About three centuries ago, prior to Harwin's arrival in this world....

  Everything was different in the past. Many of the legendary figures of the present day had still not been bestowed with their titles. They were pursuing their ambitions — still trying to forge a place for themselves in the world.

  For many young swordsmen, mages or any other warrior for that matter, the royal army was a prestigious institute. It was a light shimmering in this dark world, a force to be reckoned with, and a beacon of hope for the weak against the forces of evil.

  In this time the mage-king was still in the position of power, rather he was active in exercizing his authority. He had influence all over the continent, even though he was only the king of the empire of Silfordan. It was due to his vast knowledge and wisdom, that his talents were recognized by men in great positions who entrusted him with great responsibilities; they deemed him worthy of leadership.

  Any member of the royal army was looked upon with admiration and respect — almost everyone used to dream of joining it one day.

  The criteria of enlisting was arduous to say the least. It did not matter if you possessed incredible skill or stength, even a person who could lift a mountain could be rejected if he did not possess the required qualities.

  These were not the qualities of a pious knights either, these men were not meant to be only pious, faithful and free from all of worldly desires. No, these men were meant to be faulty and prone to make mistakes, yet they would not keep on repeating them and would have enough control over their body and desires to put their duties forward. They could be criminals — wanted by law in a country and still become a member of the royal army, but why?

  It was because the heart and the intention were judged. A thief could be a good person — much better than any knight — but his surroundings and upbringing might have led him astray, thus they were trained once enlisted to become the best version of themselves.

  It was only after such rigorous trainig that a warrior was born, one who would not hesitate to die for his country as the country had helped him in his worst time. He will save the people, as the people had saved him, and he will help the ones in need, as he was helped in his time of need.

  Favors and a helping hand often shape the entire personality of a man.

  The royal army criteria involved a strong character, a useful skill, a resolve to become the best, and most importantly, a strong sense of empathy.

  However, this was only the criteria for the soldier. An officer was someone who possessed all of the previous qualities but also leadership, wisdom, thirst for becoming the strongest. Of-course charm as well, a leader needs to be charismatic; a subordinate can follow someone who rules with an iron fist, but he will never be faithful to such person, even if the leader is a pious man. A charismatic man can have his men kill the innocent whilst making them believe that they were delivering God's justice.

  Two such officers had been enlisted at a faithful day; both were young, ambitious, powerful men while charismatic too.

  Their names were Graftel and Yhorm — a wood-elf and a beast-man. They were selected from a thousand other men who were all remarkable in their own stead, but only two out of the thousand were selected that year. The reason was simple, the system worked on relative basis, and as none of the others even came close to the class of these two young blood, thus none of them were selected.

  Yhorm and Graftel had been ordered to duel as the final test — it was just a formality, as it had already been decided to select both of them anyways.

  Both took their positions and then readied their weapons — awaiting the signal from the invigilator....

  At the instance that the signal was given, Graftel leaped to his opponent in the blink of an eye. It was a technique he had been able to master throughout years of travelling 'Lightening fury' — a formidable move and almost everyone fell immediately to it. However, this time this unstoppable force met an immovable object—

  Yhorm casted a spell — a wind spell to be precise. The pressure and force was so immense that it slowed down even the great Graftel — delaying his technique by a few seconds. This might not be considered much but to a master like Yhorm, it gave him the opportunity to strike. He was wielding a short blade. His speed and precision though not comparable to Graftel, were still way above that of the an average person.

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  Yhorm thought he had officially won, but to his surprise, Graftel changed from the offense to the defence at a moment's notice — blocking the incoming blow as well as creating some distance between themselves. Both of them nodded to each other as if recognizing eachohter’s talents. The fight continued.

  Yhorm casted another wind spell called 'hurricane', though small in size, it was still destroying everything in its path.

  On the other hand Graftel tightened his grip around his great-sword. He firmly planted his feet — almost as if becoming one with the ground — clenched his teeth and then performed a single slash. This brought forward a shock-wave so powerful, that it was equal to the destructive force of the hurricane.

  Both of these clashed with each other and were simply canceled due to being equivilant. The battleground was shaken to its core and was in shambles when the fight concluded.

  Yhorm was a mage-sword while Graftel was a pure swordsman. The fight ended with neither of them winning, and being forced to be withdraw on the instructions of their invigilator who did not want further wreckage in vicinity.

  Naturally they became good friends. Their instructor was a group-leader, a high-ranking position; he was a human. One would think that against such strong races, a human could hardly get the job done, but this man was the pinnacle of strength and skill in the Royal army. He was known as:

  Artredies “The Bone-breaker”; the title was given to this humongous man due to his feats and fighting prowess. He stood more than two meters tall, and burly. The strangest part about him was he fought without any weapon — all he used was his fists. According to him, it was all that he needed against any foe. It was rumored that once this man picked up a weapon, the whole world will shudder in fear, as none shall be able to stand against him (a rumour only).

  Graftel and Yhorm had already travelled alot till then, and they had trained under many masters.

  Graftel was not called the sword-saint yet and neither was Yhorm given his title — both were abit cocky as most young men are. They fought against their mentor without weapons as well and quickly regretted it. They were knocked-out in a single second with both of their arms broken. Of-course, in the royal army the best healers served as well, thus it took only a day for their wound to completly heal.

  Artredies saw their potential and trained them rigorously. They were asked to fight once again whilst being equipped with the weapons of their choice, so they could, atleast, stand a chance against their mighty mentor.

  However, they were still beaten easily, but this time around Artredies tried pull back his punches, as he wanted to make them not break them.

  Artredies was passionate about the art of fighting. He was honourable, and being a man of high rank, he was very wise and often used to read literature. He was well-versed in foreign languages, different cultures and history.

  Artredies was also a man of few words, he did not laugh and only smiled when custom demanded it. His emotions did not leak and his mind always vigilant. He was the best warrior the royal army had produced — a genius and the pride of the whole empire.

  Artredies trained the young lads for two years during which he taught them all sorts of things — from historic lessons to various styles of combat. Surprisingly enough, he was also an expert level mage. It was an achievement only one in a million could ever hope to achieve. Some argued that he could even reach a rank higher than that, but simply did not pursue it further. He ingrained his years of knowledge in Yhorm who was keen to learn about magika as well.

  There were only few men the young lads had ever come to respect in their lives till the present day, and on their lists Artredies was at the top. He was simply perfect, the greatest benchmark for a warrior and a source of motivation for his beloved students.

  Time went on, Yhorm and Graftel continued to perfect their arts while gaining wisdom. They were trained to lead as well.

  Artredies on the other hand continued to rank up as well. Infact, he reached at the highest position a officer could ever hope for — "the chief-commander of all the royal forces and Allies". This meant that not only was he the military leader of the royal forces but also the armies of almost whole continent. The empire was in an era of peace and prosperity with strong figures shadowing over it.

  Of-course, time does not always remain the same. Artredies was sent on mission to wipe out the demon army that had set-up a stronghold in the far north of continent. Both his students were assigned to be his subordinates in the mission as well. Only fifty other men were given in total as it was believed that with the presence of Artredies, there was no need for a greater host.

  The stronghold had been established by a tribe of minotaurs. They had settled there without any permission from the emperor of the demon realm under the leadership of a self-proclaimed Minotaur king. The hellspawn had betrayed the previous leader — slaying him and wiping out his entire family in the coup. He then set his eyes on the southern continent.

  The city where they had built their stronghold was nearly rid of all human and other races existence with few captured — kept as slaves. The honourable Royal army could not have sat without doing anything against these tyrants, but this proved to cost them dearly as well....