"Khushboo is located in the West Bank. You'll have to travel... Well... west and they'll be right before the river but..." The Khanhawar woman explained as she stood by the irrefutable gates of kingdom Qasin.
"What did you see?" Balencia asked, well aware that the Khanhawar warrior had discovered something that almost made her tie her tongue in shame.
"I saw something I was unaware of, warrior. I saw... The race on the other side of the river... They are being subjected to immense suffering by the ones on this side of the kingdom. And we didn't even know or throw our metal shields for protection. The rest is for you to discover" The Khanhawar warrior explained as she tightly pressed her palms together in discomfort.
Balencia and Rehamal entered Kingdom Qasin with a weight sitting on their chests for their hearts knew that there was an neverending suffering looming over the land. One only a true warrior would be able to put it to an end, but even then, it would be a long excruciating journey.
"I wonder if... That's my race..." Rehamal thought to herself as her own memories came flushing back like the uncontrollable rivers. Her memories were suffering and they were literally engraved onto her tainted skin like ink penetrated.
It didn't take long for them to arrive at the West Bank, as the loud sounds of missiles and gunshots were like a guiding northern star, but unlike the star, the destination was one no one wished to arrive at.
Soldiers stood by the borders with their guns and protection aiming at a group of people that in no way radiated any form of threat. Upon crossing the border the other side was just a bunch of civilians with torn up shirts and flip flops digging for their loved ones under the rubbles.
"What... What happened here?" Balencia said shocked to see such destruction. The 223km acre land was all at one level from the demolished homes, hospitals, and institutes. The land had turned ashy gray with white fluff floating in the air from the aftermath of destruction. All one would see and hear was fathers and mothers pulling children and babies out from the rubble, hoping it was theirs, running with them in their arms towards the doctors in hope that they were still alive. But that same hope was like a flame that had burned all the wax down.
"Mamaaaa!!! Mamaaaa!!!" A small boy covered in dust and dirt screamed as he ran mindlessly like a lost puppy trying to see if he recognised anyone. Balencia immediately ran to the little boys' aid, picking him up in her arms. He reminded her of Tini and his little body seemed so fragile, just like hers.
"Where did you come from?" She asked him as she wiped the dried blood off his forehead. But the boy didn't answer, he just looked around with such emptiness in his eyes that if one saw what he had seen our brains would make our eyes turn blind to never see such sights again.
"Let's take him to where the doctors are! At least they'll be able to take care of him" Rehamal recommended as she watched the sapphire eyes of the boy twitch and tremble. Anyone would be able to see that his sapphire ornaments was the same as Rehamal's.
The three rushed to the small house that supposedly was a hospital. Father's running with their children chaotically entered the hospital with their eyes maniacally trying to find help. Yet the starved, thirsty, and exhausted doctors would run trying to help but it was all like watching falling dominos pieces.
They saw children trembling with trauma. A little girl holding her new born baby sister in her arms as she herself starred into space emotionlessly. On the hospital beds was another baby given oxygen by her older brother that was passed away in the same bed. There were mothers kneeled to the hospital floors cradling their babies, daughters and sons as they were wrapped in white cloth with their once names written on. Doctors would randomly scream and cry when they realised the patient was their own families. The hospital was filled with cries, scream, blood, and death.
"What kind of monsters have done this?" Balencia bellowed as her golden illuminances shined brightly. The controller of electricity turned to go back to the soldiers at the border and blow them up.
"Hey HEY!" A man's voice called from behind. Balencia turned around to see a middle aged man with his doctors robe but flip flops on his feet covered in dust and debris. He ran over to Balencia as if he knew exactly who she was.
"I've been told to aid you in finding Khushboo, this way! Hurry! We don't have much time before the missiles come back" He panicked as he yanked Balencia's arm towards him.
The man took the little boy from Balencia leading her and Rehamal to a prison with only two guards surrounding it. The prison was ugly, and looked as if they were harbouring the worst of criminals, yet behind those iron doors were just innocent souls they wished to silence.
"I'll escort you out of the kingdom once you come out but hurry!" The man pressed cradling the little boy in this own arms. The way he would swing the little boy up and down was no where near to comforting. But could you blame him? The poor man had become a ticking time bomb and still, he tried comforting the children of destruction.
They entered the world of isolation. The deary dungeon was all-consuming. Once you entered, you lost the ability to smile or feel joy. The spirits of the tortured souls roamed the cells and halls like ashes of creatures that never tamed unshackled, even after death. As the metal bars rattled close behind Balencia and Rehamal, their eyes grew used to the dim light. The dingy cement reeked of loss, tattooed with the life stolen by steel and metal. The guards stood in front of the cells with prisoners, the hall of cells before that of the dead prisoners that the prison was too rotten to even clean up.
As Balencia and Rehamal approached the guards, the controller of electricity charged her illuminance ready to win a battle long awaited.
"HEY! WHO ARE YOU?! STOP!" The guard yelled walking towards them as if he was the authority of humankind. Rehamal took a step back remembering the days her Yaba was held captive.
"Disgrace! This land is a disgrace! No matter what part of the land I step on, it has blood of the innocent running through its lake!" Balencia roared underneath her breath. The anger and frustration of the land she once had hope for took over her and before the guard had a chance to yell once more, Balencia shot her golden light like the very airstrikes flying over them and blew up his entire face. (SPLAT) Blood splattered across Balencia's face as if she was an abstract painting. With that, the guard fell immediately to the floor. The guard behind him stood shivering, he was so fearful that he was unable to utter a single word. Balencia didn't even give him that chance as she served him the same fate as his friend.
"The coast is clear. Let's find her" Balencia bellowed as she started jolting down the halls looking for Khushboo. She shot her illuminance at every cell door opening it up. The prisoners were terrified for surely they weren't free, were they?
"You only have limited time! Escape!" Rehamal told the prisoners as she pointed to the way out. The prisoners ran out of their cells like brainless zombies, jolting, crawling, running towards the daylight.
At the very last cell a recognisable figure laid face first onto the ground. Tears welled up in Balencia's eyes as the long clay coloured hair was of one she couldn't deny.
"Khushboo! Damnit!" Balencia panicked. The doe-eyed maiden lifted her tired face with a faint smile. She was unable to see from the swelling of a billion lashes to the face but the voice of her saviour was one she would always recognise.
Balencia threw herself next to Khushboo forcing the beaten vixen to steady herself on her. Her body was malnourished, and hair tinned. She was bleeding from places unable to trace and her skin had turned yellow and deadly. Rehamal ran up behind Balencia steadying the tortured vixen against themselves.
"Shit! What did they do to you?" Rehamal wailed as she grabbed Khushboo's waist making sure not to drop her. For if she did she would crack immediately like a broken vase.
"ARHHHHHH" Balencia roared out of frustration and anger. She seemed to have picked up Zunaid's aggression for the look in her eyes were ultimate vengeance.
The three stumbled out of the prison watching the free captives roam in confusion. In the midst was the man that was guiding them and he came running towards them.
"Hurry! You don't have much time!" He said as he started running towards the parlor occasionally looking back at the struggling three.
"Where's the baby?" Balencia asked the man who no longer was cradling the little boy he was given.
"He's with the doctors. The trauma put him in cardiac arrest... I don't know if..." The man stopped as he dragged a small kayak boat out. A Boy... A child... So traumatised it caused him heart failure? What... What is this world? Balencia despaired in her thoughts.
"Listen! The only way out is through the sea. Travel north west and you'll end by kingdom Laham in about 35 minutes." The man explained in a franzy. Balencia helped Khushboo onto the boat into Rehamal's lap and for a second looked back at the devilish prison and then, the innocent people who were deprived of a chance for a good life.
"Balencia! We have to go!" Rehamal cried. The illuminated warrior stared at her hands watching the golden light radiate through them. Her light traced the wrinkles in her palms and there was only one way she could make it stop.
"I have been given a power by the weeping willow. I shall use half of it for destruction and half of it for hope." She muttered as she slammed her palms into the ground on both sides. (ZOOM) Her golden illuminance traveled through the ground like the roots of trees. Her left hand led the light to the prison (BOOM) and blew up the house of nightmares in an instant. The right hand, traveled to a small mountain behind one of the hospitals (BOOM) and blew up a hole, where fresh water gushed out of it.
"Am...amazing..." The man said astonished by the beauty of her light.
Balencia loaded herself onto the kayak and started sailing in the direction the man had said. Something about the man's soulful pure eyes would stay and haunt the neverending warrior forever. And as they looked back a last time they saw an airstrike fly over the heavens before landing right in the center of the forgotten.
(BAM BAM BOOM) Flashing lights were all that could be seen and Balencia's eyes filled up with tears as she knew half of the people she just met were already gone.
(Pant, pant, pant) "Those monsters!" Rehamal cried as they watched a fire emerge from the city.
"Rehamal! It's my promise! We will be back!" Balencia comforted as she knew the blacksmiths daughter has reliving all her past traumas.
The superiorly thick smoky clouds rolled in like boulders, ready to crush the skies. The darkness was engulfing and seemed to fully consume any spec of light. The contents of the ocean came gushing and the rocks seemed to slice the water from its many thousand sharp daggers embedded all over it. The murky water below was an opaque block, of which only faint ghost-like shadows of sea creatures could be seen. Yet somehow the ocean seemed to travel around the kayak avoiding it like a sacred diamond. The screaming winds almost sounded calming to Balencia as she for the first moment in a long time closed her eyes and took a deep inhale.
"Ahhhh" she breathed smiling at the nature around her.
"LOOK!" Rehamal yelled as Balencia turned her head to see branded upon a colossal tree trunk was a single blinding white light, which had somehow cut through immense thick clouds and fog and burnished like a slashing laser. Its source could vividly make out to be an inferior and small house with a sharp strong light radiating from it. It almost looked like a lighthouse, perched on the top of a cliff like a bird sat upon its nest, just watching its neighbouring home shatter to a thousand pieces.
Balencia's eyes shot open as she flung herself up on the boat making it wobble and tilt from side to side.
"Woah woah woah!!" Rehamal panicked embracing Khushboo.
"OBSIDIAN!" Balencia bellowed, as she recognised the curvy mountains that Jamshar had always described to her. They were larger than anything compared to Kingdom Laham, for they rose from the soil, standing proud and perkily against the hazy sky. The delicate, shapely slopes led your gaze to the sharp peaks that poked out of the clouds. Along with the soft mist that nestled around them, cupping the mountain like a husband lovingly holding the face of his wife.
The land of melanin, the land of the strangers, the mystery place, the home of Jamshar Iwaloye was only but an hour away from the sea in-between. The scenery curved like a river that meandered gently through a meadow, with no cracks or imperfections.
Obsidian.