"Huff! Huff! Huff! Huff!"
A teenage boy breathed in and out heavily as he climbed his way out of a pile of rotten corpses.
The stench of rotten flesh permeated the air attracting flies and all sorts of insects.
Zzzzhhh~ Zzzhhh~ Zzzzh~
Buzzing sounds from the wings of the flies rang out as they moved in swarms, perching from corpse to corpse.
The stench was so extremely nauseating that the teenage boy felt like he might empty his stomach contents anytime soon.
However, this wasn't even that big of a deal to him right now. He was more confused about something else as he slowly climbed out of the sea of corpses.
"How am I still alive?" He voiced out amidst his heavy breaths.
Landria's clothes were drenched in a mixture of blood and mud. Some of the bloodstains were his.
He touched his neck trying to feel for something while cleaning the mud off, "It's like it never happened,"
His arms trembled as he made his way forward.
Landria felt his left eye burning up but his right eye was completely fine so he would occasionally shut his left eye but then his vision would be greatly impaired after that.
He had a mud-covered face which impaired the vision of his right eye.
What he didn't know was his left eye was glooming with dark light and a small mystical blue dot in the middle.
Landria's left eye was so dark that his irises couldn't be seen.
"Huff! Huff! Huff! Huff!" He finally climbed out of the sea of corpses and began making his way through the dimly lit forest up ahead.
After a few minutes of running across the forest grounds, he was spotted by some guards patrolling the forest area.
"Stop there! identify yourself!"
They yelled out but he didn't stop running and they had no choice but to give chase.
These guards were dressed in purplish platted armor, armed with swords.
Landria ran as fast as his legs could carry him even though he was supposed to be fatigued right now, he could still move fairly fast.
He had no idea where the energy was coming from even though he couldn't feel any mana within himself.
One of the two guards chasing him started chanting something and a mysterious circular green colored light, laced with runic figures appeared in front.
Thwwiiissh~
A beam shot out towards Landria.
Hie left eye radiating with darkness twitched as he turned to the side, spotting the beam headed for him.
He quickly moved towards the side causing it to slam into a tree up ahead, creating a wide hole within.
'I am out of mana,' Landria wanted to activate a spell but he couldn't.
He kept running as fast as he could as several attacks came from behind.
He had to change directions several times due to the attack from behind. This was the reason he didn't notice the landscape kept extending upwards.
He was finally approaching the end of the forest area. The moment he escaped the range of the canopy of tall trees, he arrived at a cliff.
Tssshhhhhsshh~ Tsshhhhhsshh~
He didn't hear it earlier but now he could. The sound of moving waters coming from beyond the cliff.
Landria moved a little forward and stared down at the body of water at the bottom of the cliff.
His eyes followed the current which was moving extremely fast towards the west.
Thwwhh~
Hearing the sound of branches snapping and the leaves rustling coming from the forest area behind, he turned around.
Fwwwoooooo~
A massive fireball blasted forth from the forest area. His eyes widened as he turned back around and jumped past the edge of the cliff.
The heavy wind blew his face as well as his muddy and blood-soaked clothes while he fell across the air towards the body of water below.
Psshhl~
The sound of the small splash his body made after dropping into the river was covered up by the violent movement of the current making small waves.
The two guards initially chasing, arrived at the edge of the cliff and looked down.
"He jumped in," The one on the left voiced out.
"Should we report this to the Commander?"
"We will just get nagged at for being unable to catch a kid,"
"What if it wasn't a kid?"
"Let's keep it to ourselves, it is no big deal anyway,"
"Okay, I agree,"
After this conclusion, both of them turned around to leave the scene.
------
"Gurrrgghhllee~ Grrhhuuu~"
The currents drifted Landria towards the unknown. He was powerless to have any control over the movement of his body right now.
He kept sinking into the river and floating back up occasionally. He got drowsy and vomited liquid contents so many times as the river currents kept dragging him away.
He had no idea how long he had been floating but it felt like forever.
His mind circled back to how all this came to be.
********************
Landria was a sixteen-year-old from a family of royal bodyguards who protected the main royal household.
These royal bodyguards were a separate type of guards that had been existing for generations and their sole purpose was to keep the royal family they were linked with safe.
They had no business with kingdom wars like other officials and war troops, their only purpose was to protect the royal family.
They were from the greatest Kingdom of the west, Razledania.
From the beginning of time, the planet had been overflowing with Mana. Only mystical creatures could harness it and use it to perform magical deeds.
When humans began to evolve in both physiology and intellect their bodies began to harness mana and they learned how to use magic.
Razledania was among the first empires born around the times humans with magical abilities began to emerge which was why it was one of the most powerful Kingdoms in the world presently.
The Royal bodyguards were from the lebenoire family which was a big extended family that had been existing for generations.
Different branches of the family had different royals they were linked to and they had to make sure to protect that royal and their household.
The main head of the family had always been linked to the King and his descendants. There were other royals like the counts, dutch, duke, and many others.
The other Lebenoires were linked to these other royals to protect them while the head was linked directly to the king and his immediate descendants.
The Lebenoires were a special type of Magic users who were enhanced by mana in the aspect of Combat.
They were mostly skilled in close-quarter combat which made it easier for them to protect the royals personally.
Their unique bloodline gave them the ability to enhance their physical capabilities with magic and every Lebenoire could use transformation magic as well.
This was a rare type of magic that was only privy to the Lebenoires in this age. It connected to nature and gave them the ability to take the form of a mystical creature, enhancing their capabilities by a whole lot since mystical creatures were the first magic users.
They didn't cast magic outrightly like other mages and barely make long-range magic spells but they were still the most feared across kingdoms because of their unique mage bloodline.
Landria's father, the current head, was the king's guard. His grandfather used to be the King's father's guard back then when they were both alive.
Their family line had been the ones keeping the King's immediate family safe for centuries.
It was a great honor and title and they were well known and feared all across the kingdoms of the west.
Landria was next in line to become the King's bodyguard which would only happen when the King's son, Phastus took over after his father died or passed the throne to him.
Phastus happened to be Landria's best friend. They had been close since they were little kids and even took some combat training together.
Landria was excellent and gifted in combat so much that none of his peers, cousins and other family members in his age group could compare.
He would even teach Phastus little tricks to protect himself sometimes. Phastus would always tell him, "When I become king one day, we'll go on so many adventures together,"
Landria would respond with, "Hehe of course who else would you pick to protect your weak ass," And they would both laugh it off while mentioning places they would visit.
Landria was the only person who could speak to Phastus this way.
Everyone else was scared of his title and as the next king. Phastus was barely let out of the palace grounds so he and Landria spent a lot of time together since Landria's father always had to be around the King.
Landria was different from other Lebenoires too. Unlike the other Lebenoires, he could also cast magic like normal magic casters.
Not only did he have the unique Lebenoire bloodline, but he was also skilled in other uses of magic which made him even more gifted.
Flandor Lebenoire, Landria's father, always took pride in his son believing he would surpass every head of the family in terms of power one day.
Landria had only one sibling, a little sister who was twelve years of age but his father was still trying to create more so the numbers would be balanced out with the immediate main royal family members.
Landria was still undergoing special Lebenoire training but would become a full-fledged Royal bodyguard who would directly be linked to Phastus in two years.
Everything was going well...
Until one evening when the alarm bells within the palace ground rang out.
Landria who was playing a game of tag with Phastus at the time had no idea that these ringing bells were announcing the change of his fate.
"Arrhhh!!! The king has been murdered!!!"