Chapter 1- To have a future we must look back.
I wake up to the sound of knocking on the door, with the call from my communicator going off, as I get out of bed I try to understand what is happening and seven people enter my room, one in the middle and three on each side of him, all dressed in black military armor and armed with the best plasma weapons that our technology allows to create, the man in the middle, who I recognize as my military advisor, Rareen, is one of the generals who was at my disposal, salutes and the six elite soldiers around him kneel in my direction, I see this and realize that this was not the meaning of a good omen.
“What has to happen will happen” I thought, and soon after that I discovered the answer to my fears, he made me understand what was happening with his cold and direct words.
“I, the commander-in-chief of your highness’s armed forces, swear at this moment with my strategists, loyalty and serve with honor the new lord of the house of Alermium, that the Alermium may endure for eternity,” said the man, and those around him exclaimed next, “Glory to the eternity of Alermium.”
I had no idea what had happened, but my father prepared me for what was happening, “I, Aaron, son of Ethan, now assume the role of lord of the legions and the people of Alermium. I will honor the mantle of eternity that falls on my shoulders and the role as guide of the lost. At this moment, I declare myself Aaron Alermium, lord of the empire of Alermium. Now, stand up again, my soldiers, for I will only receive you on my knees again in death.” As soon as I finish my oath, I feel my aura increase, and around me the world begins to green slightly with the energy that accumulates around me, as if creation itself were recognizing me as one of its lords. I observe the phenomenon of the oath slowly diminishing and my aura returning to normal. I look at the men in front of me, waiting for my orders. I see their hard features, like steel, trained under extreme rigor, men who will die if I so order. I look at Rareen, his appearance already more advanced, showing everyone the respect he deserves, because someone who is old in a profession that dies young deserves respect, and his six colonels are all middle-aged.
“Tell me what happened to my father.”
“He was lost in the void and we are no longer able to rediscover his position, nor do we dare go beyond his last contact signal, but his final words in his last transmission were as follows.” He moves to press the retransmission button so I can hear.
“My son, it seems my eternity ends here, take the book from Rareen’s hands and take it to my room. The book will guide you to where you must go, but remember you must go alone. Long live the new lord of Alermium.” I hear a beat in his chest at the end of the recording as if it were his goodbye and his conviction for his mission and belief.
"You heard my father, I must go to my father's room and take the book alone as all heirs do, fulfill your duties, I will be back soon and tell Catelyne that I love her, but duty calls me" with that I greet by hitting my hand on my chest with a closed fist to the men in front of me and they give me the same greeting with even more strength in their arms, seven hollow knocks echo loudly through the room and I begin to move towards the door that leads to the beginning of my objective.
Rareen moves to the side and hands me the book in his hand in a ceremonial way, and he stands to the side to make way for me, taking the book, I look closely at its features and am fascinated by its extreme beauty and elegance, with the embroidery golden as gold, a cover with reliefs and symbols that made it seem like energy ran through the words that were written there, coming out of my distraction I went to my father's room.
I passed through several corridors, many of them guarded by several men dressed exactly like the ones who entered my room, but of lower rank, but just as trustworthy. Each time I passed, they greeted me and made way for me. They are my father's men, now mine. They owe me respect as their current master, that's how they are taught.
After passing through increasingly thicker doors and walking for a significant amount of time, I finally reached my father's chambers. Stopping in front of the door, I feel the pain of knowing that this is now my new room and that I will never see my father again. I forced myself to walk forward, entering the room and seeing his simple room, consisting of only a bed, a closet and a desk. I remembered the wise words that are passed down from father to son to the heirs of our family: "a simple and determined king reigns for ages." He never told me what our family did, much less our history. I only know that we have existed for long enough that it is difficult to explain in a simple chapter.
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
I sat at my father's desk and looked for something, I knew this was where my questions would be answered, at least some of them. I put my hands on the table to feel that table worn from so much use, with marks of its age already revealing the amount of time it had been used, perhaps it had been used for generations. Running my fingers over the wood I felt a twinge and saw a small cut form, big enough for a few drops of blood to run down and fall directly onto the table.
Suddenly an ancestral voice came from somewhere, which I'm sure wasn't from the room's speakers, and said "In my family, eternity awaits us under the cloak of death, and that's precisely why we exist, we inherited within us the guide of the cycle, so at this moment you must take your ancestor's book to the sacred library of the Alermium, among blessed relatives, for now you will have access to the lost and forgotten knowledge of past ages and the truth of how things really happened." I felt a pull on my body, I feel my weight disappearing for a moment and coming back very quickly, the lights come on again and now I'm in a room decorated with the finest of arts, on the ceiling a complex design that I can't understand extends as far as I can see, two walls lined with books for an almost endless distance, all books identical to the one in my hand and all placed in numerical order on their shelves made of carved quartz and in front of me a pedestal finely decorated with silver and gold, which seems to indicate that the book was to be placed on top to read.
I put the book in its proper place on the pedestal and the book begins to glow greenish and I feel that it is being attracted to an empty spot on the shelf to my left. I see it float upwards towards that same spot and as soon as it settles into its position on the shelf all the books glow, as if they were recognizing the arrival of another brother. The book I placed there glows brightly and a mechanical voice comes from somewhere unknown, “Ethan year 8-67890”, and the spine of my father's book glows as if something was being forged, it glows with his name and those numbers whose meaning I still don't understand, but it seems like a date, however in the imperial calendar we are in the year 918439.
The voice echoes again “do you want to hear the message left by your father?”
“Yes”, I answer and hear my father's voice again. “Aaron, forgive me for never telling you the origin, but only you are allowed to know about this place, and here is stored the history of our family, which walks alongside the history of this world, from our first significant ancestor to you, every member of the family is here, whether they are heroes or monsters in human skin, everything here is recorded and this is the symbol of what we call our eternity, study here and you will learn many of the secrets that this world has, and perhaps you will have a chance to contribute to unraveling the missing secrets, but be careful, with knowledge comes power and with power usually comes irresponsibility”
The voice echoes again “end of message, do you wish to hear the ancestor's message?” “yes” I answer again. And another message plays with a voice much deeper and older than my father's.
“Child, destiny has made you the current leader of the family. Whether it is good or bad for the family and destiny, be sure to fulfill your obligations, because we will all be watching you, and never forget that at the end of something, there is always the beginning of something.”
After the end of the message, a golden light comes out of a single book, the furthest and the most to the right at the end of the corridor, as if it were the first, as if it wanted me to go to it. I walk towards it. As I approach the book, I see a greenish-black crystal, which I feel I should pick up. As I pick it up, I feel a strong pressure on my head and see this crystal being absorbed by my hand. The book in front of me gives off a very bright light and I pick it up and look at the closed book in front of me.
I go in search of the answers to the questions I have asked myself many times in my life. What is my father fighting for? How does the Alermium have so much power? Why couldn't I know anything until now? What room is this anyway? Why did a green aura appear around me when I finished the oath? And finally, why do we always remain isolated from other peoples? Finally, each of the answers awaits me. And it seems that to understand the current world around me, I must understand all of this. I must go to where it all began, and so I look again at the closed book in my hand. The title leaves me with even more questions. The book whose cover was written “Wuitt year 0-12497”.