After a night’s rest, the boy rolled over in his uncomfortable wooden bed, pushing the wool that scraped at his skin off. Without so much as a yawn or a stretch, he hopped out of his bed, running over to where his project awaited him.
Grabbing the metal, he carried it over to an earthy appliance that constantly let an unobtrusive glow out of the opening in the center of it. The kiln-like structure let out a steady, powerful heat, and after covering the metal in clay, only either end of the blade was uncovered. Sighing, he set it in the furnace to allow it to heat to an extreme temperature.
The boy put his hands on the top of his head, rustling his unkempt hair with an annoyed look on his face. “Why must this part take so long? I don’t get to do anything.” He pouted as he sauntered into the room that held the works throughout his past, only to find a very suspicious figure, the same size as his own, rummaging through his treasured collection.
“...Asha?” He asked the figure, confusion on his face as he wondered why his close friend would be here.
Immediately, her obsidian-black hair angled away from her head. It took a moment to realize that this was caused by gravity as the girl, Asha, fell backwards. The boy gasped as he noticed what was falling after her: a sword, its blade’s hue deep, almost forest green. It was another perfectly straight sword, this one 35 inches long and slightly over and inch wide. A very long one-handed sword, its edges grew inward to intersect at the point that curtailed the simple blade. Two initials were the only nonconformity to affect the blade, spelling out A.M. in engraved, ornate letters. It was a mistake of his youth, as the end of the sword had been folded more densely and weighed more than the hilt. Due to this, it fell towards this Asha almost as fast as she fell towards the cold, hard floor, and he could easily see what came next.
However, the boy would have to be a pansy to accept such a thing, and with a bright silver flash that tore through the air, the sword fell to the ground inconclusively, shattering into several large pieces. His expression dark, he stood over Asha, blood falling from his hand as he tightly gripped the remains of the tip of Berserker.
“The second one today…” He spoke with a defeated sigh, before looking down and seeing drops of his blood copiously falling upon the girl’s notably less white shirt. “...Oh, your shirt!” He very observantly exclaimed as he tossed the contorted metal to the side and ran off, returning moments later with an immaculate scrap of cloth in his much less mutilated right hand and tossing it to her.
Not touching the cloth offered to her, Asha stared at the boy, mortified. More specifically, she was watching as hot crimson liquid coated his marred palm, dripping onto the floor below as the hand hung uselessly to the side. “Angra… your hand…”
“Oh, this?” The boy, Angra, responded slowly, his eyes half-closed in boredom as he looked at the ichor that flowed from his wound. He hadn’t felt the trademark burning, sharp pain of the blade rending his skin. The icy, almost electric touch of the blade was all he felt. He considered Asha to be overreacting to an extreme degree, but decided to humor her. After a brief pause, “...Meh.”
The same blank, disinterested look on his face, he peeled the cheap cloth from his upper body, revealing musculature uncharacteristic of someone aged as young as 12. His entire bare figure was less one of evident dedication than of tragedy. Those cuts and burns that marred his right hand travelled up in a horrifying series of twisting blemishes. He looked as if his entire body had been shredded and put back together.
He rebuked himself and rushed from the room, entering his own and shutting the door behind him. His teeth clenched and his brow contorted, his eyes wide in an expression of intense fury. He had disappointed and aggravated himself to an extreme degree. That tiny cut in his hand had so distracted him that he forgot that he had vowed to himself that he would keep those scars and abuse a secret, especially from her.
Still in the room that was covered in countless works, Asha’s pale, ice blue eyes were wide. Her hands were held close to the chest that was covered in blood that wasn’t her own, her mouth slightly agape. She couldn’t hold herself steady, shaken by what she had just witnessed.
Her closest friend was keeping something as important as that a secret from her. It was shocking, frustrating, painful. The negative emotions that coursed through her body felt like they turned the very blood that coursed through her veins to black.
Those dark thoughts, however, disappeared as the bedroom door slammed once again and Angra appeared once again, in a slightly more tattered version of the same shirt that now covered his bloody wound. Not even looking Asha in the eyes, he walked up to the wall and went to a single, very specific sword. Pulling it from the stand it took up, he inspected the wide space, much more than the sword needed. This was one of the few that he would pull from the walls often. This sword was finished on a date very important to him.
The sword’s icy luster made the weapon look cold, as if it were an icicle itself. The 28-inch sword gained in width until close to the end of the blade, where it reached a pinnacle and tapered off into a sharp point. This was one of his engraved blades, one that had his own thoughts carved into a seemingly incomprehensible pattern inlaid in golden floral patterns along the flat of the sword that contrasted powerfully to the Koorite metal.
There was only one reason that this was the rare metal he chose for the sword.
Koorite was the color of Asha’s eyes.
The crossguard curved upward slightly and was cut into the curious pattern of open wings in flight. The guard was plated in gold, much like the round pommel with an outer rim cut wider than the rest of the piece. The haft of the blade was formed of dark leather, a curious design adding straps to tighten to the knuckle to prevent the wielder from disarmament.
Angra pressed the blade into Asha’s hands and spoke tersely, coldly, his back turning to her. “Keep this and don’t talk to me again.”
It was only fair. He didn’t deserve to be able to talk to her if he couldn’t even keep that simple promise to himself. He had failed her, and he was liable to hurt her more if she stayed around him. There wasn’t much time anyway, and if she could stay away by choice, it wouldn’t feel like he was pried away from her. If he could keep her enmity toward him and not toward the village, she could live happily, and with this weapon, she could live safely.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
It’s for the best. That’s what he told himself, over and over, but as he stared up at the empty sky through his window, a drop of moisture fell below his face. He could convince himself that it was a good thing, but he couldn’t stop those emotions that he wished he never had.
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After some hours locked in his room, he went back into the workroom. He had only one task as the bright white sun’s glow began to end its slow descent to be smothered by the silhouette of the world blanketed in clouds. His current project had been enduring intense heat for hours now, and though it never reached a point of glowing, it still had become quite brittle. Unable to leave it like this, he moved to his oil bath. Water evaporated far too easily, and the villagers wouldn’t let him use any for such a process, so he used oil.
This was the most breathtaking part of the process, hands down.
He held the sword by his gloved bloody hand, plunging the sword into his basin and immediately evacuating it, admiring the flames that licked the blade. With its heat, the metal burned off the oil, lowering the temperature and also causing some seriously badass effects.
He took the sword, now quenched, and placed it into what looked much more like a traditional kiln. The fuel for this appliance burned much colder, which let the sword become more flexible, while retaining that hardness inherent to a sword. This process would take all night, so he decided he would sleep through it.
His expressionless face was illuminated by the red light of the second furnace, hiding the turmoil that raged within him, a maelstrom that wreaked havoc upon his heart. He curled up on his uncomfortable mattress, quickly falling into the world of dreams.
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‘Why? Why would he do this?’ Asha paced her room, tears pooled in her eyes. On the wall in the corner of her room leaned a bronze-adorned leather sheath; the sword gifted by Angra that day lay within. Burned into her eyes was the image of his facade, especially his upper body. She had no time to think about his body itself, preoccupied by the disfigurements that riddled it. It pained her to think of where, why, how he got those scars.
She couldn’t think of anything. He even expressed his interest towards separating, which irritated and confused her. It didn’t make sense that he would do such a thing to her, that he would do such a thing to himself. Thus, she decided she’d sleep on these thoughts that ruthlessly haunted her.
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“Just moments are left, folks! Get right up to the edge while you can!” A deep voice brimming with excitement projected through the small mass of people that were scrambling to the edge of the Milaelerion.
“Buy fresh pastries here! Special sale until the Clairvoyance begins!” Another voice shouted, this one much higher, the voice of a middle-aged woman calling out for customers.
Soon, a hush swept through the crowd like the unusual turbulent winds that assaulted the islands of the sky, as an elderly man in pure white robes that fluttered in the wind raised his wrinkled, withered hand, his fingers splayed wide. “Silence!” He called.
“Today, a day has come that I never thought I would have the fortune to witness. We have reached the day that we shall see the home of old, that glowing city of our ancestors that retreated here so long ago!” He called, thinly veiled excitement in the scratchy voice that passed through his thin white beard. His voice projected even through the winds that whipped across the land, and the people began to cheer. Only two were unaccounted for.
On the opposite corner of the island, two children hung their heads over the edge of the island, looking down at the infinite grey that was just about to disappear from before their eyes.
“Come on, Angra, we really should go where everyone else is!” Asha nagged the boy next to her, tugging the hem of his shirt with a concerned look on her face.
“I’m good here. Go ahead if you want to.” He spoke flatly, though he still stayed close to her, arm around her back so she didn’t slip off of the edge. “Though isn’t it fine here, where it’s less crowded?”
“Nobody will catch you if you fall here!” She warned, though she didn’t budge, rather enjoying the warmth of his arm.
“They’d push me anyway.” He mumbled, his line only half jest. Asha didn’t respond to this, and just continued to watch as the clouds slowly moved.
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“Wh--” The elder that stood over the rest of the group was currently staring downward at the ground, his eyes bulging. Half of the people there would have burst out into laughter seeing his shocked face, and all of them would smirk. However, they all stared downward, faces aghast and mouths open in shock. The blood drained from their heads as they looked down. There was no beautiful golden temple. What existed was a forest. Many colors spread through the leaves that adorned the trees, ranging from bright scarlet to deep amber to dead brown. “Why… has our god cursed us so?” He fell to his knees in despair and in deference.
That elder hid a smirk.
“It must have been him.” his voice shook in frustration and in rage. “That boy, that… odd one, the one who pursued those… cursed contraptions of slaughter.” He stood, his teeth clenched and eyes wide in anger. “Our god has punished us for this transgression! We must forgo it, lest we be abandoned by Him.” His voice was fanatical, as if he had found some answer.
The crowd broke out into mumbling and whispers, a dull roar emanating in response to the transpiring events, as the boy in question stared down on the scenery he, too, never expected.
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Author's Note:
This chapter and the next one likely won't be very interesting. Exposition has to happen somewhere!
Sorry if this seems to be going a bit slow. Since it's a couple of slow chapters, I'll try to get an extra chapter on Friday or Saturday. However, bear in mind the normal schedule is Tuesday/Thursday, but if this seems a bit too slow, I'll try to upload more when my own life has slowed down.
Either way, thank you for reading! More to come, and I hope you enjoy it. If you find any slip-ups or have any questions, don't hesitate to throw a comment.