A small group of men and woman stood in front of the golden gates of Starsks' castle. Behind them were a larger retinue wearing matching colours. Red, green and blue where the resounding colours that dominated each group.

All of the members where in conversation, relaxed and at ease. Almost as if standing outside of the ruling castle of the kingdom had no effect on them.

For the three figures at the front, it didn’t. Their posture and smiles looked like they were being waited on instead.

“Crenol, made advances in your cultivation?” an old man said to the younger lady. He was dressed in dark green garb native to Farsi officials.

The lady in question wore a revealing red dress and was stunningly beautiful. She began to laugh, “Wouldn’t you like to know. If you keep worrying about others cultivation you will fall behind yourself. If you do, Trejor will be happy to accept you.”

Sighing to himself the old man responded; “You and Jarl already advanced so far at such a young age. It took me almost a hundred years to reach half my current cultivation.”

Shaking his head with a smile and muttering to himself; “Young ones these days!”

The last man had a sky blue robe and a matching ice cold expression. “Crenol, do not attempt to poach experts in front of me. There is a delicate balance that must be maintained and what must be done to keep it.”

“Relax Jarl. You need to lighten up, in fact here comes a joker from the Starsk kingdom anyway.” Crenol laughed at her quip and faced the gates as the coined ‘joker’ approached.

The doors of the Starsk castle raised and a lone man stood at its entrance. Each of the three experts smiled to themselves. The caller was only a sixth stage expert, but was probably selected to be a show of strength.

Jarl smirked, Flaunting a sixth stage cultivator in front of us, you must be joking.

“I am the second general of the Starsk army. Come, come. The King is waiting for you.” He proudly declared and turned around marching back into the castle.

“Lets go!” Each of the three leaders called on their entourages and streamed into the castles front gate. None of the three groups allowed the others to go first in an attempt to gain superiority. As a result, only the leaders who were afforded a wide berth due to their stature, got in without shoving anyone.

Θ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ Ξ

The king stood at a mahogany table which lay two meters away from the royal viewing platform. It overlooked the people crowding around the centre of the square waiting for the Annual March to begin.

At the table sat four people.

“Thank you for gracing us with your presence great cultivators of our Airlenn continent. I hope the travels have not been too tough.” The said to everyone sat at the table. He was at the head of the table looking around. I'm sweating under this robe, the pressure of their strength is too much .

“Please, I am Crenol. Travelling the Airlenn continent poses no threat to me, a soul mate cultivator. I don’t know about these chumps, but I could travel alone and have no problems.” The beautiful woman smirked and glanced purposely at the other two representatives.

“You might be younger than me but I am still higher cultivation stage than you Crenol,” the old man from Farsi said.

Replying in a heated voice; “So what, you’re so old I’ll catch up to you in a decade no sweat. Don’t even talk to me you old bastard!”

“Bitch”

The name calling and arguing escalated while the king overlooked uncomfortably. The Estonian representative Jarl observed unaffected, his stone expression remained the same.

Straightening out his robes and looking to the rest of the table the old man cleared his throat. “Ahem. Ok down to business and to why the three great nations visited Starsk.”

The King of Starsk face visibly darkened for a second at the statement. You think I don’t realise that you are insinuating Starsk as an inferior nation. Knowing that he couldn’t refute the man, he hid is displeasure at the statement and nodded for him to continue.

“We have created the Airlenn Alliance.”

The king’s body tensed up and his mind began to calculate at a rapid pace. This is worse than I thought. They didn’t ask Starsk to join so the rulers of Trejor, Estone and Farsi obviously believe us to be an inferior nation as well. The only reason they would come post creation of the alliance is to pressure us.

The king’s face had long since hid what he was thinking and smilingly asked the old man from Farsi to elaborate.

“Well, the Airlenn Alliance is the collaboration of might to conquer and defend the human race against threats. We came here to ask you to join.”

“Why would Starsk need to join the any alliance? We have no threats to our nation.” The king replied. He already knew this meeting was going to go bad the second an alliance was mentioned.

This time Crenol intervened. “There are no threats posed to your nation ‘currently’. The AA have been protecting and defending against threats behind the scenes. The AA has been created for many years and has accomplished a lot of things while Starsk, well, just existed.”

The kings bowed his head, he couldn’t believe it had been years since they had created the alliance without any word from his intelligence of such an entity. Wait, threats. Behind the scenes. Accomplishments. This sounds a lot like crusade talks.

He slowly raised his head and in a soft voice said; “You still haven’t told me what threats.”

Crenol smiled. “Of course. As you know the Airlenn continent is the safest continent on the planet, but it is also the poorest. We have mined most of the precious metals and haven’t found a single deposit of soul crystal in over a 100 years.”

They are still searching for soul crystals. They were only found 300 years ago and are almost 5000 gold for a single piece. According to the historians at the Starsk institute, they can increase your cultivation by leaps and bounds.

The king had stopped searching many years ago after all his forefathers had found only small amounts. Although it was barely anything, the soul crystals managed to boost the kingdoms strength enough to compete toe to toe with the other kingdoms.

The king still didn’t believe that the other kingdoms had found any major threats. Unless... Not daring to believe he continued listening to the lady.

“Fortunately, we had found soul crystals in the continent of Erf. Unfortunately we encountered some of the filthy monsters while searching for the crystals and had a minor skirmish losing two soul mates and enraging a minor nation. Apparently a son of some King was killed, crazy that the bastards have familial ties. They look like animals, I didn’t expect them to have any culture.” Crenol chuckled. She didn’t mention to the king that she initiated the fight and coincidently killed the son.

Gasping with horror, the king realised two major things. The reason why Stark has been supressed by the other nations was they have soul crystals. No wonder we can’t match military might to a single one. They lost two soul mates in a minor skirmish. Shit, how strong are the inhabitants of Erf.

Finally Jarl, the last representative of the nations present decided to speak. “We came to Stark today to gift your nation a secondary position in Airlenn Alliance and want your army to help combat against the possible invasion of a Erf army.”

The king still had his pride as the leader of a nation and indignantly exclaimed. “Secondary, what does that entail and why can we not be primary?”

Laughing Jarl responded. “The force that we attacked in the Erf Continent was a quarter the size of ours and had one expert. Their strength is unbelievable and we need numbers to counter against it. We discovered that they are only a small nation, just the size of the city of Starsk. Although you command this Kingdom with all its fiefdoms and villages around, you do not have any soul mates. There are three in this very room.

We want numbers and numbers is what you have. But the alliance has the real strength.”

An unsettling silence pervaded the room, only shouts of the people outside the viewing chamber could be heard. In the heated conversation and complete shock, the king had completely forgotten about the annual march. The platoons had been marching past for a while, each member’s companion proudly walking alongside its human.

The king straightened up and firmly responded. “And if I refuse?”

The old man, Crenol and Jarl all sighed. The old man of Farsi told the king, “Refusing is not an option. You cannot defend against those of Erf with your strength, you cannot even defend against us.”

Disguised in his statement was a thinly veiled threat. The king of Starsk slowly stood up while thinking to himself. Even if they kill me here, I cannot accept their terms. Numbers? All they want is a meat shield so they can save themselves while picking off the enemy. Farsi has a large army, so many alternatives exist. I cannot let all of Starsk suffer such a fate. Even if the kingdom falls, we can regroup and rebuild with the fiefdoms.

“I refuse and ask you to leave Starsk.”

For the second time that day the three representatives of the Airlenn Alliance sighed. Jarl, an icy expression on his face, stood up along with the other two. “I see you still don’t understand. We expected so!”

The king looked on in horror as the room began to freeze over and Jarl began to hover. He floated towards the royal viewing platform and even further over the crowds gathered in the city square.

Suddenly a mirage of an azure eagle appeared underneath him, its wings spanning over fifty meters. He stood on its head as the eagle somehow hovered without flapping its wings. It immense pressure brought all the festivities to a halt.

“Greeting citizens of Starsk. I am Jarl, representative of the Airlenn Alliance.” His booming voice echoed across the entire city.

“I am one of the soul mates that our alliance possesses and we come from all kingdoms of the Airlenn continent. Your king has decided to rebel against the alliance and therefore, against humanity itself.

Starsk must bear the punishment.

For those of you who wish support humanity you must be reborn from its ashes. For those who cannot, you will endure the curse of weakness for only a short while longer.”

Θ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ ΞΘ Δ ∪ ∀Δ Ξ

Cain, along with thousands of people, marvelled at sight above the royal viewing chambers. However, Cains face didn’t morph into outrage and anger like the others. He was completely absorbed, looking up at the huge bird that was opening it beak bit by bit.

He was suddenly jolted awake by his father, who began to back away quickly along with the rest of the crowd. Cain almost fell of the back of his father’s shoulders in the panic. His eyes were still glued to the gargantuan bird which was now gathering a blue mist around it open beak.

“Cain, Cain,” his father cried out from underneath as he swung his son down and began to run, shoving people out of his way.

The man on the bird had finished his preparations and screamed a resounding word.

"HAIL"

It suddenly began to hail. Pieces of ice pelted onto the ground without even the slightest trace of a cloud. As the crowds began to flee the size of the hail began to increase in size and the man that initiated the mayhem was nowhere to be seen.

Faster. Faster. Toke repeated over and over in his head. At this point Cains feet hadn’t touch the floor due to his father dragging him along so vigorously. Bark flew overhead, nimbly ducking between pieces of hailstones.

The father and son where on the main road that led outside of the city, along with a slew of escaping people and their companions.

The small hail stones had a surprisingly vicious effect. If a single piece of ice managed to hit your head and knock you out, or even make you trip, only death followed. Bodies of companions and humans littered the road as the fallen were continuously pelted with hail stones.

The longer anyone stayed in the same place, the greater their chances of dying.

Toke almost faltered when a hailstone pierced straight through the head of an armoured bear in front of him. It died instantly with its master at its side trying to wake it up uselessly.

“Miss, miss. He’s dead. You have to…MOOVE” Toke let go of Cain tried to call out.

The girl lost in her sorrow didn’t notice what loomed above her. Toke looked on in horror as a massive hailstone the size of man came down in a flash.

BANG

Only her blood remained, it pooled around the bottom of the hailstone which didn’t even shatter and splattered across Tokes face. The dead bear burst into a sparkling array of green natural energy and disappeared, signalling the masters death.

“Quickkk,” Toke yelled as his son froze both his legs locked. Grabbing him once again Toke sped away.

“SPEEEEDD, come on bark.” Screaming out at his companion.

Borrowing the power of his companion, Toke pumped his legs, shattering the ground travelling faster than he even had before.

He ignored the look his son gave him as fully utilised the power that the first rank had to offer. They had already reached the gates of the city which were completely destroyed. When a hailstone pierced Cains forearm.

A guttural high pitched scream exploded out of the boy’s mouth and destroyed Toke’s concentration. Their speed dropped dramatically as they slowed to a stop.

Cains whimpering worried his father immensely as he inspected the wound. Fortunately it was one of the smaller projectiles.

“Let’s go” he motioned to his son. Noticing the shocked expression Cain was making, he turned his head upwards and saw the biggest hailstone hurtling straight down on top of them. Without sparing a second of thought he dived forward pushing his son backwards.

It wasn’t enough , Toke thought to himself as he felt his legs pinned down. Bark flew around franticly, twittering to his master.

“DAAAD,” his son screamed out as he got up of the floor and saw what had happened. His father was pinned under the hailstone, both his legs stuck and the blood of the girl they had just seen die decorated his face. Even more disturbing was his own blood which dribbled down the corners of his mouth.

“Go bark, lead him out of the city,” he called out to his panicking companion weakly.

“Tweet”

“NO, dad I can’t leave you.” Both Cain and Bark seemed to share the same sentiments.

Cain sobbed, the pain of his own wound was ignored as his he cried. Pulling as hard as he could on his father’s torso.

It didn’t budge.

He couldn’t move his father normally, so being pinned down by a mammoth hailstone made trying to even more hopeless.

“Go on son. Get out of here, survive. I know you can,” he said softly while caressing the face of his balling son.

“No.. no. Please dad, get up! Please.” Cain cried, on his knees still pulling uselessly.

Bark realised it was impossible to help his master and pulled on Cains collar. The boy sprawled backwards just as another hailstone shattered in front of him, the pieces nicking him as they flew past.

Toke looked up and realised that all of the projectiles had increased in size. “GOOOOOOOOOOOOO” he yelled. Sighing as his son had finally began to run, his own companion tugging him out of the way of danger.

He smiled as the mixture blood from two people rolled down his face and the tears of one joined the wretched cocktail. He could barely see his sons little back anymore.

***

Cain found himself in the dark, exhausted and afraid. He couldn’t remember how long he was running for, but he knew that he was in the Dark Expanse.

Looking back at the way he had come he saw pitch darkness. Turning forward, he still couldn’t see any light. There was nothing except for the little brown bird which hovered around him.

Cain looked towards his father’s companion and began to frantically shout; “Quick Bark, let’s turn back. Take me back to the city. The hailstones have stopped, we can save dad. Come on!”

Bark warbled in a broken tenor and began to slowly descend before being caught by Cain.

“What happened Bark? We have to go back and save dad!”

But the little bird that laid in his palms did not stir. Before the boy could even call out to his father’s companion it burst into multitude of green sparks. The shock of the flare pushed Cain onto his knees.

Looking at his palms tears streamed down his cheeks as he realised why Bark had dissolved into nothingness.

“Happy Birthday Cain,” he muttered to himself in between uncontrollable sobs.

:)

Apologies for not releasing for a while. I didn't know how to write this chapter and when I finally did my internet died. Good news is I have another chapter written as a result.

Tell me if you like it, its my longest chapter yet!!

Thanks for reading