PROLOGUE

(This chapter has pure narration that briefly describes the setting of this fictional world. You can completely skip this chapter and not miss anything. You can always come back and read this prologue whenever you can digest a telling of a thousand words! Having said that, the choice is yours.)

Every mortal in the world was bound to the laws of nature, but none except a certain few—the ones at the top of the Martial Chain, knew the bounds better. Such was the belief rooted in a good deal of lands across the whole world, and nearly all, if not every sensible soul under heaven at least once dreamed of reaching that level, which, in their eyes, could be attained at best through the pursuit of truth with integrity.

Dreaming was one thing, but turning a dream into one's destiny was another thing entirely. Countless members formed groups, divisions, legions, clades, clans, tribes, sects, kingdoms, empires and everything they could to survive and help themselves get close to the summit of the Martial Way, and that required overcoming a long and arduous path—the end of which, however, always appeared to have stretched to an infinite extent.

It was backbreaking enough for anyone to win over their little world. As for winning over the whole world one lived in, it was beyond the realm of reason. Nevertheless, most people still stated that both pursuits needed enough power; howbeit, when one asked those same people to define 'enough,' they all failed miserably, for no one fitly knew what was enough to conquer themselves, let alone the whole world.

So much of life was uncertain, so much in fact, that it made most people live in ways as if they had no sense of their lifestyles or the tenor of their lives. Some lived for themselves while some others lived for their families, for their clans, their hometowns, or for their kingdoms. Happy one moment and sad the next—too many minds in the world were at a loss unable to make out their role in the world. Many had looked for answers only to fail at some point.

Without frills, many folks had given up on the Martial Way and settled for less, thereby choosing not to pursue all that the world had to offer. These individuals eventually came to be collectively known as hollows—entities belonging to the lower classes who were commonly known to consider living as a burden to the point that some sections of them would see protecting their loved ones as asking for too much. The class that thrived above the rest was the martial class. Martials were the entities who set their souls on fire by pursuing the Martial Way—the aim of which was to become stronger in body, mind, and spirit and someday unveil all the truths of the world, counting the maker of all. Though both parties had things to pursue in their lives, just being alive for as long as they could was not enough for an average martial, unlike it was for a typical hollow.

In due course, this raised a lot of friction between the classes and led to statements such as:

"A martial gives more to the world than what a hollow takes from it."

"Hollows make a living through undertaking different laborious things from farming to working as subordinates and slaves; however, to a great extent, they engineer it by breathing in and out."

Unlike most martials and hollows, Godrick the Father of Martials always had peaceful things to say: "How you see the world is often how the world sees you. Worry not on where you belong in the world and what you can comprehend and can't any more than you worry about waking up before going to a good night's sleep. Just believe and be good in and out to get to God."

Godrick never differentiated people depending on whether they were hollows or martials. He never treated hollows as if they were beneath martials. In his eyes, every breathing thing was God's creation, and so, everyone must learn to abase themselves, and it'd help not just them but everyone around to reach greater heights in life. However, his line of thinking meant that martials should lower themselves before hollows and work to strengthen the weak. Naturally, not every heart admired his ways, and in consequence, martials came to be in many characters. Still and all, there were certain beliefs most of them agreed to.

"Wake up and live without worries." Martials, as a whole, informed this expression to hollows throughout history; however, sometimes, the easiest actions were the hardest to comprehend, much less follow. Some hollows joked about 'awaking' as nothing more than getting up from one's bed and 'living without worries' as the money-making necessity, which included earning immeasurable wealth and gaining incomprehensible power and control.

Seeing how their efforts were failing, over time, the martials reduced their efforts in refining hollows by degrees; the latter of the two, on the surface, liked being stuck in the past, or maybe they were afraid that the Martial Way would only bring their death sooner thanks to all the onerous trails one would encounter. In the eyes of most martials, leading an easy life seemed like a way better option for a hollow.

Though the number of martials was quite high in some sections of the world, it wasn't much as compared to the number of hollows at large. When it came to numbers, martials were like big cats, whereas hollows were like every other beast in the woods.

Nevertheless, the hollows—who could think better than the creatures lower than themselves on the food chain—also formed groups, guilds, clans, clades, and whatnot to not only survive but also improve their lifestyles while depending on one another.

On the face of such similar ways, three families had formed a clan they had named themselves as Faceless. These three families were Basha, Basuvu, and Vesta. They held on to one another for many decades—through all struggles—and helped themselves and the families living in their town from getting eradicated from the world.

Generally, tourists were a rarity in Helenia, the town where the Faceless clan was situated, and they supremely showed up during special times and occasions. Needless to say, the ongoing day was one such day of the year when one of the clan's young masters turned fourteen, the moment meant to mark forth one's meekness.