We could finish our night duties without incidents after dinner. My body was more than grateful to hit the warm comfort of my cot.
As I was closing my eyes, I spied luminous lichen cast a subtle light on the rock ceiling. My mind swiftly entered into a deep area of my subconscious, where I heard Eve’s voice speaking words I couldn’t comprehend. My inner eyes opened into another vision of what felt like a different place and time.
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The obsidian walls were randomly shifting around me as I dodged and sprinted along a corridor. I did a leap and dash to enter a hexagon metal platform before the walls could close around me and the gangplank crumble and fall away. The platform was freestanding, midair, at the exact center of a vast black chasm. An ancient magic power keeping it stable and in place. This central platform was connected to others via gangways and shifting tunnels, which locked into landing points along its edges. The array of other hexagon platforms connected to this one formed the image of a flower. This was the Hana Bridge.
At the center of the Hana Bridge was an orb of cream stone within a glowing hexagon apparatus made of silver and gold. It hovered over a magic hex array that formed a white lotus flower on the platform’s entire black metal floor.
The orb was enclosed with a within a column of twirling gold coins, which cast a cylinder beam of protective light around it. Silver coins along the hexagon edges, where making sigil patterns light up with erratic fluctuations. The surrounding platforms were shaking and threatening to disconnect from the floral array, which the orb’s platform was keeping together as the pivotal one.
I stood among a group of capable knights who were grouped near a crystal and sigil control feature of the apparatus. Men and women in navy patchwork overcoats with gun belts on their hips with their Colt 38 Specials (laced with magic bullet chambers) docked in holsters, utility pouches and other sheathed weapons. They wore the knight’s uniform of navy slacks, leather boots, white cotton shirt, navy paisley waistcoat and a tie bearing a gold star symbol.
I looked at my hands and saw leather gloves, and over my body to see I was wearing the same uniform with buckled boots, same gun belts and guns, and a longsword sheathed at my hip beneath my overcoat.
“Finally. Tell me you were able to prime the Lotus Bridge core!” a young man swiftly signed when he saw me among the group.
He looked feminine with soft black eyes and short and silky black hair, but I heard his voice in my mind. It was a gentle yet passionate voice, with all the feelings and desperation for the world he loved. This passion for life made his lean form in the knight’s uniform beautiful and innocent. By his mannerisms, he wasn’t a man to mess with, and that made me feel pride and respect for him. Especially, since I knew, like all of us, he had suffered and endured to cultivate his strength.
He moved around the hexagon apparatus without the overcoat, so his dual Colt 38’s, docked in his shoulder holsters, were visible. They dangled as he raced about the apparatus, activating sigils with leather gloved hands to make them shine brighter with intense focus.
“Of course.” I reassured him.
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I had come from the upper levels and followed the trail of red chi along the obsidian walls to reach the Hana Bridge. Although, I had barely been able to achieve the task. The blood splatter all over my waistcoat and shirt, and torn parts of my sleeves, were evidence of a battle I had fought. I particularly felt and noted a small bullet wound to my right rib cage. It was still seeping blood to my waistcoat. I pulled my overcoat to cover it, and heard other thuds behind me, turned and saw other knights entering from other platforms. They were familiar and much needed faces to see.
“The Illuminate Group has activated the Sol Savior. Zyonkind is entering in droves. The people…”
A woman stepped forward, doing her best to be strong, but her tears streaking down her dirty cheeks were saying otherwise. She was lean and held a resemblance to the black-haired knight, who was hurrying about the outer edges to activate a pattern of sigils. This caused columns of gold light to activate in places, so thirteen columns were casting solid lights around the platform.
My heart raced with feelings of wanting to protect this woman, of everyone here who had become special to me. Especially for those still fighting Zyon’s monsters in other areas. Those knights desperate to save our world.
“Are you okay?” The woman stepped up to me and began fussing around my body.
I brushed her off with cool bravado. “I’m still standing.”
Her expression became fiery with a glare. “That’s the one thing I dislike about you. That overconfidence.”
The platform and walls began to quake and crumble. Stone and metal let out groans and sounds of bending and breaking.
“We need to activate the Hana Bridge, now!” A blond haired man entered my view, looking as worse for wear as myself in his knight’s uniform.
Tears welled in my eyes as I felt my hope fading. These knights were more than my comrades, they were my family, and we were losing with the stake of our lives on the line.
The blond man turned and faced me. He placed his matted gloved hands on my shoulders, feeding his hope into me. “Let's make this shot count.”
I smiled at the sight of his wise, kind and beautiful face. His blue eyes swelled with tears and the same feelings of protecting the world and people he loved.
The platform began to groan and tear apart, making us wobble like drunks. Fear crept into me when I heard howling and screeches enter the chasm space. My eyes bulged with anguish at the sight of reptilian monsters and demons flying for us. I spied a red winged lizard demon at their rear; the one called the Wyrd.
The monsters and demons roared with their victory cries and volley of magic lightning, fire attacks, and hex arrays of magic being cast midair and racing toward us with intentions to eliminate.
Bolts and blasts slammed into the platforms with devastating waves and impact to make them fall. The atmosphere was charged with the stench of metal, ash and magic. A part of the Hana Bridge groaned and was snapped off by a lightning attack. It fell to the formless deeps.
My eyes bulged when I saw the swell of magical green lights headed for me. And was pulled into one of the glowing gold columns.
“Wait!” I yelled at the black-haired man who had yanked me into the column.
His expression was a mixture of hope and sadness.
As gold light seeped into my body, I was losing my will to move. All I could do was watch this knight retrace his way back to the central apparatus and white orb. My heart pounded so hard with feelings of breaking my rib cage and bones. My cries were stifled by the light. Tears dried on my cheeks as I watched his body be engulfed with white light and magic fire from the monster’s onslaught as they swooped down on him to break the mechanisms.
“Remember the laws and live.”
My voice, being and soul was snuffed by white and gold light.