Chapter 1: 1 — A Call From the Void

Noah Brown punched his boss in the face. It wasn’t a particularly strong punch, but given his frame and his gift for punching things, the blow still sent the short, balding man falling back a good few feet.

“Y-you punched me!” His boss - Clive - shrieked, clutching his bleeding nose as his face contorted with anger. “Get out! Get the hell out of here! You’re fired!”

Noah ignored his boss’ pathetic screams, bending down to pick up the item that’d caused all the trouble. It was a copper-red coin made of some kind of crystal. Strange characters were engraved onto it. He didn’t spot a single scratch on the item.

“You were going to cut Leah’s pay over this piece of rubbish?” Noah said, his anger rising once again. “Or was it because you knew she needed the money desperately, and you would do anything to take advantage of her?”

Clive’s face continued to drain color, his eyes now darting sideways to the other employees who stood watching the spectacle. No one called the police, or tried to interfere. “It’s not like that! I was merely enforcing discipline…” the man begged.

“You know you can’t call the guards right?” Noah said, his eyes staring firmly into the man’s. “No one, not a single soul standing here would speak up for you.”

He saw Clive’s eyes leave his, to briefly glance at the others standing nearby. No one moved to help the man. Not a friendly gaze in sight for him.

Noah felt disgusted watching the man. He was surprised he’d lasted almost an entire year before he punched the man. In some ways, he was quite impressed by his restraint.

After a brief look towards the warehouse and the rest of its employees, Noah turned away, not finding himself with anything to say to the rest of them.

“Noah! Wait!” A woman shouted. Noah turned back to see Leah running towards him. "Sorry. I just wanted to say, thank you," she panted.

"Don't mention it, Clive had it coming. I was just the deliverer of the smite."

Leah smiled at his words, before her expression settled into one of confusion. “Even so, why did you do that all of a sudden?” she asked. “I’m grateful, but… I’m just surprised I guess.”

Noah looked at Leah. She was twenty four or twenty five, with curly black hair that fell back onto her shoulders. Roughly the same age as he was and most certainly not someone he’d expect to work in a shit hole like this. Noah had tried hitting on her quite often at first in the last month she’d been here, though Leah had never shown any interest.

“I’d been planning it since the day I met Clive,” Noah replied. “I worked under him for an hour and I knew I wouldn’t leave this place without punching that guy at least once. Today just felt like a good day to quit I suppose.”

“Well… thank you. I really needed that money and with Clive constantly looking for reasons to point out mistakes in everything I did and threatening to cut my pay… you’ve saved me a lot of problems Noah. If you don’t mind, let me take you out for coffee, to repay you. Perhaps this Sunday? There’s a cafe I work part-time at.”

Noah looked at Leah, surprised. “A date then?” he asked with a smile.

"As long as you don’t mind if I arrive in my work uniform," Leah replied with a quiet laugh.

“A work date. I like it. I think you already have my number?” Noah asked.

“Yeah, I do,” Leah said, nodding back.

“Sounds good,” Noah said, turning around.

“Oh wait- I also need that coin. That thing still needs to be shipped,” Leah said.

Noah realised he’d never returned the coin back, and dug into his pocket, before taking the thing out and handing it to Leah. A strangle tingling sensation covered his body as he put the coin in Leah's hand. Like something had whispered very quietly in his ears. Noah ignored the feeling.

“Thanks. l’ll see you on Sunday, Noah,” Leah replied.

Noah turned around, walking out. To his surprise, a smile covered his face as he left the warehouse feeling far better than he’d expected to.

***

Any happiness Noah felt was short lived. He sat on a park bench a couple blocks away from his work, as he counted the money he had with him. “Not enough,” he mumbled with a sigh.

The money he had on him would last two weeks at best after paying rent. He needed to find a new job before then. Noah groaned. “I really don’t want to go back to retail.”

It’d been an hour since, and somehow, he didn’t regret it. He was glad, if anything, to be rid of the place. But it also reminded him why he’d taken the job in the first place.

Putting the cash away, he dug in his pocket and pulled out a box of cigarettes he’d bought on his way to the park. He hadn’t smoked in four years, not since the day his mother died. But today, he felt like he could really use one.

Taking out a cigarette and the new lighter he’d bought with the box, Noah put it in his mouth, lighting the end before he took a deep inhale. Acrid smoke filled his lungs and throat, as he felt his worries fly by for a moment.

Noah sat all by himself at the park bench, watching the world pass by through a dense cloud of smoke. His mind kept returning to the events of the morning, but no matter how often he thought about it, he couldn’t bring himself to regret his actions.

“Well, at least I have the date with Leah to look forward to,” Noah said, tossing his cigarette, before reaching for the next one.

His thoughts got interrupted when he saw a strange woman wandering around the park. She was tall, almost as tall as Noah's six foot four, and that alone would be something that’d catch his eye. But the woman only got stranger the more he looked at her.

She wore golden armor that curved around her lithe figure, the cuts revealing a red dress underneath. Little markings were engraved on the armor that flickered and moved, lighting up when they caught the light at the right angle. Her hair was a deep crimson, redder than anything he’d ever seen, and she carried a sword at her waist.

But the strangest thing about her was how beautiful she was. It wasn’t physical beauty, though there was that too, but the woman possessed some kind of draw that made Noah unable to look away.

“I wonder if there’s some kind of convention nearby,” Noah murmured, watching her. What surprised him more than anything was how no one else she walked past even gave the tall woman a side glance.

She seemed to notice Noah looking, as their eyes met. He tried to look away, feeling awkward that she’d caught him staring, but something held his gaze. Her rust red eyes were infinite swirls that captured him, as she began to make her way over.

The armored woman stood right in front of Noah, her eyes not leaving his. For a long minute, the silence held, Noah’s eyes still stuck in her infinite red swirls, when suddenly, she spoke.

“You really can see me.”

The words were not in any language Noah recognised, but somehow, he understood her perfectly.

“If you’re trying to keep people’s eyes off of you, you should really try wearing something else,” he replied.

“My armor is immaterial to this fact. The Veil should keep any creature of this realm from being able to perceive me.”

The dissonance of the woman’s appearance, the fact that he could understand a language he did not even know, and the pull she had were starting to ring alarms in Noah’s mind. Yet, despite that, he couldn’t keep his eyes away from hers.

The woman looked Noah up and down, before her eyes went towards his hands. “You have wisps of extremely powerful mana on your hands. Strong enough to cut through the Veil. How did you get that?”

“Uhh…” Noah blanked, unsure of what to say. Now that his eyes were not stuck staring into hers, Noah couldn’t ignore just how weird the entire situation was.

“You don’t understand. There is something here that  never should’ve arrived in a reality like this one. The Astral space is in chaos, searching for the ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ███████”

An all-encompassing emptiness filled Noah’s ears. He could tell that something was said, that the sound reached his ears but for whatever reason his brain refused to process the sound whatsoever.

The woman in front of him cursed. “The Veil won’t let you hear it. No matter. Tell me, when did you start seeing strange creatures, perhaps little spirits or moving shadows that didn’t look right. Or perhaps others like me,” the woman asked.

“Okay, first of all this is getting very creepy. I can’t even specify how creepy and weird it is. So if this is a dream and I somehow fell asleep on the park bench, I’d really like to wake up now,” Noah said out loud, hoping for something to happen, anything really. “Guess it won’t be that easy huh?”

“Human—“

“Noah. My name is Noah,” he interrupted.

The woman nodded. “Noah. All of this is very real. Think of me as an angel whose job is to protect realities. We exist beyond the Veil, and your kind is not meant to perceive us. But something is happening that is letting you do so. I know this is a lot to accept, but if I do not find what is causing this, then creatures far greater than me will become capable of entering this realm. And if that happens, your reality will cease to exist.”

Noah leaned back on his park bench, closing his eyes. The thought that he could close his eyes even inside a dream weirded him out even further. “This is a lot to take in. And very frankly, I’m taking nothing in at all. I’m far more inclined to believe I’m in a coma or had a seizure or just dreaming, but…” Noah glanced around the park. “I don’t think my brain is capable of making a dream this real. So for now, I’ll bite. What do you want to know so that the world doesn’t end?”

“Hold my hand,” The angel said, extending one hand forward.

Noah raised an eyebrow curiously, but decided to go along with her request. A strange sensation filled him, like something had passed through his entire body instantaneously. A glow lit up in the angel’s red swirling eyes.

“A strange building. Warehouse. The seal resides there. But something is interfering,” the angel said, before glancing down at Noah. “Can you take me there?” The angel asked.

“My workplace? Former workplace, anyway,” Noah asked, looking at the angel’s face with a strange expression. "Alright sure, why not. I don’t see anyone else saving the world from inevitable doom anyway,” Noah replied. If he was already mad enough to hallucinate, then he may as well show his hallucination around for a while. It helped that she was dead gorgeous.

The angel smiled, as Noah got up from the park bench, making his way out with her in tow. “I wonder if I’ve got some kind of stockholm syndrome. If this is a dream, then I’m not sure what it says about me that I’m going right back to that shitty place,” he wondered out loud.

“It’s not a dream,” the angel said.

“Angels don’t exist on earth outside of dreams and Japanese porn,” Noah replied with a shrug. He noticed more than an occasional odd glance sent his way by anyone walking nearby. But none noticed the tall woman wearing battle armor next to him.

“They really can’t see you. I guess it’d look like I’m just talking to myself to them,” Noah said.

He glanced sideways at his companion, marveling at the little tid-bits of detail on her armor. A scar ran from her neck, down to the golden armor seamlessly set around her shoulder. A moment later he realized that the armor was her arm. The transition was so seamless and the movement so pristine that it never felt like she had a prosthetic instead of a real arm.

Noah paused, surprised at how real everything felt. The thought of all of this being real felt crazy, but perhaps it was crazier to deny the lack of any other logical explanation. He certainly did not expect to be able to think this clearly if he was going mad, or hallucinating. Glancing at the angel next to him, Noah put the thoughts aside for the moment.

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After a few minutes of walking, Noah stood outside the gates of the warehouse, the armored angel standing next to him. The building looked roughly the same as before, but an unnerving atmosphere made the hair on his arms and legs stand up on edge.

“I knew this was a shithole, but I never thought this place was this creepy. It looks haunted now,” Noah said, rubbing his arms as he felt a chill crawl up his spine.

“What you perceive is a domain. The Veil resists its manifestation, but it can still be felt, not just by you but even other regular creatures. It seems we were too slow .”

“We’ll need to find a way to sneak you past the gates, but it won’t be easy. Shady or not, they do keep fairly tight security at the warehouse,” Noah said.

The angel stepped up, unsheathing the sword at her waist. The blade was a silvery metal with arcs of red streaking across its body. Before Noah could interrupt her, the angel swung, slicing the thick metal bars of the door.

Noah winced, moving a step back as the gates collapsed with a loud thud on the ground. “What the hell are you doing? The guards are obviously going to hear that!”

“They will not,” the angel said, pointing at one of the guard posts. Noah noticed a burly tall man slump onto his desk, fast asleep. The same appeared to be true for every guard in the vicinity.

“This is as far as you have to escort me. You’re free to leave, or remain here, but do not enter on your own,” the angel said, glancing at Noah. “Thank you for bringing me here,” she said, patting his shoulder once before she rushed inside.

Noah stood at the gates, watching the woman run faster than a speeding car, before she vanished into the warehouse. Noah remained standing, glancing at the sleeping guards lying on the floor. He scratched his cheeks. “Well, this is awkward. I got abandoned by my own dream-hallucination angel.”

Deciding that he had nothing better to do and nowhere else to be, Noah remained at the entrance, keeping a watch at the warehouse. A few minutes passed with nothing happening, soon turning into half an hour. Noah fidgeted, feeling more and more concerned. His gaze went back to the warehouse to look for any changes, and he felt the unnerving sensation beginning to deepen. Something definitely felt wrong, yet no matter how hard Noah looked, everything appeared to be just fine, with the angel nowhere in sight.

Idly, a thought appeared to Noah. If only he was meant to be able to see the angel, would his camera capture her image? Opening his camera, Noah pointed it towards the warehouse, and found his breath stuck in his chest.

Dark tendrils swirled around the entire warehouse. Its walls were crumbled and broken, as the world itself seemed to be fizzing into dark nothing, breaking apart at the seams.

Something snapped in his eyes, as the image in his camera now became clear with his eyes as well. “What… in the world?” Noah mumbled, staring at the scene straight out of some lovecraftian horror movie.

His gaze went to his shoulder, as he felt something leave his body. “She must’ve put a spell on me,” Noah murmured, watching the battle unfold.

The angel rushed in, crashing into the tentacled beast pouring through everything and everywhere at speeds so fast, Noah could barely see her. Her sword flashed in blooming arcs of gold and red, slicing through the beast's body at rapid speeds. But no matter how she cut, the monster seemed to simply appear at a greater and greater speed.

A strike from the tendril had the angel crash into the building, as an explosion shook the ground, sending rubble flying through the air. Noah stepped back, watching the dust cloud with a racing heart.

The angel jumped out moments after, rushing back into the fight and Noah breathed a sigh of relief.

Taking a glance around, he noticed little pockets of dark sparks eroding at his surroundings. Chunks of the grounds that seemed to lead into bottomless pits, sections of the air that appeared pitch black, as if reality itself had been erased from the section.

As he looked around, Noah spotted his coworkers inside the area, lying unconscious on the ground. Leah, even Clive, and the others were scattered around the warehouse, bundled together against a broken wall. A moment later, he saw a tendril appear out of thin air and rush towards one of them. The angel rushed back in, her blade cutting through the tendril. But the creature fought back. Within moments, tendrils began to appear at faster rates, rushing towards where his coworkers lay on the ground.

The angel moved rapidly, cutting through the tendrils, but slowly but surely, she was pushed back. A large tendril swung at the angel’s body, a wave of darkness rushing towards her. The angel dodged back, but a portion of her arm caught the strike. The darkness cut through her metal, flinging her back as it simply erased whatever came in its path.

Noah watched in horror, as the creature began to pick up his coworkers one by one, wrapping them up in dark tendrils. The angel reappeared, cutting through the tendrils as she began to grab back the people, but there were simply too many.

Noah cursed, rushing inside the entryway. He ran towards one of the prone guards, searching their bodies in a rush, hurriedly, he took the pistol belt from the guard’s waist tying it around his own and began to run closer.

He loaded the gun, keeping the safety on as he made his way closer. The angel noticed his approach, but did not reprimand or comment in any manner. The brief distraction did cost her; a tendril struck her.

Noah screamed, keeping his eyes rooted on the people held by the tendrils. He raised his pistol, disengaging the safety and pulled the trigger. The gunshot rang loudly leaving a deafening ring in his ears. The bullet hit the tendril as the dark appendage shivered and trembled. Noah fired twice more pushing past as the man in the tendril’s grasp slunk down.

A loud shriek pulsed through the mass of tendrils, the creature seemingly enraged. One dark tendril rushed towards Noah, and he jumped aside, rolling out of the way. Taking cover behind some walls, Noah ran, aiming his bullets at a different tendril that held another one of his workers.

“Eat some bullets you magical freak!” Noah shouted, firing the pistol at the tendril. The shrieks grew louder as more tendrils began to rush towards Noah. The angel ran in swinging her blade from a distance. An arc of energy shot towards the tendrils heading towards Noah, slicing them apart. Noah didn’t slow down, quickly changing the magazine, as he began to shoot once more.

“Where is the thing?!” Noah asked, glancing briefly towards the angel.

“With that woman. The void beast is trying to consume her along with the seal!” The angel shouted back.

Noah looked at the further end of the warehouse, where the large mass of tendrils seemed to be originating from. He saw Leah wrapped up in a sea of dark tendrils, the copper object he’d picked up this morning remained clutched in her hands, as dark ooze slowly flowed around her, pulling her in.

“Goddamnit Leah,” Noah cursed. Watching the shifting mass of tendrils, Noah looked back at the angel still fighting the majority of tendrils behind me. “I can get her out. Cover me!” He shouted, before running in.

A streaming mass of tendrils swirled in front of him, shooting towards him rapidly one after the other. Noah ran as fast as he could, jumping over a broken wall as he dodged a strike from one tendril. The angel behind him shot arcs of sword, taking out the majority of the tendrils.

The creature in front of him stirred, the massive stirring ball of tendrils screeching as Noah approached closer. With each step forward, dozens more tendrils attacked him, the holes in realities streaming dark somethings that eroded the world around him.

Noah jumped off a metal shelf, finding its leg collapsing into a dark hole. He used the momentum, running across the falling shelf and leapt towards Leah. Aiming his gun, he pointed at the core of the monster, and fired.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Three bullets struck the core, as dark liquid oozed from the wounds. The creature shuddered and twitched as Noah grabbed onto one of the tendrils, and began to climb. Arcs of sword waves now formed a constant blur of noise around him as the angel kept him from being skewered instantly.

Climbing on top of the creature, Noah waddled through the thick dark ooze and stood above where Leah lay. Bending down, he grabbed onto her hands, slowly dragging her out of the thick sludge.

A swirl of infinite teeth twitched and shivered underneath, forming the mouth of the creature, as Noah suppressed a shudder. He noticed the copper seal from this morning in Leah’s hands. Taking the seal from Leah, he pushed her away from the gaping mouth of the monster.

“You want this don’t you?” Noah said, holding the seal up. The dark eldritch monster beneath him pulsated in response, the swirling mass of teeth moving in a wave.

“Well I hope you don’t mind it being covered in frozen pizza and stomach acid!” Noah shouted, as he put the seal in his mouth and swallowed. The circular seal the size of a coin, nearly lodged itself in his throat. Forcefully Noah pushed it down, as it slowly slid down to his stomach.

“Ugh, it tasted like literally nothing,” Noah groaned, as the seal slid into his belly. The world around him seemed to slow down, the creature beneath his feet now deathly still.

Noah looked up from where he hung on above the mouth of the eldritch monster, and towards the angel, who stared at him with a horrified expression.

The creature beneath Noah stirred, tendrils pulling backwards. Dark energy pulsated from inside the monster, before a wave of dark flowed outwards.

A powerful shriek, loud enough to stun Noah slammed into him, knocking him backwards. His footing slipped, as the creature exploded from underneath him.

“Step back!” The angel screamed, shooting an arc towards him, but it was too late.

A thick dark tendril shot through Noah’s chest, piercing through his body, before bursting out his back. Pain and numbness filled Noah, as his body seized up from the intensity of the shock, his vision blacking out.

He heard loud screams and noises rush over him, lights flashing in front of his eyes as he awoke once more, looking down at the dark pulsating tendril piercing his body. He was dead, he knew he was. But somehow, that realization failed to sink in.

An arc from the angel’s sword cut the tendril apart, as golden light flashed around her. Arcs of light cut through the creature, sending the monster reeling back. With a howling shriek of madness, the endless ball of tentacles retreated, crumbling apart, as the dark ooze faded from reality.

Noah coughed, blood pooling under him. He could barely feel the pain anymore, the only emotion besides sheer undiluted terror that he could feel was surprise at how he was still alive. He could see a hole, the size of a basketball inside his chest. But despite that, he could still see, and hear, feel a strange numbness covering his pain.

A whirring noise stirred, as light flared behind Noah. From the corner of his eyes, he could see a dark swirling cut in space, awfully like a portal that had formed near where he lay on the ground. His eyes found their way towards the rust eyed angel’s. She walked towards him, red hair swaying behind her, before she crouched to grab his bloody hand.

“I…I’m dead aren’t I?” Noah asked weakly, a wheezy rasp to his voice as air whistled through the hole in his chest.

“Not yet. I’ve frozen your body and my magic keeps your soul from departing. But I cannot hold it for long,” the angel replied, a sorrowful sound in her voice.

Even though he knew what was happening, hearing it still made his throat clam. “Is everyone else alive?” Noah asked, finding more strength in his to speak.

“Many are injured, but all are alive,” the angel replied.

“I see,” Noah murmured, feeling the strength in his body starting to fade again.

“I do not know the reason for your actions, Noah. I had not expected a human of all things to decide to help me on a task like this. But know, that if it wasn’t for you, then many realities would’ve been lost to the void beast. You have saved countless realms today. The world may not remember you. But I will. From now until eternity, I will not forget your sacrifice,” she whispered in his ears.

The words did not console Noah. But as death slowly eased into his body, it was the only comfort he had.

“I’ve opened a portal to the interdimensional void. It will dissipate your body, returning it to nothingness alongside the seal,” the angel said, letting go of his hand.

“One… last thing,” Noah mumbled, his eyelids starting to turn heavy. “I never got your name.”

The angel paused at his words. Looking down at Noah, she replied. “Raylinah. My name is Raylinah. A Valkyrie of the Dawn.”

Her gentle arms lifted him up, carrying him towards the portal. With one last look into her rust red eyes, Noah felt himself fall.

As the distorted cut in space swallowed him whole, and his body began to dissipate, a voice echoed from somewhere beyond the ends of reality itself, ringing in his ear with the familiar noise of his phone’s notification.

You’ve got a call from the Incarnation of the Void!

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