Prologue 1: Life As A Kid

The snow that fell from the sky polluted the world into a snowy white surrounding and was as cold as usual. "The wind ... blew stronger."

Walking in the snow with a crunching sound in every step,

A tall 19-year-old boy dressed in the uniform of the Jezaniah University slowly walked down the snowy path, seeing the shingles of some houses still left ahead from the war four years ago.

The place was deserted from the war and no one wanted to live there, food and water were also hard to come by. The boy stopped walking and crouched in front of a small, dead shrub. He looked at it as his eyes showed a trace of desolation, somehow his expression trembled slightly showing a hint of regret, it looked as if he was…..lonely. As the blizzards continued to hail in the spreading silence of the snow. He saw a berry that had been rotting for many years, then with a small smile on his face, he slowly picked it up off the ground.

"George really liked collecting these strawberries." he blurted in a little voice,

….

....

"Wait, who's George?" confused, yet somehow he got used to calling this name. He did not know who it was, but he felt familiar as if this was his daily routine, yet unfamiliar at the same time as if he had forgotten a very precious person...

The young boy had a panicked look on his face, not knowing what he was spouting about, and his head suddenly ached with a whirring sound as sweat kept pouring down his face.

"And I… Where is this place?" He knows this place… He should. "Why is this place so desolate and….empty?" The words revealed a trace of sadness, and a breath of cold air came out of his mouth. Perhaps he's had a traumatic experience here, maybe something happened here that couldn't be undone. As he felt that, his heart ached a little.

In the blink of an eye, he was in another place, not in a snow-covered village, but a very large and empty building. He was not surprised by the teleportation, as if he had experienced it many times and was already familiar with and used to this level of teleportation. He stood up wearily and saw a huge figure in front of him, unable to see who it was because his vision was beginning to blur. Although he can still see some parts slightly, the place was big enough for even both sides with five giant troops in golden armor but also like statues to line up. Looking at this situation, it may be considered an execution site for this young man.

In between the left and right side of the lined-up troops stands a tall and gigantic long-golden-haired lady. "It" looked as if it was going to do something to him as if it was going to shoot him with a bow and arrow. With the positioning and strength, all prepared, "It" did not look like it had mercy nor pity to spare.

The boy looked scared as he faced the fear of death for the first time. The bow looked golden, shining with the thin arrow placed on the shelf as the string was already pulled at maximum strength. This shooting form in front of him was bigger than normal and one blow could end his life.

"No! W... Wait!" He wanted to take a step back, wondering what he had done and why he needed to be executed by unknown creatures.

"Your mission has been accomplished." At these words, he wittingly remembered the feeling that everything was already done and was meant to end, he felt relieved and did not take a step back. "It" aimed its bow at the boy's chest. The bow slowly moved downwards due to its bigness, like a cannon positioning to aim its target with a cannonball.

The sound of a bow and arrow being fired was emitted, "Swoosh!". In a split second, the bright arrow has covered the whole vision of the young boy….

....

"Tz..." atz"... Hatz"... HATZ" Called loudly as his father kept nudging him. He woke up and looked around with a feeling of almost having a heart attack from the sudden shot of an arrow.

"C'mon kid, did you have a nightmare? How come y'all sweaty from a mere illusion." in a sly tone, Hatz's dad made a funny face as if he was looking down on his son. Funnily enough, Hatz thought that it was too immature of his father to act like that.

"Dad ... I" Hatz wanted to tell his father about his nightmare, everything unknowing has been deeply imprinted in his mind, and he can not forget it.

"I know I know, you're making excuses again aren't ya," As his dad said that, he picked a booger out of his ear and glanced at Hatz for a moment with his one eye closed and one eye open,

"The sun is shining, get up or not M'not gonna leave even bits of your breakfast if you come late Haha!" With a tone all high and whatnot, he didn't seem like he was lying.

He seems to be in a good mood, Hatz thought as he received the glance from his dad knowing that he could actually eat his whole breakfast if he came late. And with that, his dad walked straight out of Hatz's room and then shut the door. Of course not that loud, there is no need to be angry and throw a tantrum for no reason.

"... was about to die" Was Hatz wanted to say but instead, mumbled under his breath before he could get it out. He did not dare to tell his dad about this because it was too surreal. Also, Hatz hoped that his dad would wash his hands before having breakfast.

Without a second thought, Hatz got up and headed for the back door. Hatz always took a shower before getting the day started, so he walked to the back of the cabin where there was a well surrounded by trees, and water fished out of it. Relax, no one is going to peek since their village is pretty secluded from the City.

With the first splash of water using a wooden bucket to his short brown hair, the second splash went for his face he closed then opened his eyes with colored blue blending to cyan, which is his natural color. The third splash went to his whole body, finally covered with water, he began scrubbing starting from his arms.

In Hatz's POV

Even if the temperature is always near zero, I still wonder why I didn't feel cold when I took a bath in such cold weather. This question…. I thought about it for a long time and never got an answer to it. But I suspect that people born here would have special cold-resistant skin to survive this low-temperature environment, or maybe we are just used to winter.

The village I lived in was particularly small, you could say it was an old 1980s version; the huts were made of straws and wood. The crops and land were harder to harvest than elsewhere, and most of the people looked thin due to the lack of food supplies, but even as thin as they were, they still retained some of their muscle, and because of this they were still good at combat, but not all. Our dad was good in combat, especially with swords and he has never lost a spar to anyone in his life. He also taught me and Henry swordsmanship when we were still 5 and 4 years old. In the cold and heavy weather, on a rainy and slippery day, all of these pathetic climates did not stop our dad from teaching us. But in reverse, I and Henry regretted joining his training every time although it was worthwhile when we got serious. Sometimes, we even secretly admire our dad's persistence in training and chores. I said "secretly" because our dad likes to brag a lot and it gets pretty annoying. He even sleep-talks with the compliments he had heard on the day.

In this village, where the environment is full of snow, the people still manage to live a healthy life, even if they don't eat for a day and only drink water, they still have plenty of energy and can do almost any hard work.

Children like Henry and me are included. Why are we so healthy? Why are we so good at combat? One reason is for sure, it's our natural, unique attribute.

*Hatz continues to scrub his body with a wooden scrubber filled with an old soap that was made with animal and vegetable oils with a little salt.

"Combat is our natural talent, and as knights who have served the heavens for generations and centuries, we ask for no more but the praise of the Gods." That is what our dad would say. During this unfair society, our village was special, because all people who were born here have the attribute of light. The light attribute is passed down from generation to generation, and in this small village where no one in the society knows about it, it is always a good idea to keep a low profile and act weak and poor from the start so as not to be targeted by other cities. Having a unique attribute is easily coveted by others and leads to overthrowing oneself.

Although our village may be in the 1980s version, compared to the City, the City is very modernized and has the highest high technologies. I heard that robots and spaceships were flying around for patrol, there was not a single scratch of paper seen there since all of the people there use holograms with a special pen for taking notes instead. If they have these, then, of course, their weaponry and explosives are no joke.

….If they found us….the government will likely crush us like ants. Thinking about it makes me shiver.

To introduce the so-called attributes, usually, the world possesses 7 of them; ice, fire, lightning, dark, water, wind, and earth. Light attributes also exist but are gradually being forgotten by humans, which is why they are called Incomplete Sets. In fact, they were forgotten not because of the small population of people who have light attributes but because they have been looked down upon by society from the beginning of their service to the Heavens until today. People called us "Slaves from Hell", I thought it sounded cool but I don't understand it, some code or whatever dad kept rambling on me.

But I also have a question for this one,

As I splashed water from the wooden bucket to the top of my head, the sounds of drip-drop began to play,

"Are we really selfless?",

not in terms of personality, but the justice and pride in this sole village.

As I thought about it, a water drop fell to the ground from a part of my hair, I looked at the snowy floor that seemed to be fluffy, and then I thought, we called ourselves "Knights of the Heavens" but why are we living like this?

Suddenly, a young shout brought me back to reality,

"Brother! Hurry! Dad is about to eat your meal!"

"Huh?!" I turned around to see my one and only brother, Henry, running up to me and throwing a big bucket of water at me.

The splash of cold water flew past my eyes and slapped me right in the face.

"Done splashing! Surprise! Hahahaha, come and get changed, brother!" Henry said while standing up straight and proud in front of me.

"You ...." I said helplessly with an annoyed look, do you know how painful it is to have a negative 2-degree water splat in your eyes?

"I'll protect your breakfast!" Henry said, running into the house.

"Ugh," It hurt and my face slightly started to flush.

Sigh...Henry.

Third Person's POV

As Hatz got back from his room and changed into his ragged clothes, he left his room and then went to the dining table. Their house was made of wooden planks and straws. Their dad built it proudly as if he thought building a house was a game. All furniture was made of wood and the cooking was done in the fireplace. The sounds of slicing vegetables were already heard and the crackles of the fireplace were relaxing to hear. Their mom prepared a meat pie that was already placed on a stone stove as it was emitting mild smoke.

Their mom quickly pulled a towel to cover her hands to pick up the stove, "Let us eat boys," said in a delighted tone as she saw her whole family sitting at the table waiting for food.

After Dad teased Hatz a little, the four happy family members enjoyed their breakfast time.

Later, after they were done eating, Henry went to help their mother with her chores and Dad was going out to chop wood.

Hatz's mom looked at the nearly empty strawberry basket and then called out, "Hatz! Go pick some strawberries, we're almost out of them."

"Okay, Mom," Hatz responded.

He put on his leather boots, put on his well-worn coat, grabbed a small straw basket, and then smiled at mom and Henry before he went into the woods filled with trees.

Hatz knows his way around the forest well. Although he sometimes gets lost if he wanders into new areas, he never forgets the location of the strawberry bushes.

The blizzard today was fine for a trip to the forest. The trees inside the forest were mostly covered in snow. From branches, they slowly fall to the ground if it is too heavy to carry on. Only a small number of creatures live in this kind of forest and weather. However, winter is not suitable for creatures as they easily die from the low temperature.

Hatz continues to walk, leaving a small trail of his little footprints. He breathes a little faster with his eyes all focused on looking for strawberries. Hatz's height was short, it was somehow around the first branch of a tree. The trees' height was taller than the huts they built which would make it easy for them to hide from danger.

As he roamed around looking for the location of the strawberry bush, he saw an unusually tall tree in front of him with a common large flat stone in the middle, which seemed a bit strange. Hatz looked in that direction to check if there was something in there, and after a moment .... he saw a human figure.

Hatz thought, person? Is that a person? Why is it lying there? looked left and right, side by side. He crouched on the ground to knead a handful of snow.

To find out, Hatz cautiously approached the big flat stone with snow in his hand, then saw a figure with eyes widened. After that, Hatz's posture began to stiffen a little.

As he leaned forward, he saw a little face who was toppled up by the snow.

"Ah, he's covered with snow!" Hatz shouted with a surprised face, he dropped his kneaded snow and strawberry basket.

The little face's expression did say it looked comfy, but from Hatz's point of view, it actually looks suffocating with all the snow piling up on the person.

Hurriedly, he ran to his side and shouted hard,

"Hey! Hey! Are you okay? Can you hear me?" The voice sounded with urgency,

Hatz frantically dug up a pile of snow with his bare hands. Suddenly, the boy who looked the same age as Hatz slowly opened his eyes like a snow-white princess who was already kissed by the prince, but not in this story though, sadly.

As Hatz almost dug out almost his whole body, his appearance piqued his interest.

He had snowy white hair and wore a long white scarf and a long white coat. To add, his skin color was snow-white with a pair of snow-white blue eyes.

Hatz saw his eyes open and said in a panic, "Oh! You're alive! Hang in there! Hold on a little longer!" As he continues to dig up the snow, the boy pops out his right hand to stop him.

"Hey! Why are you trying to stop me? You're going to die!" Hatz said with a worried yet angry look,

With a strong grip, he smiled at him a little as if the snow did not concern him at all, as if that was his only bed to sleep on.

The boy said, "I'll be fine," and a cool, young voice came out of his mouth and said, "Besides, you should stop, you might hurt yourself."

Hatz was confused and at the same time amazed by his grip and survival from wearing thin clothes from the freezing weather. After concerning that, he decided to back down and stopped digging with his hands and asked with a worrying look, "Aren't you cold? You should be freezing by now!"

The snow-white teenager wasn't surprised by the reaction and was about to answer No to Hatz.

But Hatz disregarded the teenager's intention since he already knew what he was going to say and asked: "Do you want to drink hot water?"

"..." The teenager could not catch up to his conversation and still has not had the time to refuse as Hatz said "I'll get it for you! We live nearby, hang in there!".

Having said that, Hatz rushed out of the forest, leaving the boy dumbfounded. The boy watched his running figure, then sat up to clear the rest of the snow away from his body.

When he was done clearing it, he thought with a discerning yet perceiving look, Hatz huh... then stares blankly at an open space of trees.

In his perspective, this name has been known to him for hundreds of years, even before Hatz was born. The boy heard a prophecy with the name "Hatz" in it which interested him to meet him. Alas, from that touch of his hand, he already knew his identity.

He sat down on the flat rock idly and waited for Hatz to return.

Later, Hatz came back, holding a clay cup with hot water leaving another trail of small footprints from the village,

"Here! Drink it now!" Said Hatz, pushing the cup to the snow-white teenager in front of him, but he pushed it away with his hand to reject Hatz's kind offer and said "I'm fine, really." Moreover, he looked healthy with no bruises or dehydration on his lips.

But Hatz said with a look of urgency, "No! You have to drink it! You've been out here for too long! You should be freezing at this moment. Here, drink some hot water to warm up!" He still wanted to give the water to him since he thought he had already come all the way from the village and it wasn't right to leave a kid who was buried in the snow.

The boy tried to resist and thought, ....Did I look like I was shivering in the cold? Though right now, it would be too rude to not accept him. Alas, the boy now had the intent to accept the cup of water but Hatz unexpectedly shoved it into the boy's mouth and forced him to drink it.

!! The boy was surprised. He knew that he had to grab the forced cup on his mouth off, however, he only held it with both of his hands.

When the boy had drunk almost half a cup, he coughed a little with his hand covering his mouth, and then Hatz said, "This is warm, right? Hahahaha!". Despite the resistance, Hatz did not regret that he shoved it in.

A pretty blunt move if you ask me..the boy guessed that Hatz was especially open when it comes to strangers.

"In such cold weather, hot water is the best, warm water is a bit too weak for me". This was said in a sly tone by Hatz himself. The boy ignored that statement straightly by saying, "Thank you" in a very respectful manner, which made Hatz lighten up that he wanted to jump up and down because he was not good at hearing these words. So the cause of that, he paid no attention to his ignored sentence.

"N-no problem! By the way, what are you doing in the snow?" Hatz asked suspiciously. Of course, he should be, why would someone stay in the snow for so long?

The boy looked at Hatz for a moment thinking whether he should trust him or not then looked in another direction, staring at the space,

"I... was waiting for someone here", it is a fact that the boy has been waiting for someone. Surprisingly, he seems somewhat happy for a reason, but he didn't show that face to Hatz.

WAITING FOR SOMEONE? IN THIS SHEER COLD? with eyes as wide as a tarsier, Hatz tried very hard to hide the annoyed-looking face then said, "Really? They made you wait like this? That's harsh!"

In contrast to that, the teenager smiled silently remarking, "Yes, they really are harsh, but it doesn't matter anymore" closed his eyes and still maintained the smile.

"Oh?" Before he could finish his sentence he was interrupted by a distant shout, again...

Henry shouted from far away in the forest, "Brother! Mom is calling you!" he ran to Hatz's side as if he was about to run out of energy. He was out of breath and it seems like he has done a number of chores for today.

Another one…Interesting. The boy seemed intrigued as he met Henry.

"Okay!"He then faced the boy and said, "Looks like I have to go, you should go back too, you might get a fever" Hatz said this with a worried tone and expression. His worrying-for-others habit still hasn't changed.

The boy looked at him with the still clear sky-blue eyes in awe as he thought how thoughtful Hatz was to him, then smiled and said, "Well, thanks for the water." The words were laced with gratitude as he replied.

"Hehe! See you next time!" With the little smirk glued to his face, Hatz took Henry's little hand and then waved, the boy waved back and watched Hatz exit the forest. After a while, he suddenly remembered he hadn't said his name to Hatz yet.

The next day, Hatz entered the forest once again under the pretext of picking strawberries then went to the same place where he met the snow-white boy.

From that context, he thought that his meeting with his new friend was delightful and a change of pace from all the tiring chores in the village. So he decided to slack off a little, even for just a while.

When he walked to the same large flat rock, the same spot where he met the boy, Hatz looked around,

Woosh– as the cold wind blew sidely, it can be felt but it shan't be seen then a strand of white hair flowed with the wind in front of him as the wondering snow-white blue eyes stared at him.

He looked at Hatz for a while, faceless but not that awkward, and then sat on the rock as if he had been waiting for him for a long time.

"You're back." The boy said in a very soft voice.

Hatz's heart fluttered thinking that he looked like a very good boy, like an angel, and he quietly admired the sight of his snow-white hair. For a moment, all he was thinking was I want to get close to him; how is he so adorable; he is taller but he looks so mature at a young age; is he a young master of some kind of rich family–

"Hatz?" The boy called out, trying to get Hatz's immediate attention.

"Ah! I'm, uh-uh... Hi! It's good to see you again." Hatz said in a happy and shy tone after he snapped out.

"Well, it's good to see you too."

Hatz realized something was wrong then paused to think and said "Wait, how do you know my name?"

The snow-white boy replied firmly and without hesitation, "I recently heard from your village that your name is Hatz."

"Oh, really? Am I that famous? Haha!" Hatz said shyly, his face slightly flushed, and for a moment, his self-confidence grew a bit, then sat down next to the boy.

"Hey, what's your name? It's totally unfair that you know my name and I don't know yours.", Hatz said with a pout, filled with the childishness of a child.

"Oh, please forgive me for not telling you, my name is George."

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End of Prologue 1…