The Red Dragon:
~*~Prologue~*~
'There once lived an emperor born to greatness.' An unknown voice narrates the scene. Of a young man being groomed and dressed in a silk wardrobe. His hair was long passed his shoulders and loosely tied in a red piece of ribbon.
'He was loved by all who knew him. Neighboring kingdoms respected him. He caught wandering and interested eyes on his youthful looks.' A black cat was walking side by side along his master, catching eyes around the palace.
'Unfortunately, his life was caught short.' There were eyes full of excitement and disgust. Either way he ignored them as he passed through large double doors about nine feet tall and Chinese dragons chiseled on its features. The largest Dragon mirroring the same design on its opposite side was painted gold.
'The guardian of the royal family was a giant statue made out of pure gold. If anything ever happened to the young emperor, the golden dragon would protect him by granting him a second life.' Besides the golden dragon, there were other dragon statues sitting on pedestals. Only the silver one was equal in size and height of the gold one.
'The emperor was killed by a group of rebellions who were arrested after being caught. He left behind his widow.' The emperor fades from the scene and a new figure approaches the golden dragon statue.
"You are no guardian! You didn't protect my husband! He was my everything, my reason to live! I will never forgive or serve you!" He cried, dressed as an empress but is physically a male wearing traditional makeup.
"~did you really love him~?" A voice reached out and a crimson red fog clouded the room to hide the voice's identity.
The empress didn't respond covering his face with his fan as a wife should. Despite traditions, the throne was passed to the empress due to his gender and relation to the emperor. Although he is the only person available to take the throne, he's deeply in love with his late husband and wants justice for him. He escaped the tradition of being buried with his late husband.
"~Does it anger you that you are separated from him~?" The voice seems to show itself while the fog lightly fades. The empress looks up to see a missing dragon off its pedestal and it took a human form, of a human that looked like his late husband, but with red eyes.
"Who are you? What are you?!" The empress asks with a beautiful Chinese fan covering his lips.
"My dear, I hate to tell you but the golden dragon isn't home at the moment. He is with the late emperor at moment."
"What do you mean by that?"
"You did say, 'the golden dragon didn't protect your husband', right? Well, he is protecting him by granting him a second life. However I see and hear your pain, of your feelings of losing your beloved husband. I could grant that you could receive the same reward. To be reincarnated again together as soulmates. All I need, in return is you to accept me as your new guardian. I am Red dragon."
The empress stopped to think, 'the red dragon'? He was believed to stood for the feelings of love, passion, desire, and lust. If he made a deal with him, the golden dragon wouldn't be able to continue to be the guardianship of future royal families after him.
He decided that his husband meant more to him than anything and the chance to be with him again meant more to him as well.
He accepted the deal with the red dragon. Fog seems to reappear and amongst the fog, a green dragon statue's eyes glowed emerald green.
~*~Chapter 1: Lao Dragon~*~
"Tell me again why we need a sponsor?" Yao rolled his eyes while sipping his green tea at Starbucks.
Arthur sighed, "A sponsor is someone who could help fund our excavation. Since it's an ancestor of yours Yao, I know we could find the tomb. It's just the issue on labor, flying to china and let's not forgets money for safety of artifacts that need to be transported to the museum in Beijing. We need a wealthy sponsor who believes in our hard work!"
"Then who is this sponsor you accepted?"
"His name is Kiku Honda, a wealthy Japanese entrepreneur and one of his hobbies includes a huge interest in artwork. At the moment he's in charge of funding an art gallery in the city for a local Italian artist. He wants to also fund our excavation, in hopes of finding beautiful scrolls or paintings of the lost emperor that you are a descendant from. After all, it sounds like a good deal for us."
"Anyway, the only reason I'm involved is because I am a descendant of this emperor. Well, if this emperor actually exists, that is. It's been a debate all through my family and little records have been found to prove his existence."
"Plus you do owe me a favor since we were children, remember?"
"Do I really, still?"
"I was joking before, but I really do appreciate your help after all."
"That joke never gets old, but I do have an interest to discover this ancestor as a myth or fact."
"Of course! By the way, Mr. Honda will meet us in China in four months."
"What? Why?" Yao asked stunned.
"He needs to see us in person and interview us first, before deciding to be our sponsor. He has a vacation apartment in Shanghai."
"Let me get this straight, he is currently funding a local artist here in New York, but he also has a place in China?!"
"Not exactly, he has multiple properties around the world."
"He sounds like a snobby bastard than anything!"
"Yao, calm down. He's a wealthy businessman with many fascinations. Art being his favorite, he is interested in cultural artwork and artifacts. The pay is really good too."
Yao rolled his eyes, ignoring Arthur's many positive points. He doesn't trust rich people, especially rich people who had a better life than him. Although he wouldn't blame anyone about his depressing childhood, he still felt other people around him don't know true suffering.
"Earth to Yao, everything okay?"
"Yeah..yeah. Can't wait to meet Mr. Honda." That was a lie.
~*~The Red Dragon~*~
In a room with emerald green wallpaper, sits four individuals passing around a pipe for a puff. The substance doesn't affect them; in fact no drug could affect them. The one who seems to be in charge, is shorter than the other three individuals. He has short black hair with long bangs, a paper boy styled cap covers the top of his head, and red eyes that aren't natural to a human.
Sitting on his lap, was a taller male. His emerald eyes never leave his master. He is a lot younger than his master, at least appearance wise. He has a hungry lust look in his eyes. His hair is longer than his master's, and is barely fitting in a loose hair tie.
Across the two, on a lounge sofa sits two individuals, one is male and the other is female. The male looks pissed eyeing the male on his master's lap. His eyes are blue as sapphires. His glasses are resting on his nose, he pushes them up to see a little better.
The lady with long black wavy hair has dark purple eyes. She takes a puff of the dragon shaped pipe made out of solid gold, and hands it back to the red eyed master of the room.
"Opium isn't as thrilling anymore." The master said.
"It was never thrilling. It never affected us like it does to humans." The lady said.
"I guess it's not as thrilling to humans as much as it did so long ago."
"No, Lao. Remember, they were dying." The blue eyed dragon with glasses spoke.
"Brother, they are still dying from it." The lady replied.
"Anyway, I did call you here to discuss our plan." The red eyed master known as Lao spoke putting away the pipe.
"Which one, Master?" The lady asked.
"Our final plan has come. Remember, my darling?" He looked at the green eyed male sitting on his lap. He looked hungry for a taste of Lao.
"Of course he remembers," the blue eyed male with glasses rolled his eyes, "he's the dragon who crushed your enemies."
"I did it out of love and because they were ruining my beloved Lao's plan." The green eyed male responded. He is also a dragon with a human form like the others in the room.
"You couldn't control your temper as usual and went on a killing rampage all because you thought the rebellions were after the newest emperor. Isn't that the reason you did it?" Lao sighed.
"It was out of love for you my darling!"
"That's your excuse every time. Don't let me remind you, you're not the original green dragon, and you are certainly not going to be the last if you can't control your feelings for me!"
The green dragon gulped and started to cry. "Why is it hard to believe I love you? I loved you since I was born!" He sniffles.
"Aiyah! Quit saying that too!"
"Excuse me, master. Could we get to the point?" The lady interrupted.
"Right, the two candidates we have helped to make a comeback, is now ready to be reacquainted. The Emperor Wang Zhou Lin and Emperor Wang Xiang Li are finally ready to realize who they really are and to re-establish an imperial kingdom in MY name! It's going to be amazing!"
"Did you really wait two thousand years for this?!" The blue eyed dragon asked.
"Well...yes."
"Wow, your father the golden dragon must be so proud." The blue dragon replied sarcastically.
"He will be for sure," Lao smirked, "Because he'll be returning home shortly once it's been established."
"What are you talking about?!"
"You didn't know?" The purple dragon started, "the gold dragon and the silver dragon are reincarnated with the former emperors."
"Lao, you really are weird." The blue dragon replied.
"It was their decision. I just helped pulled the strings since then. Now our rightful places as royal guardians could resume." Lao answered.
"Except that the new candidates have no memory of their past lives as Emperors or that they are dragons, but you'll take care of that won't you?" He responded sarcastically again.
"Don't worry; I have it all under control. At least the present selves know each other."
"How is that?" The purple dragon asked.
~*~The Red Dragon~*~
A Japanese businessman is face to face to an online friend sitting in front of him for the first time in his office.
"You see, Mister-I mean, Chrysanthemum. You are the only one who has experience to eliminate this huge worldly threat. Dragons are mystical but are powerful. The three of us had the same prediction; they want revenge over the fall of the last imperial dynasty that was taken away from them. That's why we need to destroy the dragons." The Hungarian woman argued passionately about the prediction that all three online psychics predicted, leaving the Japanese man as one of them.
"Don't be so concerned. I told you I'll take care of it. I'm already meeting the so called Golden dragon sometime this week." He smiled.
"Really, do you know his name?"
"Hai, his name is Wang Yao."
~*~to be continued...~*~