lead dark-robed figure that had been at the front of the group pointed to a muscular male that was over 6ft tall and was wearing a full heavy set of silver armor used by knights.
The large man had a head that looked like it was one size too small for his large body but he gave off an honorable and trustworthy feeling. He was currently surrounded by several others who had been trying to curry favor with him before the dark-robed figures had spooked them into silence.
The muscular knight said nothing and only stared back at the odd-robed figure that was pointing at him. The rest of the dark-robed figures’ hooded heads all silently nodded as they grabbed the hand of each other and began to chant loudly in an ancient language that no one else in the cave understood.
With the chants growing louder and louder the shadows from the firelight grew more restless. Everyone gathered near the fire was captivated by the odd light show that the fire and shadows were producing. Some of the images were lifelike, odd, and or extremely disturbing.
Over a minute passed before the shadows burst out from the stone floor, walls, and ceiling and pierced through the over 100 bodies of those gathered in the cave. Those pierced by the shadows were killed in an instant not allowing any time for them to respond.
The shadowy cavern was filled with bright bursts of light as each of the bodies disappeared into thousands of light fragments.
When the bright flashing lights faded away only the tall knight that stood before the 6 dark robed figures survived. He did not look spooked or scared at the sight of such a powerful attack wiping out everyone else and instead had a smile on his face. He knew what it meant for him to be the only one alive.
He had been chosen!
“Your name?” asked the lead dark-robed figure who had a calm and old husky male voice.
“Ualtar, guild leader of Demon Hunters!” said Ualtar with a polite bow toward the six odd-robed figures in front of him.
“You have been chosen to become the sacred vessel we have been looking for,” said a playful childlike voice that caused Ualtar to be unable to tell if the voice was male or female.
Ualtar seemed to be only half listening as he was distracted by something in the air that the dark-robed figures could not see. The six standing in front of him knew of the oddities that these ‘Demigods’ had power over and were not surprised by his absent-mindedness.
They waited several seconds before Ualtar snapped out of whatever was distracting him and returned his full attention to the dark-robed figures in front of him.
“So what do I get out of this?” asked Ualtar.
“We will make you the most powerful being in the entire world!” said a fiery female voice who seemed angry whenever she spoke.
“So you mean I will be receiving extremely rare and one-of-a-kind Armor and weapons that only I can use?”
“That and more,” said the husky voice.
“Well, I am lucky this time!”
“Since you already agreed to come here and have been chosen by us, you are not allowed to back out of this agreement!” said the angry female.
“Don’t worry I will wholeheartedly do whatever you need me to do to gain the power that you were talking about!”
“Then come with us. We must leave this area before any of those failures return and try to meddle with the proceedings. We must also prepare you for the ritual!” said the childish voice.
Ualtar happily followed the Dark robed figures into the shadows full of happiness and anticipation!
He had unlocked a class change mission for a super secret class!
From all that he had seen so far, this was not like any of the other secret class change quests he had heard about. He had personally talked with a few guild members of the Demon hunters who had gone through simple quest chains to receive their new classes.
Most, if not all of these secret classes were minor offshoots of the main classes or specialized life skill classes. They did not interest Ualtar so he had stayed with his basic Knight class.
This right now was something big and different! He could feel it in his bones.
‘Hopefully, the new class is still a melee one and not all that different from what I am used to…’ thought Ualtar as he was swallowed by the shadows of the cave and whisked away to some unknown destination.
With the last occupants of the cavern gone the roaring fire was extinguished leaving the cave dark, quiet, and smokey.
***
Elsewhere on the Halrverold continent each of the human kingdoms were in discussions with their ministers, councilmen, and statesmen.
They were all worried about the large influx of rowdy Demigods and were all trying to figure out what to do with them.
“Should we use them for our own goals?”
“Can we just kill them all and rid ourselves of them?”
“If they die enough times will they leave us alone and go somewhere else?”
“We must do something before they cause problems!”
Such similar discussions were being held in each kingdom.
They all had proper cause to worry as many of their smaller towns had larger populations of demigods than their original human occupants! This was causing havoc on their economies and the supplies of the villages and towns making for many headaches for those in charge.
That was not even the worst of it. The different factions of Demigods were always getting into fights with each other causing damage and even the destruction of several buildings in the towns.
Some even caused the death of a few townsfolk in their wild fights!
Most of these demigod factions restrained themselves and did not try to kill the townsfolk as it would lower their reputation with the town and the kingdom which it was in which would make their life harder.
Still, there were always those crazy people who did not care about what others thought about them, and did whatever they wanted including killing whoever they wanted whether it was a normal villager or a mayor of the town!
What was even worse was the recent trend that had started in many of the large cities where there were more and more demigods and their different factions flocking to their gates wanting to buy or rent buildings.
If the rulers did not do something about this issue the large cities would also be swamped by all the same problems that the small towns had been going through!
