He turned to the door, taking a deep breath. That door represented everything. Everything he had gone through to get to that point, the pain, the loss of Faalken, the fear and hate and sadness and worry. They were about to end. Beyond that door was his goal, his end, the last obstacle. The end of the Questing Game stood beyond that door. But there was one more challenge to face, one more battle to fight. And from the sound of it, it would be the fight of his life. A fight for his life, where absolutely everything hung in the balance.

The game would end, one way or another. Either he would succeed and gain the book, or he would die at the hands of the monster that defended it. One way or another, it was about to end.

He knew fear. He had faced Shiika, and he had lost. This Demon was supposedly even more powerful than she was. But his fear was not as strong as his sense of duty, his obedience. He had lost Faalken to this mad quest, and he would not dishonor the memory of his treasured friend. The Goddess had tasked him to find that book, and he would find it, he would take it. No matter what. And that meant no matter what.

Duty was honor, and the cost of that honor was blood.

Honor and Blood.

The fear retreated, replaced by a terrible resolve. He raised his bloodstained sword, feeling it in his grip, trusting in it. It was bane to Demonkind, it would give him the only weapon he would possess against whatever laid beyond that door. He was beyond pain, beyond weariness. There was only his duty now, and it supplanted his anger. This wasn't about Shiika anymore. This was about making the Goddess proud of him, of doing her bidding, of winning the game for her. This was about duty.

This was about a beautiful little girl named Janette, whose very future hinged on whether or not he succeeded. A beautiful little girl, with a heart of gold, who had saved his life. A little girl to whom he owed everything.

Now it was time to repay that debt.

Bloodied, battered, exhausted, emotionally drained by what he had done, Tarrin faced that door without fear. The Goddess was with him.

They would face this together.

He padded up to the door. It was simple, unassuming, a simple wooden door with a rusty chain holding it shut. But it was cold to the touch, like the cold of a Wraith. Hooking the chain with his claws, he broke the rusted obstacle easily, twisting it apart, and then he pushed the door open carefully and slowly, exposing the chamber beyond.

It was very large. Very large. Nearly a hundred spans long, and it looked to be almost perfectly circular. There was a single light in the room, coming from the ceiling, surprisingly bright to his dark-attuned eyes, making him blink to adjust them to the increased light from inside the room. It was devoid of decoration, of furniture, save a small dais in the exact center of the room, a dais that supported a simple iron stand, upon which rested a large book. A very unassuming book, with a black leather binding and a simple metal lock keeping it closed. The light above shone down direcly upon the dais, bookstand, and book, as if to showcase them to any who entered.

He had finally reached the Book of Ages.

Trying not to let his impatience get the best of him, he looked into the room without stepping inside. It was empty, only the circular walls of grayish stone, the light that seemed to come from the top of a domed ceiling, and the dais and its stand and the book on top of it. There was no indication that there was a guardian lurking within the chamber, not a scent, not a rustle of air, not a whisper of sound. The chamber was empty. There it was, the Book of Ages, and it looked like there was nothing between him and it but fifty spans of empty air.

He knew that that was far from reality.

There was no sense in standing outside and waiting. There was no way around this. He would have to face this Demon sooner or later, and the longer he waited, the more of a chance that fear would gnaw into his resolve. Gripping his sword tightly, Tarrin lifted his foot and sent it over the threshold, then set it down onto the stone of the chamber.

Nothing happened.

Stepping completely into the chamber, his every sense keenly aware of the slightest change to his surroundings, Tarrin began to slowly and carefully walk towards the book. He was ready, even expecting, an attack. There was no telling if it knew he was there, or he simply hadn't gotten close enough to the book to trigger a response.

His ears twitched. There was a sound now… very faint, very far. Like the hum of a gnat's wings. He stood up and turned his head this way and that, trying to track the source of that sound, and it became louder and louder. The faint hum turned into a rhythmic buzzing sound as it approached, the sound of large chitinous wings beating at the air.

No! Not now!

Sarraya's form simply wavered into view just as the Faerie passed by him, her wings buzzing in his ears. She flew quickly and arrow-straight towards the podium, towards the book, unaware of the danger into which she had just placed herself.

"Sarraya, NO! " he screamed suddenly, raising his sword, lunging after her.

The room darkened when Sarraya reached the midpoint, and the shadows seemed to coalesce, to gather into a form immediately in front of the dais holding the book. She pulled up into a hover and watched in shock as the shadows melded, merged, and solid form replaced the immaterial darkness, a form that caused Sarraya to scream in terror.

Tarrin was absolutely awestruck. How horrifying!

It was nearly fifteen spans tall, twice as tall as Tarrin, formed more or less like a humanoid. It was unclothed, covered with patchy, manged fur of a rust color. Its body was thin, but it was most certainly powerful, for its wiry body was defined and sleek. It had four arms, two small ones sprouting directly from its chest, ending in clawed hands. The other set, where they should be, ended in clawed pincers that looked like tusks attached to flesh, the claws as long as he was tall, the insides of them covered with sharp ridges and spines to injure trapped prey. The tips of those pincer-tusks nearly dragged the ground, so long were its arms and its pincers. Its head was that of a dog, a frothing maw with glowing red eyes above, and goat's horns atop its canine skull.

It roared, a sound of utter darkness, of pure evil, and Sarraya turned and tried to flee from it mindlessly. Tarrin rushed forward to protect his tiny friend, ready to face this monster, to distract it so she could get away, but he could run fast enough.

With a raised pincer-arm, the Demon smashed Sarraya like a bug, sending her tiny body catapulting to the side, all the way to the wall. Her multicolored wings shattered when she slammed into the wall back first, bouncing off of it and falling limply to the floor, surrounded by tiny fragments of what had once been her beautiful wings as they drifted to the ground in sparkling spirals.

She did not move.

"No! NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! " Tarrin shrieked, his eyes igniting from within with the unholy greenish aura that marked his fury. Not again! He would not lose another friend! He would not! Abandoning rational thought, abandoning fear, abandoning care, Tarrin threw himself into his rage, raised his bestial half to its highest state, a state where the need to destroy overrode even the instinct to survive. Tarrin raised his weapon and literally leaped at the horrifying monster before him, unafraid of it, unconcerned that he was overmatched. There was nothing but the need to destroy.

The creature met his charge without concern, but that nonchalance evaporated when it raised one of its pincer-arms to catch the airborne Were-cat, and got the bottom claw of its pincer sliced off as the Were-cat got within reach. Tarrin literally landed on top of its extended arm, leaping from it with madness in his eyes, flying right into the monster's face with his sword held high over his head. He brought the weapon down in a savage overhanded chop, a chop that would split the monster's head clean in half-