The Frozen Ones

The Frozen Ones(Clao Panson) The cold air and the dripping cold water woke me up.
I tried opening my eyes slowly, I can feel the cold hard ground transferring a cold sensation throughout my body.
“Ahh, huh where am I, what is this place?” I felt drowsy as I tried to stand up. I remembered something, ahh no it’s more like a memory or a dream. It’s all so weird, I could’ve sworn that I was somewhere else a few moments ago.
Impossible.
The layout of my surroundings, the buildings, the roads, this isn’t from my place, it’s too old to be from my era.
I picked myself up and started to look around for people. The layout of the city looks like a maze, I walked around for almost an hour now.
“Umm, excuse me but are you lost?” A girl revealed herself from an alleyway, looking curious
“Hahaha, yeah it seems so…” I can’t tell her that I don’t know anything yet.
“You’re not from around here are you?”
“Nope, I’m from Bristol”
“Umm I’ll just take it as you coming from another country then”
“Hahaha yeah, anyways do you know where I can find a phone?”
“Um… a phone?” her face is so serious it’s not even funny.
Finally, after she stared at me for quite a while like I’m some sort of weird guy that spits out some random words I decided to explain to her
“Yeah a telephone, you know the thing that can enables you to have a long distance conversation”
She went on thinking really hard and shook her head after a while and gives me a blank stare as if she did not find anything of some sort in her memory.
“Hmm, yeah, yup, there are no such things here. The cold air must be getting into you. I think you should find a place to stay first for the night and we can discuss everything by tomorrow, besides its getting late.”
I was about to wave her off and walk away until I remembered that I didn’t have a place to live in. I had a moment of doubt but then I decided to ask her about places to live in.
“Hey umm do you know any places to live in? Like an inn or something”
She nodded and pointed an old lavish building located near the end of the street and it’s named “the sleeping giant”. I told her thanks and decided to check on how much money I have.
“Eh, umm, haa” I patted the back of my pocket and every other ones and it seems that I have no money.
She smiled and giggled, I think she knew about my little problem as she told me that it’s fine.
“Well how about staying in my place then? My parents are out of town for a while so it won’t be a problem. Oh yeah my name’s Eleanor by the way, what’s yours?”
“Ah yeah my name is Hotarou, Pleasure to meet you Eleanor.”
I rubbed the back of my head while nodding. I asked her if it’s really ok and she just nodded back and asked me to follow her. She brought me around the maze like alleyways and we ended up in front of a house, it looks quite cozy and nice. She then turns around and smiled
“Well what are you waiting for? Come on in”
So I went in and she told me that I could use the vacant room at the 3rd floor so I went there and she also told me that the bathroom is at the 1st floor so I took a bath and prepared myself to go to bed I told her good night and went to bed. I lay down on the bed, it didn’t take me too long to fall asleep after a long night.
I had a dream about my world, I remembered a machine, it was like a portal and there are lots of people surrounding me. Yes I remembered, it was an experiment about something. Just as I tried to remember more a voice called out to me.
“Hey, hey wake up! Hotarou, its noon now, you’ve been asleep for too long!”
I slowly open my eyes and yawn while stretching, it’s more like a habit now. I greeted her and she told me that she wanted to know about my origin more so I told her that I will tell her after I eat breakfast, she told me that there are food that she bought from the market ,so I went down and ate my breakfast hastily.
She kept on staring at me with that serious face of hers so I can’t help but to finish up my meal and do my part of the bargain, I put down the paper wrapping and looked at her.
“Hey um thanks for the meal.”
“Hehehe, no problem but more importantly tell me more about yourself, you seem like a strange guy.”
“What do you mean strange? Ahh never mind, well I can tell you that it seems that I came from a place far away from here.”
“It seems?”
“Yeah”
Well I guess I could tell at least tell her a few things about myself. But I need to give her an explanation that is enough to satisfy her while not to reveal everything, if I tell her everything now then I might be called a freak or an idiot.
“I came from a faraway place where the people there are all great thinkers, my full name is Hotarou Isshiki. My home town is in Bristol. As for the reason on why I’m here, I still have no idea, it seems that I lost a few of my memories. I’m sorry, it seems that I can’t recall more.”
“Ahh, well you don’t need to be sorry, well this town is called forget me not, it is quite a peaceful town. Well in the meantime you can stay here until you regain your memories again. Can you recall any other memories?”
“Hmm I don’t. Wait, I remembered that me and my friends were operating a machine, it looks round and… and.. urgh, I can’t remember anything more…”
“It’s okay, take it slowly, you’ll remember it sooner or later, let’s try this slowly okay?”
“Alright”
So we did this for around 2 hours and we managed to make a drawing of the machine that I was talking about and for some reason, I remembered the components needed to build it so I decided that building the machine is first priority as it might help me regain my memories and it might help me go back to my world.
“Is it going to be hard to find the items for my machines?”
“Hmm I don’t think is going to be that hard to find but we need to go to the capital to buy some of the items though.”
So we took about 2 hours to the capital by walking there, she told me that the people in the capital’s market are all friendly and nice. I was pretty excited with the idea of middle aged market system.
“Eh, this is strange… where are the guards?” She looked really confused so I asked her if something is wrong. She told me that the capital gates are usually guarded by 4 guards from dawn to dusk. She told me to proceed with caution.
“Hey umm, isn’t this city a bit too quiet? I thought that it going to be livelier around here.”
“Yeah, usually it’s really crowded by now since its still noon. But I haven’t seen any other person here besides us”
“It looks quite…”
“Abandoned”
“This isn’t making any sense, where is everybody?”
“Let’s look for leads first, we might find the reason behind this.”
We started to look around for clues and after looking through the windows of the houses, I could see a figure near a corner in the house. So I started tapping on the glass and I could hear a faint cry.
“He… Help”
I called out for Eleanor and kicked the door open
‘Kyaaa” she screamed and my body started to shiver, I could only look at the horrid scene in front of me. Eleanor sat down while closing her eyes. It was a crimson red pool all over the house, the floor and the walls of the wooden house were stained with red blood. I took a deep breath and managed to calm myself down a little. I rushed towards the man and I could see a rag covering his abdomen, he is pushing down on it really hard, it seems that he managed to slow down the bleeding.
“Kid, listen to me, the red moon is here, the guards tried to fend them off but they got killed within 30 minutes, some of the people here fought as well, the rest of them ran away to the city shelter. Please help this city. Cirque du Soleil, The lover’s bond and the moon light’s tears”
He gave off his final breath with these 3 clues. After I checked his pulse and confirmed that he’s dead, I went to Eleanor and helped her to collect herself.
“Hey, are you okay? Can you stand?”
“Uhh. Yeah I think so, we… we… need… to solve this”
“You don’t need to push yourself you know…”
She took a deep breath which seemed that she was hardening her resolve and this time she told me that she needs to figure this out and solve the case no matter what.
“Hey Hotarou”
“Yeah”
“Could you give me a moment please?”
“Yeah sure”
She went in the wooden house again and it seems that she was speaking to the man. Did she know him? Wait she said that her parents were out of town. My train of thought was interrupted.
“Okay I’m done, let’s go”
I decided not to ask her anything and let her be for now. But still the 3 things that old man told me still bothers me. Maybe she knows something about this.
“Hey umm do you know anything about Cirque du Soleil? What is it? It sounds like a name of a circus.”
“Huh? How can you not know about him?”
“Him?”
“Yeah, almost all of the kingdoms in this country know him, he is the only alchemist in the country and he wore a silver mask and a fully covered clothing. But he disappeared 5 years ago after being charged with gold fraud. And it all happened in this kingdom.”
“What about the Lovers bond?”
“That was a rumor only known within this kingdom”
She told me that the alchemist came to the kingdom and he presented the Queen a golden rose, and she was mesmerized by the gold. The Queen used to be adventurous, she would love to hike and venture through the woods. But one day, she was forced to get married and she was required to leave her hobbies and she needs to stay in the palace grounds which she got bored with eventually. Then she bore a son, by then she was almost used to her new life and then the alchemist came with magic, this sparked her curiosity back. So she spends more and more time with him and in the end, she fell in love with the alchemist. Soon after, the king knows about this secret affair and he decided to kill the alchemist. But if he just directly kills the alchemist, the queen might be angered at him so he decided a plan. The plan was to charge him with gold fraud. So one day he ordered the alchemist to conjure 100 000 bars of gold. No one could see the alchemist expression back then but I would say that he might be shocked. Surprisingly, the alchemist said yes and he asked for the king for a month. The king allows his terms but in that month, he blocks all gold trading in the kingdom and the alchemist can’t leave the kingdom in that one month. But the king made the greatest mistake here, after 10 days the king grew impatient so he sent his guards to kill him. The alchemist managed to escape and he went hidden. After 3 days, the king found his son dead in a clock tower, His son was oozing out liquid gold from all over his body. Even after 5 months of search, no one can find the alchemist. All they found was a note that says “The moon light’s tears will show a way that leads to either death or a solution.” And 2 days later, the king was found dead right at the top floor of the tower. No one could figure out the reason why he died.
“Then I guess that we need to solve this one then”
“Well I guess we can give it a shot”
So first we went to the clock tower, we started to climb up the stairs and I felt disoriented.
“uhh, my head hurts”
“Hey are you okay?”
“I just felt dizzy all of a sudden”
“ahh, ow yeah is your first time going here, for some reason, the builder of this tower miscalculated the blue print and it didn’t match the blue print which resulted the building being tilted”
“I see, so you’ve been here before?”
“yeah, all I can find is a strange plate that can give off different types of light”
“Hmm, that’s interesting to see”
We continued walking through the stairs and saw the cogs that keeps the clock running, it’s really a wonderful design. After a few flight of stairs we reached the top of the floor
“So, where’s the Thing you saw?’
I started walking around and I turned around and found a stand
“WHAT?? IT CAN’T BE”
What stood there was a stand and a pad, it was a technology from my modern era. I turned the pad on-
“System ID: 022 detected, Commence synchronization?”
I pressed yes and soon a blue aura surrounds me.
“Syncing Player ID: 022 and system priority access LVL: 02 Syncing now… Sync completed, starting calibration sequence… calibration 100%. Player is ready”
The blue aura was soon gone and Eleanor was surprised. I told her that everything was fine and I told her that the pad came from my home town. I soon called out a command. It seems that the console gave me some of my memories back.
“System Command: open inventory”
Soon a window appeared and I saw a few items there, I checked for essential items and I found a Gun and other items for survival. I closed the window and I figured out who the alchemist is.
“Hey, I think I know where the alchemist is.” I said with a grin
“Whaa?? How?” She was really confused.
I explained to her that the alchemist ran away using the system command and he seems to be here (at least the character)
“Will there be a full moon tonight?”
“Yupp”
“Then we will wait here”
Soon the clock shows midnight and the light of the moon shone in to the room, the light shines to a specific area which is a painted wall and it shines on a rose insignia. Eleanor rushes to the hole and tried to put her finger in the hole but I pulled her back just in time.
“What’s that for?”
“remember about the note that says death or solution?” I sigh and took a stick. It was just a feeling I have but I pushed the hole with the stick and a needle pierce through the hole and stabs the stick.
“See, if your finger was in there then you would’ve died by now, the needle has a poison tip in it. The note was meant for the king to find and he Knew about this place and he poked his finger right through that hole which a poison tipped needle pierce through his finger and he died”
I turned the stick and the rose insignia turned, apparently it acts like a lock and soon the wall opens up. And there we saw the body of the alchemist stabbed with arrows and behind him was piles of gold bars and on the corner was a chest and it the antidote was there, it was the antidote for the infected people that inhaled the red moon’s mist.
I saw Eleanor trying to open the alchemist’s mask.
“Stop”
“why?”
“He lived his lived using a mask for a reason, and the only one who is allowed to see the man behind mask is the queen.” I hand over his diary to Eleanor and she seemed to understand and she bowed to the man for once more. Then we left the place in peace, we decided to let him rest there so we lock the room again.
Suddenly red letters flashed through my eyes, “System ID:022 Objective not completed, Apply restrictions ID:082991 and ID:446292. Eject Player ID:022” suddenly I felt a sharp pain throughout my body, this sensation is like when you touch something really cold and it hurts but it feels like you’re being poured with concrete. I started to lose my consciousness I looked over to Eleanor and it seems that she’s trying to use the pad to release the command but she did not understand how to operate the pad. I smiled at her for one last time and then I could see that she is tearing up…
“Vitals are fine. Heartbeat is stabilizing. Subject has regained consciousness.”
“Uhh what was that?” I Looked around and I found the staffs of RATH around the director greeted me and he gave me a glass of cold water.
“Good job, How was Eleanor?”
“It was different, She is just like a human being. Anyways, why did you erase my memories back there?”
“Well we have our security reasons and we need to ensure that no sensitive information is leaked”
I looked at Kikouka and stared at him
“Well when can I go back there?”
“hmm, this is quite complicated. The reason why we use the system to manually eject you is because we there’s been a problem with the main translation machine, so you’re gonna need to wait for a while”
I will definitely return to forget-me-not.
The End