Fifteen years before Tero's conversation with his father in that room, Tyde Tazakani and that same father marched with an army of twenty-nine thousand troops up a harsh, rigid, snowy mountain.

Tyde, now age nineteen, had entered his father's army three years prior. His dreams and aspirations were nothing short of a King's. After serving in his, at the time, 39 year old father's army, he wanted to go on to create an army of his own and eventually take the throne.

Tyde realized that he couldn't just embark alone on such a journey without any war or leadership experience, so he made the decision to enter his father's own army in an attempt to experience real battles and command sub-divisions to gain all of these skills.

It may seem odd to many that the first grandchild of the King would take the military route that most commoners took, but Tyde did not care what they thought. He knew that the best way to become strong was to fight, so he did just that on his journey.

One thing he did not prepare for though, was how harsh it would be.

The wet freezing wind attacked Jonakai's army in waves as they climbed the snowy mountain. They had been in the Baldor region, which is the harshest region, of the Freezelands for three weeks, and in these three weeks, Jonakai's army went from a whopping forty-one thousand members, to only twenty-nine thousand. Twelve thousand troops had died as a result of this venture, and the reason was to kill the Gold Centipede.

The Gold Centipede was designated to one animal, which is the second biggest Centipede in the world. This creature was categorized within its own species, and this category is known as "Gem Beasts". The Gem Beasts consist of the four largest animals that are identified and currently living as that specific species. It starts from Bronze, then goes to Silver, Gold, and finally, Diamond, as the biggest in that species.

There are many beasts in the world that have limitless lifespans, and centipedes are one of them. A centipede eats, drinks, sleeps, and grows, and it can keep growing if there is no threat to end its life.

Seeing as how this centipede resides in one of the most inhabitable place in the world, it's clear to see how such a large beast, coming in at seven hundred feet tall and four hundred feet wide, could survive and grow for so long.

In the past five years there had been numerous collapses of very strong armies and specifically, army leaders. These armies collapsed and died not due to humans, but to these wild Gem Beasts. There had been dozens of armies completely wiped out because of a random attack by Silver and even Bronze beasts, and nobody wanted to know what Gold and Diamond could do.

A week and a half before the expedition into the Freezelands, a man named Roman Jabari and his famous warrior group "The Insyles" embarked into the Hellands, a region which is extremely hot, volcanic, apocalyptic, and home to the most evil people in the world. Roman Jabari was an extremely close friend to King Jonah, and his group was known for not being affiliated with the warrior or warlord system, but rather taking up random cases they felt were necessary and attacking evil within them.

While they were in the Hellands, they were ambushed and killed by the Gold Dragon. Medical professionals searched around the scene in which it took place, and found out that their bodies were completely unrecoverable. Based on their judgements, the Gold Dragon appeared, blew his fiery breath, and melted them in just a few seconds. The group that had been notoriously strong and defeated hundreds of evildoers had been wiped out just like that.

The government, and especially King Jonah, was very upset about this, and figured that it was time to get rid of these beasts once and for all. So, he developed a plan that shocked the world.

Jonah's plan derived from what the normal person would have thought of. Instead of assigning a group of extremely strong individuals to exterminate these beasts, he made it a contest.

He set each Gem Beast with a specific bounty price and a plethora of other rewards. Anyone could compete, the only exception is that they must be law abiding citizens or warriors, and not evil.

There were many flaws with this plan. For one, there were tons of strong Evil people that had set up camp around the places where these beasts resided. Who's to say they couldn't just exterminate them? Jonah was not including a massive majority of the world in this plan to kill these beasts.

And the other fatal flaw that he did not consider was that the people, that he had first started this plan to protect, would also enter in and endanger themselves already more than they were.

And Jonakai, his own son, did just that.

Jonakai's army had just fought a great war and had about forty-five thousand members. After seeing the plan and assessing the bounty prices and danger levels of all the beasts, Jonakai called his army in for a speech and announced that they would be going into the Freezelands to kill the Gold Centipede.

Although a lot of his army saw this as a brand new adventure where they could gain glory, money, and all of the things that come with war, this time upon a creature. On the other hand, many of them saw this as an extremely dangerous thing to do and opted out.

Out of all Forty-five thousand members, four thousand left Jonakai's army over the waiting period for the trip. They realized how harsh the conditions were in the region and how dangerous the creature was.

Jonakai did not care about this though. He believed in himself and his army and wanted to kill this creature. His eyes were on the prize rather than the practicality of the situation, and he wanted the money, fame, and glory, no matter what.

His father realized the lapse in his judgement when it came to constructing the plan when his own son set off to kill one of the most dangerous creatures in the world, however, he knew that calling off this plan that people had already devoted the rest of their lives to would take a huge toll on his reputation. At the end of the day, he prayed for a good outcome, and hoped things wouldn't get out of hand.

Tyde, his father, and hundreds of leading officers and militants sat on the back of Boutants, which are half emu-half ostrich mounts that are incredibly fast and sturdy. Some of them could even hold a side carriage, in which another person could sit. They kept climbing the mountain, and could see the top in the very far distance.

"Keep going!" Jonakai shouted back at his army. "We're nearly there! Pass the message down to the back!"

His message echoed in a downward slope to the back of the crowd, and it reached the back after ten or so minutes.

Although the front looked sturdy, as the line progressed, you could see the toll of the weather upon the army. Many people and mounts were collapsing and dying every minute.

However, Jonakai kept on going. He had come this far already, and there was no way he was going to stop.

Thirty minutes after the message was broadcasted by Jonah, they finally reached the top of the mountain and crowded around a massive plateau. On this plateau, there was a cave that entered directly into the mountain in which Jonakai and his army slowly entered.

All of them rested, bathed, ate, drank, slept, and even cried once they got settled within it.

Jonakai, Tyde, and many other high ranking officers settled in a specific corner and had a feast. They had been climbing this mountain for 29 hours, and fortunately they were the ones that had it easiest with the best mounts.

While they ate and drank, conversations, cries, and motivational chants echoed through the cave. The journey had been an intense one, and Jonakai realized the full effect of this climb once he looked towards the entrance of the cave and saw no one new entering.

Jonakai's puzzled face grew less confused and more shocked as he realized exactly what was going on.

"Hey..." He shouted at his top organizing officers, a group of people that section off the many sub-divisions within the army and count how many people are in each. They had just come back from counting how many people had arrived inside of the cave.

Jonakai continued speaking after his shout, "How many people are there now? I know we lost some but it can't be tha-"

"22,000." one of the organizing officers said, interrupting Jonakai completely.

The people around Jonakai, and many people that weren't even close to hear Jonakai, but were close enough to hear the number, knew exactly what it was without context.

Seven thousand people had died as a result of the twenty nine hour climb up the mountain.

The room grew silent as Jonakai's mouth stayed open in shock and his eyes signified a blank expression.

He looked around at his army men, and even his son, waiting for someone to speak, but remained silent.

Jonakai looked down.

"I see." he said firmly. "It appears that I did not realize how dangerous this expedition was. I did not expect for so many people to lose their lives." Jonakai's lifted his head back up as he saw a slightly low ranking soldier dashing towards him.

The soldier trampled over people, much higher in rank than him, as he full sprinted towards Jonakai with a lone knife in his hand.

He was planning to damage him, and once other people saw this, they tried to tackle the soldier.

"DO NOT LAY ON A HAND ON HIM!" Jonakai demanded. The other soldiers slowly but surely backed off and even made room for the boy to run towards him.

As the soldier got closer and closer to Jonakai, he started to yell out "AGHHHHH!" He closed his eyes and had an uneasy look as he positioned the sword facing right where Jonakai's heart would be. He was now about twenty feet away.

Jonakai stood up and pointed his pinky out from his fist. There were two tiny consecutive flashes of lightning that popped out from his pinky once the boy was about eight feet away.

One of these flashes shot the knife out of his hand, and the other hit the boy's shoes and made him trip.

As the boy was falling face first, Jonakai lunged forward and embraced the boy with both arms, and hugged him very tightly.

All of the other militants were confused as they witnessed the scene around them.

The boy was crying and yelling in distress. Some words escaped his mouth every once in a while, like "why?" and "why did my best friend die...I had to leave him..not a proper burial..."

Jonakai felt extremely sympathetic towards these words and started to calm the boy down.

"I'm sorry. I know how it must feel." Jonakai patted his back.

"I understand you're mad. You have a right to be mad. You're mad at me. I can't say that none of this is my fault. In reality, it all is. One can blame the journey and all these externals factors, but I was the one who started us upon the journey."

Jonakai nudged the man forward and looked at him in his eyes.

"I can't say that there's no blood on my hands, because, truly, there is a ton." Jonakai looked down at the ground, appearing to be in shame. "In fact, they're drenched."

Jonakai let go of the man and looked him in the eyes one last time. His eyes were filled with guilt, shame, and sympathy all the same. Jonakai turned to the other side of the cave that he had not seen in ages because of the event that just played out. He started to speak.

"The journey is difficult. It's long, hard, and deadly, and it seems as if there is no end in sight." Jonakai turned around in all parts of the cave, staring at people to make sure they were listening as his voice boomed and echoed.

"But don't you see? His right arm pointed outside of the cave, off the of the edge, seemingly into the bleak white distance. The end is right there!"

Everyone was still confused as he had not explained what he had just said yet.

"When we start our journey tomorrow, we will venture down the mountain, which won't take very long at all. After that, we'll be in the crisis plateau; where the Gold Centipede is confirmed to lay dormant!"

Murmurs started echoing through the cave as excitement boomed and minds raced.

"We're so close! You want to give up here? Then give up! But then what did we come here for?"

"Once we stand up tomorrow and get on our feet, we'll make one last stride towards the abominable centipede, and the next time our asses will sit upon this snow will be after we will have slain the bastard!"

Roars started echoing as hope churned. This speech was nowhere near as extraordinary as one would have hoped, but the militants, after nearly dying, and seeing their friends die, would cling onto any hope their leader would give them.

"None of their deaths were ever in vain! With their help, we're just one journey away from being the most famous army in the world, right next to the King's!" Jonakai shouted vigorously.

The crowd's roar grew even louder as they imagined a future in which they had wished this journey resulted in.

"We'll be living in luxury, and whenever we step out of that luxury and reach uncharted territory again, we'll all be dozens of feet above it, flying on the highest quality mounts that money can buy!"

The roar echoed once more, and Jonakai finally smiled as he realized that his speech had reignited the hope that had been lost ever since the number "22,000" was muttered within the walls.

Jonakai gave one final shout to singal the end of his speech.

"WE EMBARK AT 7 AM SHARP! GET SOME GOOD REST!"

Jonakai sat back down and continued eating.

He looked over at his son, Tyde, who was smiling from the speech he had just gave.

"I'm very excited, Dad. Everything changes tomorrow."

Jonakai smiled back at his son. "I'm excited as well."

Tyde was right. Everything would change the next day. Just not in the way that he had hoped.

"The next day, at 7 am, we finally took off towards the Gold Centipede." Jonakai explained.

Tero listened attentively. He loved stories about war and expeditions, however, he knew that this one was tragic since it was about his brother.

Jonakai had been telling Tero about what happened on the journey to the mountain and what happened inside the cave at the top. However, he had left out a lot of the details, especially about how harsh the expedition really was, and that he may have been responsible for most of the deaths.

But who wouldn't lie about such a thing? After all, Jonakai had created a trail of corpses on his way up the mountain. Telling his son such a story would surely make him lose trust in his own father.