It was late into the night, or rather, early in the morning when Arkham was suddenly woken up. He jolted up in the uncomfortable straw mat that he was using as a bed.
"Arkham, Kutra has the runs. Need you to take his place and go patrol with Quatre." Hareel, the ranking guard said as he marched off from the tent Arkham shared with several others.
Arkham was groggy from being woken up at this time and took a little bit to collect himself.
'I left the capital Augusta two months ago after I was framed. I joined the Iunian Guard to situate myself in Iunia. Then I got sent to do border patrols since there have been reports of Febran movements in the Silver Shear mountains.'
He quickly grabbed his spear and pouch then made his way out of the tent. His tent was one of four big tents that housed six people each, totaling twenty four people who were currently here on look out. The tents surrounded a fire that kept them warm in the cold desert night, now Arkham had to rely on his wool under shirt.
"Arkham? Nice to meet you, I'm Quatre." The young man said, standing next to the fire as Arkham came out.
Arkham nodded and then motioned for them to move out, he was still tired from his actual payroll last night. Quatre was a year younger than Arkham and generally listened to his seniors, so he kept up with Arkham's pace. They were supposed to trudge through the sand dunes and take a quick peek at where the mountain steppe met the desert.
"You think it's true that the Febrans are going to use the mountains to invade Iunia?" Quatre asked Arkham as they walked under the star filled sky. It was bright enough that they didn't need torches to see on the dunes.
"As someone from Augusta, I can't believe the other cities are so tribalistic." Arkham shook his head in exasperation. Febras was a port city located on the eastern end of the continent that also happened to be where the Cordus river met the Eastern Ocean, they shouldn't have much reason to go after Iunia.
"We've had a rivalry with them for years! After we get back from this trip, I'm going to join the Iunian Army! I'm going to go fight the Febrans on the front lines and make my grandpa proud!" Quatre declared to Arkham with a confident look in his eye.
"Hmm, war huh? I thought tensions were rising but war does seem like it's not far behind."
'I could use this opportunity to get some achievements too! Being in a position of power in the Iunian army could help me. But how long will I have to spend as a damn foot soldier!?' Arkham pondered as Quatre rattled off on something else.
"-and you wouldn't know it but my grandfather was part of the Augustan guard before he retired to Iunia." Quatre was in the middle of saying before Arkham cut him off.
"You know what, Quatre, let's do it! Let's join the army after this nonsense!"
"Are you being for real!?" Quatre asked, joyfully surprised.
"Of course, someone's got to watch your back! You're still too hot blooded!" Arkham laughed as they shook hands on a pact.
The two chatted more as they went along their way, eventually Arkham considered Quatre to possibly be his first real friend in Iunia. Quatre wanted to protect his home and gain glory, meanwhile Arkham stated that he was just here to look for his own glory here. All Quatre knew was that Arkham moved to Augusta and now to Iunia, Arkham carefully left out the parts about being a Scholar in training.
"Wait, stop!" Arkham suddenly said as he stopped to the sand, pushing Quatre to the ground as well. "I see figures ahead of us!"
"Another patrol?" Quatre suggested as he squinted to see five figures slowly making their way towards them. "Could or possibly one of ours?"
"A squad of five? Looks like a standard Frebran scouting party, just like Hareel said!" Arkham shook his head as the figures slowly got more and more clearer.
"Arkham! Incoming!" Quatre pointed at a fast approaching thing in the sky.
An ear piercing cry very suddenly echoed through the dunes, drawing the scouting party's attention to where Quatre and Arkham were.
"Damn it! That's a Warhawk! We need to go now!" Arkham cursed as he and Quatre scrambled to their feet. The hawk was now checking above them, letting the Frebrans know exactly where they were. "Two against five plus a bird is not good!"
"We need to warn the others!"
"You mean you need to!" Arkham said as he stopped and turned to face the enemies.
"Arkham, what are you doing!? Fighting them is suicide!" Quatre exclaimed as he tried to get Arkham to start running again.
"I'm only going to say this once, leave your spear and run! That Febran squad is catching up too fast! I guess they've been really training to run on sand so easily. I'll just use your spears when they get close!" Arkham said with a determined look in his eyes, focusing on the enemies that were nearly upon them. "I hope you have another weapon too."
"I do, it's just a knife though. Why!?" Quatre quickly said as he dropped his spear at Arkham's feet.
"That bird is probably going to try to maim you, it's masters probably taught it to herd us together. Good luck!" Arkham smiled as he finally turned to Quatre. "What are you waiting for!? Run like hell!"
Quatre nodded and started sprinting off again, all the while as Arkham predicted, the hawk following from above. It was about as big as Quatre's torso so it wasn't that big, Arkham thought Quatre could probably handle it. At worst it would be some injuries, at least that's what Arkham hoped.
Meanwhile, the Febrans were nearly on top of Arkham, with their swords in hand. Arkham frowned when he could finally make out their armor. They had on leather armor with various interlaced metal bits, normally the metal would weigh someone down in the sand. But obviously these men were conditioned to not be as fatigued from the weight.
"Die!" The Febrans shouted as they were about 10 feet away, they were not in the mood to take prisoners.
"Here we go." Arkham had put everything into a gamble and threw his spear at the Febrans. He was nervous and keeping calm was the most important thing to focus on.
It flew over their heads but landed when Arkham wanted, causing the sand to shift slightly from the impact. As it turned out, Arkham had stopped near the edge of a dune and now his final gamble was played.
Just before they got within slashing distance, Arkham quickly reached for Quatre's spear and drove it into the sand below him. The impact from his spear had weakened it which allowed Quatre's spear to start a chain reaction in the sand, causing Quatre and the Febrans to start tumbling down the side of the dune. The weight of their armor had allowed the sands to shift easily!
"Ack!" When they finally stopped tumbling, two of the Febrans had sprained their ankles and one had bumped their head on a rock.
Quickly scrambling to his feet before the Febrans could recover, Arkham ran towards the closest thing he saw. This turned out to be a strange opening in the dune next to him.
He took out a small clear canister and shook it, this caused the contents to mix and chemically react to produce light. This was an emergency item so he had to act fast, he needed a safe way to run as far as he could into the cave.
It turned out that the cave did in fact have various twists and turns, but the end of it was a small circular area about three times Arkham's height in diameter.
"I can probably stay here until morning, hopefully those bastards go away!" Arkham sat on the rock pillar in the middle of the room, catching his breath. After a few minutes of rest, he decided to explore the rest of the room before he turned in for the night.
'Figures that I'd get more sleep here than with the guard' Arkham thought as he searched for any signs of danger.
That was when he finally saw what was on the other side of the pillar, it was a skeleton with various objects around it!
The skeleton was in white robes and the first thing that caught Arkham's eye was the thing on its head.
"Impossible! How can this be!?" Arkham gasped as he got closer to confirm it, his hands shaking in excitement.
"The Crown of Souls that the Thousand year Emperor owned!?"
Arkham had only read about it in Augusta but the object in front of him matched the drawings and descriptions! It was a black crown that shone when the light from Arkham's emergency lantern hit it, its blood red rubies also seemed to react to the light as well.
As Arkham was about to reach for the Crown, he noticed a small knife and a cut in the robes where a large black stain was.
"Suicide?" Arkham was skeptical, why would the Emperor who conquered the continent and ruled for a 1000 years, kill himself in this place!?
That's when his attention was finally drawn to the small black objects by the skeleton's feet. They looked like jewel sculptures of some sort, with similar composition just like the Crown. But these had an ominous black aura that made them seem almost alive on the forms they were in, a jet black scorpion with blood red eyes and a centipede with red eyes as well.
"The 5 great generals were powerful warriors rumored to be Evil gods incarnated, Scorpius, Centrax, Zazabe, Koteros, and Draxis. Scorpius and Centrax were represented by scorpions and centipedes respectively."
Arkham was really intrigued by the strange scene he had discovered when he felt something calling to him.
He looked up and saw the Crown, it's rubies pulsating with life. His heart beat got louder and louder until it was all he could hear.
"Damn it! What is this!?" Arkham said as his heart beats thundered in his eardrums.
It seemed like the Crown was threatening to swallow him up!
Arkham fell into a fetal position as he covered his ears, that's when he noticed the black scorpion next to his face. He reached for it, fully intending to throw it at the Crown. But that's when the unthinkable happened!
The black scorpion moved and stung his arm, and after that it seemed to melt into his skin and turned into a tattoo!
Words with an ominous feeling suddenly appeared out of thin air and floated before Arkham's eyes.