As I settled down I arranged my things and went to sleep so I could pass my time.
----
Upon waking up it was already dusk. We stopped at a restaurant and ate some food then resumed our trip. I wanted to make sure that I get to my destination as quickly as possible since I didn't want to waste time.
I started to meditate again in the carriage so I can use my time productively. I started to break through my light black stage and into my pure black stage which is a big leap forward. My body felt as if it was boosted several times over both physically and mentally.
As I continued to meditate, time passed by faster than I thought. After I opened my eyes it was already the next day so it means I have been meditating for more than ten hours.
"Young master Alex, it seems like there is a problem ahead." The driver said through the glass window that was separating us.
"Hmm? What is it?" I asked as I snapped back to reality. Looking ahead I saw a huge explosion followed by fire spreading through the forest.
"Young master, should we turn back?" He asked hurriedly.
"No, keep going until I say so." I said. I wanted to see what happened ahead, if the situation isn't as bad as it seems we might be able to save some lives.
"Are you sure about this? Your safety comes first." He said hesitantly.
As we crept closer towards the fire we saw several carriages with fancy symbols on the side.
'I've seen those symbols before... I just can't pinpoint where exactly.' It was like on the tip of my tongue but I just couldn't get it out.
"Stop here." I ordered as the carriage came to a stop. We were just a few meters away from the gigantic fire that was spreading through the woods. There were the carriages I saw before, in the middle of the whole fire.
I opened the door and stepped out of the carriage.
"Young master, what are you doing?!" A mix of surprise and concern was laced in his voice.
"Helping, of course." I answered simply. I have the confidence that I could at least save one or two lives with my current level right now.
"B- But-" He stuttered.
"No buts, I'm going to go in." I took off my jacket and used it as a mask for the smoke that was caused by the fire.
Using the mana around me, I concentrated it into my legs and started sprinting forwards towards the carriages.
"Young Master!" The driver yelled as I ran towards the fire, his voice slowly got fainter and fainter as I ran further away from him.
As I got closer I jumped over the fire using my mana to enhance my leg strength. I looked around for people that were still alive. I had to say that if it wasn't for my past life I would've fainted at the sight of these dead and disoriented bodies that were laying on the floor.
"Someone! Help!" I heard a muffled scream of a little girl in one of the carriages. Quickly, I sprinted towards the noise and looked into the glass of the carriage. I tried to open the carriage door but it was stuck.
'Crap, this was going to be harder than I thought.' Once again, enhancing the mana into my arms I tried to pry open the door once again. This time I heard a small *crack* followed by a series of other cracking noises.
"Push the door from the inside!" I screamed from behind my mask. The girl inside didn't hesitate and pushed the door. As we kept trying to pry the door open the fire around us began to spread quickly.
Finally, the door broke free and the girl landed on top of me. As I looked up I saw a little girl with... with horns! She was one of the dragonkins! We both quickly got up and tried to find a way out.
I spotted a small opening in which we could squeeze through. "Come here." I said, pulling her towards the small spot.
"Here, quickly go in before it collapses." We were surrounded by fallen trees, this was the only way I found. She didn't say anything and quickly went through the whole swiftly.
As I tried to go through, a tree log collapsed on my leg.
'Shit, does god hate me this much.' The pain was unbearable, the wood was on fire so it burned the skin on my leg, also adding the weight of the log it also broke some bones in my leg.
"Oh no!" The girl yelled as she came and grabbed my arm, trying to pull me out. Good thing that the driver from the carriage followed me here, he quickly came and pulled me out from under the log.
"Ahhh!" My leg slid out but my legs were still broken and burnt from the log.
"Hold on, young master." He hurriedly carried me to the carriage and laid me on the seats.
"Oh, god. This was worse than I thought." He muttered to himself.
"T- take the medicine in t- the pouch." I coughed out, it felt as if someone was peeling my skin away slowly.
He quickly got the pouch out and grabbed some medicine out, putting some cream on my leg and bandaged it up. The cream was cold so it soothed my leg, it was like heaven's touch.
I heaved a sigh of relief as I sat up, leaning against the chair. I looked around and noticed the dragon girl was standing just a bit outside of the carriage.
"What's your name?" I asked, tilting my head a little bit.
"I'm sorry, my name is Aria Alder. I come from the dragonkin, just call me Ari." She bowed in 45 degrees.
"No need to bow, and it's good that you're alive, Aria." I said genuinely. The girl has silver hair that reached under her shoulders, two large round violet eyes. She wore a white, elegant dress that reached just above her knees paired with a teairra and a pair of sandals. Her black and electric purple horns weren't fully grown yet since she's still young, but the color collided together greatly. Her horns matched her eyes too.
"So what's your name." She smiled happily.
"Alexander Hollows, but you can just call me Alex." I smiled back at her.
"So, where were you heading? And were your parents with you?" I asked.
"I was heading to my kingdom, and my parents were waiting for me there but something happened while we were on the way." She said, disappointed.
"Young master, I think we are heading to the same destination." He bowed politely.
"Well that's goo-" I was cut off when I saw a big wyvern in the sky.
"Aria! You're alive!" A voice boomed in the sky.
"Father!" She yelled, she hesitated if she wanted to stay here or go to her parents.
"Go." With these simple words she went running towards them. The wyverns landed near our carriage and the lights hopped off the wyverns helping her parents off. They all hugged and reunited.
"Young master... Th- that's the emperor and empress of the dragonkins." He stuttered in astonishment.
"I can see." I knew she was someone important just by glancing at their clothes and the carriages in the fire.
As Aria talked to them, their heads turned towards me. They started to walk towards me, Aria running ahead of them.
"This is Alex! He was the one who saved me." She smiled at them sweetly. The emperor turned his head towards me, "So you're Alex? James's son? And I'm correct."
"Ah, yes. How do you know my father's name?" I asked suspiciously.
"Hahaha, no need to be suspicious. We're your parent's old friends. My husband here is Ryker and I'm Kathryn Alder." She said politely.
"I'm sorry, with my leg right now I can barely bow nor stand." I apologized.
"No need to bow, since that old James finally has a child you count as my nephew now." Ryker chuckled.
"So Uncle and Aunt?" I asked, it sounded a bit weird for me to say, it was unusual for me since I've never had an Uncle or Aunt. Both of them nodded, satisfied with the names.
"Alex, you can come with us since we're heading to the same destination, no?" Uncle Ryker said. I looked at the driver who was just standing there, waiting for my order.
"Sure, uh, you can head back." I said to the driver as he nodded and said, "Have a safe trip, young master."
"Come on, Alex! Let's go!" She said happily while dragging me towards one of the wyverns.
'She sure has grown close to me in such a short time, so dangerous...' If it was me I would still have been on guard just in-case, not everyone who's nice is actually nice. She's lucky that I'm not those two-faced people.
"Uh, how do you ride this." I looked at the gigantic wyvern that was looking down in me like a small ant.
"Just climb on, these wyverns are all trained." Ryker said, assuring me. I climbed up with the help of a guard being my temporary stool. Aria then climbed on behind me and grabbed my waist. The wyvern started to flap its wings, less than a minute later we were flying in the sky to Zetra (The capital of Escrane).
In a matter of minutes we arrived at Zetra, I kept a note in my mind that flying will be easier next time.
'What if I invent flying magic?' It would be a game changer if I could fly.
"Tell the guards at the gates to stand down!" Ryker yelled through the howling wind.
I've read in a book that the dragonkin went into hiding after the great war, it seemed like they used some type of magic in-order to hide their whole kingdom, it must've been hard just by estimating the size of this kingdom. But I wanted to ask how can people not run into this, it's not like you can walk through this whole thing, right?
"I have a question." I said, turning towards Ryker.
"Go ahead, ask away." He leaped off of his wyvern.
"Estimating the size of this country, the buildings, people, e.t.c., what magic do you use to conceal your kingdom? And how can people not run into it?" I was quite curious, and since I've been curious all the time I always asked questions.
"Well, if you want me to give you a lecture, then sure." He waved his hands to the knights, signaling them to go off first.
"Alright then, let's start from the bottom. Do you know that there are two types of mana? On is the mana that is commonly used, but there is also another kind of mana called quin. But the difference from mana and quin, is that quin can only produce one kind of magic, aether. Aether equals raw magic, unlike mana, aether isn't in your body. Aether can only be produced from your surroundings." He said, as he continued.
"Most people don't know about Aether because it was made by our ancestors. Now, we don't have records of how aether was even made but we know how to use it. Sometimes you don't have to find the starting point to know everything." He paused.
"Because of the experiments our ancestors have done to each other, we have aether flowing in our very beings. Since our blood has branched out to many beings, there were also half dragons, but there were barely any since we didn't like to socialize with other races. Now there are two ways of having aether, either 1: You are born as a dragon, or 2: you become a knight whose soul is tied to a royal blood, that means that if either one of you dies, the other will suffer the same fate." He said slowly, making sure I heard the last few details.
"So, moving onto your second question. Aether is like the secret fifth element, compared to the common four elements, fire, water, earth, air. When using aether it equals to spacetime magic, in which we can 'create' an artificial dimension in which we hide. And in-order to open this second dimension, you need to have spacetime magic." He explained, while slowly walking in.
"Now I know you might be still confused, but you'll understand it soon." Ryker assured me.
"So in short, only the dragonkin/half-dragons have quin running in your bodies, and quin is different from mana. Quin can be turned into aether, in which again, can only be used by 2 different categories. And by manipulating aether you can make spactime magic. So you used spacetime magic to 'create' a separate dimension where all of you hide because you are introverts." I summed up.
"Wow kid, you sure do understand things fast. And well the introvert part was a little bit over the top, you've got everything down." Ryker happily said.
"He sure has the brains from his mother." Kathryn chuckled lightly.
"Come on, father, mother." Aria said, grabbing me by my hands and pulled me towards the portal that was left open for us.
As we stepped into the portal, I felt my body shiver. After less than a second we arrived at the kingdom. I could hear chattering from the people, some applauding and others cheering.