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Book Two: The Burning
Part Four: Ablaze
Chapter One: Kindle
The young lad, once the High Prince of Mars, walked along at the side of the being who had claimed his troth only two days earlier in the Throne Hall of Mars. He was a handsome boy, if a bit on the thin and scrawny side. Some might even have been tempted to call him pretty or effeminate if it wasn’t for the sword hilt dangling from his belt.
The hilt itself wasn’t truly awe inspiring, rather it was the promise of what had the possibility of protruding from the hilt at any given time. The Sword of the High Prince, which he still retained despite having surrendered his title for the dubious honor he strode towards, had been known to sprout blades of many varied and sundry types. On occasion, a blade formed of pure light had formed, on others lightning and yet others called forth a blade of purest fire. Only once had a more material form been summoned. That had been during the fated duel to the death betwixt him and his arc nemesis, the Raging Boar, sometimes better known by his given name, Butano Gekido. During that battle, despite the fact that Shima had won the hand-to-hand duel notwithstanding that Shima was half the size of the monstrous warrior, Gekido had chosen to attack the victorious prince in a blind rage as he left the arena. Shima had reacted with the speed of a lifetime of training in the Arts of War. He had drawn the Sword of the High Prince from where he had just hung it at his hip, whirled about, and, summoning a blade, plunged it to the hilt in the chest of the berserk gladiator. The blade had been formed of a rainbowed crystalline structure unlike any before seen in the Lunar Realm.
And so Butano Gekido died with an expression of shock on his face as his killer looked on in tears. For Shima had not wished to kill his opponent. Despite their differences and animosity, the two youthful knights of the Solar Kingdom had been true friends. Later, it had been discovered that the burlier warrior had been drugged in an attempt to create the perfect assassin of the juvenile cavalier. Shima himself had delivered Gekido’s lifeless corpse into the arms of the boy’s father. Even three years after the event, it still brought pain to the prince’s heart.
**********
He was suddenly shaken from his silent reverie by the duo’s arrival at their destination. A massive slab of iron stood before the pair barring their passage further down the ancient corridor.
The being at his side gestured towards the gigantic slab of primitive metal and spoke in his fluting, child-like voice.
"In here, Mortal, you shall find the first stage of your transformation into my Champion."
"Lord Phoenix, I am sorry, but I do not understand."
Lord Phoenix stared at the mortal for a solid minute before replying.
"You are weak, as are all mortals. You are like this iron, which was extracted from the ore, as you were from the womb. You are malleable, flexible. You have no path chosen. If you are struck with power, you bend, if you do not break. You are brittle. You are fragile. Like iron. However, iron can be refined through fire with other materials into steel, which is strong. You must be refined, through the fires, with courage and determination. As with the creation of steel from iron, my Champion shall be created of strength from weakness through several stages. This is the first of many. As steel must come of iron, there are hidden strengths in even the weakest. Find yours."
With that, Lord Phoenix vanished in a brilliant flare of white hot flames.
**********
Shima stood in the ancient corridor for many hours, pondering the words of the Lord Phoenix. The iron slab loomed over his head the entire time.
He believed that he had tried everything. Not one single blade in the Sword of the High Prince’s repertoire caused even the slightest scratch in the increasingly puzzling slab. Finally, he roared with frustration and slammed his fist into the slab.
After recovering from the pain of doing something that infinitely stupid, he noticed a significant fact.
The slab had moved.
It wasn’t much. Only a few inches at the most, but it was a start!
With a grim smile the young ex-High Prince quickly tied back his long raven dark hair into a tight braid and tied it off with a scrap of thread he tugged from his tunic hem. Then he wrapped his braid around his neck several times to keep it out of his way, set his shoulders against the slab and heaved against it with all of his strength.
It didn’t move.
Puzzled he took a step back to reassess the situation.
"So, if I slam my fist into, which really, really hurt, it moved. But when I pushed it as hard as I could, nothing happened."
He stared at his throbbing hand in bewilderment. Which was when he noticed the fact that he was bleeding. He raised his fist to his face and stared at the blood creeping down the back of his hand from his split knuckles deep in thought. Then he walked over and examined where he had struck the slab.
Just as he had suspected, there was blood on the slab.
"Very clever. Very clever. Hidden strengths." Shima chuckled as he began smearing as much of the blood from his hand as he could onto the slab.
He reached out and smacked his hand against the slab, causing the palm to sting rather nicely.
The area covered in his blood slid back and disappeared.
Shima quickly tore off a piece of his tunic and bound his still bleeding hand. Then he strode through the slab to where the Lord Phoenix was waiting on the other side.
**********
The duo had traveled for many days through the torturous twisting of the catacombs in the Earth mountain the Lord Phoenix called his home. Unfortunately for Shima, Lord Phoenix still didn’t truly know how to treat his new mortal. They had disdained food, water and sleep for the past several days. Shima was steadily growing weaker, but he adamantly refused to give in and prove that the Lord Phoenix had been correct about him.
Typical arrogantly stupid mortal. Creatures like the Lord Phoenix are generally right when they pass judgement about a person.
**********
They were fast approaching the end of their second week of travel. Shima had faced down and defeated several more obstacles, but he was very frail now. His clothing, once well fitted, now hung loose on his emaciated frame. The Sword of the High Prince hung heavy at his hip, its belt wrapped nearly double around the haggard prince.
To put it simply, Shima, who had once been the High Prince of Mars and the Heir to the War Throne, was dying.
And he knew it.
But that, by no means, meant that he would admit it to anyone.
Not even himself.
**********
It had been a long and arduous journey. It had taken the better part of two weeks without food. Without sleep. And without water. But he had survived. He had triumphed at last!
Barely.
His skeletal hand reached out and seized the ornate golden handle of the elaborate portal that the Lord Phoenix had informed him would lead him to a place where he could rest and, if he so chose, return to his home. The tests were over. He had passed.
With a weak smile, the moribund mortal opened the door and passed through the portal.
**********
The flames leapt up to catch him as he fell. And he fell forever, the fiercely hot flames eating at his soul for all eternity.