CHAPTER ELEVEN- THE COLOR OF THE MOON

Laura had been on Antipsychotic medications for a while now because she thinks something is wrong with her; she eventually opens up to Collins her therapist who chides her on why she would take such drugs without a doctor's prescription 'I thought it would make it stop, but instead, it gets worse' Collins visibly worried on the inside as every test and hypnosis he had carried out on her had not has many effects. she only sees the silhouette of a man in a hat and would immediately black out and wake up before she can see his face, in the process of their discussion Laura gets a sudden call, her uncle whose birthday had just been celebrated a few months ago has passed on.

She left not long afterward and even though she was too stunned to grieve, she knew it was only a matter of time as he had been treating his final stage of cancer for a while now. Feeling numb, she returns to her mansion and tells everyone on her staff that she is off to study and wants to be left alone, meanwhile she carries a big bottle of liquor and a wine glass cup along with her.

She had never been the type to grieve openly, as she is the tough one who would prefer to drown her sorrows in booze as she likes to call it to ease her pain, she does not have many friends despite being super rich so she is mostly by herself after a long day of business transactions with top dogs from all walks of life. Then she began to feel a presence standing at the back of her chair, it was so close she could feel the breath of air on her neck and the movement of fingertips across her hair, she becomes disturbed and had been sure there was no mirror in sight she became a bit relieved, howbeit the presence still looms and begins to whisper into her ears 'You need the secrets of the ages' a confused Laura stands up and begins to respond, this time defiantly.

She has had enough of all the back and forth and the things she has been tormented with ever since her parents died, at first, she thought it was their memories but over the years she realized there were more sinister things at work, it seemed as if an ominous presence was watching her, stalking her and threatening her. The voice responded 'Lilly' in her uncle's voice and she became startled as John is the only one who calls her by that name, the voice continues slowly 'You deserve to know the truth, wake up Lilly' 'Wake up!!!!' Then she sees John in chains with bruises all over his flesh and a monstrous creature called the Collector dragging the chains as John yelped in pain, the creature has horn-like metals, and its entire face was covered with thick fur, his large demonic eyes glowed red like the rest of its body and as it began to advance closer and closer to Laura, she became flustered and anxious.

At this point the lights in the room had grown dim and everything seems to be at a standstill, in his severe anguish, John's ghost says to her before he vanishes with the Collector, 'They are coming Lilly, Its too late for me now, but not for you as he is being dragged away and Laura realizes her voice has no sound so she can't even scream nor cry, John continues 'The secrets you seek lies by the Crown Lake, you need to wake up Lilly' and just like in a flash everything goes back to normal and the lights turn back on.

It all happened like a short dream, Laura lies stunned and dazed for a few minutes and then stands up to leave the office, so many questions on her mind, she decided to do an arch on Crown Lake and she began to dig deep into it like a dog on a bone which never let's go. The story of Crown Lake is a story that goes far back to how the collectors came into existence, she was able to make out some mysteries that came along with the lake, one of such being that the man who discovered the lake was an ancient painter one who name was Gilk.

From her research about the lake, she realized it was an old lake that had been in existence for a while, long before she was born but what was bizarre about the lake was that no one swims even travel through it, and there was not a single fish in it. It is a large black lake that revealed the door to another world and the last person to visit the lake is a man called Gilk he became the only one who went into the lake and returned but then he became a different man afterward

After Halanda had accomplished her mission of transferring her soul into the body of Gilk through the ritual of Vial of Dawn. Halanda while in the body of Gilk realized there was more to her newfound power than meets the eye.

So she decided to read all about the books and realized that with more power comes more darkness, The Vial Of Dawn was a book hidden by the High Lords themselves because they realized the degree to which mortals can go to acquire power, and in the universe, between the mortal and the terrestrial abodes there must be balance in the realm of life and light to avoid anarchy and doom. The High Lords of the spirit of whispers themselves who ruled the mortal world from the Avalon where they dwell had laws of the realm that they dare not break or there would be dire consequences for them as well, this was what led to the downfall of Vlada who damned the consequences and became cursed to dwell in the doomed Nether world for all of eternity.

For every lope hole that power brings, there is always a balance to it in the realm, the application of the dark powers that the Vial of Dawn brings to whoever wields it brings forth the ability for a such mortal to transform the soul into whosoever body he or she dims it fit yet because it was a powerful dark power with the absence of illumination, it sucks deep into the soul of the user and the more the mortal who uses transforms the more weak and dusk that soul will become and the power gradually becomes a parasite eating deep into the mind and head of the user the more he uses it and this can lead to a state called the Damned Bank, whereby the soul is lost and doomed, blinded from all works of illumination.

In the process of these visions, we see Laura watching and we see Orion beside her watching as well, and then he tells her 'Remember' as Laura wakes up in an instant, even though she had been able to see Orion's face countless times in her dreams and visions, whenever she comes back to reality she forgets what he looks like and she only remembers him as the man with the black hat and weird beard as she is yet to know his name. It seemed as if she had been asleep for a long time whereas it's been only minutes, Laura returned to the laptop before her on her desk, and she decided to pay a visit to Crown lake herself.

We see Orion once again at the gates of time, watching intently as various events unfold, he has had his eyes on Laura since birth even though he knows she has to realize who she is and her gift by herself. Orion decided to dig deeper into the life and times of one of the Frotos allies Gilk, the man who would later fall victim to the beginning of the ruination of mortal souls.

Gilk was a very talented painter gifted with the ways of color created by the High Lords, he was already an accomplished painter before he met Frotos. The two met as a result of a business between the two and Gilk long before he met with Frotos, Gilk had been a believer in the things he stood for, and also like Frotos he was a man whose quest for power and ambition knew no limits.

Over time both men's friendship grew, and Frotos made Gilk one of his allies and also one of those who do his dirty work. Just like Frotos, Gilk's insatiable quest for power quickly became his undoing within just a short while. He began to see himself as the second in command and thus as someone who had the same privileges as Frotos even though he was just an ally.

So when Halanda presented herself, Gilk was quick to give in and sooner met his end in no time. After Halanda's soul had successfully taken over Gilk's body, she realized the body began to grow weak after a few months and did not think much of it, till she began to have constant bouts of blackouts and which became increasingly regular. So she researched her new body and realized that for everybody that houses a new soul, there is a limited time for the body to survive unless the person eats from the illicit grapes of the Crown Tree that grows under the Crown lake.

Halanda's soul began to eat deep into the body she was using, she began to experience hallucinations of dwarf-like smoky creatures with little sharp tridents poking at her sides and stabbing her. Even though she never bleeds nor is she ever injured, the pain is always severely felt and when she could not bear it anymore, she decided to look for answers and that was how she found out about the illicit grapes, these grapes help a Vial Of Dawn User to stay in whichever body he or she chooses for 10 years, but with every food comes it's own poison, this feat did not come without a price. An impatient Halanda rushed down to the Crown Lake without fully understanding what she was getting herself into, little did she know, she was in for a doomed adventure and would never be the same again.