A sudden knock takes the distinguished academician, renowned scientist, and brilliant artist Cornelius Witt by surprise. The venerable old man turns around to see a spring pipit, a bird rare in these parts, beating its wings against the windowpane. The sight takes him to a memorable time three years back, when a bird just like this was drumming its wings against the windows of the Strongford Library. On that occasion, a few seconds later the stained-glass windows exploded into a thousand glittering shards, and an entire army of Dark sorcerers materialized in the spacious reading room, led by Kragg...

Witt recalls that the decision to burn his life's work had come to him instantly and without a doubt. He managed to cast the Darganai's Ash spell just in time to destroy his magnum opus, a tome entitled "Methods of Countering the Darkness". Kragg roared with rage and frustration, sending out a burst of violent magic that enveloped Cornelius in excruciating pain. As the henchmen of Darkness bound him in spells and began to escort him back to their lands, the scientist tried to distract himself from the intense physical sensations that wracked his body and contemplate the unfolding situation.

"The Emissaries of Darkness came for my book. That means I must have been close to discovering their secrets, and so became too much of a threat.” Thus he reasoned through the blinding veil of pain. "What they want to know now is whether copies of my work exist, and where they are. As long as they don't know that the only remaining copy is the one stored in my memory, I still have a chance of survival."

After several days of traveling, the group arrived in Graven, the capital of the dark elves who had betrayed the Dominion. Various high-ranking officials of the Darkness happened to be visiting at the time, and they were very pleased with such a capture. The torture began.

With boundless delight, the dark elves started to subject the scholar to their worst curses and incantations — the scholar who had raised Galahad, Aurora and Ginger, their despised nemeses. These magicians of Darkness knew how to inflict suffering without shedding a drop of blood, thus drawing out the pain as long as possible. Cornelius felt as if his mind was being squeezed in an iron-hot vice, and he was on the point of complete exhaustion. Terrifying hallucinations conjured up by the finest dark spellcasters invaded his mind with pictures of the death of his loved ones, the fall of the Dominion, and the complete triumph of the forces of Darkness. Meanwhile, spells of affect clouded his mind with feelings of utter hopelessness and despair. Two years passed since his capture, but it seemed to Cornelius that the torture had lasted several hundred years already, and showed no signs of stopping.

But even when his mind rebelled against him and his body was on the verge of death, Cornelius's resolve remained as strong and unbending as steel. Despite being a man of advanced age, he somehow kept his sanity and never revealed the secret of his research. How did he manage it? He had discovered a way to resist the dark magic, and even dissipate it. Unwittingly, the dark mages had given Cornelius the key to the arcane. Thus, the torture became like a training for the scientist, who eventually unraveled the mystery of their dark arts and began to develop an immunity to them. Cornelius waited patiently, honing his skills to perfection.

It was a sight to behold when at last Witt, with impeccable dignity and confidence, stepped calmly off of the platform where he was held, shattering his shackles as if they were made of fragile glass. The sorcerers around him started gesturing wildly, desperately reciting their most powerful spells, but it was all in vain. Cornelius's newfound strength had rendered them as dangerous as puppies yapping at an elephant. Even the mighty Kragg didn't last a minute, struck down by a massive boulder launched by Cornelius with a single thought. The servants of Darkness could only look on helplessly as their former captive, the famous scientist Cornelius Witt, walked freely towards the rising sun, safely protected by an energy shield.

A small smile playing on his lips, the old scholar opens the window and returns to his desk, allowing the melodious trill of the spring pipit to echo through the reading room of the Strongford Library. He dips his pen into the inkwell and continues his work, inscribing his wisdom into a huge tome. To this day, his discoveries in the field of anti-dark magic aid the Dominion in the struggle against evil... But Cornelius's work is still far from complete.