“Is the barrier still up?” one of the guards asked Werenita who had just come from the city.

“Yes, all cities are fine for now.”

The guard breathed a sigh of relief, having confirmed that his work load wasn’t going to jump in difficulty due to a barrier failure.

While the guards surrounded the princess as she lay sleeping, their captain was already making his way down to a nearby mountain not worried in the slightest.

Hanrare was good enough that she could keep the barriers up while asleep, and if she failed then they’d have no choice but to work harder. Waking her up wasn’t a feasible option.

Once he’d gotten to the mountain he immediately started his hike all the way to the top, moving at a normal pace even though he could sprint his way up with little effort. Sometimes doing things this way was more fun and eventful.

After several hours of climbing he was close to the top, so high up he could nearly touch the clouds now. As Yuga inched closer to the top, just below the level of the clouds he met a familiar face, suspended in the air on a giant scythe.

“Will you teach me how to fly today?” Yuga asked the floating person.

“I don’t know how many times I have to tell you this but I can’t teach* you how to fly. I didn’t learn this. I can fly because I believe I can.” replied the person before drifting off, hanging listlessly from his scythe.

That was Adam. He was something like a guest of the princess’ but he was always around and didn’t do much of anything besides drifting slowly through the air.

What Yuga found cool about him was that he could fly. Voyagers could zoom through the air at high speeds using shooting star but couldn’t actually float. Flight was a very high level aias skill that very few were able to achieve.

Which made it even more odd that Adam could fly. He wasn’t particularly talented or strong at all. Adam would tell him the secret some day.

Fun as climbing a mountain was that wasn’t Yuga’s reason for ascending it. He came to the mountain top to see something he’d found a while back during his explorations. A very special tree. Hopefully it had survived Hanrare’s flames.

It would be really disappointing if it hadn’t, there was only one of it. Thankfully he could sense it as he approached the summit.

At the very top of the mountain was a small lone tree, about the height of an adult person. It wasn't the largest thing but its roots dug deeper than it’s height, granting it the sturdiness it needed to withstand whatever that would threaten its position at the top.

It had numerous small leaves that dotted its branches and were arranged in a pattern that shaped the tree like a cone.

Yuga doesn't walk all the way to the tree and stopped few meters from where it stood. The special thing about the tree revealed itself when you got close enough, and it wasn’t something you’d want to demonstrate with your body so he kept his distance and began picking up rocks to test it out.

After piling a decent amount of rocks of various sizes he began testing. He picked the smallest rock he could find, it was large enough to cover his entire hand, and threw flung it with incredible force.

It flew hard and fast, straight at the tree. Now came the cool part. Once the rock got within two meters of the tree it reacted.

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Every single one of its leaves detached themselves from its branches and attacked the rock, slicing it up with their blades till nothing but dust was left of it. Having neutralized the threat the leaves flew back to their positions on the branches and reattached themselves.

It was one of the coolest things Yuga had seen on Vesta and he spent the next hour exhausting the pile of rocks.

Yuga eventually grew bored of it and left the tree alone. He searched for a good spot to sit, plopped down on the ground and crossed his legs.

The top of a mountain always featured an incredible view. To the south, where Yuga was facing, the capital was visible. A large city crafted mostly from metal and glass that reflected the harsh sunlight. It was hot all year round here and rain was a rare occurrence.

Beyond the capital city where other cities not quite as large. None of the cities bordered the other and were arranged like independent colonies scattered through out an arid land surrounded by mountains. This was Vesta. Home for the last ten years.

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Ow, I should’ve gone with that last attack at the start. Or not, it takes too much time to actually use.

Hanrare slowly opened her eyes as she stirred awake. She placed her hands flat on the ground and pushed herself up to a sitting position. Standing around her in a loose circle was a sizeable number of guards.

The fact that there were this many guards around meant that the barrier was still ok. Part of her training goals was getting better at barrier management. Good enough that regardless of what happened to her the barriers would remain in place as long as she was alive and in range.

This required her to partition her drive energy in two parts, for herself and for the barriers. Making it possible for her to be exhausted till she passed out but still have energy for the barriers.

A bit up front within the guards circle was Yuga crouching in the snow. Her esteemed captain of guards who had an attention span barely more than a few minutes. He was making a snowman- or snow creature that looked something like a bird.

“You’re awake.” said Yuga. “You’re really pushing yourself with training these days, it’s weird for you to be so hardworking.”

“Oh, please. I’m just trying to my best as a monarch.”

“You still couldn’t harm me anyway.” said Yuga still working on his snow creature.

“You’re just too strong.” Hanrare grunted then threw a flameball at Yuga’s snow sculpture but he easily deflected the attack without even looking.

“Melting my snowbird doesn’t help with that.” said Yuga unperturbed. Hanrare breathed a sigh that signified she had given up and continued idly sitting on the snow.

Yuga completed the snowbird which turned out to be a very accurate replica of the bird he had in mind. Once he was done he admired his work for a short while then began walking away from the area.

“Hey, where are you going?” asked Hanrare.

“To a show on Erinoa.”replied Yuga.

“But we have a meeting to attend.”

“Werenita can fill in for me. See you later.” said Yuga before vanishing from sight.

“Should we stop him, princess?” asked one guard.

“No, don’t bother. It's a waste of time trying to convince him.” replied hanrare.

That marked the end of the day’s training. Periodic training was normal for her but she’d been going much harder at it for the past year and for a very important reason.

Hanrare gazed at the scenery before her at no spot in particular. To the surrounding guards it might’ve seemed as though she was merely staring into space but her view featured something unseen to the average voyager.

In Hanrare’s view of the scenery an extra layer overlapped with what you would normally have seen. In this extra layer several areas were covered in flames.

These places covered in flame fell perfectly in line with areas known as danger zones. The flames were growing ever slightly, expanding just a little bit more with each passing moment.

Hanrare’s face looked deeply worried while looking at the growing flames. She was growing stronger and trying harder but time was running out.

Werenita was approaching Hanrare and as soon as she noticed the deputy guard coming she fixed her expression, putting on a more relaxed and tired looking face.

“It’s time for the meeting, princess.” said Werenita. Hanrare doesn't reply and fell back to a lying position, ignoring her.

The old fools can wait thought the princess as she got comfortable in the snow. She needed to sleep and waking a sleeping princess was a grave offense, punishable by incineration.

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LOCATION : COR CENTROS

A warp gate whirred to life and projected a beam of light, transporting a single person from a distant planet. Juruno had arrived on Cor Centros several hours after his talk with the clan head. He was met by four soldiers garbed in gold and white uniform, two either side of the warp gate.

“You come from Merval.” said one of the soldiers, “Are you Juruno Vaeveron? Here to see Lord Quilofer.”

“Yes, I am.” replied Juruno.

The guard approached Juruno and asked to see his gauntlet. After confirming his identity the soldier let him pass.

“At the foot of this platform there are several transport discs, get on any one of them and it’ll take you where you need to go.” said the soldier before returning to his position.

Juruno walked down from the platform and immediately saw the items the soldier had described. They were silver discs wide enough for a person of any size to comfortably stand on.

He stepped onto one of them and it immediately activated. It hovered about three feet above the ground then began to move forward. It sped away from the warp gate following the road that led from it into the city.

The pace of the transport disc was only just as fast as a normal human in full sprint, gliding silently above the ground. Surprisingly, the ride on the disc felt very stable despite the fact that there wasn’t anything to hold on to as the the user moved through the open air.

Juruno felt quite firm on the disc as he would have been if he was merely standing on the ground. As Juruno moved through the city he could see other people utilizing the transport discs to get around. Moving through winding roads and even ascending with them to get higher floors of buildings.

The cityscape featured buildings of various shapes and sizes all coloured the same deep blue and a bit of white in some places. Plant life of various colours could also be seen through out the city arranged in strategic spots that allowed them to blend perfectly with the buildings.

The city’s design was very aesthetically pleasing and one could tell that no effort was spared in its creation. It had a look that told of an advanced society. This was Cor Centros which meant “Heart of Centros”, the home planet of the Centros order.