The skies lit up in a myriad of colours while explosions shook the ground. Smoke, dust, ash and steam dirtied the atmosphere as winds from the shockwaves of the battle before him blew Khaos' robes and hair backward.
Khaos was currently kneeling, watching at the chaos happening in front of him, elements flew all over the place with no rhyme or reason, however, not even a single spec of dust fell upon Khaos' figure.
This was because five soldiers had stayed behind to protect him, with a single soldier on each cardinal direction and the last one floating above him. The one in front of him had already sustained some injuries, from surprise stray attacks but he did not falter.
His determination shook Khaos.
"Why?" he asked.
His voice was low, not to the amount of noise on the battlefield, but all five of his protectors heard him perfectly clear. "We do not have a choice", the one behind Khaos said. Since he was behind the defensive line, he did not have a single scratch on his body, hence he had the luxury to speak.
"How do you mean?" Khaos asked. "Does The Spear force you to fight?".
"No, quite the opposite actually. Every morning we are given the choice to walk away from The Spear. We would still get our pay and benefits, even without fighting".
"However to what end?. Humans are loosing this war and that is a fact, you don't need to be an Academic to know that. Even if we do not fight, one day we will die anyway. We would rather die for something than nothing".
"Someone needs to stop this", the soldier at the front said as he conjured a water wall in front of him. "This war has been going on for ten thousand years, and i think the higher ups of humanity have even forgotten about it".
"A portal appears every month at different parts of the world. Every month our comrades die trying to buy time for the Defenders to arrive. Then they do arrive and protect the cities, then the next month, the same thing happens over and over again".
"The higher ups have become content with humanity just surviving instead of living. For how long is this going to go on?. Are we doomed to fight forever?. Is this humanity's fate?" He said.
"Ten more thousand years from now our descendants are going to be saying; 'This war started twenty thousand years ago'. If no one stops this, they will never say; 'Long ago there was a great war which spanned thousands of years'".
"My grandfather was here on this very same spot as me, he died buying time, my father also died buying time. And i am also going to die today. I have a fifty year old son at home, chances are this is also his fate. We all die just to survive".
"I do not have the talent to change things. I will never grow powerful enough to make a difference, i can only hope that my death will mean something one day. I can only hope that one day we will be looking down at a peaceful world". He concluded.
Khaos faced the ground as he thought about the soldier's words. 'He is right, he knows that his death will mean nothing in the grand scheme of things but he still has hope that this will all end one day'.
Now that i think about it, i never heard anyone at the Academy talk about ending the war for good. They only talk of protecting the citizens, but for how long?. I was born when the world was already like this so a part of me convinced myself that it's normal'.
The funny part is that my goal is to gain enough power to protect the ones i care about. But what about those that have no shot at gaining this power?. They put their faith in people like me, but people like me have adapted to living in war because we can become powerful enough to protect ourselves and our loved ones'.
The Academies do all they can to protect the people, but they cannot always do so. If they could, my parents would still be alive. Humanity will survive, but will it live?, I say becoming powerful will allow me to live in peace, but that's not true.'
Peace is not having the power to protect oneself, peace is having no enemy. It is having no need to fight. So as long as the war continues, there cannot be peace'.
"What are your names?" Khaos asked the guards around him.
"You can call us Daniel", the soldier at the front said.
"Okay Daniel, I am nothing but a stage seven cultivator, as of now, and i cannot promise that i will change anything. But i can promise that i will try. This war has become the normal state of Zylon, and i will do my best to change that. One day maybe thousands of years from now, things will be different".
"Thank you". The Daniel at front said before suddenly collapsing onto the ground. His face was pale white and black veins bulged out from his forehead.
He ran out of energy' Khaos thought 'The piece of rock sticking out of his chest was the cause of death but that rock only got through because he ran out of Flux.
In only a second, the Daniel who was at Khaos' back jumped over him and took the dead Daniel's place. Khaos clenched his teeth as two bottles appeared in his hands. They were potions he had taken from his space ring, and he began gulping them down a second later.
His wounds started healing at a pace visible to the naked eye as he used the small sliver of Flux he had regenerated during his talk with the Daniels to distribute the potion's medicine over his injuries. When he was done, one bottle was empty and the other one had been halved.
He then poured some of the remaining potion into the empty bottle so as to have equal amounts on each bottle. Then he handed each bottle to the two Daniels on each side of him. "Are you sure?, these things are very expensive", the Daniel on the left said.
"I am sure". Khaos nodded.
The Daniels thanked Khaos before also gulping down the healing potions, healing the injuries they had sustained. Five Flux stones then appeared before Khaos as he assumed a lotus position. As soon as the stones lost their energy, five more would appear, repeating the process as Khaos regained his Flux at a rapid pace.