Disclaimer… I do not own Maple… Aeons do not own maple!
In the outskirt of Henesys, a young girl was shooting at a green mushroom with her Red Viper - the newly acquired bow and one of her favorites.
"This is boring!" Evelyn signed deeply. "When is master coming home? And what's the purpose of killing 999 green mushrooms?!" Unable to hold back the boredom, she then laid on the grass facedown and poked at tiny green snails with her bow for fun.
It has been two days since master Spike went to Ellinia, she thought to herself. Could it have something to do with her sisters? She knew for a fact that Silmerra trained with the other powerful mages over there. But what about Elismerra…she wondered…
Thinking about her two older sisters had brought a bitter-sweet smile to Evelyn's face. They were so close when they were young…until one day Pauline, the oldest left home and went to Ellinia to train under the great mage, Grendel.
The memory of that faraway day five years ago still showed vividly in Evelyn's mind.
It actually started with Evelyn finding the scrolls in a dried up well to the back of their little shack. With both of her sisters busy finding food in the market; Evelyn was often left alone to play by herself. The well itself wasn't deep, only around four feet or so; barely can hold any water in emergency. But she loved the place as her secret hiding spot, and had been digging here and there in that little round place in an attempt to find 'treasures'. And that's when she discovered the scrolls one sunny day. Without knowing much of the scripts, she had brought the scrolls home for her older sisters to exam, thinking she might have found some treasure maps. But alas, upon reading them, her oldest sister's face darkened like a cloud in a storm.
"These were written by our mother, Kastallia…" Pauline said quietly. The hands holding the scrolls trembled slightly.
The other two sisters spoke excitedly at the same time. "What did the scrolls say?" "Is that a will?" "Are there some instructions for us to find treasures?"
Slowly, Pauline rolled up the scrolls. "No…" She turned around and looked at her two younger sisters with a seriousness that they had never seen before. "Listen carefully and listen well, my dear sisters. These scrolls tell prophecies…things that had happened long ago, and would happen again in the future."
With a heaviness Pauline continued, "A great evil will befall our world, it has been sealed away for a long time by our ancestors, but it will be set lose once again. Only with great caution, courage, strength, love and…sacrifices, would it be eliminated once and for all."
Unsure what they were hearing, Karen and Evelyn held on to each other's hands tightly. Silently, they watched with wide-eyes at their oldest sister.
"We are to take on trainings and prepare for the great battle one day. And these are the names our mother given us once we become apprentices of other great masters in four different classes: Silmerra is for me, Elismerra is for you Karen…" Pauline placed a hand softly against Karen's face, and then turned toward Evelyn with a single tear rolling down her face. "And Selimerra, that's for you, my dear youngest sister."
That night Pauline said goodbye to her younger sisters and left home for the training. The scrolls had been put back into that accursed well, and never be mentioned again.
From that day on, the atmosphere at home changed. Karen talked less and less, and kept to herself most of the time. She would sometimes disappeared for the whole day only to come back home in the middle of the night with wounds on her arms. And that spooked Evelyn so much that she had decided to run away from home one day.
With little resources and no money, Evelyn had wandered aimlessly from one town to another in confusion. She was frightened one evening when she accidentally dropped into a pit full of pigs, though luckily for her, an archer came out of nowhere and rescued her hide. At a young age of ten, she was awed by the archer's skills, and had promised herself to become one as great. The archer, later on became Evelyn's master, had graciously taken this little child under his care, and slowly teaching her the art of becoming a bowmaster.
However, not one day past had Evelyn not thinking of her two sisters. Five years had gone by since the day she ran away from home, and much had changed. Pauline became a priestess, and being a dutiful oldest sister, she had tracked down Evelyn in Henesys, and sent allowances regularly to the youngest sister.
"Even though she never had time to come and visit me…" Evelyn muttered to herself while angrily poked at another snail.
As for Karen…Evelyn shrugged her shoulders. Karen has always been so mysterious with a dark aura. No one really knows what went on in her mind, and probably no one dared to ask. Though from what she heard during the conversations with others in the market, she had found out that Elismerra is a ruthless Bandit with an ability to disappear in a wink.
While Evelyn was deep in thought reminiscing the past, suddenly, from the direction of Ellinia came a big booming sound that shook the ground where Evelyn laid. She jumped up in bewilderment, and with a pounding heart, started to run toward its source.
New poster... Pauline.. Silmerra