~Prologue~
Once a great many years ago, in the age where Mages and Dragons were common in existence, when countries were forging new laws and at peace, there lived a great colony of Mages who kept the world in order. They were lead by Orcaster the Sage (he preferred this title to “Mage”). For his great plans for the world to be realised he created these laws for the countries. He also made a seal that would open a portal to other worlds to enable for things such as technology and trade to be shared between them. However, he set it so it would only open once every thousand years. Then after the Seal’s creation he chose to make a link with the simple planet named Earth. However, he had a problem. He would have to make another seal to close off passage to Tsamelp, the world between dimensions. If anyone were able to enter this place they would gain an unbelievable advantage of control over the other worlds and the last thing the universe needed was a tyranny… By the stage he was in his later years, Orcaster had created about 5000 seals. Immortality had become difficult to gain. Before he died he trained two apprentices to carry on his work. Their names were Shen and Lernice. They both quickly learnt Orcaster’s skills quickly but secretly abused their powers in foolishness.
Orcaster had created eight mighty countries that neighboured each other. For each country he created two gloves of great power, and for each pair he designated a guardian. These gloves each contained an unlimited supply of an element’s power. Due to this they had taken a long time to forge. Orcaster had named these gloves ‘Essences.’ However, when situation called for it, these gloves could be merged into one glove wielding ultimate power. This glove, which was dubbed ‘Anessence,’ could only be forged at the pedestal which each Essence glove had been originally created. The guardians that Orcaster designated had a knowledge about every aspect of the country they were to protect and govern. They also knew the full knowledge about the Essences, which was a knowledge that no-one else besides Orcaster knew. Orcaster was happy and dubbed each guardian with a name: Arlek: Guardian of the Light, Neltorg: Guardian of Darkness, Haruna: Guardian of Fire, Harralander: Guardian of the Essence of Life, Zerrage: Guardian of Thunder, Yun: Guardian of Air, and Boskier: Guardian of Water. However, when Orcaster was creating the eighth Essence for a people known as the Tri-Rantiams, they began to grow impatient. This was the third year past since the promise of an Essence and it still hadn’t arrived. They soon began to hate Orcaster.
When Orcaster received this news, he was saddened. He summoned the Tri-Rantiam governor to Orcaster’s tower to negotiate and hopefully remove any ill feelings. However, the Tri-Rantiam governor was harsh towards Orcaster and tried to kill him, but he had no chance against Orcaster. So the governor fled for his life. It was then that Orcaster realised what a mistake it would be to give the Tri-Rantiams such a power as an Essence, so he placed a curse on them, turning them into lizard-men hideous to the sight. They became a stupid nation and migrated to the forests to live. Although all of this had occurred Orcaster had still believed that the other nations would find other things to fight about besides each other, so he was delighted to see alliances forming between them.
However, as the years passed, the situations started to become more evil. When the guardians held a group meeting every twenty-five years there was a mass bickering among them as each member saw only their viewpoint on matters as correct and every other viewpoint or opinion inferior. Unfortunately, Orcaster didn’t attend this meeting but his apprentice Shen did. He was the more rebellious of the two apprentices and he acted in the opposite way to what Orcaster would have: He made the situation worse. After the meeting was finished all alliances between the countries were broken and they went their separate ways. Shen was so pleased with what he had done that the continued to create havoc. He traveled to the Land of Darkness where the first Dark Lord lived. He spoke of evil things to Neltorg; starting war and forging the Anessence. Shen was so articulate that he succeeded: Neltorg would go to war, but first the Anessence needed to be created.
Neltorg traveled to the Thunder clan and fought Zerrage for his Essence. Although it was a struggle, Neltorg overcame Zerrage and defeated him, taking his Essence, he left and traveled to the Air clan, then the Water clan, both times becoming the victor. Word of what was happening came to Haruna and Harralander so they discussed what they should do; they weren’t angry with each other anymore and they discussed possible actions they could take. Harralander wanted to use a seal so they could escape to another world, but Haruna wanted to fight. So Harralander sent message that he would come back as reinforcement for Haruna, but Neltorg reached her first. Haruna was forced to fight him. During the battle, a dark bolt of lightning rained down on Haruna and the impact knocked her Essence glove right off her hand. A massive explosion followed. It blew Neltorg hundreds of feet away from Haruna. Her body swelled and she became a dragon. Neltorg, now thinking Haruna was dead, set his sights on defeating his closest friend, Arlek.
Neltorg sent a message to him saying that Orcaster wanted to meet him at his tower. As he left to ambush him, Shen also headed to the tower and cast a spell on Orcaster, making him fall into a deep sleep. However, Shen was witness to an unexpected surprise: not only did Arlek’s army arrive but the armies from the other countries had and they were all fighting against each after. Shen laughed at such chaos. Neltorg killed Arlek and this triggered something inside Orcaster to wake. He ran to the top of the tower to see Neltorg standing over Arlek’s corpse. Orcaster was so grieved by this that he sacrificed him own life to create a seal that would permanently end the fighting between the countries. His dying words were that he was sorry for ever creating the Essences in the first place, and he named Lernice his heir as he was mature, cared about Orcaster’s work and didn’t create havoc as Shen had.
And so Orcaster died at the age six-thousand, five-hundred and forty-two. The nations separated and they didn’t fight each other for many years to come. Neltorg, after realising what he had done, killed himself and his son Bartik took his place. His son Jown took his place when Bartik died. Seven years later, Jown was killed by a dragon when he was out hunting, and his daughter took his place. When she passed on her oldest son took her place. But a few days later he was murdered by his younger brother who desperately wanted the position of Darklord. This younger brother was killed twenty-seven years later by a group of rogues. Both sons that the younger brother had shared the throne until one mysteriously disappeared. When the other son died, his only child Meltage took to rule. Meltage had twin children; a son named Paldor and a daughter named Serane. When it came time to choose an heir, he chose Serane. When Paldor discovered this, he became very upset and not only hated Serane but his entire family.
One day when Darklord Serane visited the Mages concerning a treaty, interesting events unfolded… Lernice was the head mage, Shen his right-hand man. Shen hadn’t had much fun in the last two-thousand years and now he saw his chance to have some. He began to harass Serane about wanting to sign the treaty, whist convincing Lernice not to sign it at all. Serane warned Shen not to interfere, but he laughed at her warning and broke out into combat. Shen killed Serane’s bodyguard in a flash. But Serane herself was an extremely tough opponent. Lernice tried to stop the battle but his attempt fell flat. Shen and Serane continued to battle each other for ages, matching blow for blow. But Shen gained the upper hand by kicking Serane to the ground and focused a giant ray of thunder in his palm. As he was about to kill Serane with it, she pulled out a dagger she had concealed and cut his hand off. Shen dropped to the gound, screming in pain. Serane focused a dark ball of energy in her hands and was about to kill Shen, but Lernice couldn’t let it happen. He called a Trinity* seal on the Darklord. As she lay sprawled on the floor, almost dead from the impact, Lernice approached Shen and was about to help him when he realised how evil Shen truly was. He then banished Shen and all his followers, and they became known as Grey Mages.
(*A Trinity seal is a seal that redirects energy in one’s body using elemental power.)
Seven years later, Serane had still kept the secrets of the Trinity seal placed upon her, thinking that if she didn’t reveal this information, no-one would realise. But at this time, Serane had a total of three children. Only one of them was born without the seal curse due to him being born before the seal was placed on Serane. But as time passed, Paldor noticed something was wrong with Serane. The main clue was that she no longer went out to negotiate treaties anymore. He could also sense her power diminishing. Drake began to want the Essence of Darkness so badly that one day after he attended a meeting with the highest officials in the Darkclan, Serane announced that she didn’t want or need Paldor’s help. This humiliation caused Paldor to want to kill Serane. Shen, sensing this deep hatred, visited Paldor. After a brief discussion, Shen revealed to Paldor that he was willing to help eliminate his entire family in revenge for his left hand. With little thought, Paldor agreed. After all, he did want the position of Darklord…
