Entering the Tower of Babil's crystals room Kain put down, into the glass case, the two missing crystals. With the addition of the last two, all of the crystals seemed to glow brighter and seemed to throb and pulsate light, as if they were one. Kain then looked around at the great room, and remembered just how much it mirrored the crystals room in the lunarian palace. "751 years," Kain said to himself. "Where has the time gone?" Then he started to remember the faces and smells and sounds from all of those years ago, but he quickly pushed them aside. For viewing them had always been bitter sweet, but know the sweetness was fading, and all that was left behind was the pain of remembering things that he could not change. He didn't care whether he had been forgiven of his sins or not, they were still there. Then a small part within him said, But the First Dragoon said...
No. Another part of himself said, I'm not going to play this game anymore, I'm just going to forget it all and live this day out. And as soon as this day is done, I will forget it too.
"Ready to leave Kain?" Dawne asked; she was standing about 20 feet behind him, so she hopefully had not heard him talking to himself.
"I'm always ready."
"Kain, can I ask you something before we go?"
"Sure, what's the question?"
"I wanted to know... what do you think we're going to do next. I mean, now that the Guardian has been defeated, I can go home, right?"
"You could have gone home at any point you wanted, Dawne."
"That's not what I meant Kain. I was talking about the fact that our job is done now."
"No, it isn't Dawne." She gave him a confused look at that. "Why you ask, simple, just because the world has lost its leader, doesn't mean all of the people of the world will suddenly wake up right then and there. No, it's going to take everyone here a long time to realize what was even going on in this world. You have to understand, most people probably don't even realize that they were being controlled and repressed. This isn't a one-step process, this is going to take a long time."
Dawne looked down at the floor and asked shyly almost to herself. "What are we going to do about that then?"
"I'm not quite sure yet. The first step is probably on its way towards being accomplished by now though."
"What do you mean?" Dawne said sounding even more confused then she was a minute ago.
"I mean those two that were down in the under dark, I don't remember their names but they've probably already gotten the entire place into a state of rebellion. I don't know how we are going to do it up here though; I mean those dwarves knew that they were being repressed and practilly put in slavery. The people up here have no idea what's going on and because of that, the world isn't going to follow the Dawn like it did Cecil when he formed the Alliance. Back then, Cecil traveled to every nation on the Earth. Every person realized just what kind of man he was, a hero, a warrior and defender of the light. Phantine isn't known... people followed the Guardian with blind faith because they were taught to. And although blind faith would be nice to have in Phantine's corner, we don't have it and besides, to create such blind faith in people isn't the most morale thing to do."
"Yeah you're right, and what about all of those people that were undyingly loyal to him, they won't even believe us. And I know that all those Dark Knights aren't going to bend knee. What are we going to do if they decide to hunt us down, I remember seeing those two almost kill you Kain."
"Good you're learning." Kain's face almost turned to reveal a smile, but trying to smile with a face of granite would have been easier. "I may make true warrior out of you yet."
"I don't want to be a warrior Kain. I want to save the world as soon as possible so that I can help my people; I think coming back is really going to help create more callers like me. I want peace, I don't like war Kain, it wasn't as... fun as I thought it would be." Kain chuckled at that remark; anyone that thought war was fun was either a recruiter or an idiot, or maybe both. "And you still haven't answered my question about the Dark Nights!"
"Dawne… don't worry about them; just remember a Dark Night can always be turned into a Paladin. You just need to find the right motivation to turn them." And with that Kain and Dawne began to phase in and out faster and faster until they dissapeared.
* * *
Naxos looked over the cliff, it had been a hard hike to get up there, but he decided that if the mountains were good enough for Kain to be alone in, they were good enough for him.
The view was beautiful, he could see the entire city of Mist, and now he was glad that the hike had taken him so long, because he had always thought that cities were twice as beautiful at night; he had only seen a couple so far, but the ones that he had seen had never impressed him during the day, only at night could you see what they really were. And the near infinite number of lights glowing as one seemed to mesmerize him. All he did for nearly a half hour was look at the city below him.
"I can almost feel his remains still." Naxos said to himself. "It's like having a scar inside of you, that just won't heal up. No, it's not just a scar, it's like a disease, and it's like having corruption in a solid form, inside of you. Just thinking about it makes me sick. At least that demon never made me turn against my friends like it made Kain. No never mind, I don't even have any friends, all of those people... they hate me; and for good reasons too. Who could like someone like me, I'm a sad pathetic man, and the only thing that I can do that makes me special is calling the power of the summoned ones. If I fell off of this cliff no one would care, no one would probably ever notice. I... I'm just so tired too; it wouldn't be too bad to fall asleep would it. The only problem is that I don't know whether this is ever going to get any better. What if it does? What if I meet a beautiful girl, and we get married and have children. Or if I'm the one that is actually going to save this world, what if I'm a child of the light also. You never know whether you are, or are not. I just need... I don't know what I need!" Naxos shouted out at the top of his lungs. Then he stopped and listened to his voice echo off all of the nearby mountains. His voice sounded so gruff and coerce; it was no wonder why no one liked to hear him talk.
"What are you doing up here boy?" Naxos turned around and an old man was standing behind him, he had a gray beard that dropped to his stomach and the only clothes that he wore, were worn, faded, and dirty. He looked quite at home in these mountains.
"Thinking, and I'm not a boy. I'm 21 years old, that may be young compared to you, but then again, I'd wager that you could call nine tenths of the world boy, or girl." Naxos's thought that his own comment was fairly amusing, but the old man only gave him a cold stare. "Now please I like being alone so if you don't mind..."
"I don't think being alone is the best thing for you right now. You need to go home and be with your family and friends. Cheer up a bit, you only live once. And that advice you can take from this old man here. I wished I'd lived more when I was young like you."
"I hate my family, and my friends hate me. Being alone is my only sanctuary from the world; and I would hope that you would be nice enough to leave it to me."
Naxos said with more then a hint of bitterness.
"I can see why they would hate you."
"What do you mean?"
"Listen to yourself one of these days, you're always insulting people, I'd wager you never have one nice word to say, all you can do is pity yourself. And I doubt you've ever tried to do anything nice for other people, you're greedy and selfish. And I figured that all out just by talking to you for a minute, now what does that say."
"That you have no idea what you're doing."
"Thank you, thank you for proving my point."
"So what, I'm cynical, just because of that, people have the right to hate me? I grew up and I was taught my cynicism by every bully, every jackass, by every PERSON I came across. I'm not the reason that I'm like this; it's not my fault. The rest of the world molded me into this shape, I barely even had a say in the matter."
"Now you're just making up excuses. Do me a favor will ya." Naxos looked at the man wondering what this favor was. Probably wanted him to bring him food or something like that. "Tomorrow when the sun rises, I want you to be happy. For the entire day, just be happy. It may sound strange, but just do it, you'll be glad you did."
"Whatever." And Naxos started to walk away, he could care less what that old man wanted him to do, he lived his life his way. And nothing was going to stop him.
* * *
Phantine and Dekan were sitting in their hotel room quietly. Phantine was reading a book on the ancient order of light; something founded by Cecil himself. It was designed to fight any and all elements of the dark. It helped make over five hundred people, in it's 200-year history, into paladins of the light. Dekan was on the other side of the room, sitting in a corner, meditating. It was much harder then it looked, thinking of nothing for the entire time while the women you loved and wanted to wrap around in your arms was less then ten feet away. Very hard to do.
"How's the book?" Dekan asked, though that really wasn't what was on his mind.
"Good, did you know that the 'servants' as they called themselves, were sworn to no one or no kingdom, they were trusted to know and to do what was right. Absolute freedom was theirs because the served the light and were willing to serve its every need."
"Oh." Dekan said while he was trying to concentrate on the calm that Kain had always told me would come with a good meditative state. And a good meditative state couldn't be broken by fire or ice, light or darkness, lust or sorrow.
"Dekan." Phantine said, sounding as if she wanted something.
"What is it?" Dekan said, trying to sound calm and patient, because if you could sound that way, then others would think that you were.
She folded up the book with a clap that emitted a small amount of dust. "Let's take a walk Dekan, Mist is such a beautiful city, and we've barely seen a tenth of it."
"Okay." Dekan said with a smile.
* * *
The two of them had started their walk in the morning and after wandering the streets for what seemed like a blessed eternity. When it came to the noon hour the two stopped at the central park within the city; there they sat at one of the benches looking at a large pond.
"Did you ever think that you would be who you are Phantine?" Dekan asked blatantly changing the subject from which they had been talking about before (clothes).
"I always thought I was special, but I never thought that I was the person destined to change the face of the Earth, and to be a reincarnation of the light if that's what you mean." Dekan nodded his head. "I always did have an inkling though after I met you that I would change the world, your radical ideas made me think I could change things... and look where we are now, we banished the Guardian, who was actually Zeromus. And to boot, Kain says that I'm going to lead this world into this 'brand new day' he keeps referring to. I have to admit though, it does sound like something I'd like to do. I mean, who wouldn't want to mold the world into their own image?"
"Well I don't know about molding the Earth into your image, but..."
"I was joking Dekan, jease you're as serious as Kain sometimes; I really think he's becoming a bad influence on the spectacular job I've done at making you into the person you are today." Dekan looked at her and gave her a devilish grin.
"My darling, just how 'whipped' do you consider me that I cannot even try to become what I've always dreamed."
"You ARE what you've always dreamed! You're a Dragoon now, but just because Kain is teaching you the ways to fight as one, doesn't mean you have to act like one too."
"Sorry. But I think I'm going to spend a lot more time with Kain soon so I'd wager I turn into a good shade of stone just like him."
"You had better not or... or... I don't know what I'll do, but I'll guarantee that you won't like it." Phantine then paused for a second and thought about what Dekan had just said. "Now what do you mean you're going to be spending a lot more time with him?"
"Well you are going to be having your things to do, and Kain and I are going to have the stuff that we need to do as well."
"You don't mean that you're going to train on some freezing mountain for the next 5 years like he did?"
"No, no, no. It's like he said, the best way to gain combat experience, is through combat."
Phantine looked at him and smiled, she knew what she had to do next. She knew that Dekan wouldn't be able to accompany her, but she decided that that wasn't so bad because she knew that he would always come back. Rosa always came back to Cecil, and so Dekan would come back to her as well.
The End of the First Book of the Light of Dawn
"Those who review, shall be karmicly rewarded."
-Kain DeLuman