As I stood before the Demon door in Barrow Fields, the old man’s voice echoed the same words it always did in the game: “Oh no, not again! Another bony adventurer seeking to plunder my riches. I’m not interested in your meager frame. Get some meat on you! I want you beefy! Blubbery! Plump! Porcine! Stop being a slave to public perception, and treat yourself. Pies, meat, beer—anything, but lots of it! Eat yourself large, and you’ll be welcome here!”

  “What a pervert you are, wanting a child to drink beer and get beefy for you!” I retorted.

  “What?!!! That’s not what I meant!” the old door hurriedly protested.

  “Oh, and I suppose I should be a slave to your perception and forced to get fat just because I need what’s inside?” I shot back.

  “Well, nobody’s forcing you to come here,” the Demon door pointed out.

  “Circumstances are forcing me! So I’ll give you a choice: if you don’t grant me access, I’ll be forced to come here and fart on you every day—right in your mouth! I’ll have no choice but to accept the evil points,” I threatened.

  “You wouldn’t!” the Demon door screamed.

  “Oh, I will! Even though it doesn’t sit right with me. And the longer you take to grant me access, the worse it’s going to get. I’ll start eating cabbage, pickled eggs, garlic, asparagus. I hope it doesn’t come down to me having to use you as a toilet too,” I said, fully embracing the role of a villain. As much as I hated the idea, I was more desperate for progress than the door could imagine. As a small, weak child, there were limits to how far I could go to gain what I needed.

  “Fine! Just don’t do that!” The door began to open.

  “Oh, and I’ll be staying here for quite a while, so feel free to manifest yourself and lock others out while I’m here,” I demanded.

  “What a bully!” the door exclaimed as it disappeared.

  Walking inside, I set down a bag I had made from one of my old shirts, tying the sleeves and neck into knots. It contained a few apples and a small stockpile of dried meat I had prepared over the past month. I wasn’t planning for this to happen; I just liked dried meats—especially biltong, which is meat dried after soaking up vinegar and salt. It retains juiciness while being well-preserved and is incredibly tender. It took all my willpower not to eat it when the door demanded I fatten up. I needed rations for this to work!

  Taking note of the clean spring inside that would serve as my water source, I turned my attention to a wooden chest nearby. Opening it, I found a blue bottle of "Will Master’s Elixir" and grabbed it. Taking a meditative stance, I crossed my legs and downed the contents of the bottle. The game never mentioned that the potion tasted terrible, but I expected it would. Medicine always tastes horrible!

  Focusing on the influx of Will energy, I directed it to the pool of energy already within my body and felt its overall size grow. It was both a hot and cool sensation, condensing around my solar plexus, or Dantian. My overall capacity for Will increased, and as a result, its rate of replenishment became much faster.

  Perhaps increasing the size of my Will Pool now would ultimately yield a much larger capacity than it would in-game. After all, I was still in the early stages of development. Those guild idiots allowed the original protagonist to waste his early years swinging sticks and beating up scarecrows for the negligible experience. The only reason I could think of for their negligence was that they wanted to prepare the boy’s body for the immense power it would store. This applied only to Might and Skill powers, as a strong body was not required to use Will. I mean, couldn’t he spend an hour a day doing push-ups, sit-ups, and running a mile for fitness three times a week like everyone on Earth?

  Demon doors in Fable always claimed to be people cursed into magical objects by the Archons. So basically, these people were cursed by my ancestors. They may have been willing volunteers, but I didn’t want to remind them that I was from the family responsible for their current state. Maybe being an immortal door was the greatest thing ever. William Black, the first Will user, and the first Archon were still around, now called Scythe. Fable 2 said he created the first Demon doors, and I intended to confront him about it when I got the chance.

  The spaces inside were magically sealed off from the rest of the world. In some cases, they even seemed to exist in other worlds or times. Regardless, I needed the Demon door to create something. At this point in history, item enchanting was a lost art. The old kingdom knew it, and in 600 years, it would become commonplace again.

  In Fable 3, it turns out that the protagonist from Fable 2 created the "Sanctuary"—a magical place that exists outside of Albion and the flow of regular time. Albion is what this world's inhabitants call it. The protagonist of the third game, who is also my descendant, used a much larger guild seal-shaped object to access the Sanctuary. This didn’t surprise me, as guild seals allow for teleportation in this world. Another reason why the Heroes Guild is so choosy about who they accept and grant hero status to is that there is a limited number of these relics.

  The Hero of Bowerstone must have figured out how to create them and designed a larger one that could reach beyond Albion. First, he would have had to use his power to reach it, which also doesn’t surprise me, as William Black is said to have done so first. The antagonist of the third game is "the Corruption," a being of darkness and disease. William was first summoned to the void by Jack of Blades, who, as far as we know, was born there. After defeating Jack and the rest of his kin, known as the Court, he returned to the void when he developed cancer. He cut himself and willed as much of the disease out of himself as he could. Time barely exists or moves in the void; a being can exist there but will never age.

  In 600 years, "The Corruption" will grow immensely powerful. It will also give birth to other formidable adversaries like the "Corrupter" and the "Crawler." Time in the void for these beings would equate to millions of years, giving them ample time to grow powerful before they are dealt with.

  I wouldn’t stop at just defeating Jack. I wasn’t a fool like William Black, who left huge messes for his descendants to deal with, all the while watching them be killed, tortured, or starved in poverty. I would kill the Corruption, the Corrupter, and the Crawler before they became too powerful to stop. If Theresa were alive a thousand years from now, like in the games, then I would be there too. We would fight these threats together as a family—all of us! No child would ever go hungry before me, much less one of my own.

  Such a paradise is only achieved in Fable 3, where a new kingdom has been created. This land is currently in a severe state of chaos. The old kingdom crumbled, leaving only small, mostly lawless towns run by "Mayors." There are also bandit and pirate warlords, but it’s not relevant at this stage to think about. These Mayors are the surviving nobles from the fall of the old kingdom who managed to maintain a position of power. Once I defeat Jack, if I marry Lady Grey, I’ll become the Mayor of Bowerstone. Bowerstone is the largest town and is situated within a castle. This would put me in a position to make such a future a reality. Had Theresa seen that far ahead? Could that be one of the reasons she reached out to Elvira? It didn’t matter because I knew she had her reasons, and that was likely one of them.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Bringing my attention back to the task at hand, I examined the interior of the Demon door—not the mystical woods I was in that contained no other living creatures, but where the door melded with the surrounding rocks. There were circuit-like markings that held Will energy, glowing blue as they emanated from the Demon door and disappeared into the rocks. These lines likely ran throughout the entire sealed space. I didn’t understand how they worked or how they were inscribed in the first place.

  What I needed to fight Jack and these other god-like foes was the Sanctuary—a room with magical walls inside the void. A magic room was necessary; otherwise, I would be unprotected from the Corruption’s influence. How could I obtain what didn’t exist? I could create it myself—that’s how! The second game’s protagonist was the second most powerful hero ever seen in the series, and he created the Sanctuary. For other heroes, this could mean it was impossible to achieve, but do you know who’s the strongest in the series? It’s the Hero of Oakvale, and currently, that’s me!

  For my plan, I didn’t need to know how magical structures were made. If William Black could "Will" a disease to leave his body, then I could impose my Will onto an existing enchantment. The void existed outside of Albion, but it also existed everywhere simultaneously. Time and space are connected, and since the void is another space, I would need to force this room out of Albion’s space. I confirmed that time and space were still connected when I froze time on an object. The fact that a time-stopped object cannot be moved from its location in space means there is a connection. So, placing my hand back onto the blue line, I willed time away from this place. It quickly consumed all of my Will energy, but I didn’t give up. I could tell the location had shifted ever so slightly. So, I continued over and over again.

  After what must have been days, I felt something give, and Nemo exclaimed, “My gosh, we’re nowhere!”

  Turning the door transparent, I could see the infinite blackness of the void—the very place Jack was never able to return to. It was the resource I’d use to defeat him. Of course, it was ironic that the source of his original power would now be used against him. Here, outside the regular flow of time, I could train indefinitely while aging only a second for every day spent here.

  But as my provisions dwindled, it was time to turn back for now.

  I would have waited longer to start focusing my Will into the structure, but I noticed the most hideous creature heading toward us to investigate. It was the Crawler, and boy, was it ugly. It was far more grotesque than I remembered it being in the game, but I recognized it immediately. The monster couldn’t harm or influence us, but it was best to avoid it for now. Using all the Will energy I had on hand, I willed us back into Albion’s space. I forced us in but ensured to leave no path for the Crawler to follow. Then I willed to seal the space behind us after I entered. Doing all this drained my Will several times, even though my Will Pool had more than doubled.

  That was close in a certain sense. Even though I knew the Crawler couldn’t hurt me inside the Demon door’s space, I didn’t know if the door’s mind could be corrupted. Nemo, as I had started calling him, was once a living person and could therefore potentially be influenced mentally by the Corruption. This could only happen if they targeted him directly, which was why we fled for now. There were ways for me to prevent this and protect myself should it ever happen, but not on this trip. I would need to make preparations first before trying to return. If I could find a way to prevent the abominations from being drawn to us, that would be ideal.

  The trip back felt longer, even though my increased Will Pool should have made it faster. What I hadn’t expected was that the return journey would be harder than leaving Albion. No wonder the second hero used teleportation magic instead of a magically moving castle. Albion’s space naturally tries to keep things that aren’t within it outside—a sort of immune system that fights off would-be invading diseases. So getting back in was much harder than getting out. It was slow, and once again, I was pushing myself to my limits. Glowing blue Will lines began to form on my skin. Anyone who looked at me could instantly tell I was a Will user.

  My body, however, was worse for wear. The lack of food provisions meant my daily rations had dwindled significantly.

  The old door, Nemo, rarely shut up about how I was wasting away. I had underestimated just how dangerous this trip was, but I didn’t plan to make that mistake again. I was all skin and bones by the time we made it back. Thankfully, this place had a somewhat unlimited supply of water. Nemo claimed that this place recycled water automatically. Had that not been the case, I would have died long before making it back.

  Struggling out of the Demon door, I found my physical strength was practically nonexistent. I crawled as best I could into Barrow Fields, where, fortunately, some traders spotted me. I could hear them discussing fetching food from their packs as I collapsed.

  When I woke up, a damp cloth rested on my forehead. I was lying in my own bed, and several empty bowls that had contained fish soup sat nearby. I turned my head to the side and saw Theresa staring at me.

  “Did you find what you were looking for, little brother?” she asked.

  “Yes, but I’m a long way from being able to use it,” I replied.

  “Not as much as you think. Guess how long you’ve been gone,” she prompted.

  “At least two or three weeks, right?”

  “No, brother. It’s been two and a half days,” my sister stated.

  “How’s that possible? I spent weeks leaving and entering this space! Most of the time, I was gone. I was only in the void for a few moments…” As I voiced that thought, I realized something. When someone moves really fast, time affects them differently. It’s the whole “E=MC2” thing—your personal time is longer the faster you move. Since I was forcing myself out of space, I was technically traveling a long distance very quickly. I was also moving outside the regular flow of time. How strange is that? I guess even a blind squirrel finds a few nuts.

  The upside is I could use this to grant myself more training time, but the downside is that I would still age, unlike inside the void. I could end up like in the game, looking 65 years old while my sister remained only 20. Perhaps the original protagonist or the guild figured out something similar, which is why that could happen if one trained too long. It could also explain where the protagonist of the second game got the idea for the Sanctuary. It was an improvement of something someone had already created, just like the guild seal that he made a larger version of.

  After what had happened before I left and now that I returned looking like a mummy, I doubted my parents would let me out of their sight easily. I could stop time, but I would need to earn gold and buy provisions before I attempted anything like this again. They would probably do everything in their power to prevent me from getting what I needed to leave. They might even enroll me in the guild academy early, which would be good if it didn’t mean Jack would attack them while I was away.

  “Don’t worry, little brother,” Theresa said, cutting off my train of thought.

  “Why? We’re basically screwed now, aren’t we?”

  “No, Arn. I took this opportunity to tell them everything. I also told her when and how you would return. She saw the Demon door, an object believed unmovable and indestructible, disappear. Mother has seen and felt our powers, and now she believes. She wishes to grow stronger and fight the threat with her battle ax in hand. When Jack comes, we will not fight alone!” Theresa explained.

  When she said that, I realized that with her future sight, Theresa had lived many lifetimes. It felt like she was far older than her appearance suggested. She now held a mentality that didn’t match her age. With so many changes, this timeline didn’t resemble the old one at all. My current knowledge of the future would become less certain, but at least we had a chance now—a chance to save Oakvale

  Had Theresa seen that far ahead? Could that be the reason or one of the reasons she reached out to Elvira? Well, it doesn't matter because I know she has her reasons and that's probably one of them.

  How strange is that? I guess even a blind squirrel finds a few nuts.