Fantasia

Arc3: The Heir of Ardneria

Chapter1: Preceding the arrival of Klaive

A month had passed since tower of Grimoires' destruction and Vergil being captured, at the far north of the main Féenian continent lies the Hatenaian Empire, the largest and the strongest region that existed at that time.

By the judges of the high Hatenaian court, the famous mage and criminal Vergil was prosecuted, his sentence was supposed to be execution for the horrifying mass murderers and unreasoned crusades over many village which swore loyalty to Hatena, but with the interference of a brave member of the council, the mages life had been spared and his sentence was reduced to a permanent imprisonment.

One would ask who was this brave member of the council, and the answer would be no one but her highness Cassandra Heinz the older Clavian princess, the sister of Cecilia and the daughter of King Heinz.

After the trial she left the court, a twenty six years old woman, with a tall curvaceous body, a beautiful clear face, wide eyes that glows like her sister with the charming glance of honey color, her brown hair was flowing beyond her shoulder braided together with rings of gold.

Wearing a white silk vest that descent from her shoulders to her thighs decorated with beautiful thorny roses with the Clavian symbol weaved on the back, completed by a dark colored knee length tunic, she walked across the hall where only the sound to be heard was the clacking of her heels on the polished marble floor.

At somewhere else, a familiar figure was roaming in the great library of Hatena where every book that ever passed since the rise of the empire was here, he was a tall slender blonde man with a fancy suit; he was Artemiciano Zoldeo the son of Zoldeo the Arcadian ruler and the fiancée of Princess Cecilia.

But opposing to his habits, this time the calm prince was tense, he still suffers from the shock that Juan caused when he transformed into a fire demon in that unfortunate night a month ago at the Clavian palace.

Memories had been troubling him lately that he started talking to himself while looking at some book he didn't find, he checked almost every section of the library yet disturbing thoughts prevented the man from focusing:

"That young man, the orange haired man, he transformed into Fenix! He can open one of the seven heavenly gates! But there's no way! They died at that day seventeen years ago, their image is still in my head, how could he survive? Nevertheless, I didn't sense the existence of the gate until he opened it, meaning that he wasn't aware of it, thus someone opened it for him, and the only person that father gave this authority was no one but Eduna!…but how come I didn't feel her presence? She is alive and Juan is alive too, this means that they survived the catastrophe! Which means that I can…" were his talks when the tip of his suit was pulled gently breaking the chain of his thoughts.

He looked down to see a familiar and a dear person to him; she was an adolescent plump girl, with a short red bobbed hair, wearing a simple pink shirt, puffy pants and short vest, with an elegant blue tie over her neck, she had a dark puffy face with red bulged cheeks making her eyes closed, but what was really remarkable about her was her pink bunny ears tiara that gave her a cute appearance.

The timid girl handed a clout to the prince, which made him ask her but soon he realized that after tasting a weird metal taste in his mouth that his nose was bleeding, so he took the rag and cleaned his face.

"Thank you Gallia" he told the shy girl.

"You are mostly welcome your highness" the girl responded bowing in respect.

"Gallia you don't have to be formal with me, remember that you are not my servant but my sworn sister." He responded playing with her locks.

The girl blushed giggling, but the prince didn't pay too much attention for her, because he heard a strange voice in his head…or was it someone calling for him? He looked left and right, then he tried to reach the source of the whispering, running away from his foster sister who followed him in worry.

The man ran from a shelf to another, the voice was getting closer, someone was calling him but suddenly a hand grabbed his, he turned to find out that it was Cassandra's:

"Good morning young Sir Zoldeo" Cassandra saluted.

"Um, Good morning your highness" the prince answered politely then he noticed that the princess had some company; he was her fiancée Zeve, the Hatenaian prince.

He was slightly shorter and younger than his princess, he had a slender muscular body, and a notable dark skin, a handsome face with dark narrow eyes and a pointy nose, his had a spiky hair that somehow resembled to a rooster's crest with the color of coal, he wore a dark colored tight leather mail and pants with high brown boots in addition to a knee length blue cape held to his collar by two silver coils that carried the Hatenaian crest.

"Morning to you too, your holiness" Artemiciano said bowing with a sneering accent.

"Young Zoldeo, I presume we didn't get to that phase when one of us can tolerate the other's humor, am I not right?" the other prince responded rudely, but giving no chance for an answer he walked away with his fiancée ignoring the Arcadian prince.

"Some arrogant fool, thinking he's a God!" Artemiciano murmured aggressively but Gallia calmed him dawn by holding his hand saying: "Your highness please, Weiss prepared a vessel for us to return home." making the prince leave the library with her.

…

Meanwhile on the other side of the continent, at Ardneria, it was a peaceful day, Juan unusually was on the north-eastern frontier of his village spending his day off at an infamous hot bath owned by his older brother Demetri.

-After some familial troubles between the older brother and their parents when Juan was at the age of seven, Demetri isolated himself from the other Ardnerians, people say that he worked as a mercenary for a short period of time before he finally settled himself and bought an old abandoned hot bath, and with much effort he managed to turn it into a source for his living-

It was a break day in that place too, so the shepherd volunteered to help his brother clean the place for the opening next day.

Juan was in the halls that lead to the men bathes, he was wearing nothing but his underwear carrying a mop sweeping back and forth across the wooden floor, until he felt a bit strained so he sat soaking his skinny legs in the hot waters.

"Hey Juan! Quit slackin' around and c'mere" a deep voice echoed calling for the young man making him rush to his brother.

His brother was an Ardnerian beastman in his late twenties, he had a tall and slender body rarely to his tribe, he had a rectangular skinny face with a short messy grey hair, lightly trimmed beard and mustache, sleepy green eyes inherited from his mother topped by dark spots like those owned by a cheetah, and a thin scar coming from the right side of his forehead to the eyebrow.

He wore a sleeveless green leather jacket and a tight ragged black shirt, with grey pants slightly shredded on the knees and bare feet, his remarkable traits were two: there must be a cigarette in his mouth reflecting his addiction on smoking, and another distinctive traits that his hands were always shoved in his pockets that Juan never recalls seeing them out since he was a kid, and now instead of using them Demetri is known of manipulating the smoke he exhales to use it as limbs.

"Um what is it Demetri?" Juan asked.

"Well, I dunno what kind of contraption is this? But I found it stuck in the chimney so it's all yours" his brother answered while using his smoke to toss a weird puppet to his brother's hold.

The puppet resembled to a plump midget with a cute face -That was simply two black beady eyes and a smiling mouth- having short angel wings.

Juan shook it, when suddenly the doll slid out of his grip and started floating in front of him talking with a familiar voice:

"Juan is that you?"

"Um…Yes but wait a minute! This voice! Are you Princess Cecilia?"

"Tee hee yes and no…"

"What do you mean? Is this…"

"Yep it's another empyrean spell I've learned from the book that Vergil gave me, it's called Ponzo doll"

"Wow, you are learning magic fast! Is this doll for communication?"

"Yeah, but I won't be able to know what it had seen or heard until it pops out and the spell's time wears out quickly, so tell me about Ardneria and how Nimmy, Tsuki and that ragon Zolu are doing?"

"Well first of all I'd like you to meet my brother Demetri (Juan turned the doll to his brother who yawned shortly before leaving the hall), he's not that talking type, anyway Nimmy is doing great she's working now at some restaurant and people here are somehow impressed by her rainbow magic she lives in a rent room with Tsuki who spends most of her days gazing at the sea, while at night she stages some poetry for the elderly people who seemed to like her poems especially the sage, for Zolu he helps fishermen spotting good fishing areas, and for Dean, I send him carrier pigeons from time to time he seems to be okay, he told me that he's taking a long vacation because of the nice fee he got for helping us back at the tower, aside from that my life is dull nothing new so I think this is goodbyes, please pass my hi to Marceline for me" Juan said before the doll disappeared in a puff of shimmering sparkles.

"Finished talking to yer girl, Juan? Cuz I need someone to help me remove dust over these shelves!" Demetri called for his brother.

"Hey she's not my girl! She's engaged!" Juan yelled before joining Demetri.

"So brother, haven't you find a girl yet?" the shepherd asked while mounting the wooden shelves to dust them off.

"Nope don't think so, besides since when yer talking about these stuff? Did ya hit yer head? You should reduce the time you spent with Ronél he's messin' yer head with his stupid contraptions!" the older brother answered while looking at his brother noticing that his timid personality is slightly fading.

"Yeah I guess you are right, anyway brother, I want to show you something I've learned in my quest." The shepherd noted driving his brother attention.

Juan lifted his left arm and started tilting it gently until it turned magically into a well knuckled crab's pincer, the moment Demetri saw this he dropped his cigarette showing amazement.

"Holy Gods! Since when you…"

"I don't know what kind of magic is this but I've learned it while I was fighting at the tower of Grimoires, it doesn't last long, I couldn't find any information about it in any book, it's very peculiar, and I've never heard that a beastman did something like this before."

"So how do you do it? I mean how can ya do it? Do ya use incantations?"

"No, I actually just tilt them a little and focus my mind deeply imagining any creature's limb, and suddenly my arm mimes it in shape."

At this moment Demetri stopped asking, and started talking to himself: "No way! He'll soon know everything about himself, knowing that he's able to do this will lead him to ask more, mother and father told me to keep all this a secret but what should I do? He's old enough to know who's he, but I can't just keep lying on him like this, I think…he should know."

"Um Juan…Can I ask ya somethin'?" Demetri asked approaching his brother.

"Sure what is it?"

But suddenly Demetri remembered all the good times he spent with his family and how they've treated Juan like a beastman despite his appearance, imagining how depressed his little brother would be if he learned this "truth", so he gave up on his decision in the last moment and tried to change the subject.

"I think you can go home now I'll take care of everything from here, and don't forget to purchase some tobacco for me while yer down town cuz I'm kinda short on cigarettes lately." The older brother suggested.

"Are you sure that you'll be fine? Because I'm not tired or anything, I mean I don't have anything to do for the evening."

"No no, it's alright…"

And so the younger brother put his simple shirt and pants on, wore his shoes and headed out of the hot bath, but he saw something in the sky that made him smile, he saw beautiful flowers made of flames decorating the blue vast space above their village, so he turned back and shouted at his brother: "Hey brother guess this! Klaive has returned".

But his smile turned into confusion, when he saw the expression on Demetri's face, because the beastman's face frowned as his canines stressed on his cigarette that ignited with the fire of an unhidden wrath.

To be continued