Fate Arcana

Chapter 7

"Meet me at the back of the castle near the forest before dawn, I'll just finish some preparations for our escape." Barbara said and I just nodded.

Confused with the visions I saw, I'm certain this world was fully revolutionized by those elemental cards so if I were to rewrite that history I can't tell what might happen, but then again this isn't my world so why should I care? And again, I don't even know if I could do it, I don't have those powers they claim. As I pondered with these thoughts my feet led me to the garden and there I saw Baltazar once again, noticing my presence he motioned for me to come closer.

"Can't sleep?" He asked, but I did not answer back.
"Who's fate do you want me to rewrite?" I asked instead and he was silent for a bit, but then he answered.
"Mine." He finally said.
"Why?" I asked even tho I pretty much have the gist why.
"I want to meet someone again."
"Isn't that really petty and selfish?" I asked.
"I know." He said plainly
"Again, what makes you so sure that I can do this?"
"Because you're his son." He said looking at me straight in the eyes with his lifeless gaze once again, I was about to ask what he meant but then he cut me off. "It's getting late Sebastian, you should sleep."

Feeling the fatigue from the long day and not to mention all the information from the vision that Barbara showed me, I no longer pursued his statement. I also have to rest for the escape plan that Barbara said, so I excused myself and told him I'll be returning to my room to rest and he just nodded.

---

As the night gave way to dawn, my tension for the unknown grows. I'm escaping the castle but is this the right thing to do? I asked myself.
"Are you ready?" Barbara asked.
"I don't know." I said full of uncertainty "Where are we going?" I asked.
"You'll know when we get there. Know that I'm on your side okay?" She said full of conviction so I just nodded, with that we started to move.

When it was safe to say that we were already far enough from the castle, Barbara decided that we take some rest.
"Here." She said handing me an item, it was a purple card. "This is a card was specially made just for you." She added.
"A joker card?"I asked.
"You already have an idea of the elemental cards right?" She asked and I nodded so she continued. "This card is the combination of all those-" She was cut off when suddenly few soldiers from the kingdom appeared, they already followed us that fast? I thought.
"Want to give that card a try?" Barbara said.

So I did, I held the card and I just felt my energy rise. My surrounding started to glow and warmth filled my body specially my hands that held the card. The sensation was so familiar, it's as if my body has been doing this before. The card then turned blue and it released glowing silver dusts towards the soldiers, suddenly the floor they were standing on turned to ice and it rapidly crept up to their body until they were frozen solid, I couldn't believe my eyes at what just happened.

"Good job Sebastian, now let's go!" Barbara said as she pulled me so we started running as more soldiers appeared. The soldiers then pulled out cards; there were blue, green, red, and yellow, and those cards produced different elements towards our way. Barbara on the other hand pulled out a green card with a clover sign on it, an earthquake followed as the card began to glow, when I looked back I saw the trees behind us moving, the branches slowly crept to each other as if covering the path we just went thru and the soldiers were no longer following us.

---

Barbara and I have been walking for the whole day until finally we reached the foot of the mountain, encountering wild animals along the way and the soldiers no longer on our trail, thus having me use my joker card every single time-Barbara said to consider this as part of my training while she explained the card's functions along the way.

"As you know the four elemental cards control the fundamentals of nature-Earth, Water, Fire and Air. However your card is special since it can control sub elements like the Ice magic you performed earlier. These cards were created in the context of helping the citizens improve their lives, making their daily living easier. After Queen Erin passed away, King Baltazar did not announce war towards the Diamond Kingdom as there's no solid proof that it was the Diamond Kingdom who sent assasins to kill the queen, instead he improved the cards to be of used to the military thus making the cards a bit more offensive. He made it that way so that the people can protect themselves through the cards, however it can't be helped that some people would misuse it and hurt each other in the process. King Baltazar's frustration grew but since the cards were already there there'snothing he can do about it."

"They should've stopped creating it, it was from the queen's powers that the cards were produced so how did they make more? After the queen died the production of the cards should've stopped right?" I asked.

"Since the technology is evolving along the way, people found ways on how to create and improve the cards without the help of the queen's power. They manage to find a new source of energy by using the original cards that Queen Erin and Aurora first made, since those cards contain raw energy they used it as reference and extracted its energy, then they transferred those energy to the genes of several individuals thus the casters were born, and ofcourse these casters passed their genes to their offspring."

"Then he should've just ban the use of it instead." I stated.
"He did, however people started using it in secret creating more mayhem. So his only solution was to allow the people to use it once again, if the people would use it more openly, in that way he could atleast monitor." Barbara said.

"Hey Barbara, how old is Baltazar?"
"I think he's in his early 50s, why?" She asked, so I was right he was in his 50s. I thought as I remembered the first time I saw Baltazar.
"How old was he when he met the Erin?"
"They were the same age as you, but I think Erin was two years younger." She said.
"How many years has it been since the cards were first introduced to this world?" I asked once again and she thought for a second before answering.
"I'd say about 30 years more or less."
"I see." That adds up, I thought as I counted the timeline. "So Barbara, how come you know all of this?"

With this question, she suddenly stopped walking, we now reached a dead end as the path was obstructed by a big boulder connected to the mountain. Then she used the clover card once again and the rock slowly morphed into an entrance making the boulder look like a cave.

"I am Aurora's sister." She said as she entered the cave.

---

Meanwhile at the castle the soldiers were in turmoil as they searched for Sebastian.
"Shall I look for them as well King Baltazar?" Gregory asked.
"No, let's have Sebastian do a bit of an adventure, this will help him gain his powers back. Once he's ripe he'll return." Baltazar said calmly.