ESSENCE

Dragging sounds could be heard from a distance. A weakened man with bartered armor but no form of injuries was dragging his left leg on the floor and limping with the right. He was on a battlefield at the moment. The place was ghost quiet for a place of battle though. This was probably due to the fact that everyone but this man had been slain. Both the armies from the Verisian and Dracodian kingdom had come for an all out battle that would decide their fate. They each came to wipe out the other from the face of the Earth. Though ironically each of them had ended up sealing their fates.

These kingdoms had large amounts of power in the world at the moment, so it was only a matter of time before one would want to dominate the other.

The man eventually dropped face first on the floor. Groaning in pain he turned over facing the sky. The sky had taken the colour of the blood red moon which made it impossible to identify the moon. It was still surprisingly easy to see as the war had taken place in these conditions. Smoke could be seen by the man erupting to the sky. The stench of blood and burnt flesh surrounded the air making it unbearable for this man. He blinked a few times while looking at the sky before passing out cold.

With his eyes wide open and gasping for air, Dwayne had just woken up from another bad dream. He held on to the pendant hanging around his neck. It happened almost every night. His mind playing games on him trying to remind him of the worst experience of his life even in his sleep, the Draconic war also known as the Draco war.

Dwayne was a well built man considering the fact that he was once in the army. His hair was as white as snow with eyes that had a noticeable emerald glow in the sunlight. He had a light skin tone which made him a lot more attractive.

Dwayne eventually caught his breath. He released his grip on the pendant he had held tightly. This pendant was the most important thing in his life, it reminded him of his family which he had no more. The pendant was on his neck at all times, he never took it off even once.

He got off his bed and went on to the rest room, there he washed his face and looked at the mirror. Since the war, his eyes had some kind of lifeless look in them. He hated this look as it scared people aware from him and also made him feel inhumane. For this reason he had made a mask to cover up his face.

Dwayne came out of the rest room and moved to a wardrobe in his bedroom, there he removed the mask and wore it on his face along with some candles. The mask was round with two eye holes for vision. It also had two red lines drawn from one side of the mask to the other. It was never intended to be scary but people took it that way.

He wore his winter boots, thick coat with a hood and wrapped a scarf around his neck before heading out.

At this time it was winter, the winter breeze blew up against Dwayne. Even though he had covered himself well, Dwayne could not help but feel the cold of the breeze. He could feel a sting in his nostrils as he breathed in the cold air but it was bearable as he was already used to it. From a distance Dwayne could see people staring at him. They were clearly afraid of him. People tend to fear what they did not understand and he was exactly the definition of that. Although he did not like the way they looked at him he did not care as today was an important day for him.

On the snow, Dwayne knelt down opposite the graves in front of him. There were three graves in front of him, his father, mother and only sister were buried there. His knees sinked into the pile of snow. He knelt in this position so as to block the air coming the candles way. He lit the candles he had brought and began the rites. Today was the day he had lost his family, on the 9th of December. He believed that he had failed to protect his family and hence would have to be punished for this later on in his life. After some time, he put off the candles and got up to his feet. He looked at the graves once again. Gripping his hands into a fist he swung at the air only to end up falling to the floor.

After awhile he got up and started walking back home. The walk back was quiet. The village was named Erile. It had quite the small population, but that was what made it easier to survive. There was more land to use and an easier life to live.

Few years after the Draco war, a wave of 'Shadow' suddenly appeared spreading slowly over the continent. It threatened the life's of all races as it devoured everything in it's path. Once a person was touched by the shadow it was impossible to escape as it would devour that person on the spot.

All races came together in an attempt to stop it's spread.No effort was spared in trying to stop the shadow but it was only in vain as it appeared to devour magic itself. When hope was almost lost, it was discovered that the shadow followed a pattern so it could not consume certain parts of the continent. On this discovery, races divided the continents into different parts. Each living in separate dwellings. The dwelling for humans was created and named 'Eden'.

After that day, travellers had not been seen as they believed they would be engulfed by the shadow even within Eden.

After a long walk, Dwayne got home only to discover something was off. He entered the house slowly only to be welcomed by the voice of a woman whom he did not recognize.

"Took you long enough, I thought you would never come Dwayne Rayford."

By the side of the room a woman with a sword by her side sat down on his chair sipping some wine. She wore military attire that was used for magicians and short blade fighters, to be specific armor that enabled them to be quick on their feet. Dwayne was annoyed that this person entered his house uninvited but was much more annoyed by the fact that the wine she was sipping was the wine he had been keeping for months. He was hoping to take it when he came back.

After finishing the wine she finally spoke to him. "I helped myself to a bottle of your wine since you kept me waiting."

She stood up from the chair and walked to the window in the sitting room.

"We need to talk."

This woman broke into his house and took his bottle of wine, there was no way Dwayne was going to listen to her.

Dwayne dashed forward and threw the table in front of him towards her. In reaction, she held her blade by the handle pulling out the sword from its scabbard and slicing the table in half. Dwayne used the to opportunity to smash the wall by the door. On doing this he pulled out a beserker sword from it. Beserker swords were huge swords that were used by people having a lot of strength.

The intruder prepared to defend herself as he dashed towards her at high speed. Swinging from below, Dwayne sword crashed into the sword she used to defend lifting her from the ground and throwing her into the window.

She broke through the window and fell to the floor rolling some distance from the house. The snow had broken her fall protecting her from any form of injuries. The same could not be said for the window she broke through as few pieces of glass had impaled her skin. She considered herself to be lucky as the injuries were not severe. She smiled as she fought back the pain, his strength and speed was beyond her imagination.

Dwayne jumped out the broken window running towards the intruder at high speed. Leaping into the air he lifted his sword high eventually coming down to strike at the left side of her neck. Bearly keeping up with his pace she held her sword up blocking the left side of her neck. Her left hand held the handle as her right was under the top of the sword acting as a wall for defense.

Dwayne came down colliding his blade into hers with great force. As their steels clashed, the woman was pushed down to a kneeling position. Her legs sank into the snow at the force of the impact. She could feel the weight of his sword from her sword to her bones.

"It's so heavy", she mumbled as the sword was coming closer to her neck. At this rate it was clear to her that she would be killed. Seeing she could not match up to him, she shouted at the top of her voice

"Stop! Stop! Stop!."

On hearing this, Dwayne felt a strong current flow through his body eventually forcing him to stop. It did not hurt him by any means but he could not go against the currents will.

The woman collapsed to the floor as the weight had been lifted. Dwayne however did not stop for long as he made an attempt to lift his blade to strike again.

"Don't move a muscle!", She said in a desperate voice as she saw his strange movements.

The same feeling stopped him in place making him unable to move. Have I been spelled?, Dwayne could not help but wonder.

"Now we can talk", she said while still gasping for air.

Dwayne suddenly felt able to speak. It was strange to him that she controlled his every move. One thing was clear to him at this moment and that was the fact that he hated being controlled.

"What is the meaning of this you pile of .....!", Dwayne shouted at the intruder.

"Am not a pile of whatever. The name is Emily, Emily Gray."

Dwayne gave her a questioning look, from her proud expression she knew what it meant. From her pocket she brought out a shiny rock and put it in front of his face. It was a amber looking stone, it looked like a gem and was glowing as it got closer to him. It seemed to react to him. In realization, he opened his eyes in shock. He knew what the stone was, he would never mistaken it for another. Besides he was the one that threw it in the sea some years back.

"Where did you get that?, That is impossible", Dwayne said in utter disbelief.

"Am not telling you anything, you almost killed me remember."

Dwayne knew it was impossible to resist the stone. This hurt him as this all reminded him of what happened in the Draco war. He was forever compelled by the will of this stone as a result of a decision he made in the war.

"Wow, you were much more stronger than I thought, no wonder you are a High blood", Emily said in a satisfying tone. "That is perfect because I need your help."

"You know I won't help you Emily, you broke into my house and drank my wine."

"You must have really liked that wine but I doubt you can refuse", She said in response.

Dwayne cursed as he knew what she said was true. She could simply just order him to do it now that she had the stone.

"Before we get started I should probably place some rules", Emily said.

She pointed the stone forward once again. It started to glow in response to what she was about to say.

"You will never try to harm me in any way, you will also refuse to do anything that would led to me been hurt, you will also never try to take this stone away from me and lastly you will protect me to the best of your ability whenever I am in danger."

On setting these rules, a circle with arrows pointing north, south, east and west appeared on the back of his hand. The symbol seemed to move and work like an actual compass. Dwayne couldn't help but wonder what it was for.

Dwayne couldn't also understand why she did not just order him to do whatever she said.

"You can move now."

On hearing this Dwayne could finally move again.

"Dwayne, you should follow me so that I can explain why I did what I did. Though it is your choice, I won't order you to do some things against your will. I am going to get a drink to celebrate."

Emily started walking away as Dwayne was thinking of what to do. The last thing he wanted to do was watch her celebrate but in the end he decided to follow this girl to at least figure things out.

Dwayne and Emily had gone to a tavern. It was night time but not so late in the night that the tavern would be closed. They entered into the tavern and sat down at a table. Dwayne did not like being here as it was clear that people were weary of him. In the corner people couldn't help but look at him. He couldn't blame them though as the mask he was wearing would drag attention.

Emily was ignoring them as if they were not even there, though the same could not be said for the beer. She had already ordered three cups of them. One she had finished and other reduced to half the size. It was quite obvious she was going to over do her celebration so he had to get answers now.

"What do you want?"

Emily looked at him as if he had asked a stupid question then bursted into laughter further attracting attention to their table. For some weird reason it looked like it was only the men that were annoyed by this.

"Isn't it obvious, I said I needed your help."

"Okay then, what do you need my help with?", Dwayne asked her hoping she would not laugh at the question.

Emily put on a serious face and dropped what remained of the beer on the table even though it was clearly a few drops in her last cup. It looked like she was about to tell a story.

"Few years back, I was living in the town of Omos like any other person. Living a normal life. There I was practicing spells when by accident I broke down part of my ceiling. Strangely a key fell down from it, one that I had no idea of in the slightest. Though for some reason I felt oddly drawn to it. I tried a connection spell to link the key to what it opens and found out it was in Liscon town south of here. After having finding this out, I had a series of flashbacks of things I didn't remember."

"Hmm, that would be strange indeed", Dwayne said in realization.

"That would either mean I had amnesia or I had been spelled."

Emily waved her hand in the air. It seems she wanted to order another round of beers. On ordering another three cups Dwayne knew he was carrying her back. Emily offered him some but he refused, something didn't feel right about drinking beer with someone who broke into your house.

"So you are a magic caster, why didn't you use magic on me?", Dwayne couldn't help but ask.

"You obviously gave me no chance to do that. I couldn't just match up to your speed and power."

"Oh!", Dwayne's tone made it clear to Emily that he had a smug face under that mask. On noticing this she scoffed before speaking again.

"Anyways, I came for your help because of that. I am glad to see you live up to the hype."

Dwayne couldn't help but feel uncomfortable at the direction of the conversation. Hype? There were people hyping him? Those are strange people indeed.

"I heard you were the only survivor of the Draco war, the worst war ever recorded in history. Also I heard rumors that you were the only person to move around the whole continent even with the emergence of the Shadow."

Dwayne on hearing this was surprised at how far rumors could go and was worried at the backlash that may occur from them.

"One more question how did you get your hands on this stone?", Dwayne asked as he had to know if someone made her aware of it, gave it to her or she just found it. Her answer would make him know the kind of trouble he was in.

"There is no way I am telling you that, it's a secret", Emily said drinking her last beer.

It was clear he was not going to get answers from her. He wanted his normal life to keep going on, the last thing Dwayne wanted was to travel around again.

"You should know that even with all of that said I am not helping you out", he said this with no hesitation.

Emily looked at him before looking at the six empty cups in front of her. She then pointed at the cups catching Dwayne by surprise.

"Don't they look like unicorns! I think I would want another", Emily said in a giggling voice.

It sounded so dumb that he just had to assume she was drunk. He stood up held her by the hand and walked out of the tavern. She moved so wobbly that he had to pick her up.

They eventually got home which brought up a question to Dwayne's mind. Should he throw her out in the snow or bring her in? He was not so heartless that he would leave her to freeze. On hearing himself he realized it must have been her command talking.

He laid her on his bed. It was at this moment he actually noted how she looked. Emily had raven black hair which complimented her pale white skin. Her hair laid spread on the bed with some strands on her shoulder. Her training seemed to have made her shape come together making her quite the attractive lady. Dwayne never thought this annoying girl that ruined his life could look this beautiful in her sleep. It didn't matter though as his only goal was to escape from her.

Dwayne covered her with a blanket before proceeding to sit outside on the balcony. He felt sick at the thought of moving to another town or village. It would probably end up causing issues for him. Though it was clear that as long as Emily had that stone it would be impossible to live the normal life he once desired.

Hence he decided to follow her for the main purpose of getting the stone back from her.