A week had passed, and Orion grew more anxious with each passing day. The road was unforgiving, and exhaustion gnawed at him. The only thing giving him any sense of direction was the great spire. At the centre of the world and far beyond the eastern horizon, it was a mountain as ancient as the world itself, tall enough to pierce the heavens. Legends say it stood firm, protecting the world from dangers beyond comprehension.
The caravan travelled north, passing by a few villages without interacting with them. In the first couple of days of the journey, Orion talked with a few kids to learn their situation. He wasn't surprised that all of them possessed a minor or intermediate affinity to darkness and another intermediate affinity, though none had any higher affinity.
After that, none of the prisoners wanted to talk about anything, even himself. Orion had nothing to do other than observe the guards. They always started moving at the brink of dawn, stopped for a short break when the sun reached its peak, and halted to rest when the sun set. These breaks were also when they received their meals and time to sleep.
He was bored and disoriented from the constant bumping and the claustrophobic space he was cramped into with the others. It was akin to hell.
His thoughts were interrupted by a strange sound, different from the occasional whimpers from the other cursed children, the banter between guards, or the sounds of the reptaurs. His ears perked up, trying to identify where the sound was coming from, and he wasn’t the only one to notice.
At that moment, the caravan slowed to a halt. By the captain's orders, the armoured guards moved in unison, drawing their blades and channelling their mana.
After a few long moments, a giant wolf, three times as tall as the captain, jumped out of the forest canopy, aiming its fangs at the captain's neck. The captain dodged the attack by a hair's length.
Immediately, the guards sprang into action, supporting their captain, who counter-attacked with a horizontal slash aiming for the beast’s neck. The giant wolf was fast, dodging the attack with only a light cut. The beast growled, noticing the elven guards surrounding it.
The captain rushed the beast. A faint light, barely visible to the naked eye, seeped out of his body, spiralling and condensing into two circular barriers on both sides of his body, with the rest flowing into his sword. He swung his sword down at the wolf, which jumped out of the way. Some of the guards launched spells—projectiles of wind and water—striking the beast in its moment of vulnerability.
Suddenly, the wolf's mane started to glow, solidifying into a metallic form to shield it from the incoming spells. When it landed, its body seemed heavier. Noticing this, the captain ordered his men to go on the offensive, trying to exploit the wolf's reduced agility.
The wolf responded by turning off its ability and evading, engaging in a deadly dance of wits with the soldiers. When cornered, it switched to defence, taking sword strikes and spells with its armoured body. When it found gaps in their formation, it struck, managing to bite off an arm of one of the men and wounding many others.
Orion observed the battle, momentarily losing himself in it. The guards fought with excellent coordination, slowly whittling the wolf down. They targeted the same spot on its neck, forming cracks in its hard shell. Soon, the cracks widened, and the armour surrounding its neck broke away.
Sensing impending danger, the beast ran away, realising it was outmatched. The captain didn’t pursue it and instead instructed his men to tend to the wounded.
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The journey continued with more caution after the wolf attack, but the next week of travel was uneventful. On the seventh day since the attack, the scenery started to change; the canopy receded, and vast farm fields took its place.
During this time, Orion opened up a little more to Azar. The boy was unique in a similar way to Orion. His coarse crimson hair was quite rare among elves, who mostly had straight blonde hair. When Orion asked him about it, Azar said, "Oh, you mean my hair? It's nothing special. I inherited it from my great-grandfather. My paa told me he was a human who migrated from the Kingdom of Lunaria, fleeing an undead crisis. He got married to an elf, and his features got passed down. What about you? I don’t recall seeing someone with your silver hair before."
Other than talking about a few of their stories and incidents, they stayed silent for the most part. But neither of them minded it. Knowing that they had someone to share the misery with did alleviate some of the anxiety.
On the eighth day, they reached the city of Brightfield. The city itself was half as big as the capital Enor, but that didn’t diminish its grandeur. This city was the biggest producer of grains in the federation. Unfortunately, Orion didn’t have the time to ponder the food supply chain of the country.
The caravan waited a fair distance from the city until nightfall. That’s when another few dozen carriages joined their caravan. Most were filled with cursed elves like them, and a few held supplies.
By dawn, the enlarged caravan resumed its march. In two weeks, they reached Brightlight city, another major settlement in the federation, where another few dozen carriages joined their convoy. Orion concluded that the federation was gathering the cursed from all over the nation to be sent to a single destination, and soon that destination became clear.
A month since they departed from Enor, Orion saw a massive structure slowly revealing itself over the horizon—a wall as tall as the tallest palace back in the capital stretched as far as a city in each direction.
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Orion was in awe before the fortress, which stood tall and proud, having withstood many wars and invasions. Many towers lined it, each boasting a mana cannon or a ballista, ready to repel any invader that dared attack the federation.
Soon, the convoy reached the wall, where a massive gate greeted them. The captains grouped and headed to the guards manning the gate, presenting a badge. Then the gates slowly opened.
The scale of what was inside the wall could rival the capital. Barracks, training grounds, and warehouses filled the space. Near the centre of the fortress stood a ten-story building, made from six large rectangular sections. Each could house a town’s worth of people. The building itself was an amalgamation of stone and steel, each section connected by a secondary wall that acted like a bridge.
Orion knew this place; it was one of the two frontlines against the beastkin invaders. On each side of the Hollow Steps stood a complex of fortresses and citadels, forming a wall that protected the federation in the north. This one was named the Bright Sword Citadel.
His father had told him about this place once. He spoke of a general whose combat prowess was second only to the heads of the five families. His achievements were well known even to the warriors on the other side of the mountain; he repelled an invasion from a beast lord with minimal casualties, took down a storm dragon that terrorised the region, and single-handedly stabilised a collapsing frontline that was considered a lost cause.
The children were transported to a section in the eastern part of the fortress, littered with tents. The soldiers inhabiting the citadel were clad in azure armour, unlike the black armour of the ones that brought them here. They separated the children into two groups based on gender and were given water to get cleaned.
After that, they were given a clean set of clothes and ordered to wait in an open space near the camp for further orders. Orion didn’t know what to think; the past few hours passed like a haze. He wasn’t prepared for the improved treatment compared to the last month. But he didn’t dare make any mistake, scared that any inconvenience he caused would revert his treatment to what it was before.
After what seemed like an eternity of silence, a man clad in full-body azure armour walked in to face them. He was at least six feet tall and wore a white fur cape. His face was hidden behind a visor, and his hand rested on the hilt of a blade sheathed at his waist. Orion thought this man embodied the ideal of knighthood.
Once the man reached a spot in front of them, his gaze seemed to pass over all of them, counting how many there were before he finally said, "There are exactly 987 of you right now. By all accounts, you should have been killed, but you are still breathing." He glanced at the stiff group of children in front of him. "The army lacks the manpower necessary to keep up with the intensifying war. That is why, by my request, all of you, cursed children of Nox, will be trained and forged into weapons. You will be given a chance to earn the right to live in this nation. Whether you like it or not, you will fight. Those that are not ready to face the incoming hell will perish. And those who temper their steel in the flame of war will prosper!" He paused, taking note of everyone's reaction. "Cursed children of Nox, under me, Commander Thalor of the Bright Sword Citadel, your training will begin tomorrow. You will be educated, fed, dressed, and taken care of as long as you prove yourself."
After the speech, Commander Thalor stepped back and walked toward the inner fortress while a human man took his place. This one wore formal attire and was a head shorter than the commander, dressed in a simple teal robe with his hands hidden in his sleeves.
"Hello, children. Pardon my friend's big talk about glory and warfare. He may sound callous and indifferent, but he has a kind heart. He just doesn’t know how to act around younglings like you. Anyways, call me Chief Scribe Frederick, or Fred for short. For the rest of the day, you will be divided into groups of four to commence your training tomorrow. If you have a friend or would like to pair with someone, speak now."
The kids didn’t respond, still dazed and fearful of the situation they found themselves in, and Frederick seemed to expect it. He scanned the group quickly before laying eyes on a seemingly random girl. "You there, child, is there someone you want to pair up with?"
The girl flinched, and after hesitating for a bit, said, "...Y-yes, I want to stay with Cloe."
"Excellent," Frederick said before pulling a few sheets of paper and documents from his sleeve. Then, he pulled out a pen and an ink bottle from his other sleeve and threw them into the air. From his hand, a soft breeze blew, picking up the papers, pen, and ink bottle, leaving them suspended. He then made some documents hover closer and quickly skimmed through them. "The Illumis domain, the Illumis domain..." he muttered. "Ah! There it is. Child, what are your names?"
"M-my name is Rosy, and my friend's name is Cloe."
"Rosy, an intermediate nature affinity and a minor darkness affinity. Cloe, an intermediate water affinity and a lesser darkness affinity. Both fitting names if you ask me," Frederick laughed, trying to lighten the mood a little bit. He then gestured for the pen to scribble something on a blank sheet of paper and said, "Anyone else?"
After seeing the display, Azar, who was sitting next to Orion, seemed to gather some of his courage, raised his hand, and said, "My name is Azar, and I would like to have Orion over here with me in the same group."
Frederick nodded with an exaggerated motion, and after looking for the names, he exclaimed, "Azar, a higher fire, an intermediate darkness, and a lesser metal. Orion, a higher lightning, an intermediate space, and an intermediate darkness." He paused for a moment. "Both of you have great potential. Put in the effort, and you will surely make a name for yourselves."
It didn’t take long before all the groups were formed. After friends and acquaintances secured being together, the rest were filled in based on compatibility of elements and talent. For instance, Orion's group had him, Azar, Theo, and a boy named Malvin, who had an intermediate nature affinity.
By the end of the day, they were given dinner and guided to a tent that would become their residence for the foreseeable future.
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Orion lay in his soft bed, puzzled. His time on the road had been miserable, but after what happened today, he didn’t know whether it was a blessing or a curse. On the one hand, he got to live despite his situation; on the other, he would be used as a weapon to fight in the war that took his parents' lives and possibly join them in the afterlife because of it. And if the commander's words were to be believed, the war had become far more deadly than it was five years ago.
"Hey, Azar, what do you want to be known for when we get sent out?" Orion asked.
"Hmm," Azar said, and after a few seconds, he continued, "I always wanted to be a blacksmith, like my father and his father before him. And I still intend to forge things, so... I would like to forge a weapon like no other and use it to spread fear into the hearts of my enemies. What about you?"
Orion stayed silent for a moment and said, "I want to become a swordsman, the best swordsman on the continent, the world even..." He paused for a moment and then added with a grin, "And I want to spite my uncle with it."