The Flames of Darkness (Old)

You open your eyes and you see a beautiful white ceiling, only interrupted by stars that were never painted over at all. You wipe the sleep from your eyes and jump up ready to start the day.

Your name is Elizabeth You are 10 years old. You are a member of the Blazing flames sect and you have been yearning to finally take part in the flame sects sacred ritual that all kids your age must take part in as a coming of age ritual.

The ritual awakens the latent flame in your body that almost everyone in the flame sect had passed down to them. On rare occasions, the children's element might not be fire but this is usually caught during the training process.

Where you meditate in a 100°F metal room which slowly rises to temperatures over 3000°F this is called the boiler room and usually if your element is not that of the flame you would either die from the unbearable heat or pass out during the early stages and either be moved to another sect or put to work at the Barn as a farmer.

You can still remember the scorching metal floor, which burned your feet to the point of numbness and even worse the air which was so hot that every breath felt like your lungs were on fire and slowly turning into dust.

But you stayed strong and continued training in those horrendous conditions, and soon enough the heat didn't bother you anymore every breath was like a warm gentle flame was flowing through your body your originally burning blood that made your veins feel as if they would burst turned into a warm gentle sea and soon enough you could handle even the hottest of flames.

You can't help laugh at how weak you were back then.

Every time you thought back to those moments you have grown so much in only a few years and now you're ready to unlock your own flames.

You've seen flames plenty of times before like when your mother was cooking and needed to light the stove though it's a lot weaker than it once was it still works for simple tasks or when your father uses them to light the fireplace on those unbearably cold winter nights.

You have always envied the people who are able to use their flames and couldn't wait to finally get your own. You have been counting down the days down and finally, today is the day.

You make your bed, shower, brush your teeth, wash your face and change into your flame sect uniform since regular clothes can't stand the heat of the training rooms and rush downstairs.

Where you see your mom softly singing to herself as she sets the table for breakfast and your Dad who is nodding off at the table, His dark brown messy hair matted together as if he hadn't washed it in weeks, His eyes though barely opened to reveal his tired brown eyes, his shirt is ripped to pieces and it barely covers much of anything.

'He was probably out fighting again, he really worries mom what if he gets hurt, what drives him to even do such things anyway can't he just be a teacher or something.'

'You let out a sigh. 'Never the less he's still my father.'

You walk over to him and hug him trying not to make skin to skin contact so you don't get drenched in sweat. He hugs you back giving you a tired half-assed smile as he pats you on the head as he says in a monotonous tone.

"Good morning sweety are you ready for the ritual."

You nod with a big smile not even trying to hide your excitement a little, you know it's already panted all over your face. You can't wait until you are finally standing in front of that volcano ready to finally unlock your own flame.

Your mom looks up as she places the last plate down right in front of your father.

Her eyes are a beautiful green, her beautiful black hair stop just above her small nimble shoulders and she's covered from head to toe in flower from the freshly baked bread that sits on top the counter.

She looks up at you with a cheerful smile and says, "Of course, she is she's always begging you to show her your flame every chance she gets she's probably happy she doesn't have to ask you anymore you should be too since you have more time to sneak out the house off to those damn fight clubs."

She wraps her arms around you and kisses you on your forehead as walks back over to the stove to put the food in the middle of the table.

Your dad smirks and replies in his usual joking manner, "What fight clubs hunny I would never sneak out to the fight club...I always say bye before I leave plus id steal shows her my flames I mean who else in our village have a blue flame.

You can't help but laugh as you think back to your teacher Mr.Green explanation on the order of flames.

"Ok, class pay attention because I'm only telling you shitty ass brats this once, the order of flames is the order your flames go through during the ritual the lowest level of your flame is orange like the usual flame that we see every day this is the weakest flame you can activate and also the rarest. The next flame is the crimson flame, this flame is the most common yet twice as hot as the orange flame and can char any normal human. Though it's more common than the orange flames it's easier to cultivate. "

"The next on the list is the blue flame which can burn a normal person down too bone this flame is usually the flame of most genius mages. It is also the requirement to get into blazing academy the number one school in the sect."

"Finally, we have the green flame it is the strongest of the bunch and extremely rare but it isn't the last flame you can achieve, usually a fire elemental would use either crimson or blue and train that until it advances. But everyone has their own flames after green which can grow to be as hot as the sun but it's hard to even break through to this level if you're not given it during awakening into this level. Plus to even get your flame to this level you would need to be trained under special circumstances that are different for everyone but the rewards are extraordinary at the higher levels it is even said that some can bring people back from the dead. "

"Now that's it for this class get out before I expel every single one of you."

You are brought back to reality by your mom who begins to make your plate stacking it high with oatmeal, bread, sausages, bacon, and eggs. Which you quickly scarf down as you give your mom and dad a kiss goodbye as you hastily put your shoes on and rush out of the door heading in the direction of the blazing volcano.