Dead Eyes

"Jason, tell us about the chronicles right after the dark-age began!" a deep but somehow scholarly voice resounded in the small classroom.

A young 13-year-old boy got up from his seat with a straight back. He stood facing the front without looking anywhere in particular, as he began to narrate the events from 300 years ago.

"300 years ago, the invasion of foreign races and wild beasts began because of the mana outbreak that had shocked humanity. 

The mana outbreak created rifts, opening the pathways to other planes that linked them to Argos, the reasons for which, we are unsure of.

In the beginning, humanity was unaware of the invasion of foreign races.

They were still reeling from the shock of the mysterious energy explosion, and the creation of the blood-red cracks.

Later on, news of the appearance of a new race called [Corvi] spread like a wildfire. They were tall, bulky, and humanoid-like with huge wings, ravenlike heads, and medieval-looking weapons. 

Their appearance was overshadowed by the explosion of the overly compressed peculiar ball along with the invasion of the unknown energy we now call Mana, whose essence is now inside every living being including the planet.

Unfortunately, humanity wasn't prepared to fight back against an invasion of terrifying life-forms and suffered huge losses.

The [Corvi] race wasn't the only invading race, as several other races followed suit and entered Argos. The once quiet and peaceful planet was transformed into a raging battlefield. All the invading races fought among themselves fighting for supremacy and, leaving humanity as cannon fodder.

Humanity tried to fight back but their weapons were rendered useless against these foreign races, as their bodies were protected by a membrane of mana.

This mana membrane deflected bullets, and even bombing proved ineffective. It was as if all of humanity's weapons were useless against them.

Humanity suffered and had to retreat to the smallest continent on Argos called Canir. They sought refuge in an archipelago consisting of around 40 small islands.

Canir, where most humans live now, has the smallest number of permanent rifts. Fortunately, those permanent rifts connected none of the intelligent bipedal race planes to Canir.

The only permanent rifts it had connected the planet to the worlds with beasts. These beasts often invaded Argos because of their wild instincts and desire to massacre humans.

These powerful beasts had everything that they needed in their original habitats. However, they chose to travel through the rifts and continue their attacks on the defenseless mankind without any remorse. At times, the beasts would lose some of their own, but it did not matter to them.

The Archipelago saw a few more permanent rifts appear, and were battling the growing menace of the overpopulation of beasts.

They didn't receive much support from the main continent, as nobody was able to fight these beasts head-on.

Humanity lost more than 90% of its population, as they were yet to find an effective way to fight back except for using fire against fire.

It took them a long time but after years of experimenting and a huge amount of luck, humanity was able to handle mana.

But, humanity was still learning and they weren't able to control all the elements the way the other races did, who also used mana as their main weapon.

Some of these races could manipulate earth while others could control water as if it were an extension of their arms.

But humans didn't own an innate element that they could use their mana with.

However, instead of a handicap, it was more of a blessing in disguise.

One fine day fate worked miraculously in mankind's favor as a young teenager saved a cub of an invading beast from getting killed. It could have been luck or destiny; the young teenager could have been the bravest of them all or the most naive, nobody knew for sure. But, that incident propelled humanity in a new direction.

After this teenager saved the cub, he was almost abducted and killed by other humans as he was seen as a threat to humankind.

He had rescued one of the enemies, a beast cub that might grow into a terrifying beast that could kill everyone later, after all!

However, instead of running away this particular cub protected its savior, and instinctively bit the finger of the teenager. This inadvertently led to the formation of the soulbond contract between the cub and the young boy. Once the cub did this, a bright shining light appeared."

Jason stopped for a second and took a few deep breaths before he continued his narration.

"The whole process about the first soulbond is described in many different texts so I will skip most of it."

"Unknown to everyone else, the youth felt a connection between himself and the beast cub slowly building up. Even more important, was the fact that he felt a connection to a certain element.

Using mana, he could feel the connection to the cub's affinity and he was somehow able to use it.

Furthermore, after forming the soulbond, the teenager found out that his constitution increased to a certain extent and it continued to grow with his bound.

Through the soulbond, the contractor's constitution would receive an amplification that influenced everything around the contractor.

That was how mankind found out about the soul awakening and soulbond contracts.

With this important find, the exploration of rifts leading to other planes with the help of weaker beasts began.

Many other discoveries were made through this exploration.

For example, not every beast was compatible with every human. But even so, humanity was desperately trying to gain strength.

To find out if a human was compatible with other elements, they created relics with the remains of artifacts from the battlefield of other races.

With these relics, mankind could awaken one's soul, which would then show what type of beast one could form a contract with, in addition to the compatible affinity.

Everyone wanted to form a contract with strong beasts, but it was obvious that these beasts wouldn't just sit back and watch as their cubs got kidnapped.

A war between beasts and humans ensued and predictably the beasts were on the winning side.

Even if humanity was losing, some cubs were still caught, and more humans were able to use their bounds' elements.

Though humanity suffered many losses, this time they didn't return empty-handed.

They grew stronger as each day passed, while their individual soulbonds increased the overall combat prowess of humanity by a large margin.

While only around one billion humans were left, they continued to grow stronger. Humans absorbed the natural mana which Argos began to generate since the mana outbreak.

Mana proved to be a double-edged sword for humans as they were not the only ones benefiting from it. Nature and mana worked together against humanity as plants that were stimulated by mana began to grow ten times faster. Similarly, the strength of animals increased, the more mana they absorbed.

This consequently increased their ability to reproduce in addition to strengthened constitutions.

Evolving wasn't a fantasy anymore, and millions of new races of wildlife emerged. The vegetation that had evolved were in some cases able to attain sentience while animals were able to acquire an element of affinity.

Humanity was forced to come together in order to build a few fortress-like cities close to each other in order to survive without getting overwhelmed by beast tides.

While the first rifts used to be the biggest challenge previously, now, it was the number of evolved wild beasts. They were becoming more and more threatening, forcing humans to increase their military power.

On Canir, 12 permanent rifts exist. Some of them are.."

*DING DANG DONG*

"That's enough for today, Jason, your recitation was good."

The school bell rang and the teacher left the classroom.

Jason was still standing there with his feeble build, patiently waiting for everyone to leave.

He had short black hair and delicate facial features. If his hair were longer, many would mistake him for a girl.

At13, he still had some childish features left. But, he no longer had the plump features that children are known for, as he didn't eat much.

His eyes, however, were his most special feature. They looked like a dead fish's would, empty and devoid of the slightest trace of life.

A fortune-teller had predicted that his eyes were the most important asset in addition to his beautiful soul at the time of his birth. Unfortunately, that seemed like only a dream for young Jason at that time, so far out of his reach! Jason thought of it as a cruel joke because he was born with malfunctioned optic nerves!

His mother was said to have special eyes but he had never seen her.

She used to work for a big and respected family, the Cerus', who was known for treating their workers as family members.

One fateful evening, a few years ago, around the time that his mother usually returned home from work, there was an unexpected visitor knocking on their door instead. A butler came over to their apartment with a tearful voice and was holding something heavy in his hands. It was a briefcase.

The butler told Jason that his mother had died during a spar between the family's patriarch and another big clan's heir from a foreign place.

Apparently, there had been some disputes during a party that was attended by multiple important personalities of influential families The squabble resulted in the foreign heir getting disgraced and humiliated.

The foreign heir was aware of the close kinship between the servants and the Cerus family. Thus, he decided to go on a killing spree as a means of revenge!

It was said that more than ten servants died before he was finally stopped.

It was a disaster! 

The whole party was immediately disbanded, and the Cerus family was dismayed, angered, and hurt to lose their beloved employees.

Using money and power to subdue families like the Cerus family, the foreign heir spent money like water to silence the families who had lost their loved ones.

Not even the media dared to release any news about the accident that happened.

The Cerus family had been aware of Jason's situation and offered some help to Jason. However, he was too young to understand what disaster had befallen him and he couldn't quite grasp the meaning of his mother's untimely death.

The butler offered Jason his condolences and laid down the briefcase next to Jason, where he would be able to reach it. He then quietly walked away leaving the blind boy alone within the lonely apartment.

Jason didn't even know the name of his mother's killer. Nobody answered his pleadings about the whereabouts of the murderer and only the family name of his mother's employer was branded in his mind.

'Cerus'

He wasn't even able to cry, as the wrath, frustration, agony, and sorrow were subdued deep within himself.

But how could Jason hate the Cerus family when they had treated his mother so well before the accident had occurred?

His father was said to have been the chairman of a large company governed by the Federation. The company was backed by his family as well as other authorities.

Apparently, his father hadn't been scared of anything at all, but that had been a terrible mistake.

A feud with a certain family he got involved with had caused the annihilation of his entire family along with the company's destruction. Only he and his wife were left behind.

His mental health worsened over time as he became an alcoholic and a gambler. His addiction made him lose a few hundred million credits, and amass a huge amount of debt.

His mother told Jason that she had left his father before anything worse could happen when she noticed that she was pregnant with him.

The story was crystal clear, but Jason didn't believe it at all. It sounded as if his mother had left out too many details and shortened the story!

The Cerus family took both of them in but Jason was suspicious because he had never heard anything else about his father before. Only his mother knew who he was. There had been no pictures of his father nor his mother ever mentioned him. His father was like a ghost to him, a nameless and faceless identity.

But Jason didn't suffer because he didn't need a father!

His mother was everything he needed….

She was grateful for the Cerus family and decided to work for them with her special eyes.

Who would have thought that her own decision would kill her someday?

Jason didn't know what her eyes could do, but apparently, they were special enough to raise a child and take care of herself.

The Cerus family gave Jason an allowance and the opportunity to study in a decent middle school post his mother's death.

For Jason, however, this money wasn't even close to replacing his mother who had raised him with love and affection, all by herself. 

Now, he had nobody by his side, he was all by himself in such a dangerous world.