Chapter Nine - First Segment

Lycia, on the border of The Balkanian Empire

It had been nearly a month and a half since the magical incident at Mycenae had thrown apart Tanner’s group and sent the Balkanian Empire into disarray. Tanner, Regal, and Alice had awoken in a densely forested area. Tanner was initially surprised by seeing so much vegetation. His whole life had shown him little more nature than a decaying tree in Pylos square. Still, he supposed that he shouldn’t be too surprised. So far he had seen things he could have never even dreamt of on this adventure.
The three later came upon a small city and realized that they had been flung just outside the Balkanian Empire to one of its neighbouring territories still offering some resistance, Lycia.
The Lycians were a peaceful people by nature and did not possess a large army. There would be no strategic reason to conquer the territory since it posed no threat and had only the natural resources required to sustain itself. Nevertheless, the Empire was vigilant in their quest to conquer the continent and would leave no stone unturned, not even peaceful Lycia.
Lycia was abundant in nature but did have technology. It could best be described as a hybrid city where technology and nature worked in tandem to provide beautiful hillside scenery, fading off into dense forests. If Balkan swallowed this territory as it had the previous ones who offered resistance, much of the city and all of the nature would be destroyed, being replaced by electricity and massive skyscrapers.
Tanner, Alice, and Regal had formed a makeshift camp on the outskirts of the city. Every now and then they would go into the city to trade lumber Regal had chopped into bundles for the supplies they needed. Though, because lumber was so abundant, this usually did not yield an abundance of supplies. Still, they were able to get what they needed to survive.
Their existence was relatively peaceful, but they knew the Empire would come for them sooner or later and began to plan their own attack, countering the Empire before it had a chance to strike first. Also of concern was the dark magic that had seemed to awaken within Tanner at the Mycenae Museum.

Regal sensed something dark within Tanner, something that he hadn’t sensed before. Everyone had some darkness but the darkness seemed to be pouring out of Tanner like a cup overflowing with excess water. It was intoxicating like a bitter-sweet red wine. The more Tanner used the magic, the more he would be consumed by it. If they were to avoid that, Regal would need to teach Tanner the magic of the Outer Circle, something that had not been attempted in Zealonia for five hundred years. But he was no longer in Zealonia and Regal saw little choice. Either he could delve into the dark arts to save Tanner, or he could take the risk of letting the dark magic consume and kill him.
There were good reasons why the Outer Circle magic was not practiced. The first was that the nature of the training put the user’s life at risk. The Outer Circle was dark magic and had to be kept in a certain balance. Unlike magic of the Inner Circle, the Outer Circle required the user to take in dark magic from his surroundings instead of channelling the light from within. This magic was chaotic by nature and was therefore unsuitable for defence. If the user took in too much dark magic energy he would lose his mind and life, being forever transformed into the form of a crazed dark beast, hell bent on killing. This would surely happen to Tanner if he went untrained in the dark arts. The closest analogy would be if one were so drunk he was unable to taste the alcohol he was drinking and drank himself into sickness as a result. In Tanner’s case: death. Regal could not – would not – let that happen.

New Beginning to Chapter One

This part comes in directly before the part where Tanner is running from a man in the market. I think Regal's character and Zealonia as a whole really came out of nowhere and needed a few more paragraphs of background, though most will be revealed in later chapters.



Zealonia was a land where magic thrived. Its inhabitants were able to use the magic in varying ways. Generally, some were innately attuned to offensive magic and some were more attuned to defensive magic, though only defensive magic was now practiced in Zealonia. In addition to manipulating magic to offensive and defensive ends, one could feasibly generate fire, wind, lightning, water, or various combinations of the four.
Regal Altara was a mage trained in the defensive arts, the craft of the Inner Circle. He was also Zealonia’s most gifted archaeologist, which was a coveted position considering the high volume of ancient ruins in Zealonia. Regal was originally born in Zeal, Zealonia’s largest city, but had since moved to Mist, which was a small coastal village with a local ruin and large amounts of farmland. Regal didn’t mind living in a smaller village. For the most part, he found it refreshing. Deciphering the mysteries of the nameless ruin close to where he had erected a house took up most of his time. Every now and then he would spare a few moments to keep up with his Inner Circle training. Honing his defensive skills was never a bad idea.
In Zeal, Regal’s parents had pushed him to be both dedicated and insightful, his father being a professor and his mother being a talented mage in her own right. He studied hard at the magical academy, excelling in the field of archaeology, his curiosity shining through in all facets of his tenure at the academy.
Zealonia had been at peace for around five hundred years. Little was known about the war that once required the skills of mages trained in the offensive Outer Circle arts. In fact, all records of the enemy the Zealonians were fighting at the time seemed to be scarce and vague if found. It was these sorts of mysteries that drove Regal to pursue archaeology and his curiosity that made him so adept at solving them. Under his reign as de facto main archaeologist, Zealonia had learned more about its history in four years than it had learned in the last four hundred. Regal was slightly competitive as well, still looking for what would be his crowning achievement, but was more interested in satisfying his own curiosity and zest for learning than for gathering critical acclaim that would only be acknowledged in Zeal.
Regal was also becoming bothered by the monotony of meeting the same road blocks at every turn in his research and was yearning for something exciting to come his way. He always thought that some day he might find something so foreign that it would shake the very foundation of their society. A dream – but a good dream nonetheless. He hoped that there were others out there that shared his dream, and also his passion.