The Ten Guardians: Sacrifice©

Prologue

Long ago, an immortal race of beings traveled the stars. There was little they could not create, shape, or destroy with their powers, and they held creation as their greatest joy and purpose. As they traveled, they came upon a broken world. The balance between the world’s energies had become corrupted, running rampant until the planet’s surface was a chaotic mixture of deadly elements.

A handful of giant, four-legged beasts were all that remained on the once fertile planet. The visitors knew they could not save the creatures from their ultimate demise, but the planet could be redeemed to support new life once more.

The visitors held a council and decided a select few of them would remain behind until the planet could sustain itself once again. Ten were chosen, all of whom had a specific task assigned to them. They were titled Light, Dark, Flame, Ice, Wind, Stone, Storm, Life, Death, and Time. They became this world’s guardians, with Time anointed their leader.

These ten entities infused themselves within the last of the giant lizards, blending their intellectual and magical abilities with the bodies of the dying beasts. That is how Dragons, the Guardians of this world, came to exist.

The elemental Guardians harnessed the chaotic elements of the planet, creating unison to correct the planet’s ecosystem. Light and Dark altered the planet’s rotation to divide the light and dark into two portions. This created the four seasons and, when combined with the corrected climates of the elements, made conditions suitable for new life. The Guardian of Life used the stabilized ecosystem to begin creation. She created all manner of animal and plant life that could thrive in the new conditions, including four sentient species to rule the lesser ones. Death would recycle the life force of all living things, giving Life material to create anew, constantly seeking the perfect combination of life forms for the planet to sustain itself indefinitely.

There was only one creature that Life could not alone create, and that was another dragon. She took Time as her mate and eventually had their own offspring, although their intelligence and magical abilities were far less than that of their parents.

They loved them all the same.

Countless ages passed as the ten stood ever watchful, fulfilling their duties without question, righting the world’s chaos. However, in time the ten began to forget what had transpired before they became dragons, and they began to question their purpose. Their memories faded and then became dreams. Until they forgot altogether, they forgot the mantle that had been placed upon them.

Without purpose to guide them, the ten became divided, each pursuing their interests after their nature. The elemental Dragons became obsessed with fighting over territories, embedding magic deep in the roots of existence. This is the source of erratic volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornados, and thunderstorms, all leftover tools from a great global warfare created by the elemental dragons of Fire, Ice, Rock, Wind, and lightning.

Light and Dark saw the fighting between the elemental dragons and decided to rise above the quarrel, maintaining the night, day, and seasons in their heavenly home.

Death, being the antithesis of Life, had forgotten her true purpose and would often snuff out Life’s creations for spite. Life and Death often disagreed, sometimes coming to blows but parting ways before any true damage could be done to the world around them.

 The fragile balance of peace between the non-elemental dragons was not to last. One day, Life stumbled upon the bodies of her youngest clutch of offspring; their corpses were thrown into a pile like discarded rubbish. If their deaths had been natural, she would have accepted their fate. However, it was clear that her youngest children had been murdered and placed on display for her to find.

Life went into a rage. She blamed Death for the loss of her clutch and attacked. The two battled for hours, spewing energy streams throughout the planet in all directions. Scars from this battle can still be seen today if one knows where to look.

Time tried to join the battle to aid his mate, but the elemental dragons wanted the battle to remain uninterrupted. Their purpose in these events is unknown, but they set aside their differences and combined their powers to hold Time at bay. He was not prepared for their combined intervention and was overpowered. He could only watch as his mate fought on.

In the end, Life and Death perished from their wounds, and Time was released from his magical bonds. As he slowly approached the fallen body of his mate, he passed the pile of his offspring, the source of this epic battle that cost him so much. Using the power of his namesake, he could look backward in time to the demise of his children and see that their fall was not caused by The Guardian of Death, but rather by a group of humans. These humans believed they could become immortal if death was killed and had orchestrated the battle between Life and Death. Their plan had worked.

However, there was one consequence the humans did not expect with the demise of a Guardian. The ancient intelligences that had embodied these beasts were released upon their deaths. Their memories were restored, and Life and Death embraced, rejoicing at their restoration.

They were interrupted by the pull of magic, stronger than the world itself. They turned to the source below them to find the Guardian of Time in the middle of casting a godly spell. Directly around Time was a ring of pure energy, and expanding outward from the ring, the planet’s surface was slowly being ripped into the air. The debris of earth, trees, and water spun around Time while simultaneously being pulled towards him until the debris was converted into energy, adding itself to the ring around him. As more debris was added to the ring, the ring grew larger.

Life and Death knew he was trying to change the past, to travel backward in time to stop the death of his mate. They didn’t know if it was possible, but the attempt would surely destroy the world as they knew it. The elemental guardians tried to stop Time the same way they had held him at bay during the battle between Life and Death, but in his grief, he had poured his entire essence into the spell. He would be successful, or all would be destroyed.

Life and Death quickly decided that one of them would remain behind to try and stop Time, while the other departed to seek help from their people far away. As Death disappeared, Life tried pleading with Time, telling him who she was and that death was only the resuming of their true existence. Time was blinded by grief and could not see his mate in the otherworldly entity pleading with him. Life tried to stop his spell, but she could only slow him down.

At that moment, there was an eclipse. The moon and sun aligned, and a beam of energy shot down from the sky. Light and Dark had been observing events from above, had heard Life’s words, and decided to intervene. Life saw their combined magic and knew it would still not be enough to stop the Lord of Time. She infused herself into the stream of magic, exponentially enhancing the destructive beam to save the planet filled with her living creations from the one she loved. The energy beam grew as it traveled until it dwarfed its target when it finally slammed into the Guardian.

An enormous cloud of dirt, dust, and rock erupted on impact from the massive beam of energy. Nothing could be seen of the guardian through the dust, but the swirling ring of energy was gone, and all of the debris that it had been spinning in the air came crashing to the surface of the planet. The dust finally settled after what seemed like ages, revealing a massive crater where Time had been standing. Time and Life had disappeared, and no one knew if either of the two Guardians were dead or alive.