The world is divided into six kingdoms that creatures called demons rule. One of these kingdoms is called Denderen. This one is known for being the most powerful one and has the trust of all other kingdoms. Close behind is the kingdom of Tinderen. Both of these kingdoms are well known and help each other when needed. About a few hundred years ago in the kingdom of Denderen, the royal family was gifted with twins. The twin princesses are great news for the royal family but sadly the two little princesses were born with sick bodies...
One of the twins, Luna, is reading a book as she is sitting under a huge tree in the garden of the palace. "Luna!" She hears her twin sister Elsa calling for her. Luna looks up from the book to see Elsa, who is running towards her. "Luna, Luna~", Elsa says while smiling brightly as she approaches her sister. Seeing the bright smile makes Luna smile as well. She wonders what Elsa was so excited about. Did something good happen?
Both Luna and Elsa share a similar appearance. The long black hair, soft skin, and two-coloured eyes. The only difference they have is that their eye colours are opposite. Luna has a red left eye and a green right eye while Elsa has a green left eye and a red right eye. Besides this difference, their personalities are also different. Elsa is social and always going somewhere while Luna would rather stay in a few familiar places and enjoy her time on her own or with those who she knows well.
"Did something good happen?" Luna asks. Elsa nods and takes Luna's hand, getting her to stand up. This causes Luna to drop her book on the ground. "Let's go, they will be here at any moment", Elsa says excitedly without explaining the situation to Luna. Instead, she starts to lead Luna away from the garden. Luna looks at the book that she has to leave behind as she is dragged away from the garden.
They walk to the gates and that is when Luna puts everything together to understand the situation. At the gate, there is the royal family of Tindere. Luna and Elsa's parents are there as well, greeting the king and queen of Tindere. Luna's attention goes to the young boy with long red hair making his appearance to be slightly more feminine. His arms are crossed and he is looking around but he doesn't seem happy for some reason.
Elsa seemed to have noticed it too as she blinks when they get there. "He's upset because his brother wouldn't train him", the slightly shorter boy with short white fluffy hair explains with a soft quiet voice. "I'm not upset about that!" The boy with red hair says sharply and turns to look at them. His eyes slightly widen as he notices Luna there. His gaze moves to the surroundings while he continues to pout.
The red-haired boy is the second prince of Tinderen kingdom, Ren. The brother that was mentioned is the first prince Ran and the shorter boy is an adopted child of Tindere, Shiro. He was found at the gate of Tinderen but there is no background information about him. Shiro also has no memories of his past. Since Ren, Shiro, Elsa, and Luna are all around the same age, they hang out with each other when they can, usually when the Tindere family visits them.
Elsa blinks slightly confused. "Wouldn't train him?" She asks. "Yeah, I asked him to help me with my swordsmanship training but he said no without explaining why", Ren explains and then sighs. The word swordsmanship catches Luna's attention. Both Elsa and Luna have weak bodies when it comes to anything related to magic. Elsa's body seems to be weak physically as well. She gets tired easily and needs more rest than others but for Luna besides the problems with magic, she isn't different from other demons.
"Are you there?" Ren waves his hand in front of Luna's face trying to get her attention. Luna had been in her thoughts and hadn't focused on what they had been talking about. When she gets back to reality the only ones there are four of them. Their parents and king and queen of Tindere had gone inside already. The first prince of Tindere was in another kingdom doing something so he hadn't come to visit them this time.
"Seriously, spacing out like that. Pay more attention to your surroundings, idiot", Ren says and crosses his arms. Luna nods not minding the rude attitude of Ren as she knows he doesn't mean anything bad by it. Usually when Ren says things like that he is just worried about her. "Luna, are you okay?" Elsa asks and looks at her twin sister with a concerned expression.
Sometimes when Luna spaces out it means she is in pain or has little energy left causing her to not be able to focus on her surroundings. Luna smiles a bit and pats Elsa's head. "I'm alright", she says assuring the worried sister of her. "...Maybe we should go inside", Shiro suggested as he noticed the day was coming to an end. The sky was getting darker and the wind was getting colder. Everyone agreed with this suggestion but Luna said that she has to go to get her book before going inside.
While others went inside, Luna returned to the garden and went to the three where she had dropped the book. She picks it up and looks at the cover. 'Learn how to protect', says the cover of the book. "You still read those books?", a voice says behind her. Luna blinks and turns to see Ren behind her and leaning over to see the book cover. He must have followed her. Luna didn't need to explain why she had chosen a book like that since Ren knew exactly why. It was so she could protect Elsa who has a weaker body.
Luna nods and Ren sighs. "Stop worrying so much. If you worry so much about the future that hasn't even happened you will regret it", Ren says. "Regret?" Luna asks back with slight confusion on her face. She knew worrying wouldn't help but she didn't understand what Ren was talking about when he said she would regret it. What would she regret? "Yeah, you'll regret not enjoying these moments… You know, when this day ends you won't get it back", Ren says and turns to walk back inside.
"Come on, others are waiting", he says and looks back at her waiting for Luna to catch up and walk with him inside. Luna hadn't thought about that but Ren was right maybe she should focus more on the moment she was living. Even if Ren's words came off as mean or rude, he still shows that he cares and worries for her in his way. Luna is thankful for that but still, she can't help but worry about Elsa.
A few days have passed and Luna is walking through the hallways. She stops as she hears a voice from the room next to her. It's the room of the royal doctor. He is the one who takes care of both princesses. Since they were born he took care of them and looked after them and thanks to him both Elsa and Luna are still alive. Luna is about to continue walking when he hears her mother's voice inside the room. It caused her to turn her attention to the voice and listen to what they were talking about.
"Then we don't know how much time she has?" The mother asks. Luna can't help but wonder if they are talking about Elsa's situation. Only a few weeks ago Elsa had collapsed badly and for a few days it seemed like she wouldn't survive but luckily she did. Luna was scared next time they wouldn't be so lucky so she has been worrying about it. "Her body is already slowly dying. it's just about how long it takes to completely die. My magic won't be able to stop it either. It should slow it down for some time so the rest will depend on her will to live. She has a better chance of getting better if she can live past her birthday", the other voice replies.
The royal doctor, Kenshin is one of the best magical doctors known in the whole planet of Seir Nei. Even so, even in this world, there are sicknesses, diseases, and wounds that magic cannot fix. Not all miracles are possible after all. Both Luna and Elsa were born with magic-related diseases called magic refusal. This is a rare type of disease that makes the owner unable to take or use magic energy. Elsa is unable to take the magic energy or be surrounded by it while Luna is unable to use it well or be surrounded by too much of it.
Elsa's situation is harder as her body is trying to refuse all the magic energy that surrounds her. Sometimes it's said that Elsa is allergic to magic energy. Luna on the other hand can handle the normal amount of magic but her body has a strong reaction when there is too much of it or when she is trying to use magic. The words Kenshin had said stayed on Luna's mind as she walked away not wanting to hear more of this conversation.
She goes outside where Elsa and others are waiting for her. As she is walking to them, she remembers Ren talking about swordsmanship when they came. "What took you so long?" Ren asks and raises his eyebrow at Luna. Instead of answering, Luna looks at Ren and stays quiet. Ren feels his cheeks warm up and turns to look away while placing his hand in front of his lower face.
"If you have something to say, just say it already", he says while trying to hide his embarrassment. This makes Elsa laugh as she watches the two. "Hey! Don't laugh", Ren says looking at Elsa who ends up laughing even more. Even Shiro chuckles. "Not you too", Ren says as he looks at the short boy who was trying his best not to laugh. Ren then sighs knowing they won't be listening to him now.
Luna looks at them and sees Ren turn to look at her again. "This is your fault", he mumbles. "Ren", Luna says and catches Ren off guard. "Huh? What now?" Ren says and raises his eyebrow at Luna again. "You can use a sword, right?" Luna asks and Ren gives a nod with a slightly confused look. "Yeah, why? You're not planning to learn how to use a sword, are you?" He asks even though he could already guess where this was going as he was asking.
"I want you to teach me", Luna says. "I can't, it's too dangerous", Ren declines immediately. "I'll be okay", Luna insists and looks Ren into his red eyes but Ren tries to avoid eye contact. "It's not about that. You need a strong body to use a sword", Ren explains. "I can train", Luna says, not giving up on this. "Ugh… It won't be easy to use a sword", Ren says then and Luna nods. "I know", she says. "... "Why do you even want to learn to use a sword?" Ren asks then but there is silence as Luna doesn't answer.
"My body takes a long time to learn magic. The limit of how much and how long I can use it is too much to use it well but my body can handle other things normally so I thought that I should learn to use a sword instead", Luna explains. Ren looks at Elsa who is amazed by what Luna is saying and then turns to look at Luna again. "This is for Elsa again?" He guesses and Luna nods confirming his guess.
Ren sighs as he gives up on trying to argue as he knows Luna won't give up on this. "Fine but you need to get permission from your parents and Kenshin otherwise I can't do anything to help you. And you need to promise not to overdo it", Ren says then. Luna agrees with this and so they go to get the permissions they need. Luna's father is first against it but just like Ren, he ends up agreeing if they can get others to agree as well. Luna's mother is worried but says that they should talk about it with Kenshin who should know Luna's body the best to make the right decision. Surprisingly Kenshin agreed on it easily. "If I disagree she will push herself too much while learning magic. Her body is better at handling physical stress than magic", Kenshin had told them explaining why he agreed to it.
"Yey, Luna can learn to use a sword now!" Elsa says happily. "You sound happy about it", Shiro comments and looks at Elsa. Two of them are sitting on the grass to watch Ren and Luna starting to train. Elsa looks at Shiro and smiles brightly. "Of course I'm happy. When Luna is happy, I'm happy, and learning how to use a sword seems to make Luna happy", Elsa says and turns to look at the training. Shiro chuckles quietly and also turns to see the training.
Ren starts by letting Luna get used to the weight of the sword as it's her first time holding one. Luna is fast at learning but it will still take her a long time to get good at it besides using a real sword is not as easy as it might seem based on stories. The time Ren and Shiro stayed in the Denderen, Ren was able to teach Luna some basics of swordsmanship. With this Luna can continue practicing on her own. The progress is not as fast as Luna had hoped to but it's better than nothing.
"Your birthday is in a few days, right?" Ren asks as they are standing in front of the castle gates. Both Elsa and Luna nod. "Will you come to visit us then?" Elsa asks happily. "I wish we could but we can't", Ren says a bit sadly. "Why not?" Elsa asks and looks at Shiro. "There are special guests in the castle at that time so we cannot come", he explains. "But we will come when they leave", Ren promises. "We will wait for you guys then!" Elsa says as she smiles happily.
Luna hasn't said anything since Ren brought up their birthday. It reminded her of how close it was and she hasn't forgotten about what she heard by accident. Luna wanted to ask Kenshin about it but at the same time, she didn't want to know. Would this birthday be their last one together? Luna didn't want to think about it, not now at least. She didn't want to think about it at all if possible so instead, she turned to watch as the Tindere family left.
"Luna", Elsa says and looks at the sky above them. "No matter what happens, you should live happily and enjoy your life to the fullest", she says and smiles with a sad smile. Luna hadn't thought of it but there is no way Elsa wouldn't be aware of her own body and how much time she would have left. Hearing Elsa's words made Luna fear that the time left is running out. "You too", Luna says, causing Elsa to look at her confused. Still, she smiled and nodded.