“Ugh…”
Avion sat up his left hand touching his head, “ah man my head,” he said in pain, Avion was experiencing a skull splitting migraine.
“How long have I been sleeping here? Wait!” he said, suddenly remembering the woman dancing on top of the lake.
Quickly turning to look, what he sees causes his heart to skip a beat. That lake, which once shined under the moonlight, had all but dried up.
“Impossible!” he thought. “Just how long have I been asleep?”
“Master your awake! Finally.” A young girl’s voice said, coming from on the inside of Avion’s head.
“WHAT! Who?”
The girl’s voice startled Avion, to where he even jumped backward in fright. “Show yourself!” He shouted, his head moving from left to right in search of where the voice originated from.
“That one cannot not do that, this one is without form.”
“Without form?” he wondered, all the while at the same time he had since picked up a nearby tree limb from the ground.
“Yes, this one is a soul, I am formless, shapeless, I just am what I am.”
Avion paused; he needed a couple seconds to gather himself, was he to believe the girl, that she was a soul, formless and such. ‘Bullshit’ was the very first word to come to his mind. How could he believe such fairytale bullshit, growing up in the Vartanian Palace he had read a many of books, and the ones that spoke of souls. But they were all kid books.
Never after reading hundreds of books from the Royal library did it say anywhere that a soul could speak, let alone that souls were even real.
“Child, how about this,” Avion said to the voice. “Why don’t you come out so that we can meet face to face?” He asks. Dismissing the girl’s previous words.
“This one is not a child” She said rebuking him, a small hint of displeasure was hinted by a sudden pitch in her voice. “This one is Forty thousand years old.”
“Forty-thousand years old? Impossible!” Avion couldn’t believe it. The more this girl spoke the more unbelievable her words were. If she was going to lie, then surely she could have come up with better lies. Being a soul and being 40,000 years old who was going to believe that, surely no sane person would.
But somewhere far at the back of his mind, if only for a couple of seconds. It occurred to him that maybe just maybe she was telling the truth. But soon that fleeting thought was met with a quick shrug of Avion’s shoulders. “Girl what is your name?” he suddenly asks. For some reason he was now suddenly focused and a little less disorientated.
This sudden switch of self surprised the girl; his switch was just too fast, almost unreasonable
“I am Ruby.”
“Okay Ruby, I am Avion, but people that know me just call me Avi. So Ruby why don’t you come out, I want to see your face.”
There was a brief silence, and then Suddenly Avions body goes limp; to where he then collapses onto the ground.
“What is this? Why can’t I move?” Avion thought, he had no answer for this. Why did his body go limp? Why couldn’t he move? Why was his heart slowing? Why did he feel like he was dying?
Many questions but no answers.
It was only when Avion lowered his eyes down towards his chest where he then sees a base ball sized white orb half way out of where his hearts suppose to be.
“It can’t be. Ruby is that you?” A startled Avion asks.
“Yes it is I Master Avion. I am Dragon’s…”
As soon as Ruby had begun to speak, Avion loses consciousness. No. Truthfully, he died. But it wasn’t long before he regained consciousness, just like the lighting of a match the flame in his Soul Palace came to be.
Wheeze…
Avion suddenly wakes up gasping for air, his entire body drenched in cold sweat.
It was there that he suddenly sat up, his eyes wide as they roamed wildly over his surroundings. His face scrunched in pain as a he suddenly remembers the white orb.
“Master! You’re awake.” A voice inside him calls out cheerfully.
“Ruby, so what you said before was all true.”
“Yes!” She simply says. “I am Ruby, The Dragon Soul of the White Dragon Bahamut, All that he was, all that he had, has now been given to you. And so have I. In these 30 years since master has been sleeping I have been.
Avion’s soul shook; Suddenly he turns his head towards the lake. “Something doesn’t add up,” he thought. The lake was massive at least twice the size of lake Mecklenburg in Germany. (Reference) So how could a lake as massive as that dry up in just thirty years. It was impossible.
“Ha,” Avion laughs. “Impossible, I have said impossible at least six times now, it seems that I am going to need a new word.”
…..
After a couple minutes of silence Avion rose to his feet, his heart was calm, his will solid. Once more he stilled himself, his change in self once more baffled Ruby, just one minute ago his heart and mind were in disarray then a minute later after he takes a deep breath his heart is no longer stalled. Instead there is absolute resoluteness. He seems to be able to control his emotions at will. He has control of his Hearts Mind.
“Let us go Ruby. I want to see how the world has changed,” he said walking deeper into the forest. His figure fading into the thick forest.
……
He let the wind be his guide as he walked across the lands devastated by the war, for miles there was no life to be seen. Only that, that once was an open expanse of green. That was now replaced by the smell of Death.
“Master in the thirty years since you have been asleep the war has only intensified the other Seven Great Empire’s have also join in. The regular people of all empires are now displaced. With no place to call home.”
Avion was silent he ignored her and kept on. What could he do he was born without a Mana Pool. In the eyes of the world he was just a regular person. Those people that fight in those armies were all mana users; hence even the weakest amongst them could easily kill him with just a slap.
Avion avoided one battered village after another, having little desired to repeat the dialogue he had suffered with the widow from Fraloon village all those years ago. Truly, after his encounter with the folk there, he didn’t wish to speak with anyone that he couldn’t help.
But he did sneak into the clusters of farmhouses whenever he found them, though in the dark of night Avion made his way about the communities, pilfering food and drink where he could,
With his great evasive skills the villagers of those communities never seen are heard him once he passed through their villages. He was well on his way even before the sun lightened the eastern sky. He tried to leave behind fire wood or anything he could find to repay his unwitting hosts.
Time passed and each morning seemed to dawn a bit warmer as summer came in full to this southernmost region of the Vartanian Empire. Still moving further south, Avion made his way past the towering Snow Top Mountains of Mozura, their beauty, since he was a child always left him in awe.
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He was now in a land all too familiar to him, he was approaching a city that was once known as the jewel city of Vartania, ‘Melos’ the city that sits on the water.
This Venice like city, rested some fifty miles from the Turban border protected by the Mozura Mountains and the open sea. The only way to get into Melos was from its suspension bridge, otherwise it would be impossible to enter.
The landscape surrounding Melos made the City a fortress. Making it impossible to penetrate. Any army, whether it is approaching from the North, South, East or West, would be spotted miles away before they could even reach the cities walls.
“This is it Ruby over that mountain is Melos City.” Avion said with a smile on his face as he made his way pass the mountain passage. And what his eyes fell upon was a city in ruins.
“This… What am I seeing right now?”
“Master, must have forgotten, remember that this one said that thirty years have passed. And holding off a siege for thirty years is inconceivable.” Ruby said not mincing her words.
Avion took a deep breath where with one step at a time he walked towards the suspension bridge. Withholding in his grief.
Though the suspension bridge was heavily damaged and hadn’t been tended to for some thirty years Avion without any hesitation stepped onto the mangled bridge and made his way towards the heavily damaged city gate.
The closer he got to the city the stronger the stench of death had become. It was a pungent reminder of the awfulness of war, instinctively he looked to the west were the sun was low in the sky.
“The sun is setting he reminded himself,” as he was almost upon the city gate. Exhausted and hungry, hoping to find some leftover food, at this point in time anything world do to ease his empty stomach.
“Please stop!”
It was at that moment where just as Avion pushed open the city gate he heard the cries of a woman screaming at someone to stop.
“Ye belong to me now, wench!” a man yelled back. I’ll take ye as I want!” he continued.
“My husband,” she pleaded.
“Dead!” The man shouted. “And soon to be pecked by crows.” As soon as she head that the woman began to cry out in agony.
Avion crept up on the place where the voices were coming from as fast as he dared, trying to remain silent and unnoticed. For there were others up there, he realized.
Flat on his belly he crawled along ground into a nearby damaged home where he watched from the corner. Where he spotted two campfires, where his eyes then fall upon a man atop a woman, having finished his deed. Avion frowned, he could hardly look that way, more surprising he saw other women and children all gathered around in a circle. There were thirty of them at least, their eyes vacant of his light, their faces and hair filthy with soot and mud, they looked as those they’ve been through hell.
Avion then as he grinded his teeth, looked elsewhere, a place where he heard groans and moans, it was there that he spotted fifty men all tied up, the men were scrawny seemly they lacked malnutrition.
“Bastard! You are fucking Scumbags!” Avion suddenly heard a young man cry out sprinting towards the rapist. This young man had seemly escaped from his binds and Instead of fleeing to save himself he charged towards the rapist. When suddenly out of nowhere another young man tackles him, only then did the young men start to fight.
The tackling young man after a series of punches quickly gained the upper hand. He knocked the boy down and dropped on top of him, straddling him and pummeling him mercilessly.
Those nearest bandits laughed, while many others seemed to giggle, Avion counted ten of them in total.
“Don’t ye kill him,” a man instructed, coming out of nowhere he was the biggest of the ten many bandits who when they saw him they all quieted down. So Avion figured that he must be the leader.
Looking at that man Avion found it hard to breathe, he felt this kind of pressure before, this man was a Mana User. Across the way the Rapist stood and brushed himself clean, then kicked the prone woman and spat upon her.
“Here now, don’t ye do that,” the man who had just spoken said with folded arms, “My turn with her.”
He headed over towards the woman opening his belt as he went, and no one seemed to pay him any heed at all.
“And if ye try to run again we’ll do worse, don’t ye doubt,” said the rapist who had already had his way with the woman. He kicked her again for good measure and then moved away back to his bandit buddies. One young girl watched him with wide eyes, and he shouted at her, “Get me some food!”
Quickly she scrambled away in fetch of some food. Not wanting to be next.
Avion couldn’t comprehend the scene before him. He tried to keep his wits about him, to take measure of the opposing force. But that mana user, yes Avion was good with a spear, he even believed himself to be unbeatable. But that was only against regular humans, mana users were an entirely different matter with just the wave of their hand even the weakest mana user could easily kill him.
“This is not your fight,” Avion stubbornly reminded himself. “You can’t save the world, fool. It’s all beyond you. There is no point!”
He almost convinced himself to walk away, so despondent was Avion that he nearly surrendered, there and then to the darkness. But before he had even finished his internal battle, fate mercifully intervened, for a girl spotted him and let out a shriek, pointing and hopping.
Avion probably could have made it out of the city before any of them got a read on him, but this suddenness shattered Avion’s pathetic justification for leaving, So upon taking a deep breath he stood up and took a few steps towards the encampment, in full view of more than eighty eyes.
He noted the boss man behind the log scrambling up from the beaten woman, hiking his pants as he went. He also noted the previous attacker down to grab a short bronze sword as the rest of the bandits grabbed their short clubs. All of them looking at Avion with murderous eyes.
“Leave her alone,” he said looking at the man still standing over the immobilized woman.
The bandit boss upon seeing that Avion was directing those words to him goes over Avion where he then notices no mana coming from the others body.
“Hahaha!”
He laughed. He couldn’t contain himself, how dare a regular human say those words to him.
“And what do ye think ye can do insect, get ye out of here before ye get yer ‘self killed.”
“Those words scum, I throw back at you!”
Avion said his blood starting to boil; his body was becoming insanely hot.
It was at that moment when Avion takes a deep breath and exhales where from his mouth emit’s a blue flame.
The seventy captives as well as the ten bandits were all frightened, because what was happening before them was something that they couldn’t put into words; this seemly ordinary looking young man’s body was steaming. It was actually releasing steam.
<<
“My body is hot.” Avion mumbled, raising his right hand up to his face, where he then clenching it into a fist. He couldn’t understand what was going on.
As this was going on, the young girl who had spotted Avion quickly turned and ran to her sister, running right past the Bandit Boss. “Sister,” she called out to her tears welling up in her eyes.
Seeing the young girl’s sudden change, the bandit boss frowns, “You little bitch! Who told you to help her?” He yells reaching for her hair.
Bang…
Suddenly, the bandit boss was sent flying, crashing through as series of buildings.
This sudden action left everyone present shocked and at a loss for words. Even the remaining nine bandits didn’t know what had just transpired; all that they knew was that their boss was sent flying.
“Ah,” the young girl shrieked, her sudden action quickly caught everyone’s attention. Turning their gazes to the girls location what they all saw was a young man whose body was covered in blue flames, with snake like purples, and what he had in his hand was the still beating heart of the bandit boss.
With their anger clouding their judgment bandits raise their swords and clubs and slowly inched their way towards Avion who was now standing before the young girl and her sister.
The little girl who was tending to her sister with tears in her eyes suddenly cries out, all of her pain, her sorrow, her hatred, and her resentment. All that was built up was finally released. Like a dam that had finally given way, her words sounded out like a raging river.
“Mister! she shouted. “Please, help us! Kill them! They murdered my Papa and Mama! They took everything from us!” The girl said. Her tears, falling like heavy rain. All that was pent up finally released.
Upon witnessing the courageous display by a young child the other seventy prisoners soon join in, all of them pleading to Avion for revenge.
But Avion couldn’t hear them; in his mind, he back at that lake witnessing the scene after he lost consciousness, hearing the woman’s otherworldly voice as she only spoke a few words. And the Dragon, such a Divine creature, not even did it hesitate in giving its all to Avion, it wholeheartedly followed her will. Giving all that it was to Avion, a mere mortal.
A mystery presented itself, a mystery that Avion was sure to look into and learn why that mysterious woman did that for him.
……
“That bastard he’s not moving,” one of the bandits said to another, where he then nodded to the other bandit who retrieved a bow and arrow from his back, firing it at Avion.
Swish…
The Arrow shot by the bandit upon making contact with the flame surrounding Avion’s body turned into ash. It was then, that, as a reaction Avion’s eye shifted onto the two bandits that attacked him, and as soon as his eyes fell upon them the Bandits bodies caught aflame. Their agony-ious cries left many with a shiver running down their spines.
Was this young man before them even human? A many of them thought. But who were they to complain this young man was saving them.
Soon after, Avion’s gaze shifted back from into its previous location. The remaining bandits and the rapist upon seeing this looked over at one another and dropped their swords and fled. They wanted no part in dealing with that monster in human skin.
Sometime after the bandits departed, Avion, after a couple or more minutes snapped to, only to find that the little girl had released the other prisoners. And they were all staring at him with weary eyes.
“Mister, are you okay?” the girl asks, approaching him hesitatingly, for too long have they been prisoners to others. Cautiousness seemed to be their first trait.
Avion upon seeing how hesitant she was smiles, “No need to fear me child, I will not harm my own people.”
“Mister who are you?” She asks looking him directly in the eye. Reaching out his hand Avion pats the girls head, “I am Avion VI Vartania Second Prince of the Vartanian Empire, and I will rebuild this city.”