Chapter 02 What to do, What not to do?

It has been an hour since I woke up, at the moment I was having a conversation with the only person I could in my current situation.

" So, you are telling me that I am a prince".

"Yeesh".

" And I am in prison because I lost the war of succession".

"Yes, you can say that, but technically it was not a war, it was a duel".

" So, he beat me up in a duel, but you just said to me that I'm the only child of the King, so technically shouldn't I get to be the King".

"Yes, Master, but don't you remember what you did? You tried to force yourself on Lord Arzil's eldest daughter, Miss Diana, that is why Lord Arzil challenged you for a duel in the name of the 'CREATOR', and after you lost, he ordered the soldiers to throw you in the prison, fuck how hell did that piece of shit beat master up in front of me, I'm sure, he was trying to provoke me, that shithead, let him do something like that again, I will hang him by his balls in the street"'

At the end of her explanation, the warrior went on to violent self-reflection/monologue, when Theo's loud voice brought her back to reality.

" WHAT AN IDIOT? WHY WOULD HE DO THAT?".

"W-who?"

" Oh, sorry, I mean me, why would I do that?".

"Well, you do drink a lot and whenever you are drunk you aren't able to control yourself".

" Was I a drunkard or something?".

"Don't you remember that master? That one time you were so drunk that you went after the wife of the tavern owner, and that ignorant fool, he threw you out without knowing that you are the prince and next hair to the thrown. I got so angry after that incident that I distro...hh...I asked the owner to leave town".

" No, I don't, and Who the hell is this Lord Arzil?".

"Master, Lord Arzil is your uncle, don't you remember him? That sick old pervert tried to recruit me for himself, that shit head wanted to take me away from my beloved master, and now look what that old fart has done, that you can't even remember who that old fart is. "

{ I don't even know who you are, how the hell would I know who this uncle of mine is?}.

Theo thought to himself. He saw the girl yawning and looked up, through the crack on the roof Theo could see that the sky was going dark and the sun was going down.

" Looks like it'll be evening soon, why don't you rest for some time?".

"How can I do that, I'm your bodyguard, I have to keep watch'.

She was rubbing her eyes while doing that which made her look very cute, if not for her foul mouth, she would have been perfect.

"Ok, then do this, lay down next to me, and if somebody does attack me you'll be the first to know".

" I-I can do that?".

With wide eyes and a smiling face, her face looked too excited.

"Yes, you can ".

" O-ok then, if you don't mind".

She went and laid down next to Theo and after some time a pleasant breathing sound could be heard in the prison cell.

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The whole prison cell was dark, there was not a single source of light in there. There was only the crack on the roof from which one can see the sky. It was evening, the sun was already settled, the atmosphere was silent all I could hear was prison rats.

{Looks like she was very exhausted}.

The warrior girl fell asleep beside me.

{ I should ask her name after she wakes up, well I would also have to come up with a reason for my amnesia}.

I had already come to realize that my situation was not normal, and was definitely, had something to do with the red book that I found in that library.

{ For now, I should relax and get some rest, I have a feeling that tomorrow will be a busy day}.

I closed my eyes and tried to sleep a little.

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Moon was out in its full bravado, not a soul was awake. Outside the prison, the guards had fallen asleep for a while now, inside the prison, two people were sleeping behind the bars, the girl was lying on the ground, and the boy was beside her leaning against the wall.

The girl looked in her early 20s and the boy looked like he was still in his teenage, maybe 15 or 16 years old.

"M-master Alex, don't you remember me?".

The girl was mumbling something in her sleep, lying on the ground so defencelessly some may think if they looked at her right now that she is just a naive girl with a gorgeous looking face, but she was among one of the most feared warriors in this part of the continent, nobody who had challenged her lived to tell the tails about their duel.

Her only weakness was her love for a certain someone, for the boy who was sleeping next to her, her master, Prince of Northwich, Alexander the second.

It is said that in ancient times, there was a legendary warrior, nobody knows what his name was, but it was widely known that he had the power to create something out of thin air, which gave him the name " CREATOR", the legend has it that some 10s of thousands of years ago an army of the demons were ruling over the continent and it was the "CREATOR" who defeated their king and drove the demon army behind the red forest in the southeastern part of the continent. After that, he established the first human empire, and the name of the empire was the Northwich empire. The empire does not exist at present and where the empire's capital used to be is where the present Northwich kingdom is situated in.

Nowadays most people believe this story to be a myth, any scholars who researched ancient history never found any evidence of their being any demon army or a demon empire. Those who believe the stories to be true, which is not many, point towards the red forest, which is a real place, and most would say is more dangerous than the one in the stories. If you know the location of a certain place, where supposedly, a "historic event" then proving the history true or false becomes easier, but not here. Nobody knows what's on the other side of the forest because anybody who has ever entered the forest never came out if a normal person even comes close to the forest they choke to death. this has made it harder to prove or disprove the historicity of the story.

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It was somewhere past midnight, Alex was deep in his sleep, mixed with the sound of rats searching for food, there was a very soft sound of something crumbling. Alex had a bracelet on his left arm, it was a gift given to him by his father, the bracelet was made from something that looked similar to silver and it had three white-colored gems stuck to it but right now there were only two gems left on it and the third gem was missing, there was some white dust-like substance on the ground which got blown away by a gust of wind

After a few minutes, later another one of the gems got eroded and crumbled into white dust, and after some time the last gem was also gone. The surrounding area around the prison got completely muted, not even the sound of the rats or crickets could be heard, as if they got scared of something and hid in silence.

In the sleepy hours at night, the environment changed from hot to cold and from cold to rain, and from rain to stormy. If something like this happened during the day, it would have caused a commotion, but everyone was sleeping right now, except some.

Alex was breathing raggedly, his clothes were drenched in sweat.

" Master, could you please let me sleep, yesterday was a very exhausting day, you know".

Rubbing her eyes, the warrior girl arose from the ground and got into a sitting position, and turned around, but just as she got her eyes on Alex, bright powerful energy was unleashed from his unconscious body. It was so strong that it threw the girl and she got her head smashed on the wall.

" What is this mind suppression? is master doing it?"

Even though she got hit very hard, she instantly got on her feet, there was not a scratch on her.

" Master has never practiced spirit arts in his life, he never showed any talent for it, how is he able to do it now all of a sudden?".

She tried to get closer to Alex but was instead pushed back again.

"AAAAAA.......WHY IS THERE A BARRIER AROUND HIM?".

The girl was getting frustrated, she had only one purpose in life, which was to keep her master safe from all danger but in just a single day she has failed in her duty multiple time, she was unable to do anything when the when king disappeared, nor when lord Arzil beat Alex up in a duel, nither now when she is helplessly looking at the scene in front of her unable to do something.

" If there is an energy barrier surrounding him, then is he having a breakthrough right after his spiritual awakening. How is that even possible?".

Inside the barrier, Alex's body was lying on the ground, immobile, it was not visible to anyone but right now Alex's whole was covered in some odd symbols, that was crawling in a particular direction, around Alex's chest. There was a peculiar light pouring out of his chest, it was in the shape of a string. This whole time Alex's body was covered by a translucent red light, as all the symbols came together around his chest, the red light covering him made his body hover in mid-air.

Looking at the bizarre things happening to her beloved Master made the girl afraid of what might happen next, she had witnessed countless warriors go through the process of spiritual awakening, and subsequent breakthrough, she has gone through this process herself, but she had never seen something so bizarre during someones spiritual awakening.

{ Why is this happening, this is not a normal awakening, he is breaking through right after his spiritual awakening, he has not done any preparation for the breakthrough, it could be dangerous for him.}

Standing there feeling powerless, unable to help her master in, she clenched her fist tightly in anger.

" I have to do something".

She raised her hand and punched the barrier'

-BOOM

It sounded like a bomb had exploded.

-BOOM

Another punch.

{I know, this might destroy any chance he has of ever making a breakthrough in the future, but at least he will still be alive if I let this continue, he might not survive the last part, the solitary path, in the process of breaking through}.

-BOOM.

While she had decided on her route, Alex's journey had still not started. The string-shaped light flickered as the third punch landed, taking this as a sign of danger, the barrier around Alex started responding to the punches by giving back force equal to the punch. When the two forces crashed against each other the walls got cracked, the prison tower shook so hard that a piece of the roof fell, the girl had decided what she had to do to save her master so she kept on punching.

-BOOM

The metal bars got bent and broken and surrounded by all this destruction a creation was taking place inside the barrier. The string-shaped light has started going through the symbols, sewing them together as one. As the light took more and more symbols together, the new creation started taking shape.

-BOOM.

The walls of the prison were strong, but even they could not take so much abuse and crumble under the force, and as the roof fell one could see that on Alex's chest there was a black curved symbol, if one looked closer they could see that it was the mathematical symbol for zero.