Chapter 1

He was alone.

All alone. He smiled, wondering how this could have happened to him. He was a tall, well-built young man. He was well in shape, and well-practiced in the arts of melee fighting. With hand-to-hand combat, and heavy sword, spear, lance, dagger, battle-axe, throwing-knife, and mace training, he could not comprehend defeat. He had passed the tests with flying colors, he had spent several years in training, and had been building his strength for as long as he could remember. To fail.
He remembered how it happened, of course. He kept replaying it over and over in his mind. There he had been, wearing his plant-green armor: dark-green, iron-covered boots, strong yet flexible green plate-legs, multi-layered, green, powerful chest-plate, dark-green chain-mail-covered arms, dark-green, strong, steel-coated gloves, and a green helmet that no sword could penetrate. With a mace in one hand and a shield in the other, and two swords with three spears strapped to his back, he felt invincible. Thanks to his training, it hardly weighed him down at all, though he didn’t exactly feel like running a mile or two with the stuff on.
All to be defeated.
There he had been, wearing his plant-green armor, viewing his target: a castle so large he considered it to be a fortress. It was nighttime, and the silhouettes of the many guards were shown, thanks to lit torches upon the walls. About ten stories high, the castle was swarming with guards like an anthill would with angry ants. These weren’t the dime-a-dozen guards who knew how to raise the alarm and swing a sword. These were professionals: trained killers who had spent a good portion of their life dedicated to learning the arts of their weapon. He could beat one, maybe two. But they would overwhelm him with numbers, he knew.
All to be defeated.
There he had been, wearing his plant-green armor, viewing his target, and reviewing his information. “Find the hidden castle. It can be found if you follow the road that heads through Dark Forest-- follow the torches at night. Once found, survey and understand the protection levels in guarding. Prepare yourself for battle and move in. You can invade in any way or form you please, so long as you complete the main objective: rescue the prisoner in the deepest dungeon. There will be no lighting down there. Speak, “Fear is the enemy” to the prisoner and he will explain on how to get him out. Treat him as an ally. Once the main objective is complete, get out of there. They will resist. Plan accordingly.”
All to be defeated.
There he had been, wearing his plant-green armor, viewing his target, and reviewing his information. Once he was sure he had found a blind spot in the guarding patterns, he had moved in, sword in one hand, battle-axe in the other. He had trusted his armor to protect him from anything that passed his weapons. A symbol dimly glowed black on the ground, right between the main gate and the secondary gate:



He hadn’t paid much attention to it then, but now he stopped his train of thoughts and dwelled on the mysterious symbol. It had been glowing black, he was sure, yet he had seen it from outside the main gate at midnight. It was almost as if it had been darker then its surroundings, making it stand out. Well, of course he hadn’t paid attention to it then. He was busy fighting for his life against those guards. His mind returned to them.
So he had moved in. He didn’t care too much about being caught, so long as he could smash his way through the guards with enough time remaining to get inside the castle before the gate was drawn. But, the moment he left his cover behind him and moved into the open, the guards went from patrol mode to defend mode. No sound or alarm had rung, no flame had been lit, and yet all the guards were immediately aware of his presence. Pushing that thought aside, he had come leering up towards them, as they formed a defensive line. He thought he recognized the phalanx from his training.
He should have given up then. The opponent had been obviously aware of his presence, and had quite the defensive line formed. Even so, he recklessly charged into the battle. He had to give himself some credit, as he had taken down three to five guards. Out of twenty-five or so. That didn’t improve his mood. When he looked back though, he realized the only reason he had taken out three of them was because the defensive line didn’t fight back at first. They had little reaction to his attack, to a point. Then they took him down and made him a prisoner-- upon a silent command of sorts, he supposed.
Well, he could only hope his friend would come to save him. They could probably get it without being noticed. After all, they’d had years more training in stealth and such. How long would it take them to find and rescue him? Well, he supposed it would take about a day to realize he was missing, and that’s only if his superiors had notified the world of his disappearance. With his superiors help, they could find and save him about a day and a half past his capture. Without... It might take up to a week. They were a good tracker, he knew, but when would they get started on the trail?
He guessed he had been prisoner here for about 12 hours. His belly confirmed the idea-- it had definitely been a while since he enjoyed some food. He wondered if his captors would feed him.

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A noise awoke him. Someone was whispering his name. “Lance! ...Lance!” Lance knew the voice.
“Aurelia! Is that truly you?” Lance whispered back. There was a scuffling movement, and Lance caught a glimpse of Aurelia’s face-- or rather, what was on her face. She was wearing one of her masks, as usual. She had once tried to teach him masks’ importance and such, but he found them to be annoying to keep on his face. He preferred a helmet.
Aurelia was of medium height, and about a head shorter than he was. She was very thin and light on her feet, and seemed tiny when next to Lance. But she was far from weak, he had learned. In a mock fight with her, she had taken him down. She had light armor that seemed to blend in with most any surroundings, but she didn’t usually need her amor. Instead of taking hits like he did, she moved around them. She was never still longer than a second in a fight. She preferred to use two knives for melee combat, one longer than the other, which had taken down many opponents.
But her real skills were in archery. If it was within sight, it could be hit by her. And, thanks to her armor and training, she was near impossible to locate if she didn’t want to be found. She was usually in the outskirts of a battle, until she found an opening she needed to get farther in without being seen, or sometimes by killing the few who would have seen her. Usually at the turning point in a battle, when the defense has rallied their troops to best efficiency and the offense was considering retreat, something important to the defense would explode in a glorious burst of fire and arrows would begin raining down upon the tightly packed defense.
If you ever caught Aurelia without a mask, which very few of her friends could say they had done, you would find a pretty girl with long black hair. She had very pale white skin, because her skin was rarely exposed to the sun. She wore all sorts of colors of armor, but each seemed well-made to blend in. She was currently wearing a blue mask, with intricate symbols and markings all over it, with grey armor. She was smiling, he was sure, though her mask showed no sign of it.
“Hey, let’s get you out of here,” she whispered as she moved closer to the bars to Lance’s cell. When she approached, she was quiet, but wasn’t being cautious of being found. But the holding room he was in seemed empty, save for him and her. She took out a small tool, and began sawing on the lock. Within a minute, Aurelia had it broken, and opened the door wide to let him out. Lance stood gratefully, and almost immediately collapsed. He was extremely weak from hunger.
“What’s wrong?” Aurelia demanded with worry in her voice.
“Hunger. I’m starving.” Lance grunted back. Aurelia reached into her small bag which she keeps tied to her boot, and took out some bread.
“It won’t taste the best, but it’s better than nothing. We’ll get you a nice hot meal when we get back. But first, we have to complete your ‘main objective’. Let’s go free this prisoner.” Lance grunted in agreement. He had completely forgotten about the main objective. He quickly stuffed down the food, muttered thanks to Aurelia, and left his holding cell. He followed her out, and they reached a spiral staircase going both up and down. She paused for a moment, then chose down.
“Did you see the marking on the ground on the way in?” Aurelia asked him. He remember the strange symbol.
“Yea, but what it means or how it got there is beyond me.” Lance answered. She paused, then answered him.
“I don’t know either. I just hope this prisoner won’t slow us down more than you do.” She said.
“Where are all the guards?” Lance remembered.
“I truly don’t know. I was watching them, and they all sudden withdrew from their posts and went somewhere. I haven’t seen one since I entered. Normally I would suspect a trap, but something tells me otherwise. This whole business worries me, let’s get out ASAP.” She said. Lance muttered in agreement. This whole time they had been descending the staircase, it had been getting darker, and unless he was imagining it, colder. There were torches along the wall every here and there, but it was mostly dark the entire way down. Then the staircase ended, and they began walking down a corridor. At the end, a huge door dominated all around it. It had originally been painted a bold white color, but the painting had chipped and melted to show black, charred wood in many places. The door may have once been friendly, but now it was ominous.
“It’s like 10 degrees down here! I mean... look at that!” Aurelia exclaimed. She pointed to a torch on the wall, and Lances’ eyes widened. There was a flame there, but it was encased in ice. Somehow it kept burning, though the ice was very solid.
“That’s... not natural,” Lance mumbled. Suddenly, it went pitch-black; the torches had been extinguished. With a grunt and some shuffling, Aurelia took out two rocks she had in her bag. She struck them together, sending sparks into the air, until she had lit a torch held in her hand.
“Where’d you get the torch?” Lance asked.
“One of the things I keep with me,” She replied. The torch illuminated the door, now totally frozen solid, with icicles hanging off the handle. All the torches along the wall were completely encased in ice, and there were stalactites and stalagmites everywhere. “This happened rather quickly,” Aurelia muttered doubtfully.
Lance walked up to the door, and pressed his ear against it. Suddenly, there was an incredible flash of flame, and Lance fell to the ground unconscious. There was cold water all over the floor, and all the ice in the room had melted. She ran up to Lance and turned him over, to find his exposed skin covered in burn marks. He was unconscious, but alive, and not bleeding too badly either. As she examined him, she began to sweat. This struck her as odd, and she guessed it to have changed to about 90 degrees fahrenheit.
She moved him against the wall, and pressed cold water against his injuries. He groaned, but seemed to be alright. She then stood, took the magnificent bow off her back, and pulled an arrow from the quiver. She loaded and readied the bow in a quick, fluid movement, and had it aimed at the door with complete stillness. Something wasn’t right, and it was coming from the door. Her eyes scanned the walls for traps, and tried to figure out how someone had set up this temperature change. But her eyes found her little to go on, and she decided her best move was to open the door somehow.
She loosened her bow, and began unraveling the rope strung around her waist. She tied one end to the arrow, then let it loose into the door. It sunk into the door a ways, and she had landed the shot perfectly inside of the handle. She lightly tugged on the line, and the arrow slowly came loose, and fell to the floor, still through the handle. She crept up towards the door slowly, then fast as lightning grabbed the arrow and fled back to where she had been. Nothing had happened.
By pulling on both lines of the rope, she lifted the handle, and pulled the door open a ways. Nothing had happened. But all she saw beyond the door was a giant dark room, with nothing moving. With a glance at Lance, she loaded her bow and crept inside the door, leaving the torch behind on one of the walls. Then she poked her head in and glanced around. It was too dark to see anything, but she could tell there was only one person in the room, in the very centre. She then retreated back through the door, and lit the tip of an arrow she loaded into the bow in place of the original. She then ran to the door and immediately shot toward the back of the room. She had guessed correctly. She hit dead-on to a torch, which illuminated the entire room. She stopped dead in her tracks.
The entire room was made of some kind of fire-resistant wood. She could tell that, because she had run into it before. But this wood had clearly gone through a nightmare of seasons, being frozen and thawed and frozen again. Currently it was thawed, but this act had twisted the wood into strange shapes. Hundreds of chains hung from the ceiling, and many of them bound a lone figure in the center of the room. The chains had scorch marks and all were dripping with water.
The figure was almost entirely encased in chains. Only the staring eyes could be seen, dark brown in color. They were locked unblinkingly onto her. At first she was speechless, because something in the figure’s eyes froze her in place, like the way a snake would stun its prey. Then her mind began working again, recalling details of her mission. Then she spoke, after remembering what she should say to the prisoner.
“Fear is the enemy,” she said with a shaking voice. What was wrong with her? She catches glimpse of somebody’s eyes and she’s suddenly scared? That was no way to think.
The eyes blinked. Then morphed. Aurelia couldn’t believe what she was seeing, but she watched as the eyes went from dark brown to lime green. Then, a deep guttural voice arose from the figure. “Free me, from these that bind me,” the man growled. Then, the eyes blinked again, and looked away, at a corner of the room. After a moment of two, she stepped forward, but then began to walk towards him. She began to untangle the chains, but found the were being bound in place by an unknown force. This unnerved her.
“إن روح روحك كسر الربط.,” He said.
She looked up at him with confusion in her eyes. He paused, then spoke again.
He said, “The Spirit in your soul can break the binds,”
She nodded, but was still pondering what that could mean. The Spirit in your soul...

echoed his voice. So what do I do? Will the binds to be gone?

Aurelia wondered. In a way, yes.

He answered her. She jumped. He hadn’t answered aloud, but in her head. She looked at him once more, fear showing in her eyes. His eyes remained locked unblinkingly at a corner of the room. She began to attempt to untangle to vines of chains again, and was surprised when she saw a symbol glow fiercely on the ceiling.





She recognized the symbol as the one she and Lance had talked about earlier. It glowed very brightly on the ceiling, rather than the dimly glowing symbol outside. Then, she felt a sudden fleeting feeling of a warm breeze. Just as suddenly, the mysterious bind that held the mass of chains together disappeared. It didn’t take much unraveling to reach the huge man they bound.
She couldn’t judge much of him through the chains, but as they fell away, she realized this was not a person to get on the bad side of. He wore dark, dark blue-colored armor, though the armor itself didn’t seem very heavy. The man was huge in height and bulk; he was at least a head taller than Lance, and a little stronger if she was any judge. Strong odors of smoke and flame came off him as she freed him from the chains. But, he didn’t move as she was taking off the last few chains. She’d think after being trapped in there, you’d immediately want to stretch and move around. But he stood just as still as when the mass bound him.
Then Aurelia exclaimed, “Ouch!” and quickly let go of the final chain she was taking of him. It was dimly glowing red, and it was as hot as a fireplace. Her hand had some burn marks and soot on it. She wondered how he could stand to be next to this chain, and it looked like it bound him tight. But though the man smelled of fire and smoke, he looked untouched. In fact, after she let go of the chain, he slowly put his hand on it and pulled it off of him. She was sure his flesh would be mangled and burned, but it looked untouched by the heat.
But she realized he had been hit with a lot of other things. His skin was covered in scars and lightly bleeding injuries, and the very skin seemed rough and leather-like. He seemed unfazed by the injuries. However, a moment after he let go of the last chain, he collapsed. All his joints seemed to pop and crack, and it sounded painful. She was stunned, and then began to walk towards him in an increasing pace.
Just before she reached him, he was on his feet in a flash. The mountain of muscle was oddly graceful, and stood with perfect balance to the sound of more joints popping and complaining. Aurelia halted just before colliding with him, and looked up at him with a question in her eyes. However, he didn’t speak, and moved around her slowly. She watched him walk, before realizing he was heading towards the door. She began to follow, wondering what he would do when encountering an injured Lance outside the door.
But she was surprised. When he walked through the door, his footsteps stopped, but only for a moment. She quickly followed him, to find him carrying the sleeping Lance like a sack of potatoes. “Where are you going? Wait for me!” Aurelia called out, while hurrying to gather her things and follow him towards the spiral staircase.

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Tag der Veröffentlichung: 16.12.2010

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Widmung:
To those who still know the honor of the Samurai.