Marthan and Shayla had been talking for hours, telling each other about their respective families, their life before joining the Paladin Order as initiates and how they became initiates in the Order. Marthan found the conversation he had with Shayla to be engaging, and he hoped that she thought so as well.
“So who do you want to have as your master?” asked Shayla.
“I’ve got no preference actually,” answered Marthan, “as long as he or she is willing to teach me, I don’t mind who I get. How about you?”
“Well I hope that I could get Master Liana Sunrunner as my master,” answered Shayla who had a twinkle in her eyes.
“I think I’ve heard of her before in my readings. Is she the one crippled a weapons smuggling ring in the Trionak system?”
“The very same!” said Shayla with enthusiasm in her voice. “She also managed to get both parties fighting in the Aporian civil war to sit down at the negotiating table, which led to the signing of a peace treaty between the two parties that ended the decade long civil war. In addition to those feats, she also single handedly defeated Warlord Geda of Laskaria and his band of marauders that were harassing passenger liners and cargo ships in the Laskarian system. She’s amazing.”
“Those are impressive feats indeed,” acknowledged Marthan as he stroked his hairless chin, “it takes a great diplomat and warrior to accomplish those feats.”
“I know, I really hope I get her,” Shayla said wishfully.
The chirp of the internal comm system coming alive caught the attention of the two young Paladin initiates. “Attention all passengers this is your co-pilot speaking, please be informed that we will be exiting lightspeed momentarily and will soon make our final approach to Corethdel.”
“I’ll guess we’ll be finding out who our masters will be pretty soon,” commented Marthan to Shayla as soon as the co-pilot had finished the announcement. Although Marthan did not show it, he was excited at the prospect of meeting his new master, but at the same time there was also a sense of anxiousness, as he did not know whether he was capable of becoming a fully-pledged Paladin.
Corethdel came into view in the viewing port next to Marthan moments as the transport dropped out of lightspeed. Both Marthan and Shayla peered out of the view port to look at their new home. From orbit, Marthan noted that Corethdel had very little similarities to his homeplanet of Aldrila. It had large bodies of water and areas of greenery like Aldrila, but unlike Aldrila which had only one main city that left the planet unspoiled, Corethdel was almost entirely covered with cityscape, with the exception of the few spots of greenery. He also noted that unlike Aldrila, Corethdel had heavy orbital traffic around it.
“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” exclaimed Shayla in wonderment as she looked out the view port, “have you?”
“Nope.”
As the transport descended to the planet, Marthan noted that the buildings of the city were taller than any other building he has seen before. The skyscrapers of Corethdel easily dwarfed the skyscrapers found on Aldrila and its airspace was filled with aircars which followed a very uniformed skylane, which prevented aircars from colliding with each other in mid-air. This whole experience was new to Marthan, he had never seen anything like this in his entire twenty-years of life.
The chirp of the transport’s internal comm unit came to life. “All passengers, please be informed that we are making our final approach to the Bastion.” The Bastion was the headquarters and the main training facility for the Paladin Order. It was the home of the Paladins, it was their refuge.
“There it is!” exclaimed Shayla while pointing at a huge mega-structure in the distance.
Marthan looked over to what Shayla was pointing at and saw a huge ziggurat like structure which had a huge dome on top of it, and on top of the dome was a tall tower which height could touch the heavens. Surrounding the ziggurat was a large circular wall that had towers located at each cardinal direction. The four towers located on the wall were slightly shorter than the tower built atop of the dome on the ziggurat. The ziggurat was linked to the wall by large covered bridges which were located at each of the cardinal directions. Marthan was in awe, he had only seen images of the Bastion, and they did not fully convey its beauty.
“It’s magnificent,” said Marthan who was in awe at the view. Shayla nodded in agreement as the transport approached the magnificent structure.
I should be doing uni work right now, but procrastination is one of my greatest talents, so here I am!
Points: 1234
Reviews: 590
Donate