Elementia Tellurian

Chapter 6

"You are both a mess. Why are you soaking wet?" Alistair commented. As soon as he saw Birch and Sera coming out from the forest. Both of their tracksuits had a tear and they were covered with mud. Calyx run to their direction. He cupped Sera's cheeks with his hands and assessed it. "You have a scratch!" he shouted.

Sera removed his hands on her cheek. "Stop being so clingy and it's no big deal."

Calyx ran to Birch direction and hold his hand. "What happened?"

Birch shoved Calyx's hands away. "We just fought and don't act like we are close," he said in irritated manner.

"Splitting up was a bad idea. I never saw one of you," Leed interrupted.

 Both Calyx and Alistair agreed.

"Yeah, I felt like I was just walking on circles," said Alistair while recalling his journey on the forest. "It was quite peaceful. The area was calm and sunny. I never faced or sense any danger there," he added

Sera looked at Calyx "What about you Calyx?"

 "I can't really comprehend the area. It was actually very weird. It was like the world was divided into two. The other side was light and the other side was dark," he said trying to remember other details from his memories.

Sera looked at Leed to ask him the same thing. A theory had form on her mind but she was not actually sure if it was right. Leed replied with a stern look. "Mine was great. The bodies of water that I found on the forest kept calling me," he sarcastically answered.

Sera nodded. She took a squat on the floor and drew a two perpendicular right triangle, both facing the opposite side, on the ground with her fire. Everyone looked at it. "Is that the northern part of the compass?" Birch asked in an uninterested way.

Sera nodded once again. "What if we are not just here to train? We have been training all our life so what if that is not really the priority here? What if we are also brought here to study the forest?" Sera finished the drawing by adding two line to transform the two right into for acute angles.

"This is the west, northwest, north, northeast, and east." Sera said while pointing the edges of each direction. "Leed came from the west. He said the bodies of water found on the area were calling him. That might represent his strength. He is one with the water. The water is for him. West direction projects strengths." Leed tsk-ed but Sera did not give him any attention. "In contrast to that, Birch and I was on the east. The opposite of strength is the weakness. Both Birch and I had become vulnerable earlier on the east direction. The east could symbolize weakness.”

Sera breathe in for a moment and continued. "On the northwest side, Calyx said he was in the peaceful place and the opposite of it was the northeast that could possibly be in war or destruction but we can't be so sure since none of the members were there but it might be supported by what Calyx saw. He said that the world was like divided into two: light and dark. The north could be the middle ground!"

“So are you saying we should take note of the meaning of each direction?” Leed asked.

“Yeah, that might help us to determine what is ahead of us but I’m not entirely sure if it is applicable to the real forest. This is just a theory.” Sera answered.

“Alright,” Leed said in response.

“Everyone are returning to their chambers. I saw them passing outside when I opened the door. Should we retire, as well?” Alistair questioned.

“We should. Look at these two. It looks like we’ve let them deal the hard stuff. They should clean themselves.” Leed announced.

Calyx and Alistair nodded. They all straighten their backs. Leed took off his upper tracksuit which left him with his sleeveless undershirt. He threw it to Sera. “At least cover yourself.”  He then left the room immediately.

“Good job!” Alistair went out of the door with his smile and thumbs up.

Calyx got the tracksuit from Sera’s hand and placed it on her back. “See you when I see you!” and then he followed Alistair out.  

“How did you do it?” Birch asked looking at her. “Your fire was useless. It was against a pouring rain. It can be easily extinguished. How did you counter my attack and threw it back at me?”

Sera just shook her head and headed to the door.

“Yo!” Joash greeted. He was covered with sweat. Did they really train hard?

“Why are you there?” she asked. She started walking to the direction where her chamber was.

Joash followed her. He raised both of his eyebrows while looking at Sera. “What is that?” he asked referring to the blue tracksuit on her back.

“I was told to cover myself. I got soaked by the rain.”

“Are they being difficult on you?” It was Sera’s turn to raised her eyebrows.

“Not yet. I’m now getting in. Bye.” She immediately closed the door and sighed.

She was tired. She was worn out because of the sudden utilization of her energy. After she took off her clothes, she started submerging herself in to the tub of water. They must have really prepared the whole room for a competitor. The bathroom smelled lavender all over. It helped with stress.

She tried to draw the same amount of energy she used earlier while battling with Birch. She took a deep breath and released it through her mouth. She calmed herself. She repeated to breathe three times before she felt an energy trying to wake up inside her hands. She raised both of her hands and the waters were starting to morph into different sizes of circles. She moved her right hand forward. Half of the circles followed her hand and the other half stayed still. She motioned her left hand in a circular way and all of the circle control by her left hand revolved around that particular hand.  

She took another breath and drew a big circle on the air. The water formed a shield. This what saved her earlier.

Manifesting other element aside your own was not uncommon for those people who wanted to rule the kingdom but for Sera, it was an early manifestation, you were either an innate one or a gifted one. In order to learn the element from other kingdom, you need to be taught by the masters from the said kingdom. Self-taught was an event that was rare.

Sera finished her bath. She wore her usual clothes and walked out of the room. She heard there was a library that they were allowed to go. Maybe she would be able to find an information about the forest and to her manifestation of water as an Ignis resident.

She went down the stairs and started looking for the library. This was her first time roaming around the mansion. The only room that she had been to were her chambers, the main hall, the dining hall, the general training ground, and their own team’s training ground.  She cannot deny that it was really a big mansion.

She passed by the window and she saw some competitors from Aeris were laughing and joking around together outside the mansion. Looking at them, she just realized that she had not spent more time around her fellow Ignis competitors other than Joash. All she did when they gave them some time off was read her book, she packed, in her chambers.

As she continued walking, she saw a sign telling her that she already reached the library. A library with full of books greeted her. There was a big book on the center of the aisle right after you enter. It was placed on a sole bookstand.  Sera went near to it and read a passage of it. It was the history of the Elementia Tellurian.

***

Elementia Tellurian is a place where ordinary people lived peacefully and with unity not until foreigns visited their land. People from the kingdom accepted them wholeheartedly but they took advantage of it and colonized the kingdom by using the elements of magic. They brought fear, pain, anger, and regret to the people living there. They had caused bloodshed. The people cannot forget that significant event that had change their lives completely. Ever since, the blood from their colonizers runs through their veins.

As the years passed, peace envelops the whole kingdom. However, a tension between leaders from different elements and from the original tribe occurs. They all want to be king. They all decided to divide the kingdom into five Regnums: Aqua, Ignis, Aeris, Terra, and Meta. They all named it after their element. Aqua for water, ignis for fire, aeris for air, tera for earth and lastly, meta for change. Meta kingdom is composed of two different kinds of people namely:  Aether and Vaesir. People with aether attribute promotes compassion, empathy, kindness, love, and other factors that are for the goodness of the kingdom. On the other hand, Vaesir people has this magic that can either make or break a person. Since meta regnum usually composes of people without natural powers and as they grew older they were trained to use magic.

The kingdoms’ way of choosing rulers was through competition held every after thirty-five years. It allows user from the five kingdoms to join and prove to the entire Elementia Tellurian what they are capable of. They need to have the strength, the capability to rule, and especially know how to love. The five remaining competitors will rule each kingdom and it will be based upon their performance during the final battle

***

Sera learned this when she was still a student in her academe. It had been thirty-five years since the last competition and here she was, joining the competition to heal the broken relationship between the Ignis and Aqua due to the attacked that happened twenty years ago, Regnum Aqua was attacked by the people that wanted to take the throne and the youngest princess was kidn*pped. There were also rumors that spread that the Ignis ruler was jealous of the Aqua King. Because of that, the relationship between Ignis and Aqua had loosen.

Sera continued to look for a book that would help them know more about the forest. There must had been some kind of documentation that was written from the past.  Or, was everything that they saw on their training ground were not real but just an illusion?

Sera sighed.

“You looking for this?” A voice of a man behind her caught her attention. She faced him and Birch’s face was the first thing she saw. He had already change his clothes but the wetness of his hair was still visible.

He raised a book with his hand and threw it to Sera’s direction. With Sera’s reflexes she was able to caught it. “Are you here to know more about the forest, too?” she asked.

“You were smart. Realizing things in a few minutes while our historians took a decade or centuries to understand the forest.” he commented.

“You already read this? How long have you been here? I never noticed you.”

She never really saw him enter or even if he came to the library earlier than Sera, he never made a sound.

“Not fully, just some passages,” he said coldly.

Sera handed the book back to him. “You should finish it first. You saw it first.”

“Okay,” he agreed and snatched back the book.

He started walking out of the library door. “I’ll give this to you later,” he added.

“Okay, thank you,” Sera responded in gratitude.

Since the book was already on Birch’s hand she decided to leave library. When she was already out of the library, she saw the prince of Aqua walking to her direction. She stepped aside to let him walked pass her.

“I intend to speak with you,” he said as soon as he was already in front of her.