"Hello there wanderers…My name is the Chronicler. Oh? You were expecting to see someone else here, another narrator perhaps? Yes, I suppose my role so far has been to be an observer, a being who dictates how alternate worlds were born…But the fact of the matter is that my role as an observer is needed this time. The lore of this particular world you'll be visiting today has been buried away, for reasons you'll understand as you listen in to what I have to tell you…
Imagine, exactly 5,000 years ago, when a war began between two countries on a world grander than any the likes of which had been seen before. These two countries fought over control of the power source known as mana that spread across the planet from the mythical comet, Derris-Kharlan. The war was fought with devastating weapons that tore apart the lands, ensuring that lands would become barren, dwindling the food supplies for over a thousand years….
The devastation spread across this single millennium led to the origin of this war being lost to the recesses of history, and desperation was the only thing driving humans to win…But now they weren't just satisfied with slaughtering each other. For you see, Derris-Kharlan not only gave the planet mana, but it also brought with it elves that integrated themselves with the humans for a time…
This led to the creation of half-elves, which had the genes of humans and elves flowing within them. With the war leading to the destruction of the planet, humans slowly began to blame the elves for bringing Derris-Kharlan to their world, which instigated the war in the first place…Naturally, the humans ignored their own greed and began to fully discriminate against the elves and half-elves, killing them and enslaving them to build more weapons to continue their endless slaughter.
But there was still a way to salvation, a way to end the war…Four heroes, two from each species involved in the conflict, traveled across the world to forge pacts with the Summon Spirits, giving them the necessary power to make the humans listen and release the horrors of their actions. The four heroes were Mithos, a half-elf, Martel, another half-elf and sister of Mithos, Yuan Ka-Fei, a half-elf that originally served the Sylvaranti army, and Kratos Aurion, a human mercenary…
While they sought out the Summon Spirits, the four heroes did everything they could to try and ease the tensions between both sides of the conflict to no avail…Cities burned, thousands died, but the four heroes pressed on, each pact they made bringing them one step closer to an inevitable end of this accursed war. The final spirit they made a pact with was Origin, who vowed his loyalty to Mithos alone.
Mithos asked Origin for a way to end this war, and with his four arms Origin created the Eternal Sword, a weapon capable of controlling both time and space. With this blade in hand, the four heroes headed to the center of what would be the grandest war between Tethe'alla and Sylvarant. Mithos exclaimed to the heavens that now would be the time for peace to reign between both races as he raised the Eternal Sword into the sky and waited for both armies to take notice.
They ignored him and rushed to slaughter each other once more, so with barely any thought put into his actions, Mithos swung the Eternal Sword across the very fabric of time and space, creating a divide that split the very planet in two, separating Tethe'alla and Sylvarant in a mere instant, leaving the four heroes on the Tethe'alla side as the two sides of the war were left scrambling in confusion.
Using the Eternal Sword in such a manner wore Mithos out, leaving him vulnerably in Kratos care for a few minutes, which was all the time the humans needed to notice the four heroes. One lone soldier took aim of the heroes and shot Martel straight through the chest before Kratos, Yuan, and Mithos' eyes.
The human was cut down afterwards, and in her final moments Martel begged her brother to create a world without discrimination. But Mithos misunderstood what was said, for as he held his sister in his shaking arms…Something inside of his mind snapped. The war between humans had come to an end, but in doing so they had accidentally given birth to a new threat.
Carrying Martel's body into the Great Seed that he had originally vowed to plant and grow for Origin, Mithos rose into Derris-Kharlan alongside Kratos and Yuan, vowing to revive his sister no matter the cost while giving her her wish by creating a world of lifeless beings.
For the next 4,000 years, Mithos gave birth to a system that would change the flow of mana between both worlds through the use of a "Chosen One", a person created by the manipulation of bloodlines within the humans so they would perfectly match Martel's own. If Mithos could find the perfect match for his sister, then there was a chance he could revive her through that person's body.
Not only that, but Mithos began to tamper with the bodies of his brethren and humans via the use of Cruxis Crystals and Exspheres, creating "angels" and "Exublas" in the process. Via the Cruxis Crystals, Mithos ensured immortality for himself, Kratos, Yuan, and every "angel" that he modified to fit his needs.
With the Chosen One system and the formation of the organization Cruxis along with the Church of Martel within Tethe'alla, Mithos had secretly taken over the divided worlds. He ensured the continuation of his system by planting his "angels" and half-elf factions known as the Desians throughout both worlds, making it so the humans on the mana deprived worlds would become subjected to slavery and experiments…This was his revenge against the humans for killing his sister, even though he became the very thing he fought against in order to meet this end.
By the time Mithos had put everything into place to secure his grip on both worlds, the innocent boy was forever lost. Mithos transformed his body into that of an adult via a combination of magic and the Cruxis Crystal, becoming the daunting leader of Cruxis and taking up his last name of "Yggdrasill" in turn. Kratos and Yuan still stayed loyal to him for quite some time…But both eventually began to have their doubts as different events unfolded. For Yuan, it was realizing the truth behind the words of her former wife Martel, and for Kratos it was the death of his own wife and young son at the hands of the Desians…
But whereas Yuan secretly created the Renegades to help deal with Mithos' misinterpretation of his sister's last words, Kratos was left broken by the loss of the two people he loved, and even though doubts were now stuck in his head he couldn't bring himself to rebel against Mithos.
Eventually though, Yggdrasill assigned Kratos to a simple task. He was to head to Sylvarant and guard the latest Chosen One, a young girl by the name of Colette who Mithos had high hopes that she would be the vessel necessary to revive Martel.
Kratos performed his job exceptionally, though he received some help from the girl's two best friends, a human by the name of Lloyd Irving, and an elf by the name of Genis Sage. They were also joined by Genis' older sister Raine, and eventually a ninja summoner from the land of Tethe'alla who went by the name of Sheena Fujibiyashi. Eventually, Kratos betrayed the group at the Tower of Salvation after the ruse of the Chosen One system had been revealed by the angel Remiel, and with Yggdrasill himself coming to claim Colette it was only because of Yuan's timely assistance that the group managed to escape.
But Lloyd and his friends proceeded to fly off to Tethe'alla through the use of Yuan's Rheaids, taking the now lifeless Colette with them. Kratos has returned to Derris-Kharlan to await further orders from Mithos, and one of the Desians Grand Cardinals has been sent out on Yggdrasill's orders to deal with recollecting Colette. But in this universe, there is one other that is about to take part in this particular event in history…
Clash of the Elements Part 4, Story 5: Reuniting the Divided World
Chapter 1: Derris-Kharlan
Months after departing from the last planet he visited, we find the teenage Overlord Riku Mew traversing space like usual. He wore his regular clothes and had a capsule of air around his body that prevented him from perishing in the deadly vacuum of space. His only company is the black dragon of darkness, Takashi, who speaks to him now from the realm that he is lying in "Riku, couldn't you at least try and land on another planet sometime soon? It's been a couple months now, and surely you are getting tired of space and the stars by now."
"You know why I can't." Riku says in response, leading to Takashi saying in turn "You can't possibly tell if a planet needs help unless you land on it and look around. Plus you need to eat."
"I landed on an asteroid a while back and made some food…I'm fine. As for the planets issue, call it odd, but ever since I gained the Chaos Form, it feels like I can just…You know, tell whether or not a planet needs help?" Riku's answer makes Takashi go silent for a few seconds.
"Hmm…Could it be that this is the higher-ups' doing?" The black dragon tries to mumble to himself, but he ends up being just loud enough for Riku to hear him.
"What are you talking about?" The boy pauses in place in the middle of space and turns around, raising an eyebrow as he awaits an answer from the dragon.
"What I said is that the original Elemental Overlord was like that as well. It was what made him so efficient in finding worlds that needed assistance. The Dark King was naturally his opposite in that regard, as he always found himself drawn to peaceful worlds that needed chaos." Takashi managed to nonchalantly avoid the issue of what he just mentioned, and though Riku glanced suspiciously at him he dropped the matter in a moment.
The teenage Overlord then turned around and continued flying, saying to Takashi "I can definitely tell a planet needs my help around here. We're getting close."
"Hopefully we won't have to deal with another super powered regenerator. It was too risky for us to face him back then." Riku nods in agreement of the black dragon's statement, then says in turn "I won't let something like that happen again."
The two end their conversation there, and Riku continues flying towards the planet he felt needed his assistance. It only takes him another hour of flight before he begins to notice something suspicious in the distance…To be specific, he notices a couple of things way off in space that were unusual even from his perspective.
The first was a blue planet that was split perfectly across the middle by a large grey and purple dimensional rift, but surprisingly the place didn't seem affected by it. The other thing of note was another planet hovering close to the first one. It was surrounded by a hazy purple atmosphere, but appeared to house a large city underneath. The depths of space around both planets were dark blue in nature, likely because of the purple planet's influence.
Riku immediately felt something familiar upon looking at both planets, something he's just gotten used to at this point in his travels, but instead of making a single comment he glares at the purple planet and kicks off from where he was currently floating to rocket towards the mysterious planet.
The teenage Overlord thickens the capsule of air around his body just in case the atmosphere of the planet is poisonous. It takes him only five minutes to break through the purple haze and descends down into the planet, the atmosphere blowing apart in all directions as it makes contact with the boy's barrier. Riku glances around and tries to get a feel of the haze, finding that while it's mystical in nature, it doesn't match any of his elemental abilities.
"Hmm, the air seems to be pure on this planet. Guess it's ok for me to drop this." Riku finishes going through the atmosphere and notices a technological city down below, at which point he gets rid of his air barrier and flips his body around, transitioning into a slow descent feet first towards the closest stretch of floor in the city.
The boy softly lands in the corner of this particular area, lowering his arms beside his body and immediately glancing up at the tall building just a few feet away from him. It was composed of green and yellow metals and was framed by a slanted, thick blue-grey wall. The floor was made out of a sky blue sleek metal with a few thin dark blue-green plates sending power between the facilities in this city.
Riku notices as he glances off to the left and starts to walk that there are two conveyor belts leading into and out of this area, both covered by a glass tunnel that would be tall enough for anyone to walk through. From the ground, it was also possible to look out into space and see the stars, which looked prettier than usual thanks to the hue of purple covering them.
Now that he's taken in the scenery, the boy quietly comments to himself while walking forward "Wonder who built this place? Hmmm, now I'm starting to get that feeling of familiarity again…"
Riku pauses in the center of the area and quiets himself as he felt a presence in the area for but a brief moment. Glancing to the left and then to the right, the teenage Overlord happens to notice only a shadow fly by on the ground, which causes him to then look up and see what appeared to be the citizens living in this city.
There were three human-like beings flying through the air, all of them wearing old time shirts and elongated skirts while they slowly flapped their feathery, angelic wings. All of them had aquamarine colored hair, which made it hard to tell if any of these beings had individual identities or they were all simply clones of a single person.
The teenage Overlord flinches in surprise as he glares up at the angelic beings, stuttering to himself "A-Angels?" This observation leads to him remembering the fact that there was a second planet a close distance away from this one and in turn he comments "H-Have I stumbled upon this world's equivalent of Heaven?"
His words grab the attention of the angels, who glance at him and immediately fly down in front of the boy in an almost drone-like manner, levitating themselves an inch off the ground before they say something to him. "You are a human…How odd." The centermost angel spoke in an emotionless tone, caring little about Riku's presence here.
The teenage Overlord felt tense and uneasy in the presence of the angels, and more and more he was beginning to piece things together. For now though, he knew that he was not in any sort of 'Heaven'. He swings his body slightly to the right and holds his arms out, putting himself in a battle-ready stance since he couldn't gauge if the angels wanted to attack him or not.
The angels all hold their arms out at the same time, and Riku grits his teeth and says to himself "Don't get too aggressive here Riku, the last thing you want to do is draw too much attention."
The teenage Overlord summons forth his helix-bladed sword in front of his right palm and immediately sets it on fire, warning the angels then and there "Don't make a decision you'll regret." The angels were unfazed by the words, but instead of jumping into a fight with the boy then and there they suddenly folded their arms back into their bodies and froze entirely in place. Riku paused and raises his eyebrows for a second before he heard a noise coming from behind him.
Two footsteps were taken by this newcomer before they stopped to look at the boy. The angels back away and nod their heads out of respect towards the person who had arrived, and as the teenage Overlord turned himself around he realized quickly just why the angels stopped fighting.
Standing at the edge of the conveyor tunnel is a human with well-kempt dark red hair, with some of it covering over the left side of his face. He wore mythical armor of ivory and white metal along with bronze straps that curved to and fro across the front of his chest. On his back were two thin cloths with sharp points at the end, and beside his left hip was a hilt with a ivory handled sword that he placed his hand close to as he stood in place.
"Now what do we have here?" The man asked in a subdued tone of curiosity as he slowly waves his left hand out in front of his body and looks closely at the boy's appearance.
Riku recognizes the person in front of him, and quietly says "Kratos Aurion…To think that I'd run into you here." The man overhears his remark and focuses his attention on the boy's face, his expression becoming a little more relaxed as he mentions "So you know who I am…That doesn't surprise me."
The teenage Overlord flinches and his muscles become less tense as he thinks to himself "W-What? Does he know what I am?"
Kratos glances at the boy's sword and says "Hmmm…The sword is different but the flames are easily recognizable."
Riku raises his right eyebrow and glances at Kratos, saying to him as calmly as he could "So you DO know who I am."
Kratos looks back at the boy's face and says to him "I do not know your name, but I know you by your title, Elemental Overlord."
The boy's muscles tense up, leading to him gritting his teeth slightly and chuckling as he comments "Hehe, it's been so long since someone recognized me by my title that I had almost forgot it was possible."
Riku then glances at the angels behind him and comments quietly "Judging by your outfit and the angels behind me, I guess right now you're still working for Yggdrasill, which makes you my 'enemy'."
Kratos cracks a tiny grin and hums before saying to the boy "How odd that you'd put little emphasis on the word 'enemy'. Nevertheless, maybe I'm your enemy, maybe I'm not. It all depends on how you plan to proceed from here. Would you like to come with me for a moment?"
The teenage Overlord says to the man "Only if you answer a few questions for me first." Kratos quietly responds after taking a moment to sigh "…Very well, I will allow you exactly three."
Riku starts off with "Does the name Lloyd Irving mean anything to you?" Kratos quickly responds with "Lloyd? Hmmm, if I ever were to have a son, that would be a nice name for him."
The teenage Overlord was surprised by how quickly Kratos responded to that. It was very unnatural, even if the man did know about what being an Elemental Overlord entailed. Riku thus goes off to ask another question "Have you already protected the Chosen One, Colette Brunel?"
Kratos' response this time comes out a little later than before, but he manages to not answer the question the way Riku intended by saying "The Brunels will soon have a daughter of their own, and we plan for her to be the next Chosen One of Sylvarant…But Colette certainly sounds like a name that they would give to her. You now have one question left."
Riku thinks to himself "He's trying to confuse me by giving information relevant to past events, I just know it. Guess there's only one thing I can do now…"
Gripping his fingers around where the handle of his sword should be, the teenage Overlord asks "You plan to take me to your master Yggdrasill, don't you?"
Kratos takes his left fingers and starts to grip them around the handle of his sword, responding to him with a simple "Yes, I do."
The teenage Overlord says in turn with a tense smile on his face "And I guess you aren't going to tell me just what he wants with me?"
The man starts to walk away from the tunnel, slowly drawing his sword out of his hilt as he calmly says "I only allowed you three questions. You have made your position known, Elemental Overlord."
Kratos glances at the angels and says to them in an authoritative tone of voice "Tell Lord Yggdrasill that he should be expecting company soon." He then draws his silver and pearl bladed sword out all the way and stands sideways in front of the boy as a small red gleam comes from the back from his right hand, causing six almost see-through light-blue wings to emerge behind him.
A moment later the angels fly off, leading Riku to look at Kratos and think to himself "Kratos Aurion…To think that you'd be my first opponent here."
The man says to the boy in a focused tone "Sorry, but I will bring you to Yggdrasill one way or another."
Kratos quickly swipes his sword against the ground in one clean stroke, the impact of the blade's tip creating a fanged projectile that speeds straight towards Riku's body. The teenage Overlord leaps up to avoid the shot and then holds his right hand out, sending out three simple fireballs at Kratos. The man holds his sword diagonally in front of his body while bending his left leg down a bit, creating a green field around his body while calmly saying "Guardian."
When the fireballs impact the barrier, Kratos remains unharmed behind it. Riku lands on the ground and focuses on the ground below the man's body, manipulating the metal in such a way that it creaks and bends before it starts rising up around Kratos' barrier. The man dispels his Guardian spell and leaps up before the metal could clamp itself around his body.
Using his wings to suspend himself in mid-air, Kratos held his sword horizontally in front of his face and summoned forth a red glyphic seal around his feet. After a few seconds a sphere of unreadable runes emerges from around his body along with a small comet of fire as he holds his left hand out and focuses the built up magical energy on Riku's body.
It only takes a mere second for the ground below Riku to transform into a ring of burning magma, leaving him with just enough time to create a sphere of water around his body to absorb the three dome shaped eruptions that emerge from the center of the ring. With the barrier dissolved around his body, the teenage Overlord thus is forced to take a projectile of fire to his body that Kratos launched forth with a swing of his sword.
The burning effects of the projectile were negated, but Riku still took some damage from the rest of the attack's properties. Kratos falls from the sky and lands on the curved edge of the bent metal, where he proceeds to then launch himself forward at the boy. Riku raises his sword in defense, causing the tip of Kratos' blade to meet the center of the boy's own. But the man anticipated this maneuver and swiftly summoned forth a purple lightning bolt from the ether that struck the boy straight down.
Kratos then used his wings to pull back and land on the ground a few feet away from the boy, who was now briefly stunned thanks to the lightning bolt. The man quickly goes to conjure up another spell, this time with the glyphic ring being brown in color.
Riku recognizes the spell that was about to be performed and chooses to counteract it by hardening his shoes with a coat of raw steel while bracing his body perfectly in place. Kratos swings his left hand out and the ground below Riku breaks apart as a spike shaped mass of onyx pushes against his feet and kicks him into the air, which would then be followed up by four more spikes erupting around Riku's body if he did not swiftly spin his body around and cut the tips right off with his heated blade.
Once back on the ground he looks at Kratos, who waited for the exact moment that the boy landed before running forward and flipping his blade around so he could use the very brunt of the handle along with his fist to punch Riku straight in the chest. The boy's breath is taken away before he can fight back, and as Kratos takes a couple steps back Riku drops on one knee and uses his left hand to keep himself from going down all the way.
The boy glances up at Kratos while catching his breath, and the man says to him in a somewhat puzzled tone while sheathing his blade back into the hilt "Why are you holding back?"
Riku smiles at the question and says "Hehe, you were expecting me to put up more of a fight, weren't you?"
"Of course." Kratos replies honestly. The teenage Overlord then glances at Kratos' hilt and comments in his head "Kratos is holding back as well…He's not using that fabled sword of his…"
The teenage Overlord then glances back up at Kratos' face and says to him "You were fighting to incapacitate me. You intentionally used tactics that I could easily counteract or be relatively unharmed by…Why?"
Kratos says to the boy in turn "What Lord Yggdrasill requires from you means you need to be kept intact. You have nowhere to run, Elemental Overlord. Your only options are to surrender or fight."
Riku swiftly realizes that Kratos had a point. With the way things were now, even if he wanted to he probably couldn't take down Kratos before Yggdrasill arrived. And seeing as how there was little point to the boy sticking around this particular planet, the teenage Overlord started to get back on his feet, dispelling his sword while smiling at the man in front of him.
"Hehe, yeah, I guess I only have two options, don't I? So if I'm going to fight, then I'm going to fight on the side of the Chosen One and her friends." Riku makes his position clear as day to Kratos, and then proceeds to mention as the man looks at him with a brief hint of surprise on his face "I can't blame you for trying to make me think that I was further along in the past, but I know better than to be tricked like that."
"Is that so?" Kratos replies with. "It would be simpler for you to just assist Lord Yggdrasill then to go down this route."
Riku swings his right arm out and summons forth a barrier of wind around his body that brushes aside some of Kratos' hair as it comes into form. The boy looks at Kratos and says to him confidently "If Yggdrasill wants me, then he'll have to come after me himself."
"Then we will see each other again." Kratos calmly points out, and Riku smiles and replies with "You can count on that for sure." With little left to say, the teenage Overlord kicks himself off the ground and flies away from the planet at high speeds.
Kratos turns around and says to himself as he slowly starts to walk off "Hmmm…If he's going to help the Chosen, then he'll be heading for Tethe'alla…I suppose it'll be up to Pronyma and Yuan to bring the Elemental Overlord to Yggdrasill for now."
Outside the purple planet, Riku finds himself rapidly flying towards the blue planet close by. He aims for the right half while tensing his muscles and thinking to himself "I hope I'm right about this…Tethe'alla, here I come!" The teenage Overlord breaks through the atmosphere of the planet, his body being encapsulated in fire as he does so.
Down on the planet's surface, we find a single teenage boy climbing around a mountain trail. He wears a red shirt with multiple buttons and two straps wrapped over his shoulders. He also wears two red gloves and boots along with dark-grey pants that have an X-shaped cross of belts that help keep his two swords held beside his body. While his spiked brown hair blows around thanks to the mountain breeze, the boy looks up at the sky and sees a burning speck descending from afar, commenting in a puzzled tone "Huh? What's that supposed to be?"
Next Time: Meeting with the Chosen's Group