Prologue

Mana is the center of metaphysical energy contained in the bodies of living things. It has been there since they were born in this world. What differentiates one's Mana from another is the capacity.

From there, one's destiny seems to have been engraved very clearly. The greater one's mana capacity, the more secure one's future would be.

Mana is the energy source of a person or any creature to activate their magical power. Because the greater a person's Mana capacity the stronger that person's magic will be.

However, many people don't know that in fact, there is another energy that is stronger than Mana. The energy is called 'Aignus'.

In contrast to Mana which can be manifested in the form of various elemental magic. Aignus was not like that. Aignus was basically fire, or one could also say it was the fire energy that resided within the human body, just like Mana.

A person who has this power is able to use all magic related to the element of fire including its derivatives.

In fact, since Aignus resided within the human body as an energy core, it made the body of the one who used it change and look as if he was the fire itself.

The person who has and uses this power is known as Igniz.

The fire of Ignis is very special. This fire will not go out unless the user really wants it to. in fact, this fire is able to burn everything including one's magic. With the conditions that the user intends to burn it. But if not, then the fire will not burn at all. Even someone who was hit only felt a very cool gust of wind.

The strength of an Igniz is far more terrifying than even the 1000 strongest Mana users. it is so strong that the person who at that time managed to save this world from the big war between the two worlds was an Igniz.

because of his great deeds that made him appointed as a king and lead all life in this world.

However, those days of leadership were short lived, because the king suddenly disappeared.

Everyone tried to look for him, even to a place where it was rarely visited by anyone, but no one managed to find him.

Because the king disappeared for a long time, plus none of the king's descendants inherited his power, making the kingdom that was once one, began to disintegrate again and form other kingdoms.

There was someone who wrote this story in a stone carving. But as a very long time passed, the sculpture was slowly eroded by the water, and in the end, the history where the king who wielded the strongest power was completely lost.

Only a handful of people are still fiercely loyal to him, passing the story from one to another among their descendants. Hoping that one day their descendants will be able to meet again with an Ignis, and continue their oath to be loyal to him.

Now, a million years have passed since those days. I don't know if anyone still remembers this story. But what is clear is that the legend has never shown himself until now.

***

At the top of a steep mountain, which is located near the dragon valley in the north, there is a building that stands very majestically.

The building will not be visible to the naked eye just like that. This is because the building is indeed covered by a very dense magic fog so that not just anyone can come and find this place.

The valley below is also inhabited by dangerous monsters.

Those monsters can exist not because they nest there. But because it was deliberately caught and kept to guard this place.

The luxurious building might look like a very grand palace. But indeed this place used to be a royal palace. this is where the king once ruled this world.

However, after being abandoned for a long time, this place had now turned into an empty palace. Even so this place is still guarded until now by the descendants of the races that used to be very loyal to the king.

In the main room which was also the throne room. There were five people sitting cross-legged on the floor. They sat around a large cup made of gold in the middle of the room.

They were all elders of the five representatives of the races.

However, none of them came from the human race. Rather they were only elders from the races of Elf, Beast (Demi human), Demon, Dwarf, and Dragon.

What they are doing now is not meditating, but just sitting looking at the golden cup, while looking at the dark blue flames that can be seen blazing quietly above it.

No one spoke, not even made the slightest sound. Their eyes seemed to only focused on the strange colored flames.

Why is it strange? This is because the fire is burning without any trigger that can keep it burning. The fire seemed to lit on its own.

For people who don't know, maybe they will think that the fire will soon die out by itself.

But it was all wrong, on the contrary… this fire had actually been burning a long time ago, ever since the king was still alive.

You could say that fire is the only legacy of the king. Because the age of the fire is also very old, making the fire dubbed as the eternal fire.

While the elders were still sitting quietly. Suddenly the dark blue flames in front of them flickered once.

"D-did you guys see that?" One of the elders of the Elf race asked the other elders with a stunned face.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure. The eternal flame just flashed!" said the elder of the Beast race.

"What's this all about?" The Demon race elders looked very confused.

"I don't know, this is the first time in my life that I saw the eternal flame flickering like that?" said the elder of the Dragon race. Not much different from the other elders. He was also amazed by what had just happened.

At that moment, the cup that supported the eternal flames suddenly shook violently, followed by a tremendous burst of energy.

"Aaargh!" the elders who were hit by the energy shock immediately bounced off and hit the wall.

"what's going on here?" the Elf race elder asked.

"It's not normal for the eternal flame to be agitated like this!" the Dragon race elder replied.

"Wait, could it be that... the king is back!" the Dwarf race elder exclaimed.

Hearing that, the other elders immediately flinched and everyone immediately turned their gazes towards the Dwarf elder.

But it's not impossible. During this time the eternal flames had also always been calm, and had never been this agitated.

While all the elders were still thinking and analyzing what was really going on, suddenly the blue flames changed color to white.

The fire was also slowly moving, until the shape of the fire that was just like normal flames now turned into a koi fish, all of which were made of fire.

The fire koi looks like they are swimming in the air while continuously moving around the cup.

[The heir, has been found.]

The elders immediately froze in place when they heard the fire Koi say that. Their eyes widened as if they couldn't believe what they had just heard.

The day they had been waiting for had finally come.

The day their king finally returned.

At the same time the Koi fire turned blue again, followed by a very ear piercing shrill sound.

"Aaargh!" The elders even screamed in pain, trying to cover their ears with both hands.

At that time, all areas of the palace were suddenly filled with Relief that appeared out of nowhere.

The Reliefs glowed and slowly emitted pale blue flames. It instead looks like a blazing array of images.

At the same time a multilevel magic formation suddenly appeared right below the golden cup, followed by an earthquake that shook the entire mountain area.

The monsters in the valley even howled loudly, showing that they were frightened.

"Ugh!?" the elders were once again taken by surprise.

While still covering their ears. The elders slowly watched as from within the magic formation two twin swords appeared.

The sword didn't look like metal burning with fire, but a sword that was actually made of fire.

The sword hovered in the air and in an instant it shot through the ceiling with incredible speed and left the place along with the fiery Koi.

***

The elders still looked confused. With this incident. Their heads were now completely filled with thoughts about the return of the king.

"I must return to the Elf kingdom now, and tell this to the other king's retainers!" Elder Elf shouted and immediately disappeared leaving the other elders behind.

Hearing that, the other elders only glanced at each other for a moment, then instantly disappeared from that place.

Of course it was the same as that of the elders of the Elf race. They must immediately tell this incident to the people who are still loyal to the king.

***

*a moment earlier.*

In a remote village called Setoa which is located in a valley, on the west and east sides of which there are snow mountains. Making this place never feel the panoramic sunrise and sunset.

This village was the outermost part of the Winterain kingdom's territory. The kingdom dubbed as the white kingdom. This is because this kingdom has always been covered with snow, because in this place there is only one season, namely winter.

everyone in this village lives by farming and raising livestock. Surely this was strange how could a region as cold as this be inhabited by a population of farmers?

But this is a common thing in this world. Where the residents here cultivate using the help of their magic, to control the temperature and humidity of the air and improve the soil elemental structure of their fields. Making plants that should be impossible to grow, in the end can flourish.

However, not a few adult males also occasionally hunt to fulfill their needs for food.

On the outer side of the village, stands a 3x3 meter wooden hut. If someone had seen the building, they might have thought it was a stable or a warehouse. Because there really is no other building that stands close together in the hut.

But actually it was a house that lived a 10 year old orphan boy. He has black hair like his late father and crystal blue eyes like his late mother. The boy's name is Roma.

Inside the hut there were no rooms, and was really just an ordinary square room. There was no fancy furniture except for a small kettle that hung over the fireplace, and a pile of dry leaves which the boy now slept in.

The only decoration on the wall is a small wooden box with scribble on it.

Roma was born without a Mana core. You could say he was a disabled child who was born without the ability to use magic. This is also what made him shunned by the villagers because they were afraid they would be infected with his curse.

But this is actually not a curse, but a congenital condition in which he was born in a state that does not have a Mana core.

It's just that everyone perceives this as a curse. Because an incident like this had never happened before where someone was born without any mana core at all.

Roma, who lives alone, inevitably at a young age and should still need more attention from adults, especially parents, inevitably has to be independent to be able to make a living.

It's also impossible for Roma to hope for other people's compassion when the villagers even stay away from him. He didn't want to do something like that anymore anyway. He had done that before, but what he got wasn't pity from people but insults and humiliation.

Since then Roma was determined, no matter how hard life he lived, it was better to try himself than to ask for someone else's mercy because that would definitely make him have to receive even worse humiliation.

Maybe this is a peaceful village for other people. But for Roma, it was the other way around.