A loud knock started coming from the door. The singer pulled me to the side and told Rosemary to hide with me in the coat closet and wait for his signal. The banging on the door continues as we hid ourselves inside the closet. We couldn’t see a thing, only the loud voices of some unusual dialect I have never heard of. A loud crash sounds, they were wrecking our home. I wanted to open the door, but Rosemary stopped me and held me tight.
“Miss Atalia, please stop. We need you to live. And there is no other way to save Mr. Molina now,” she said.
I was surprised back then as I never knew his name, and I believe Rosemary had a slip of tongue when she revealed his name to me. But there was no time to wonder and think as we heard a loud scream from the living room.
“Leave now! Go further east, outside of the city!” The singer screamed.
Rosemary pulled me out of the closet. We saw four men bloodied up on the ground knocked out. I looked at the singer and he looked back at me, nodded to the left directing us to the door. That was our goodbye, the last we saw each other.
Rosemary tugged me and we started running. We used the fire exit and ran down to the parking lot. Once we were there, she instructed me to stay calm and act normal as we were passing through the guard post of the parking lot. The security guard didn't notice a thing. We were on the outside of the building by the time we knew it, the raining was pouring so it was easier to blend in on the surroundings. We crossed the street to get a good distance with a view of the condominium lobby. We stopped by a medicine store a few meters across from The Golden House as Rosemary told me the plan.
We were to go to the Outer Train line that connects Ironhart City to Sylvite City. From there, we were to meet one of the singer's colleagues that would guide us to where we would have to head to next. When we reach Sylvite City, there would have been a small house in an old neighborhood where we would live. I'd go to school there and choose a course that I wanted to take and continue to live the life the singer, Mr. Molina, wanted for me. Apparently, he left me with a fortune from his savings that would have been able to support me through my collegiate studies.
We were soaked in the rain. The street was clear, not much people were outside but us and a few that were stuck under the waiting sheds because of the downpour. We were trying to catch our breaths as the anxiety and fatigue had already hit us.
Suddenly, three white and gold vehicles pass through the street, stopping in front of The Golden House. Rosemary looked on; her face was filled with anxiety as twelve hulking men came out of the car. They pushed aside the concierge and the security guard on the entrance of the condominium lobby. People around the lobby looked scared.
After seeing what had transpired, Rosemary turned to me. I looked at her teary eyes. She held my shoulders tightly and said,
“Miss Atalia follow through with our plan. Please go east. I know you're mature enough to handle your own, yes? She said to me.
“I need to go back. I need to help master escape. He's too vital to everything we've worked so hard to achieve,” she added.
She left me in the middle of the sidewalk and rushed back inside the building. I was speechless as my mind was still frantically trying to get a grasp on the whole situation. I didn’t know what to do. I was totally lost as I was in the dark of all the necessary details. As a fifteen year old girl who lived a good sum of her life in the streets, I thought I had been through everything and was prepared for anything, but I wasn't.
After a while, I found myself walking down the street, mindless, like my whole body was just moving by instinct. I had lived my life in the lap of luxury for the past four years back then. I found comfort and peace, living quietly yet abundantly in a three-bedroom condo unit. I never wanted anything else but to live how I lived at that time forever.
I checked my pockets to try and get a hold of my current situation. I found that I left my purse in my room. The only thing I had in my pocket was the rusty old pocketknife that I had kept as a memento of where I came from before I was adopted and the emblem that the singer gave me. I thought that, maybe I wanted too much back then. That may have been the payment for all the sins that I have done. Scum like me should have never had the chance to enjoy a meaningful life.
While I was mindlessly walking, I heard the sirens from AOA vehicles passing the street, going to the direction of where our home was. I was out there, alone and afraid, preserving my own life. It felt as If I was back to square one, like the time I left the temple, running away from the monks. But that time it felt different. It felt like I was leaving behind the very people who gave meaning to my life. As I kept walking without a place to go in mind, I thought of following the plan, but I felt as if I betrayed them, the singer and Rosemary. I felt the depression get to me as my mind went from “I need to live on” to “die a horrible death”.
I squatted out for days in those Ironclad streets, hiding in the shadows of city dumpsters in the back alleys. I was living in a nightmare back then, each day was filled with stress and depression, scraps of food and drinks off of dumpsters keeping me alive. Each night, I tried to hold my own rusty knife towards me, trying to take my own life. That used to be me every day, until I was found out and reported to the authorities.
Illustrado was pristine to the brim and I was a small speck of dust to that wonderful lay of land. They had zero tolerance for screw-ups like me in Ironhart so the Ward Smiths came to take me to The Forgery. Two men held my arms and dragged me towards the detention vehicle. I didn't know why my body moved or why I did what I did. But soon after, I found myself in the middle of a bloodbath, five Ward Smiths were down as blood spilled everywhere, slashes seen throughout their bodies.
After that, more detention vehicles came, the Ward Smiths had guns on them unlike the previous ones before. Then I saw him, the former Commander, Master Cao. He had disarmed me of my pocketknife and with one swift blow to the back of my head, I was out cold.
I woke up in the middle of a dark room. The only light source was a hanging lamp that lit up the table before me. I couldn't move as I felt sharp burning sensations around my arms and legs. Then I realized that I was tied to a chair. I didn't know how long I was out or how badly injured I was. The only thing I remember was the lingering pain at the back of my head and a man entering the room.
“You’re going to be enlisted in the Service Corps. You seem to have piqued the interest of Master Cao with your exceptional killing ability,” the man said with a thick accent.
“Don't make us wait too long though, it's a simple matter of choice after all, a choice between joining or dying,” he added.
“Then kill me, I have no other kin. No reason for me to live any longer,” I said to him with despair.
“Well then, why not try out for the Service Corps? You'll get to have the chance at dying every day. Maybe you'll die in the middle of the heat or freeze out during the winter, either way, if you survive, you can get anything you want, be it death or maybe even something more, who knows?” He replied.
“What do you want? Goals, dreams, aspirations, everyone wants something, or sometimes, they even want everything,” he deviously added.
That time, I started to ask myself what. What do I want? I had gained everything and lost everything in a blink of an eye. What more did I want in my life? I remembered the words of the singer, Mr. Molina. He said that I had already seen the dark and light within this world. So, what else was there experience? And then it hit me. Questions, questions unasked, questions that have haunted me throughout my life. Who was the singer? Who was this Mr. Molina? Why did he help me? Why was he being hunted? What has he done and where is he now? Is he alive or is he already dead? What was he fighting for and why did Rosemary have to go back to him? What made him so special?
There were a lot of unanswered questions. Right now, the only thing I want is the truth, the only thing I have not yet felt was being enlightened with the whole entirety of the truth. Where were my parents and why was I left all alone in a temple? I had been in the light and dark, but I have yet to uncover the truth, about my life and about everything around me.
“Can I have information if I graduate?” I said to him as I glared.
“That depends on what kind of information you're seeking,” he promptly replied.
“About my long-lost parents, about my family?” I said.
“Maybe we can make a consideration, but this is all up in the air until you graduate from the academy,” he replied with a smirk, seemingly implying that I would fail.
I took it to heart. I made my new goal to uncover everything about my life, my family, the singer, everything. I wanted to know why my life became what it is. How I found myself here, in this dark room, with this devious and cunning man.
“So, tell me your name as a sign of your confirmation,” He Said to me.
“Atalia, Atalia Reign of Orient City, daughter of no one, kin to none,” I said to him.
“Good, sign here and we'll be off our merry way,” he replied with an eyebrow raised.
I signed the papers which sealed my fate and from then on, my journey was neverending. After graduating, I became a Ward Smith, to follow the teaching nourished to me by the singer, to pave the way for heaven to reach the land, to purify the land and to make peace everlasting. The twist and turns along the way had turned me into something more vicious than who I was, even before poverty. As I seek peace and justice, I have turned into a god of war. They stationed me to each of the seven major Iron cities that I have reformed through my own means.
I was fierce, undaunted and I stepped on people which I should have not. I pulled people down and tried to never make a mistake. I was the Magistrate's general, realigning anyone who's anyone, celebrity or commoner, no one is an exception to my justice. I bowed to no one but the Ironclad and gave my loyalty to Extol.
Through my hard work and dedication to the government, in front of Divine Court of Rinnamads, I was invited to the Gilded Region and I was awarded with the first ever Noble Armament of Extol. The award ceremony was held at the Divine Hall, the Gold and White hall that only the royalty of the Iron Colony can enter. The Noble Armament of Extol is an exemplary award given as a symbol of loyalty and unwavering dedication to the Iron Colony. Having it would pronounce you as one of the highest ranking military officials in all of the Iron Colony. It also gives you the privilege of becoming an honorary Ironclad. I knelt before the Emperor and the leaders of Divine Council as they looked on and honored me.
“I give to thee the Onyx Blade. The black sword that protects our people and all that the Iron Colony stands for. With this, you are a cut above the usual ore, you have ascended from a mere Sevenite to become one with the Ironclad. You have been reformed and forged a new. Let the black blade pierce the light and direct us further to the future, to glory and to peace,” the Grand Ruler said with a deep voice.
A loud applause echoed across the Divine Hall. From then on, I have never looked back. I had achieved great feats and realigned a lot of people who lost their path to leading a proper life. I was a part of the upper-class, I was exalted beyond my wildest dreams. But one entity has stood its ground against me, the demon; an entity that is trying to wreak havoc in what I had built.
It suddenly appeared one day while a woman was being kidnapped by unknown men in a white van. When we got to the scene, there was blood everywhere. I had never seen such carnage and pain before. He left all the men alive, but I knew that these battered men wished they weren't. Broken bones and fractures everywhere in their bodies that caused pain that they had to endure for months or even years for some. Some were left half dead while others were crippled. It was an unsightly scene, one of which I cannot forget.
From our three encounters, he was almost caught every single time. But he always found a way to escape our grasp. He was like a hare, jumping to and fro with acrobatics and reflexes unseen from any regular being. He is now my prey, the only stain in my renowned career.
But through all of these, last night reminded me of a past I had buried long ago. This clumsy girl carrying this guitar case that had an emblem printed on it. It looked a lot like the one that was given to me. It opened up my past and woke up the sleeping questions within myself. I had forgotten the reason why I joined the Service Corps and I believe fate had caught up to me.
I had been living a life of unanswered questions. I was driven to become who I was not because I was fighting the world for survival, but because I was a lost child looking for answers. This has led me to believe that the world is rough and evil, but truly, the enemy is not the world, but the questions that lie before me. The questions that the people I met left me with.
As Atalia Reign, I was taught various things about the world and the people around me. It was instilled into me to be keen and polite, filled with poise and love, to honor and to seek freedom, to see the light in the darkness and contrast it to one another. I was led to a life filled with joy and peace, up until the day that the peace and love I held so dear was mysteriously taken away from me.
As the Onyx Blade of Justice, I had been serving the people of Fraction Seven with all my might. I had given my life to the Divine Council and Extol; served as their mighty sword that leads people to the proper way of life. Abolishing evil and proclaiming peace, I was the judge and the jury, I was the monster that forced people to become good and was a slave to the Justice system created by the gods above me.
Now, it may be high time I unravel the questions before me and find the answers to my life's greatest mysteries, to be able to learn the truth and find eternal peace within myself, to experience enlightenment and to finally find tranquility within my soul.
From this day on, I promise myself to find the truth and seek the answers which lie beyond the surface. Only then will I truly find eternal freedom and be able to break the shackles created by these mysteries, liberating my soul from all this pain and agony. I am Atalia Reign of Orient City, daughter of no one and kin to none, the Onyx Blade of Justice, honorary Ironclad. I was a weapon forged by the people around me, but no more. I hereby dedicate my life to the wings of truth that will unbind me from this cruel world.
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