4 // History

 

 

"T-The Guardian of Water?" AeMi repeated from where she was still pinned to the ground with a slab of ice. Her eyes flitted back and forth between Yumi and her brother. "But the Guardians disappeared over a hundred years ago!"

 

Youngjae nodded in acknowledgement. "That is true. But perhaps they have returned to protect YoungNan and to restore the land back to its original state." He glanced at his sister with hope. "Our land may finally have the four seasons back!"

 

"Waaah!" came Yumi's voice. She had only just managed to move out of the way after the demon pulled the ice arrow from its eye and had thrown it at her. It was livid with anger.

 

"W H Y !" the demon growled in its demonic voice, causing Yumi to flinch. "W h y  d o  y o u  f i g h t  a g a i n s t  u s, C o m r a d e ! "

 

She stared at it in both shock and disbelief. This thing was calling her a comrade as well. "I am NOT your Comrade, demon!"

 

"T h o s e  w h o  w i e l d  w a t e r  b e l o n g  t o  o u r  M a s t e r ! " the demon growled, before sending spears of ice to rain down upon her.

 

Yumi dismissed those words to worry for later. As for now, she watched in panic as the spears came closer and closer to ending her life. *It's ice, so I should be able to control it, right?* she frantically thought. *But how do I do that?!*

 

Concentrate.

 

It was a voice in her head.

 

Close your eyes and find your inner power.

 

A female voice was telling her what to do. But whose was it?

 

Yumi, concentrate!

 

She quickly closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on using her abilities. *But what should I…? Split the spears! I should split it around me!*

 

A potent power bubbled from within her and spread throughout her entire body, making her fingertips itch with the urge to dispose of the demon once and for all.

 

Youngjae and AeMi observed her in awe as Yumi's whole body disappeared into a bright blue light that burned at their eyes before emerging from it looking like a completely different person. She now wore a wide-sleeved robe of white and different shades of blue that extended down into a dress and was patterned with lines of silver. The dress was split on the two sides from the upper leg down, revealing the white legwear underneath and the light blue and white ancient Korean shoes she wore on her feet. A thick, dark blue ribbon was tied around her waist into a bow at the back, with a matching hair ribbon pulling her black hair up into a high ponytail. From her neck hung a blue, water-drop shaped pendant -- one that was identical to Yumi's family heirloom.

 

She flipped open her blue-coloured eyes and with one word, 'Split!', unleashed her power and manipulated the ice spears into splitting around her. The character on her forehead shone brightly as she did so.

 

Yumi inhaled a deep breath and swung her arms forward with a yell, sending the spears of ice to fly back towards the demon at lightning speed. The ice pierced right through the demon's body and stabbed into the snow on the other side. It screeched in agony.

 

"Who is your Master!" Yumi demanded. "What do you want from me!"

 

"D o n ' t  t h i n k y o u ' v e  w o n  y e t ! " the demon spat without answering her question. "Y o u  w i l l  n e v e r  b e  f r e e  f r o m  o u r  Ma s t e r ! "

 

With that, the demon transformed the snow around her feet into ice and trapped her legs to the ground. It used the last of its energy to spring up towards her, getting its claws ready to swing at her.

 

"YUMI!"

 

An orange bolt of energy suddenly flew through the air and punctured the demon's head, before transforming back into a katana while it was still wedged in between its flesh. With the fatal blow inflicted, the demon slowly disintegrated into dust before it disappeared into nothing.

 

The ice trapping Yumi to the ground returned to its original state of snow and released her legs, allowing her knees to crumple into the snow as they gave way to the shock of the near-death experience. Her hand clutched at her chest as she breathed heavily, and unintentionally brushed against the pendent. She glanced down at it and recognised it as the one that she had been looking for.

 

*This! It's my pendant!*

 

Daehyun was supporting his body with one hand in the snow and was clutching the wound in his abdomen with the other. It was bleeding like a waterfall now from the strain of throwing the katana. The ice trapping the two siblings to the ground also disintegrated into snow and allowed them to quickly run over to Daehyun. He had rolled over onto his back and lost consciousness. He was in a grave condition.

 

"Daehyun!"

 

Youngjae ripped open the part of the clothing over his wound and shook his head at the sight of it. The cut was deep and looked gruesome.

 

Yumi got up and rushed over to his side. "Oh my god, Daehyun… W-What should we--"

 

"We need to stop the bleeding!" Youngjae immediately answered. "We have to get him back to the house, but first we need to stop the bleeding!"

 

Yumi suddenly got an idea. She had no idea what else she could do except for this. Carefully reaching her hands forward and resting them on the wound, she closed her eyes and prayed for whatever she was going to do to work. A blue light glowed from her hands for a few moments before it disappeared.

 

When she removed her hands from the wound, the three saw that it was now being covered by a spread of ice that effectively stopped the bleeding.

 

"A-Amazing, Yumi," AeMi breathed. "It worked!"

 

Youngjae crouched down with his back towards where Daehyun was. "Help me get him onto my back. We have to get back and treat him."

 

AeMi quickly did as told, and the two siblings hurried back to the village as soon as that was done. Yumi remembered that Daehyun's katana was still lying in the snow and went to retrieve it before going after them.

 

 

~~~

 

 

"I think your ice has healing properties," Youngjae remarked after he had treated Daehyun and had left him to rest in his room in a stable condition. "The wound had already closed up a bit by the time I removed the ice."

 

"Really?" Yumi marvelled from where she was seated in front of the low table in the living room with a warm cup of tea in her hands. She was still in her transformed appearance.

 

AeMi rested her face in her hands and leaned forward to look at her. "You're amazing, Yumi. How did you learn to control your powers in such a short amount of time?"

 

Yumi placed her cup on the table and kept her gaze on her hands. "There was a voice in my head telling me what to do."

 

"A voice?! Who was it?"

 

She shook her head. "I don't know, but it was the voice of a female. And after everything was over, she said something strange to me."

 

The siblings remained quiet in anticipation.

 

"The voice said: Fire, Earth, Wind, and Water. Find the other three, and together you can restore this land to what it was once before."

 

Youngjae and AeMi exchanged knowing glances as they heard this.

 

"Yumi, there's no mistaking it," Youngjae began. "You are one of th---"

 

He was cut off by the door to the living room suddenly sliding open to reveal an elegant middle-aged woman dressed in dark red. Her eyes immediately flitted over to Yumi's transformed appearance.

 

"S-She… She's one of the Guardians!" the woman announced in astonishment.

 

Yumi blinked. "Me?"

 

"Mother, you're back!" the siblings smiled, as they got up to greet her.

 

A middle-aged man dressed in dark blue appeared at the doorway. "And what about me?"

 

"Father!"

 

Yumi watched the heart-warming family reunion and started thinking about her own family, which consisted of her one and only little brother.

 

*Junhong…* she thought sadly.

 

"Mother and Father were gone for so long that we were starting to get worried!" AeMi wailed.

 

Her father patted her head. "Sorry AeMi, but there was a great number of ill people across the villages this time. But putting that aside for now…"

 

The room went quiet as every single person directed their attention towards the girl clad in blue and white. Yumi quickly bowed.

 

"It's nice to meet you Sir and Madam. I'm Choi Yumi."

 

"And you are the Guardian of Water, I presume?" Sir Yoo asked.

 

"I-I don’t---"

 

"She has yet to find out about her identity," Youngjae explained. "Yumi came here from another world."

 

"Another world? Oh my!" Madam Yoo gasped. "And where's Daehyun?"

 

"I'm right here," a voice wheezed.

 

The group turned around to see Daehyun holding himself up at the door. It was obvious that he had not regained his health in such a short amount of time.

 

"Daehyun, you have to rest!" Youngjae scolded. "What are you doing moving around like that? Here, I'll take you back to your room--"

 

"No."

 

The stubborn demon-slayer refused to return to his room and slowly fumbled his way to the low-table across from Yumi. "I'll have explanations first. Then I'll rest."

 

 

~~~

 

 

"We have to take more precautions," Sir Yoo was saying after the siblings had explained everything to him regarding the occurrences during his absence. "The demons have a target now, and that's Yumi, the Guardian of Water."

 

Yumi was still having a hard time trying to get over that fact that she was a long-lost Guardian, seeing as how only yesterday she was just a normal girl back in her own world. And why was she a Guardian? Why was she, someone who was from another world, one of the four Guardians of this land? It just didn't make any sense.

 

She found herself looking over at Daehyun, who was hanging his head with a somewhat guilty expression on his face.

 

*He's probably feeling apologetic for accusing me of being a demon* she thought to herself. Her attention went to where he was clutching onto his wound, and she felt herself soften. The man had already saved her countless times, and they had only just met each other yesterday. Technically, he had gotten injured for her sake too.

 

"What exactly is a Guardian?" Yumi asked. "And how did they disappear in the first place?"

 

The Yoo family took it upon themselves to explain the land's history.

 

As long ago as the history books went, the land of the Three Terrains existed. The land was surrounded by the oceans and was split into three individual countries -- KangRang of the North-West, YuNan of the South-West, and YoungNan of the East. Of these three countries, YoungNan was the largest and most resplendent nation.

 

The country flourished with everything from mining to cultivation and was a wealthy and powerful nation. It was home to the colossal Snow Mountain -- a mystical mountain that was always covered with snow and was the origin of the great Snowy River that extended across the entire country. The river never froze, never flooded, never disappeared, and never failed to provide the people of YoungNan with a fresh source of water. Thus, YoungNan was known throughout the Three Terrains as the Land of the Mystical Snow Mountain.

 

Here, the existence of the Guardians was to restore the equilibrium between the seasons that have become imbalanced by the mystical Snow Mountain. Each of the four Guardians were blessed with the power to control one of the four elements in order to protect the land. On the first full moon of every year, the four gather together in the Snow Mountain to pray for the land's peace and to bring balance to the seasons. Once a Guardian dies, his or her status as a Guardian is immediately passed on to another worthy individual within the land.

 

However, this cycle was broken for the first time more than a hundred years ago. During one of the prayer ceremonies at the time, the Guardian of Water suddenly disappeared and her status not passed on, leading the people of the land to think that she was still alive. However, when the years went by and the other Guardians passed away one by one, their statuses were also not passed on and they were lost forever. With each Guardian that died, the snowy season seemed to last for a longer period of time until finally, only the snowy season remained. The last of the four protectors, the Guardian of Fire, passed away exactly a hundred years ago, and that was when the country's everlasting snowy season began. The Guardian of Water that had vanished was never found.

 

Soon after this the demons started appearing, and many of them were able to control water whilst a few were also powerful enough to control ice. With the Guardians lost and the land's sense of security gone along with them, many lives were succumbed to the carnage that followed. The wealthy fled to the bordering nations, leaving the poor to fend for themselves, while the spellcasters took it upon themselves to protect the living.

 

"But now, now we can restore our land back to what it used to be," Youngjae announced. "Your appearance, Yumi, must mean that the Guardians have returned and can protect our country once again."

 

"I-I… w-we can?" Yumi stuttered.

 

"Yes," he answered definitely. "With the Four Guardians together, we can be saved."

 

"Together?" she repeated. "Then, what are we supposed to do now?"

 

Five pairs of eyes stared at her.

 

"We find the other three Guardians."

 

 

 

 

 

---

 

Here's another update for this week :D

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--- Mistlea