Akilah was in front of her grandma Imala's old house. The place had turned decrepit since they both left the house; it was so far into the forest that one could barely even find it if not already familiar with the road. As soon as Akilah entered the house, she leapt towards the basement door and started searching frantically.
“It is around here somewhere, I know it is. It's here somewhere!”
Akilah was frantically shuffling through the basement, when suddenly she stepped on a wooden floorboard that sunk beneath her steps. It was not a sudden change but since she was barefoot and had wounded feet, she could feel everything more intensely. Akilah searched the basement for something she could use to remove the floorboard.
'This might work.' Akilah had found an old and rusty shovel. She figured that all she needed to do was to put the blade under one of the side floorboards, use her weight to press down on the shaft and break open the hidden floorboard.
After much struggle, Akilah managed to edge the blade underneath the floorboard and was pressing down on the shaft. When suddenly the shovel broke in two. Akilah’s hands ached as she felt several splinters had pierced her skin. 'It does not matter I cannot stop now' she thought.
Akilah threw away the handle piece that she was holding and instead held the end that was still connected to the shovel. She pressed it down ignoring the pain that it caused by pressing the splinters further into her skin. It did not stop her from pressing on further, until she finally heard a loud pop. The floorboard had open.
“THERE IT IS!!”
Akilah scrambled down to the opened floorboard to pick up the book that was hidden underneath. It was old and dusty, but Akilah was sure that this was the right book.
Akilah's grandma Imala was seen as an odd individual; it is known that she lived away from civilization because she hated being around people. However, Akilah knew that that was not the whole story. Imala did indeed have a strong dislike against civilization but the biggest reason as to why she lived away from humans was to protect herself, because she was a magician.
A century ago the Kingdom of Vela and its neighboring Kingdom of Livue had the unique power of magic. Magic was a recessive hereditary gene, and only existed within a select few. These people were also distinguished from the average human by having bright golden eyes. Individually these magic users were not strong, but together they became powerful.
In the Kingdom of Vela magic users were neither a part of the noble class nor commoners, they had their own ranking in society as Magicians, and they would use their magic to help both nobles and commoners with any small issues that may arise. A magician could heal minor health issue or make a dead and withered garden come back to life.
It was said that magic was a gift sent down from God and whoever misuses this gift will lose one eye, it had been named as “The Devils Curse”. Such was the case with black magic users. Black magic users were a stronger breed of magicians that had chosen to go through the trials to give up “God’s gift” to earn “The Devils Curse”.
A single black magic user can cause great misfortune upon a person or even a town. However, a group of black magic users could cast a curse upon an entire nation. Therefore, black magic was highly illegal and any black magic users found were immediately sentenced to death. Hence why they only operated within the black market. With the risks of becoming a black magic user, only a few magicians had gone through the rigorous process to become one.
However, everything changed when the 27th ruler Kritanta ascended to the throne of the Kingdom of Vela. Kritanta was a strong and power-hungry king that aimed to expand his kingdom into an empire. He started and won multiple wars with the neighboring countries and he expanded the kingdom tenfold, making his desire a reality. Kritanta had built his own empire. But one faithful day a plague started spreading across his empire. It was a rapid and deadly plague that had killed ten percent of the empire’s population in a matter of a month.
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Kritanta tried to stop it but his efforts were all in vain, nothing he did could stop the plague. He turned to the magicians and commanded that they find a solution. A few magicians ventured out to the infected areas to examine the people and found out that it wasn’t a plague, but a curse. When Kritanta heard of this he gathered all the magicians within the empire to use their powers to undo the curse. However, they soon found out that the curse was created by several black magic users and the only way to undo the curse was to kill its creators.
Kritanta knew that the black magic users were either from his empire or from the fallen kingdom of Livue; which he had recently conquered. Kritanta had heard of the rumors that the fallen king of Livue had secretly colluded with a group of black magic users. However, after the Kingdom of Livue lost the war and the late king fell; the group went into hiding.
Kritanta gave orders to have all the members of that group found and executed. Although it took some time Kritanta's plan was a success and the plague disappeared. Many wondered how Kritanta had managed to defeat a group of well-skilled black magic users. Rumors even started to spread that Kritanta had made a deal with the devil, but that remains a mystery.
However, Kritanta grew very weary of magic users ‘If this happened once if could always happen again’ That idea started as a seed of doubt that grew into a forest of paranoia; consumed by his paranoia Kritanta went on a crusade against all the remaining black magic users. But this too did not stop the paranoia inside of him 'A good magician can always turn into a black magic user” nothing is stopping them from going evil and cursing his empire again.
The emperor made a drastic decision, he secretly ordered the execution of all magicians within the Empire of Vela and its surrounding areas. Kritanta took advantage of the fact that the magicians are only powerful when they are together. He separated them and killed them off one by one until they were all dead. In a matter of weeks all magic users were killed off by the emperor. Many black magic users and regular magicians had cursed the king before their deaths, and this eventually led to a long and painful death for Kritanta, who died not long after the crusades. However, his law that forbade magic and demanded the death of all magic users still stands.
But Akilah knows that this was not the whole truth. In fact, there was one magic user left, Faust who was her great-grandfather that was alive during this time. Faust was born right after the crusades began. His father was a magic user, a black magic user. However, Faust himself was born with brown eyes which indicated that he did not possess any magic at all. His father was relieved since Faust's brown eyes would guarantee his son’s safety. When the crusade escalated his father sent him and his mother away to keep them protected; leaving behind only his grimoire as memorabilia for Faust.
Faust grew up and got married and when he had his first born child, he saw some that shook him to his core, his child had golden eyes. Faust knew what this meant and him and his family went into hiding. Thereafter magic alongside the grimoire were passed down through Akilah's family. The magic gene had skipped Akilah, since in most cases it was a recessive gene, it appeared very rarely.
Before Akilah's grandma died, she decided told Akilah where the grimoire was hidden just in case, she ever needed it. That was a decision that Akilah was grateful that her grandma made because she needed that grimoire now.