The two archmages knelt down and removed their outer robes which covered their heads and placed it on most parts of the other archmages who had fainted. "Wow! This is the first time anyone from the kingdom except the royal family has seen the faces of any of the archmages." said a random man in the hall. "Yes, I heard the king doesn't want anyone to see his archmages. I don't know the reason for that though" said another random man. They found out that one of the archmages was male and one, female. The archmages closed their eyes, stretched their hands above the fainted ones and wiggled their fingers. Immediately, a speck of golden light flickered towards the fainted archmages and the light slowly diminished. They opened their eyes with fear and started shaking.
"What happened? What's wrong? Are they going to be okay?" asked Princess Elizabeth. "Yes they will, princess, they're just unconscious" said the male archmage. "Yes they are unconscious but you know that's not all there is to it, Peter" said the female archmage. "Even if we tell them everything, they can't do anything about it, Rachel ". said Peter. "What is it? I order you to tell us everything" said the king. "Okay then but you have to dismiss everyone, including your soldiers and children" said Peter.
King John XII got up from his throne and faced the people who are still in shock about what happened. "A lot of things just happened in this hall which we can neither explain nor apprehend but I, the king of this Kingdom will not stop until this new evil has been destroyed. I apologize for the shock, fear and panic inculcated in you today and I promise that those whose family members were killed will receive a life long compensation from the palace. May the gods be with you. You may take your leave" said the king. Everyone, one by one turned to the door and left without saying a word.
When they had all left, the king turned to Peter and Rachel. "Okay, now tell us, what's going on?" he asked. "Okay! When we wiggled our fingers, we didn't just figure out what happened to them, we also saw how we can rescue them and a shocking vision" said Rachel. "A shocking vision? Let it not be what I'm thinking" said Queen Ann. "So tell us everything then" said Prince Stanley. "Okay we have already explained what happened to them. Now, how can we rescue them? We can rescue them by getting the stones back from Rrond or we recreate the stones from scratch!" Peter explained. "Yes, let's recreate the stones! It's better than to go after that disaster of a person called Rrond." said Princess Elizabeth. "I'm afraid that's not as easy as you think it is." said Rachel. "Why did you say that?" asked Queen Ann. "Well, to recreate the stones from scratch, we have to travel to the five dark realms to get the minor ingredients and the three realms of light for the major ingredients and trust me, I'd rather travel to the dark realm than to the light realm." Peter explained. "Why would you say that? Isn't the light realm ought to be easier?" asked the chief advisor of the king. "The light realm has a rule of no killing, you have to bargain for everything. If you must fight, the opponent must surrender, kill and you shall be erased forever, whereas in the dark realm, killing is allowed and trust me when I say this, opponents in the light realm are far more powerful than the opponents in the dark realm." Peter explained carefully.
"So, what about the second option, to chase after Rrond?" asked King John XII. "Well, that is a better option and yes, Rrond is...." Rachel said before she was interrupted by a sharp scream which came from the back of the dining hall. Mariah came into the hall, screaming with her hands on her head. She bowed down to the King "My King.....Your Majesty..... It's..... It's....." said Mariah with a shaky voice. "Speak Woman!" shouted King John XII. "Your majesty..... it's... it's..... it's Sir Rrond" said Mariah. "What are you talking about, Mariah?" asked Queen Ann. "I found Rrond dead outside the hall. I didn't do anything. I was just going to get water from the well and I saw him dead with no face." said the scared Mariah. "How dare you come to my presence with lies!" shouted King John XII. "I'm afraid she's telling the truth" said Peter. "What do you mean?" asked Queen Ann. "I mean we all saw Rrond practicing magic and how well he used it. Even used it to take the most precious things in the kingdom. So, what do you mean Mariah is telling the truth, that he's dead?" asked the curious chief advisor of the king. "That man wasn't Rrond. It was a demon named Neizuan. It is also known as the demon of shape shifting and to shape shift to a particular person, he must steal his face first. That was what we wanted to tell you before Mariah interrupted." Rachel explained. "Oh that makes sense. So, what do we do about the retrieval of the stones?" asked the king.
"A team of at least five mages will be have to embark on a quest for the retrieval of the stones. According to our vision, Neizuan has already kept the stones on different places which I can't explain now for his main purpose" said Rachel. "And what is that?" asked Queen Ann. "He wants to absorb all the magic in the stones and then become the most powerful demon in the entire 12 realms." Peter explained. "Wow, that's a lot of information to put up. Hey but how is this possible? They're only two of you remaining" asked the bothered Princess Elizabeth. "No we are not, only the mages who gain their magic from the stones are unconscious. The others are okay." said Rachel. "Well, that means you two have to go and find three other mages to join you in this quest." said King John XII. "I can't go. My magic is not good enough for this quest. We need mages who specialise in Elementary magic, Nature magic, sound magic, conjuring magic and Healing magic but I am more of a teleportation/transportation mage. And lest I forget, we have just two months to retrieve the stones and put them in their chambers or else the kingdom will turn to dust along with the people living in it." said Rachel. "Peter is an elemental mage, right?" asked Prince Stanley. "Yes he is. So he will go and search for other worthy mages and I guess I'll be here taking care of the other arch mages." said Rachel.
"Kneel down Peter" the king ordered and Peter did as he was told. The king stretched forth his sword and patted him on his head with it and gave him his blessings. "You will go with your team and come back good and healthy" the king prayed. Peter hugged Rachel "I will be back" said Peter. "Please don't die" said Rachel and waved Peter goodbye. Peter set up with a bag and buckled his sandals and left the palace. To