"Come quickly. We have taken too much time."

The little blue Kobold scampered eagerly down the corridor, ushering the group along as soon as Corvus stepped through the portal. As it closed behind him, he took a curious look around.

He expected something grandiose or epic, something that might boggle the mind and force him to reevaluate his very understanding of the universe. At the very least, he expected something interesting looking.

What he got instead was a hotel corridor. One he had been in plenty as a child. Equipped fully with the long red carpet that spanned the length of the seemingly endless corridor, plain wooden doors either side of that corridor and ugly, ill-suiting wallpaper on its walls.

The most interesting thing about this tragically mundane hotel corridor was the art hanging on the wall. Just like every hotel, it had to have tacky landscape paintings to give it some feeling of life and vibrance.

But the landscape this hotel chose to have a painting of clearly was not of anywhere on earth.

Blue grass filled the landscape, while a towering tree made of pure gold and which had leaves of silver sat beside a lake that seemed to shift in colour depending on the angle from which you looked at it.

Now with the way things have changed, you would think that this could easily be anywhere on earth. But the painting also depicted three separate moons in the night sky, one of which was partially exploded.

There was also a something sitting against the tree, reading peacefully. He was forced to call it a something not because he could not find the name for it, nor the words to describe it. It was entirely because he couldn't actually remember what it looked like, nor even figure out the details of it when he stared at it.

It's figure constantly shifted and warped in his mind, making it impossible to figure out if the something had six legs or two, if it had three arms or nine tentacles, or even how many heads it had if it had any to begin with.

When Corvus looked away from the painting, he simply forgot any speculation he had. The only memory remaining was that there was something in the painting, sitting against the tree. It was just a blank space in his mind, with only the feeling that something should be there.

It was quite disturbing.

Pulling his mind away from the anomalous painting, Corvus ushered the group to follow the impatient Kobold as they started to walk. Their footsteps echoed down the corridor as they walked for close to ten minutes. The entire time, the little Kobold kept pulling up his sleeve to look incessantly at the golden watch on his wrist, before muttering to himself in discontent.

Corvus could see Woe start to fidget in boredom beside him as they walked, but no matter how long they went for the teenager never complained. Not even about sore feet, or a single 'Are we there yet?'

That was even more disturbing. But it was also just Woe. He had always been like that, and was strangely the most eager about the cult they escaped even though he wasn't even a toddler when they left.

Corvus could only imagine the damage Lightbringer had done when he got his claws into him again.

As they walked, Astra slid up beside him and wrapped her arm around his, leaning close like she was leaning on him, then whispering lowly.

"You know what this place is, right?"

Corvus nodded softly, "Mhm. Some liminal space, just like the endless Meadow."

It became clear by the first minute of walking. No matter how far they went, they could never see the ends of the corridor. Not to mention, the repeating patterns. The scraping on every second doorknob, the wallpaper peeling every fifth door on the left and the slight bump in the carpet every thirty seconds.

Strangely, the paintings never repeated. They always changed, depicting different landscapes of god knows where, with no discernible pattern or reason that he could figure out.

It also meant that the thing the Kobold was neurotically checking was not, in fact, some fancy gold watch but was instead the same bracer that Seth and Astra had previously used to escape the meadow.

That device, as useful as it was at that moment, had sat uselessly on his desk ever since. He tried to study it, but never got anywhere with it. Not beyond the ability to detect opening breaches in space, which was helpful when sealing them off.

But that was it, and after a while he simply forgot about it.

The next time the Kobold checked his 'watch' he started his annoyed grumble, only to quickly cut it off with a joyful yelp. He scampered forwards, stopping before a door that looked exactly like all the others they had passed. It didn't even have a number, like regular hotel rooms would.

However despite that, he turned to Corvus and held out his grubby little hand, making a grasping gesture.

"Present the key Human."

Corvus frowned beneath his hood, glancing at Astra before untangling himself from her. He couldn't help but notice the strange look that Woe gave her as he did so, but he couldn't focus on that at the moment.

Instead he reached under his armour once more and produced the letter. It was the only thing that made sense as a key.

The Kobold snatched the letter and unceremoniously tore the wax seal from the top of it. He tossed the letter, which was completely blank and seemingly worthless, at Corvus' feet before pressing the wax seal against the door.

Runes appeared around the door frame in the same red as the wax, flashed brightly before disappearing too fast for Corvus to read them. At the same moment, a decisive click came from the door before it creaked open slightly.

The Kobold let out a satisfied hum, before shoving his way through the door and entering the room with Corvus' group following close behind.

The air around them immediately changed as soon as they crossed the threshold of the doorway and despite the corridors appearance, the room they entered was far from a simplistic hotel room.

Instead they entered a room with towering stone columns that reached to the ceiling high above. A chandelier, seemingly made out of golden bones, hung from that ceiling and had black wax candles that flickered with a deep purple flame.

The room was shaped like an octagon, with the columns at each corner, and intricate tapestries decorating the walls themselves. Whether the tapestries depicted Myth or history, Corvus had no idea.

None of the creatures on it seemed familiar, bar from the singular red dragon that took up most of them. From a cursory glance, it seemed to tell the tale of Prometheus' rise and his war against other strange creatures, as a few of them showed some kind of battle. Although they didn't show who won or the reason for their combat.

He moved his eyes away from the walls and towards the centre of the room, where a large circular table seemed to grow out of the floor, forged from the exact same dark stone as the room around them.

Elegant stone thrones sat around the table, with tall backs and draconic decorations on the top of the back rest and on the end of the armrests. There was a total of twenty seats, with just under half of them already filled.

One sat, while two stood either side of the filled thrones. It wasn't hard to figure out who the leaders were.

The leaders all turned at the sound of the door opening, sending curious looks towards the newest arrivals. Some of them wore judging frowns as they looked over Corvus' outfit, mainly focused on his hood.

A few gave warm smiles, trying to start their interactions on warmer grounds or simply because they were friendly people. However the most amusing of all, was the four individuals who looked utterly confused.

It wasn't at his outfit, instead they seemed confused by his very presence as they quickly turned to their companions, hissing whispers into their ears and having hushed arguments.

Their confusion was honestly adorable, and Astra seemed to agree as she chuckled beside him.

Her voice tickled his ear as she spoke softly to him, "It seems your little distraction was more effective than you thought. "

He let out a soft chuckle, "Yes, It seems it was just too good. I hope they aren't disappointed. What a poor first impression that would be."

Their playful, teasing conversation was spoken in soft tones, but not nearly low enough not to be overheard. It seemed like they were more focused on flirting than stopping other's from listening in.

The fact that Astra maintained direct eye contact with one particularly irate looking leader while she spoke, and only got more amusement from his growing irritation, was evidence enough of that.

These few individuals must have been fully convinced of his presence at the tournament. So much so that he could even see a few of the companions pulling out various styles of communication devices, just to make sure he was still watching the tournament.

Just to fuck with them a little more, Corvus focused on the puppeteered armour as he had it turn to the nearest streaming Communicator and give it a teasing wave.