[Jaykobell]

Joshua's heart tightened as Adair spread the book open, the familiar sound of old paper piping up. The pages were old, but the magic surrounding the book was probably what kept it from crumbling to pieces of shredded paper.

Joshua's hopes for Adair being able to read it were slim. He crossed his arms and stared carefully at the captain, whom was starting to focus on the pages of the book and the runes written inside. He could feel Meryl getting tense and a little insecure, yet the sister remained quiet. Just like Joshua, she knew how stubborn and persistent Adair could be. He would only drop the subject if he tried it on his own, and in this case, trying to read the book was the only way.

What went on next happened in silence at first. As Adair opened the book, his eyes started to scroll from left to right as he looked over the runes inside. He did as instructed and focused on trying to understand them in their supposed universal language. It took but a few moments for the book to react to the desire of the reader, letting its runes glow to a soft, magical light. Gradually, Adair's eyes started to overlay with the runes themselves, the magic slowly seeping into his mind to offer a sort of "translator" to the captain's brain. That's the kind of magic that allowed everyone to read the book, regardless of them being recognized by the book or not.

While the first part went well, what happened after went exactly as Joshua had predicted. It didn't take long for Adair's expression to change to something serious and even insecure, as the overlay of the runes over his eyes got thicker and more obvious. Eventually, the light from runes got brighter, and Adair's eyes completely disappeared to give place to the runes he read through. His eyes were opened wide, and at some point, the captain reacted badly to the spell in effect. His first reflex was to push the book away, although his hands hadn't let go of it. His mouth opened into a gaping hole, and while it felt like he was trying to scream and yell, no sound was coming out of Adair's mouth. Only faint noises of pain and surprise were uttered, and it felt like the captain was helpless against the strong and painful magic of the book.

"Adair!" Joshua heard Meryl call out to her brother, but the captain didn't react to the voice. Immediately following that, Joshua quickly stepped forward towards Adair and forcefully snatched the book from the captain's hands.

[Jaykobell]

Taking the book away during the reading gave off the same feeling as someone severing a link. For a split second, there was a force as Adair's hands were obliged to let go of the book, and it felt like a snapping sound had even been heard as the link was broken.

The second the book was snatched away from Adair's hands, the captain's body responded and immediately grabbed its head. Letting out a painful scream, Adair held his head tight in his hands, feeling his mind and soul splitting apart from the inside out. His eyes were burning from the reading, and his soul was screaming in agony as it felt like a mysterious force was trying to rip it apart from this way and that. As the captain experienced the pain, he lost his balance and used the railing of the stairs to keep himself steady, even though he ultimately let himself sit down on the stairs.

"Adair!" Meryl called out again, this time worried and concerned for her brother. A chill ran down her spine when he brother started to scream in pain, and the moment the pain was starting to die down, the sister held her brother in her arms. She kept a strong hold on him, providing him support as she turned to Joshua, although she didn't say anything. Adair had been fairly warned, yet he'd gone through with the experience; the young pirate wasn't to blame for what had happened.

"I warned you," Joshua reminded the captain, closing the book and immediately canceling the reading spell that had started. "I think this is a fairly surefire way to say you're not meant to read it," the pirate added, the glowing light of the runes slowly diminishing as the book remained closed.

However, to be honest, judging from Adair's reaction, the book had reacted strongly to him. Sedna's pain hadn't been nearly as agonizing as Adair's; at least, from what it sounded like. Sedna had only suffered from a bad headache and from slight disorientation. Adair, however, had screamed out in atrocious pain, and the book had obviously hurt him more than the female pirate.

[Jaykobell]

It took a few more minutes for the captain to recover from the mental damage of the book. Meryl stayed close to him, quiet, only giving him some support as Adair rubbed his head and gritted his teeth with pain.

Joshua just sighed quietly, already used to the failed reading attempts from the people who'd tried before Adair. Although, the pirate had to admit Adair's reaction had surprised him. "What did it feel like?" he asked the captain, now that the other seemed lucid enough again to answer and think. Sedna's reaction hadn't been anywhere near that level of pain, so it was curious to have seen Adair suffer so much damage.

Adair sighed deeply and slowly, letting one hand drop limply from his head. He grumbled a little as he tried to find words to describe the pain. "Well, painful, for one," the captain answered first, finally opening his eyes again, although only slightly. "It wasn't just my head... I felt like it was literally my mind itself that was getting split apart. It felt like those runes were pulling this way and that at my mind," Adair explained, the memory of the event already sending chills down his spine at the thought of it. "Honestly, I didn't think it would hurt that badly."

"To be honest, Sedna's reaction wasn't nearly as strong as yours," Joshua admitted, although it wasn't like he was the one picking just how powerful and painful the spell would be on everyone. It was the natural chemistry between the book and the reader that determined just how painful or bearable the reading would be. "It hurts even me when I read it, but the pain isn't anything I can't handle." Still, that was a reason why he couldn't read too much of it too often.

Adair blinked at the mention of the other female pirate. "Speaking of Sedna, where is she? It's awfully quiet," he questioned, the last comment given with a small grin.

[Jaykobell]

With Adair pointing out where Sedna was, Joshua suddenly remembered why he'd been looking for the captain in the first place. "She's getting ready," the pirate answered, and although he was going to continue his sentence, he was cut short before he could go on.

"Getting ready for what?" Meryl piped up, unknowingly cutting off the quieter pirate, as she still remained by her brother's side. "It's so unusual you see you two apart," she added, knowing how close the two were, despite them being complete opposites in every sense of the term.

"I wanted to speak to you," Joshua added, turned towards Adair and not bothering to say anything about Meryl's comment. It was a fact that they were rarely seen apart, but he really didn't have much to say about it, regardless. "I read a bit more of the book earlier, and I have a destination in mind."

"Oh, did you? Do you?" Adair asked, crossing his arms and crossing his legs casually, now that the majority of the pain had left. "Where are you thinking of? And what kind of treasure are we going to find there?"

Joshua sighed as he mustered the courage to say the name of the place in question. "The book is hinting at... Idalani Falls," he said hesitantly, grumbling a little to himself. "But it doesn't refer to any particular loot or treasure."

"Idalani Falls," Meryl echoed thoughtfully, putting a finger to her chin. "Isn't that the place where they say lovers tend to gather?" she asked, and Joshua's sudden change in expression tipped her off that she was right.

"There's that, but they say the place in itself is a beauty," Adair added, nodding slowly as he imagined the place, although he'd never gone himself. "So, Idalani, right? I don't know how far we are, but let's make that our destination!" With that, the captain awkwardly pushed himself up, with his sister giving some balance so he could keep steady on his feet.

With the two siblings heading for the upper deck and the ship wheel to change directions and head towards their destination, Joshua sighed again. He would have to steel himself for what was to come, and he wasn't sure if this trip alone would be enough time.

[Jaykobell]

It didn't take too long for the small pirate group to reach its destination. A few days of sailing and good wind, and soon enough the small boat made its way through the region of Idalani Falls.

As the boat slowly parked in, falls and clear water were all around, with blue skies and a wonderful feeling of beauty. Tints of rainbows could be seen all over the sky, and overall, the place was almost looking like a natural paradise. Animals could be seen as well, happily bouncing and relaxing around the plains of the Falls. The place looked untainted, beautiful, and actually prone to nice treasures, considering its beauty. Perhaps jewels or gold were hidden behind the waterfalls, or maybe an ancient artifact that kept the Falls at peace?

Regardless, while finding loot was one of the important things they had to do, the group had mostly stopped here because of the book's riddle. Something could be found here, so whether it was treasure or something else, it wouldn't be a waste of time.

When they reached the shore, the idea was for Joshua and Sedna to explore together, while Adair and Meryl would do the same in a different area of the Falls. However, when they got there, Adair complained about a bad migraine and how he preferred not to go. Ever since he'd tried to read the book, the captain suffered from headaches that ranged from mild to extremely painful. It was one of those days when it was bad enough that Adair was almost seeing double, so the three others judged it fair for the captain to stay on the ship.

While Meryl had insisted to stay by his side, her brother insisted otherwise and told her to just go and enjoy the scenery. They were exploring a peaceful, beautiful place for once, so it wouldn't be fair to keep his sister grounded on the boat with him.

In the end, after a short bit of argument, the two agreed and Adair stayed on the boat while Meryl would go out and explore. It was organized in such a way that Joshua and Sedna would still explore together, while Meryl would check out the place on her own. While she objected at first, since she wasn't as battle-oriented as the others should anything happen, she was convinced when her partners mentioned the nature of the Falls. Considering this was a popular love-finding spot, there probably wasn't a lot of malicious or terrifying creatures.

[Jaykobell]

That was all nice and dandy, but once she found herself alone, Meryl did wonder what she was going to do.

The idea to have her explore on her own had stricken her as strange from the beginning. Apparently, Joshua had had the idea of having two pairs explore the Falls, and so, Meryl and Adair were supposed to be exploring together. Obviously, that wasn't the case, since the captain was stuck on his ship. Why, then, hadn't the three pirates stayed together instead of splitting up? Since Meryl was an elementalist — albeit a weak one, to be honest — Joshua argued that she would be fine on her own. When she did think about it, she figured that this place did look too peaceful to have any malicious creatures roaming around. Still, Meryl wasn't the strongest fighter around, so even a small creature could probably overpower her. It was an embarrassing thing to say, especially considering how powerful her brother was compared to her.

What was more embarrassing was the fact that, apparently, Meryl was stronger than her brother. In theory, her raw power was supposedly on a completely different level from his, leaving the gap between the two siblings incredibly large. Now that she was alone, those memories came back to her: when her and Adair weren't living on this part of earth, but rather in a strange, unique community that had a place of its very own.

The two siblings had the same father, but different mothers — and neither Adair nor Meryl had met their respective parents. They had been born seemingly as orphans, and they had been raised as such by their community. However, the said "community" was more like a clan, or even a cult, of its own that had made its home on a strange floating island high above the ground. It was a clan strictly of elementalists, where they born, raised and trained to become masters of their assigned element.

Of course, as nice as it sounded, the memories sent shivers running down her spine.

[Jaykobell]

To a human, it sounded like a magical place. By using crystals filled with powerful energy, elementalists could use them to expand their elemental abilities. Regardless of the crystals, humans weren't born with such abilities, and that was where elementalists differed from normal humans. The elements could still be used without drawing power from the crystals, but they were significantly weaker and quite often couldn't be used for very long.

There was also something else. Normally, an elementalist was born with a single element: ice, water, fire, air, ground, or grass. While a few elementalists could be born with maybe two elements, they were few and far between. This was where Adair and Meryl were so special, and also so different from the regular elementalists: they had been born with the ability to use every single element possible. That was why both siblings wore the rainbow necklaces around their necks. Considering they could draw from any element, they required a crystal for each one, and not only for one particular power. Supposedly a blessing from their father, what looked like an advantage at first glance turned out to be a terrible curse for both siblings.

When both siblings grew to a reasonable age for training, both Adair and Meryl were subjected to harsh training sessions that were beyond the level of the other elementalists. They would train harder, train longer, and most of all, the teachers were merciless. Mistakes were not allowed, and it was imperative for both siblings to expand and master their unique ability to its maximum.

While Adair had adapted fairly well to the hard training sessions, Meryl had gotten the short end of the stick. Gentler than her brother and far from being as assertive, it didn't take long for the teachers to break the little girl's heart and mind, especially considering her drills were even harder than what her brother had to do. Despite her brother's support, the sister was unwilling to continue with the training, incapable of growing and learning fast enough for the higher-ups to please them.

As a form of retaliation, Meryl had forced her powers to remain locked up and dormant within her. No matter how hard they would hit her or try to train her, the girl refused to try the drills and to develop her abilities.

[Jaykobell]

After that fateful decision, things went downhill in a matter of seconds. Although it had lasted months and years, the ultimate result had come and happened in what had felt like mere heartbeats.

There came a point when even though Meryl would try to use her magic to stop the higher-ups from hurting her, she couldn't force anything to happen. Despite focusing on twisting water, growing plants, or creating fire, the elementalist became unable to pull off anything. While she could still summon elements now and again, it had become mostly sporadic, and when summoned, the elements were surprisingly weak. It quickly became a problem with the higher-ups as they became incapable of figuring out what had happened. Why was it that an elementalist with so much raw power had suddenly become weaker than a regular human with no abilities whatsoever?

The original idea had been for the adults to stop trying to train her, and to let her live her life as she wanted. However, the plan quickly turned sour as Adair got just as curious as the higher-ups about Meryl's condition. He'd requested talks, meetings, explanations from the higher-ups; why his sister was being treated so harshly, and why her powers had suddenly started disappearing. Meryl wasn't there to hear the conversation herself, so all she knew was based on what Adair had told her.

Apparently, the higher-ups had seen her "condition" as a form of rebellion, although they didn't know how she was doing it. They threatened that if the elementalist didn't unlock her abilities, consequences would ensue, and they could no longer guarantee that Meryl would be safe. They'd explained just how much potential and raw power she had, even compared with her half-brother, and how they, of course, wanted to exploit it. If they couldn't get the girl to released her powers again, they were ready to use unconventional methods to force her to do just that.

[Jaykobell]

Despite its amazing and curious front, the elementalist island was far from being a paradise.

From birth, both boys and girls were carefully observed and watched in order to spot their very first attempt at handling their element. For some, it took years to develop and realize; while for others, it came naturally, such as breathing tiny sparks of fire, or giving off static shocks of electricity. From that point on, the caregivers — whether they were the parents, family members, or just assigned adults — would shape the elementalist to match their elements. The concept was that the element would be powered up by the user's affinity with it, or in other words, depending on their personality.

Fire users were usually more hot-headed and boastful. They tended to be more reckless and hyperactive than the others, and the ones most prone to accidents. Earth users were somewhat similar, although they were more logical, rational, and level-headed, despite their increased display in emotions. Air was usually for quirky individuals, the ones with a strange, yet likable and familiar personality, which adapted to the gentle or strong currents of the wind. Water users were usually calmer, quieter, and more gentle than the other elements. They were often the most level-headed of the elementalists, capable of twisting something as powerful as water with a single flick of their finger. Finally, ice users were typical cold and distant, showing very little emotions and keeping to themselves. They were the hardest ones to befriend, considering how hardened and uncaring they had to be for their element to bloom.

While somewhat logical and understandable in theory, those values proved to do extremely poorly in practice. Gentle fire users were motivated and forced to grow interests in everything, to become active and rambunctious. Social ice users were torn apart emotionally, forced to grow distant towards their own feelings as they cared only for themselves and gave up on feeling any kind of emotion. Energetic water users were constantly being put down to become more controlled and level-headed in order to be able to focus on controlling such a powerful element of nature.

It was a concept made to destroy one's sense of personality and being, to replace it with pre-determined criteria and ideas.

[Jaykobell]

Since Meryl and Adair had been born with all the elements, the higher-ups had been unable to force and mold them into a particular personality. It was necessary for all the elements to have a matching personality quirk, meaning that they couldn't afford to let the kids grow up into one set personality, either. Both siblings had been a rather peculiar experiment for the leading elementalists.

It was when they threatened to force Meryl into a comatose-like state that Adair took the rash decision to leave. While they could mold children fairly easily, it was increasingly harder with young teenagers and young adults. For those extreme cases, the leaders did have unconventional means of turning the elementalist's mind to a blank, ultimately turning them into an empty vessel for the elements to bloom. It was the destruction of an individual in its purest form: a destruction that often resulted in the affected elementalist to be unable to gain their personality back.

Refusing to see his sister go through such an inhuman experience, the brother had insisted that they escape. With Adair developing a stronger niche in air, he'd learned to create thick, solid wings made out of air from a young age. When he told Meryl about what was awaiting her, the sister initial reaction was to agree and leave.

The question was, where would they go? Born and raised with the elementalists, they would have to fend for themselves; worry about food, shelter, weather, and everything else. They were all things that the leaders provided for the young learning elementalists, but if they escaped, those given things would become worries. Who would they turn to? They had no family, no friends, no resources. At first, Meryl had insisted that they stay there, stay with familiar faces, and that she would do her best to cooperate from then on. Regardless of her promises and ideas, Adair refused to hear any of them, instead only planning for the escape. If his sister didn't want to leave, then he would force her to do so: for her own sake.

[Jaykobell]

It took only a bit of convincing to get Meryl to agree with Adair's idea to escape. After the initial threat, Meryl's training sessions had gotten inhumanly brutal, driving the girl to the brink of a mental breakdown. While the force had managed to bring out a certain amount of her inner abilities back from Meryl's self-inflicted lock, they were still nowhere near as stable or powerful as they wanted them to be. Unable to bear with the pain, Meryl agreed to leave the island and the torture behind.

The history between the normal humans and the elementalists was an interesting and peculiar one. After facing a near-fatal flood ages, centuries, millennia ago, most of earth had become flooded, and the amount of water had far surpassed the amount of habitable territory. While it was far from being as chaotic and post-apocalyptic as it sounded, it had become hard to travel without a means to travel over sea.

The humans who desired to stay on firm ground proposed that they use magic to raise the grounded territories up above in the sky, and to keep it afloat with magic. It was a rash and unconventional idea, and most refused to do such a thing. At the time, anyone and everyone could be born what they called elementalists today; such magic abilities weren't uncommon. However, as the more prominent magic users moved to the floating island, the grounded and flooded humans developed and evolved, eventually turning to other means and creations instead of the limited magic they could pull off. With time, magical abilities became unheard of in humans down on earth. While some could still be born with mild abilities, it usually meant that they were of distant elementalist descent. With time, even those basic abilities had disappeared from the genetic codes of humans. Only those who were training passionately in the art up on the floating island could still use the ancient elements  to their liking.

While there was originally discord between the two races, as it were, it eventually died on its own. With the humans keeping to their new creations and discoveries, and with the elementalists doing the same, the two races ultimately drifted apart. Nowadays, it was more intriguing fascinating to meet an elementalist, rather than being upsetting or enraging. At least, they had that going for them when Adair and Meryl decided to leave the floating island behind.

[Jaykobell]

The escape had actually happened without much of a problem, much to the surprise of both siblings. However, the idea of the higher-ups not caring about them enough to chase them down to earth was a rather pleasant feeling. The siblings travelled for a while, facing new creatures and challenges on their own for the very first time. Thanks to Adair's natural abilities, the siblings had managed to reach their very first port town.

There, they gathered information, watched the town folks, observed the culture in front of them. While there, they learned of this thing called a "pirate": a seafaring individual that was either a keeper of peace between towns and oceans, or someone who abused the title to steal and loot villages or poor people. There were traveling pirates whom offered ferries between islands and towns, and others were more traditional, finding an appeal in traveling across oceans, an appeal in adventure and in finding hidden and forgotten treasures.

It didn't take much to convince Adair that this was the path they had to choose in order to survive on earth. By searching for treasure, they would earn loot to sell and to gain money. From there, they could expand and buy a boat and travel across the ocean, find more treasure and build a life of their own. Not only that, traveling constantly would make them harder to find in the horrifying case that the elementalists from the island were looking for them.

Of course, the latter was but a thought in passing. In due time, Adair's gamble and efforts paid off, eventually earning the team a small ship of their own. They went on to defend small towns from more villainous pirates, earning a small name for themselves and meeting allies down the way. It was while helping a town that the siblings met the two traveling pirates Joshua and Sedna, whom had had their boat stolen just a while before their meeting. Hitting it off right from the first meeting, and with the two pairs having similar goals, the small team of two turned into a team of four.

And for a while, everything was going just fine.

[Jaykobell]

Now that they had two friends in this brand new world, Adair and Meryl were having an easier time adapting. Traveling in such a way and being with her brother, neither siblings judged it important to bother developing Meryl's unstable and weaker elemental abilities. They both figured that they would ultimately not be necessary for much, other than fighting off monsters and aggressive creatures during their travels. In such cases, Adair was the one doing the fighting, so the siblings never thought it to be something necessary. Considering all the pain Meryl had gone through to train for said abilities.

It changed when their past literally came back to haunt them.

After a few months of travel, the pirate group was ambushed by a pair of elementalists. First thought to be ruffians and pirates going after a good name by thrashing some good pirates, it turned out to be quite the opposite. They had no interest in earth-related matters or customs: all they wanted was Meryl, in order to bring her back to the island. While they wanted Adair as well, the pair were primarily after the sister and would do without the brother if necessary.

Forced into a corner, the earth and ice elementalists beat Adair to a point where the brother couldn't stand up any more, and used it as an opportunity to kidnap the sister away. Being regular humans, their friends Joshua and Sedna had been incapable of doing much of anything against two elementalists that had been so intensively trained for combat. Almost leaving her brother for dead, Meryl was dragged away from her group and family and forced to stay with the two enemies until they were ready to return to the island.

It was while chained in one of their rooms that Meryl got familiar with the ice elementalist. Since they had very limited space, the two had spent a certain amount of days together, and with nothing better to do, Meryl had engaged in several conversations with him. While the elementalist had refused to answer her the first few times, he eventually decided to humor her and to play along with her game.

Thinking back, it was probably thanks to that that Meryl had been able to escape.

[Jaykobell]

After a few days, it wasn't surprising to see Adair come to rescue his kidnapped sister from the ones who were going to literally send her to her death. At least, her death in terms of individuality and soul.

Adair had never been known as being extremely talented in battle. He was the type to recklessly charge ahead and to hope the enemy would fall from his hits before he fell from theirs. A primitive way of fighting that he never really polished, and which turned against him when he had to fight against an elementalist trained specifically for battle. Anxious to save his sister, knowing what was awaiting her, Adair had decided to challenge the two elementalists again, with the freedom of his sister as the prize. Of course, the same strategy wouldn't work again; fortunately, Adair had the mind of Joshua to help him with strategy and new means of attacks. By controlling multiple elements, Adair was capable of creating effects with them, such as making steam using fire and water together.

By polishing his skills and developing a few set strategies, the brother managed to beat the earth elementalist, although the ice partner still remained. Between the two, they had both agreed that the ice partner was much stronger than his earth friend, to the point where their levels were incomparable.

It was only after thinking back on it that Meryl realized the ice elementalist hadn't fought at his best against her brother. When Adair broke through their place and attacked the ice captor, the elementalist remained on the defensive for the most part, rarely countering Adair's hits. Even the brother had mentioned how he hadn't expected the second elementalist to be that weak and unresponsive, but he was grateful for it. With his sister safe again, the two siblings made it a promise to practice again, considering the pair would probably continue to come after them.

But little did Meryl know that her little conversations with the ice elementalist would actually set doubt into their minds.

[Jaykobell]

Over the last few months, they'd had a few encounters with those rival elementalists that were still going after her. However, the more they met and fought, the more Adair's group noticed a change in both characters. Even if they ended up overpowering Adair or winning a bet between the two teams, they never took on the opportunity to capture Meryl again. They always had an excuse, or they just let Adair land a winning hit. While it wasn't obvious at first, it became increasingly difficult to ignore. While the earth elementalist was snarky and a bit of an irritating character, the ice elementalist grew more and more unwilling to fight them, period. Considering how battle-trained and powerful he was, that had been the most obvious and striking clue.

The more they met, the more the two parties seemed to become friends, rather than staying enemies and developing a hateful relationship.

During those unexpected, strange meetings, Meryl and that ice elementalist had gotten to speak a few times. They had mostly been general statements between the two, and never something personal or private. Maybe only once or twice had they gotten to be together, mostly alone, but the others had remained close by, making it not as personal as it could be.

To be honest, his behavior really fascinated the female elementalist. Especially considering his element, he had been shaped and molded to be cold, uncaring, emotionless, and ready to carry on his mission without feeling remorse or thinking too much about his orders. So why was it him that refused to fight the group? And overall, why had those two elementalists stopped trying to kidnap her?

Back to the present, they were questions Meryl often asked herself when she was alone, with her own mind to talk to. She sometimes found herself daydreaming for a long time, and sometimes spending nights wondering about those two elementalists and what their new goal was.

Perhaps those questions would get answered earlier than she'd initially thought.