On the third day of rest, Ezequiel began to prepare the trip, moving quietly while Igor drank tea. He tried to help, but the wise man told him to save his strength. He opened the closet, whispered something and a pair of backpacks appeared that he took. Then, he took off and wore a cape of wine color inside and gold outside.

"So you, despite being level two, are a guardian!" Igor said curiously. "Of what, since I never saw this color?"

"I am the guardian of all the ancestral wisdom, son." He laughed, mocking. "Nothing more appropriate for the oldest man of the thirteen planes, don't you think?"

"I believe so," Igor replied. "But remember that there are fifteen planes."

"And your cape, Igor?" Ezequiel asked. "It was so destroyed that it could not be identified, it and your other clothes."

"It's because it's white," Igor said, downcast. "All white."

"Why didn't you say?" he asked, shaking his head disapprovingly. "Are you ashamed of it? Did you think that by omitting this in your report there would be no interference?"

"No," Igor replied, "just because it doesn't seem relevant to me. Master or student, what difference does it make at this time?"

"Look, son, I've seen hundreds of wizards, thousands, and never one with powers as strong as yours, so be proud of it. Now rebuild your clothes and let's go."

Igor did nothing but think, something that fascinated Ezequiel. His clothes changed without transition and he looked very different. A silk shirt with long sleeves, loose on the arms and tight on the wrists, appeared in place of the T-shirt and the pants, of a very comfortable fabric, had a more normal appearance than the jeans. The cape hung on his shoulders almost to his feet, swaying with the gentle breeze and making a suggestive noise of cloth in the wind, all white. On his feet he wore comfortable shoes and, on his waist, he carried a sword in flaming gold with a handle all adorned with precious stones, wrapped in a sheath of an unknown material and intense and bright red color. Except for the weapon, everything else was white and Igor looked like the incarnation of a noble swordsman of the eighteenth century. Even knowing what to expect, Ezequiel widened his eyes and said, laughing:

"It's Magnificent indeed, much better." He laughed again. "With these clothes and that blond beard, you even look like a Nordic prince of the past, son. If your girl saw you like this, she would drool all over."

More seriously, he continued:

"Be proud of who you are and of that cape, Igor. Please, don't hide it anymore."

"I promise, Ezequiel. Where are we going?" the young man asked, trying to ignore the comment about Eduarda. "I still feel too weak to open a portal and much less for more intense training."

"One more will not weigh on Saci." The wise man pointed to the dog, smiling. "Ready, my friend? Return to your form."

Even having seen it twice, Igor was amazed by the incredible metamorphosis of a dog, huge indeed, into a gigantic dragon of about twenty meters. When it was over, Saci turned his neck to both of them.

"You can mount." he said. "I hope you are comfortable."

"But where are we going?" he asked again.

"We are going to the world of dragons, on the eighth plane," Ezequiel replied. "Just get ready that it will take us about five days to get there."

"Five?!" Igor was amazed. "Why?"

"Dragons do not make more than one jump and, also, do not pass more than one plane at a time. They need some time to recover after opening a portal. Much more than us."

"Maybe I try to open one," Igor said, annoyed by so much delay. "We would save a lot of time."

"Wrong," Ezequiel insisted. "Time is what we have the most. These five days will be great for you to regain your strength. It is pure waste of time to waste them in any other way."

"You are right." Igor smiled. "It is not by chance that you are the guardian of wisdom."

"Of course it is not." Ezequiel laughed. "Let's go."

Both mounted on Saci, a new experience for Igor who found his position comfortable. The huge being took two steps and the third was a strong jump, which ended with the unfolding of the four wings to take flight. Igor felt an intense pressure, as if he were on a plane under strong ascent and calculated that the winged being must have an impressive energy and vigor. He concluded that Saci should not be using all his strength so as not to affect them with the acceleration rates.

The dragon gained height, maybe a thousand meters by the wizard's calculations, and followed gliding with the huge wings all open, something that caused Igor a delicious sensation of freedom that he had never experienced, not even when he used his gifts to fly. Feeling his thought, Saci said only to him:

"It's an incredible feeling, isn't it, Igor? I also have this feeling of freedom and happiness when I fly. Now I will open the portal. Many times I flew with Ezequiel's granddaughter, when she was young, and we did real madness just for the pleasure that it gave us." He spat flames through his nose and a slit formed about fifty meters from them, causing a thunderous noise as if a thunder had happened nearby. Saci dove, passing to the fourth plane and closing the opening. They were now in a reddish and somewhat arid world, with two moons at the zenith that illuminated it well. If it weren't for the fact that it had a breathable atmosphere and gravity was almost identical to that of Earth, anyone would swear they were on Mars.

Saci continued gliding as long as he could, until they reached the edge of a sparse forest where a narrow river ran, winding between the trees. The dragon landed and the pair descended.

"Today we stop here for Saci to rest," Ezequiel said, sitting leaning against a tree.

Igor went to the stream to drink water. He crouched down and joined his hands in a cup, picking up some of the crystalline and pure liquid, drinking it with pleasure, while Ezequiel, mocking, took a bottle from his backpack and started drinking his water.

"Be careful not to drown, okay?" he said. The young man turned his face to him, who smiled and extended the bottle. Igor smiled back and did not want to waste time explaining that he went there because he wanted to walk a little, but the dragon spoke for him:

"The young Wizard wanted to walk to the river, Ez. For him, certain things are new. Poor thing, so powerful and so lost to some of the great wonders of the Universe."

"I admit that it is true. When I want to go to a certain place, I just open a direct path there. I don't need intermediate pauses. So, I don't know all the planes very well except for the planar astronomy classes. I mean, I know the paths to all the Earth's brother planets and I've been to all of them because it's part of the basic learning of a level one, as well as I know the coordinates of more than two thousand worlds by the curriculum of a Guardian of the Portals, but I never stopped to appreciate them and that saddens me now. I've been to a few hundred of these planets, especially when I accompanied a friend who loved to explore certain worlds, but I don't have full knowledge of them like Carol did. Maybe now I've understood what the old Supreme Guardian told me about missing a few years of life."

"Well, son," confessed Ezequiel, "I imagined that it would be so and I make a point of you knowing the main characteristics of these worlds. This is also a potential weapon."

"How can it be a weapon?"

"The geography of the place can bring traps for certain forms of life and you can use it to your advantage."

Igor finished looking at the horizon and turned to the guardian who went back to drinking and smiling, shaking his head. Willing to a little revenge, he concentrated a little while walking back to his friends. The water of the river began to rise, slowly, as if a geyser spout threw it up, only the strange thing was that the fluid made an elegant curve and followed the wizard. Ezequiel had not paid attention until he heard the mental laughter of Saci. He looked ahead and saw the young man being followed by the waters, gaping. Without resisting the joke, Igor made the jet of water enter the wise man's mouth who ended up choking.

"If Muhammad does not go to the river, the river goes to Muhammad." Said Igor and Ezequiel jumped to the side and the water turned to the bottle to fill it. Igor continued. "I thought you might want more water, since you handed me the bottle."

"You, you... funny guy," grumbled the wise man, but ended up laughing.

Saci remained lying down and Ezequiel used his powers to make some pieces of wood fly and form a small pyre because he intended to light a fire. When he was done and saw the dragon look at the firewood, he said:

"Don't you dare sneeze at the wood, Saci. Last time it turned everything into charcoal in three seconds and I had to pick up more firewood."

Igor was forced to laugh, even with all the sadness and worry. Then, he had no more time, because the wise man began to pour a huge torrent of information from that world.

The next morning, the old man took him for a walk through the forest, deepening more and more into it that became a little denser, but not much. Curious, Igor accompanied him in silence and paid a lot of attention to everything. The intense red tone of that world in contrast with the dark green of the forest was beautiful and it seemed that he saw everything through the lens of a camera with an infrared filter. The trees were very spaced apart and the low vegetation was scarce. The few animals he saw were only birds and insects and the silence of the place, which had no wind, was gloomy.

Absorbed in these thoughts, Igor did not realize the transition between the surface and the interior of the mountain where they entered, so subtle that it was, even because the trees continued to exist inside and the ceiling of the cave was so phosphorescent that it looked like day. When they stopped, they were at the entrance of a gigantic clearing, with the diameter of about three football fields and so round that it could only be artificial. In the center of it, there was a domed building made of a type of material that looked like a blue marble, also phosphorescent. The building must have its fifty meters of radius and the highest point of the dome seemed to be another one.

"That building," explained the wizard, "is the last legacy of a civilization that ceased to exist about six hundred thousand years ago. Have you ever thought that Man was still little more than a monkey and they crossed space for several worlds of the fourth plane? I suspect, even, that they were able to jump between planes with their machines."

"I'm impressed." Igor started walking, accompanying the partner. "What happened to them?"

"I have no idea. The dome is intact, despite the millennia, but I never managed to enter. I met this world almost two thousand years ago because of a friend who came here to explore and, in my exploratory wanderings, I ended up finding this. Once I investigated the possibility of traveling in time to be able to meet these people because there must be true treasures of knowledge in this building, but it is impregnable. No magic art can open. It even seems that he can neutralize our powers."

"Once, in the Citadel, I discussed with a great friend of mine the possibility of a temporal displacement. We concluded that, in theory this would be quite possible, but we did not manage to find a way to make it happen. However, maybe it's better not to play with time."

They continued walking along a stone path and flanked by flower beds of red flowers so well cared for that one could swear that there was someone to take care of. When they got close to the dome, Igor saw that the walls showed several drawings that looked like science fiction, with spaceships and even a correct model of the Universe with the planes. Ezequiel signaled for them to follow a path that surrounded it and, after a few minutes, they arrived at the entrance.

"The door faces the north geographic of the planet, just like the pyramid of Giza, and the paintings give a very accurate idea of this civilization," Ezequiel explained. He pointed to the left and continued. "Look at the statue."

Igor circled the statue until he faced it and was impressed because the beings who built it could pass for humans except for having three eyes, the third in the middle of the forehead. The guy was standing and had his left hand extended while the right remained close to his chest. He spun around her a few times, paying attention to everything and said, convinced:

"This statue has a specific purpose, but I'm not sure what it is. To me, it looks like a warning, an alert, maybe of danger."

"I confess that I never cared about the statue except for their human appearance," admitted the wise man, "but now that you say that, I feel that you are right and maybe that's why the building is impregnable."

Igor raised his right hand and touched the statue's hand, feeling something.

"This has energy and vibrates!" he exclaimed to his friend. "Let me see if I feel anything else."

He closed his eyes and concentrated, but the flow was very weak. For some reason he could not say, he took the other hand to his chest and the emanations became a little stronger. Ezequiel approached and held his shoulder. They remained silent for almost an hour until Igor released the statue.

"This is a very special prison," he said with conviction. "What is trapped there is immortal and considered the pure incarnation of evil, that must never be released. This, Ezequiel, is a fortress in both senses, intended to prevent anyone from entering or leaving there."

"I see," commented the wise man shivering. "Thanks to the Goddess it resisted all the attempts I made to open, which were not few. Let's go back that Saci must be ready."

The passage to the next plane was similar. Saci climbed very high and opened the slit, diving through it and gliding to recover. This time, however, they flew for another two hours before landing. That world was green and very beautiful, so similar to Earth that it would deceive anyone. The people were pleasant and friendly who knew the travelers. They were beings who were in the equivalent of the thirteenth century, but in terms of spirit they were very different and very hospitable. Igor knew well some places on the planet, but Ezequiel wanted to stay in a clearing of a dense forest quite far from civilization. When they landed, Saci drank water in the stream and then slept, while Ezequiel took the opportunity to train the young man.

"Is that little knife stuck to the beast that you carry on your waist just for decoration or do you know how to use it?" he asked.

"Do you want to end your life so soon, Ezequiel?" Igor crossed his arms in a tone of challenge. "Know that I am the best swordsman of the Citadel."

"That's what we'll see, my young Wizard," said the wise man, laughing. He raised his hands and invoked a saber of respect, placing it at the height of the head in the samurai style, keeping his arms bent at a ninety degree angle. From the blade, a red glow came out, very suspicious. Igor laughed and he said. "En garde!"

Igor pulled his sword that also began to emit a strong glow, but golden. With all the calm, he approached with the weapon in rist and, when both touched, sparks and small rays came out between the red and the golden. After the first touch, they began to fence and Igor laughed, because Ezequiel was too energetic for such a heavy sword. In five minutes he would not bear the weight and would be at his mercy. One more quick clash and, when the blades clinked amid crackling rays, Ezequiel made a quick spin disorienting the opponent and used the flat side of the weapon as a racket, throwing a ray at the young man, who fell stunned by the strong electric shocks received. He backed away two steps and raised his sword vertically, right between his eyes. On his lips, he displayed a fierce smile.

Igor got up and looked gaping at the opponent, not believing that he was capable of doing that. He advanced and positioned himself to face him again, but the result was similar, to his great astonishment: the partner exchanged some blows and then used the sword to throw small rays of shocks. On the fourth attempt, Igor raised his personal barrier, but it burst violently when touching the opponent's blade. Dazed, the young man searched for his sword that had flown with the clash.

"Enough," commanded the old man. "Lesson number one: never judge someone by their appearance, son. I already manipulated a sword before your oldest ancestor that you have knowledge was born and I keep myself well tuned; second lesson: protection barriers can be neutralized if it is possible to identify their nature and create an inverse magic. Your task in the next few days will be to learn how to create an individual barrier that is random.

"A little more and I call you Obi Wan."

"Well, believe me, boy, that you can take some excellent lessons from that movie."

"How can you understand so much about movies that are somewhat modern if you live so isolated?"

"Well, my son." Ezequiel laughed a lot. "What is television but electromagnetic waves? When I want a different distraction, I create a TV and watch a good movie."

"I didn't expect that." Igor gave a frank laugh and shook his head. "But you are right. I confess that I prefer good music."

"Music is easier to do." Ezequiel laughed. "You can even invent a melody out of nowhere."

― ☼ ―

Obi Wan Quenobi, a character from the Star Wars movie, a jedi knight. A. N.