Travel Back in Time

"What's that on your hand?" The guardian of the Wind Kingdom asked the young prince when he approached him in the bookstore. "Is that a pass?" The young prince watched the older man smile at him, his eyes showing the prince that he disapproves of whatever it was that he was planning to do. "Young Master, you do know that you are not allowed to cross the ocean. It is dangerous for you. You are still too young." "I am not too young!" The young prince frowned at him, "I am a hundred and eighty-seven—that is not young, you understand that!" He let out a grunt as he watched amused expression paint over the older man's facial features. "Look, if there's anyone who truly understands me in this world, it's you. You know why I want to do this so badly. Come on, it's just a peek, Lee!" "If only there is a way for me to let your pain disappear, Young Master, I would do it without question. But. . ." Lee tried his best to smile at the crown prince of the Wind Kingdom, an awful memory of the other princes' pained faces as they suffocated in their own blood flashes his mind, ". . .But running away won't help." "I said it's just a peek," the young prince mumbles under his breath as his shoulders drop when he sighed with disappointments present in his. The young prince looked back at Lee who was trying so hard not to seem affected, "Don't bother. I know you saw it—my memory." "I'm sorr—!" Lee was a bit startled when the young prince smashed his fist on his broad and rock solid chest. He watched the young prince tremble as a tear fell from the corner of his eye, a tear that he could not hold back anymore. The young prince pressed his palm on the older man's chest, the golden-colored paper shining through as he held it in between. "No. Young Master, you will not." "I thought if I showed you what I saw, you would understand." And in a moment, the entire place was blinded by a light so white yet so dim—a very rare level of power that only the young prince can manifest without sweat. "Lee, I am an heir to a horrible kingdom and that disgusts me." ~~~ "Checkmate," the man before them sighed, clearly bored out of his mind as they challenged him for the twelfth time in a chess match, no one can beat him in anything. The house was nearly abandoned, if not for the young man who liked to spend his time playing chess with the other spirits—or by himself when there are none. The floors creaked in each step and the ceiling threatened to fall down on anyone anytime, yet none of these seemed to matter to him. "I try to keep this place intact," he would always say. And one would always feel a sense of comfort from him as a faint smile spread across his face when he was in that house. That day, too, when an ominous spirit came barging through the wooden door, throwing it across the room. Its presence could make even the sturdiest tables tremble as it whispered its vengeful and downright evil intentions through its filthy tongue. Its eyes strained in red as if it had no time to sleep or blink, not wanting to miss a second of the despair and grief and suffering that it brought upon those who were weaker to it. "Is there something I can help you with?" That day, too, Paxon Carter had a smile on his face as he talked to the spirit as if it wasn't threatening him. And it wasn't. "You're the Crown Prince of the Fire Kingdom?" It asked him, its tone unbelieving. "You sure don't look like it." "Believe me, I was quite surprised as you are," Paxon humored, sipping the newly brewed coffee in his cup before looking back up at the spirit with pure wonder. "Would you like some coffee?" The spirit let out a grunt, disgusted by the guardian's hospitality. The spirit had heard rumors about the Guardian of the North while it was on its way to the West side of the Spirit Realm. It heard of his anger, his hate, and of his shame. But with the guardian before him, holding a cup of coffee with a faint smile plastered on his face as he looked at the spirit –as if there is no room for fear in his soul—"Would I like some coffee?! You are quite absurd!" The guardian's sudden display of hospitality seemed so natural, and it was not what he expected. "You think you can fool me with that façade of yours? Child, I was not born yesterday." "Well, yes, it would've been impossible for you to be born yesterday and be this huge and vengeful," Paxon said as a matter-of-factly, walking his way to the coffee table to set his cup down. "But, whatever do you mean by façade? Believe me that I am as true as I can be." And the spirit, who had felt nothing but warmth while he was in such a place where only cold should be, almost believed that, nothing more, nothing less. Its strained red eyes wandered around the greying white-colored walls, the floral-patterned wallpapers ripped and stained. The minimalist touches of décor from the guardian—an old grandfather clock, a brewing machine, an old chessboard with the pieces scattered everywhere, a coffee table, and a few chairs here and there. The cracked ceilings held no light, and he didn't seem to have any lamp around the room to illuminate the prince at night. "You like it?" The prince's voice rang in its eardrums, interrupting its observations as it tried to figure out what kind of spirit Paxon really was. "I'm not an interior designer, nor do I have any talent in that stuff, but I do believe I did pretty well on decorating, don't you think?" The spirit hissed, "I hate what you have done to this awful place that you call your own!" For a moment, the spirit thought it saw a flash of anger in the prince's eyes. Dismissing it as a trick of the sun rays that illuminated him, it continued to say, "Is this not the home of the young man that you strangled that night?" The spirit expected Paxon to at least flinch in regards to what it said to him, but did nothing and just stared back at the spirit with a smile on his face. "Ah, how happy you must have felt when he suffocated in your command. Were you not satisfied enough for you to mark that young man's own property like an incubus on its prey?" "If there is nothing else, you are free to leave," Paxon gritted his teeth, sitting on the chair as he rearranged the chess pieces on the board, ready to challenge anyone he sees. "That is, of course, if you beat me in a chess match at least once." The guardian's piercing gaze brought excitement to the spirit that had been expecting such a game to be offered in its plate. Its huge human-like form appeared in glitches as it tried to walk its way to the coffee table where the Chess Match of Death begins. "But your parents are at home, aren't they?" the young boy asked his friend, hesitant as he thought about what his friend told him he wants them to do at his house. "They will scold us if they find out." "Don't worry about it, Tri," his friend laughed. "We can do it in the basement. And we'll be over before they know it!" "PAX-PAX-! PAX-T-TON-! TON!" The young boy tried to call out to him as the air kept thinning and thinning for him, watching the much older boy before him, Paxon. He was in a daze, his eyes glowed in blue as gravity defied him and all the other things around him. "P-LEA-SE! ST-OP! STOP!" There was no way for Paxon to hear his cries as he lost himself in a loop of memories that he doesn't even own. The young boy knew this, but he still tried to crawl and drag himself towards him and pull on his legs. He was getting weaker and purple as he suffocated, his grip to Paxon's leg loosening.