"Hell is not beneath our feet. It lives among us, asleep… waiting to be called home."
After leaving Dinaria, Pablo knew the most mysterious and dangerous states of Norgalia awaited him: the sealed dimensions. Lands where neither the Republic nor the ancient kings dared to fully rule. Territories where reality and reason blurred into shadows.
But to reach them, he had to pass through Transporium, where the high-dimensional portals were kept.
⸻
The Return to Transporium
Pablo returned to the tower of Transporium, the heart of Norgalia's interdimensional transport system. In a room entirely white, lit by floating spheres, a hooded figure awaited him, guardian of the ancient portals.
—"Do you seek the sealed paths?" asked the figure.
—"Yes," Pablo replied. "I go to Infernara, and then to Umbrallya. They must also be restored."
The figure nodded, placing a red crystal key upon an altar carved with inscriptions in forgotten tongues. The portal shuddered, roared… and opened like a vortex of fire.
—"Pablo… be careful," the figure warned. "Infernara is no state. It is a trial."
The portal swallowed him in a whirl of heat, sparks, and darkness.
⸻
Infernara
The land of Infernara was an underground world, carved from living lava and black stone, with floating structures upheld by crimson energy pillars. The air burned in the lungs, and the skies looked like cracks torn into a slumbering volcano.
No roads. No cities. Only a half-ruined temple stood at the center of nothingness, buried in ash.
There, three figures were chained to columns of fire. One wore a mask of molten metal, another muttered in dead tongues… and the third remained utterly still.
A voice rumbled from the walls of the temple:
—"Welcome, descendant of betrayal. Here the sins of the soul were forged. Here the errors of power were sealed. Welcome to Infernara."
From the fire emerged a figure. Neither human, nor god. It was an ancient warden, a being created by Shastakan in the earliest years, when it was discovered that Norgalia rested atop a dimensional underworld.
—"I am Flameron, guardian of this core. I witnessed the birth of the Pillars. I saw Eldric rise. I saw Draven fall. And I saw the world burn itself into ashes, only to survive."
Pablo met his gaze. His eyes glowed like lanterns deep within the abyss.
—"What remains of Norgalia here?" Pablo asked.
—"Nothing… and everything. This state was the prison of the soul. Here the Republic cast away those they deemed irredeemable. Politicians, traitors, children born with powers… failed experiments of Cintekis. Here they were buried. Here they were forgotten."
Pablo knelt, pressing his palm against the scorched ground. Flashes struck his mind—screams, pain, memories of the buried alive.
—"This… this was a massacre."
—"And the one who allowed it was Julius," Flameron whispered. "One of the Seven. He used Infernara as an emotional laboratory. A factory of despair."
Pablo breathed deep. The fire did not burn him. His lineage shielded him, as though the dimension itself recognized him as its rightful heir.
—"Is there anyone left alive here?"
—"One," Flameron said. "But he does not wish to be found."
Guided by the energy of the place, Pablo descended into a deeper abyss. There he found a cage bound in chains of fire. Inside was a boy—or perhaps a young man. His skin was black as coal, his eyes golden like suns.
—"Who are you?" Pablo asked.
—"My name is Kael. And I was born here."
—"How are you alive?"
—"Because I learned to command the fire that was meant to kill me. Because I… am part of Infernara."
Pablo felt something different in him. Not a mere prisoner, but a soul forged in agony, a spark that had never been extinguished.
—"Then come with me. Help me rebuild this state."
Kael smiled, for the first time.
—"And if the fire escapes me?"
—"I too carry fire within," said Pablo. "I will teach you to wield it… as I am learning to wield mine."
With a single motion, he broke the chains. Infernara quaked. The energy of the realm surged and began to stabilize for the first time in centuries. Towers rebuilt themselves from the lava. Temples rose from beneath the molten crust. The inferno turned into a sanctuary.
Flameron's final whisper lingered:
—"May your fire never forget where it came from… nor whom it burned."
⸻
With Kael at his side, Pablo returned to Transporium, prepared to face the twin dimension: Umbrallya.