Tilda enrolls in a prestigious university, but finds herself in its strange branch. Barely stepping inside, she falls into a fiery abyss—yet she’s saved by a guy who appears out of the flames. He is the student who disappeared a year ago, named Volga. All this time he spent in an otherworldly realm and doesn’t remember what happened to him there. The gift Volga had before he vanished has changed and made him dangerous. At the university, rumors spread that Volga has turned into a demon. Hoping to find the reason for his changes and discover whether everything can be fixed, Volga goes back to the Barrier that separates worlds—and along with it, Tilda—but this time with a different goal. Terrible things begin happening at the university: a worker is killed, and a girl student is kidnapped. Tilda learns that the perpetrators plan to cause a worldwide catastrophe, using the kidnapped girl’s gift—something that can awaken all the volcanoes on Earth. The third book in the “Likhomorye” series can be read separately.