Now, in the real world, everything was spiralling into madness. Chaos had grown beyond control. The kings, despite years of meetings and debates, had still not found any solution. Twenty years had passed. Twenty years of watching their people vanish one by one, then two, then entire groups. Entire families were gone. Towns left half-empty. And still, there was no explanation. It was like a plague of disappearance.
People were vanishing into thin air. One moment, you'd be standing next to someone talking, laughing, eating and the next moment, they'd be gone. Just like that. As if they had never existed. As if their presence had been an illusion.
Fear gripped the nine kingdoms. Panic replaced order. Trust eroded. People began locking themselves in their homes. Some fled their villages in fear. Nothing made sense anymore. Even the royal courts, thought to be safe, had not been spared.
One day, during a meeting of kings held in a highly protected chamber, it happened again, right before their eyes. One of the kings disappeared. Mid-sentence. Right in the presence of all the other rulers. The air in the chamber froze. Silence swallowed their voices. Eyes wide in disbelief. None of them could explain it. No one had ever seen anything like it. It was no longer just a mystery. It was a crisis beyond logic.
This horrifying event left a question hanging in every heart:
*Who will save the kingdoms?
Who can stand against this force?*
Desperation led them back to the old prophecy, the one written about the boy born on the day the barrier was broken. They knew he existed. They had calculated the timeline. Twenty years ago, he was born. Now, he wasn't a boy anymore. He was a man. A man of age and thought. A man who could tell right from wrong. But no one knew where he was. No one even knew what he looked like.
That night, under the eerie glow of the moon, an old man arrived. A stranger to the court. He walked straight to the palace gates, and the guards, half-afraid, half-curious, let him in. He asked to speak to the king. He claimed to know a story no one else did. And the kings, desperate for any answers, for hope, allowed him in.
He stood before them, shared what he had kept for twenty years as a secret, a secret barrier for twenty years. He spoke of a man whose wife had once been pregnant with twins. But the pregnancy was cursed. The woman couldn't bear children. Doctors had warned that neither she nor the babies would survive childbirth. The man had been given a terrible choice: to pick which child would live, or lose them all. But he refused to choose. Instead, he turned to dark magic. Chaos magic.
He made a deal with a forbidden force.
Somehow, miraculously, the woman gave birth to both children. And she lived. But this victory came with a price. The man was declared a traitor for using dark powers. The king ordered his execution. But he fled. Vanished from the land. With his wife. With his children. They disappeared into the wilderness.
The old man said he had traced their path to the far Middle East. Beyond the forests. Beyond the rivers. Deep into the unknown.
Upon hearing this, the kings finally had a clue. A real lead.
That same night, they summoned their generals. Armies were mobilised. Maps were studied. The path into the wilderness was marked. They were marching out at first light. Through the jungle. Through darkness. Through silence.
To the Middle East. Where the man had fled. Where the children are now grown, might be.
They were looking for the one born on the day the barrier broke. The one tied to chaos. The one who could end this.
But would they find him?
Would he be willing to help?
Would he even remember who he was?
That remained to be seen.