The Story [Prologue; Chapter 0]

Inspired by MapleStory; Heavily inspired by Tower of God; Inspired by Magician's Guild

[BIG]CHAPTER 0 - UNTITLED[/BIG]

The chilly snow gently blew upon the lands of Rien. The shades of the white snow are gleefully decorated with blood and corpses. Screams of fear and despair made by the villagers echoed in the island village of Rien.  One by one, screams diminished. A young girl, with her torn & tattered shirt dyed red and dripping with blood, limped through the scattered debris buried in red snow.

A green scaly serpent, with roughly the diameter of twice the young girl’s height,  devoured a corpse right in front of her.  Its menacing pair of eyes which reflected a tint of light red glinted upon noticing that young girl.  It sprang towards her with its bloody mouth wide open.  With its enormous mouth it has, it engulfed the girl whole like how a snake will consume a rat.

The young girl gritted her teeth as she stretched out her left hand. She pictured the entire world gathered on her hand. A warm, bright ball of light appeared in front of her left hand, illuminating the total darkness and the disgusting remnants of the villagers that it consumed. The air inside is filled with the smell of rotten corpse. Seems that the giant snake isn’t really a good eater.

The young girl magically pushed (or accelerated) that ball along the winds of magic. The straight magical beam surged violently through the snake’s insides, penetrating most of its interior organs. Its green murky blood splashed all over the girl. The giant predator released the grasp of its prey, hissing in pain and agony.  Green blood dribbled down its mouth profusely , and soon the snake fell to the ground with a loud thud, unconscious and most likely, dead.

The girl gasped for her own breath, her heart beated wildly for that previous moment. It was frightening, she would have become food for the snake’s next generation if she has had reacted a second later. She had taken down 3 of the mobs and she was down to that state. A thousand more to go… For what reason the mobs suddenly invaded here, she don’t know. All she knows is that monsters from a foreign land suddenly invaded and turned Rien island into their human food platter at this day. Images of her mother getting killed in front of her flashed her mind uncontrollably. She smacked her head to suppress those traumatizing thoughts. It isn’t the time for any weakness to be shown, this is now a battlefield and she will be screwed over if she even fidgeted for a moment…

She continued forward, without any aims or plans. The only word in her mind is “survive” . Like an animal of the wild, she ventured through the place instinctively, to hunt or be hunted.

She saw a dragon lying on the ground with both its eyes closed.  The dragon is enormous, just its face is 10 times the size of her. Its orange scales glittered brilliantly under the afternoon sun. Its pair of wings are tiny, if you are comparing it to its plump build, and it makes you wonder on whether the wings are usable. The dragon has two large bull-like bloodstained horns on both sides of its head. There’s a noticable trails of dried blood that is slightly diluted by its leaking drool. It made a pungent but awfully quiet snore, especially for its size. Its mouth revealed its white teeth stained by blood and remnants of the villagers.  Its sleeping…

She stopped immediately at the sight of a purple-haired man approaching the dragon from the side. His hair is short and wavy, but looks messy and untended from afar. He has fair skin and chiseled jaw. The girl was somehow relieved that there’s an eyepatch over his right eye, which allows her to be hidden from the man’s blind spot. She carefully approached a nearby tree and hid behind, further observing that strange man. He has the appearance of a young adult, somebody in his early 20s. The man dons a finely-weaved brown cloak around his body. That quality of that cloak he is wearing is beyond what an average person would be able to afford, by an astronomical gap. She wonders how many houses she can buy with just the man’s cigarette that he is currently smoking on. One of the few things that got her suspicious about is that he has no traces of blood, not even a drop is seen in this island of bloodbath. That man obviously isn’t one of the villagers, there isn’t anybody in the island with such level of financial power. He must be somebody of a powerful status, most likely someone like a Ranker.

A drop of sweat tinkered down her forehead at that realization. She had heard stuffs  about them like “Don’t mess with them” and “If they want to kill you, they will, you can’t stop it, the only thing to do is to watch”. It is most likely him, that he is behind all these. After all, they can do that, they are beings with unparalleled power beyond her wildest imagination. She had mixed feeling of fear and hate. Is it so that she can do nothing about this, not even when a Ranker committed atrocious acts like this? The mastermind is right in front of her eyes yet she can’t do anything. Fighting that man would mean worthless suicide. “Just why the hell did god give me so little power; but so much of them on that murderer?” Her pair of eyes are wide open, focused towards that man at that flash of thought. She can hear her pulse beating uncontrollably and felt as if her heart was stabbed repeatedly. That helplessness isn’t what she can bear.

She took the wisest, but the most painful decision. She retreated away from the tree and decided to take a detour. A snap from one of the fallen branches was deafening in the quiet setting. The sight of two broken pieces of branches between her feet made her heart fall. Fear and despair gushed into her body. Her right leg was trembling like jelly. She know what will happen next: Imminent Death. The only thing she can do left is to look at that “grim reaper” turning to face her. The man’s left eye was literal golden that glimmered literally. His eye has no pupil, its just a circle in the middle of the whites of his eye. She thought for a moment that the man isn’t a human, but does it even matter right now? Human or not, she was at his complete mercy of life and death.

“Manon, wake up,” That golden-eyed man let out of puff of smoke, gently touching the dragon with his right arm. “Kill the last…”

She wasn’t really surprised about this, after all she kinda expected this. That dragon was on a complete different scale of power as compared to his monsters she fought previously. Before she could even make a slightest twitch, the dragon was already right in front of her, towering at a height of 100 feet. Its mouth was wide open with an enormous ball of orange light between its mouth. She doesn’t even have the idea when and how it woke up. From that height, she can already feel how dense that magical ball is, she will be incinerated without any traces of herself, let alone survive. Running away before that ball accelerates? Impossible, ’cause it will strike at the very next instant and this instant seemed as if its as still as a picture. Furthermore, even if the dragon somehow manage to miss its target, she will never be able to escape considering its phenomenal speed. Its wave of magic released, storming towards her mercilessly like an inescapable tsunami that ends lives.

The next instant she realized that she was still alive, and that the scene in front of her changed totally. She thought that the objects around her moving in a blur, until she realized that she was being carried by somebody. She looked that person’s robe and its quality is similar to what that golden-eyed man was wearing. That person is probably another ranker. The right side of that person’s robe is stained in fresh blood. She can’t perceive much of that ranker from the current position that she was in. The ranker stopped at the coastline. She was placed onto a rowboat. “That piece of shit Rt-ll, he really mean business when he says ‘no survivors’…” That ranker cursed, holding her right arm which have 5 huge icicles stabbed into various locations. “Leave, don’t look back, I will settle with that fucktard…” The ranker is an woman who appears to be in her early 20s. She headed back into the island.

The rowboat moved on its own, away from the island. That young girl survived. She stared at the endless ocean, her emotions hard to make out. It is mixed with confusion, sadness, anger, hate and guilt. Her heart numbed from the terrifying massacre. The face of that golden-eyed man was imbued in her mind – she will never forget that face. When the time is ripe, she will find him, she will kill him. The afternoon was a bloody one. All her close ones died, and yet she still lives. Just because of a person, she lost everything. “I’m still alive… what for? Why can’t I die like anybody else?”

The rowboat continued forth towards its unknown destination.

Afterwords:
I realized that there's alot of plot inconsistencies & plotholes in this chapter, chapter 0 is more like a practice chapter to me, so CNC pls, its my first chapter I made. Chapter 1 will be the start of the series. Yeah, this takes place in the Maple World. Rankers are people who achieved the 4th job, and they are one in a million. Be harsh on ur critique~