Axel wandered the halls of the palace, letting his feet carry him through the maze of pathways, past numerous rooms that displayed only a dim remnant of their previous splendor. His mind kept trying to plunge him into a torrent of memories, reflections of his past actions in the palace. His heart was still hurting. He missed this place, the magnificence of it all, and the friends he made and saw every day. However, something stopped him from fully immersing himself in his memories and the feelings which flooded back to him as if bursting from the dam that was his amnesia. Despite his curiosity and desire to uncover his past, some dull, aching pain filled his heart, an unspeakable dread, piercing sadness, and burning vengeance that made the visions that now flickered in front of his eyes seem sad and nostalgic. The inexplicable feeling coursed through Axel in a deep undercurrent, far below the pounding heart that beat on the surface, stopping him from digging any further.
"Do you have any idea what a Paragon is?" Kyle whispered from his side as he walked.
Axel dimly saw himself turn to the left and look at Kyle.
"Not sure, apparently it's some position of high power."
"From what the butler said, it sounds kind of like a royal guard."
Axel shrugged. "Maybe."
"Well, I don't like being a royal guard. I don't even know the guy."
"He's the king, Kyle. Show some respect."
"He's not my king," Kyle grumbled.
Axel chuckled slightly in the dim hallway as the ghostly figures of the past faded away. He looked back to his left and let out a long sigh. There was nobody there. He kept walking, letting voices carry him through the halls and around the castle. Phantom images of the past began to appear and disappear, running around Axel and appearing randomly, as if a tap had opened and memories came flowing out as if blocked up for years.
"Yo, Axel!" Kyle's voice called from far behind him. "Y'know the king's daughter, Arville? She's an absolute hottie! I'm gonna ask her out!"
A little ways down the hall, a sturdy young man wearing simple but rich training clothes sauntered around the corner towards Axel, pointing a wooden sword at him.
"Hey. Mister Paragon. Heard you were strong. Wanna spar?"
"Don't let the position make you feel burdened," King Creon said from Axel's right. "Think of it as being a hero from a storybook."
"Why is everyone in this castle so good-looking?" Kyle asked cheerfully from behind Axel. "It's like everywhere I turn there's another beauty."
"These social gatherings make my ears bleed," another young man grumbled from Axel's left. "I'd rather lose to my sister in a spar than attend another one of them."
Axel tried to blot out the voices and figures, but the more he squeezed his eyes shut, the more the figures wandered the halls, overlapping and chattering in an ever-growing clamor. The more he tried to ignore them, the louder they talked from every direction. Axel felt his feet start running, carrying him through the palace in an angry attempt to escape. He turned a corner and ran up a stairway, surprising a phantom maid that disappeared as soon as Axel charged through her ethereal body. His heart kept throbbing, pounding in a painful reverie. Axel dashed down a hallway, ignoring the countless illusions created by his confused mind and darted into a room along the hall, slamming the door shut behind him.
A musty smell drifted through the air. Axel opened his eyes. He found himself standing in a large, spacious room, richly furnished in red and gold, with an ornate interior and a curtain-covered doorway that led to a balcony overlooking the withered garden. The room was in pristine condition if not for the layer of dust covering everything. There was even a small round table with fancy chairs and a tea set sitting there, waiting for friends to join. A massive dresser took up part of the wall immediately to Axel's left, and opposite it was a massive ornate canopy bed. Beside the bed was a side table with a half-burnt candle. On the wall next to the door was a full-size mirror which reflected Axel's tattered appearance.
Messy brown hair that lay haphazardly around his head, only a little too short to fall into his eyes. Silent brown eyes that stared sadly back at himself. Bloody black bandages made from his shirt wrapping around a lean, well-defined body. A pauldron strapped to his right shoulder in a measly attempt at self-preservation. A toned figure peeking out from under the various rips in Axel's clothes. A weathered belt with a worn brown scabbard that was a little too long for his sword. A height that was on the shorter side. A face locked in a solemn expression.
Axel looked away from the mirror and sighed. As if on instinct, Axel's body moved itself over to the bed and reached under it, feeling a leathery yet smooth texture of a strap. Axel pulled on it, dragging an old backpack out onto the richly designed carpet. It was light gray with black lines and designs. The various pockets were sealed by a strange contraption which Axel's mind identified as a "zipper". Axel's arms moved automatically, sliding the pockets open with a curious soft scratching noise and taking out the contents. Axel's brain began to work overtime, dragging up strange words that he didn't know, from a time in his past sealed further back in time than even the bright memories of the castle however many years ago.
Old jeans and a plain gray t-shirt.
A black swimsuit.
A half-empty bottle of sunscreen.
A pair of broken sunglasses.
A small first aid kit that his mother made him bring.
A cell phone and a portable charger.
Axel's hands slid smoothly over the flat screen of the cell phone, sliding naturally to a bump on its side and pressing it. Nothing happened. Axel's hands pulled the portable charger over, and in a series of movements unknown to Axel by anything other than the mysterious words, "charging the phone".
Axel then put the phone and charger back into the backpack, zipping it back up. He put the backpack on and left the room, deep in thought. His feet carried him back through the castle, but this time, no voices called out to him. No ghostly figures followed him. No hallucinations of warmth and sun followed him as he walked aimlessly through the castle, wondering where this backpack came from.
The items in the backpack clearly did not belong to Falnear, where the gem keepers lived, or Argean, the dead continent where he lived in the past. Axel felt a strange sense of sadness when he looked at them, as if he missed something important. The material they were made of was foreign to both lands, and didn't seem natural. The neat lettering on the sunscreen that Axel both didn't recognize and instinctively knew how to read was printed in colors and in straight lines which Axel knew was impossible even with the steadiest of hands. Everything about the items felt artificial.
But at the same time, the items felt oddly familiar.
Axel shook his head, clearing his thoughts away. He had tried and tried again to dredge up his memories, but it never worked unless he saw something that had been involved with his past. Axel opened his eyes and refocused on his surroundings. His feet had taken him through the palace to the royal treasury, a room that was somehow even more ornately and richly furnished and designed than the rest of the palace, and was on par with the throne room in its majesty.
Axel frowned.
"How'd I end up here?" he muttered.
Axel glanced around at the relatively untouched treasury. Behind him was a massive set of elegant gold and iron double doors, too heavy to be pushed open by one person. Lining the hallway on either side were ornate gold armors, with some spots empty. Clearly, the empty spots used to house actual royal guards who blended into the wall decoration. The doorway in led to a set of large, gradually widening platform steps leading downwards as the pathway opened up into the vast expanse that was the treasury. The treasury walls reached up many times higher than Axel's meager height, and had tall, rectangular alcoves built into them at regular intervals, separated by massive Corinthian pillars holding up the magnificent arched ceiling. Mounted on the pillars and in the upper recesses of the numerous alcoves were richly designed sconces with eternally burning flames lighting up the various treasures in the room. The room continued onwards like a hallway, shouldered by pillars, with a royal green carpet with gold trim lining the middle. In each alcove was a small Ionic pedestal with a rich grasslike cushion holding various small treasures. Crowns of past kings, necklaces of past royals, rings worn by long-dead nobles, and various other items that Axel couldn't be bothered to identify in any detail other than "expensive".
Various other items were mounted on various stands, mannequins, and in glass cases, spaced evenly among the pillars on either side of the carpet with room to walk between. Richly designed ceremonial weapons and armor stood silently. As Axel continued walking down the hallway, feet treading silently on the rich carpet, the weapons and armor mounted on either side of the carpeted path began to change from decorative and ceremonial items to worn and weathered weapons that had seen battle and armor of accomplished warriors. They were clearly well taken care of, with the only indication of their past use being tiny cracks and chips that could not be polished and shined enough to disappear, and the only differentiation from the other ceremonial items being their more practical and sturdy designs.
Axel continued walking through the treasury, marveling at how this was the only room that seemed untouched and full of life, unlike the rest of the castle.
The dull buzz in Axel's head that was steadily growing stronger as he walked down the treasury was likely the reason why. Axel had felt this feeling before, three times now. Once in the deep reaches of the strangely designed Dark Lord's castle out on the island south of Argean. Once in a hidden room behind a dungeon cell in the castle the gem keepers lived in. Once more in a hidden room deep underneath Azor's ruined castle.
This was the aura of an Elder Dragon's gem.
Axel wasn't sure of it due to how distracting the treasures in this room were, but as he neared the end of the hall and saw the massive circular raised platform, he was sure.
Mounted atop a pedestal adorned with nothing but the immense gem itself was a large cloudy gray spherical gem that seemed to fade in and out of sight as Axel moved. White and gray wisps seemed to float around, inside, and through the gem, illuminated by a gentle ghostly glow, making the gem seem blurry and unreal.