One Living Life: The Chronicles of CoC: Chapter III - Learning their ways

Thursday 18 June 2015

The Chronicles of CoC: Chapter III - Learning their ways

It was a grand welcome to the village. I was carried by the huge creatures called Giants into the designated square, rather the Army Camp as they called it. It was the venue for my welcome celebration. Barbecues of carrots, chicken, ham and beef were being prepared around the camp fire. Music, chatter, singing and dancing continued amidst the venue.
But, truly speaking, I could not enjoy a bit of it. I had a lot of questions running through my mind. How did they know me? Why were they rejoicing my arrival? What does the prophecy say? Why did she call me 'Chief'?




While a million questions and guesses were running across my mind, the creatures who looked like me rejoiced like savages. They were called the Barbarians. Tearing into the uncooked chicken and fighting over the barbecued beef, they continued their hooligan like dance around the camp fire. The pretty maiden who had first met me was not around for sometime now. Meanwhile, a couple of other maidens came upto me and offered me drinks and food. They sat beside me and were actually pretty cozy. Not that I did'nt like them, but I was more inclined towards that pretty lady in the big hut. By this time, I knew that these creatures referred to the big hut as the Town Hall.

I asked the maiden beside me, "Umm!! Where is she who brought me to your settlement?"

She blushed and replied, "Pretty sure, she is waiting for you at the townhall".

"Can I go?"

"You are our chief and that is your home.", she replied surprisingly.

More questions meant more answers that lead to even more questions. I was about to get up and head towards the town hall when I saw her coming towards me. Ethereal beauty she was. Her light brown hair neatly tucked up just above her right eye, a small purse around her waist, and a yellow piece of cloth just underneath her belt along with the deep & light green gown seemed like a derivation from the mystical forest around. While she was away, I had a lot of questions running but as she approached I became calm.

She held her hand forward and said, "I am Iisa. Sorry, I was away. Had to run a few errands. Come with me... Its my job to show you around. We have just started and all depends upon you to fulfill the prophecy."

"What is this prophecy?", I asked. "And, how did you know me when we met?"

"Everyone knows this prophecy and believes in it. But, no one talks about it. The ancient Devas {read: developers} have written all the scripts which can never go wrong.", she said.

"So, how come anyone else gets to know about this prophecy, if none talks about it.", I asked.

"Patience!!! You will know all about it in time. Patience. That's the key to success in this pristine magical forest", she replied, gesturing me to accompany her.

"But, how did you know me when we first met? At least I should know that", I asked annoyingly.

"Brown Eyes. Just know that you are the only one with those eyes and you happen to be at the center of the prophecy. Never ever ask me about the prophecy again. That's all I can tell you." she said with a stern voice. "Now, let me show you around. You need to learn and know things fast."

"That is our Town Hall, the most important building of our village.", she said pointing at the biggest hut in the center. "All meetings and important decisions regarding our village were made by our maidens here. Now that you are here, we do whatever you decide."

It was silence as we walked across the settlement except the barbarians continuing their hooliganism at the Army Camp. We walked a few feet across the settlement as she kept describing me everything about their village. The mediocre sized huts with dangling shiny metals were the Barracks. It used to train almost all the creatures in the village. The Barbarians, the cutes firing sharp sticks i.e. the Archers, the green creatures called Goblins, the giants and the wall breakers were all who got trained at the barracks. I had actually never seen a wall breaker but Iisa mentioned that they were real stupid creatures responsible for an extremely important job on the battlefield. The pink liquid on which I was surviving in the forest was called Elixir and this village had some real intelligent innovations. They had designed something called the Elixir Collectors which had pipes going down deep into the earth with a suction motor and a filter. It used to suck out elixir and filter it so that our village guys could keep themselves alive without any hassles. The pumped out Elixir was then put into huge glass flasks for storage. Then there were the wooden structures with tunnels which were called the Gold mines and their storage where the mined metal was collected. Every Gold mine had one goblin working at a time in 3 shifts. The black pipes throwing balls were called cannons and mortars, while each of the wooden pedestals with an archer on it was named the Archer Tower.

There was a lot in this small village and it was just the beginning of my learning phase. As we walked across one of the Archer Towers, the cute girl with a bow and arrow slid down the wooden pole with great ease and came towards me, "Heya!! This is Maria and I in fact have been yearning to meet you, ever since I learnt about your arrival. Tower shifts suck... you know. So, the delay. Well, see you again soon.", she winked and ran away while another archer climbed up to take her position.

"Pretty swift they are.. huh!!", I exclaimed.

"All Archers need to be in order to take down our enemies. Agility is one of the most important aspects for them.", Iisa replied.

"So, how long have you been here?", I asked.

"We have been here for generations, waiting for your arrival. And, the prophecy has been passed on to me by my mother, who was passed on by her mother and so on.. So for me, right from birth I have been here.", she raised her eye brow.

"Ohkay, so are there any little or new borns here?? I don't see any.", I wondered.

"The Elixir keeps us alive and it helps us mature right from our birth. We are born mature and that's the magic of the Elixir.", Iisa said.

"Hmmm...", I muttered. Perhaps, I was not born in a muggle world anymore. There was a lot of magic in here.

"But, you on the other hand are not mature yet and need to be protected. Let me show you your room.", she went ahead towards the Townhall while I tried to keep pace and follow her. But, who was to tell her that even I came into this world with fully grown hands and legs and survived in the wild jungle without food for weeks.

The Townhall looked like a hut from outside but inside the space was pretty huge. There was a large hall with a big table decorated with live creepers and flowers on its border. On the center were various sized flasks filled with Elixir to the brim. They were glowing due to some light kept below every flask. The corridor after the hall was pretty long and there were countless doors to its left and right. As far as I could see, every door had a picture of someone on them. Apart from these, there were various objects put on display on shelves across the hall. A stick with a skull on it, a golden spring, glass bottles filled with violet, green, blue and yellow colored liquids, a golden chain, a hammer, a blue cloak, a big bow, a red sword, even a few grey stones and some other stuffs were put on display in a decorative manner. But, apart from all of these, a small vile filled with a pitch black liquid was put on display in the center. It was protected by a glass box and out of reach for any  creature in the village.

"If you are tired, Elixir is always at your disposal here. Our goblins scratch barks and raid other villages to feed us. We have everyone doing their assigned jobs and we are developing fast. Now that you are here we expect to rise and grow even faster. Its just a beautiful ecosystem here where we all depend on each other and keep us going forward.", she said in a satisfying tone.

With a deep sigh, "So, this is your new village. Is'nt it lovely! Life here would be perfect if it was'nt for...", suddenly a thunderous noise came from outside making us deaf for a few moments.

"Oh no. Its the Goblin Horde! Quick. Lets setup a canon to defend the village! And bring that Green gem on the shelf with you.", saying so she ran outside and I followed her hastily.

"Go get Borke, the builder in the hut to your east. He will be building another Canon for us."

I ran towards the hut and got Borke, the builder while she pointed me a place in the center of the village for the canon. It was indeed a magical land. Borke, was putting up the wooden canon base pretty quick. He was ready with the wooden planks and metal pipe. But, Iisa perhaps wanted him to do quicker. "Give him that gem that you got from the townhall."
Handing over that gem to Borke, was indeed a magic over magic. Borke's grin became even wider. It was just a blink of an eye and a blinding flash within which Borke had finished building the canon.

Soon after, we had to run into the town hall for protection. Even Borke and some other village maidens roaming outside ran towards the townhall. We all gathered together in the hall while we could hear the canon firing, the goblins were trying to scratch and destroy the canon.  The battle lasted for just a few minutes. Our canons were strong enough to face the resistance. The canon had killed the goblins but one of them was destroyed. As usual, it started building itself up again and the village looked exactly as before except the two tombstones representing the dead goblins.

"Phew! That was a close call. Thanks Chief!", said one of the maidens as she moved out on her regular inspection work again.

"Umm!! How do things repair themselves here?", I had to ask this sometime or the other.

"We built the village on a Ley Line. That means the canon will magically repair itself over time.", Iisa replied.


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