. There were booths in which and everyone an elf was sat. Up to the booths were lines of different creatures, waiting to do whatever they did here. The whole booth area was lower down than the platform he stood. The platform followed the lining of the wall, a barrier in black metal, cleverly forged, kept visitors from falling. Loads of doors were scattered with an equal distance. Noah happened to see that one of the doors held a cabin just like the one behind him. He understood that they must be the only way in. In the middle of the platform a big black door was placed, it was raised a bit on a higher platform. The wall with the platform was arced like a bow and on the straight wall holding the room together a huge window was placed; it stretched from floor to roof, built up by three stretched out arches side by side, the middle one a bit bigger than the other two. There were bars of black wood holding the room up. They were placed across the roof and from the roof to the floor. Everywhere he could see elves. Everyone was incredibly beautiful and elegant. There were others fictional creatures, like Centaurs, Ferries and Taurus’s. There were creatures with the upper body like a human and legs and wings like an eagle. They were called Alans. There were creatures first mistaken for centaurs by Noah but later he saw that the animal part of the creature was the body of a lion, Lamias. He vaguely remembered reading something about them being evil and being able to drain people from knowledge, but what would people from another world know? Other kinds of creatures moved in the room, but they were near impossible to explain. Noah followed in the footsteps of Gayhla while he tried not to stare at the people filling the spaces. His eyes fell upon a Lamia with golden locks cascading down her pale back. He could see she had nothing on her torso. The teenage boy in him had obviously not been forgotten back in the small house in England… Her face was symmetrical and her lips full. When she turned her head she smiled at him. The smile held small hints of possession but she was so stunningly beautiful that it passed by Noah. He smiled back, but the smile didn’t last long since his head hit the hard floor. Captivated by her beauty he had stumbled when the floor was slightly raised. Quiet laughs were spread through the room. The Lamia who had caused the action raised her hand to her mouth to try to cover the laugh escaping her mouth. Noah stood up; quickly following Gayhla through the black wooden door she had opened. He could see she had a hard time holding her laugh in. Inside the room were a desk and a throne like chair. On the wall behind hung a big map, Noah assumed it was over the seventh world. On both of the short sides were bookshelves. In the chair sat an elf with black hair and eyes just as black. His skin was white as the skin of a doll.

“Amrod” Gayhla tried to get the males attention.

He looked up, smiled and rose to greet the arrived guests. He took one of Noah’s hands in his both. His black eyes darted Noah’s green.

“So here you are at last. The chosen one.” He turned his to Gayhla with a teasing smile. “And you are sure this time?”

“Yes” She answered, glaring at him, not really able to hide her smile. “The sign showed itself when he told me his name”

“Really?” He seemed truly surprised. “I thought the story of the sign were just stories…” He turned around, thoughtfully walking around the desk.

The small conversation the elves had made Noah think a bit. Where he came from the elves and centaurs were only stories but obviously they existed so what would stop this story of the sign from being true? The irony was clear. And what did he mean by asking if Gayhla was sure “this time”? Had others attempted this quest but failed? Where had they been from? Would Noah succeed? Was he going to join the others on the other side?

“Why would that story be a myth when your ‘chosen one’ is from a world where all of you are myths?” He surprised himself by asking completely comfortably. His question had brought the elves to deep thinking.

“Well… Uhm… I guess you have a point there.” Amrod met Gayhla’s eyes. They seemed a bit too surprised for Noah to feel good about the idea.

“And while on the questioning subject, what did you mean by ‘are you sure this time’?” Noah asked starting to loose temper out of all the secrets kept from him.

“Ever since the orchs captured the great black dragon and the fight between us developed, three different fighters have attempted to set her free to regain the balance between good and evil. The great black dragon was the leader of all other dragon species and for as long as no one threatened her or tried to possess her treasures she ordered that the other dragons left the rest of the creatures in peace, well in the measure they could to survive. But when the orchs attacked her and captivated her chaos followed. Some of the dragons joined the evil side since they thought that the Great Black had chosen that path, while others understood what had happened and joined us in the quest to set her free. All of our questers have tried but the tasks on the journey defeated them all.”

Noah didn’t know how to react. Everyone had died doing what he was now set out to do. Would he succeed? And if he did, what nightmares would haunt him?