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"How can we win against that?" Xanthy clawed at her hair. The Arbotro's words about the Heiress and the Sovereign being able to cast pure magic still echoed in her head. "Perhaps it's a good thing that I was never there"
The being waved its slender hand at the glowing screen. It changed to a familiar scene. "I wouldn't think so. The Sovereign and the Heiress are now terrorizing both sides of the island, entering into an unofficial war with each other and among its citizens."
Xanthy raked her eyes at the scene before her. It's of a mountain but now it's razed clean, with smoke rising on one side. What happened here? "This is Narfalk just a few hours after you came here," the being said. "Synketros burned it to the ground after Rikavien Torlin and Elred Valkalin dared to go against the Sovereign."
"How many died?" Xanthy picked at her lips.
"Thousands. "About one-third of the Varichria population. Most of them ended up here without even knowing the reason why they had to die."
Xanthy's chest constricted. The being waved its hand on the screen again. The image changed to a scene closer to Xanthy's heart. Depandes. Cyrdel's city. Except it was wrecked without mercy. The circular buildings were knocked to rubble, the Palace itself mauled, and the walls around it stained red with flecks of clay and something darker painting it.
"This is Alkara a few weeks before Narfalk met their destruction," the being turned its luminous head towards the screen. "The Sovereign conquered their territory and used the brownies as the main workers in its mass production of dwarven weapons."
The scene changed to that of Drodham. A single temple stood tall over the crown of the mountain, its shields glowing and active. Even from afar, Xanthy could see the Rekshais swinging their weapons. "This is Carleon amid the Sovereign's onslaught," the Abrotro's voice bled through the muffled sounds of struggle conjured up by Xanthy's brain after having been there once. "They are the only territory resisting the Sovereign's rule. It is only a matter of time before they fall. The shields are weakening. Ezril Iaro is too."
Before Xanthy could speak, the screen flickered to show a cramped room full of fairies of different races—pixies, shard fairies, brownies, banshees, varichriais—all shoulder to shoulder with each other. They were dirty, scrawny, and their eyes were empty. Xanthy knew all too well what this scene was.
They were slaves and prisoners, captured from the destroyed territories, stored in these rooms like cattle waiting to be butchered. It's disgusting. Horrifying. Vile. Xanthy's wrists hurt from clenching her hands so hard. She stared at them and saw that her nails dug deep into her palms. She didn't even know she was doing it.
"And the humans?" Xanthy's eyes didn't stray from the screen. "What happened to them?"
The scene changed to that of a plump boy lounging on a throne, eating meat from a dagrine leg. "The human king allied himself to the Sovereign even before Synketros marched in and laid waste," the being said. "I don't know if that's wise. He promised the whole of the human army and the rest of the humans to fight for the Sovereign. If they refuse, his own citizens will be gutted in the streets."
