Eternity walked back to the capital, after destroying the archmage and his army with him. There was no better method of transportation available.

Step by step, he walked back, crossing first the blood-sodden battlefield. Then through a mire filled with animals that would eat your bones-and yet none could pierce his flesh for he was unconsciously using Force to prevent it.

Then he had to cross a desert, and eventually his pores started seeping blood which flowed off him. His bare feet were caked in the dried substance. And yet, he refused to die. He kept walking.

Finally, he reached the farmlands of his country, recognizable as a safe haven. Everything was normal. There was nothing destroyed. Everything was fine.

Eternity collapsed at the first house he found, overtaken by darkness as the absolute strangers took him in with no regrets.

He woke up to a bowl of soup, slowly healing his days of walking and the fight that he should never have experienced. The farming couple who owned the house were kind to him-they fed him and let him heal for as long as necessary. Eventually, though, he had to go, and told them as much.

“I’m sorry that these burdens must be put on one so young as you. You don’t want to stay with us?”

Eternity smiled and shook his head. He knew the couple would understand. After all, the only reason they hadn’t joined the army was because they were too old to do anything much more than tending to their small field every day-and even then, they needed help from the others around the village.

He walked once more, leaving them behind, and the village, with nothing more than the dagger he’d killed the archmage with and the ragged military clothes he’d wore. There were too many in the army for everyone to wear armor, so it was reserved for the officers and higher ranks.

Eventually, Eternity came across the capital, a magnificent city. He walked into the line asking for entry. The guards looked suspiciously at a ten-year-old child wearing military clothes and took him in for questioning. “They didn’t pay attention to who was joining,” Eternity told them. “There were just too many.”

The guards sighed. “You were from that army to the West? What happened there?”

Eternity shook his head. “I’m the only one left, but the enemy army is gone. They brought an archmage, and I… did something. None of them could hit me and I rocketed up to him and stabbed him.”

“Hold out your hands, please,” A sudden voice asked from a corner of the room. Eternity turned in surprise before bowing to her.

Elasia, the princess. Quickly, he did what she requested, and she inspected his hands. “Come with me.”

The guards, now mystified, let both of them out of the outpost, and they continued into the castle at the center of the city. And there, Eternity met the King. “Father, this child destroyed an enemy army alone.”

The King turned to his daughter. “You checked?”

Elasia nodded, pointing at his palms. “He does not lie.”

The King nodded. “So, child. How did you do it?”

Eternity told them what he hadn’t told the guards outside. “I learned how to use Force in the middle of the fight… and I won.”

“Tell me, what did the archmage look like?”

Eternity brought up a vague image of him in his mind. “Three silver stars, across his right shoulder. A black set of robes, with gold and red highlights. He used lightning. Beady, yellow eyes.”

“Scander. How did you kill him?”

Eternity launched himself off the ground, setting the king on guard, and let himself fall back to the floor. “Force.”

The king settled back once he’d hit the floor. “I see. How did you join the army?”

“They weren’t paying attention to everyone who joined. There were too many, and the adults in front of me and behind me helped me get in.”

The king stood up. “Well, child. Hereby, you are now a hero of this Realm. Where are your mother and father?”

Eternity shrugged. “In Restinborough somewhere.”

The king winced. “Are they part of my spy program?”

“No. They’re loyal subjects.”

Elasia turned to Eternity, picking him up like the ten-year-old he was. “How did you get here?”

Eternity shrugged. “I walked.”

“How long ago?”

“Six years.”

She turned to the king. “Can we make him a prince?”

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The king sighed, putting his head in his arms. “I suppose I have to, now.”

Eternity stood in front of another army, Elasia by his side. Their own army sprawled out behind them, but their only targets were the archmagi in front of them, floating above their armies, sneers painted on their faces. “They still don’t know what you can do,” Elasia told Eternity. “They expect little of you, since you’re quite young. Blow them out of the water.”

Eternity nodded back. “I’ll do that, sister.”

Elasia sprouted a sudden grin before it faded into a grimace, then the war-scowl she’d adapted on the battlefields. “Well then, let’s go.”

Eternity flew forward, directly at the archmagi. A spear of ice appeared directly in front of him, flying straight for his head, and the archmagus who’d done it immediately took his attention off him, turning to Elasia.

He was very surprised when his own ice spear took him through the head. The other one frantically defended himself against Eternity’s Force and Elasia’s Crystal, but didn’t manage for long, Eternity’s Force shoving him into a Vampire crystal, a variety named by Elasia, which sucked people’s life force out of them.

Then they dropped and started causing havoc on the enemy army until a third archmagus rose behind it.

Instead of silver stars, gold stars circled the man’s head like a halo. Elasia went pale and started to fly away. “Run!”

But the man had already locked onto Eternity, letting Elasia run with their army. They had decimated the other army enough for it to be basically nonexistent. Bonds of air locked into place around his limbs as the archmage laughed. “You’ll serve as a good magician for our side once we break your mind.”

Eternity looked at the bonds holding him and back at the archmage.

With a flex of will, they broke, and he flew in midair, staring at his opponent. “I don’t think it’s going to go that way.”

Eternity’s blows were each coupled with a plume of force that shattered anything it hit, not that his opponent allowed it to happen to him. The gold-star’s wind was incredibly dangerous, but Eternity always redirected himself before his opponent hit him, flying around like an excited bouncehare.

Then another gold-star rose above the mountains ahead, and Eternity knew he was in trouble. He didn’t dare to turn his back to the first one, even to run, and this second one would be too much.

But within him, Eternity refused to just give up. There was no way he’d stop right here, fighting a war that had changed little in this planet.

He’d change this planet.

Then he’d change the universe.

Eternity faded out of existence as a bolt of lava flew through him. “Did you evaporate him?,” The air magician asked.

The new lava magician shrugged. “Probably. I’ve done it to other people before, and he was only a ten-year-old, after all.”

Suddenly, the air magician gurgled, and the lava magician looked over. Eternity was standing, holding his backup dagger, the air magician’s throat slit. A slight wispiness came off of the surrounding space, and the lava magician backed away as his partner fell to the ground. “D-Dream? They told me you used FORCE!”

Eternity didn’t bother revealing his secrets as Force blasted him forward, and he twisted his Dreams into Nightmares. His eyes turned into black pits, and he grew fangs. His skin turned into hexagonal scales, red, black, and white, covering his entire body. Lava hit him, but fell right off of his scales, and Eternity’s arm, which was now a massive spike, went through the man, who gibbered and coughed for a brief second before Eternity let him slide off the spike and drop to the ground.

His body changed, returning to normal, as his Dreams were once again that-Dreams. “What am I?”

Elasia found him just like that, staring at his hands. As he turned to her, he knew he would answer that question.

After he’d saved this planet.

The war ended quietly. With Eternity, they were suddenly in a superior position, as he was unmatched by anyone the opposing nations could field. He’d also learned to use Crystal from Elasia, and Light from the king himself. The planet was now normal, and fully prosperous.

Then Eternity turned towards the stars. He had to find what was out there. And help anyone he found. He just had to get strong enough-

A resonance caught him from the depths of the world. What was this?

Eternity found the hole leading to the resonance, and quickly descended. A single creature stood, covered in hexagonal scales. “Descendant. You are mine. My progeny. I have helped you in every turn of the way, given you all your abilities.”

Eternity shrugged. “I am not yours, but I am your progeny.”

The creature smiled, a hideous, grinning mouth full of fangs. “I like that fire.”

“What did you want from me?,” he asked, not unkindly.

“Just know that the stars are dangerous. Down here may have been your playground, but up there? They’ll throw you around like a ping-pong ball.”

“What’s a ping-pong ball?”

The demon laughed, before morphing into a human. “It’s a ball used for a tabletop game I invented. You never ended up socializing enough to play it with anyone. Why did you lie about your parents?”

Eternity shrugged. “I wasn’t about to tell them my mother tried to destroy the world.”

His father shrugged. “I was there to stop her, though, wasn’t I?”

“I suppose you were.”

Light blossomed on his father’s face, and Eternity could suddenly see all the wrinkles and marks of old age upon it. “I don’t have long. I’ll teach you all I know before I die.”

“Let’s not let the knowledge go to waste.”

So Eternity began training with his father, going to the caves every day and doing something new each one. His father expected him to grasp everything after a single day of practice, and Eternity did. There simply wasn’t enough time to move slower.

Eventually, his father stopped being able to move, simply instructing him from bed. Then he died, his last lessons written out in shaky handwriting. Eternity absorbed it all before nodding to his father’s body and leaving. As he exited, though, he paused.

Looking back at his father’s body, Eternity glanced at a nearby tree.

Soon after, his father’s body was gone.

“Let the Forest of Spirits Reside Within Me, For Eternal Remembrance of These Forgotten Souls.”