Athena: The Song of War

In the valley between the vast Exile Desert and the great Oracle Peak, north of the Kingdom of Basilica, two armies faced each other under constant rain, amidst mud mixed with blood. The battlefield was a hell of mud, blood, and fire. Weeks of incessant rain did not ease the heat of the war but only served to enhance the power of the enemy mages, who cast furious lightning that tore through the gray sky. The heavy humidity made the air almost unbreathable, and the waterlogged earth mixed with the blood of the fallen, creating treacherous ground that weighed down boots and drained the hopes of the combatants.

The Elsenorian cavalry, in a desperate charge, had broken through the Basilica shield walls. Now, brutal and relentless hand-to-hand combat unfolded. Swords clashed against armor, spears pierced shields, and cries of pain and fury echoed through the valley.

In the midst of this chaos, Athena, the crowned queen of the Kingdom of Basilica, found herself surrounded by knights of the Empire of Elsinore and paladins of the Order of the Sacred Light. With mud up to her knees and the iron scent of blood filling her nostrils, the aura of the first knight shone with an intense red flame, revealing his power and bloodlust. Sensing his intent to take her life, Athena advanced, dodging the mud that tried to trap her movements. With a horizontal strike to the left flank, she pierced the enemy's armor, who roared in pain.

The fight was far from over. A cold sensation ran down the base of her spine, alerting her to imminent danger behind her. Using the firmness of her stance, she turned, blocking a deadly thrust with her blade. In a fluid motion, her sword found the throat of the second adversary, killing him in one stroke.

The Valkyries, fearsome mercenaries who fought for Athena, with a heart impaled by a spear emblazoned on their armor, faced wave after wave of imperial soldiers without faltering. Lobana, the captain of the Valkyries, an ebony woman of pure muscle wielding a great sword, struck down enemies as often as she was struck, smiling as the heads of imperial soldiers rolled in the mud.

Thirty meters from Lobana, Serien, the first princess of Basilica, focused on healing Lobana and other reckless soldiers and mercenaries. Her long black hair dripped with rain, sweat, and blood that splashed on her when Sahari killed anyone who dared get too close.

With the same ferocity as her captain, Kaizer, the half-giant, obliterated imperial soldiers with her two maces, while Hale, the werewolf, with her gray fur stained with blood, tore into enemy flesh with her sharp claws.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield, in the imperial camp, the empire's strongest knights watched the battle attentively. These knights belonged to an order directly answering to the emperor, known as The Emperor's Twelve Swords.

Among them, Samy, a halfling and the fifth sword, sighed in dismay.

— We're screwed...

— Why do you say that, sir? — asked Veta, the eighth sword. She was the youngest among the twelve, only 15 years old, with round rosy cheeks and big brown eyes.

Samy looked at his subordinate with his large blue eyes and let his tail drop in discouragement as he sighed again.

— This war is going nowhere for the Empire, young Veta. We shouldn't be attacking Basilica now, and I warned the emperor about it. — Samy turned his eyes to Athena, whom he had met shortly before in the imperial capital. He knew the queen's strength. — One shouldn't attack a lion that is strong and well-fed. Athena hasn't used any of her true power yet.

— But you can defeat her, right?

— I can, but defeating Athena isn't winning the war. Athena's nymph, the Anemus, has yet to grace us with her presence on the battlefield. Lobana is keeping some of her Valkyries in reserve, and something seems off...

— You're right, Samy — said Arion, a tall man with strong features and the emperor's first sword. — We are at a disadvantage. Our army is large, but it lacks quality. Athena beats us in quality. This was certainly not the right time to start a war against Basilica. Not when we are in a near war with Draconia.

Samy sighed heavily, letting his furry ears droop back like a cornered animal.

— I knew Evana and that idiot bishop were fools, but I didn't know it was chronic idiocy!

Hearing these words, Helena, a beautiful woman with a volatile temper, glared at Samy as she reached for the hilt of her sword.

— How dare you speak of the emperor that way?!

Samy looked at Helena with icy eyes, but before he could say anything, the ground shook in an explosion that scattered the corpses of soldiers from both armies in all directions.

— Enough. I'm tired of this — said Athena in an almost divine voice as she emitted a powerful aura that even changed the weather.

Samy's eyes sparkled and a broad smile formed on his small childlike face.

— The empire is screwed. — The small knight jumped off his horse and started to walk away. — I'm going to see if Draconia will let me open a shop there...

Weeks later, the battle that would change the topography and geography of the continent took place and the war ended, but this is a story about an unknown future, and to understand how it all began, we will go back twenty years.

The year is 3005 in the Era of Dragons, and the night sky was streaked with thousands of shooting stars raining down on the world. For some, this phenomenon was a sign of good luck, for others a sign of happiness or even the fulfillment of wishes. But only a small group of ancient sages in the Fortress of Wisdom, atop the Oracle Peak, understood what those stars were.

— How long has it been since the last arrival? — asked Yranda, the youngest of the elders, as she opened a thick book that kept all sorts of records.

— It has been just over thirty years — replied Uttae, with an ancient and weary voice.

— Will these be good or bad? — Ojan asked with a wrinkled and empty smile.

This question caught the attention of Tarcio, the oldest of the elders.

— As always, old friend, we hope they will be good. Although we know the truth.

— It doesn't matter — retorted Sarah from her rocking chair, staring at nothing with her white, blind eyes. — Our job is to report what we saw. Where are the stars falling?

— The majority are falling in the old world — replied Yranda, watching the stars through her telescope. — Five will fall in the south... Exile Desert. Another will fall in the northwest... Ellora perhaps. Finally, two will fall in the southeast... By the way they behave, maybe they are a pair or a couple...

— Alright... Notify Ellora, Elsinore, Basilica, the Empire of Draconia, and Mizhar — ordered Tarcio, with an old tremor in his bearded chin. — We can't make the same mistake we made with the arrival of the Olympians.

— May the old and new gods have mercy on us...

Meanwhile, in Basilica, in the king's quarters, Artios and Kalmir looked beyond the King's Forest, where they could sense a powerful magical force emerging.

— My king, that direction...

Artios squinted his eyes full of concern. Until then, due to the storm, he had been prevented from leaving the castle at the request of his beloved second queen, but now there was no more storm.

— Have the horses prepared, Kalmir. We are going to the White Palace.

Kalmir did not question his king. This was a situation where the king commanded and he, as the king's right-hand man, obeyed. After a brief bow to the king, he left to carry out his orders.

The distance between the Royal Palace and the White Palace was just over a kilometer and passed through the King's Forest and the Queen's Garden. It was a safe path for a monarch to travel alone, especially when the monarch in question was Artios.

However, he did not know what that magical power coming from the White Palace was. His second queen was a strong woman with excellent magical affinity, but that power was not hers. The king needed to be sure of what it was and, if it was a threat, he had to be prepared to combat and destroy it.

With everything ready to leave and face any threat, Artios left the palace walls behind. Along with him, Kalmir and fifty other knights of the Order of the Black Lion, the kingdom's strongest knights who answered directly to the king.

Leading the procession, the king did not spare his horse, forcing the animal to run at full speed on the muddy terrain of the road drenched by the storm that had been occurring for less than thirty minutes.

The king's armed procession crossed the dark forest quickly and, passing by the palace of the first queen, he did not consider stopping for a second. Not that he wasn't worried about her well-being; he was. Both the first queen, Helena, and the second queen were in labor that night and both were important to him. But the urgency was at the White Palace.

Neither the king nor anyone else had ever seen or felt so much magical power before. In the distance, as they passed through the Queen's Garden, now completely ruined by the storm, they could see the White Palace shining in the light of the stars and moons, but they could only feel chills and fear seeing that subtly bluish sheet of mana covering part of the place.

The men gritted their teeth and tightened their grips on their reins, urging their sturdy animals to run faster. After several more minutes of relentless riding, with the horses panting heavily beneath them, the fifty-two men reached the courtyard of the White Palace. They quickly dismounted and stormed the place with swords drawn and hearts pounding.

Artios's sole objective was Karina, who was in the process of giving birth to the couple's first child. Despite the chill running down his spine from the power enveloping the palace, the monarch was focused solely on the safety of his wife and child.

Determined to destroy any threat that might befall his beloved and their newborn, the king and his knights crossed the entrance hall, staining the white floor with mud, and hurried up the stairs with urgent strides.

After navigating through corridors and climbing more stairs, they encountered a crowd gathered in front of the queen's chamber, from where came the crying that calmed the king's heart.

— My king, this is...

— My child... — The king smiled.

Without hesitation, Artios dropped his sword and pushed his way through the crowd blocking his path to his family. After a few seconds of struggle against the throng, he finally reached the room where he had longed to be all night.

On the large bed, with sheets stained by the proof of a mother's effort, lay a woman with long platinum blonde hair and eyes as green as the verdant plains in spring, holding a child with hair as white as silver.

When the man's and the woman's eyes met, they simply smiled at each other without saying a word. Words were neither necessary nor important at that moment. The man, now neither king nor knight, approached, letting his damp cape fall to the floor, and sat on the bed beside his wife, embracing her.

— You did well — said the king, kissing his wife's hair. — Thank you so much...

— It's a girl — the queen whispered, nestling into her husband's arms while cradling the child.

— What's her name?

The queen was silent for a moment. She wanted a strong name. A name that would be remembered.

— In Odeon, there is a legend about a woman who managed to fight and draw in a battle against Chionothýella. Her name was Athena, the first queen of ice.

— So... Athena? — asked the king with a proud smile, and the queen confirmed. It was a strong name that also carried wisdom. Strength and wisdom were all Artios wished for his children. With his large hand, he held the delicate, small hand of his daughter. — Welcome to the world, Athena.