My Name is John Kegan and I have lived a life that some would only dream of. I have loved a wonderful woman and raised wonderful children with her. I have fought many battles laying many of my foes corpses at my feet. So many things have I done so many years have passed for my descendants I leave this written journal so that they may know where it all began.

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I was eight years old reading out in the woods of my parents farm that fateful day. I always loved the written word and the knowledge it gave to those who would seize it. I also loved working with my father it was the only time I felt close to him. Whether it was baling hay to taking care of the cows I didn't care. School was not a place I enjoyed the other kids made fun of me due to my glasses and my small size. I was 115 cm tall with brown hair and blue eyes. I wasn't weak working with my father insured that, but I hated conflict I just wanted to live my life in peace and quiet. My mother was loving but busy and my three older siblings treated me the same as the kids at school. So when I felt depressed I would go to the woods and read my favorite books. Even though I hated conflict I loved to read stories of knights, samurai and other books of that kind. That fateful day I was reading the Canterbury Tales, The Tales of Genji, and a book the librarian said I might like called The Art of War.

I was sitting on the ground with my back against the old oak tree I loved to read under when it happened. A blinding white light blinded me it took me a few minutes to be able to see again. What I saw amazed me a circle of blue energy as big as me was hovering off the ground in front of me. I just sat there and stared at it in amazement for I didn't know how long. As I was staring at the anomaly two metallic shackles came flying out of it and clamped onto my legs. The shackles slowly pulled me towards the anomaly I cried out for help and clawed at the ground trying to stop it. When I realized I couldn't stop it I grabbed my books and prayed for a miracle that wouldn't happen. As my head passed through the circle of energy my mind faded into blackness.

As I slowly awakened I noticed I was laying down. When opened my eyes I saw a wooden ceiling above me. I was in a stone room laying on straw on the floor. The door looked like cell door you would see in a jail and that's when it hit me I was in basically a jail cell. The only thing that decorated my prison was a wooden bucket in the far corner of the room. After getting over the shock of where I was I noticed that instead of my blue jeans, sneakers and blue t-shirt I was dressed in what looked like a grey feed bag my dad used for the cows. I wondered if they took my clothes why didn't they take my glasses to? I froze after getting one shocking surprise after another I finally noticed I didn't have on my glasses and I could see perfectly. I huddled in a corner hugging my knees trying to figure out what was going on would I see my home again? Would my parents think I ran away? Would they think I was dead? all these questions and many more crashed through my mind. Then I did what almost any eight-year-old would do I broke down and cried. I don't know for how long I cried but at some point, someone put a plate of what looked like grits and a loaf of bread in my cell. After I saw it I felt a pain in my stomach, so I walked over and took back to my corner. I don't remember what it tasted like, but it stopped me from crying.

"Crying will not solve your problems son only action will" I remember my father telling me. So, I looked around my cell again and tried to see if I had missed anything. I noticed the stone wasn't like the cement or cinder blocks at home they were huge squares and looked rough. the wood on the ceiling also didn't look like wood planks back home they were rougher, and the cell door was made of a brown metal. I was very confused by this revelation when I heard voices coming from outside the cell door.

“@#$$$%$#%$@#$%” said one voice I couldn’t understand the language they were speaking.

“!@#!$!$!$$!$!$@#!” said another voice.

The door to my cell slowly opened and two men stepped in they were dressed in brown metal skirts and chest pieces. They wore sandals and the same colored metal wrapped around their forearms. They had black hair one had blue eyes the other had brown eyes. They were of average looks and height they both had brown metallic necklaces around their necks I wasn’t sure but there seemed to be pity in their eyes. The blue-eyed man reached out his hand to me I reached out my own hand. The blue-eyed man smiled as he held my hand and led me out of my cell. As I was led out of my cell by what I assumed were guards I saw eleven other doors like my own in a hallway. At the end of the hallway was a wooden door and we were walking towards it. I didn’t see any other people in the cells as we walked down the hallway when we reached the door the brown eyed guard opened the door while me and the blue-eyed guard walked out. We were in another hallway with four wooden doors at one end of the hall was a stone wall and at the other end was a huge wooden door that opened like the one at the church my parents took me and my siblings to. As we walked the door I saw us enter a circler room with only one other wooden door like the one we walked through in front of this door was someone covered in cloth from his head to his toes. He was taller than the guards, but I couldn’t make anything else out through his hood. The blue-eyed guard led me to the center of the room while the brown eyed one stayed in front of the door we had walked through. We stopped walking when we reached the center and the blue-eyed guard let go of my hand. I looked at him and he held up his palm to me to stay as he walked to the wall on my left. After he had reached far wall the hooded man nodded and raised his hands.

“@#$@” said the hooded man he had hiss in his voice but that’s wasn’t what surprised me.

When he held up his hands I almost screamed in fright they were covered in what looked like blue scales and claws at the end of his fingers. As soon as he spoke grey metallic shackles shot out of the stone and clamped onto my arms and legs holding me in place. I was starting to panic when the hooded man took off his hood and then I wanted to scream. What greeted me was simply put a human with a lizard’s face covered in blue scales and two horns coming out the top of his head. His pupils were like a cats and his eye color was an icy blue they seemed to stare right into my soul. He started chanting in that strange language of his and not even a few seconds later I felt like my mind was splitting in two. I screamed then as loud as I could the pain was excruciating I looked at the blue-eyed guard and I saw that pity even more pronounced on his face. As the chant kept going I started to understand a few of the words that the creature was saying and then he pulled out a small block of brown metal. It was glowing with a blue light and started floating towards me I tried to struggle to just get away, but I was completely bound.

“….. And let the holy bronze bind him to the master race for the ressst of hiss natural life” said the creature as the metal touched my neck. There was a flash of light the next thing I know I was laying on the ground the blue I guard looking down at me. He reached down and picked me up and put my head close to my ear.

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“Listen boy” he whispered “you are now a bound slave to the Draconar if you want to live obey if not you will be killed then eaten” he finished as he carried me to what I now knew to be my own personal hell.

I felt a metallic touch on my neck I lifted my arm to see what it. “Don’t touch the slave collar! You will feel agonizing pain just stay quiet and I will explain it to you later.” The guard said me. The brown eyed guard went in front of us and opened the door for what I now knew was a Draconar. Daylight greeted me as the door opened to the outside. I saw high white stone walls with what I thought were soldiers walking across their ramparts.

“Take him to the castle blacksssmith ssso he can learn the trade.” said the Draconar to the guards.

“Yes Master.” Responded the guards as the Draconar walked to the right. The guards took me to the left on a path made of stone.

“Waste of potential using an Ancient for blacksmithing right George” said the brown eyed guard while staring at me.

“You know it’s forbidden for an Ancient to learn any type of combat knowledge Caleb so shut it.” Replied George what did they mean by Ancient and why couldn’t I learn combat skills. So many questions filled my mind. Why steal a child just to be a blacksmith slave? Also, why hadn’t I passed out from the pain of that ritual? And why could I suddenly understand the language was it magic? science? I just didn’t know. We were walking down a cobbled stone path with grass and trees to side of it. On one side of the path to my right behind the trees was a white stone wall and on my left behind those trees was a white stone castle. It looked like the ones I saw in some of the books I read high round towers narrow windows but unlike the uniform gray color of the ones in the books this one was a clean majestic white. As we walked down the path we came to a small courtyard where twenty odd humans in loincloths were sparing with wooden swords. In the corner of the court yard where five Draconars in what looked like brown full plate armor with swords and shields to match. They had their helmets on so I couldn’t see if they were different from the other one, but they were watching the humans like hawks in the sky. On the other side of the courtyard was a man in a leather apron was rubbing a shiny brown piece of metal with what I guessed was a file. As the guards took me over to that side of the courtyard the other humans stopped what they were doing and stared at me with looks in their eyes I didn’t recognize.

“Get back to drill you lazy dirt bags!” yelled Caleb at the other humans I noticed they had the same necklaces as the guards. Me as well now I guess as we approached what I know guessed was the blacksmith he didn’t stop what he was doing. He continued to file what I now recognized as a sword. It had mirror polish on it and reminded me of the type of swords I saw in history books that the Romans had used called a gladius, but it was not made of iron. Then it hit me the shiny brown metal must be bronze! He put the sharpened sword on the table with some others but what else they needed done I had no idea.

“Father” said George “We brought the boy to be your apprentice as commanded by Lord Mage Grekian.”

“Hmph I am two hundred sixty-seven years old with at least another six hundred years ahead of me the prime of my youth and here I am stuck teaching whelps” muttered the blacksmith

“Father please don’t complain, or the royal guard might punish you” said Caleb in a worried manner.

“Bah they won’t punish me can’t work their precious metal if I’m injured, now can I?” said the blacksmith “now set the boy down and tell me his bloodline.” Demanded the blacksmith. Over two hundred with six hundred more years ahead of him he looks as old as my dad and he’s thirty-five!!. George set me down and looked at his father.

“Dad he is an Ancient and freshly taken from the otherworld” George said with a serious look. After hearing this the blacksmith who had been putting his tools away froze and slowly looked at me with what I recognized as pity in his eyes.

“Son tell me your lying my grandfather told me the stories of the otherworld and how the portal changed him, and he was a grown man.” Said the blacksmith

“I’ am not lying father and we must go train these men. We haven’t explained anything to him yet” replied George who then turned away and walked to what I now knew was the training ground. I stared at the blacksmith for a while and he stared at me probably trying to think of where to start.

“So, boy what name do you go by?” asked the blacksmith in somewhat gentle voice

“My name is John” I replied “John Kegan”

“Well John Kegan I’m guessing Kegan is your surname my grandfather told me about those we don’t use them here only the masters use surname’s” stated the blacksmith “My name is Conrad, but you will call me master not as in master and slave” he continued “But as master and apprentice” he finished. “Now seeing as how my worthless bootlicking sons didn’t explain anything to you did you notice any changes in your body?” asked Conrad

“I can see better sir” I replied softly

“And you probably feel like hell after the enslavement ritual.” Said Conrad “ahhh” he sighed “Okay boy let’s get the worst part out of the way” he stated “You will never see your world again I don’t know why but a person can come from your world to this but not the other way around” he said “All that tried died a horrible death also when you passed through the portal the magic in it fixed anything that was wrong with your body and also made it stronger” he continued “ You won’t get sick or age normally you are now what is referred to as a Ancient like me.”

“What about your sons?” I asked

“Don’t interrupt” he said with a scowl that caused me to cringe “I was getting to that they are half-blood because they were born from my second wife whose human lineage originated from this world. Now take a seat this is going to take a while” he said while pulling up two wooden stools he had in the corner of the smithy. “Now” he continued as he sat down “A Ancient can live anywhere from eight hundred to a thousand years old. Half-bloods like my sons can at most live five hundred years and even that’s pushing it any lesser than half-blood results in two hundred years at max. Now Ancients like you and me cannot learn anything to do with war or fighting under pain of death because of our immense strength.” Said Conrad he then reached over next to him and took a two-inch-thick bronze metal bar grabbed it with both hands and bent it like a pretzel without any sign of effort. “Now any Draconar can do that as well but a half-blood would have a more difficult time and a regular human would need tools to bend this bronze bar like I did. About bronze the Draconar consider it a holy metal because it is the best metal to receive enchantment from their magic.”

“If its holy why would they let us handle it if we are slaves?” I asked

Conrad smiled “because even though they like warm climates if they touch fire they will catch on fire faster than any tinder they don't tell us why and they don't tolerate people asking about it either” he replied.

“Then can’t we use that to gain our freedom” no sooner had these words left my mouth then a intense pain coursed through my body and I fell to the ground writhing in pain. The pain lasted for a few minutes and as I laid on the grounding trying to regain my breath. With tears coming out of my eyes I saw Conrad look at me in pity

“That’s the reason boy with those enchanted collars on us anytime we talk about something it recognizes as treasonous it will deliver immense pain to our bodies the stronger you are the more pain it inflicts. If you harm or kill any of them it will kill you as well in the most painful of fashions” Conrad said with a trace of sadness on his face. “Another thing that will get you killed is if they find you with any iron on your person it is considered an evil metal though for what reason I do not know” he continued “So any questions?” he asked as I gained my breath I looked at Conrad and thought of everything he had told me.

“Does that mean I will be stuck in the body of an eight-year-old for several decades?” I asked

“No, you will age normally till you hit about twenty or twenty-five then your ageing will slow down considerably.” He replied

“Can I bend the metal bar like you?” I asked a little eagerly

“No at most you have the strength of a normal adolescent human “answered Conrad

“Anything else you want to know?” he asked a small smile appearing on his face

“Where will I stay?” I asked a little worried I didn’t want to sleep in that cell again Conrad looked at me with the soot covering his face and that smile spread to the whole of his face

“You will stay with me and my family even though I know you will miss your family I hope you can come to think of us as like your extended family okay.” Said Conrad as tenderly as anyone had spoken to me since I had come to this strange world I broke down again and cried. “Now I am done for the day why don’t I take you to see my family okay John” he told me with a smile on his face. I nodded and took his hand and I walked out into a world that I still did not fully understand.