When Darkness Turns to Light

When Darkness Turns To Light

Chapter one: Mora the Bounty Hunter        Mora’s P.O.V.

         I was on a high rooftop when I saw a figure upon the neighboring building. My hand was already on one of my weapons, “Fight now, and ask questions later.”  The kingdom of Seisui (rise and fall) was a mystical, unpredictable, and dangerous place. The monsters of our world, which left me trying to protect myself, had overcome most humans. As I got closer to the stranger, I began to recognize who it was, “*Gasp*, it’s the Steel Beast! He’ll bring a handsome bounty…” I snuck up on him from behind, jumping from the other building. The Steel Beast had steel chains that grew out of his back; one of them grabbed me as he turned around. His eyes became angry once he saw me. “Not another one of them,” He thought while twisting the chains tighter. I wasn’t very strong at all so I couldn’t break free…that is until my elemental powers kicked in. A crack of thunder was heard through out the rooftops and my eyes turned a glossy white. Then a bolt of lightning struck the chains, electrocuting both him and me.

         At the point of contact, the beast dropped me and was briefly distracted. I got up in time to take advantage of this. “This should do the trick,” I believed and threw a few poisonous throwing stars at him. In defense, the Steel Beast put up his wrists but that was no way near the amazing part. The stars, in the middle of their path, paused and headed back in my direction. Before I could question this feat, I had to get away from my own attack. I released a smoke bomb and escaped quickly onto a telephone wire. He located me within seconds and sent his metallic minions after me. Luckily, I was fast enough not to get caught. I leaped off the wire and soared towards him, “Please don’t let me be a total failure.” “Elemental Hammer!” I commanded prior to striking him with the legendary weapon, which was really a big judge’s hammer. I knew it had worked when I saw my enemy unconscious instead of me. “Wow, maybe I am getting better,” I congratulated myself. Though I came from a long line of elementalists (those with power over the elements) I couldn’t always tap into my abilities.

         “He’s not so scary, “ I said, curiously looking over him. The Steel Beast was rumored to have a monster’s face, horrible boils, and hair everywhere. “Hmph, no boils…no monster’s face… no hair everywhere…hey, this guy almost looks human,” I evaluated, “Well, better move him before he wakes up.” I ran over to the edge of the roof and saw an officer patrolling the streets. “Hey, officer! I got something you might like!” I yelled. This officer was of the elephant race, very strong creatures. When the officer finally made it to the roof, I had noticed that the criminal’s chains had retracted. The officer almost didn’t believe it was him but I eventually confirmed his identity. “You?” my supervisor, Rakuno was surprised of my deed, “I mean, you have talent but…not that much. We’ve been looking for him for years!” I was considered a normal bounty hunter until then. “Yes, I know,” I boasted, “So, how much money am I getting?” “None. Until he’s transported to Jisatu’s Tower.” He explained, “But once he gets there, you’ll be in for the biggest pay day of your life.” “Wow, all the way to the king’s castle, that’s harsh. What has he done, really?” I wondered. “You mean, you don’t know? He single handedly murdered the former king and his family, not to mention killing his own wife.” He professed. “He was the guy that did that, I thought nobody knew who killed the former king?” I questioned, “Are you sure?” He nodded at me with certainty, “No doubt about it, Mora. He’ll be off to the king’s castle first thing in the morning.”  “Oh, I had no idea how bad he was…I guess it’s because I’m so young.” I reasoned, “He’s really powerful, is he being kept in a good place?” Rakuno decided to show me where he was instead of telling me.

         The former king’s name was Okusto. He ruled a long time ago, before I was born. My mother told me how peaceful and colorful it used to be back then. Instead, I grew up in a dark and dank city where the best thing to become was a bounty hunter. I was very surprised of myself; I was only nineteen when this happened and had just became a bounty hunter. Rakuno bought me to the basement and unveiled to me the vault my catch was held in. “I don’t know why you’re so interested in that cursed man.” Rakuno complained as he left me alone with the vault. “I just…wanted to see him.” I touched the vault and realized that it was just regular steel. The vault should have been made of angel steel; it’s the strongest of all. There was a small rectangle in which I could see through. “There he is…” I thought as I watched him, “He looks so sad.” On the floor, he sat hugging his knees…not really looking at anything. His eyes dimmed at the empty space. “Is his hair black-no…it’s a dark velvet. Hmm, he seemed so violent before but now…” I kept analyzing him until he became aware of me. His already red eyes immediately started to glow and the light flickered off inside. Although it was pitch black within the vault, I could still see his glowing eyes glaring at me lividly. With vengeance, his chains struck the door, leaving spear-like imprints. I was startled by this and confined my thoughts of him to what Rakuno had said, “What was I getting myself into? I never should have thought of him differently.” I walked out of there with a chip on my shoulder.

         “Stupid guy, I thought he was normal for a second and then he does that. Oh well, I’m getting  mad money for this anyway, I don’t need to worry about the criminal.” I ranted on the way home. I went into a near by ally and climbed up the fire escape. “Ah, my condemned home,” I sighed happily after hopping into my window. At that time, I lived in a condemned apartment building with bad plumbing and hardly a kitchen. By now, the doors were locked to the place so I sneaked in through the window. This didn’t bother me though; I was living the adventurous life. The floors were fragile, which is why I only have one couch and a small TV. ”Oh, come on now,” I pleaded with my tub for the water to run, ”Maybe a little elemental power would do the trick” Then I looked around to see if anyone was watching. You see, using elemental powers was against the law. This law was in place for as long as I could remember. The government even separated those who had the ability and I never got the chance to learn because of that. Anyway though, I constantly broke this decree to get water or electricity in my apartment (If my powers decided to work). Eventually, I got enough water to run a bath and went to bed right after I bathed. While I fell asleep I pondered about the mysterious smell in my couch.

Later on that night, the beast decided to make an escape. The steel of the vault shrieked as he tore the door open with his metal chains. Right away, the alarms of the building went of. “Oh, here they come,” the fugitive anticipated, ”It’s silly how they try.”  The guards blocked his only exit, but not for long. The beast’s eyes shined a bright red, again signifying his anger. They shot guns at him but like my throwing stars, the bullets failed to reach him. (If I may add, bullets never work in this world. They should have known that.) Swiftly, one of his chains grabbed a guard and smashed him into the others. ”After him!” a guy who seemed to be the chief ordered as the Steel Beast got away. He snickered as he ran from the police, “Heh, they’ll never catch me now.” And the beast was right, they had lost sight of him a couple blocks down.

         A ringing phone suddenly awakened me; it was my supervisor wanting to inform me of the Steel Beast’s escape. “You better hurry,” he warned, “—every bounty hunter in the city is looking for him.” With this news, I got up quickly and prepared for an all out search. “You know what I should do?” I thought while packing my weapons, “I should try to use the wind element!” The Element of Wind actually changes you into wind. The downfall of this is that you can only go in one direction and you can’t pause for a moment but it’s incredibly fast and would give me a bird’s eye view of city. I climbed to the top of my building to try and do the command. Then I brought out the Feather of Wind and said, “Element of Wind!” Nothing happened. “Why can’t I ever do it?!”  I screamed at the sky indignantly. After a minute, I figured I might as well do it the old fashion way, jumping from roof to roof. However, as I made the first leap the Element of Wind consumed me and I began soaring through the sky.

         I flew for about five minutes and saw that I was heading out of the city and into the countryside. I never knew that there was a country area outside of the city I lived in. When I was thinking of this, I saw who seemed to be the Steel Beast, “Ah-ha, I’ve found you!”  That’s also when my powers conked out, “Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!” *THUD!* I landed right on top of him. “Why are you here?” he asked looking up at me strangely. I noticed that this was the first time he ever spoke to me. For some reason, I analyzed his voice for a couple seconds before I answered, “You know why I’m here!" I had jumped off him to say , “You tried to escape, you fugitive!” “Look who’s talking,” he complained, “You Elementalist!” I winced at him, “You won’t be able to prove it!”  Then we heard a crowd of people say, “There he is!” I turned around and saw a huge group of bounty hunters charging towards us. We both panicked and ran in the other direction. I think one of the  hunters behind us was throwing  boulders at us because they were dropping  everywhere. A boulder almost hit me but the Steel Beast pushed me out the way, “Move!”  “Hmph, I can take care of myself!” I argued dodging another one. To catch my breath, I leaped upon a nearby tree. I thought I was safe until I saw a big blade coming my way. I hopped off before the tree was sliced in half. 

         Meanwhile, the real target was getting tired of the boulders and decided to throw a couple back. He stopped to see the results but started running again afterwards. Out of breath, I asked him, “How are we going to get away?” “We?” he replied, “You don’t need to get away, I do.” “Uh-oh,” I said seeing a short cliff in front of us. We would have to climb it to escape but we would lose time. The hunters were beginning to spell out a victory and they were getting closer to it every second we struggled to get over the cliff. I thought we were doomed until, all of a sudden we felt  a strong breeze blow against our backs. We heard a silence and realized that no one was chasing us anymore. ”Hey, they’re asleep…How’d that happen?” I mentioned after we climbed the cliff. “Yeah, I can see a priestess arrow over there in the center. I wonder why a priestess would be here though…?” the beast responded, “But anyway, I’ll be seeing ya’.” “Wait a second, man, you’re my bounty and I’m taking you in.” I declared assertively, “If I could beat you before, I can beat you again.”  Then he became serious, “You only beat me because I didn’t know you were an Elementalist. If you were to fight me now, you would lose sorely.”  In defense, I responded, “Why should I argue with a person like you? Someone who killed his own wife.”
He cringed at the comment and said, “Lies…but if that’s the way you feel about it then, fight me. I’ll even give you a head start.”

         And so, the stare down began. The ground was grassy and cool and there was a river on the right of us.          “Alright, here I go…”
Using my agility, I ricocheted off a neighboring tree trunk and flew at him with my Blade of Fire. It was a samurai style blade that was used for the fire element. Anyway, I attacked swiftly yet it didn’t surprise him. He blocked my attacks and hardly tried to strike back. He said this as I struggled to land a hit, “You’re not a very experienced Elementalist are you?”  The beast must have noticed that I didn’t use my powers. At that point, I decided to get a little distance from him, since I was just tiring myself out. I got far enough away so that he had to use his chains to get me. He sent his chains after me, as I expected. Then, instead of letting them grab me, I let them grab my sword. I leaped onto the tip of my blade, giving myself leverage to jump towards him, now with my Elemental Hammer in hand. I assumed that I had him where I wanted and gave him a smirk of triumph but…right before I reached him, one of his chains caught my leg and sent me flying back into the river.

         Consequently, my head hit a big rock in the landing and knocked me out. There was a waterfall at the end of the cliff and the strong current was pulling me towards it. The beast took note off this and surprisingly went to save me. He made it with time to spare, heroically pulling me out of the river and even rescuing my hammer. “You can die another day…” he whispered to himself as he propped me against a tree. Dreamily, I could see him putting my weapons neatly beside me. Then, he mysteriously disappeared into the forest lying on the other side of the river.

About thirty minutes later, I had awoken. The sun was shining through the leaves of the tree while I realized my head was slightly hurting. I could vaguely recapture what had happened moments before, however I still knew that the Steel Beast was the one that pulled me out the river. His recent actions threw me into confusion once more but this wasn’t enough to change my mind about him. I was still hurt because he had beaten me.

         After sitting there for ten minutes, I finally got up. Chasing after the Steel Beast seemed pointless and because of his good deed I probably wouldn’t have fought him with the same determination. I saw that the other bounty hunters had left already when I looked over the cliff. For some reason, I took a slow walk back to the city. As I stared at my grassy surroundings I started thinking of my mother and father. Though they were still alive, it was forbidden for me see them any longer. Once an Elementalist turns eighteen, it was by law that he or she leave and never return to their parents. Mother used to tell me how the Elementalists used to live with nature and how our unity could stop any enemy. “Ah, those were the days,” I thought, “I wish I could have stayed there a little longer past three.”

         When I started to approach the city walls, I paused for a short moment but kept going. The city seemed to depress me; it was dirty, noisy, and grim. Its philosophy was  “every monster for itself”, which meant that humans weren’t allowed a simple buck either. Although some monsters were nice, I had a hard time finding friends. I missed humans like me. I waited anxiously for a chance to get out and meet some real people.

Chapter Two: Looking for a Destiny    Jeremiah’s P.O.V. (change of veiws)

         Who’s Jeremiah you ask? It is I…who they call the Steel Beast…who they say is evil in every way…who they think has slain many, but are ignorant to what really goes on…yes, this is me who is speaking. While the hunter girl was just getting home, I was laying in a field of wheat. The stalks were so tall that I could only see the blue skies above me. “*Sigh*” I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, “Another day, another fight. I wonder if this will ever stop.” See, the truth is…I never killed anyone, especially not my wife, Mina. She was the only one I felt cared about me and though our union wasn’t for long, I loved her with all my heart. It had been a couple years since I had last seen her. After running from the government so long, I was beginning to think ‘what for?’ “I run all this way and for what… because I didn’t do something? It doesn’t matter, what reason will they listen to…and as for fighting, what freedom am I fighting for?” All my life, humans had isolated me and now that I was accused of these crimes it got even worse. Now I couldn’t walk two feet without being noticed. I was wavering on the decision to give up when something just pushed me over the edge, “I can’t stand it! Someone’s going to catch me one of these days…I can’t fight the inevitable.”  Then I sat up like I was going to do something and went back down realizing I had nothing to do. ”Not like I know where Jisatu’s Tower is anyway.” I discovered, “Plus I wouldn’t make it through the journey there by myself. Oh well… Hmmm, I wonder if that girl woke up okay. I thought I’d never see an Elementalist again… That girl was sort of cute too, but she’s like all the others.” 

         I didn’t want someone to defeat me yet I didn’t desire to stay “free” any longer. Then an idea, popped in my head,” Maybe the hunter girl could take me to Jisatu’s Tower. This way I could have a companion that can fight but can’t over power me; she couldn’t possibly refuse the bounty offer either.” With that in mind, I waited until night to see if I could at least find her. It was three a.m. when I happened to rest on the fire escape of a condemned apartment building. Just as I thought it was hopeless, I saw the feisty girl through the window right next to me. I watched her, gently as she slept on the couch. Funny thing is, she slightly reminded me of Mina then, though I did not want to admit it. The girl had short brown hair that rounded her oval head and a light build. Nervously, I fiddled with the window’s handles; I wondered whether I should go in so suddenly. “She’ll probably get scared or something.” I opened the window anyway and hoped that there wouldn’t be so much commotion. The intrusion didn’t disturb her sleep and not even when I walked around did she stir. “What an armature, if she wants to succeed in this place she’ll have to increase her senses.” I said to myself, “I guess I’ll have to wake her up, then.”

         Softly, I shook her. She awakened at first in a daze but quickly figured out what was going on. “What are you doing here?!” she exclaimed  and stood up on the couch. Her huge hammer was already in her hand since she slept with it that night. That’s when I realized that she wasn’t wearing any pants. She didn’t seem to care nonetheless. “Calm down, I’m not here to fight you; not that it wouldn’t be easy enough.” I began to explain,” I want you to take me to Jisatu’s Tower.” Confused, she replied, “Why? You’re turning yourself in?” “Um, something like that…” I kept trying to divert my eyes from her underwear, “Uh, are you going to put on some pants any time soon?”  Then she looked at herself and hastily grabbed a skirt from the floor, “Anyway, so you just want me to take you…now?” “Now would be good.” I responded, “The sooner we leave, the sooner you get the bounty.” She paused in thought, “He’s right…I could finally get out of here.” Although she was willing to leave and get the money, she wasn’t sure she could trust me. “Look, if I wanted to kill you I would have done it already. You can trust me,” I argued, “So…are you in?” With a snotty expression she agreed, “Hmph, I don’t trust you but…I’m in.” “I don’t trust you or like you but you’re all I got.” I replied.

         Then she narrowed her eyes and said, “My name’s…Mora. What’s yours?” I stayed silent. Because I don’t usually interact with people, the question took me off guard. Mora just continued, “You have to have a name besides Steel Beast…or maybe you like to be called that?”  Finally, I answered, “No, I hate that name. I’m Jeremiah.” Mora didn’t expect me to have such a nice name for my reputation, “Oh, well just stay where you are until I’m ready…Jeremiah.”  Then she went into the bathroom and turned on the water for a shower. I merely sat on the couch uncomfortably, “This is going to be dreadful, isn’t it?” Ten minutes later, Mora came out with a bundle of clothes and a rolled up map balancing on top. Her clothing, I discovered, were all suited for battle. I guessed that fighting was all she did. Mora wore mostly skirts with stockings and toe shoes that were generally dark in color. “Let me see…” Mora declared after she opened the map, “*Gasp*, Jisatu’s Tower is in Beings Territory!” Beings Territory is a reservation set for only humans. I wasn’t too thrilled about it on the contrary and said nothing. This new finding pushed Mora additionally into going with me. ”Time is slipping away,” I mentioned, “I don’t want to be caught leaving.” Then Mora looked up from packing, “You’re the one that came so late. You expect me to be ready for you?” I rolled my eyes in response but she didn’t see me since my back was turned to her. Minutes were going past and I was getting bored, so I figured I could ask for some scissors to cut my hair with.

         I stared into the small mirror she had in her bathroom. Almost disappointed with myself, I began to cut away at my hair. “Velvet hair…red eyes…they cause so much trouble for me. If only I could have kept what  was rightly born to me.” I brooded, “This moment reminds me of the last night I saw her…” The memory wasn’t a fond one. I dashed it away as a person would garbage. “With or without bananas!” Mora asked from what I guess you could call a kitchen, “I’m making cereal!” It almost sounded like she was complaining, “Hello?” Her voice broke me out of my trance, “Uh, bananas please!” I didn’t mean  to be so polite however. When I came out for breakfast, Mora examined my sudden change. She thought, “Hmmm that does look a… little better.” After I had grabbed my bowl off the countertop, I sat next to Mora on the couch. Well, not really next to her, there was a foot radius between us. Mora stared at the tv and paid no attention to me what so ever. We both had this feeling of, “Yay, company!” even though it was with someone we didn’t like. I enjoyed the cereal so much that I almost frowned at the empty bowl.