Several millennia ago, there was a catastrophic battle between the gods and a very terrifying beast of chaos. According to the legends, the battle lasted almost a decade with a lot of the gods losing their lives. At the climax of the battle, the gods came up with a strategy that weakened the beast enough for it to be destroyed. The beast fed upon a power that was abundant on the planet called mana.
Mana was an inexhaustible power flowing through the entire mortal realm that granted power to every creature on the planet but for the beast, it was a source of infinite power. The plan of the gods was to sever the beast's infinite strength by taking away the source. The legends say that they sealed the planets mana core which gave them the chance to wear down the beast until it was weak enough to be destroyed.
After the battle, every celestial being left the face of the mortal world and locked themselves behind the gates of the celestial realm, never to return; all of them except the ancient spirits of nature. The spirits of the land, water, air, fire and darkness, decided to remain on the mortal plane with their mortal followers.
In terms of ranking, the ancient spirits were on the lowest level in the celestial realm; even lower than deities. Whether they move to the celestial realm or stay in the mortal realm was inconsequential so the higher ranked gods did not care. Taking the opportunity, they decided to stay with their followers who still revered and worshipped them.
Since spirits can't exist on the mortal plane without the help of mana to materialize physical forms, they created totem trees that generated bits of elemental mana; enough to enable them move freely in the mortal plane, although they were incapable of manifesting their full powers.
A chiefdom was built at the base of a dormant volcanic mountain that formed in the chaos of the battle between the celestial beings and the great beast. The chiefdom was named the Ongoi Chiefdom. It was made up of five villages centered around the five main elements of the spirits. The villages were the Tamma, Yanco, Teimo, Lagua and Yuna villages. Each village had an assortment of mortals and spirits living together as neighbors with a partnership of a mortal and a spirit serving as co-chiefs of each village.
The spirit who served as co-chief was the leader of their respective element. Raffa, the great spirit of fire partnered with the chief of the Yuna village; Sura, the great spirit of water partnered with the chief of the Lagua village; Nashi, the great spirit of air partnered with the chief of the Tamma village; Doma, great spirit of the land partnered with the chief of the Yanco village and Nabro, great spirit of darkness partnered with the chief of the Teimo village. Each great spirit had their respective elemental totem tree in the center of their resident villages.
The years went by as the spirits and mortals lived side-by-side in perfect peace and harmony. This peace continued until an unexpected event stirred the pot. The great spirit of the air, Nashi had got too close to the chief's daughter, Naane, and soon fell for her. The feeling was mutual of course. Although it was an unwritten rule that the spirits and mortals do not mix in the romantic setting, the two love birds disregarded it and started dating each other.
After spending a lot of time together, their love reached the tipping point and they ended up sleeping together. This action would have gone unnoticed or even ignored by those who found out if not for the fact that the impossible actually happened. Naane turned out to be with child. There was pandemonium when the news broke out across all five villages.
Mulatta, Naane's betrothed chosen for her by her father, as well as the Tamma village's head warrior, feeling immense jealousy and betrayal, roused his followers in all the villages and destroyed all the totem poles. For years, he had continuously grown arrogant and detested the presence of the spirits in their midst.
He felt like the spirits were oppressing them with their very presence there. He was a humanist through and through. Over time, he gathered like-minded people and soon he had followers all over the chiefdom waiting for a perfect opportunity to act; an opportunity that came through the loss of his own fiancée to the very spirits he detested.
Enraged by the supposedly premeditated rash action, the spirits abandoned their materialized bodies and allowed their spiritual bodies to return to the celestial realm. As one of the leaders of the spirits, Nashi had no other choice than to abandon his love and return to the celestial realm.
Naane, as a culprit in committing a taboo as well as having a child out of wedlock was forced to a dilapidated house in the outskirt of the village. Fortunately, he still had support from her father, siblings and a few of the villagers. Even Mulatta, who caused her to lose her lover, also came around. He still had hope of acquiring her as his bride. No matter what crime she had committed, she was still one of the prettiest girls in the entire Ongoi chiefdom and he had to have her. He planned of getting rid of the child as soon as it was born in order to wash the slate clean.
Naane's pregnancy advanced unusually fast, so much so that, in just five months, the pregnancy was in the stage comparable to the normal late stage of the third trimester. A few weeks later, she went into labor. The midwives sent by her father attended to her carefully and aided her throughout the entire process. Due to the nature of her quick pregnancy, her body was not strong enough since it was taxed greatly due to the fetus' quick development. Luckily, she was able to deliver the child without any lasting complications.
She gave birth to a beautiful and healthy baby boy. The baby had the mark of the great wind spirit engraved on his forehead. It was the insignia of the wind elemental spirits that was found on the totem trees as well as each wind elemental spirit; an eagle. The baby let out a loud wail and the mark on his forehead glowed slightly; causing a windstorm outside the residence, knocking down anything that wasn't nailed down.
Naane stretched out her hands and the midwife handed her baby to her. "My son…my little Naho. I'm so happy to see you. Your father and I are so happy you were born", she whispered to the baby as she soothed it with her gentle voice. After a few seconds, the baby stopped wailing and calmed down; the glow of the mark disappearing as well. The raging windstorm also disappeared the moment the baby stopped crying. "My baby…my sweet sweet baby", Naane said as she kissed the child on the forehead.
A pair of red eyes stared at her from outside the house as the observer gritted his teeth. "Don't get too attached. There is no room in my family for a bastard", the figure said as it walked away.