At the crack of dawn above the North Pole, where the sun peeked through the clouds and the ice spread as far as the temperatures would allow, there lied a city. A floating city. A city that was new to this world, but had long since existed elsewhere.

The city was filled with nothing but huts, a temple, and a Pyramid erected towards the heavens. The people, dressed in colorful robes and wooden sandals, looked human enough. Their thoughts were mired by confusion, for they hadn't yet adapted to this strange new world they found themselves in.

A young woman with shoulder-length teal and pink hair, wearing a similarly colored robes with cloud prints, confidently strut her way amidst her kinfolk. Her hands were wrapped in their sleeves before her waist, and she held her head up high with a dauntless smile.

She alone was tasked with the burden of leadership among her race, and as her first task, she had brought this city from her home planet to this strange new world called "Earth". And now she wished to gauge their reactions, to see if there were any concerns she could alleviate. But it wouldn't be long before her path would cross with another...

"Lady Auris." The man spoke, his voice deep, powerful, yet also respectful.

The woman froze in place as the man's shadow draped over her from behind. She was a woman of amazonian stature, standing at approximately six foot-one, and yet the man dwarfed her still. Gently tilting her head back with an unease to her expression, she whispered in response, "What is it...Damascus?"

A man with the muscular stature of a Greecian hero lied in her view. His skin rough, his beard groomed but shaggy, and his black hair long and tied into dreadlocks. He wore baggy pants and a glittery rainbow vest, with his chest bandaged up, barely containing his bulging pecs. In his right hand he grasped a naginata with an emerald blade, while at his wrist lied a bracelet wielding a stone with a pitch black mark.

The man, Damascus, folded his left hand before his chest and took a bow, "I wasn't expecting you to be out and about so soon."

Auris trembled slightly and diverted her gaze from the man. Her eyelids sank in melancholy, but her tone portrayed a strong will of heart, "Do you see me as being so weak?"

"So much has happened to you lately. I would not blame you for wanting some peace and quiet."

"...You know I can't. The people need reassurance in this stressful time. As the daughter of Borealis Aurora, their care lies in my hands." Auris laid a hand on her chest and gazed towards the people.

Damascus lifted his head at them for a moment, then narrowed his eyes with a subdued growl. He then rested his hand comfortably on Auris' shoulder, and felt her tremble at the touch. He immediately retracted, offering his condolences.

"I...understand. But is this really what you want?"

Auris laid a hand where she was touched and glanced at the ground, "It doesn't matter what I want. If our people don't get accustomed to this new world, then it will only lead to trouble."

Damascus raised his hand towards the sky with a smile, "The atmosphere is breathable, albeit a little thinner than on our world. And with Catherine's cloaking shield, I imagine it will be a long, long time before this primitive world learns of our existence."

He then stood a little closer to her and whispered, "I insist, Lady Auris, that you take care of yourself for once. And I shall lead our people in your stead."

He was unaware of Auris widening her eyes with a glint of fear in her stare until she turned her head his way and shook it.

"I'm sorry Damascus. It has to be me," As she looked away from him she remarked, "But...I thank you for your offer. Above all else, I want you to know that your efforts will always be appreciated."

Damascus let her wander off without either of them saying another word. He furrowed his brow and his heart beat started pounding against his chest, drowning out all other sounds, even those in his mind. He squeezed his right hand into a fist, and scowled.

"The Ten Sages have breathed their last breath...And still I must wait?!" Damascus closed his eyes and calmed himself with a slow, tired breath, then started mumbling to himself, "Why? What cause is there to this madness?"

As he opened his eyes the air suddenly felt cold and still. But the stillness did not end there. He looked around and saw that he was the only one who could move. The color was washed away, leaving everything a dreary shade of gray.

"What...what is the meaning of this?" Damascus' head lurched back, the hairs on the back of his neck sticking up on end. He turned around slowly, greeted by the whispers of a widening rift in the fabric of time and space. The portal bulged with cosmic energies unlike anything he'd ever witnessed, but it was what came through it that truly took his breath away.

Malice. So much malice. He has felt hatred. He has lived and breathed hatred. But what crawled out of that rift eclipsed any of his feelings or experiences by a deep, unapproachable margin. And, to his surprise, the source of this hatred was only human...

Or to be more precise, it looked human. The source of hatred wore pale skin kept warm with a red t-shirt, blue jeans, and rough looking white sneakers. They didn't have much muscle but their figure was clearly masculine. He couldn't have been any older than sixteen. His short brown hair looked dirty, but otherwise fine. His hands were tucked into his pockets, and he dragged his feet along the ground, bringing along with him a heat that charred the ground as black as ash.

The ground cracked in his wake as he stopped ten feet away from the man and deigned to raise his head. Immediately the sight of his bright, crimson irises made every semblance of courage disappear from Damascus' heart. The piercing screech of a pained bird penetrated his eardrums, and with it came the devastating crackling of a world-ending inferno.

The boy cracked a grin and said to him in a high-pitched, gravelly, echoing tone, "If you have time to groan then you have time to take action...Damascus."

Damascus furrowed his brows and felt his heart racing against his chest. The boy's tone of familiarity spoke to his sense of reasoning and a bit of his fear began to subside. He looked to the boy's means of entry along with the frozen scenery, and quickly deduced one crucial fact from this enigmatic figure.

"You...aren't from this time period, are you?"

The boy simply chuckled and started to be wreathed in flame. Somehow, it made the glow in his eyes brighter. Then, as a gesture of feigned ignorance, he remarked, "Maybe not. Time is relative, after all."

Damascus brushed his left hand up near his hip and his fingers started to glow with his aura. He narrowed his gaze at this source of malice and thought, "I cannot let him live..."

A loud snap was followed by a painful crack coming from beside his body. He grit his teeth and looked down to find that all five of his fingers were being pulled back.

"As easy as it would be to snap your fingers in half, it would be a waste of our time." The boy, seemingly without moving a muscle, released his phantasmal grip on Damascus' bones. The man then quickly raised his hand to his chest and tried to squeeze it.

He looked at the boy again and thought to himself, "This feeling...It was as if he was controlling the calcium in my bones. Calcium...a mineral..."

He slowly opened his eyes all the way and came to a sudden realization, "Impossible...You couldn't possibly be...the Elemental Overlord?"

"Close," The boy cackled with a mild sense of delight, "You can say you are in the presence of...a new breed of lifeform."

Damascus hadn't yet made a decent effort to fight this stranger, but from one look knew he was outmatched. Silently closing his eyes, he took in a deep breath, then relaxed his arms at his sides and stood tall before the malice.

"And what would this 'new lifeform' want with me? If this is your approach, then I can only assume you mean to silence me."

"No," The boy replied in a humored tone, "You must live for everything to turn out correctly."

There was something...curious about the way they spoke. There was a subject that was clearly being evaded, and yet it was one that would be so easily coerced.

Raising his head and not making an effort to hide his contempt towards the boy's presence, Damascus remarked, "Humanity is nowhere close to being capable of making clothes like that. Are you from this Earth?"

"Hehehehe..." The boy seemed prepared to feign ignorance. But to Damascus' surprise he said, "Yes. This exact, putrid world."

"And from how far into the future?" Damascus does not realize that his tone was getting more relaxed the more he managed to coerce out of the boy.

"Two-thousand years." The boy replied.

"Hmmm..." But there was still room for surprises. And to hear so great a number did rattle Damascus' suspicion of disbelief for a brief moment. With a deep, hearty chuckle, he raised his hand out and shook his head.

"There must be some mistake. Even with the highest expectations, I will only live for sixty more years. And yet...you make it sound as though I am still present in your time."

"You are only...half correct. The man named Damascus will die today, that part of history cannot be changed. But in his place, a greater man shall rise to the occasion..."

Damascus took his hand to his chin and murmured in a firmer tone of voice, "I ask again...What do you want with me?"

"You've wanted power all this time but have never taken the measures to seize it. The Ten Sages are dead. The foolish Elemental Overlord and the Dark King are gone. That wench is weak...And all she has left to shackle you are worthless, honeyed words of praise."

Damascus felt his heart start to thump loudly against his chest. He tensely smiled and remarked with a staggering degree of hesitation, "L-Lady Auris isn't-"

The boy suddenly widened his eyes and his mad, piercing gaze froze the man's mouth shut. He laughed aloud, proclaiming to him a screech of liberation, "Free yourself from these shackles Damascus! Or cower in servitude until death takes you!"

He then creased his grin out as wide as his face could allow it and whispered, "What are a few morals cast aside compared to the sense of liberation you gain in return? Trust me."

Damascus started to tremble as his smile turned into a more genuine one. He then started laughing. Quietly, then more audibly as the seconds passed. He brought a hand to his forehead, and the laughter suddenly ceased to be.

"Never would I have expected a messenger of destiny to take your shape..." Damascus scraped his fingernails down the side of his face and peeled down part of his grin. With one last chuckle he then murmured, "But your actions confuse me...I am no expert on time travel, but I do believe you are changing the course of history, no?"

"The cause has been replaced by the effect shall remain the same. This meeting will not cause a divergence nor a paradox." The boy's maddened tone couldn't defy the confidence he wore proudly on his face.

"And so I ask a third time...What do you want from me?"

"...Your trust is not so easily gained. Very well..." The boy pulled a strange black and gold stone from his right pocket and hung it before his chest. His flames burned into the stone, forcing it to glow bright. The golden glow went from the stone to the man's body, lasting only for a few seconds.

When it passed Damascus felt strange. Not that it was possible to describe why.

"Your ability to age has been removed. Even if your head is sliced off, your flesh will not entropy. Now you can last as long as you'd like...To acquire the power you covet so dearly."

The boy quickly tucked the stone into his pocket and said, "But in exchange for this gift, there is something you must do."

"And what is that?" Damascus inquired.

"You must go and meet with the one called...Justek Arcavira." Upon hearing that name, Damascus felt a chill down his spine.

"H-Him? Why...him?"

The boy turned for the rift from whence he came and started walking towards it, "Everything will fall into place in time..."

Cryptic words were not what the man intended to end this meeting on. He stretched his hand out and proclaimed with a tinge of desperation, "Wait! Will you not tell me your name?!"

The boy froze in place and an insatiable malice exuded from his backside. He creaked his head back with the speed of a rusty gear and narrowly glared at the man.

"We...are the Phoenix of Destruction," He then lifted his head slightly to show his sinister smile as he poised one last question to the man, "And just who...are you?"

Damascus coiled his hand before his chest and let out a short, deep chuckle, "You can refer to me from now on as...Gravitus."

"If we meet again, that is..." Leaving those ominous words behind as a lingering, lasting impression, the Phoenix of Destruction dragged his feet through the rift and arrived in the middle of space overlooking the Earth and the moon.

At the exact moment of his return to the present he watched as a powerful cone of rainbow light shone brightly past the northern atmosphere of the planet. Humbled in battle, his pride now broken, Gravitus' body was sent flying through space, his desolation bringing a very big smile to the boy's face.

His body tingled with excitement as he curled his hands into his pockets, tickling the boundary of the strange stone with his flaming fingertips. He then raised his head in contempt towards the planet and whispered, "Two seals down...One to go."

His heartbeat was almost still as his crimson gaze burned with a reflection of the one called Mew, who was omnipresent in his thoughts.

"The time of reckoning is at hand...All things will burn, starting with you...My loathsome copy."

CLASH OF THE ELEMENTS PART 6 (R): THE SCARS OF SINS PAST

Prologue: Sanity Keeps on Slipping

Next Time: Calm Before the Firestorm