Crossing Universes (NaNoWriMo13)

Chapter Two

The man leaned over the passed-out girl, his expression thoughtful. 'Strange... This girl appeared out of nowhere and appears human. Humans haven't been around in centuries,' he thought as he straightened up and turned to his knights and warriors. "I want you all to pick up this girl up and carry her back to castle. She will be locked up in the dungeon until interrogation," he announced.

The knights all did a short, quick nod and surrounded her, lifting her up and putting her on a wooden wagon that they had apparently hauled. They were out here at this time in the first place because the flowers on the dining table had withered, so they had to replace those flowers, along with the rest of the castle's flowers, to match each flowers in the vase.

The man waved a hand, dismissing them. "Alright, go on. I'm staying to get my flowers." He said as he started walking deeper into the meadow. "However...follow me, O'Leon; I need to speak to you."

A short, child-like elf dressed as some sort of priest and that had been standing at just the edge of the forest, perked up and stumbled up to the man. "Y-yes, my king," he stuttered, "w-what is it that you need to say to me?"

"How long have humans been extinct?"

"Almost f-five centuries."

"Thought so; but, why is there a human girl out in the middle of nowhere? Where did she come from, when did she get here, and how? It's impossible that she just showed up out of nowhere," the king said, narrowing his eyes and resting his chin on his knuckles.

"I don't know, si-"

"King! King Shoko to you!" He bellowed.

O'Leon jumped, making a small, terrified squeak. "S-sorry, King Shoko," he whimpered, "a-as I was saying, I do not know. Perhaps I can research in the library why the human has suddenly appeared?"

"Good. Now help me pick flowers; I need them since the flowers in the castle have withered," King Shoko said as he searched the meadow for some good flowers. "We need about two hundred of them."

"T-two hundred of them?" The priest gasped, aghast by the fact that they had to get that many and they had no wagon or anything to carry it all in.

"Yes. You have a problem with it?" He asked, turning towards him with a raised eyebrow.

"N-no, my king!"

"Good."

A good two hours later, they finally returned to the huge stone castle that was practically on an island. The king greeted to every villager he passed as he headed towards the castle, O'Leon by his side, carrying a heap of flowers and trying his best to keep up with Shoko.

"K-king, can you please slow down? You know my short legs can't handle your long strides!" He said, panting a bit from trying to catch up and his high-pitched voice muffled by the flowers covering his face.

"Well, I'm not slowing down or stopping for you! You know the way to the castle, right? Well, you're gonna have to use that knowledge!" He said, snickering a tiny bit.

O'Leon let out a tiny whine, using his knowledge of knowing the way back as said. 'This royalty thing is getting to his head, now that he was crowned king a few years ago,' he thought, 'I remember when we were little, we'd play together as friends instead of as prince and novice priest.'

The king made a small 'hm' as he thought for a few moments. He spoke after he snapped out of his thoughts, "I shall go call the gardeners to change out the flowers into the new ones and water them. You can just go off and do your research in the library. Tell me when you find something." He set the pile of flowers he was carrying in front of the onyx black throne and went off to summon all the gardeners to take care of the flowers and put them in the vases.

O'Leon nodded quickly, putting his pile of flowers next to King Shoko's pile. He scurried off to the library, ignoring all the glaring portraits of the past kings that were covering practically every inch of the hallway's walls. He opened the huge ebony doors to the library and walked in, looking through every section that could have any history on the humans; so far none could be found.

He looked up and a tiny smile appeared on his lips. "Finally," he muttered, getting a ladder to get to the book. He skimmed through the book and narrowed his eyes. "This says nothing about how the humans got here!" He squeaked, closing it and putting it back on the shelf angrily. He climbed down the ladder and continued on his search.

He was about to give up as he sighed, pulling out a random book to just read and calm his mind down. However, that didn't help because pulling the said book out had triggered some sort of secret room.

O'Leon's eyes widened to the point where they looked like they were going to pop out of their sockets when he watched the bookcase move aside to reveal the stairwell. "Oh...my...lord... Since when did we get this secret room?" He murmured under his breath, slowly stepped down into the stairwell and headed down towards the secret room. He jumped and looked behind him when the bookcase covered the stairs again. He huffed, "Hopefully there's a way back in," he said as he started stepping down the staircase. He reached the room, he gasped at the sight.

There was a huge leather book that had golden vines etched around it like a frame of a picture. It was sitting up on a pedestal and it seemed to lure the elvish priest towards it.

He slowly stepped towards it, eyes wide in curiosity. He opened it, coughing roughly when a large puff of dust exploded into the air due to the book not being opened in a long time. As he began reading it slowly, he became more intrigued and he believed he had found the answer to his question.