24) The origin of the kingdoms

After a few hours of explaining, Ryker had finally stopped asking questions, meaning he finally understood. He had gained so much information that in his map now appeared the names of the kingdoms and their locations but the rest was still black.

From his understanding, there were four continents in this world. Mervin, the northern continent, where they were right now. Agari, the southern continent, had Empires divided by races instead of Kingdoms divided by affinities. Morte, the western continent. At first, they didn't want to tell him about it but he annoyed them so much that they told him it was the land of the dead, ruled by the Undead, the living were treated as slaves. And finally, there was Forbean, the eastern continent, the forbidden land. No one knew anything about that continent because no one had ever come back from it. In the middle of it all, there was "Black Tower Island".

The Black Tower was the place that held information about The Ancients. There were ruins all over the world but the information held there was scarce. Every year, an expedition would be sent in an attempt to retrieve more information from the tower. But the island was protected by mythological beasts. Sometimes they would let people through and other times they would annihilate the entire expedition. So far they had found no pattern to the attacks so they had to keep doing it. It was also believed that the Black Tower was where the apocalypse originated but so far that was only an urban legend.

As for why the princesses of every kingdom looked the same it was complicated. It was a prophecy type of thing. Even though the kingdoms were ruled by men, they were inherited by women. The people who founded the kingdoms were their ancestors. Four identical sisters became rulers of their own land. It is said that the gods, or some form of a higher power, had taken a liking to them. They eventually found love, got married, and had children. Their first child was always a woman with the same characteristics as them. They had different parents and different mothers but they always looked like sisters.

It had been like that ever since. Then, the firstborn of the kingdom would inherit it and they would choose the ruler. Although they had no control over the kingdom's affairs, they were still regarded as the true owners of the kingdoms. They had a special connection between them. No one knew the specifics of this connection as they had an oath not to tell anyone. That included the annoying Ryker.

As for the guardians of the kingdoms, they were beings of incredible power who could not be bought. They were pure of heart. But in every light, there is darkness. A couple of decades ago, the King of Shadows had attacked the Kingdom of Light. To everyone's surprise, the shadow guardian was part of the attack. The light guardian did not intervene as they would only do so when the life of one of the sisters was in peril. The King of Shadows was pushed back by the joined forces of the other three kingdoms. He had only used his shadows to attack since then. People were starting to worry that he might be preparing for a final strike and without the help of the guardians, the other kingdoms would perish.

Their only hope was to free the shadow guardian but for that, the four princesses had to meet. Right now, the princesses were on their way to save their sister. They had escaped from their respective kingdoms and met at Feywood village. They never expected for a shadow raid to happen while they were there.

While they explained all of this to Ryker, Holden was sitting on a tree nearby with his eyes closed. He would sometimes gasp and others shudder. Ryker assumed he was having one of his visions. He was very curious about what these visions showed him so he asked. Fortunately for them, Ava had a device that could create images. It was like an IPad used for drawing. So Holden started drawing his vision.

The first thing he did was write:

"Me: *Says gracias to Spanish waiter*

Waiter: *Replies in Spanish*

Me:"

And then he drew a yellow rat with a sombrero and a mustache.

Ryker was dumbfounded, was Holden serious? This was his vision?

The triplets who looked like triplets but were not triplets were looking at Holden with a mixture of amazement and suspicion. They had never seen anything like this. If it truly were a vision of the past, they would not need the Black Tower anymore.

Holden then started drawing another thing. This time he wrote:

"Couples getting married in 2021 engagement photos like:"

And then he drew two people in hazard suits with gas masks laying in the grass.

This time, Ryker could not help himself.

"Are you serious? Your visions are memes?!?!?!?!?!?!?"

"How do you know that word? It has appeared before in my visions but you have no way of knowing that unless you also have visions"

This time, four pairs of eyes were directed at him as everyone grew suspicious of Ryker. They realized that he was a stranger to them. And he somehow knew about Holden's visions? Who was he? Ryker realized he was in trouble now. If he came here and told them they were not real and lived in a video game what would be the consequences? If he has banned from the game, his life would be ruined, again. So he decided to go for the obvious response.

"The daughter of the neighbor of my friend's cousin had some visions a few years ago and he told me." -he then plastered the most innocent smile he could and prayed to all the gods that they would believe him.

"That makes sense" -the four of them said at the same time while nodding.

'Gosh, I am surrounded by idiots.'