Chapter Sixteen

"Why Princess Isabel isn't living here anymore?" I asked, confused.

"Because Princess Isabel is training in the temple, she is a light mage after all." Mary explained.

"...What?"

'So I am not the only light mage?' When I realized that something inside of me was broken, it was my hope.

Several years ago, the first light mage was born, and since then the light magic had not just become one of the most powerful magic in this world, but also one of the most needed.

In the past, there were tons of horrendous and powerful monsters in this world. These monsters were called chaos beasts not just because they were gigantic and chaotic, but also because they could use chaos magic, a magic that is poisonous to humans.

No human can use chaos magic, only some monsters can. Different from us humans that use mana as our font of magic, they use the energy of chaos. Chaos and mana are opposite energies.

All humans have mana within them, even the ones that can't use magic, chaos magic is poisonous to us. In the history books, it is written that just by staying close to a chaos beast for too long, a person could end up getting weak or even dying because of it.

These beasts lived in the northern hemisphere, they weren't a threat to humankind, that lived in the southern hemisphere far away from them. It was rare for a chaos beast to appear in the south until suddenly, several chaos beasts started to invade the southern territory, attacking the human realms in their way.

The chaos beasts that were a threat just to some realms closer to the northern hemisphere became a threat to all humankind.

In the history books, this time is called "The Dark Ages" when almost half of the human population died, if not fighting against the monster, they died because of chaos magic poisoning, or attacked by the beasts, or even starved, because of the war, the peasants' food was taken away to feed the soldiers in the war, what made tons of peasants die from hunger.

But, it was hard for even the strongest warriors to fight against these monsters, it seemed to be the end of humankind since they couldn't hold the advances of the chaos beasts for much longer. But then it was discovered that dark mages weren't affected by chaos magic, they were all immune to it.

Ironically, back then, dark mages were seen as the hope of humanity, the heroes. All dark mages were recruited to fight against the chaos beasts, some even were forced to, no matter the gender or age, they were all had to fight in the front line against the monster.

And for some time, they succeed. They killed most of the chaos beasts and held back the advances of these monsters. Hope and a better time came for all humans, but not for too long.

It seems that it was just the first wave, soon later others came, and it was worse than before.

When the first colossus came, as it was called, it destroyed a whole human realm. The colossus was a chaos beast that seemed like a real Titan walking through this earth.

It took several dark mages to fight against only one colossus. Humanity morale was destroyed when soon after the first colossus was defeated, others appeared.

But like the light at the end of the tunnel, the last hope of humanity appeared.

The child of the prophecy, the first light mage, a prince of Arhan, was old enough to fight in the war against the chaos beasts. He was only fourteen when he led an army against the chaos beasts.

During the early years of the war, a prophecy appeared saying that an angel blessed the King and Queen of the Arhan Kingdom, saying that their descendants would be born with the power to fight against the chaos beasts.

It seemed more like a lie to keep the hope of everyone during the war, but, in the end, the prophecy was true. The prince was born as the first light mage.

Even though no one knew how effective light magic would be against the chaos beasts, the prince still was sent to fight against the monsters.

Just then it was confirmed how powerful the light magic was. The light mages were immune to the chaos magic just as the dark mages were, and the light magic was even more effective since just one light mage was enough to kill a beast that took several dark mages to kill it.

Light magic seemed to be the weakness of the chaos beasts.

After that the golden age of the Arhan Kingdom came, since they were the only kingdom that had light mages, the best warriors to fight against the biggest threat to humanity, no kingdom could go against Arhan.

Unfortunately, it wasn't in a noble and heroic way that the Arhan Kingdom became the great and powerful kingdom that it is today. And that is all because of one man, Leonard De Angeles, the first light mage.

He was just twenty years old when his father died and he became the next King of Arhan. Leonard grew up on the battlefield, killing monsters and leading armies since he was just fourteen. He grew up in the front line, killing the beasts, so people thought he would be the best King to lead the kingdom against the monsters, to get the world free from these creatures.

But Leonard thought otherwise. He noticed that the Arhan Kingdom would lose its influence and power as soon as there were no more chaos beasts. The world needed Arhan, so he used that in his favor.

Thanks to him, the influence and power of the Arhan Kingdom just got stronger and stronger. Soon, no kingdom could go against Arhan, because Arhan was the only kingdom that could get ridden of the chaos beasts.

And that was what happened, most of the chaos beasts are extinct now, but not completely, these days there are still a few of them living hidden in the northern forests far away from human society.

But it took centuries for that to happen because Arhan royal family wanted so. Arhan was the kingdom that most expanded to the north, becoming the biggest kingdom in this world since they had the light mages to eradicate the chaos beasts in their way.

The position that the Arhan Kingdom has today is thanks to the light mages and the cruel methods that the royal family used to conquer everything.

They had a few rules back them to keep the power and influence they had. They need to manage well their most valuable resource, the light mages.

One of the rules was, no marriage between kingdoms, until today Arhan is the only nation that has light mages. No member of the royal family could marry someone from another nation and leave Arhan. So no other kingdom would have light mages, keeping them all dependent on Arhan.

And also, not all members of the royal family could have children, actually, it was selected the ones that could keep the bloodline going. It didn't matter if it was the King's children or his siblings' children, anyone from the royal family, that had the royal bloodline, should have to obey the king.

The King was the one that could choose who could have children or not. Most of the boys were castrated, and most of the girls had to live locked in the palace far away from males, never marrying or having children.

That was all so they could control the birth of the royal members. And that actually worked, nowadays there are only a few descendants of the royal family, besides the current King and his children.

So having a bastard was a big scandal between the royal member, more than it would be to any other noble. Throughout history, there are just a few public cases of royal bastards and all of them were killed or castrated.

When I learned that I panicked so much, but then I learned that these are old things now. It doesn't happen anymore.

In the last century, a big problem appeared, it was that there were just too few royal members alive.

It was all because of the rules the royal members couldn't have too many kids, and for some reason, a lot of the kids died young. And also, not always the children that were chosen by the King would survive long enough to adult age and then have children themselves.

They realized that the royal family was going to extinction. So the current King back then banned these practices of limiting the royal members to have children, just keeping prohibited the marriage with other kingdoms, and having bastards.

Also, another big problem was that there were too few light mages being born.

Since the angel's blessing, all royal members were born as light mages, but then, something change a few centuries ago. The first lightning mage was born in the royal family, different from the light and dark mages, a lightning mage is not immune to the chaos magic.

Even though the kings through generations chose the ones to keep the lineage were all light mages, most of the royal children started to be born as lightning mages. And then, light mages became rare.

The rumors say that the Arhan royal family is losing the angel's blessing, and that would be the reason why almost no royal member is born as a light mage. But others say that it is probably because the light mages aren't needed anymore, since there is almost no chaos beast alive.

But it doesn't matter the reason, the real problem is that light mages are pretty rare nowadays.

During these years that I passed basically locked in the royal library studying, I didn't notice how many things had happened in the palace and how I lost the ace card up in the sleeve that I never had.

The thing that comforted me all this time was that, even if the worst situation happened, if the King suddenly decided to kill me, or if I was found out as the King's bastard by everyone, I still could show myself as a light mage, and nothing bad would happen to me.

But, now that I know that Princess Isabel, a legitimate daughter of the King is also a light mage, I am not that sure how safe I am. He could easily get ridden of me since he already has a light mage, the princess.

"Alex, are you alright? You seem pale, is anything wrong?" It was Mary asking, worried about me.

For a moment I spaced out thinking about what could happen to me, but then I recomposed myself. "Y-Yeah… I am fine. I just remembered that I have something important to do now. Thanks for everything, Mary."

Mary smiled gently and said. "You are welcome. See you later, Alex."

I nodded and quickly I left the dining room. I could feel my heart racing while I was walking aimlessly through the palace, but then I stopped.

'Why am I so worried? It has been already ten years since I was born, and the King didn't do anything to me, so why would he do something now?'

"And I am not even locked in the northwest side anymore…" I whispered.

Just then I realized that the answer to all my fears was in front of me all this time. 'There is no way the King can ever find me.'

With my magic, I can stay hidden until I am old enough to leave this place and live my life however I want. I don't have to go back to the northwest side anymore.

I've been treated as a prisoner for so long that I forgot that I wasn't one. I forgot that I don't have to keep going back to the northwest side worried that my disappearance would draw the King's attention.

'Even if he orders all servants of this palace to find me, there is no way they would ever make it.' I realized.

I can finally live my life without fears again.