The Humans

The sounds of horses while running were echoing in the forest. Twelve horses in gold colour were competing. Their muscles glowed as they ran with all their strength under the sun.

Their skins, tails and manes were shiny and well groomed. Looking at their eyes, it was easy to see how intelligent animals they were. A one meter long horn in the middle of their forehead was enough to scare the carnivores in the forest.

- Wowwww

There was a cliff on horses' routes, but none stopped. Without stopping, they rushed to the top of the mountain, jumped forward. Suddenly the wings on the sides of horses opened to until their tip and horses began to float across a brilliant blue sky.

- Hahahaha! I told you! Pegasus horses are better than Griffins! It was worth it even if it was hard to convince my father!

- Princess Reiko! The King's allowed, but we have to be more careful on the western continent. Please do not forget your mission.

A blonde, beautiful and young woman on one of the horses opened her hands and was cheering up with the excitement of flying by several meters. On the horse behind her, there was an old and bald man, and he was constantly warning. On the horse next to the blonde lady, there was another pretty young lady with white hair and blue eyes, watching the landscape quietly. Even if she didn't speak, her lips were slightly curled up and she was definitely having fun. Each of the other nine people was guards; they wearing shiny and flashy gold armours.

- You be quiet, old man. Snow White, I told you they can go higher when we take their armours off!

"Is this really safe? You were right, Reiko!" Snow White asked. Even though she had fun, Snow White was firmly embracing her horse. She was pretty scared.

"Hahahaha, do not be afraid! Pegasus horses are best! They are also more tamed and smarter and tougher and more durable animals than all I can think! If you ever fall, they would be the first to save you", said Reiko. Her golden hair was floating in the sky like a torch.

"The presence of horses' armour could make our task easier. It was a big mistake to remove their armours just to advance faster…" The bald man complained, even though no one would listen except himself. He was wearing a red robe that was rather charismatic. All parts were covered with gold. His face had a tired manner. Although he wanted to appear vigorous, the irresponsible attitude of little princesses had exhausted him.

"Reiko, do you think we can find a stone lion? The lion passed through this forest a long time ago. It may not be here anymore" Snow White asked curiously.

"If we cannot find such a large lion while we are searching from the sky, no one can find it. The old shaman said before, it was possible to come across this lion. You didn't try to fool me, did you, old man?" Reiko frowned and asked the old man.

- Princess of the Sun and Princess of the Moon. Please don't jump over the hills more randomly anymore. The Kiklope Guard Lion is uncontrollable for a week after its birth, but then its soul in the stone will calm down. The lion was seen entering the forest, but nobody has seen while leaving the forest. This means that the Kiklope race has not yet found the lion. The stone lion is still in the woods and is probably waiting without moving.

"If we can't find it, do you think we can get one of them from Kiklope race?" Snow White asked curiously. Actually, she didn't like wild creatures that much, but she had a fondness for adorable cats.

"Why couldn't I think of it?! They must have more than one. I need to add this powerful creature to my collection!" Reiko said in excitement. She had a huge collection of thousands of rare animals in her garden and pieces of many dead legendary creatures. Princess Reiko had an obsession. If visitors didn't bring an unusual creature or a piece of it, they wouldn't even find a chance to talk with this princess.

- Princess Reiko, the Kiklope race does not trade with humans and they do not allow any human to enter their temples. With them, it is not even possible to communicate. They never talk to shorter creatures than themselves. In addition, their shortest is four meters in length.

"Tch, arrogant creatures! I, The Sun Princess, will take whatever I want!" Reiko spoke arrogantly.

***

Marwa awoke slowly after a deep sleep. He felt more peaceful and warmer. He noticed the trees around him changed. But when he examined it carefully, he saw that the changing was itself. The apple tree was now bigger. His height increased from 10 meters to 20 meters, was looking down to the whole forest! His red apples had all over the place. There were hundreds of bird nests in his branches. Their noise was echoing in all the forest…

Marwa's eyes looked for his old friends. But only the scorpion still stood still in the same spot. The pigeons had left their nest.

"Maybe every creature would need to move away from their homes to grow…" Marwa thought. Now more creatures around him were accompanying him, but for some reason, he couldn't feel happy.

When Marwa woke up, he realized he was stronger than he was before. Now he could do these simple movements without having to use all his power. The fallen leaves slowly began to form again. He was pleased with his progress. Maybe one day he could do more than that. He was impatient.

Marwa gathered his strength and roared. Of course, the result was only a strong breeze but it was enough for the birds to move away from the tree with fear. Hundreds of birds rose in an instant and caused an interesting appearance in the air. None of them dared to come back. Marwa was pleased with the result. He could see many empty nests on his branches. He regained his energy and began to swing his branches sideways. Many leaves and empty bird nests fell through the tree. The tree was now clean.

Marwa wanted to close his eyes and sunbathe quietly.

However, two men appeared and approached him quietly. They couldn't hide their surprise when they approached the tree. These two men were wearing black clothes and masks, so it was not possible to see their faces.

-Is this… This is the place? The location the our fated enemy will appear?

-… It must be. She said there will be an apple tree. And this…

- Is this really an apple tree? I don't think an apple tree can become this huge.

- I don't know too. Since this thing is big, we can be sure it will become a node in the fate map.

- Meng, do u really believe in your sister? I mean, isn't that absurd too see the future in her dreams… This doesn't make sense.

- She… *sigh* She was always right, wasn't? It really doesn't make sense why she has a power… She didn't cultivate her shamanic Powers. No, she definetly had no ability to shamanic ways.

-Creepy…

-Shut up, man. She is my big sister!

-Well, do you think we must be here? Master will punish us if he learns. He always says fate will never allow others change its course.

-What? So we must wait until enemies knocks our door?! Since we learnt they will be here today, we must at least see who or what they are.

The man with sword on his back sighed and started to check around the tree.

***

The apple tree, Marwa, curiously watched these two men's behaviours from above. Though he was not even sure what kind of human they were due to their features covered under their dark clothing. Fortunately he was able to understand their chat. That was a great suprise for him. The men was very cautious and didn't even dare to touch his apples. They places countless weird shaped objects from their pouches to the ground around the area near to the huge tree. Marwa felt like he also knew what they were doing but… what…

Suddenly the unknown objects on the ground emitted five-coloured lights and whole area scanned by it. The birds on the tree must be affected by it all of them started to fly away from the weirdness.

"That's annoying" Marwa grumbled.

-Everything is ready. We better hide.

***

The Pegasus horses did not pass through the cliffs anymore. They found and followed the trees in the jungle where Kiklope Guard Lion smashed while it was walking.

Suddenly hundreds of birds flying off into the sky drew her attention.

"What's happening?" asked Snow White. Snow White was the weakest on the team, and she had a gentle personality who didn't enjoy fighting.

"It can be Stone Lion! Let's go there! Guards forward!" Reiko's angry facial expression disappeared, and she excitedly led her guards to where she saw the birds.

When Reiko and Snow White approached to the giant apple tree, they could not hide their astonishment. When the Pegasus horses saw the bright and juicy apples on the branches, they began to neigh. Their owners should have understood them! But they didn't have to worry. Because two princesses wanted to taste these apples at least as much as they did.

"I think we should take a break here." Reiko's eyes were shining and it was possible to see that she was drooling from the edge of her mouth.

"Yes," Snow White licked her little pink lips and gulped.

Two princesses came down from their horses with their guardians at the same time and began to run towards the tree. They had black dresses that were quite graceful and wrapped around their bodies. Reiko's golden buttons, gold boots, gold crown and tiny sun earrings were remarkable. Although Snow White was dressed the same as her step-sister, there were silver pieces instead of gold pieces. Her earrings were half moon shaped. She had a totally cold look with her white hair.

"Little tricks." Old man suddenly waved his hand and cluster of White dust spread around the tree. Blue coloured ancient figures appeared on the ground at everywhere they are on.

"Is this a shaman formation u mentioned before?" The blonde princess watched with amazement the rumored formation.

"Who is there?! Show yourself!" Old man brought a golden coloured shield from his spatial pockets of his red robes and yelled.

A man in black robe approached them with calm steps. His presence was almost non-existent as if he can blur any moment and disappear in air.

"An illusion formation. I knew it. What do you want from us? Is this tree also a part of your illusion? So it appeared to attract here!" Old man asked. Even though his words sound cautious. He doesn't even look like were in a bit of fear. Calmness in his eyes was scary.

The blurred person looked at the huge tree with a complex emotions inside. "A traitor huh? Don't you feel a bit of shame?" The stranger instead replying old man's questions asked his owns.

"Traitor? What are you talking about? I don't know any lowly being from this pitiful continent" Old man yelled when he called as traitor. This word angered him a lot.

"Continent? So you are not even from here… What you are here for?! A mighty shaman like you working with the enemies of shamanism. Stay aside and let me see who is your boss"

"You know nothing-" Before the old man talks more, Blonde girl stepped ahead and looked directly into the eyes of the stranger:

"Why do you think we are enemies of all shamans? Do you even believe your own words?"

"…" The stranger was aghast.

Reiko, The Sun Princess, narrowed her eyes. "A prochecy?"

"What?!" Old man couldn't help cry.

"You mean, there are also awaken ones, sis?" Snow White appeared behind Reiko asked in shock.

"Awaken ones? What are you talking about?" Stranger also couldn't help tremble with this unknown word.

Reiko smirked.

"So this will be the result of our actions. Interesting. So be it." Blonde girl smiled as she relieved from a huge stress.

"This mean, our mission will be succesful?" Old man was not sure the princess attitude suddenly changed.

"Fate… You cannot change it. Our mission success or not, the goal will be accomplished, that's certain." Snow White replied while in deep thoughts.

"Tell me! What are all these about?!" The stranger was feeling more and more anguished. He was lost.

"I, Princess of The Sun, Reiko in this trip to spread the words of The Immortal and give them a chance to join among us. My friend, we are not your enemy. We are here to save humanity instead of destroy."

"The- The Immortal?? Which creature you follow?!" The stranger staggered. Immortality was just a fiction humans dreamed. However for the shamans this was just a yet-to-proven reality due to their path extends human life. They knew one day they could find a way to achieve immortality. Even if that belief was exist, that was still a dream even for them too. Only weird alien creatures were living long enough to creature those rumours. So he thought these people maybe under of one of these undying creatures.

"Not a creature. The Immortal is a human. A human who has achieved immortality!" Old man replied with an imposing look.

"A human immortal?" The stranger fell in deep thought. "AH!" Dark flames appeared around his body and left behind black lines on his body after erupting and extinguishing. Illusion formation broke apart instantly. The stranger revealed to be a young boy around fifteen years old.

"You were too careless, kiddo." Old man caressed the dark ring on one of his fingers. Looked at the immobilised shaman. "What is your decision about this boy, majesty?"