Lady Maria stood shoulder to shoulder with the man about to be executed, her hazy eyes drooped like a water-logged dog. Cracked lips and sunken cheeks darkened the ghost white skin. Her hands coldly held the poor man’s face up towards the light. Her nails gently passing under his chin, leaving a lasting tingle across his neck and scalp.

  “Goddess let this poor soul embrace your ever loving arms,” Lady Maria said whilst clasping her hands together, a pillar of light erupted. Sent through the tunnel, connected to the pillars of time and space. There the man landed in a body slightly more youthful than his previous one. Behind he could hear the soft shudder of waves, water reaching onto the shore. Agape, Abhilash clenched his fist into tight knots, he was reborn.

  “I have been given another chance,” Abhilash said with grey eyes. His voice was gruff for his newly obtained youth. “Now where to begin…”

  “Another murder, Westaer, seriously that place is the pits,” Caitos murmured. Caitos was a lavishly dressed man, garments of a high-guard, gold wrapped in purples and reds. A velvet cloak with Dagani leather boots, cuff-links hand crafted from the northern plains. His hair was of a muted olive, however scary his eyes, he was still rather of forgettable facial feature.

  “That’s just how it is…” Raido replied.

  “As glum as ever, has Lord Hauke abandoned you yet?”

  “Not quite,” Raido said without disturbance in his documentation.

  “Anyhow, will you be the one to cover this one, I doubt any of the lords wanna bother with this one?”

  “Grade it for me…”

  “At worst it's a B, can’t imagine it going over. It’s only two cases…hmm, actually, look at this.”

  Glancing over, Raido’s eyes opened wide, straining his brows. “Are you sure that’s the photo for this case? Do we really not have any lords available?”

  “I bet we do, but like I said, which of them would want to take such a small case. I retract my statement on the difficulty. Finding the culprit is one thing considering the ongoing pyromaniac, but the combat ability of this one might be out of our ranks.”

  “I agree, to create such destruction, something is off about it though.”

  Caitos feigned ignorance. “What do you mean?”

  “Look at the bottom left corner…”

  “Hmm, what about… My god, this… Ya, I don’t get it.”

  “It’s not the work of someone who has tapped into a pillar.”

  Caitos grew somewhat suspicious, but held his thoughts before asking. “How do you know?”

  “What are the elements primarily associated with the pillars? Although I don’t know the truth behind them, we understand the bare principles without having access to them ourselves. Wind or Air, Fire, Earth, Wood, Water, and Metal. These five are the primary elements acted upon by those who have access to a pillar. Of course there are specialty ones, and exceptions to even those, but all correlate to one aspect, and that is?”

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  Caitos took a moment to think for once, he was beginning to see the vision Raido was piecing. “This can’t be the work of someone who has access to a pillar because it breaks a fundamental rule, physics, as well as functional range.”

  “Exactly, out of all the weird and unnatural powers known in the agency, none have been able to break the rules of physics. Some create the illusion, but I have never heard of the ability to make something like that. Especially when there was surely a searcher on sight, the culprit couldn’t have been close, and yet somehow their effect upon the land lingered.”

  “Raido…I get what you're thinking, but there is one fault with your hypothesis, and that is, that this is just a photo. That rock and how it seems to be behaving with the environment, as well as the warping of the photo surely mean something, but it's so subtle… I can’t warrant it more than a hunch.”

  “No you are right, at best it is a hunch, but I have been getting a lot of those lately. Something has begun to run a course of damage that I’m worried we can’t fix.”

  “How do you suppose?”

  “When was the last time you saw a water pillar user?” Raido asked with grieving eyes.

  “It’s rare enough to find someone who has had even a glimpse of a pillar. To ask when the last water… Scratch that, it sounds ridiculous. Raido be more clear, what are you trying to say?”

  “I’m saying, the pillars are dying… I think Gehenna is itching to open.”

  “Hahahaha! Oh goodness, Raido you really believe in those scary stories? That’s campfire shams, stuff your mother tells you so you clean your room. Nonsense, Raido, perhaps…have you been having some bad dreams?”

  “…”

  “If that’s the case, come let us drink the night away, sitting at these stuffy desks won’t keep you sharp.”

  The two exited the agency’s building ready to seize the night, as Caitos put it, until the two saw a grey figure in the short distance.

  “I can’t last much longer, this was truly retribution, he has been chasing me. He’s half man, no… Can you even call him a man?” Abhilash groaned.

  “A drunk? In these parts?” Caitos questioned. Raido guarded up as he could see the invisible light, like a hollow tunnel, it funneled its way into the stars. A ‘pillar’. Raido thunk before charging after the man. “Raido! What—” In less than a second, a hole appeared, hollowing Caitos. He fell back without time to stay conscious, the light faded as fast as the realization set in. Raido had no time to panic as his body lashed itself with black flame, a torrent of death marred Abhilash.

  “So you too… You need to run…” Abhilash said with his final breath.

  “Hah… Hah… Hah…”

  Crunching concrete echoed as a young boy with tanned flesh, starlit eyes in the shape of a Selachimorphav’s. Frazzled black hair shagged down his neck as he held a long fishing pole, more so a rod with fancy line and hook; more of a set piece rather than a useful tool. He too was a tool to many, the boy was Matsya Fartford, or at least his animated corpse for all Raido could tell.

  “How? How are you alive? We solved your case, your body, it was already recovered and buried.”

  “Ya, about that, I don’t know what you're talking about,” the boy replied.

  “Matsya, how are you alive, how are you here?”

  “Let me ask you a question as well, who’s Matsya?”

  “…”

  “My name is Jaromir Trafford, I live on Jesse street right across the bridge at the center of Ontiganel… Hmm, now that I think about it, wasn’t I just in a race on that bridge? So who are you?”

  “Raido…”

  Jaromir grinned like an angel. “Same as my dog.”