'Til Kingdom Comes - The Banished Prince Vol 3: The Prophecy

Dragon Light

After having breakfast with the rest of the household, I went over to the Macleod Coliseum where I picked up the usual sack of sand and stepped it to my back as I got ready to the starting line.

I checked my timer and as the guardsman blew his whistle to indicate the lane is clear, I blasted off from the starting line and dashed through the first 650 yards down, heading towards the low wall that seemed to be within reach by running just a few short seconds.

I literally left dust billowing behind me as I sprinted along and deftly swung myself and cleared the first Obstacle with ease. I sprinted along in between each obstacle and soon had reached midway after clearing the stations and sprinting once I had completed each one of them.

The 25 pounds of sand behind my back felt like I was stepped with a down-filled pillow instead. The added weight of the 14 pieces of reinforced steel mesh studded leather armour (without the helm) underneath the soldier's uniform felt nothing as I swing my feet and hands as I sprinted along.

Soon, I reached the ramp and suddenly had an urge to perform a somersault in midair upon clearing the edge of the Obstacle. And which I literally did...!

My right foot kicked at the edge of the ramp as I leapt forward as usual but my momentum somehow brought me to make a somersault motion forwards which I managed to somehow clear at least 12 or more feet forward.

It seemed surreal and as I somersaulted, I felt as if the time stood still for me. I was literally moving in such a slow motion that I could see the dead leaves that were brought along by my momentum as I cleared the ramp in slow motion.

If I slowly reached my hand out, I think I would be able to grab a few leaves in them...!

I completed the somersault and landed on both feet and I pushed myself forward. I heard a few oohs and ahhs from the rest of the soldiers who were clearing the ramp as well and never had expected that I would do a stunt that way.

I guessed someone would come up with an idea to put up a sign in order to inform the public not to perform such stunts at home and preferably to be done by professionals only. Hahahaha...!

I sprinted the rest of the 450 yards and when I reached the finishing line, I saw once again that I was in slow motion again, just like in bullet time...!

I glanced at the countdown timer and saw that I had managed to shave off lots of seconds from the last timing and now had managed to clear the obstacles within 7 minutes and 1 second...!

I laughed to myself as I crossed the finishing line and sprinted all the way without a stop to the guardsman and handed him back the sack of sand to him. He looked rather surprised at the way I had somersaulted in the end and wished they he could do it too.

He was also surprised that I was somewhat in top physique as I was not panting and breathing heavily to catch my breath and I had no difficulty to talk to him when I handed back the sack of sand.

I jogged back out and saw that the wrestling ring had been fully setup as I went up to the registration booth to amend something.

"Good morrow, gentlemen. Could you cancel the Black Mantis participation and instead put up a 4 versus 1 AoA (all-out attack) instead just before the Royal rumble?" I informed the Shadow unit members who were manning the registration booth and nodded in agreement.

They knew who the Black Mantis is and knew that it would have been some sort of an exhibition match later on in the evening. At least I would have time to spend with Heather and my children before the match begins.

A 4 versus 1 match would include weapons in the ring and by means of weapons, it would be blunt weapons like a flail, staff, iron rod, et cetera. The defendant would normally be unarmed. You get the whole idea, right?

"Best of luck, Your Majesty. I'm going to be one of your rivals. Confirmed its an AoA match?" one of the Shadow unit members asked to confirm the change of decisions made by me and I bobbed my head and replied affirmatively.

"Thanks a lot, men. Be seeing you later in the evening...!" I waved at the Shadow unit members as I took off running once again to the Engineering Guild where I would need to discuss something to them.

"Good morrow gentlemen. Hope you had your breakfast today. Sorry to barge in on a Sunday but I would like to discuss something with you." I walked up to the door and knocked before entering the office building.

Even on a weekend, the Engineers that made up of several Shadow unit members and civilians were at their desks as they discussed with the Town Council officers of the faults that they had seen around the area since they would be rectifying the faults, in accordance to Frank's requirements.

"Come on in Your Majesty. We are just wrapping up some of the work that needs to be touched up around this town. What can we do for you?" an engineer greeted me and I plopped down to a chair and asked for some papers and ink.

I drew a large circular kind of drum and labelled the sides as made of tin for its lightweight and portability.

Then I drew some hinges at the side that would be supported by some metal plates to help the circular drum to pivot upwards and downwards.

Also at the bottom part, I sketched some kind of platform so that it would have wheels to move the circular drum slightly sideways.

Within the circular drum, I drew an arrow that indicates that the surface within the back of the drum would be like a pineapple design. This is to reflect light back and be able to cast the light further and brighter.

That's the light caster that we had learnt back in school which uses the light reflected against a shiny surface within the device to shine brighter still.

A few shutters were installed at the front of the device so it would be easily opened and closed to give a signal to the rest of the towers, plus its good to shut them off when not in use and be used only during times of need.

This would surprise the advancing troops or enemies when a bright light was suddenly shone at them form a great distance of at least a mile away...! A mile would be as good as a 5 to 15 minutes heads up for our army to ready themselves.

After I had drawn the device, I handed the drawings back to the head engineer and he lauded my effort since I was there, sitting quietly as I doodled on the piece of paper silently and knew that silence is golden and a picture would tell a thousand words.

"Dragon Light. This is what it is called, Your Majesty. Do you wish to install on all the towers and intermittent across the town's perimeter walls, Your Majesty?"

"This is used in ships when the ships were known to be attacked by some mythical creatures from the deep, called the Kraken."

"Actually it is just a huge squid, that's all. People tend to hype it up and make it sound as if there are sea monsters living near our coastline."

"The shipwrecks were actually caused by drunken captains and sailors that failed to notice the lighthouses to warn them of sharp outcropping rocks and corals."

"This Dragon Light is a very useful tool to communicate with the other ships while at sea or port."

The engineer nodded his head and asked for a diagram to be put up according to a ship's Dragon Light. With these lights installed on the perimeter walls, even mutated beast would be chased away by it.

"Nice sounding name, engineer. Dragon Light... Hmm... I like it very much. Yes, I would like to have them installed on our perimeter walls so that it would be able to shine on those pests that may want to invade us one day and at the same time be a tracker to those who travel by night and wishes to know where our town is."

"With the lights shining in the air, I am sure it would be able to illuminate the night, am I right? Besides, a tracking light seems to be a good idea too. Instead of using a flare or fireworks, it would also be a signal to others to invite them over and settle here and be part of the population and community. Hehehe."

I was overjoyed that the engineers crew out a diagram where they kept all the blueprints along with them. They showed it to me and I was delighted that the device was somewhat similar to what I had in mind.

"Farah would be able to supply the incandescent lights for the Dragon Light. Furthermore, I wonder how she would be using the incandescent lights as a measurement on the intensity of the illumination."

I suggested and I wondered how the light was measured during that time and only the engineers have the answer.

I was about to ask the engineer on how they measured light when he spoke up, "One lumen is about the same brightness as a one birthday candle from a distance of one foot from you, Your Majesty. So for this Dragon Light to perform to its peak, you need to have an illumination of 10,000 lumens."

"With that kind of intensity, you could shine up to 1 mile, Your Majesty. Nothing could escape its shine and everyone would be able to see their intended target easily."

"The Dragon Light that was equipped onboard ships would be 20,000 lumens and above, Your Majesty because there would be fog and other elements that the seafarers faced daily."

I nodded my head slowly and instructed the engineers to put up the devices upon completion without notifying me.

There was no need for me to rush them since they could delegate the work among the rest and the Dragon Lights could be easily constructed and installed in batches within a week's time.

Anything pertaining to the town's safety and security and the delegation of work done by the engineers would be dealt with swiftly. That's the word given by Eagle to the rest of the Shadow unit members.

Furthermore, they knew that I had never failed them once and even if I had accidentally failed them, they knew I would make amends as soon as possible.

The Shadow unit members had faith in me and knew that the presents that they had received and wore underneath their normal clothes were a boost to their morale and fighting spirit.

"Would that be all, Your Majesty? Is there anything else that is in your mind that you would like to share with us to improve this town further also the lives of the community around?"

The engineer asked and smiled while I sat there while sipping a cup of tea from a dispensing tun they had been filled with some freshly brewed concoction of leaves.

"This tea seemed rather nice and soothing," I thought to myself as I pondered on about certain matters that I might need the help of the engineers.

After giving a round of thoughts and confirmed that I had not missed out anything, I gladly informed that there was nothing else to discuss further and then the engineers quickly began to commence on their tasks at hand.

It seems that net the engineers knew what to do since a few of them went to the Old Jack's Blacksmith to get the shape of the Dragon Light ready while someone went to meet Priestess Farah and requested from her the incandescent light that would be more concentrated and showed then what I had in mind.

Priestess Farah knew what I had in mind and she informed the engineers that the incandescent light that had been used to light the lamppost around town would be at least 100-200 times brighter so it would be able to shine a mile away.

Once the engineers had gotten all their basic needs, they immediately set to work.