Andrew wasn't sure what had happened to him. One moment he was talking to the red-haired man, the next he was venturing alone in the blood-red mist only to find Eliza a few moments later. He sighed tiredly as he sat down, taking a break from digging up the metallic container from the ground.

Moments before he reunited with Eliza, Andrew was exploring everything around him. While he couldn't see anything within the distance, he did accidentally stub his feet into what seemed to be a metallic container of some kind. He didn't know what it was nor was he sure what he would do with it, but Andrew was too tired to think about all of that. The only thing that he had in his mind was that it was something interesting, and in a place where he couldn't see or feel anything, it was the only thing that he had noticed out of the blue. So he and Eliza just started digging for the container. They weren't even sure what shape it would be, but they still continued digging anyway. Despite them both being mages, they were still children only a bit older than infants. Andrew was much fitter than Eliza since he was trained constantly by Tameka, but the strength of the two children couldn't dig through the dirt covering up the container quickly enough.

"Ah, what did I get myself into?" Andrew contemplated as he sat by the riverside. Why was I so stupid? he thought, I could've just run away. I'm such an idiot.

"Andrew?" he could hear Eliza calling. It was getting dark, and she had already set up camp.

Andrew wearily stood up from the ground. He was more tired than he had been in at least a week, and it was only getting worse. Trying to dig through the dirt was only one thing. Andrew could feel the grimoire inside his body... changing somehow. He wasn't sure what it meant, but he was too exhausted to care.

A few days camping at that same site later, Andrew had finally reached the container. He and Eliza had been digging for what felt like an eternity trying to find something that they weren't sure was of any use to them at all. But they persevered. And there it was. A metallic chest, seemingly made out of steel and eerily clean for something that had stayed underground for such a long time. No, it wasn't just clean. It was spotless. Despite the dark brown dirt, the chest didn't have any stains on it. It was just weirdly shiny. Andrew and Eliza grabbed the chest's handle and tried to pull it out of the ground, with Andrew using air magic to assist them. About more than a minute later, they had finally dragged it out of the ground. Eliza, exhausted, immediately fell onto the ground, panting and resting. Andrew, on the other hand, immediately tried to open the chest. He tried jamming the lock open with the stone knife Tameka had given him, but it did nothing. Literally nothing.

"Hey, Ellie," Andrew called.

"Huh?"

"Don't you think this chest is a bit... strange?" Andrew asked, "Like, we dragged it out of the ground and it still remains spotless. I couldn't get my knife that clean even after I washed away the boar's blood in the river."

"I dunno," Eliza shrugged, "Maybe it's magic?"

Andrew groaned, "I really hoped I could get a better answer than that."

Eliza just ignored him and went back to rest.

Andrew continued examining the chest. The more he looked at it, the stranger he felt. His knife was relatively clean, but it still had some animal blood on it after he went hunting multiple times. But when he hit that knife as hard as he could at the lock, it didn't even make a dent. Not even the smallest stain. What the heck? Andrew thought. And then he did the only thing he could do: he made a finger gun as he focused man at the tip of his finger. A spark of electricity zapped from his finger, dismantling the lock in an instant. But it wasn't how Andrew had expected it to go. He wanted to use the electricity to fry the lock somehow, but the lock remained... intact, at least in the sense that there was no trace of it being damaged in any way. It was as if... the lock reacted with Andrew's magic. He swallowed as a shiver was sent down his spine. He strenuously pushed the top of the chest over, opening it. Inside was something that terrified him.

A black grimoire.

Andrew reached his hand out to touch the grimoire, wanting to understand what was going on when it suddenly happened.

He could feel a surge of energy rushing through his veins. He couldn't even breathe for a second. He coughed and panted.

"What the..." he groaned as he looked up at what was rising from the grimoire.

His heart sank.