<strong>The Mountains of Fire-The South</strong><br/><br/>The setting of the sun painted the desert sands crimson and indigo, a color set off by the eruptions of volcanoes not too far away. This close to the Elemental Pole of Fire, the heat was sweltering. That did nothing to stop the crimson-furred creatures excavating in the deep pit. Above and set back from the pit, a figure sat watching them, shaded by a silken canopy.<br/><br/>"Hurry you fools! It must be complete by midnight!"<br/><br/>The erymanthoi grunted and growled, but set to at an even faster pace. Several hours of digging later, as the moon rose into the sky, they finally fell back. Below them stretched a broken dome, glinting dully under a film of dust and sand. Broken minarets and crumpled towers lay scattered, shattered testaments to what had once been, now discolored and cracked by ages of disuse. There was history here to satisfy a savant for a lifetime, but that was of little interest to the figure who slid down the sides of the sand pit to survey the ruins.<br/><br/>"Finally! You idiots go guard the site. I must not be disturbed." A shooing motion sent the erymanthoi away, disgruntled but unable to refuse. Segmented blue eyes glittered in the starlight, their sheen crystalline and flatly reflective.  Hands that glittered with the beauty of the agatae rose as did a lilting, soft chant in Old Realm as the sorceress began her customized spell.<br/><br/>Around her, the air blackened. The starlight shivered and went out, extinguished by an invisible wind. The blackened heart of obsidian and Malfean iron the young woman wore on a pendant about her chest began to beat. Slowly at first, and then more rapidly as midnight neared. The air became hot, stifling, replacing the chill of the desert night. Scents of sweat and perfume rose around her, accompanied by groans and grunts, curses and howls in tongues long forgotten. The heat raced through the woman's body and spread out around her, causing even the demon erymanthoi to pant in desire as the spell reached its' climax and settled into the dragon lines of the world in a quick pulse of desire. She could feel it there, a soft pulsing in the traitor Gaia's veins. She felt the deeper infection began to seep out into the lines and grinned.<br/><br/>Soon the world would know once more the pleasures of Xela-Cas, in ways that couldn't be imagined...<br/><br/><strong>The Eastern Forests</strong><br/><br/>Sapphire was in the midst of finalizing plans to deal with a small settlement of well-armed and organized bandits that plagued this sector of the woods when he felt it. One moment he was calm, coolly reviewing what he knew and where he would strike these parasites. The next he was panting. His forehead broke out in sweat and his cock grew painfully hard in his trousers. The desire hit hard, hit fast, and then was gone, leaving him shaking on the forest floor. Deep in his mind he could feel an aching longing to head southward, for no reason that made sense. Nor was he alone...<br/><br/><strong>The East, The South, The West, The North, The Center</strong><br/><br/>Across Creation, men and women suddenly found themselves in the same position as Zaer. In battle, in peace, no one what they were doing, desire flashed across them in a devastating wave that drove them to their knees and left them hard or wet, and aching for more. There was a longing in them to head southward, vague and undefined but insistent, like a nagging headache.<br/><br/><strong>Yu-Shan</strong><br/><br/>The tremor in the Loom of Fate was slight, sudden, and then done. It went unnoticed as one of the many such tiny ripples in the Loom. But there<em>was</em>a reaction. Both Amethyst and Seeker In the Darkened Starlight were confronted by boxes that floated in mid-air. Inside each box was a terse message:<br/><br/><em>"Disturbance detected in far South, near the Fire Mountains. Believed to be affecting others in unknown range. Investigate."</em><br/><br/>There was no signature but then, Oversight never did leave one.<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/><br/>