"Stop!" A man shouted. He was floating in the air.

A steady white glow surrounded him. The rain didn't seem to make him wet.

"Is that a God?" Someone asked. "I think it is Hermes, the great messenger of the Gods! For he floats like so!"
"No, it is actually Apollo, the God of the Sun! Look at his light!" Another said.

Catopsilia's eyes widened: "Elonas?"

Elonas shouted. "No I'm not a God. Neither is your King. Neither is Poseidon. They're all masquerading into becoming something that they're not. The Gods as you know them do not exist. They're myths."

The people gasped in shock.

The King laughed. "Prove it then, you intruder, whoever or whatever you are. Prove that I'm not a God."

The mysterious Elonas shrugged. "Why should I prove it? When a little girl can."
He turned around and his eyes caught Catopsilia's.

Catopsilia stood there dumbfounded. Every single man and woman in the vicinity stared at her.

"M... Me?" She asked.
The King settled his staff. "Come, child. Come closer."

Catopsilia walked towards the center of the court.

"Y.. Yes?" Catopsilia muttered.
"Ask me something. Ask me something that I can only answer if I was a God." He asked.
Catopsilia turned at Elonas. The latter nodded.
"Umm..." she mumbled something, as if turning pages in her memory, trying to remember something.
"Gods create. What can you create?" She asked.

"ME? Create?" The King said.

"Why..." He raised his staff, the cube and cup turned around to form a combination.
"I can create birds in the sky... And let flowers grow from the ground." The sun shone, and with each thing that he said, it happened, much to the surprise of everyone.

Catopsilia turned to Elonas with her eyes wide open in surprise.
He clasped his hands and avoided her eyes.
Catopsilia turned towards the king. "Gods destroy. What can you destroy?" She asked.
He raised his staff, the cube reversed itself.
"The same things I've created just moments ago, will now be no more." The birds disappeared from the sky and the flowers withered and died.

Catopsilia screamed: "My father's DEAD. Bring him back to life!"

The king's eyes widened.
He stood there and froze.
The people looked on, full of confusion and wonder.
"I... I can try..." The king said.
"My father's dead. Bring him back to life, if you're a God." Catopsilia clarified.
The king's teeth rattled as the warmth of his glory slowly dissipated.

He took slow steady steps down the court and towards the corner where the old man lay lifeless. He caught sight of Aleskander and whispered as he came closer: "Alesky! Help me out my boy and I'll make you my prince!" The King trembled.
Aleskander looked up with his eyes wide open. "I... I thought you said you feared nothing."
The king pushed Aleskander away. "Out of my way, servant! And watch me do wonders!" The king raised his hands and uttered something. The cup turned and the cube spun, they both seemed to go into a frenzy. Then they stopped on a combination.

The people looked and waited.

Suddenly. Amazingly. A man opened the door of the inn. It was Catopsilia's father! Looking healthier than he did years ago!

"F... Father???? But.. I thought.. You were..." Catopsilia mumbled, tears trickled down her cheeks.
"I am alive and well, as you can see, my daughter." The old man said.
Elonas gasped. For the first time in a long time. He was shocked.
"See?" The king said.

Aleskander looked down towards the dead version of the father and looked up again at the standing man then stood up.
"Wait!" he said.

Everyone turned to look at him.

"What does that page boy want?" Some people mumbled in the on looking crowd.
Aleskander leaned towards the old man's dead body and took out a piece of orichalcum inscribed with symbols.

He pushed it towards the man. "What does this say?" He asked.

The old man looked at the King. The King looked back at him then turned towards the boy: "What kind of stupid question is that, boy? We have no time for this, AWAY!" He pushed the boy and he fell on the ground.

"No!" A man shouted in the crowd.
"Let him say what is written as the boy asks!"
"Yea!" The crowd shouted.
The King trembled. The old man took the tablet to his eyes. "It says..."

Everyone waited.

Aleskander stood up.

The old man sighed and dropped the tablet on the ground "But I'm illiterate! For I'm but a poor farmer who's never had a chance to learn how to read!"

The people gasped. "But... We know that trader; he always used his tablets for counting."

"That's right!" Aleskander said. "These are numbers!"
He took the tablet and showed it to all. "All humans, no matter what language they speak can make out these numbered lines that help us in counting. Except him. Because he's not a man, he's an apparition."
Aleskander turned to the king "And HE taught me about them. He said that people who said the right words can invoke these spirits who can assume the form of any man!"

The people gasped. "He's not a God then. He didn't raise the old man from the dead, but he raised a spirit to trick us. He's a fraud. That stranger Elonas was right!"

The mob started walking towards the king.

He stood there and shook his head. Then raised the staff high in the air. "Better to have lived than to have not lived at all, believe thy not?"

The staff turned to yet another combination and froze.

Suddenly, for a whole second, there was absolute silence. In fact, every single person thought they had gone deaf. There was a bright flash and a bolt ripped fiercely across the sky into the ground where the king stood.

He proved himself a true coward, for he had chosen the fastest possible way to die.

The people rubbed their eyes and sighed. Elonas picked up the staff that was all that was left from the king's demise and handed it over to Catopsilia.
"Huh?" She froze.
"We don't have much time... WIELD IT." Elonas said.

Suddenly there was a mighty roar. Everyone turned towards the west across the mountains. There was an immense splash and they saw a humongous tsunami towering high above them.

Everyone screamed. The people started running frantically away.

Catopsilia turned to Elonas and thrusted the scepter at him: "You are the wise one, you do it! I don't know how to!"

Elonas shouted above the noise of the roaring tidal wave: "I CAN'T USE IT! You're the ONLY ONE WHO CAN!! You need to think of a combination to make it work. Think of a whirlpool then point it towards the sky. Do it! Now!"

She gripped the scepter and grinded her teeth. She shut her eyes and cleared her mind. She imagined that she was in a peaceful quiet place, just Aleskander and her. Then she thought of a calm, blue whirlpool.

As her brainwaves scattered her thoughts into the air, the scepter picked them up. Immediately, the cup turned and the cube clicked thrice.

Catopsilia raised the scepter high and a whirlpool symbol illuminated the sky. Suddenly, the clouds started to churn and spin, Catopsilia looked around her with her eyes wide open as the image around her smudged and slowed and spun. The people who ran were now running in slow motion. People who spoke, spoke really slowly and in a coarse voice.

She also noticed that she was in the center of it all. She looked up and she saw the sky opened. A sense of euphoria filled her. A sense of power. A sense of glory and might. Her entire body throbbed with an intense feeling of supremacy and perfection. So much it felt like she was going to explode, yet the feeling was so irresistable.

Suddenly she caught a glimpse of Aleskander. He stood there and watched her. Even as the world around him was in total turmoil and optimum disaster, he just stood there and stared at her. His eyes had pride: He was proud of her.

She shed a tear as she chose her heart over her euphoria, a split second before she would've understood what it meant to be God-like.

"Love conquers all. And I've proved it." She said. The whirlpool stopped.

There was complete silence.

(Continued...)