Volume 1 Chapter 9 the Starshine Village

Chapter 9 the Starshine Village

I

Floria woke up first and found herself lying on a bed inside a shabby bedroom. Starsha was sleeping beside her.

It was at noon right now and the whole room was illuminated by the bright sun high on the sky, the light of which kept pouring in through a broken window.

By the sunlight, Floria noticed that there were some stains on the walls, which made the whole room dirty. No matter who the owner of this room was, he must live in poverty. Besides the stains, there were also cracks on the walls with some insects and spiders that Floria failed to recognized running through it.

Floria used to have insectophobia and arachnophobia. However, Aislina cured her by magic and after that, she showed her all kinds of insects in the forest to help Floria get rid of the phobia of them.

However, those insects crawled inside the cracks of the wall had somehow reignited her phobia of insects and spiders. Because those things were not creations of nature. On the contrary, they were creations of the dirtiness inside the humans’ unclean building.

Besides, the walls that composed this room were absolutely not soundproof. Floria could hear people talking outside the room, with all the sounds came through the walls directly. All the voices of both men and women that Floria heard were pretty rough and low. Floria began to fear because she didn’t know if those people were mobs or friendly people.

“Starsha, Starsha, wake up!” called Floria anxiously.

“Floria … umm … Oh, wow! Don’t disturb me while I’m sleeping,” breathed Starsha, half awake, half asleep.

“Wake up, Starsha. Where are we?” asked Floria.

Starsha sat up, stretched and began to observe the surroundings.

“I have no idea, the last thing I remember is fighting with that horrible Sir Bellum. He is so powerful, hellishly powerful,” Starsha recalled.

“Oh, no! Yanni! Where is Yanni! Is he with us? What happened?” questioned Floria, her mind devoured by anxiety.

Just at this moment an old man with long white beard came into the room.

“Hey, you two wake up. It’s a miracle that you two have recovered,” murmured the old man.

“Who are you?” inquired Starsha, her eyes fixed interestedly on the beard of the old man.

“I’m sorry. I haven’t introduced myself yet. My name is Thomas Berg. You can call me Mister Berg. I am the chief of this Starshine village,” the old man introduced himself.

“Starshine village. That’s an ironic name. There aren’t any star in the sky anymore now,” breathed Floria.

“Anyway, I found you two floating down the river unconsciously along with some fragments of necrite architecture. I guess that something has happened at upstream,” narrated Mister Berg, ignoring Floria’s impoliteness.

“The Grey Factory blew up the whole Dream Forest. That beautiful forest has been burnt to the ground,” sighed Starsha.

“The factory will finally pay for what it has done,” cursed Mister Berg aggressively.

“So you don’t like the Grey Factory too?” asked Floria curiously.

“Yep, For sure I don’t like the Grey Factory. We farmers used to live a peaceful and happy life, but now everything has changed. That’s a long story,” Mister Berg explained and asked, “by the way, how did you two recover such fast? I haven’t seen such heavy injuries in my life before, but you have nearly recovered within half a day. That’s a miracle!”

“Oh, that’s a secret,” said Floria.

“Two mysterious girl with mysterious power. That’s interesting. Anyway, take a rest, when you’re ready, I can show you two around my village” proposed Mister Berg.

II

Yanni and Aislina were walking through the brown grassland. It was a no man’s land, ruled by annoying bloodsucking mosquitos.

Luckily, Aislina could summon some special gases with her magic to repel those mosquitos.

Soon it was dusk and night was coming .

The pale moon rose and night fell.

“Shall we set up camp in here, Yanni? We have been walking for hours, my sore legs are killing me,” asked Aislina, panting in fatigue.

“Fine, it’s a good place to spend the night,” agreed Yanni.

“It will be a little cold here at night,” Aislina pointed out.

“Don’t worry, we can build a campfire here,” suggested Yanni.

“That’s easy, we need some firewood to fuel the fire and we also need some plant fibres,” smiled Aislina.

She exhaled a cloud of green mist, which turned into some firewood and plant fibres magically. Aislina can transformed her magical power into botanic matter.

“You’re wonderful, Aislina. Now, we need to ignite those firewood. Can you use your magic to create some fire?” inquired Yanni.

“No, fire elemental magic has been lost for a dozen centuries. Only some ancient elves could cast fire spell,” replied Aislina.

“That’s a pity. Anyway, I’ll find some flints, you can rest here and wait for me,” proposed Yanni.

“No, I’ll go with you. Floria said that you were awful with directions. If you go alone, you may get lost. Besides, sticking together means less dangerous,” insisted Aislina.

“That’s true,” Yanni nodded.

Together, the two began to look for flints on the ground. It was a vast grassland and since those brown grasses were high enough to cover the kneels of them, plus the environment around growing darker and darker at night, it was pretty difficult to find a flint.

“Can you use your magic to detect flints, Aislina?” questioned Yanni.

“I’m not omnipotent, Yanni,” complaint Aislina.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” apologized Yanni, lowering his head.

Anyway, after approximately a quarter, they successfully collected a pile of flints. Sitting down side by side, they commenced to build the campfire.

The wind of the night was blowing against them and the temperature was going down crazily quickly. Luckily, the campfire was dispelling the coldness and bringing them warmth.

They were so tired and exhausted that both of them remained silent, and the silence was finally broken by Yanni.

“Aislina,” called Yanni quietly.

“Umm?” Aislina lifted her head, her eyes which was as empty as the starless sky fixed on Yanni.

“You don’t need to hide your sadness. I know that you’re rather down now. After all, Dream Forest has been the home of elves for centuries, and now, it has been turned into a scorched wasteland,” murmured Yanni gently.

“I’m sad for sure, but Starsha said that I should be more positive and if I stayed optimistic, our team would be more likely to finish our quest,” breathed Aislina, her chin in her hands.

“She is right, but you don’t need to wear a mask, a persona, in front of your friends. Be yourself. If you want to cry or blow off some steam, you can do it. No matter what happens, you’ll still be the toughest one that I have ever known, Aislina,” whispered Yanni soothingly.

Aislina didn’t say anything but leant her head on Yanni’s shoulder, and huddled Yanni’s arm tenderly.

There were some tears streaming down Aislina’s face, which was shining under the grey moonlight.

Yanni looked at Aislina, and their eyes met. Both of them could feel a great rush of affection for each other, and they could feel their bodies at puberty commenced to react for each other, but they were hiding their feelings, locking them up deep inside their subconsciousness, since those feelings were embarrassing, given that being an elf and a human, they were even not the of the same species.

The cold wind kept blowing and some parts of the campfire had been put out, but Aislina and Yanni didn’t feel cold at all. Slowly, they fell into the world of dream together.

III

Starsha and Floria were touring the village and Mister Berg was leading the way as a guide.

The fields were a little dry and barren, with some old farmers cultivating with their rusty hoes. The air was filled with smoke from chocking cigarettes, the nicotine inside which penetrating into their lungs, making them cough a little.

There are no signs of felicity and joy on people’s faces, as if they were all living in hollowness and meaninglessness.

Some farmers were fighting with each other, their faces reddened with unstoppable wrath. Though their accents were hard to understand, without doubt, they were cursing each other with the dirtiest words in their limited vocabulary.

Besides farmers who were fighting with each other, there were also some villagers fighting their pet dogs, or to be precise, watchdogs without any characteristics of pets.

The whole village was dipped in an atmosphere of pure anger and forcelessness.

It was dusk now and night was about to come. The cunning moon rose from the east and shining weakly at this land where hope was about to die.

After the last remained ray of twilight, the redness of the distant skyline disappeared and darkness commenced to dominate the whole village. There were no lighting facilities on the road, since villagers only lit up their own houses.

Outside their houses, some villagers were sitting on their rocking chairs, their eyes closed as if they were in a coma or opened but fixed on the empty night sky meaninglessly. To be honest, it was pretty hard to judge whether they were still alive or had died. Perhaps they were still alive but had already started to wait for their ends.

“You seem unhappy, Starsha, what’s wrong?” asked Floria, her eyes fixed on the shabby scenery of the village.

“Look, Floria, we’re now walking in a village. You know, villages are places where new lives grow in the fertile fields. Crops grow, mature and finally die, with everything functioning within the circle of life. I have listened to a lot of songs concerning villages, harvesting and their festivals of druidism, and in my imaginations, villages are places full of life, hope and hot village boys,” answered Starsha, half-seriously and half-jokingly.

“Without a shadow of doubt, your point is ‘hot village boys’,” sighed Floria, shaking her head.

“Yeah, well. that’s true, though I don’t want to admit it,” giggled Starsha.

“That’s your stereotype for villages, girl. My Starshine Village is a hopeless place. All young adults have gone to the cities or factories in search of fame and fortune, leaving us the old guarding this meaningless village and waiting for the death day. After all, crops can be grown in those machines, we have been forsaken by our world. That’s why we hate the Grey Factory,” drawled Mister Berg.

“Since that, what is the everyday life of you and other villagers like?” asked Floria sympathetically.

“Our lives are boring. Every day, we keep gambling and reading trashy storybooks. The spirit of our village which has been enlightening us villagers for centuries has already died. After we pass away and rot in our tombs, this village will be destroyed and become a part of cities or factories. One era has passed, and another era will come,” answered Mister Berg.

The girls didn’t say anything. They had heard a lot of people talking about their “new era” theory, as if what they were fighting against were the unstoppable trend of history.

“By the way, girl, are you a bard?” inquired Mister Berg.

“Yeah, I am. Is that so obvious?” Starsha replied and questioned.

“Yep, that’s very obvious. I think you may be interested in attending our village ceremonial concert at the village plaza, given that you’re a musician,” advised Mister Berg.

IV

Although the ceremonial concert was a big event in the village, there wasn’t many people attending this activity.

However, there were still some audiences willing to listen to the music performed by the village musician and obviously there were still some look of vigour in their eyes. Those who didn’t lose all the hope were gathering together at the ceremony listening to their sacred music inherited from their ancestors who loved the world of wilderness with their yearning hearts.

The village musician was a bald man. He looked neither handsome nor attractive, but there was some kind of unpolished beauty hidden inside his seemingly common appearance and the moment he opened his mouth, wilder music came out from his vocal cords.

“When the sky is clear, I see you,

With all mighty power you hold,

In the fire of the life from which we’re born,

You bless us in our soul … ”

This song was extremely uplifting. Though he had strong accent and his excessively masculine voice was far from beautiful, his singing was rhythmic and he was never out of tune.

When he was singing, everyone kept in absolute silence in order not to disturb the performer. The sounds penetrated into the air and filled the whole plaza with some sort of strong energy, which blasted the night into smithereens of blackness.

Within the music, the mind of all people on the scene sank down all the way into the depth of collective consciousness, where they had shared ancient memories about where they were from and what humans used to be at the beginning of the time, when the world was elementals in pure chaos, air, fire, water, earth, which kept integrating with each other and evolving into our current world.

After about 5 minutes, the music stopped and thunderous applauses commenced to erupt from the seats of audiences. The singer bowed and left the plaza.

“The music is beautiful,” commented Starsha.

“However, fewer and fewer are coming to our ceremony. Music is a way to purify our hearts, but few people can truly appreciate real music now and they’d rather listen to the music box mass-produced by factories. Grey Factory had given humans nothing, but no one stand against them,” sighed Mister Berg.

“When a new thing is invented and introduced to our world, the rabble will follow the trend and be a part of that new thing because they’re anxious about being obsoleted by the new era and sinking into the bottom of society. What’s worse, their anxiety can infect and alienate other people, making them accept ugly things heartedly too,” explained Starsha.

“I don’t know you’re such a philosophical person,” smiled Floria.

“I’m always philosophical. By the way, Mister Berg, what is the lyrics about?” queried Starsha.

“It is a hymn to Infernal Mountain. Most of the people in our village belong to Berg family. As you know, Berg means ‘mountain’ as in ‘iceberg’. In fact, we Bergs are from Infernal Mountain. It is a volcano and the lava inside it is said to be the hottest thing on earth,” answered Mister Berg.

“The hottest thing on earth? So everything can be molten by the lava inside it?” pursued Floria, with an idea of how to destroy the Cube of Necrus coming into her mind.

“Yes, I think so,” answered Mister Berg.

“Where is that mountain?” continued Floria.

“It’s pretty far from here. You need to travel for a whole month towards the south. If you want to visit that mountain, I can mark its position on your map,” responded Mister Berg.

“Thank you very much,” said Floria. She and Starsha regarded each other for a long while. They knew now how to destroy the Cube of Necrus.