The Other Side

The empire of Argos was home to one of the powerful mages but its existence was kept secret from the general public. No one but only the royal family knew of them. Everything was fine until one unexpected thing happened.

"The Archmage went missing?" The emperor asked the messenger from the mage tower. The news was shocking indeed. The Archmage was the most powerful mage out there in the empire therefore it was the cause of worry because the Archmage maintained the stability of the empire, and protected it from any chaos.  

The empire cannot be left unprotected. The safety of the people was causing the emperor worry.

"How long has it been since he went missing?" filled with worry, the emperor asked the messenger with the hope that he might have gone somewhere for his research.  

"It's been two and a half weeks, Your majesty. If he would have gone somewhere, he would always leave a letter behind saying so but when we went to check his office, there were none, it felt like he was simply gone, we, mages, don't feel his existence anywhere, there's something you can do that's why we came to ask for your help. " 

"What is it that you need help with," the emperor asked

"There was a mirror in his office which went missing too, and as I recall, he called it a portal or something which changes its location once used. " 

The emperor was deep in thought. He thought about it for a while. It was clear that someone had to find that mirror first. From the looks of it, they need someone from the royal family to help them with this. The emperor can't send the first prince, Francis, as he is away for some business. So, that means it has to be the second prince, Theo.

"Call the second prince, immediately!" He asked his assistant. It was an urgent matter. The Archmage can't be away from the empire for a long time or it will bring chaos.

After a few minutes, the second prince arrived. The assistant explained the situation to him.  

"Help the mages to the best of your abilities, Theo. " The emperor left after leaving the matters to him.

"We would like you to come to the tower for further explanation. " The messenger said.  

Theo went with the messenger to the tower. There, the mage adviser started explaining what might have happened.

"We believe that the Archmage is in some other dimension. The mirror is a portal but it takes two for it to be used. It can only be used in three circumstances- 1) Both souls should be willing to exchange. 2) If the person trying to exchange souls is stronger than the other person. 3) if the other person is in a weakened or near-death state. " 

"What do you think could have happened, as for what I think, the Archmage didn't willingly exchange souls, and he is the strongest mage, so someone overpowering him would be nonsense and that takes us to the third option. Did he have any near-death experience before he went missing?" Theo asked the mages. He was quite sure that something must have happened to the Archmage because they weren't in contact for over a week. He wanted to find the Archmage as soon as possible not just because it was an order from the emperor but because he and the Archmage were close to each other.  

"He did have an incident after coming from the mission, his power was weakened and when we came to the treatment, he was not able to breathe properly, perhaps it was because of that, it happened?" 

"That means the one who exchanged soul is currently somewhere in this continent?"

"Yes indeed and even if we find him, he won't go back willingly and that's why we need to have the Archmage, and for that, we have someone's soul" 

"Soul? What do you mean?" Theo was confused. Are they going to force someone to go to the other dimension?

"It's not what you are thinking. We are not going to force someone to do something they don't want. There's someone here whose soul is not from here and she wants to go back to her world. " 

The mage called for the said person. She came to the office and introduced her to the second prince.

 "This is Lilian or should I say her real name is Jessica. Jessica's soul is residing in Lillian's body. What we gathered from the information is that Lillian's dead. Jessica didn't know how she came into this world. She just woke up in her body. "

"Dead? But you said exchange happens in only three circumstances. " 

"That's what we believed too but apparently if one of the people is dead, the other one can just enter its body. You just have to find the mirror. It won't be far away from here and we think that it is somewhere in the night forest"

"But nobody has ever returned from the night forest. " He has heard many rumors about the forest.  

"We will put a tracker on you two. You just have to reach the mirror. After the exchange, the Archmage will return and he shall take care of everything. "

After hearing everything, Theo and Jessica went to the night forest. The forest looked creepy from the outside.

"Even though it looks creepy, we have to get going," Jessica told Theo who was staring at the forest.

"Yes, I was just thinking whether you'll be safe or not. There are gonna be many monsters. " Theo was worried because there might come a time when he won't be able to protect her.

"You don't have to worry about me. I have a sword and a knife. " 

Theo was still worried because the monsters don't die easily. Still, they went into the forest.

Nothing happened for the first few minutes but when they got deeper into the forest, they felt like someone was watching them with the intent of killing them.

Jessica threw the knife to the left. It hit the snake who was watching them for quite a while. From the looks of it, it's dead.

"It looks like I was worried about nothing back there," Theo told Jessica.  

"It happens, you can't depend on someone else if you don't even know them," Jessica said with a laugh.

" Yes you're right, I only know your name" Theo was quite interested about her and her world.

"If you want to know something about me, you can ask and by the way, I know many things about you" she laughed.  

Theo was the second prince of the empire. Jessica knows what the newspaper showed about him. But she wanted to know the real him.

"What were you like in your real world?" He can't put it into words but he felt a connection with her.

"I was a college student, had black short hair, and I liked talking to people and knowing about them. " She said remembering the days.

"College? What does that mean?" He was confused, nothing called college existed in his world.

"Oh, it's a place where you go to get further knowledge of the subject you're interested in. " She said even while knowing that some people just attended it for the sake of attending.

"Oh, then what are you studying there?" 

"I'm studying psychology, I'm quite interested in knowing about humans and their behaviour. " 

They were talking while knocking out the monsters. They enjoyed each other's company even more than they thought.

"So tell me about yourself, what are you like in real life? I've only heard about you from newspapers and people. " She sliced a monster while asking him.

"In real life you say… I think I like growing plants. I've got a grand garden for myself and I prefer to spend time alone. " He was thinking about what else he could tell her while he took care of the monsters on his side.

"You like flowers? Well, that is unexpected, what's your favorite flower?" She asked.

"My favorite flower… I think it would be Lavender. It seems peaceful. " He said.

They talked and talked about the most random things to the deepest conversation.

Days went by and the two became closer to each other. They slowly started liking each other but even they know that they can't show it.

Two weeks passed by, and they went through many troubles to get past the monsters.

When they reached a cave and they realized that the mage might be right and the mirror might be inside that cave, they were getting this strange feeling.

They went inside the cave, they thought some monster might be there but fortunately, there was none. They saw the mirror in front of them.

They remembered what the mage told them. "When you find the mirror, just tap on the tracker two times" 

They know that they have to tap on it but they also know they won't be able to contact each other ever again. If someone said anything right now. It's only gonna get difficult. So they decided to not say anything other than tapping on the tracker two times.

They were once again in the same office. The mages started the procedure of exchanging the soul. Theo was there the whole time. Words couldn't get out of his mouth but he wanted to say so much. He wanted to tell her to not go but he knew it had to happen. So, he decided to do nothing.  

A few minutes went by, Jessica was no longer there and the Archmage was slowly waking up. Theo was really happy to the Archmage but he still returned to his palace.

Two months went by, everything returned to its place except for Theo. He thought about Jessica all the time. He was in his office thinking about what Jessica would be doing right now. He closed his eyes and thought " I wish I could experience the kind of world she lives in. " And when he opened his eyes… "Huh? What's this place?"

He was in a different place.