The party spent several days in Manthir. They were able to find a cleric to raise Vernon, who was still very weak with dexterity damage. He also found his cleric spells harder to access.

The party decided to use phantom steeds to get to the capital quicker. Because they had hired a guide, Tidus needed to stay behind. Luckily, he had found an elf interested in human cuisine and wanted to swap recipes with Tidus.

The second day into the four day ride, the guide remarked that the forest seemed "sad." They quickly passed by that section, however, and soon the forest returned to natural.

The party arrived in Lintinil without further incident. They said goodbye to their guide and went into the city. They met Haplo in one of the trees of The Research Tree.

He explained that Tamson had said that the party had taken the spellbooks from the tower and then disappeared with them. The spellbooks were important as the human working on them had come up with a revolutionary spell, an enchanced rope trick that allowed one to see out of it on all sides as well as move the portal around.

Haplo asked the party if they had any idea what happened to the book. They explained that they had put it in Vernon's bag of holding. Vernon refused to hand the bag over.

The party did say that there was a chance they could potentially return to the past and hopefully recover the books that way. Haplo offered them a copy of the spell as well as access to the Research Tree library for return of it -- an honor that had never been bestowed upon a human.

The party went to sleep using the ritual to create the dream.

They awoke in a meeting room. The party was set up in a group; next to them was another group of 6 human men, all in well-crafted armor and looking like battle-tested. In front, a noble was talking to them; he was flanked by two wizards.

The noble explained that they had recently found out an enemy had gotten its hands on an artifact named Covalence. He went on to explain its attributes. In the middle of explaining how they were going to capture it, an alarm sounded.

The noble looked directly at Malif, who somehow knew his name was Kyer, and asked if "it was in here."

Malif replied that it was not, and soon a shout was heard from the outside. Everyone else rushed out of the room and the party followed. When they reached the courtyard they saw two groups of men. Each group had a wizard in the center.

To the side was a demon. As they rushed in, the wizards gated in 3 more demons and then ported out. One of the wizards who had been in the meeting room shot a disintegrate at a demon, damaging it.

The noble yelled for Kyer's group to take the right side. In the melee that ensued, Kalagas almost died, but was saved at the last second. There were no other casualties, though many people in the other group looked damaged and nauseated.

After the battle, the party discovered they were in the year 15,000, give or take, just prior to the Demon Wars. In fact, it looked like they were taking part in the start of it.