Two Separate Lives: Ashen Series I

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE:
A NEW BEGINNING

[September 2nd, 2022, 5:30PM]

A young man is seen passing through the exit doors of the school he studies in. He is wearing a white button-up polo shirt, black pants and black shoes. Across his neck is his ID card, held by the strap indicating his school. And he's wearing earphones, likely listening to music. We all know that's not a good idea, right? Well, anyways. Just right in front of him is the street, with two separate paths. In one path, cars and motorcycles ran to the right. The other path, more of the vehicles ran to the left. Seems to be a Keep Right street. Behind him, three students follow the student with the earphones. One look at their faces, and already, someone could tell that they are one of the many ruffians in the school.

...

[Erisian 25th, 3rd Year of the 7th Sildiran Emperor, 6:50ST]

"GET THEM!"

A rough, distant and loud scream can be heard through a forest. Numerous footsteps can be heard, and it's not the walking kind. They're running. And fast. Like they're chasing something. Ahead of the footsteps, a mother carries her wailing baby, running for her and his life. She has black, diamond-patterned skin, a reptilian tail with protruding short green spines running from her tail to her back, the maw of a wolf, black horns with green highlights, black hair, green eyes with black, slitted pupils, pointed ears, and most importantly, black, large and supposedly sturdy bat wings, if not for the numerous holes and tears on them. She has a look of fear, pain and most importantly, worry, etched on her face, looking ahead and to her child. Her child never stopped wailing even if he's currently around her embrace. As for the child, he was only wrapped around a blue blanket and on the blanket was an embroidery of a cute and small black dragon's face with green, big and round eyes staring up front, where the back of the child would be. Her running around gave no chance to see what her child looked like, as she held him close to her.

...

"Hey, Ivan!"

The student with the earphones turned his head, seeing the three students behind him. "...not again", he muttered under his breath, and turned towards the three. He removed one of his earphones and spoke up. "What do you want?"

The three students caught up to him, and Student #2 snaked his arm around Ivan's left shoulder, standing to his right, while Student #1 and #3 stood behind him and to his left. Ivan stiffened but otherwise kept his facial expression flat. "Oh, what's wrong with catching up to our favourite friend?", #2, the one who called him, answered with a fake smile that did not fool Ivan. The other two students kept up their smiles as well.

"Let me guess, you want my money again?", Ivan asked. "No, not really.", #1 answered before #2 could. "We want you to... help us with our assignments, yeah? It's a bit too hard for us...", #3 spoke up, continuing #1's words. #2 smiled genuinely this time.

"...No."

...

She stopped running when she saw a cut-off up ahead. She smelled water and her fear escalated. The hostile people led her here... to this cliff overlooking a river. If she fell, it's a long fall with a painful impact to the water. She could survive the fall to the water... but not her baby. He was still far to small and far too fragile to survive such a fall and impact.

"The last two Dragonids..." a man spoke out from the depths of the forest behind the mother Dragonid and stepped into the light. He wore full plate armour coloured gold, and had no helmet fixed to his head. He had unkempt brown hair, likely due to the running, and black eyes. His expression had sadistic glee. Hidden in the forest is the man's entourage, with crossbows, plated armour staves and robes. Most likely, the entourage was strategically positioned, following a plan.

"Why are you doing this!?", she asked featfully while she backed off from the man. "Do you not value the lives o-", he cut her words off. "By order of Emperor Ildris Galim Sildira IV, the Great Dragonid Extermination Quest is to be issued and must be recognized as an imperial quest in all of the Guild Houses throughout Sildira Empire. We're just doing the imperial quest, as are many others. And... Sildirans didn't quite like the thought of Dragonids running around the empire... so no protests were held... heh."

The Emperor's decree... her fear grew even further than it was before and she stepped even further back. Then... an idea came to her. She looked at her baby one last time and kissed his forehead. "Don't worry... it'll aaall be over soon...", the man gleefully drawled out. She ran to the cliff, far from the man, and he pursued... then she raised her child above her head.

...

"No?"

"No.", Ivan affirmed, walking away from the group. "But you agreed when the girls in our class asked you?", #2 retorted. Then, he continued. "You always do this, Ivan... you never get along with the boys, and instead you go for the girls... you'll probably turn gay, yanno..."

"At least I won't be with barbarians like you three..."

Everything stilled. The passing of other students were ignored now. Then, Ivan felt a rough shove, causing him to fall on the gravelly ground of the campus outskirts. Some people, students, parents, and teachers alike, around the campus outskirts turned towards Ivan, but ignored him afterwards. They assumed he just fell. And the shove was actually done discreetly, so the people didn't see anything incriminating... Somehow. "So that's how you'll roll, eh, Ivan...?", #2 asked with quite a threatening tone. "No more bullshit then..."

Feeling threatened, Ivan scampered to stand, and after that, just behind him, the three started to run towards him. He ran off to cross the street, hopefully hitch a quick ride to escape the three bastards behind him...

But he didn't look where he was going.

...

When the armoured man saw the mother Dragonid raise her child above her head, he panicked and rushed to her as fast as he could. He then swiped his hand from left to right. Strangely, a stream of yellow fire followed his hand motion. While doing so, he called out.

"Spirit Gear, come to me!"

The yellow fire took the shape of a longsword, its handle enough to be held with two hands, and the blade is almost as tall as the man himself. The blade was gold with intricate etches and carvings of fire, the handle yellow with a brown leather grip, and the crossguard shaped like a half-moon with a ruby at the middle of the crossguard. Elegant carvings of fire can be seen on the crossguard as well. At the same time, the man and the mother yelled out.

"Raging flames of my soul, cut down my enemy with indiscrimination!"

"Beloved Dragon Goddess, take this child away from its unworthy mother!"

...

Ivan didn't see that a white public van was going to pass through the street while he rushed to get away from the three students. Due to that... the van couldn't stop on time.

...

The man then performs a downwards diagonal slash, and from the sword, a thin slash of golden fire ejects outward and travels toward the mother Dragonid. At the same time, a bluish-white glow encased the baby along with his blanket.

...

The van collided with Ivan's entire body at great speeds, and he was sent flying to the air... then the van finally stopped. Ivan crashed onto the ground head first.

...

The fire slash connected onto the mother's entire chest, and she was dealt a horrible, lethal, irreversible injury, from left shoulder down to her entire chest, and she gasped in pain. Meanwhile, the glow completely encased the baby, and moments afterwards, the baby was gone. Saved from certain death. Her eyes closed and she smiled with all her strength... then she fell into the river. It wasn't hard to imagine who the scream belonged to afterwards.

"DAMMIIIIIT!!!!!"

...

END OF CHAPTER ONE