McFarland Kingdom
To the south of the Aurora Realm resided the powerful kingdom of McFarland. Here amid the night, the silhouette of a grand castle could be seen amongst the glittering light of the city in the distance. The streets were a hive of activity, with citizens going about their nightly adventures. Amongst the richness of lords, successful businessmen, and well-to-do middleclass going about celebrating, partying, and having a good time were the displaced homeless, sickly orphans, and beggars roaming the streets, searching for a way to survive another night.
In the grand castle, in a stately room filled with luxurious furnishings, decor fit for a queen, and countless bouquets of fresh red roses, was Prince Philip McFarland. The handsome man was kneeling on the marble floor, his gaze—dark and intense—on the elegant glass coffin before him.
In this glass coffin was a woman—exotically enchanting with hair the color of ebony, lips as red as roses, and skin as white as snow. In her favorite red gown, Yuki Hoshi of Yamato, Prince Philip's wife, was beautiful even in her death.
Fact was she had been lying in this glass coffin—filled with pure qi and cast with a high-tier magical spell to preserve her body—for two thousand years now. And still, Philip had not given up on the idea of reviving her. Of course, his last mission had failed miserably, and once again, it had been all due to those bastards, the demon lords and rulers of Acaedien, his age-old adversaries.
If only they hadn't turned up. If only they hadn't slaughtered and captured his recruits, a troop of thousands of ruthless outlaws and bandits, then shit wouldn't have happened. He would have not only destroyed and ruined some part of that disgustingly prosperous kingdom of Acaedien, but also obtained that very much sought-after boy with pure qi in the process. To think that he had worked so fucking hard on it, too.
After that incident two hundred years ago, when he had felt that surge of powerful pure qi bursting throughout the realm that had driven him berserk for days, he had heard—via the network of countless spies he had cunningly placed across the realm in the many kingdoms and their cities—that a Great One had been reincarnated.
Immediately, Philip had deployed his men to find out which one of the nine that was. It had turned out that this Great One wasn't just a Great One, but the Great One, with the qi core holding three souls, and one of those was Yuki Hoshi, his beloved wife.
The moment Philip had found that out, he knew exactly what he needed to do. He'd need to get his hands on that qi core in order to revive Yuki.
Of course, he hadn't been the only one who had been after it. Many other powerful beings who harbored dark qi, too, were after it, and it wasn't long until the core had completely disappeared from this realm as if into thin air.
Via his spies and with the help of Queen Hilde, Philip's stepmother, he had managed to figure out where that core had disappeared to.
The qi core—hence, the three souls—had resided in the kingdom of Yamato. When the core had started its conception in the womb of a woman, that had been when the burst of pure qi appeared.
After years of persistent investigation, Philip had found out that the woman and her husband had escaped to another world with the help of the Great Sage of Yamato. How? He hadn't a fucking clue, but escaped they had, right out of his hands and everyone who had been in pursuit of it, for that matter.
Two hundred years he had waited. Two. Fucking. Hundred. Years.
And then Queen Hilde had come to him one day months ago, informing him that she had figured out where the core was, which was in a world called Earth.
To retrieve the qi core, they'd need to bring it back here, and to bring it back here, they'd need to initiate and break parts of the Aurora barrier.
With the help of the Dark Sages, a team of elite shadow men with dark qi, along with Queen Hilde, they had managed to do that. With Yuki's necklace, which he had stolen from the demon lords of Acaedien, Queen Hilde had cast some very powerful spells on it, one of them being the magic illusion protection to hide the qi core from those who had been in pursuit of it. Why they had chosen Yuki's rose necklace was simple. It was because the necklace had some of Yuki's pure qi, and it'd attract the soul of its owner.
Casting spells on the necklace and propelling it through the barrier, hoping it'd land in that other world at the right time and place, had been their first hurdle. When it had been a success, Philip had felt pleased. Then when the barrier broke—which would only happen if the necklace was touched by one with the qi core of The Great One—the qi core itself had appeared in this realm. He had sensed it through the necklace, which was a magic tracker, and he had been overwhelmed, thinking that this was it, that he'd be able to be with Yuki once again.
Yet when those bastards turned up, interrupting his progress and with the core disappearing once again into thin air—because he bloody hell couldn't sense the aura on the boy once he had managed to capture him during the raid—it had riled Philip to the point of madness.
One day, he thought in revulsion and frustration, he'd crush them, those demon bastards, and especially the sickening Felix and Caleb. Oh yes, one day he'd crush them and their damned kingdom.
With his eyes still fixed on his beloved, Philip leaned forward and gently kissed the glass coffin.
"Soon, Yuki," he said. "Very soon, my love, you'll be alive again. Soon, we'll be together again."
He stood, and after giving one more longing stare at his dead wife, he turned on his heel and headed toward the door. Then suddenly, as if out of the blue, halfway across the room, Philip felt his body surging, his dark qi reacting, and he became out of breath.
He fell to his knees and collapsed onto the marble floor as his head started spinning out of control and his body contorted like he was being possessed.
He continued in this agonizing state for some moments, begging and crying, a pitiful sight.
Fuck! He wanted to die. This was the reason he had always loved and hated those with pure qi. They attracted him like a moth to a flame, mindless and crazed, yet they tortured him and drove him insane at the same time.
Shit! He wondered if he was going to die for sure this time around.
Then it stopped. His body ceased reacting, and Philip lay there on the marble floor in a fetal position.
When he managed to calm himself down and clear his mind, he got up and stumbled over to the balcony. As he gazed off into the distance, he sucked in his breath.
"Holy fuck!" he swore in disbelief and astonishment, his eyes wide.
There in the night was the bursting white light, the surging of pure qi piercing the sky.
Philip's body was trembling something severely as he laughed insanely. "It's not over... It's not over yet."
Then he knew. He fucking knew that all was not lost. He still had a chance to revive Yuki, though this time there was sure to be many formidable rivalries for that precious prize of a qi core of The Great One.
Oh yes, he'd be coming for it for sure.
Now then, he'd need to prepare his plan and his armies. He'd also need Queen Hilde's help once again.