************Ron POV************

Silence. The scent of roses stung Ron’s nose as he stared down the man who had caused thousands of lives to be destroyed. There was obvious fear in Drudard’s eyes at the shattered weapon, but he still held his ground for some reason.

“My name is Drudard Trugg, King of the Vulgend Mountain. What business do you have to breach my kingdom and murder my men?” He glared at Ron as he spoke, keeping his voice calm.

“It seems you have caused more pain than I thought, your highness,” Ron hissed through his teeth. “I will be taking those slaves you keep with you and give them a better life. As for you…” he trailed off as he noticed the single rose bush that lay in a patch of dirt.

The scent was drifting from the single bush. It was strangely strong, even with it being held in a room like it was. The most interesting aspect about it wasn’t the smell though, it was the look of the roses themselves. They were red with white centers, and each one seemed to be faintly glowing.

Ron was so taken by the roses he didn’t notice Drudard as he attempted to slip away. If it wasn’t for the fact that he stepped on a half broken tile, Ron wouldn’t have noticed he had disappeared.

The sound of the tile shifting woke him from this trance. Spinning on his heels, he bent quickly and grabbed a shard of the sword that had broken earlier and threw it at the fleeing king. He didn’t have time to cry out as it buried itself into his back, breaking through the armor like there was nothing there.

“I have to admit, you almost had me there. If it wasn’t for the fact that I’ve been planning on killing you in the first place, I would have let you live,” Ron said with a grin, placing his foot where the shard had dug into.

“I will let you keep whatever you want. J-just let me live!” Durdard whimpered as blood started to seep out from his armor and onto the stairway.

There were no emotions on his face as the light behind Durdard’s eyes died. Ron knew that he could have pleaded for his life all he wanted, but with the shard lodged so deep into his body there was no chance of him surviving in the first place. Kicking the body of the old king aside, Ron strode forward to take a closer look at the rose bush.

It’s petals seemed to glimmer as he got closer. The scent wasn’t as strong as he has perceived it to be, but it seemed to be concentrated because of the room the rosebush was planted. A slight jolt ran through him as realization took hold.

“They treat it like a god,” Ron whispered in amazement as the image of the chest plates, the emblems, and the flag upon that ship came to mind.

Truly it was like a god to these men. They had centered their most important artifacts upon this single rose bush, and naturally Ron was curious to find out what had caused them to act such a way. The look of the roses were certainly different than any kind he had ever seen, but what properties made it god-like?

Knowing there was not much time to contemplate such things, he did the only thing he could do. He used a simple spell to cause the dirt around the rose bush to soften, and as easily as pulling a potato out of a mud pit, the bush was risen from the ground it had once laid in.

He created a temporary garden in a nest of vines he had grown in the room at will, and when the bush was properly secure in its bundle he sealed the area and left to find the people he originally came for. He could feel their pain far below to where the Earth was as hard as rock. Ron had to concentrate for a few seconds before he pinpointed the location as to where they were, but when he found them his reaction was almost instantaneous.

Pushing through a side door and racing past what looked like the kitchen area, he found a large set of stairs that obviously led underground. His senses heightened as he recognized the agonizing wails from the people below, sounds that echoed from the very walls of the stairway.

He ran down each step as fast as he could, taking them almost three at a time. It didn’t take long until he practically ran into a male slave who seemed to be walking up to take his turn as a server from how he was dressed. Obviously nobody had gone down to release them nor tell them of what was happening since the look on the man’s face was one of pure confusion and fear.

“Come, my friend. I am not here to deliver harm to you, I have come to take you away to a land where you will be safe,” Ron said calmly. He reached out his hand, hardly expecting the man to take it.

The slave looked at Ron, even more confusion on his face than fear now. He glanced at the outstretched hand, then back to the one who was offering it. To both of their surprise, he hesitantly took it before clenching his eyes shut as if expecting to be whipped or killed for his actions.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

A warm smile spread across Ron’s face as he nodded and shook his hand. Releasing it with ease, he started back down the stairs to find more. The slave only stood in a dazed reaction, then realized where the odd man was running. He quickly started to follow without saying a word.

“Are the others locked up? Shall I have to break open any type of gate?” Ron started asking as he ran around a corner.

To his surprise, he came face to face with an arrow pointed at his skull. He froze and held his hand out to push the slave back around the corner and out of sight. What got to him the most was that the person holding the bow was a gorgeous woman.

She seemed to be in her early twenties with an olive complexion. Her hair was in a tight braid down her back, and her armor was the same as the men’s but better fitted. If it wasn’t for the fact that she was holding a weapon to him, she might have been the first woman Ron would have fell for.

Instead, there was a dark annoyance in his heart. He truly didn’t want to hurt this girl, but she was making it difficult for him to not have to cause her some kind of harm. Ron attempted to raise his hand to push the tip of the arrow away from him but the girl had a sharp eye. She kicked out with enough force that Ron hit the wall behind him.

“My name is Fliour, daughter of Rouflin Salindoor. I wish you no harm, but come no closer to these good people!” She screamed in anger. Hatred burned in her eyes as she stared down at the man she had kicked, refusing to take her eyes off him.

“G-good people? Do you mean those you put behind those bars?” Ron hissed back, noticing the eyes filled with fear that gleamed from the shadows behind thick, black bars as large as tree limbs.

“Fliour! Put away your arrow! This is a good man, I beg of you not to harm him any further!” The slave that was behind the corner came into sight and held his hands up in surrender. The woman’s eyes opened wide at the sight of him, but did as she was told.

“How do you know he is good? For all we know, he could be from some foreign kingdom as an assassin to claim the...you know,” the girl growled. Ron watched the girl, and as he looked at her it seemed that his heart had a slight beating that grew slightly.

“This man didn’t kill me, did he? Well, I think we should trust him,” the man said with his arms crossed in defiance. The woman, Fliour, gave him a look of annoyance before lowering her weapon and glaring at Ron.

“He is right. I am not here to murder any of you particularly, but I am here to take you all away as quickly as possible. My mission from the beginning was to bring you to a place where I hope you will happily inhabit and be free from the troubles this life brings you,” Ron said as he knelt before the people before him.

This was something none of the slaves had experienced before. As he knelt before them, the shock grew amongst the large group until a small boy walked forward in curiosity. A woman, obviously his mother, gasped slightly and stepped forward to grab his arm, but the child was much faster.

As he approached the man, Ron glanced up and looked into the child’s eyes. He could see the pain and hope that gleamed from them that had grown for many years beforehand. The small boy took his head in both hands and looked at him, then when he slightly trusted him, he kissed his forehead.

What happened was completely unexpected.

Without warning, Ron was thrown into darkness. He felt like he was being sucked under a river of black ink, unable to resurface. In that darkness he saw images that confused him more than anything he had ever known. Visions came over him, a young woman he didn’t recognize crying in a room while he watched from a crack in a doorway, the same woman rising from a lake with nothing but her long, brown hair trailing down her back with droplets of water streaming down her body.

Then screaming. He could feel the panic as what looked like a small town was surrounded by evil creatures all wishing to cause death and destruction. The woman throwing herself into the hands of the man who seemed to have control over the chaos. The tears in her eyes as she seemed to scream one thing, one thing he couldn’t make out as the visions disappeared and Ron was sucked back into the darkness.

When Ron came back to reality, he was more than confused. He was nauseous after the incident but somehow managed to hold himself together. The young boy stared at Ron in curiosity, as if he knew what he was to see after doing what he did.

“Who’s Emily?” The boy asked after a few seconds of silence.