Chapter 22: 22. BENEATH THE AZKHAN SKIES

SOPHIA STONECLAW

I sat at the cliff of the Yeitgrim mountain, exhausted because I’d used up all my strength climbing it. I could have easily flown to the cliff, but I always tried to challenge my physical limits with any opportunity I got. At first, I lay on my back staring at the clear blue sky, and when I regained enough strength, I sat up to admire the savanna plains that sprawled beneath the mountain. 

I’ve only had a few times when I could sit and properly reflect on myself, or even try to understand what was happening in my life. I wasn’t sure if I understood what reality was anymore. The life I was living was something I’d always read in fantasy novels or watched in movies.

“Movies,” I chuckled.

There was nothing like that in this world, and though it was all I did in my past life, I didn’t miss it. The last years of my past life was that of a normal high school kid, except that I was always bullied and picked on. I could remember everything like it was something that happened recently, even though they were events that happened seventeen years ago.

I was raised by a single mother and that was the beginning of my sad life. For all I cared, she wasn’t fit to be called a mother; a smoker, and heavy drinker, who always hung out with different men, and often forgot she even had a child. Because I was young, naive, and dependent, I didn’t have a choice than to stick with her.

I got to high school, and somehow, everyone knew what my mother was and made fun of me because of it. That was when the bullying started. I had always had thoughts of running away from home, but I stopped myself whenever I thought about how scary the world was. I always told myself,

“It would be meaningless if I end up like her.”

At least with her, I had a place to sleep, food to eat, and she funded my tuition; that was because I threw a fit of rage and threatened to destroy everything in the house If she didn’t. She wasn’t even at home most of the time, and whenever she was, I tried to avoid her all the time; leaving home for school as early as possible and returning late at night, and she wasn’t even bothered.

At first, I encouraged myself to do well at school, and maybe if I tried hard enough, my life would take a turn for the better. But then, the bullying got worse and I couldn’t even concentrate on my studies anymore. I was slowly caving, life became undesirable, almost like a burden. I had no dreams or goals, and it got to the point where I lived through each day hoping I would sleep and never wake up. Most of the time I was having wishful thoughts of how my life would have turned out, if I was born of a different mother, or parents.

I still clearly remember the day it all ended. I was returning home late as usual, and all of a sudden, I was ambushed by three men. I couldn’t see their faces because it was dark, but I remembered one of them hitting me hard at the back of my head with an object I couldn’t identify. I passed out and when I regained consciousness, I didn’t need anyone to tell me that I had been raped. I remembered waking up in a dark alley, half-oriented. I managed to get myself together, and I remembered I just walked, not sure where I was headed. The last things I remembered were, hearing the blaring sound of a truck horn, and seeing bright yellow lights of its headlamps before it all went dark.

The next time I opened my eyes, I found myself in the body of a newborn, and it didn’t take long for me to understand that I was in an entirely different world. This new world defied all I knew as normal. Even though there were limits, it was mind blowing how far its wonders stretched.

I led a completely different life here, and a much better one. In this world, I was born of royalty; as the princess of the Azkhan Empire. I was somewhat revered as people called me the promised one or the child of the prophecy. It felt weird because I didn’t for once feel anything uncanny about myself. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that I was reborn, but for all I knew, I was sure they didn’t know anything about it, let alone my past life.

Big was an understatement if I were to describe the size of the Azkhan Empire. It was enormous, spawning the entirety of the northern continent. I came to understand that this world had only three continents that were separated by oceans; the southern, eastern and northern continents. 

I wasn’t particularly human, and people like me were called El-borns. We were different from the humans here because there were things we could do that they couldn’t. I wasn’t invested in history, but I knew my kind weren’t originally from this place, and I didn’t care to know where we came from. I knew that in the past, the continent consisted of many smaller kingdoms, and when my kind arrived, they embarked on a conquest to unify all kingdoms under one rule. After long years of war, the Azkhan Empire was created and the El-borns ruled over it.

A male figure flew right in front of me and I welcomed him with a frown. He was Orlyo my bodyguard. Most of the time, I wondered why I even had one. I didn’t need him or anyone as my bodyguard because I was strong and was more than capable of defending myself if the need arose. The only thing I knew Orlyo did, was to keep tabs on me, nag me, and relay information about what I was doing to my father.

“What is it?” I asked him.

He landed gently in front of me before answering,

“Your presence is requested at the high council.”

I heaved,

“What do those old geezers want from me this time?”

“Pardon?” Orlyo asked. 

I was sure he understood what I said. I often cursed with words unfamiliar to him, and even though he didn’t know what they meant, he understood when I cursed.

“Never mind. Pick up my climbing gear, let’s go.”

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I had lived this life for seventeen years, and it still felt surreal to me. It felt really nice being who I am and doing the things I could do. Since I became this person, Sophia, I really did want to live. Yet again, not because I had a grand goal or something I wanted to achieve, but because I found it interesting. I was given a second chance at life, so I had to live it to the fullest.

Yeitgrim mountain stood miles away from the capital, somewhere far west of it. Arriving at the capital wasn’t going to be challenging, there were transport gates readily available to take us there in an instant.

* * *

I was donned in a sleeved deep-blue sheath gown which had a simple design, but looked stunning. It had a swan-neck collar that exposed a considerable part of my cleavage; a body part of mine I happened to like. It was better, compared to my flat-chested old self who at that time wasn’t concerned about it. There were golden feather-like decorations that ran from the base of my gown’s collar to the end of its slit sleeves. The upper part of the gown was close-fitted bearing a golden fabric belt that was sewn into it.

Generally, I looked nothing like my old self. In my past life, I had black hair with a set of double lid eyes, and a more rounded face, but my current self had an auburn hair with a set of rounded eyes and an oval shaped face. I usually tied my hair in a ponytail but for the occasion, I had to let them loose.

It wasn’t the first, and it wasn’t going to be the last time I entered the throne room, and each time I did, I couldn’t stop myself from wondering how, and where the people of this world got their architectural ideas from. Though mana made things that were seemingly impossible, possible, it was simply awe-inspiring. 

The throne room was large, the kind of large that dwarfed everyone that was present in it, and I always asked myself what purpose it was built that way.

The ground was covered with large exotic marble-stones. I had the impression that they were rare because I’d never seen them elsewhere, other than the imperial palace. The ceilings were so high up that I had to squint my eyes to look at it, yet, I couldn’t make out its details. A paved path made with a different type of floor design led to short stairs which connected the platform where the actual throne sat. Behind the throne was a sculpture of a large compass cut in two halves, with each half placed on both sides of the throne. The sculpture had gold decorations and markings all over it, matching the color of the throne. Huge pillars spanned the entire width of the elevated platform, and the same pillar styles were found at various locations all over the throne room. The lighting in the throne room was weird; it was bright and dark at the same time. When I stood at a localized area, I could clearly see the view around me, but couldn’t see the view a little distance away from me until I got there. Anything was possible in this world after all.

I walked until I got in front of the stairs which led to the throne. It was apparent that the meeting had already begun before I arrived. The governors of the five regions of the Empire and other high ranking officials were present, standing in close proximity around the stairs. It seemed like there was a matter of top priority that needed to be handled as they were all gathered before the emperor. Every one of them paused what they were discussing, as they all greeted me with a little bow when I arrived. 

“Your imperial highness, it’s to my pleasure to announce that our survey and expedition on the southern continent has shown great progress. Though, I must stress the point that we’ve suffered a considerable loss of personnel so far, I can say with certainty that we are almost ready.” 

It was the voice of Vayr Hightide, the military chief. Vayr Hightide, a young man in his mid-twenties was dressed in the formal military attire of the Azkhan Empire. It was a stylish outfit with blue and black as its component colors. He wasn’t eye-catching but had good looks. His deceptive appearance that didn’t give off a strong masculine impression contrasted his strength, position and abilities.

“I believe the only delay we are facing at the moment is the construction of gates stable enough for our armies to travel over such a long distance,” Vayr continued. 

“At the moment, we’ve launched preemptive attacks on various strongholds across the continent, and I’m confident they are going to be a success.”

“Good,” Father responded.

“What about the Arcanes? We all know that they pose a threat to us and our plans,” Castor Velkthorn spoke up. He was the governor of Velschar, a region in the western part of the empire.

“As previous reports stated, most of them don’t know who they are. Those who do are taken to their imperial city. We’ve disposed of a lot of them, and we also have prepared plans to take the Imperial city,” Vayr Hightide responded.

That was the reason why he was Father’s favorite hound. He always gets the job done no matter how difficult or tasking it might be. For a young man to possess such intellect, strength and wits was impressive.

Father cleared his throat,

“Sophia, I would need you to assist Vayr, which means you will be going to the southern continent. Vayr would explain your role, and what you need to do, okay?”

“Yes Father,” I replied.

Father signaled that I could leave, as I bowed and made my way to the exit of the room, 

“The southern continent it is.”

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