Winged

Chapter 3: Past and Present

"I think I probably will," Leo said, settling in his seat.

"You'll probably learn this story in greater detail later, so summarizing will do little harm. You see, a few thousand years ago the doors between our worlds were always open, and people and creatures from both worlds could freely travel between them. The people of the Other World, as a whole, didn't have explicit knowledge of this one, but they would sometimes see things from here, and a few of them even came here and stayed. The two worlds coexisted in peace for a while."

"And by 'for a while' I imagine..." Instead of finishing, Leo's eyes widened in shock and pointed to something behind Frederick. "What is that?"

Frederick turned around to see what Leo was pointing at. It was a humanoid creature, but enormous, both in height and in width. The creature had green skin, sharp teeth, and a small thatch of black hair on its head. It walked along the road whistling happily to itself and carrying an enormous pickaxe.

"That is an orc," Frederick said, turning back around. "Now as I was saying—"

"Wait a minute," Leo interrupted, baffled. "You can't just say 'that is an orc' and expect that to be enough of an explanation."

"From the axe I gather he is a woodsman."

"Oh, good," Leo said, hoping Frederick would pick on the sarcasm this time. "That makes it all clearer."

"Good. As I was saying, the two worlds coexisted peacefully, but eventually some of the people from your world grew resentful and angry towards the people from here. They deemed them unnatural, especially the non-human beings, magical creatures and magic users."

"Magic?" Leo's eyes opened wide again.

"Yes," Frederick looked at him with a certain amount of disbelief. "Has the idea not occurred to you already?"

"Point taken." That I'm an idiot. "Move on."

"Some of these people were powerful; kings, emperors, or other leaders. They wanted to banish these 'unnatural' foreigners, people or beasts. Eventually, a war broke out, and the people of This World were hunted, imprisoned or killed. So they, along with a few supporters from the Other World, fled here to hide, closing as many portals as they could find, so they could remain safe. It was lucky that the vast majority of the people from the Other World didn't know about this one."

"Can I interrupt again? I know that's what you call them, but there's too many 'worlds' in this explanation. Can't you call them something else?"

"What would you prefer?"

"I don't know..." Leo looked to the sky, thinking. "Magicland."

Frederick raised an eyebrow, as if objecting to the new name.

"Very well. After many years of war there were no more people from This Wor... I mean, Magicland in your world. They were either here or dead. Our enemies were unable to find a way into Magicland."

"But this can't be," Leo interrupted again. "If there had been a big war against Magicland, we would have known. I mean, we studied our history, there hasn't been anything like that."

"I was getting there. After the war, those kings and leaders wanted to erase all traces of Magicland, so as to not encourage new contact. And as I have mentioned, the people here tried the same thing, erasing their existence from the consciousness of 'other-worlders', for fear of a new attack. I'm willing to wager that there is a period in your world's history that is a little cloudier than the rest. It's probably about a thousand years ago or so. And in records from before that period, magical creatures are more commonly mentioned than after that period. After the war, there was a widespread attempt to erase or discredit accounts about our world. It was in the interest of our safety that you forgot all about us, so with our help we were gradually forgotten. Over time, the same happened here, and only a select few know about the two worlds. Of course some people didn't forget so soon. A commoner would tell their children about a dragon he had seen before or during the war, and those children would tell their children, who would tell their children. This would go on to the point where everyone had heard of dragons, but no one had ever seen one, and the dragon became a myth."