Worlds Apart

Fireflies, Crystal Flowers and You

It's funny how time changes everything. One moment, you are with your sister, or any family member you love, thinking you are inseparable and at the next moment, just like that they're just gone. Some people just leave with goodbyes. Life is a miraculous thing. One moment, it's there giving you hope and love. The affection you want and in the next moment, it robs you off the most precious things in the world. It's such a cruel thing. After the fight with Shu, where the White Tyrant left the boy in the graveyard, Lui walked towards the ice palace: the famous Hyoketsu dungeons. It was strictly guarded with layers of protection. It was impossible for anyone to break in, or to break out. The two guards in the front bowed as Lui walked past them without a look.

The inside was cold. A cold that only an ice holder or a citizen of Hyoketsu could handle. Lui knew the pathetic plight of the foreign prisoners who ended up here. He himself has witnessed their frozen bodies, their blued limbs. Two weeks, that's the longest a person from another area can live inside here. That's the main reason why many of the prisoners inside here are from their own kingdom. Thieves, murderers and all kinds of men who had broken the rules, forsaken the kingdom.

Lui turned to the left route of the ice palace, turning away from the dungeons. This part of the palace was used to keep records, and other important clues to the kingdom. The two guards in front of the massive ice door parted ways as Lui entered the room. This was not cold like the other part of the palace. It carried a healthy warmth and the smell of dusty pages. He looked around at the shelves and the racks. Some filled with books in different sizes bound by leather covers. The others are filled with weapons and significant objects that are used as evidence in court cases. Lui walked past the books trying not to think of the immediate thoughts they brought them. The scent of someone so important that had suddenly become an enemy again.

He stopped in front of one of the shelves. The dust collected on it was wiped off by the cleaning maids who come inside every morning. They are closely checked thoroughly that nothing would be stolen from inside. Lui picked out a long plain wooden box from the top of the shelf. Newly added to the collection. The surface glistening in the light. A cruel joke of fate itself. The arrow inside killed his sister. The evidence they have against Moeru. Arrows that are flying to kill. Their strongest weapons. Lui walked to the table in front of the window overlooking the fields of Crystal flowers and placed the box on top of it. He had made up his mind to look into it. Because of the funeral and the loss of his sister, he couldn't make up his mind to look at anything that was connected with her death but finally he sort himself out of the maze of emotions. He needs the burning of revenge inside his heart. He knew that this arrow would give him the murderous feeling of revenge he needed. To destroy Moeru.

He opened the wooden box and stared at the arrow gleaming inside. Just as the daggers were important to Hyoketsu, these arrows carried the heritage of Moeru. None of the outsiders could get hands on them. They were made to dissolve after the moment the arrow struck the heart of the victim. Lui knew that the strongest magicians in the kingdom worked hard to put a barrier to that magic element in the arrow to keep it safe as evidence. Lui ran his hand through the soft wooden shaft. The tip of the arrow is still marked with brownish stains of blood. His sister's blood. He looked at the significant features every arrow carried in Moeru. The gleaming iron on the tip shining with the faintest red. A type of iron that can only be found in the royal mine of the kingdom where outsiders are not allowed. Feathers of a fire phoenix attached at the back. Not the actual legendary creature, but a typical bird that can be seen all around the kingdom. His eyes finally stopped on the letters: carved neatly on the end of the shaft. The letters of the Moeru kingdom. A burning fire of revenge flamed inside him as he ran a hand through the carved symbols when he stopped. The flame inside him died a little when he realized the letters were not correct.