In the southern region of an island known as Araponza, a ring-shaped wall surrounded a small city. The city, Lumina, was the capital of the country by the same name. Surrounding the city was a wall that curved to form a perfect circle, with four gates in the cardinal directions.

Inside Lumina, the citizens were divided by wealth, the poorest living just within the ring wall, creating their own ring of houses and business buildings.

The middle class created another ring, theirs being along a hill that continued rising. At the top of the hill sat the rich. Then finally the nobles, those who served the monarchy directly. The monarchy, the queen and her daughter, lived within the castle at the center of town, the hill forming a depression that hid the castle from all except the nobles.

Within the castle walls, Lukas Baronia had escaped the supervision of his family. Through the halls tall enough for some ten times his size, the little boy of only six was relieved to get away from his father and brother as he galloped to freedom, only stopping when he could see the ceiling give way to daylight.

Turning his attention from the rays of sunshine to the ground, Luke had found himself in the castle garden, surrounded by green hedges and flowers of all colors. The boy inspected the garden until he spotted a brand-new face wandering the greenery: a girl of the same age, short, pink hair, and looking equally perplexed at the boy’s presence.

“Who are you and what are you doing in my garden?”

“I’m Luke. I was just walking around.”

The boy anticipated the worst. This girl must have been the princess he heard about, and he must have seemed like an intruder wandering into her home unannounced. To his surprise, however, the girl simply smiled at him and extended her arm.

“I’m princess Elizabeth, nice to meet you.”

Shaking her hand, Luke pondered what to say next. “You uh…want to play?”

“Of course! Since this place is so big, why not hide and seek?”

“Sure. Do you want to be the hider?”

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“No, I’ll be the seeker. You might never find me if I hide somewhere. I’ll close my eyes and count to five.”

Turning around and putting her hands over her eyes, Elizabeth began to count, sending Luke into a panic trying to find a hiding spot.

“Zero.” Mercifully the princess gave him a running start, but a lot of these hedges had a gap at the bottom, making it easy to see someone from the other side.

“One.” Luke looked around hectically, considering leaving the garden, but unsure of-

“Two.” No time to think! Luke ran behind a bush.

“Three.” The bush was fairly thick, but looking from the bottom, he could still see through it plainly.

“Four.” A clever idea started to form in his head.

“Five! Ready or not, here I come!”

The princess turned around, scanning the environment for the boy hiding behind one of the hedges. Luke watched from his bush as she looked around various other hedges, until she approached his.

Stealthily as he could, as the princess began to search the area, Luke darted behind a different hedge. When the princess began to wander his way, he darted behind another hedge.

“Luke, what are you doing?”

To his shock and horror, Luke turned around to see his brother, Matthew, towering over him. More importantly, he was giving away his position.

“Matthew, go away!” Luke whispered as loud as he could without alerting the princess. “Elizabeth will find me.”

“Elizabeth?”

“There you are! I could have sworn I checked this place beforehand.”

“Luke, what are you doing with the princess?” Matthew looked at his younger brother accusingly as the latter stood up.

“We were playing hide and seek.” The princess tried to excuse Luke, but the older brother shook his head.

“Father was really angry when you ran off.”

“He’s always angry.”

“Um…” Elizabeth tried to interject until Matthew turned her way.

“Princess, I’m sorry if my brother caused you any trouble.”

“He didn’t cause me any trouble, we were just having fun.”

“Well, we have to go now. Maybe Luke will come around again.”

Matthew took his brother by the hand, dragging him away while Luke waved goodbye to the princess.

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“Luke Baronia, where have you been?!”

Luke felt his heart melt when he heard those words, not daring to look his father in the eyes.

“He was making friends with the princess, dad.”

“Princess Elizabeth? You met her?” The anger in the man’s voice disappeared in a flash, replaced with astonishment.

Curiosity having overtaken Luke, he looked at his father and was weirded out by the surprised expression on his face.

“Yeah, we played hide and seek.”

“That’s nice. However, Luke you mustn’t run off without supervision from your brother or myself.” The sterness in his voice returned, albeit without the usual hint of frustration. “Come, let’s head home. You can see your friend some other day.”

Still bewildered by his father’s calm demeanor, Luke did not argue as they left the castle. He had no reason to argue in any case, as he finally had someone to talk to and play with that wasn’t his brother.