Zephyr The West Wind (Chaos Chronicles, Book 1)

Dentro Village

Author's Note: This is the first book in the Chaos Chronicles Series! Get it online (in stores, kindle, ibooks, etc) when you get the chance, but in the mean time check it out here on wattpad :)

-RJ

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I'd heard people say that being able to understand other people's emotions is a gift beyond comprehension. Of course, I myself did not see the significance in that statement. Whether it was because I was seventeen, came from a small village on a small tropical island, or simply hadn't had enough time to broaden my horizons, I just could not fathom the gift that I had been given by whomever may have created this world that I called home.

Life is something that I think we all take for granted at first, and some do their whole lives until they can't anymore. What is the purpose of life? And even more to the point, why am I here? I had asked myself this over and over, unable to figure out a reason. I didn't even stand out from others my age, aside from my name, Zephyr.

Life was simple in Dentro, on this island surrounded by what seemed to be endless amounts of water. I'd asked myself time and time again why we all ended up here, on this island. And if there are any other lands out there, why did we, and even more so I, end up on this one? And if there are other lands...then we really are just a small piece of something a whole lot greater and bigger.

Lately, this was all I had been thinking about. Of course, someone like myself who was low on the food chain compared to all of the other people in my village had time to drift off and think about such things. Now, I know what you're thinking. This kid Zephyr is crazy to be dreaming up such foolish thoughts-why isn't he getting ready for a mission or something?

By the way, missions are quests assigned by the chief of Dentro Village that potentially allow a person or team to leave the island for some given reason. Also, missions are only assigned to those who are deemed worthy by what is known as the Council of Elders-really five grumpy old villagers who have nothing better to do with their lives. I couldn't even try to ask for a mission, as I had not completed what is known as the Trial of Adulthood. But all of that would come into play soon enough.

Anyway, I always wasted my free time imagining myself leaving this village and exploring the world beyond it. But like always, I had to come back to reality. Sitting up from my bed, I shook my head to move the stray pieces of my hair from in front of my face. Standing up, I felt the regular unpleasant sensation in my muscles that comes after lying on my rock-hard bed made of straw and held together by Sea stone.

Sea stones, unlike other rocks, are rocks that formed in the deep sea over thousands of years and gained some of the magical properties of the sea; these range from creating invisible rays that kept land creatures away to healing and other undiscovered properties. When used to create beds, they offer quicker physical recovery and keep demons from coming within a certain vicinity, although I don't really understand how it works myself.

After stretching my muscles a bit by doing jumping jacks, I looked around my room. Living in a very small one-room house just ten paces long and wide, I always liked to keep it clean. On the left, I had a small desk that rose up from the Sea stone foundation of my house, and next to my bed was a small box filled with a large number of different weapons that I used for different tasks. Of course, now you're definitely thinking, What, a box full of weapons? But don't worry about that for now, that explanation also comes later.

Walking towards the door, I opened it to look upon a small pathway that branched in two directions; left towards the village square, and right towards the south dock, also known as Demon's Pool. Directly beyond this path, in front of my house, were hundreds of sky trees that went as high as the human eye could see.