Kaiden Ross and the Hunt for the Dragon's Seal

Chapter 1: A Stirring On The Mountain

From what I can remember, I was running for my life on a mountain. Great way to start a story, right? Sorry, but it's the best place. I was running down a mountain path somewhere I'd never been before, trying to not blow my vocal chords out from screaming. (Manly, right? Ladies.....) Something was waking up on the mountain, and all I could tell was it was big. I remember climbing to the top of the mountain and hearing chanting. I figured to myself, "Kaiden, you are on a mountain in the middle of a green ocean, blanketed with nasty smelling yellow fog. If someone and/or thing else is here, you probably don't want to go poking your head in." But me, being the stubborn little alternative word for donkey that I am, hid behind a boulder to listen to what was going on. The chanting voice was deep, so deep it felt like a drop-tuned bass was blasting into my chest. There was another sound, almost like chili cooking. I decided to take a quick peek over the rock. I saw someone in a black robe chanting. From where I was, there wasn't any way for me to see what they looked like, which did in fact terrify all the more. Then I looked down at the cauldron. It was bubbling, full of.....something. I had not a single idea of what it was besides glowing green, which didn't exactly bode well with me.

The fire it was on flickered and cast shadows on the walls of the little cave they were in. I was starting to notice weird shapes on the wall when something caught my eyes in the cauldron. It looked like something was starting to float up, so I refocused on it. What I saw, however, made me wish I was still looking at the cave walls. A severed head floated to the surface, which (gasp!) made me react. I yelled, "WHAT THE FU-", but before I could finish my duly rewarded expression of surprise, the cloaked figure whipped around and stared into my eyes. His face was something out of nightmares. It was very cut and angular, but not in an attractive way, more like a mannequin with painted on features. But of course, something more terrifying started.

As you can so conveniently see above, part of the cave wall opened, and I was staring straight into the eye of something huge, scaly, and most likely terrifying. So I, being a levelheaded and rational person, promptly started running for my life while screaming bloody murder. I started sprinting down quite the treacherous mountain path, luckily not snapping my ankle on any rocks. I didn't make it very far when the ground started rumbling. I stopped before I could take the chance of slipping and breaking something important, and pressed up against the cliff face, grabbing a tree root to keep from falling over.

I could hear footsteps starting to come in my direction, and I tried to prepare myself for the worst. What happened next was more than I think anyone could have prepared for. I felt the whole mountain shake as whatever owned the eye I saw spoke.

"FOOL! COME TO ME!" I thought the footsteps receded, but it was hard to tell. My legs felt like jelly, and I was having trouble holding myself up by the root. While trying to regain my balance, he started to speak again.

"IGNORE HIM, YOU IGNORANT BUFFOON! HE IS NOT IMPORTANT!" I thought I heard the chanting man talking, but it was hard to tell. The beast started to yell again, "IT DOES NOT MATTER! HE IS BUT AN ANT IN A FOREST!"  The chanting man sounded like he was trying to choose his words carefully, but was cut off. "YOU THINK? YOU ARE NOT HERE TO THINK! YOU ARE HERE TO FIND THE SEAL AND FREE ME! ONLY THEN WILL YOU KNOW YOUR REWARDS!" he screamed. At that point, I could not stand with or without the root, my legs had been shaken so much that even trying to stand was like using pudding for concrete. I felt a new shake go through the mountain, and saw the shadow of a head the size of a city block. Whatever it was on top of the mountain spewed a jet of fire as long as a football field, then let loose a roar that shook me to my core. It was the most terrifying thing I had ever heard, which didn't help what happened next. The rock underneath me started falling away into the pea green ocean below. I tried reaching for the root that had helped me stand before, but after the roar, I could barely muster the strength to try to move. I started using my hand to claw my way towards it, but I started noticing a very disturbing crack moving across my little outcropping. With all the strength I could find I stretched towards that P.O.S. root, when I heard a new voice. I looked towards the sound, and the man in the robe smiled. He said, "I believe you are the nuisance that interrupted our ceremony. Well I know how to take care of that". He bent down to me and picked me up by the throat. Under other circumstances, I might have been a little into it, but when he drug me to the cliff and held me over the edge, figured it wasn't the right situation. (He didn't even light any candles! What about my needs?) As he started to tighten his grip, my vision swam. I started fading out farther with each blink. He spoke again, "Do not try to find this place again. If you do, your fate will be much worse than anything I can do now. I may, however, have a place for you in my brewing you so rudely interrupted." Figuring I didn't want to be in a severed-head stew, I tried to come up with some way to get out of his grip on my throat. I was starting to see spots and lines crossing through my vision, with all different colors flying past. As he drug me along the ground, I could physically feel my consciousness fading out. Reaching out, I grabbed onto his leg. What I did next probably didn't help his opinion of me being rude. (Desperate times call for desperate measures people!) I found my position from his leg, reached back, and punched him right in the...... the "you know where". As he keeled over in pain, I took a few seconds to get my breath back, and realized how far he had actually brought me up the mountain. I was near the peak again, so as soon as I got my breath back, I started running back to the beginning of the chapter. You know, running for my life, screaming bloody murder, all that jazz. I'm not what most (any) people would consider and "athlete", but I was sprinting like Usain Bolt down this mountain path. Jumping over rocks, dodging tree roots, being an all-around lucky S.O.B., as I made my way down towards my hiding place. I was starting to panic less, when (of course!) something bad happened! I went down hard and felt something in my ankle pop, and not in a good way. As I looked back, I saw what tripped me: pretty big crack running through the rock. I also saw something a lot more terrifying. The being in the black robe somehow had caught up to right behind me, and even worse, was carrying the biggest hammer I'd ever seen. He was carrying it like it weighed nothing, and smiling like a sociopath. He was doing his chanting, his voice so inhumanly low that it was shaking the rock. He moved forward, starting to lift his hammer. At first I thought he was going to swing it at me, but I saw him lining up his shot and realized what he was doing. He swung it down before I could even make a "hammer time" joke. When it hit, I felt the vibrations and cracks shoot though the cliff, then felt it start to slide. He looked down at me as the cliff slid down towards the ocean, and he said, "Have a good swim, and remember: Do not EVER SEARCH FOR THIS AGAIN!" I felt the weightlessness of free falling; I could see the boulders and rocks falling all around me. As it felt like I was almost hitting the water, I heard something I didn't expect: an alarm clock. 

Yeah, yeah, I know, "Oh, it was a dream, bla-bla-bla," can it, it's my life and it's what happened. Besides, as bad as that nightmare was, it's nothing compared to the one I had to endure next: high school.