Ch 1. The Royal siblings, and their way of life

     The sky was clouded with rain and thunder. On that dark battlefield there were thousands of people fighting. 

     It was a slaughter. Magic casters rained fireballs taking countless lives. There were bodies surrounding someone.

     In the center were hooded men praying. Above them was a dark haired lady with a somewhat mystical appearance. Her white eyes glowed and shined light on the entire battlefield.

     “May we praise the great one!”

     People chanted and praised her as if she was a omnipotent goddess. She began to speak.

     “On that fateful day when thunder, fire, and wind unite is the day the great one will appear once again.”

     Just like that a young girl had woken up. She sweated from head to toe as she breathed heavily.

     “That's the 7th time now…”

     She sat up trying to understand the dream she had just had. She got up and went towards the mirror. 

     The eye patch she wore even to bed was taken off, revealing her white eye. Even though she had this eye on her left side, on her right side was just a normal black eye.

     “What does it all mea—”

     “RISE AND SHINE PRINCESS ALICE!”

     Alice jolted up at the sudden arrival of the girl.

     The one who opened the door was Marcella.

     “Could you not be so loud? It's still early in the morning!”

     “Hahaha I'm sorry princess, I just love mornings, don't you?”

     Alice sighed, but went back to looking at the mirror. On the reflection of the mirror Alice could see the girl making her bed.

     “You're always like this around this time…”

     The girl, Marcella wore a maid outfit and had short red hair. Her face usually has a bubbly expression tied to her young face.

     Marcella has been friends with the princess since they were little kids, to the princess, Marcella is like her best friend.

     “Oh my! Princess you're sweating a lot, was it that dream again?”

     Marcella quickly grabbed a towel she had took with her to Alice’s room. She'd begin to wipe off the sweat from the princesses forehead.

     “Yeah… but it was a little different, they were praising her this time.”

     “That's certainly strange… you said she had the same eye as you right?”

Alice put back on her eye patch.

     “she does, but why doesn't she have my weird partial white hair? The people praising her were calling her the ‘great one’ also”.

     Marcella pondered after finishing up wiping her sweat with the towel. 

     “Hmmm ‘The great one’ huh? Why does that sound so familiar? Anyways, come on let's get you changed into your outfit princess.”

     After about 10 minutes of Marcella helping out Alice to change, her attire transformed into a fancy white dress with black heels.

     “AHHHH! YOU LOOK SO CUTE PRINCESS!”

     Marcella gushed out of excitement, but Alice secretly was starting to like it.

     “I mean… I guess it's pretty… it's really hard to move around in it though.”

     “Your father secretly bought this without you knowing for the banquet. So do you like it?

     Alice sighed but tried to hide the blush from Marcella, although Marcella could see it anyways.

     “My birthday, huh… don't you wish we could celebrate our birthdays once a year instead of every 4 years?”

     “Not really? Wouldn't that be too much for one person to do it every year.”

     “I suppose you're right, Marcella.”

     In the training hall there is a boy practicing sword play all alone.

     However he wasn't alone as a long haired redhead was watching him. However he didn't notice yet.

     The redhead had an idea using some sort of sorcery to sneak up behind him to whisper in his ear.

     “Oh prince Youm~”

     “What is it, Flare?”

     The boy stopped for a minute, unphased as he went to put some water in his face.

     Flare expected a quick jolt but what she got was the opposite, she rolled her eyes.

     “You're no fun Youm…”

     “Father is gonna get mad if you don't call me prince.”

     “Prince or no Prince, you'll still be the same Youm I'll play tricks on.”

     Youm went back to doing his swordplay but Flare found it strange he had his back towards her.

     Flare moved, whenever she'd get in front of him he'd turn his back on her.

     She could tell he was blushing, but played it off.

     “Honestly your form is all wrong, you need to turn your elbow and go BOOM! And a POW with a JAB.”

     “How would you know how my father's swordsmanship is supposed to be? Also what is this ‘boom' ?”

     “ ‘BOOM’ is the amount of force you put into your Exoteric muscles providing physical enhancements allowing you to therefore cause a shockwave to your opponent, but also making for—”

     “WAIT STOP FOR A MOMENT. Slow it down for my brain to process.”

Flare sighed.

     “Okay listen because I won’t say it again. As you know, Exotere is around all of us. The things we do to use that energy are Exoteric, some use it for making spells, but for warriors like you, you need to put it into their muscles making it so they're able to use Aura.”

     “Right, I remember father is able to use Aura to it's maximum output, but he stopped training that output so if he were to fight right now he wouldn’t be at his best. But he was also able to use something else. However I forgot what it was called.”

Youm replied.

     “Erm It's probably best you just stick to providing Exotere to yourself.”

     “Wait, why?”

     “It has something to do with the ‘Mark’.”

     “Yours is on your waist right?”

     Flare nodded, placing her hand on her waist.

     “Yea, around here or so. Everyone is born with a mark, and that mark determines what God you get your powers from.”

     Youm put his hand on his chin and pondered to himself before saying.

     “Why are these marks here anyways?”

     “I couldn't tell you even if I knew. These marks have been on everyone for as long as history was created, everyone has thought the same thing.”

     “Hmmm…”

     “Oh right I almost forgot to tell you but you need to get ready! The princesses birthday is today!”

     “Yea I'll be there soon.”

Flare was confused, he seemed to have something on his mind but she wasn't sure what. 

She took out a nearby stick and used it as a wand then got in front of Youm.

     “Come on, let's spar until the banquet happens.”

Youm smirked and got into position.

     “I'll take you up on that offer.”

     The fight started off with Youm thrusting forward and aiming for her leg with his wooden sword.

     She dodged, spinning around perfectly.

     He strikes again but this time he does a horizontal slash.

     She also dodged by ducking in time firing a wind spell propelling him backwards.

     Youm was unable to block in time so he took the full force of the attack.

     “Hmm not bad.”

     He then said as he took a different sword stance.

     “Oh that's the Royal knight's stance.”

     This time Youm dashed quicker than before doing a vertical slash.

     Flare tried to deflect it with the wand while dodging so it wouldn't hit her face.

     “AH!”

     But the weight of the strike was too much.

     “Didn’t the king tell you to not hit a lady~”

     “He taught me this stance so I could hit ladies.”

     They played with each other during the fight and were having a good time. 

     Meanwhile on the upper levels of the castle there sits an office where a bearded man sat.

     He was doing paperwork, taking care of plans for the princesses party.

     There came in a tall gentleman, he was a butler at the castle.

     “Sir Boumen, the preparations are underway as you commanded.”

     Boumen sat up and put on his coat.

     “Great work Bran. Have the scouts come back yet?”

     “Yes sir, there were signs of campfire 7 miles from the palace.”

     “Tell them to keep searching nearby that area.”

     They walked around throughout the castle as the maids behind them were getting stuff ready.

     You could tell this was gonna be a big event for the princess of a nation.

     Along the way of their walk they bumped into Alice.

     Alice’s white small yet beautiful dress was captivating for the king. It matched her strands of white hair and white eye.

     “Oh Alice, you look stunning!”

     Alice's maid, Marcella was grinning from ear to ear. She's nudge at Alice’s shoulder seeing her blushing.

     “Don't get all flustered now princess~”

     Alice would get annoyed playfully hitting Marcella.

     “Thank you Father, it's much appreciated.”

     She would hold the bottom of her dress doing a courtesy bow.

     It was already night time at that time as the princesses’ banquet was underway.

     Allies from surrounding areas all around the country came to attend.

     They came in their fancy carriages heading towards the palace.

     Youm, and Flare were waiting for Alice’s preparations to get done.

     “Does it always take girls this long to prepare? It's been half an hour now.”

     Youm sighed as his arms were crossed, tapping his finger in anticipation.

     “Oh c'mon Prince, you should know by now that's how ladies are, besides I believe my sis is actually the one taking too long. You know how she gets when it comes to appearances.”

Flare said.

     “Yeah you make a good point…” 

     They both felt that it'd be best to wait a few more minutes after that.

     In Alice’s room there were stacks of dresses and clothes.

     “Princess, what do you think about this one? Oh but this dress shows off your curves, ooh yeah there's also the black dress that matches with your hair or what about—”

     “MARCELLA, what about the one I had on before? Why are we trying out all these different clothes?”

     Alice cut her sentence off midway.

     “You know how indecisive I can get. Okay fine! Let's just do what you had on last afternoon.”

     Just as they had settled on an outfit Alice looked outside the window, there was nothing going on at first until something happened with her white eye.

     It expanded her vision, making her see tents miles away from the city, as well as an army of men heading in one direction that was the palace.

     Alice stood up pointing in the direction she was looking at.

     “Marcella, do you see that?”

     She looked at the same area.

     “No? Is something the matter?”

     Marcella looked confused.

     “There's people heading here, I have to warn father!”

     Alice ran towards the door, but Marcella stopped her, grabbing her arm in the process.

     “Wait, there's a lot of people here, what if it causes a commotion.”

     “B-but there's thousands of them, way too far for anyone to see!”

     Alice exclaimed, shaking off her grip on her arm rushing towards her father's office.

     It was hard for her to run from the heels but that didn't matter to her, she just wanted to tell her father the danger that lurked.

     “Hey! Alice, where are you going?!”

     It was her brother who said that this time, she'd run by him but didn't notice due to her being in a rush.

     “To warn Father!”

     Youm instantly went to Marcella for answers

     “Marcella what happened to my sister?”

     “I-i don't know she just started talking about an army coming towards us, but there's nothing there.”

     Marcella pointed towards the window saying that as Youm looked at Flare.

     “We're gonna chase after her, c'mon!”

     Flare and Marcella nodded and they all chased after Alice.

     On Alice’s side, she kept running, getting closer to the office as her consciousness faded into pitch black.  

     “What is this? “ 

She questioned.

     As soon as Alice said that, a dark figure appeared behind her, unbeknownst to her.

     The dark figure let out a cunning chuckle before speaking, 

     “This is a realm I created. “

     Surprised, Alice immediately looked behind her and backed away quickly.

     To her surprise, she sees a rather strangely odd woman.  Long and sleek purple hair that appeared to be in her mid 30’s.

     “Who are you?”

     Alice questioned but you could hear the caution and exclamation in her voice.

     The strange woman smirked before bowing afterwards.

     The strange woman stood back up before giving her a slight smile.

     “I am the time deity, but you may call me godmother. It’s a pleasure meeting you, child. “ 

And so the story continues.