A/N: Was debating about it for a while and have decided to switch this chapter up to a prologue and add something I was debating for a while to add...which is just that small sentence in the intro...I thought about dedicating a chapter to it to add as a prologue but began to get confused of where I wanted this story to move forward to...so I decided to do this instead (it was either that or just fix a few things here and there)

You may notice that some chapters are missing, that is intentional. I will fix a few things with them here and there but nothing too major. I will post most of the revised chapters by the end of the week or later on in the month as well as a new update.

For now, see you later!

12/22: Added more to the legend that opens the story; instead of seeing it in parts throughout the story, you'll get to see it in the intro of the story...yeah! Should have done this before, but I kinda short-circuited on that one.

Beware of spoilers...if you get what it all means, anyway.

The legend goes that once, long ago, there was a dragon that loved humanity.

It bestowed gifts of power and knowledge to humanity so they would never leave its side.

As the years passed, the dragon was abandoned by humanity and in turn, lost its heart.

Mad with fury, the dragon swore vengeance against the humans that had left it behind; the beast burned forests and killed all that stood on its way.

The humans tried their best to soothe the great dragon but they were powerless to stop the beast.

One day, the dragon engulfed the kingdom it once called home in despair; bridges burned, castles crumbled and humanity tumbled.

No one could stop this heartless creature until one day a stranger appeared.

The stranger stood before the dragon and the kingdoms beyond and raised his hands to the heavens, "No more, fiend! I will not let you destroy the world!"

And as he said those words, the ground below them swallowed the beast and the kingdom whole.

Legends say that the kingdom is still out there…lost to time…and that the dragon is still alive, crying out in fury against the humans that forgot him…

People say, "Beware the chasm where the invisible kingdom sleeps…fear the maddening roar of its depths as they take your life away."

Prologue

They had been falling for what seemed like hours now.

The horse—the poor thing—in a mad frenzy, had hit its head with one of the chasm's sharp rocks and broke its neck. It just fell now. It dangled about, lifeless as a doll on a loose string. It went on falling and falling as the princess and the old knight watched.

Poor thing, the princess thought as they continued to fall. The horse had been lucky. It was at peace now. No more crying. No more moving. No more living.

Perhaps they too would meet the same fate once they hit the waters below—or maybe they too would cease to be once their armor broke against the spears of stone closing in on them as they fell.

"Hold on..." the old knight whispered, holding the girl close as they fell. They could hear the chasm's walls scratching and cutting against their armor, and feel the metal cutting their skin as they kept on falling.

The princess heard the old knight's armor clink and clank as he fell; the armor was breaking apart as he went down as if the chasm itself was ripping the steel and metal apart to eat the inside. "Hold on..." he repeated, holding her even closer and trying to protect the girl from the jaws of the chasm to no avail. Even as they held each other, the princess could feel the walls scratching against her back as they went down.

How had it come to this...? The girl would wonder as they went on falling.

This was meant to be an easy mission. Her first mission outside her fortress's walls; she was going to make her family proud. She was—

The enemy had been spotted in the borders and they had chased them all this way...they were just...they were just going to help...just going to help but now...now they were both dead.

"Kamui...Kamui..." the old knight muttered causing the princess to look up as the tears fell. "Whatever you do...just...just swim...swim as fast as you can...stay afloat...do you understand me, my child...?"

"...Gunther...?"

"Just swim! Do you hear me! Just—"

The loud splash and cold caught the princess off guard and made her shiver. The pain was unbearable even as she held unto the old knight who kept screaming for her to swim. She tried swimming to the surface but the water was too fast and too vicious and she was running out of air.

Kamui felt herself get weaker and weaker as she smashed against something hard and then she let go of Gunther in the confusion. Her face was on the surface as she looked around before smashing against another rock. She swam and swam but she couldn't see Gunther anywhere. She wanted to reach out to him...and...

...and then everything went dark.

The small cabin was cold and while she didn't like the cold, it wasn't like Rinkah to complain.

She was much too used to the open fields and the warm sunlight but not to the cold inside this hut. It was the middle of winter but she still didn't like it. If she wanted to, she could go marching back to her village and be done with this cold but she didn't have much of a choice. The girl had yet to wake up and that shinobi had yet to return.

It wasn't the girl's fault, though. If anything, the princess was very lucky...lucky indeed. If Rinkah had not found her in time back then she would have been a goner.

Rinkah shook her head and muttered, "No point in thinking about that now...it doesn't matter..."

The princess was recovering and that was that.

But still, she was too far away from Nohr...no one is crazy enough to swim in that river by the chasm's entrance. The brat was basically trespassing on Hoshido land and she didn't even know it.

But when she had told the shinobi about her discovery he had seemed genuinely happy to see her again. At first, Rinkah was confused by this and then the shinobi began to speak. Rinkah certainly couldn't believe it.

She had heard many tales of the King's death and the child that was taken from him. Who would have thought that the missing princess had finally returned home...and she didn't even know it.

The missing princess...ha! What luck! Perhaps this was the reason their lives had been spared back then—of course, nothing to do with the girl's naiveté or anything like that—the shinobi certainly believed this was the reason. Rinkah had thought she was just stupid still it made sense...somewhat. Perhaps the girl had recognized the symbol that shinobi wore or perhaps it was something else?

Rinkah didn't know and hardly cared at that moment as she and that shinobi ran as fast as they could away from the Nohrian capital; they were starving and weak when they returned to the capital and many questioned what they had done to get back. The shinobi never said a thing and Rinkah just went along with it—she could hear the princess shaking in her sleep and muttering.

She's going to be in for quite the surprise once that shinobi returns...and she might not like it...or believe it, the older woman thought with a sigh.

To Rinkah, it was pretty obvious that the girl wouldn't believe them. She'll call them liars and get angry and maybe even slash them to pieces with that black sword and then run away. If they were wrong it was on them, not her.

Yet, even Rinkah couldn't deny the similarities with the Queen and that prince, Katsu...if the Queen had been younger and had white hair they would look exactly alike...and Katsu...well...if he was female and had longer hair—the princess was shaking again, and then she sat up.

The older woman watched in silence as she watched the princess shake her head and brush the sleep out of her eyes. She blinked once, twice and then looked about in confusion before spotting Rinkah. The princess blinked again as the older woman grinned.

"Welcome to the world of the living, Princess Kamui..."

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

It all began when the Hoshidans had warned her about them...the Nosferatu, the faceless ones.

They had been wandering the snowy countryside near a Hoshidan refugee camp for days and it had made a few soldiers nervous. Despite this, the creatures ignored the camp and instead wandered about as if looking for something.

Rinkah had been sent a message to look out for the Nosferatu and she had taken the warning to heart, going about in small scouting missions to see if she would spot any of them.

She could still remember the last time she had seen this creatures. They had attacked a village not too long ago and the Hoshidan soldiers had not been able to reach them on time. The attack had left a single survivor, a girl, who would probably not be the same ever again.

It was rare to spot Nosferatu these days, not like it had been years back when the Nohrians had used them to wreak havoc and chaos. Eventually the proud Nohrians couldn't control their abominations any longer and now they ran rampant in Nohr without a care, destroying and killing all that crossed their path. No one knew how they continued to thrive after the Nohrians lost control but it wasn't uncommon to see dark mages controlling the evil beings...the sad part was that not many of them had been Nohrian.

When the tribes found out the Hoshidans were trying to use the Nosferatu to win the war, their was an outrage. Rinkah could barely remember the time when the Tribe of Flames was an enemy of Hoshido. The anger of the tribes was so great that it almost threatened the peace between them and the Hoshido royal family and the King had decided against the use of the Nosferatu. But the damage had already been done. Once a Hoshidan had learned to control a Nosferatu the destruction began anew. Whenever the Nosferatu appeared in Hoshido lands, the tribes would shake their heads and point at the monsters. They would be a constant reminder for the Hoshidans own carelessness and that carelessness had caused them a lot of unneeded grief.

(And that girl's village and family and friends.)

But Rinkah had not found a Nosferatu that day, instead she found the Princess of Nohr, Kamui, struggling against the waters as she held unto a rock for dear life. Rinkah had quickly fished her out of the water.

The girl was shivering, deadly cold to the touch. Her armor had millions of scratches all over it despite being intact yet the girl had a few bruises and cuts in her face. Her sword and sheath had, surprisingly, also survived the trip in the depths—a rare thing. She couldn't say the same about the cape, though, which had tears all over.

Rinkah held her still as she helped her up and into her back. The girl had been crying out over and over again a name of a man but Rinkah knew it was hopeless. She had not seen another human being apart from the girl. Whoever she had been calling had drowned long ago...

She carried the girl all the way back to her cabin—the princess had fainted along the way—and sent a message to the Hoshidan camp nearby. That shinobi, Suzukaze, had come to see her almost immediately. He was out of breath and bowing and thanking her a million times over.

This behavior confused Rinkah. Why was he thanking her for saving an enemy soldier? What was wrong with him...?

Suzukaze then told her; the girl she had saved was none other than the missing princess of Hoshido...Kamui.

"…what…?"

"…I almost didn't believe it myself…but her…her name….her appearance…it all made sense…"

"…could it just be a coincidence…?"

"You have seen Prince Katsu for yourself…the similarities are all there. It couldn't be just a coincidence..."

"…still…"

"…it is Princess Kamui…it has to be her…"

"…I'm assuming you have already told the Queen then…"

"I'm afraid not…I came here first to check on her….but now, I will be heading towards the Hoshidan Castle…perhaps you…"

"…could take care of her? Sure, shinobi…but if she wakes up I won't be able to keep her here forever…"

"I understand…"

And before Rinkah knew it, the man was gone.

That had been two days ago and now the princess was awake and looking about in confusion.

The girl was confused and was trying to figure out where she was. She noticed Rinkah almost immediately and frowned. "You...?"

"Good to see you awake, princess," Rinkah told her with a nod. "My name is Rinkah of the Tribe of Flames...you are a long way from Nohr."

"...what?"

"You're in Hoshido, now...I'm actually surprised you came all this way to visit." Kamui blinked.

"...visit? I..." Kamui put a hand on the side of her face as if thinking. Suddenly she began to shake her head and began to whisper a few words Rinkah could not make out but even she could tell the princess was getting upset. "It...it wasn't...it wasn't...a dream...?" Kamui turned to face Rinkah, the color drained from her face. "...was...was there...I..." She turned away from her before the tribeswoman could respond.

"...you were alone when I found you, princess."

"...no..." Kamui whispered, clenching her fists. "...no...no...then...then Gunther...Gunther is..." Tears began to fall slowly as the girl went on whispering with Rinkah watching from a distance. It was sad, really. Whoever this Gunther person was meant a lot to the girl and now he was dead. "...ah...ah...no...no...I...can't cry...yet...I..." Kamui closed her eyes and opened them again but the tears still kept on falling. She glanced at Rinkah and sighed. "...you must...you must think me...silly for this...huh?"

"...no..." Rinkah shook her head. "If people didn't allow themselves to cry they'll be fools."

"...fools...eh?" The girl had managed a small smile even as the tears fell. "...I...I feel like a fool..."

"...hmm..."

"...what...what are you going to do to me...?"

"Hmm?"

"...I'm Nohrian...and well..." Rinkah almost smirked at the girl's words. "I don't think I would be very welcome here..."

"True...I'm turning you in to the Hoshidans...they'll know what to do." Kamui gave her a somber nod but said nothing. "A shinobi is coming by to take you to the castle...so...don't do anything rash." Kamui almost smiled...almost.

"I don't think I could...my arms and legs hurt..."

A couple of hours later and some soup, the shinobi that Rinkah had mentioned had finally showed up.

Kamui tried her best to hide her surprise upon seeing him again.

(Was this karma showing its ugly head, she wondered.)

To think she'll meet them again, prisoners of war forced into combat both released on the cover of night because of her and now it was her turn.

Kamui hadn't really seen it coming, though, even after her meeting with Rinkah. Still, she could see why they'll take her. Nohr and Hoshido were at war and having a princess as a hostage could prove useful to one side or the other.

But after what Ganz told her back at the bridge…she wondered if she'll be worth the trouble.

Yet, the behavior of the man was odd. He was kind and gentle and assuring, telling her they were not going to hurt her in anyway. This left Kamui feeling confused. Why treat the enemy like an old friend? Was he just paying her back for helping them escape, she wondered. Not that she was much help that had been her little brother's doing not hers, after all but still.

Rinkah had sent a shrug her way and told her to follow the shinobi.

Kamui was still rather wary of them, though. She was at their mercy now, not the other way around. If they wanted to, they could just kill her without batting an eye. Their kindness could be just a trick to get her to talk…but maybe, just maybe their kindness was actually sincere as was their intentions.

That man, Suzukaze, just wanted her to meet someone back in Hoshido castle but…

…they could still be lying…they're the enemy! She thought. It's probably a trap…they could kill me without a moment's pause…they could…

Kamui shook her head. There was no point in thinking about that now. If they were going to kill her then, she had no choice but to follow. She owed them that much even if it led to her death.

(…because her Father wanted her dead…so the Hoshidans were probably doing him a favor...not that they'll care or notice.)

After hours of traveling, they made it.

She could see the castle and the town in the distance…she could see the beautiful trees made out of pink leaves…the grass…the colorful buildings…the…everything. It looked so different from the Northern Fortress. There was more light here...more life...more of everything...and it...it felt familiar, somehow.

Kamui was confused as she went on staring.

Familiar, huh?

That was impossible.

She had never been in Hoshido before.