1 Awakening

Somewhere in the deepest parts of Jidanga jungle was a group of adventurers. This group consisted of 5 adventurers. They were the first adventurers to enter such dense jungle in search of a long lost civilization.

Normally nobody would dare to go on a such journey to try find something that is based on rumors alone. However, they acquired a map from a dungeon which confirmed the rumors to be true.

By following the map they finally stumbled upon something that resembled ruins of some sort. After awhile of searching the rubbles they found an entrance into the ruins, the tunnel inside was too dark for them to see anything, the magician of the group cast a light orb which illuminated the way ahead.

They followed a long tunnel until they arrived into a huge room. In the middle of the room was a pit which was filled with shadow people.

''Shadow people? Did we came all this way to just find some shadow people inside a pit?'' Said one of the adventurers who was kicking rubble at the shadows. Others tried searching rest of the room if they could find something of value, but there was absolutely nothing else.

''This place is empty like Bull's head, no offence Bull.'' Said another adventurer.

''Non taken, however those shadow people gives me the creeps, they are just staring at us.'' Bull replied who was the tank of the adventurers.

''This whole place gives me the creeps, let's get out of here.'' Said the leader as they were leaving. The room got dimmer and dimmer as the light faded away alongside with the adventurers. After their departure room became completely dark, something started to happen among the shadow people. One of the shadows seemed to have some type of stroke as it was squeezing it's chest and fell on it's knees. Suddenly a bright red light started to pulsate from the chest area of the shadow, it was like a heart beat. With each pulse the shadow gained veins, bones, organs, muscles, skin, hair until finally it resembled a male human being.

He started gasping for air like he had almost drown. The gasping continued for awhile until it calmed down, it seemed he had became aware of his existence as he was touching himself trying to feel if this was real or not. Suddenly he burst into tears and cried like a little new born baby, after crying he waved his hand and a massive ball of light appeared above the pit illuminating whole room and part of the hallway.

He noticed the other shadows around him and waved his hand once again which caused the other shadows disappear into thin air. He looked at himself and noticed that he was butt naked which caused him to try cover himself like someone were watching him. This time he said something in ancient language and a pair of black pants, brown boots, white shirt and a black vest appeared on him from thin air. He said something in ancient language again and a mirror appeared in front of him which he used to take a good look at himself. He had a medium sized sharp nose, brown eyes and a black short hair, few scars on left cheek. After seeing his image from mirror, he was relieved.

He jumped away from the 15ft deep pit with ease and started stretching while looking around for an exit. Once outside he noticed the surrounding ruins which made him confused, seemed like he had no idea where he was. He noticed the group of adventurers near the treeline at a campfire. He put a big smile on his face and shouted something in ancient language at them waving in a friendly manner while walking towards them.

The group noticed the man and stood up pointing their weapons at him.

''Who the hell are you? There should be nobody else than us here'' Said the leader of adventurers.

The man kept smiling and walking towards them.

''Answer the god damn question!'' Said the magician of the group while shooting a fire ball at the mans feet.

The man stopped and said something in ancient language while scratching his head in confusion.

''He might be a member of those bloody murderers, Boss!'' Said another adventurer.

The leader sighed and pointed his sword at the man. ''You heard my men, we are not going to take any chances with you. I'm sorry for doing this.'' Once he said that he activated power boosting ability and leaped towards the man with mighty force. ''That kid is dead, our leader is a 2 star platinum rank adventurer.'' One of the adventurers laughed.

When the sword struck the man, a powerful shockwave swept trough the adventurers which forced them to hold their hands above their eyes to prevent any sand getting into their eyes.

A huge dust cloud were surrounding them blocking their view. ''Boss did not show any mercy towards that kid'' One of the adventurers laughed.

After the dust cloud settled, they saw a sight which made their jaws drop. The man had stopped their leaders sword with bare hands. The leader tried to pull the sword out of the mans hand, but it felt like it was stuck on a wall.

The man sighed once again and said something in ancient language. ''What are you saying, we can't understand you!'' Leader yelled at the man furiously.

This time the man seemed annoyed and cast some type of spell and spoke again. ''I said, could someone help direct me to the city of Nabarel, it seems i'm a bit lost here.''

The group lowered their weapons and pointed the man to sit down with them at the campfire.

Everyone sat silently at the campfire awkwardly eyeing the man who had stopped their leader's most powerful attack. Some were shaking their heads in denial that it ever happened and thought that the leader must have gone easy on him or otherwise he would not be sitting next to us.

The leader of the adventurers decided to end the silence by asking ''So... what's your name? My name is Rico, the guy next to you is called Bull, the cute girl next to Bull is called Sofia, the person next to Sofia is called Gerald and the mean looking fellow next to me is called Leroy.''. Each of the adventurer's nodded when their name was said.

The man stared at the adventurers and started to smile ''My name is Nerobartametosulkandal, it is nice to meet you all''.

After hearing the name everyone was trying desperately hold their laughters. ''Nerobarta-ta-tame-tos... How about if we just call you Nero?'' Rico said after giving his best efforts to pronounce his name but in vain. ''Nero? I like it, it's short and simple.'' Nero replied.

''You mentioned some city of Nabarel? I have never heard of such a city before, is Nabarel the name you use in the language you spoke earlier?'' Rico asked.

'Nabarel is the largest city known to mankind. It is ruled by 4 kings, king of north, king of south, king of west and the king of east.'' Nero explained while receiving a cup of coffee from Sofia.

''We are from the city of Yowald, it is known as the largest city in the world. However, i have never heard of a city that is ruled by 4 kings, did you perhaps mean city of Yowald?'' Rico asked while scratching his head.

''If it is the largest city, then yes. I would appreciate it very much if you could take me there.'' Nero said while sipping a cup of coffee. ''Sorry kid, we have come too far now to just turn back empty handed, one of our members already got killed while we were trying to get here.'' Rico replied and then the expression on adventurers faces turned sad.

The awkward silence returned, everyone were staring at the campfire gritting their teeth's together out of frustration. Nero did not feel to pry about their dead friend, as he noticed how touchy subject it was among them.

He stood up and started to chant some type of spell when suddenly valuable looking artefacts started to appear out of nowhere ''If you take me to the city, i let you have these.'' Nero said to break the silence.

The faces they expressed now was pure shock, hundreds of unknown artefacts with powerful aura was laying on ground in front of them.

''H-h-how did you do that? I-i-i have never seen something to appear from nowhere and these artefacts looks really valuable.'' Rico asked from Nero while inspecting the artefacts on ground.

''What kind of spell was that? I have never heard of a spell which creates items from nothing!'' asked Sofia who was the magician of the group while inspecting a wand that had appeared on to the ground. ''Some of these artefacts seems to be legend rank quality maybe even better!'' Said Gerald who was holding one of the swords from the pile.

Nero was surprised to see the reaction of the adventurers ''The spell i used was dimensional magic which is used to store items, it's a basic spell. And the items were just some junk that was laying around.''.

They could not believe their ears what Nero just said ''Simple spell? Just some junk?'' they thought to themselves.

''Where the hell are you from?'' Leroy asked while holding multiple artefacts in his arms.

''I'm from Nabarel, i have no clue how i ended up here. The last thing i remember was a fight i had with one powerful witch at some dungeon, i almost had her but then she cast a curse on me... Can you believe that? I thought i was a goner, but suddenly i woke up butt naked in a pit filled with shadow people and here i am.'' Nero said with a carefree attitude.

''We just came from there, the place seemed like nobody had set foot in there for thousands of years and the pit definitely did not have people in it when we looked.'' Sofia explained.

''Like i said i have no clue how i ended up in such a place... That witch must have used some type of teleportation curse. Usually if someone get's cast with a curse, they become disfigured, but the curse must have been a weak one which she used to teleport me away from her so she could escape.'' Nero tried to rationalize.

Suddenly a voice behind the treeline said ''Well, would you look at that? They actually found something in this god forsaken place.'' Group of 30 bandits were standing there with evil grins on their faces.

Adventurers quickly pulled their weapons out and pointed them at the bandits ''You followed us all the way here? Where is Veril!?'' Rico yelled at the bandits.

Bandit leader stepped forward holding a severed head on his hand ''That's why we are here, we couldn't leave your friend behind, could we?'' and tossed their friends head at their feet.

Expression on all adventurers faces turned into rage when the head of their friend was slowly rolling to their feet. Rico, Bull and Gerald all used power boosting enchants and launched forward with full force against the bandits, while Sofia started to charge her mightiest spell which caused the ground to tremble beneath them. Leroy who was the bowman of the adventurers released barrage of arrows flying towards the bandits.

''Woah, what kind of thank you is this?'' Leader of the bandits laughed as he blocked the first strike from Rico. Bull charged trough the bandits knocking everyone on ground while Gerald finished the grounded bandits. Sofia's charged spell was a massive lighting strike which concentrated to area with most bandits, however 2 of the bandits were magicians who cast a defensive spell which reflected Sofia's spell back at her barely allowing her to dodge it.

Leroy's barrage of arrows had no effect while bandits had the magic shield up. To normal eyes the battle seemed intense but to Nero the fight looked like bunch of kids fighting with sticks and throwing rocks at each other.

Soon all the adventurers were exhausted which allowed the bandits to surround them. ''Any last wishes before we let you join your friend?'' the Bandit leader laughed at them.

Out of desperation the adventurers tried to muster last ounces of their strength to break free from the surrounding bandits, but they failed. ''Enjoy the afterlife'' Bandit leader shouted at them and gave the command for bandits to slaughter them all.

As the bandits were about to finish the adventurers off, a sudden burst of force swept trough the bandits sending them flying into a nice pile knocking them unconcious. ''I can't let you hurt my new friends.'' Nero said while crossing his hands behind his head.