It was sometime in April, a little after I turned 15. I was in high school, walking through the beige halls sprinkled with specks of silver on my way to the bathroom when I walked past a stairwell, except it wasn't there before. Not only that, but it went down despite our school not having a basement. For some reason I immediately thought of the man in the lake from 4 years ago, even now he was still in the back of my mind. After all how could I forget him? He saved my life. Not to mention he vaguely reminded me of what little I remembered of my father.

Curious, I entered and descended, then a figure appeared. It was the same faceless man I saw in the lake 4 years ago. Now I could see the top of his head, and it was what looked like a chasm of pure black running down the rest of his body, emitting a black mist. 

Before I could say anything he spoke

"I believe I told you that I would require payment when you were ready, correct?" 

"Yeah, what do you want me to do?" 

"You will see soon, my son. Hurry, I would prefer to finish this quickly. " I followed the man, through this seemingly endless array of stairs, I noticed that the walls progressively got more run down as we went, until the smooth stone walls riddled with cracks turned to old brick like a stereotypical school house, and then to a material I had never seen before, one of many colors with the texture of glass and the appearance of stone. Then there was a pit. "What the hell is this?" I asked. 

He said nothing, just took me into his arms and plunged us into its depths. I fell and fell and fell, wind growing increasingly loud until it was nearly earpiercing. Then the man turned to smoke, a smoke which then enveloped me, surrounded me. I panicked, but only for a second. Then I was in a canoe, the man in front with the paddle in one hand and a black torch in the other. The torchlight was a dark black, but yet it somehow lit the way. The paddle was an ordinary paddle, made from a run down wood that looked older than me, and possibly him. We were inside of these strange tunnels, made from a mix of old brick and the strange stone material I mentioned before. They were filled with muddy water, it was a dark green similar to a sewer. After a minute of awkward silence, other than the quiet crackling of the torch and the water being pushed by the paddle I asked

"What is this place?" 

"This place is in between life and death. You see, after you die your soul goes to a place I call the Ethereal Plane, but there are many names for it, every one as correct as the other. It exists on top of your normal plane, the one that you live in, and yet both can coexist almost perfectly. Funny, isn't it?" 

"I think I get what you mean, continue?" 

"Good. Occasionally however, there are dead that will gather enough power inside this ethereal plane to break out into your world. Then they become what you humans call Conserere. The most effective way of stopping this from happening is with proper burials. Hen-" 

I interrupted "Is that why the laws are so strict on making sure everyone gets buried properly? Otherwise the Conserere will come an-" 

"Precisely. I'll explain more when it's necessary." 

"That's cool and all, but what do you need me for?" He stayed silent for a couple seconds before our boat stopped in front of a door, resemblant of an ancient castle, intricate patterns inscribed in gold onto it. He stepped out and not knowing what to do, I followed him. We opened the door, which led to a hallway, these walls less majestic than the door which we entered through. We walked for what I assume was 5 or so minutes before we found another door, this one looked more modern while still having that refined golden aesthetic that I saw minutes ago. 

"Give me your hand." he said firm, yet in a charismatic, caring tone. I reached out and he lit fire to my hand? One second there was calm. The next, LIGHT! "WHAT THE HELL!?" I screamed. At this point my entire left arm was engulfed in these colorless flames, despite me having reached out with my right. 

"Relax, you'll be ok" 

"Wha-" before I could say anything else I noticed that my arm felt fine, it was a tingling feeling and I could "feel" my movements more than usual. It reminded me of the time I got drunk off my ass at Elliots house with him, a shame he moved away. This feeling lasted for a second longer before the flames extinguished all at once, to where my eyes had to take a moment to adjust back to the darkness. I looked at my arm in shock and noticed a strange pattern on the back of my palm. It was a sphere with a wavelike pattern on the inside, around the size of a nickel. There were little lines that seemed to connect to my veins, but those could hardly be seen. I gazed with a peculiar stare and then the man spoke 

"Some people are born with a small deformation in the heart. An extra organ that I call a weaver. All your blood passes through it on the way out of your heart. Except something is different. It is altered somehow, to where with a little practice you can control natural elements to a degree. Water, fire, the sky. Many other things, those are the most basic ones." 

"Do I have this organ?" 

"Correct. Normally, Weavers can only interact with already present matter, stuff that you have to already know the location of, so their abilities are… situational. Your's however, I believe is able to pull this matter from the Ethereal Plane that I mentioned before. But even then, you cannot control this matter too well. It will require one of two things." 

"Wait wait wait. What do you need with all this? Explain that piece first." 

"I don't see why not, very well then. Theres an.. old business partner of mine that has ties to this school. I told him of my research into this ethereal plane, and you know what he did? Rather than researching it with me, he saw an opportunity to gain what he saw as ultimate power, an ability to bring his perverted sense of "order" to the world. This entire place was a project of mine to give the formless substance. They can act with much greater power than normal here. He believed I wouldn’t support his ideas. And so he attempted to kill me. But before I died, I bound myself to this place. Now I am a part of it, and while I survived, I cannot leave, and he cannot use this place to his advantage."

Someone with ties to this school… I thought to myself. What exactly could that mean? Do they work at the school? Have I met them? Could they be a school board member or something and I have no idea who they are?

Still, I decided to hear Warren out.

"Will finding and killing whoever this is fix your situation?" 

"It might. The other reason I want you to kill him is what he's doing here. Notice the children that have been going missing? -no, they’ve probably been telling you they ‘moved out’ these past couple months?" 

"Yeah, does it have something to do with him?" 

"You're smart. Yeah it does, he's kidnapping them and bringing them here, at which point they-" 

At that moment, something screamed from the end of the hallway. It was horrifying. It towered over me and the man. An abomination made from what looked like corpses, mangled into a rough shell of some poor imitation of a bipedal creature. It had faces on several parts of its pale, spider-like body. It was humanoid, but it crawled on all fours with 4 patchwork arms on its back. I didn't even scream, just stood with my mouth open agape. I was too horrified to react to this… thing. 

"He's been giving them to the formless, who take them and transform them beyond repairability for their own unknown reasons.” He said some other stuff, but I wasn't paying attention. I had noticed one of its faces resembled an old friend. "Elliot?" I asked quietly. It said something I didn't hear. I was drowned in rage. What I did next I can't explain to this day. 

"Come… VASSAGO!!!" I shouted. The brand on my wrist then began to burn brightly. A rounded fish-like being manifested, surging from the pins that emerged from my arm while burdened with several of its own, held to its floating metallic body by seemingly nothing. There were wires bound tightly around several parts of it. It appeared somewhat bland, not much of any color to it beside its singular red eye, humming with an emotion roughly resembling anticipation.

"Got an awfully young one here now don't we?" One voice spoke.

“I need you to help me defeat that thing, to burn this whole place to the ground!" I shouted 

"Well young friend, that depends. Do you vow to conquer the Red Herring?" Said what sounded like a young man. 

"If that's who did this, yes." "Do you vow to never stray from this path?" Said what sounded like an old woman. 

"I will conquer those who did this, it will never be allowed under my watch again." 

"Do you vow to live, no matter what you may face? To never admit defeat?" Said the same woman as before. "I will kill all who are behind this sick, sick thing." "Say it again!!" Said a new voice, a middle aged man with a bit of a country accent. 

"I WILL KILL ALL OF THOSE WHO ARE BEHIND THIS ABOMINATION IN FRONT OF ME! MY BACK WILL NOT HIT THE GROUND, AND MY WILL SHALL NOT WAIVER UNTIL MY JUDGMENT IS ENACTED!" 

"Very well then, our power is yours." 

At that moment, this fish-like being took blood from my arm, engulfed itself to where its bland body was a flowing, crimson red, like a rose. It went to my hand and brought me a thread, a piece of skin from the abomination at the end of the hall, now sprinting towards us. I took this thread into my hand, and I reached an understanding. My hand began to glow a color I had never seen before, it was beautiful. The abomination was before me, towering, screaming. It tried to grab me, and without thinking I dodged. I got into a stance, calculating where I should punch to deal the most damage, I decided the outer side of its right leg was its weakest point. I punched with strength I didn't know I had, and it staggered. Through incoherent screaming, it grabbed the leg I had blown off and repaired itself. I tried to prepare another punch like before but I was interrupted. It began shooting pieces of lightning out of its deformed 7 finger hands. I recoiled in pain, almost falling to the ground and by the time I recovered it was too late- it had already begun to walk toward me again. As a last ditch effort I stuck my hand in front of me, hoping the fish would tank the incoming sluggish blow from its obscenely muscular arm. Suddenly there were suddenly several flashes of light. I closed my eyes, bracing for the worst.

When I opened my eyes, the creature was split open, scattered across the walls of this god forsaken hall. After a second of staring, I began to walk back to the man with the torch. Who was standing there, arm extended and holding a torch in one hand and a small spear in the other. 

"I hate to break it to you, but that big attack wasn't you, it was me. I have to say though, I didn't expect you to punch that f*cking thing! How the hell did you know to call Vassago?" He said while laughing. "No, no, we weakened it for you" said the fish like being. Then the man started messing with the fish for a couple minutes, while I stood there, trying to comprehend what just happened. 

A couple minutes later, the man looked at me and said 

"What you just did was insane. Before I was interrupted I was going to explain what you needed to do, but sinc-" 

"Just tell me what the hell this is!" I demanded. 

"Occasionally, when enough people die in a concentrated area they all transition to the ether plane. They 'band together' and become one being. They will feel their lives were incomplete and will want… resolutions. They will call upon living people to make their ideals reality. But only specific people, ones with Special Weavers to harness them. In exchange for granting their wishes, these Projections will grant their hosts considerable power, the things we need most is the ability to control your weaver, and the abilities that it grants to you." "Alright, and what's your name?" "Warren, I've been meaning to tell you, Joesph." "How did you know my name?" I asked. "It's hard to explain, but it makes sense." 

As he said this, he walked over to the remains of the abomination we killed, and he grabbed these clipper things from his coat, around the size of his arm and threw them into the air. They began to spin rapidly, and then they started sucking its body into what was now a ball of light. Warren approached this light, held a torch to it and transformed it into a crystal. He smoothly reached out to the crystal and crushed it. The fragments of this crystal began to glow a light blue, almost white. What looked like fog then began to flow into his face, or rather the absence of one. After the light died down and I looked at the exhumed fragments I asked "What was that?" 

"Both these abominations and Conserere don't die in the traditional sense that everything else does. Their souls scatter, but will eventually reform into something else. But if you do as I do and consume them, not only do you stop them from coming back, you take their power as well."

"Well then why did you take it? I swear you're a demigod or something and I'm the one who killed it." 

"My apologies Joseph, force of habit I suppose." 

"It's whatever, because I'll kill all of these things." Warren just laughed. He then stowed his weapons and walked to a door that we were going to open before "Come" Warren yelled. I sprinted over for whatever reason. "Place your hand on the door" I noticed a hand shaped imprint on the door, around shoulder height to me. I reached out to place my hand within it and… nothing? It had somehow become slightly farther than a second ago. It's whatever I thought, and I stepped closer and reached again. Slightly farther than before, again? 

"As I thought. I just remembered you're supposed to be in school, I'll take you back up now." Said Warren, sounding somewhat displeased. I obliged, there being no further reason to stay here. 

He held a rusted spade this time, and slammed it into the ground. It emanated a fog, which turned to an elevator that then ascended at a speed which nearly pinned me to the ground. I looked to Warren who stood firmly, his coat flowing upward to a nonexistent wind. After a couple seconds of this, he reached out to a wire and pulled it. Then the elevator consumed us and next thing I knew I was sat on the middle of a field near my school. I checked my watch, 3:37 PM. 2 hours I thought to myself, school gets out in about thirty minutes and I can't be asked to head back into the building, I'll just head home. As I was walking, I decided to look at my hand. The brand was there, though slightly burned looking and the skin around my hand felt irritated. My arm also felt quite cold, which was strange considering I was wearing a sweater and my other arm felt fine. I'm too tired for this sh*t, I'll figure it out later. As one last thing I decided to essentially flex a muscle that wasn't there until today, to which the needles from before were now translucent and emerged from my arm, moving as if they each could breathe, unsynchronized with one another. What the hell did I just get myself into. I thought to myself as I began to walk home.