For a moment, he closed his eyes and took a rest before sitting up to check where he was.

"No, not again.", he murmured, because he was back at his house back in Crescent Town.

The relaxing, nostalgic, golden color of the sunset was illuminating his room through the window.

Next, Edwin stood up and exited his room.

Going out of his bedroom, he saw the same old combined small dining room and kitchen, but he didn't focus on the furniture, instead, he kept his sight on the door of the other bedroom.

Slowly approaching the door, he felt mixed emotions and even burdens and lightness at the same time.

Touching the rough texture of the door, Edwin felt a chill all over his body.

"I don't want to.", he said to himself.

"Yes, you do.", he replied to himself.

"Wait, who are you?", he asked to himself.

"No, who are you!?", he asked himself.

"Why am I even here?"

"No, why am I here?"

"Where am I?"

"Where are you?!"

"Who am I?"

"Who are you?"

"I can't remember!", he grasped his head as he tried to recall. The sunlight coming from the sunset turned red, making every single thing look like stained with blood. Meanwhile, darkness slowly crept out of the corners of the house.

As the it was about to touch Edwin, it suddenly disappeared, then the sunlight turned back to normal.

"Edwin", a neutral voice sounded out behind him.

The boy was surprised that somebody called out to him. He turned his head around who it was, and saw that it was a woman.

The features of the woman was blurred, nevertheless, one would know that it was a woman from the figure of her body.

"Who?", he asked.

"You.", the woman replied.

"Me?", Edwin asked.

"Mhm.", the woman nodded. Then, it was as if Edwin's mind got clearer after the confirmation.

After a pause, she asked, "Aren't you going to open the door?"

"Should I?", he turned his body back in front of the door.

"It's your choice.", the woman shrugged.

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"Who are you?", Edwin turned around again, but he didn't see the woman anymore.

He sighed and tried to push open the door, which didn't budge. He pushed it as hard as he can but the door won't move.

Then, an idea surfaced on his mind. Instead of pus.h.i.+ng the door, he pulled it instead and it opened.

However, it wasn't a room that was behind the door, but was a mirror!

The mirror was currently showing his reflection, but it was only him and not even the objects beside nor behind him.

Touching the mirror with his bare hands, the gla.s.s rippled like a calm pond or lake getting disturbed when one threw a rock in its middle. The image that it was showing changed and Edwin saw three moving pictures each neatly leveled.

On the top was a very beautiful land, just by looking at it Edwin felt refreshed.

In the middle it was like the one on top, but paled in comparison.

Below the two, was an image of a vast red land whose skies were b.l.o.o.d.y red, looking at it, Edwin felt that the temperature became hotter and he could hear wails of numerous people.

-bang-

He closed door loudly as he started to sweat. Then, Edwin could feel that his body became lighter and lighter, until everything around him vanished.

***

Coughs broke out inside an enclosed room as Edwin woke up.

The boy stood up and examined himself. He noticed that he was wearing a new s.h.i.+rt, pants, and even boots, which were actually of higher quality than the ones he initially used.

Checking the room, Edwin saw that the room's ceiling, walls and floor were all white, while there was a light coming from the four upper corners, giving light everywhere within it.

He tried to circulate a bit of internal energy and mana, but found out that he couldn't! That time when he fought, he could use the said energies once again because the Red Thorn also decongested his energy pathways.

Now, there was a thin metal cover with engravings around his wrist, which was probably the object that was preventing him to circulate energy. He tried to remove it but was unsuccessful, it was as if it was a part of his body.

"I've been too rash again!", he chuckled as he mocked himself.

He didn't feel angry anymore, only confusion mixed with regret.

Edwin carefully looked around the small room, trying to find out the exit, but wasn't able to find anything for awhile.

As soon as he sat down after giving up, a part of the wall across the room opened up and Rein walked in.

"Come on human, follow me.", Rein said, but Edwin didn't pay attention to him.

The anger he felt towards the elves and their affliated animals already reached a high level and was ignited again when he saw Rein.

Seeing Edwin was ignoring him, Rein hastily said, "If you want to get out of here, follow me!"

"Take this thing off first.", Edwin showed him the object around his wrist.

"Later! You might do something rash again on the way if I did so.", Rein retorted.

"I won't.", Edwin replied, but the deer still didn't take it off of him, making him have no choice but to follow Rein out of here.

Outside the weird cell, the walls, ceiling, and floor this time were now made from the common rocks or bricks.

"Why are you even helping me to escape, haven't I almost killed your fellows and even you?", Edwin asked, but Rein was the one who didn't respond this time.

They kept evading the guards' sight while taking detours if they couldn't, until they reached a long corridor.

When the both of them were near the middle of the corridor, they noticed the shadows of a group of elven guards approaching the end of the corridor, not just that, there was also another group of guards slowly coming towards the path where they entered!

"Hurry!", Rein quietly urged.

The both of them rushed towards the middle of the corridor where there was a door. Rein let Edwin enter the door while he stayed outside.

"Phew.", Edwin let out a sigh of relief.

-click-

Edwin heard a sound of something clicking behind him. He turned around to see what it was, but after seeing it, he almost choked on his own saliva.

-click-

The clicking sound came from a chair, though it looked new, it was in fact, a lot older that it seemed to be. Whereas there was somebody sitting on the chair, which was a half-blonde, half white-haired elf whose eyes were green and was writing on a piece of paper on the table.

Of course, it was none other than Azriel.

'Wrong room, wrong room! I'd rather fight a regiment of elite guards than him!', the boy tried to open the door behind him without looking away from Azriel, but found out there was nothing to grasp, in fact, there was no more door behind him!

"Uh..."

"Shh...", Azriel silenced Edwin.

'This is, very awkward.' Edwin thought. He did almost try to kill the citizens of the elf in front him, making him uncomfortable even just by breathing.

After a long period of silence, Azriel was the first one to talk, "So, how did you like to fight with Chizowa's clone?"

"Clone?", Edwin mustered up his courage and asked.

"Those six animals that you saw, Rein, a Highborn Emperor Deer; Avram, a Winter Wolf; Nareol, a Monarch Lion; Kirk, a Steelborn Crocodile; Sango, an Orthodox Blackpaw Bear; Chizowa, a Horned Ruler Gorilla. Those are just their clones, so don't be proud that you have beaten one of my high elders.", Azriel said.

The king added, "Have you ever really thought of that my kingdom is so weak that the high elders are also weak? Yes? Well, I'm telling you human, they're still merciful enough not to move their real bodies just to squash you."

"And oh, their real bodies are right under this very mountain you're in right now.", Azriel gazed at Edwin.

"I'm sure that must be a very important secret.", Edwin replied. Well, he was already here, he won't be able to do anything even if he tried to flicker away.

Azriel formed a tiny ball of energy between his forefinger and thumb, "You see this little orb of energy? Once I flick it to you, your body is too weak that you'll disintegrate into near-invisible dust."

"Alright, just say it, why am I here?", Edwin slightly rose the tone of his voice. He knew that his disrespectful move now was just too stupid, but could he even do anything right now to change the situation?

Meanwhile, his left hand where the ancient symbol was glowed red, even if there was already the object on his wrist preventing him to use internal energy and mana.

"You're really bold... and stupid too, human.", Azriel stopped writing and stood up to approach Edwin.

As Azriel slowly approached Edwin, the latter became more cautious, 'What should I do? What should I do? These elves are really treacherous.'

When Azriel got closed enough, he s.n.a.t.c.hed Edwin's hand where the red glowing symbol was.

"This...", Azriel carefully examined the symbol.

"You can see it?", Edwin was surprised. He knew that only he could see the symbol through the information he got from it.

"Anything living in the Monarch Forest who are really close to nature can sense it. If they're powerful enough, they can see it.", Azriel explained.

"You don't have to hide anything, I know it's a Celestial Symbol.", the elven king added.

"So that's what it's called? Well, I have my guesses. I don't even know what it means, tho.", Edwin muttered, but he didn't dare directly look at the green eyes of Azriel.

"The Celestial Symbols' meaning are different per Celestial, even though their structure is almost the same if compared to each other. From the ancient language this symbol was written, it means 'eleventh'.", Azriel said.

"So I'm the eleventh one that will die?", Edwin rhetorically asked.

"No! Look human, it looks like you already know what you're up against, but let me tell you this, from our records, not all Celestials have died after fighting the Wraith.", Azriel said.

"So then you kept me alive just to face a terrifying being? Look, I still have a lot to do! I don't want my soul to get dispersed", the boy replied without a bit of courtesy.

"But sadly for you... your soul is already starting to disperse. I noticed it the first time I saw you.", Azriel replied.

Now, Edwin's face changed when he heard that sentence from the elven king.

"It's really dispersing in an extremely slow speed. Probably less than 0.00000000000...01% have started to disperse. It's neglible if not carefully looked, but nonetheless, it's still dispersing.", Azriel said.

"But don't worry, your soul won't fully disappear for millions of years from now.", he added. "If the dispersing speed won't speed up."

"I-I-I..." The truth washed over him like a bucket of cold water getting thrown at him. It might take millions of years for his soul to completely disappear, but could he stop it? Wouldn't he be already dead by that time then, either through fighting the Wraith and losing or dying of old age?

"I'm not ready yet, I don't even know where the Wraith is at all or how powerful is it."

"But you will surely get more powerful much faster even if you are compared to the talened ones because of this symbol.", Azriel said.

"Also...", Azriel suddenly got his knees and touched the ground with his forehead, making Edwin even more confused that he already was!

"...may you please take this as a form of apology for what my kind has done to you. I don't want the elves to suffer like what happened to the dragons."

Seeing such a scene, the red glow on Edwin's mark disappeared and returned back to normal, "Stop what you're doing! I don't want anybody kowtowing to me."

Seeing that the red glow was gone, Azriel kowtowed one last time, "Thank you for accepting my apology."

"Why did you just do that?", Edwin asked. For king not just to beg but also to bow down for apology was really embara.s.sing on their part. In fact, it could mean that the whole nation the ruler was leading was also begging for forgiveness, which was an utter humiliation whether it was done in public or not!

"I'd rather get humiliated than a Celestial potentially hating my race for his whole life. This is why the dragons almost went extinct, I just don't want it to happen to my people."

Edwin: "But, what's so scary about me getting angry?"

"When your hatred reached the peak either for an individual or a race. You can use that mark to either curse or suppress them for all eternity.", Azriel answered, this time with a much friendlier tone than earlier.

There wasn't a stark difference, but the change of tone was obvious.