Deep within the palace of Asalon was vast subterranean chasm that was awash with a whirlwind of magic intermixed with frenzied flames and great pools of magma. This hellish world stood in total opposite of the orderly upon the surface world.

A small island stood upon an the great lake of scorching magma. Upon the island lay many blacksmiths tools, anvils, lumps of metal yet to be given shape and the scrapped remains of half melted swords, spears, shields and even firearms that looked like a blacksmith had cast them aside after they emerged from the anvil too deformed.

For with every mighty shockwave that shook the island came spurts of magma from beneath the island. For this was the forge of Roland Constantine Ddraig, King of Avalon and his forging hammer made the earth quake with every mighty blow that he brought down upon the red lump of steel that rested upon the anvil.

Sparks flew off the red hot lump as the King brought down his hammer once more and shook the entire subterranean chasm. The hammer wrested in his hand was a shade deep obsidian with emerald cracks that ran across the black, a sign that a Mizihimo inhabited the immaterial object.

Roland stood waist deep within a pool of magma that was located at the heart of the island and from which he would would heat the steel and soften it so that he could bend it into whatever shape he desired.

The magmas heat may have been increased a thousand fold from the magics that burned within it, but it did not matter in the slightest to the Avalonian king who had even taken off all but his boxers before he submerged half of his body into it.

All that mattered was the piece of steel that lay upon the scarlet block of crystal which acted as his anvil. Roland raised his hammer and he brought it down upon the red hot metal, imparting not just kinetic energy but enchantments as well into the very being of the metal.

Just like his parents had done for thousands of years before. As he continued to beat the red hot lump of steel into a flattened state, he dove deeper into his thoughts.

What did it truly mean to be a good king?, Roland Ddraig, son of Charlemagne and Iris Ddraig, the king of all Avalon didn't know. Even after a near century of life he could not answer that question without the usual generics like putting the plight of the common man before your own ambitions.

Roland agreed whole heatedly with that stand but the true path of a good king and a good man was only viewable in retrospect.

He had many times before asked his parents the same question when they still lived. From when he was a small boy to when he truly became a man. But the answer was different every time and every time Roland found it unsatisfactory.

His mother had once said that it was acting to your up most ability to keep the peace. But under him, the realm was standing upon the edge of war with its neighbors and he knew that it was only matter of time before Avalonian blood was being spilled.

His father once said that it was the ability to inspire loyalty in the hearts of your people. But the public and press did not hide just unsatisfied they were with his rule and his attempts to keep them out of the madness beyond their borders.

Another time his mother had said that it was the ability to equally balance a optimistic view with a pragmatic approach and keen mind. Yet the subterfuge that he had engaged into with their new neighbours was not ruthless enough, as his council was so found of reminding him.

He had foolishly believed that the other kingdom's would leave Avalon be, but the military outposts upon the serpents way and the thousands of foreign ships trespassing on Avalon's waters told him otherwise.

How would men and women view him after he had departed from this world and into the far planes to stand alongside his parents. Would he be remembered like his father, Charlemagne the administrator or his mother, Nuith the builder.

Or would he simply be remembered as Roland the warrior. Would the best that would be said about him be that he was a great warrior and general, but piss poor at administrating the realm.

It felt ironic to think about this as he forged a sword. The metal slug had not yet taken the shape he had in mind, but Roland's enchantments were already starting to bend it closer to that right shape. Though these enchantments were not like his mothers crafts in spell works which had turned many lumps of metal into the greatest weapons in Avalon's history.

To this day no one in Avalon's history had never managed equal her greatest creation in the tapestry of the arcane arts. His own holy sword, Durandal, one of the divine weapons stood as an eternal testament to her skills.

If only he could weave and bind spells as well as she could. He was sure that the only reason his daughters didn't send back his gifts to them with a note saying "Try harder next time" attached to it was simply to spare his feelings.

But he was still young, at least in relation to his parents who had more than an entire millennia to perfect their craft. It would always get better... Or at least he told himself.

"Why do I keep over thinking over all of this" he muttered out loud as he brought the hammer down once more.

"That is the question that I ask myself every time you come down here," a voice responded from the hammer in his grasp.

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The voice did not sound completely like it belonged to a living creature as it was like a intermixing of ice and stone cracking.

"Do I do this so often Kapongo?" Roland asked not the hammer, but the Mizihimo who rested within.

"Too often, you look more like a poor man contemplating his next debt, not a king," the ancient spirit responded and Roland could not help but chuckle.

" I apologize for that old friend. It is just... there is so much happening too quickly."

Kapongo snorted " It will pass, look at what happened to us Mizihimo. Millions of years of dominance and then suddenly your parents introduced their second magic and all of sudden you mortals could match or even surpass us. Many of us thought that it was the end of the world, but still the rock spins."

Roland was sure that if you asked some other Mizihimo they would tell you that just how much the mortal world had advanced was all the same as the end of the world. The war of magics and their defeat didn't help things either.

"Well, I hope that you are right."

" I am ancient, the stars, the rivers and mountains are infants to me, of course I am right! ", Kapongo proudly declared with a tone of righteous indignation.

"Forgive my impudence then, oh ancient one," the king responded, trying his best not to burst out laughing.

Kapongo on the other hand didn't seem to care about holding himself back as he laughed out loudly, feeling the space with what sounded like a great avalanche of stone.

The laughter ended as Roland felt an almost pin prick like sensation across his back. A sign that someone was moving passed his spell work and into his domain. Soon the red earthen walls to his left began to shift and bend before revealing a tunnel.

Out of it walked his love and his queen, her natural cold expression belaying the warm bag of sunshine that lay within.

"Natalia" he said acknowledging his wife as she stepped into his work shop.

"Roland, what are you working on?" she asked as she floated across the lake of boiling magma and upon the island.

"I am not quite sure yet."

Roland usually took his time to hammer at a piece of steel before an idea of what to create popped into his mind. And as he tried to to rack his mind for anything, he could only draw a blank.

"You will think of something and it will be a wonder," she said optimistically, though he didn't believe her.

"I hope so," he said as he placed his hammer down and a green mist that shaped itself into the Mizihimo who inhabited it.

"Get his chin up dear, this boy is too much of a wet blanket these days," said the ancient spirit.

"I am not that bad."

"Bah, heed my warning, young king. You are carrying too much upon your head and if you are not careful, it shall sink you into the very earth," the spirit responded.

Roland desired to retort against the spirit, but Kapongo had already vanished from sight, returned to his peoples realm known as the Shade.

"Some times he is irritating," Roland scowled in irritation as he stepped out of the magma pool that he rested within.

"He only has your best interests at heart," Natalia defended the spirit.

"Even if that is case, I wish that he could treat me with some damn respect. I am not some boy for him to constantly prattle to."

"You are a boy to him. Do not forget that he was assigned to watch over you since before you could walk," Natalia responded and Roland bit his tongue as he remembered just how this Mizihimo had been with him since the beginning, even when his parents were not there.

"Maybe... maybe he is right?" Roland wasn't sure, the stresses of the crown had been getting to him more and more every day and he could not deny that.

"You just need to rest, a holiday might be in order," Natalia said, though they both knew that if they so much as tried to do that, the media would tear them to pieces.

"Maybe it is," he replied knowing that it would not happen anytime soon.

"Good, now lets go. We have a meeting to attend," Natalie's words caught him by surprise.

"A meeting?" Roland asked.

Natalia rolled her eyes, "Typical, so busy with your toys that you have forgotten about our meeting with the ambassadors from Ingombe-Ilede and Lamenthe."

Roland winced in embarrassment as it suddenly returned to him and he could not help but face palm in shame.

XXXXXXX

"How do i look?" he asked Natalia as they walked through the corridor leading to the throne room.

"You look fine," she replied as they neared the gates of their destination.

Roland didn't feel fine, he had dressed himself in a panicked hurry and he was sure that he had messed up somewhere in his dress code. The last thing that he wanted was to make himself look like a fool.

"Are you sure? Maybe my coat is a little too..." his rumbling stopped as Natalia leaned forward and planted a deep kiss upon his lips.

"What was that?" he asked in confusion "Not that i am complaining."

"That was a reassurance," she replied with a mischievous grin as she pushed the gates opened and Roland followed her into the throne room.

The throne room had far less people than usual. First minister Mithrose and his entire cabinet were present, as were the highest ranked Imperators and most important of all were the other eight Paladins, amongst whom Roland could count himself.

But they were not the important persons in this room. Amongst the chairs of parliament sat ten individuals who were not Avalonian.

Five were dressed in vibrant green and red cloth robes with a black water buffalo engraved upon their clothing. The other five wore what almost appeared to be a mesh of gold and cloth with a red eagle as their symbol.

As Roland and Natalia walked to the their thrones everyone in the room rose up to their feet in respect.

Mithrose coughed to clear his throat before loudly declaring "All hail King Roland and Queen Natalia. The supreme leaders of Avalon, first amongst the Paladins, slayers of the Phantom King, lord and lady protectors of the innocent..."

"Leza be good, i wish he would not do this," Roland thought as he watched the first minister continue to drone on with every title that came to the old elf's mind.

He cast a glance to Natalia and though she kept her usual cold visage, he could tell that she would rather be listening to anything it but this. Thankfully Mithrose ran out of titles to make them sound grander and he sat down back to his seat alongside everyone else.

"My friends, we welcome you," Roland said to the ambassadors who nodded in acknowledgement.

"We the delegation of his highness Chief Hachiba and the people of Ingombe-Ilede extend our greetings to you," one of the men with the buffalo symbol declared.

"As do the people of Lamenthe and our Chancellor Anaruma," one amongst those in gold declared.

"We are honoured to receive you," Natalia responded.

"Like wise, our peoples owe a debt to your people. The wizard who bore your gifts of Coros, shared it with our peoples millennia ago," one of the Lamenthe ambassadors declared.

Natalia leaned forward in interest and asked, "Tell me, what happened to the wizard?"

"Non are aware, he left our old world as soon as he had arrived. Though he left us records of all the glories of Avalon," the ambassador responded and though Natalia smiled, Roland knew that she was frustrated.

"We are all honoured to hear that. We have found ourselves in a unprecedented predicament, our former realities destroyed and this creation of the Ancient Ones our new home. But our new home bares many threats to our interests," Roland spoke with all the confidence in the world.

But it was all mask as deep within he felt a swelling up of anxious dread. Many of his attempts to bring their neutral neighbours to the table had been met with refusal and much hassle. The fact that Ingombe-Ilede and Lamenthe had finally relented was a golden opportunity that he could not allow to slip past his fingers.

"That may be the case, but our government fears that such an open alliance shall draw us into the Lunar Empire and Ocean Lords war" the ambassador of Ingombe-Ilede spoke.

"We have no desire to join this conflict just as much as you do, but what we desire is not what will happen. So far many battleships have passed through our waters and many battles have taken place close to our coastlines. An experience that you are all too familiar with," Natalia said and Roland saw the ambassadors whisper amongst each other.

"Let's see if we have them, " he thought before saying, "Lunar Empire and Ocean Lord armies are getting bold in their actions. Was not a month ago when they dared to make landfall upon Ingombe-Ilede and waged a battle that almost touched your cities."

The ambassadors from Ingombe-Ilede looked absolutely indignant at the reminder of that event. They could not pretend that such a breach of their sovereignty had shaken them.

"We have them hooked," he thought before continuing, "A united front by our three nations will work to not only discourage any future..."

Roland never finished as the gates to the throne room were violently thrown open and Hector came running into the room.

"Your grace, forgive me," the large paladin declared as he came to a stop before the thrones and fell upon his knees.

His next words were like a blade to Roland's heart, "The border has been breached by something!"