E̶̮̍c̷̢̮̖͖̲̰̺̐̽͐͘͜͝ļ̷̲̟͕̱̋̈́͑̋i̶̞̰̲͎̼̲̍̈̈p̶̫̮̠̋̄̎̓s̴͇͔̏̌̿͛̄̋͐̚e̶̪͉̗̝̔̍͋̉̽̑̎́̔͗̍ ̷͓̘͔̫̹̼̮̒̃͊̕͠

[Aero Vermilion]

It was… dark. Unprecedented? No. I had the honor to experience this kind of phenomenon before.

But there was a difference between them.

What I had marveled before was a natural one. When nature decided, it was time, it happened.

This one before me was not. It was not anything close to natural. You could even say that it was against the world itself. Literally, this thing was fighting against the world. Though the world did not have the power to reject its dominion, it did not mean the world approved of this process.

Once again, it was dark. I felt like I was standing alone in the middle of the night. But even in the middle of the night you could see the starry stars and the shining moon.

Now, I could only see the hollow of light from the back of this 'thing.'

"Have you seen one before, Aero? I mean the real one… Not this fake augmented thing…" a voice asked from beside me.

"Yeah, I've seen one back in my homeworld."

"Really?! Is it as majestic as people say it is?"

"It is… But for me, this phenomenon always indicates an incoming omen…"

"Well anybody would agree with you if they see that…' the voice said, pointing towards the thing.

There was a long fissure in the sky. Hanging down from the fissure was half a body so large it covered the whole fissure. It forced its way out of the space tear, trying to descend on this world.

It was massive, titanic, colossal, any word that could describe its big size. Its head was that of a mummy, bandaged with black tattered clothes. Where the clothes cannot cover, shadows seeped through.

Its upper torso, the only thing that we could observe from this thing, was also of a dead body. Its two hands were bare of muscle and only bones but it glistened with mana and power.

Its body was also only bones and skeleton but the cluster of shadows inside its ribcage screamed death. It was so thick and concentrated it felt like a black hole.

Behind it was the blocked sun. Only some wisp of light could be seen behind this abomination, painting the world dark and black.

This was a phenomena people called a sun eclipse. You may argue either it was artificial or natural but for me every sun eclipse was the same. Every one of them was a harbinger of sorrow.

"I heard this was the third one and you joined every one of these assault missions before. No wonder you are not surprised with this thing," the voice said in marvel.

"Focus, Sul! I may have had some experience dealing with this thing but the past two missions were not without casualties. I hope to lessen the casualty rate by giving this assault team some of the precautionary measures I had learned from the previous missions."

"Sorry…" Sul said.

"Just… just don't let that thing get you okay? If it tries to grab you, do whatever it takes to escape it. Leave the rest to me," I patted Sul's shoulder walking towards the center of the campsite where other people awaited my debriefing.

I lied. 'Some casualty' my ass! How could you call it some casualty when more than half of the assault force were wiped out. Only Royals and Nobles stood a survival chance against this thing.

But what are Royals and Nobles? They were not some pebble you picked from the road side. How could we equipped a team with members consisting of only Nobles and Royals.

That was nigh impossible.

Every assault team was balanced with a composition of regular citizens, nobles and royals. And the previous two teams' casualties proved that regular citizens stood no chance against it.

And I was about to send them to their death.

In the end nothing changed. I was still the hopeless boy staring at the eclipse while letting others take my family apart.

***

We always had our celebration at noon when the sun was at its zenith. Our preparation was almost complete. The celebration was not a surprise but we still enjoyed them nonetheless.

The exciting part was when the celebrant opened their gifts. It was a tradition to guess whose present was which. Today, we celebrated the oldest son's birthday.

It was my birthday.

I tried to help wherever I could though my sibs would nag at me and asked me to take it easy for the day. It was my birthday after all.

"Aero! You're the birthday boy, so just sit here and play with the twins!" Astra said with her hands on her hips. She wore a white apron on her light blue blouse.

She was my first ever sibling, the second child and also the oldest daughter.

"What?!"

"We also want to help you in the kitchen!"

Two cute voices replied in unison. These two wore matching blue and white lined clothes.

"You're helping the birthday boy remain idle. You two can do that, right?"

"..."

"..."

They did not have anything to refute but still they did not want to do nothing while others contributed for the party. They came running to me and grabbed the hem of my shirt.

"Big brother, can't you do anything about this," the boy pair asked.

Sky Vermilion. The youngest boy in the house. Well, you could say he was the only boy after me.

I gave him a defeated look.

The girl of the pair then asked innocently, "You can't do anything about your little sister? Aren't you supposed to be the eldest one?"

Sylphy was Sky's twin. They often fight for the older twin spot. While I know that Sky was the older one, almost all of the time, Sylphy was the mature one between them.

It's not that I could not refute her, or Astra in that matter. It's just that I knew how deadly disastrous these two could be in the kitchen.

"Let's just keep our hands away from the kitchen for today, shall we?" I asked with a grin, it would be hell if these two little devils got in the kitchen.

""Awwww!""

Astra and I were at our wits end. We didn't know how to handle these two in their stubborn mode. Luckily, the pro came to our rescue.

"Why don't…" she started as she clapped her hands, "... both of you help Aero find a good meat for the pie. That way, you are still helping the kitchen by preparing the ingredients."

A girl with twin tails, came out from the kitchen. She was whisking something in the bowl.

Luna Vermilion. Literally the middle child. She was the expert when it came to negotiating. Especially with these two cute little troublemakers.

While Astra actually did not want me to do anything, Luna compromised and made me look after the twins by bringing them out for some little hunt.

"Okay! I will bring back the biggest prey!" the boy shouted.

"Hmmph! Bigger isn't always better. I'll catch the most delicious one!"

"How could you know it is delicious without cooking it first?"

"I know because it's me!"

The two argued as they walked to the front door.

The three of us just exchanged a knowing look and shrugged shoulders.

"Astra! Luna!" our mama's gentle voice called from the kitchen.

""Coming!"" the two of them answered in unison.

"Good luck, Aero!" they wished me, before rushing back into the kitchen.

***

We did not go too far into the forest. We knew only the outer forest had wards that drove away stroger beasts. Only the ignorant, weak ones got in.

And they were our prey for today.

Both of them got a nice plump white rabbit. Plump was a bit undervalue though as the rabbit was half the size of the two of them.

The two of them raced back to the house, while I followed silently from behind them. Overall, it was a peaceful hunt.

It was, until it was not.

Out of nowhere, we heard a loud resounding horn that sent goosebumps up our spine. We stopped in our tracks or more accurately we were stunned.

The world got darker and darker ever so slowly. And as we gaze up to the sky, we see the sky split apart. Out of it came, a humongous black hand that blocked the sun.

A sun e̵̯̙̽̾͠c̴̱͓͈̈́̅̀̕l̴̖̜͖͘ĩ̸̬̣̊̈́͘p̸̥̬͚̪̎͜s̶̲̼͆̔͐͆̍͘͜e̸̳̓.

The ground suddenly cracked. I was separated from Sky and Sylphy.

""Aewo… Aewo!"" in fright, both of them called for my help.

Their teary faces seemed to become smaller and smaller as time went by.

'Oh, that's right. I fell into the fissure.'

And when I came to be, I was in The Mine.

-̴̘͎̘̗͚̮͎̒̑͑-̴͉̟͕̣̤͗̃͝-̵̡̲͉̥̌͑

̶͎̲͖̼̣͛̔

"Woah, woah, woah! Easy there little guy…" a gentle hand enveloped the boy's eyes.

"You had seen enough for today," she said as she hugged the boy from behind.

The boy's breathing was ragged. He could not remember how many times he had seen those memories, played on repeat.

It was a short respite of the good times, then came the long suffering of his adversary.

A word muttered from his mouth.

"Eclipse!"