All of their surroundings were covered in snow. When he looked out the stagecoach’s window, snow fell at an ever-increasing rate.

“We’re almost there,” his driver Mergo said.

“I would hope so. I’m freezing to death in here.”

“Would you like another pair of mittens? I’ve got a spare I could give you.”

“I’m fine.”

Their journey had gotten a lot harder since entering this mountainous region. He wasn’t entirely sure where they were but judging by the length of time it took them to get here from the capital city, he figured they were directly north in a region that wasn’t known for having much or any population for that matter.

Is this truly where I am to remain? He knew the answer already. Of course it is. What better place for Father to send me to than a miserable location that’s deathly cold year round.

Flurries of snow battered against the stagecoach. He wondered how the driver could tolerate such conditions outside. They were undoubtedly made of tougher stuff than himself. The horses too for that matter. The poor things must’ve been practically dying out there.

Eventually, he began to notice lit braziers on the side of the pathway they traveled on. Snow melted mid-air as it landed in and around the fire.

Along a tall wooden post, a black and white banner depicting a shield and sword flapped violently due to the cold windy environment.

“How are you not dying out there?”

Mergo laughed a little. “Believe it or not, I quite like it out here. Just look at all of the snow and the violent gusts of wind. It makes you feel alive!”

There can be no other answer to describe this man. He’s truly mad.

Another brazier appeared and eventually a stone wall that they began to go under. As they exited through the entrance, a wide long courtyard appeared with numerous old structures inside. More banners depicting a shield and a sword appeared fluttering at all times.

Snow kept falling and before he knew it, Mergo opened the door for him.

He immediately regretted hopping out. Most of his feet became entirely hidden due to the snow gathered on the ground. Thankfully he had a pair of warm tall boots on.

His arm went up to try to defend his face from the cold northern wind going against him. If I don’t get out of this immediately, I’m going to die.

“Come this way Raelle.” Mergo beckoned him to follow and so he did.

They found themselves inside a large structure made out of thick gray stone. The stone floors had white carpets depicting the symbol he had been seeing on the banners earlier.

Lots of braziers and hearths remained inside to provide sufficient warmth. Some individuals gathered around them chatting with one another. Some nodded their heads to him, particularly an older blonde-haired man wearing black leather armor with lots and lots of furs.

“Do me a favor,” Mergo said. “Remain here for just one moment.”

Raelle spread out his palms towards the brazier. He felt immensely relieved to finally have something to provide him warmth. He thought he might die on the way here, but surprisingly he hadn’t. Perhaps that was the first test he had to undergo to make it to this location alive.

Everyone inside was a fair bit older than himself judging by appearances. It made him wonder whether he was the youngest person in this hidden-away fortress. While most were men, a few women were inside as well taking a quick gander of himself. None of them looked particularly weak or cowardly. They all had chiseled and confident faces. They carried themselves well and made him think most if not all were fearless.

Mergo along with someone else began to walk towards him.

“You must be Raelle.” A man with short graying black hair stretched out his arm eager to shake his.

“I am,” he said shaking his hand.

“Your father and I go way back. We trained at this very place together in our youths.” Behind those plainly shaped blue eyes of theirs, was a man who had seen and done a lot. They had wrinkles on their forehead and beneath their eyes. “My name is Daren Seamore. I am the commander of this fortress.”

“May I ask a question to you sir?” After they nodded he continued. “What is a fortress like this doing out here?”

“An unsurprising question. This place was built in this specific location since no sane person would think to ever come here. In the centuries since its construction, it’s never once seen an actual battle or been visited by an outsider. As for the reason for its secrecy,” they paused and eyed a woman who came to stand off to the side, “it’s a convenient place for us to do a wide variety of tasks such as train recruits such as yourself.”

“What kind of training will I be expected to do?”

“Every kind imaginable.” He said and crossed his bulky arms. “Sara. Can you go ahead and take him to the Tower of Aptitude?”

“Yes, commander.”

He found himself led through a tight corridor. Eventually, he found himself exposed to the cold once more as they crossed over a snowy bridge leading to a tall thin tower. Lots and lots of mountains spread out all over the horizon beyond the tower itself.

He walked carefully on the bridge as Sara’s long braided blonde hair swayed to the left.

When he entered the small tower, he felt relieved to have some walls to keep the wind off him, but since there was nothing inside of it to provide warmth, the cold absolutely crushed him.

“Take your clothes off,” she said.

“What?”

“I said,” she said with a scowl, “take your clothes off.”

With that look on her face, he knew better than to protest. He did as she said feeling the cold penetrating straight to his bones.

He stretched out his arms and spread out his legs. His body demanded him to shiver violently but he tried to remain as still and calm as possible.

The middle-aged woman known as Sara wore a dark uniform with fur around her neck. She stood in front of him and began observing him from head to toe as he stood there completely naked. Her hands and fingers ran across his skin.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

When he breathed out his nostrils, he could clearly see his breath.

She began to mutter words in a foreign language he was unfamiliar with. A bunch of glyphs he hadn’t seen before began appearing on the walls, ceiling, and floor of the tower. She kept muttering the foreign words closing her eyes as she did so. Her fingertips began to run along the front of his face as he lost his ability to not violently shiver.

Her eyes snapped open, and the glyphs on the walls went dark once more fading away from his sight. “Get dressed,” she said.

He put everything back on in record time. As they made it back to the main structure, he got as close to a hearth as possible without his own skin being charred by it. While they all spoke to one another, he found himself continuing to shiver violently.

I’ve been here for ten minutes practically speaking, and I’m essentially an inch away from dying just from the cold itself. Thanks Father for sending me here!

“What is your assessment?” Daren asked.

“He should be capable of withstanding our trials. His physical traits are not particularly amazing but his magical traits are exceptional.”

“Very well. We will focus on tailoring his training towards honing in on his physical weaknesses first.”

Someone approached him. He was so preoccupied with getting warm, he didn’t look at them. He just kept his face as close to the fire as possible hoping to kill the cold that had burrowed itself deep within his bones.

“Raelle,” Daren said. “Are you prepared to undergo our trials to become a member of our order?”

“You mean to tell me that I have a choice?” Father hadn’t ever mentioned that as a possibility.

“Of course. As much as we’re struggling to maintain a satisfactory allotment of membership into our order, we are entirely voluntary. Those who serve us do so willingly.”

Out of respect, Raelle faced him directly since he didn’t want to be rude to a commander of all people. It did mean however that he couldn’t have the oh-so-lovingly luscious fire from the hearth hitting up against his still nearly frozen face. “Can you tell me a little bit about this order of yours?”

“We are the Order of the White Guard. It’s unlikely that you’ve heard of us as was intended by those who created this order many years ago. We are the sword and shield to humanity itself. Long before this nation of ours existed, we have been here to protect our species.”

“Really?” If they’ve been around this long, how is it that I haven’t heard of them before? “Why am I just now learning about you?”

“Our order works differently from others. We work more from the shadows and try to minimize knowledge of our existence from the outside. As a result, most have no clue who we are which is a benefit for us in many ways. Our order is also one that transcends nations. We are primarily focused on maintaining the safety and protection of our species as stated earlier. Although we have become more involved with our nation of Ainsvel over the years so our original purpose has shifted somewhat begrudgingly.”

“An entire order devoted to the safety of our species.” Raelle placed a finger on his chin. “That sure sounds quite noble.”

“You could say so.” Daren walked a little over towards the fire as a few people went in and out of this structure. “Our world like many others Raelle, is fragile. So too is our species. Tensions have only risen and gotten worse between our race and the familiars since the sacred pact we all once shared became shattered. I fear our days will only grow darker as time goes on. But that is why we’re here. Our sacred duty is to ensure humanity does not fall.” He began to furrow his brows a little. “Is this duty of ours something you would be willing to uphold yourself?”

I don’t see why not. It’s not like I have much else to look forward to in my life. “Yes.”

“Very well then. Before you can be inducted into our order in an official capacity, you must first undergo a series of training and trials. And I won’t lie to you. They are quite grueling and will test your very limits. You may even fail, but if you succeed, you will have our full backing and opportunities you’ll rarely find elsewhere. You must also forfeit any notion of a normal life as well. Your purpose is for something far greater than any normalcy.”

“I’m up for it.” He had challenged himself at the university and succeeded in many ways. With that chance to succeed there gone, he could redirect his focus entirely to passing whatever trials and training they would have for him.

But beyond this order and its purposes, this was also an incredible opportunity for him to get strong.

He was a truly weak person. His physique was uninspiring. His ability to fight was lackluster and he lacked any finesse or experience in it. While knowledgeable about the arcane arts, he hadn’t done much to perform magic beyond memorizing the spells and drawing glyphs that he struggled to derive meaning from.

Now I can become something more. And if I were to ever end up in a situation like the one Artius forced onto me and Nelena, then I’d be able to better protect myself and maybe even prevent such a horrid occurrence from ending up the way it did.

“Sara,” Daren said. “Can you take him to the barracks?”

“Yes commander,” she said with a slight bow of the head.

Soon enough Raelle found himself back outside. The bitter cold gladly caressed his face as if it had missed him. It penetrated through the furs and multiple layers of clothing that he wore. Snow fell atop his shoulders and on the hood he had pulled over his head.

As they walked across the snow-covered courtyard with a well at the center of it, his sight of a building they were approaching appeared more clear. The falling snow tried its hardest to hide it, but he could finally see more of it now that they had gotten closer to it.

“Over here is the barracks,” Sara said as she held up a hand to the flurry of snow battering down against them.

“How is it that you all can tolerate this cold?” he said as they both walked into the rectangular stone building.

Ignoring his comment, she pointed towards their right. “Over there’s the mess hall. Over to our left are numerous rooms to rest in.”

He nodded his head as he got his bearings of the inside. Thankfully the inside was a fair bit warm due to a large hearth kept within. Lots of logs burned and he felt like he needed to thank whoever had gathered up all of the wood needed to keep all of these places here warm. If it weren’t for them, they’d all easily freeze to death.

“Jake,” she said catching the attention of a young red-haired male who must’ve been at least a few years younger than himself.

He stood up and rushed over in a flurry. “Heya Sara!”

She sighed and placed a hand on her hip. “Do I need to flick that noggin’ of yours? How am I supposed to be addressed?”

“S-sorry, Lieutenant Sara. I must’ve forgotten, my bad.”

Sara looked less than impressed as Jake smiled a bit. “This is Raelle. He just arrived here. Expect to train alongside him for the foreseeable future.”

“Oh great. Nice to meet you!”

The young man enthusiastically shook Raelle’s hand. He’s quite the exuberant fellow.

“Show him around a little and help get him situated in one of the available rooms.”

“Yes, Lieutenant. I’ll be sure to take good care of him.”

As she turned her back towards them she looked over her shoulder for a moment. “You begin your training tomorrow,” she simply stated and then walked away leaving just him and Jake inside the barracks.

“So,” Kiran said, “is there anyone else around here besides us?” He looked around towards the mess hall but didn’t see anyone. He also didn’t see anyone in the hall towards the left either.

“Nope. It’s just us two here. There’s not exactly a whole lot of us here at this location. I think there’s maybe thirty of them total besides the two of us.”

I can’t imagine why there wouldn’t be tons and tons of people here in this wonderfully cold location.

“But you know what,” Jake said with a slap to his shoulder. “It just means we can get to know one another even better. Come to think of it, if there were a whole lot of us, it’d be easy for neither of us to come into contact with each other.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Phew, I’d have to really think about it. I’m guessing a year or more. I haven’t exactly been making the best progress if I’m to be honest though.” They began to nervously brush the back of their head. “But hey, maybe that’ll change eventually. Anyways, I’ll show you around a little and show you all there is to see here besides the snow out there of course.”

“Lead the way then.”