Bab 1: Chapter 1
"Phew." Bryan heaved a long sigh as he closed the door after seeing the last of the visitors and slumped against the back of the door and looked at the ceiling of the duplex he called home.
"It's over." It was at times like this he truly felt it. The emptiness. Both of the building he called home and his heart.
Not caring about his appearance, he slumped on the floor and only shook when he heard someone knock on the door.
Startled, he stood up and brushed his body front he dirt that clung to his suit and took in several breaths before opening the door.
Behind it was his neighbour, Miss Agnes. A woman deep into her thirties, she wore a plain black dress with a similar coloured veil that covered her beautiful features even for her age. She gazed at him with pity mixed with other emotions.
And it was no wonder. After all...
"I'm sorry about your father. He was a good man." She gave a small bow as she spoke.
Just the day before, Bryan's father and the only family he had left after his mother passed away when he was five, David Herman, had followed in his wife's footsteps.
'In other words, he passed away.' Bryan thought.
It happened suddenly. On the day it happened, his father was hale and hearty right up until the moment that he reported his successful graduation from middle school.
His father just gave a brief smile and collapsed on the spot. Panicked, he called for an ambulance but by the time they got here, it was too late.
They later revealed that he had been suffering from old wounds, something that was gotten long before Bryan's birth.
'And despite living with him for years, I never noticed it.' Bryan smiled bitterly and only realized he was alone when someone rubbed his head.
"If I know anything, then this was never your fault." Miss Agnes said and Bryna nodded as he felt his vision blur as something wet landed on the floor.
"I-I'm sorry. It just... comes out at times." Bryan said in between hiccups and Agnes just pulled him into her embrace and let him pour his heart out.
...
"I offer my most sincerest apologies!" Bryan said as he bowed his head and Agnes just waved it off.
It has taken a good amount of time before Bryna calmed down and he was aware of how much if her time he had wasted.
Agnes worked at the city hall as an important person's secretary. It was already hard enough to secure time to attend his father's funeral and he had spent even more of her time by being a baby.
"No need to apologise like that. Most people would be in a similar state after losing their loved ones." She waved it off and placed her thumb and index finger in her mouth and whistled.
It was only a moment later when Bryan felt the air shift and he stood up to open the window. Seconds later, a large eagle, far larger than anything that could ever exist on Earth, came. Into the room and almost like magic, the size of the beast reduced until it could fit on even a baby's palm.
Bryan observed the eagle he had seen many times but it still took his breath away. Wings that seemed like each feather was forged from silver, a refined face and sharp features along with a golden beak that was ready to tear into anything and anyone, sharp talons that seemed capable of ripping apart large prey with ease.
This was Maya, A Wind Willow Eagle and Miss Agnes tamed beast.
If there was a difference between this world and his previous one asides the advanced technology, it was this.
Have you ever seen a winged lizard more than a hundred metres in width soaring over your head? That was the first thing Bryna saw when he regained his memories at the age of five. Or it could be that the sight of that, something so astonishing and amazing jolted his mind reached deep into his soul before ripping out the memories with brute force.
Born in the twenty first century, at least in his last life, David died at thw age of seventeen after running to save an elementary school girl from a runaway truck.
And the next thing he remembered was the sight of what he would call a dragon. Beautiful and majestic but just as dangerous.
It was then he found what he wanted to do. What he needed to be.
In this new world, there exists people capable of taming and contracting such outstanding beasts. It was a profession highly respected.
Beast tamers. A profession where one fights alongside their tamed creatures in battles. Where they connect and associate with them.
It was precisely the thing that he was missing in his past life.
The grief he felt over his father's death seemed to have dissipated slightly as he stared at the eagle named Maya with affection in his eyes.
"Who's a good girl?" Miss Agnes cooed as she scratched the bird under her chin and the latter leaned into it.
"Did you bring what I told you to?" Maya nodded in response and opened her motion far larger than a normal bird should be able to and vomited an egg about fifteen centimetres in diameter.
Unlike most eggs which were oval or not perfect spheres, this one, even without measuring it, was a perfect sphere.
It almost seemed like it had been crafted and not laid with the way it screamed perfection.
"Bryan, how much do you know about your father?" Miss Agnes asked him that question as she picked up the egg and handed it over to him.
...
"I can still remember it clearly. I was just a fresh graduate from college and had luckily gotten work at the city hall. While I was cleaning the office, two people, who later caused me thousands of credits in damage crashed into the office with fire raging all over their bodies." Bryan and Agnes faces each other as she began her tale.
"Fourteen years ago, a couple holding a baby and an egg crashed into the city hall and caused a huge commotion. The female passed away just a few years after that and just recently, the man passed away."
Just from that, Bryna knew that the people Miss Agnes was talking about were his parents.
There were times where he felt that his father and mother must have come from an extraordinary background.
For example, at his age, most people would have had one or two tamed beasts but his father had forbidden him from ever contracting one until he was about to enter high school.
He was only a child physically and knew that there must be a deeper reason for it. He had trained his spiritual power and honed his knowledge for this day only for his father to suddenly pass away.
"Your father passed away from old wounds. Wounds so deep that it was unable to be healed. I don't know how he got those wounds and he never told me but I suspect it has something to do with this." Miss Agnes gesture at the egg he held and Bryan focused on it and felt a strange warmth permeating from it.
"Your mother also died from similar wounds. I only knew her for a short while before she succumbed to her wounds. Now, what exactly injured them? I still don't know but I know one thing." Miss Agnes said with a build-up so Bryan responded and shifted his body accordingly.
"That egg... I suspect that they were injured while getting it. Even without his tamed beasts and his wounds, your father was capable of taking out Super level beast tamers. A being capable of dealing injuries would have to be at the Epic level. Even in this kingdom, there are a limited amount of those at that level. No matter who the Herman couple were, it was no doubt that they were not ordinary. And neither is the thing they risked their lives to get."
Bryan looked at the egg and closed his eyes and extended his spiritual senses to the egg but did not perceive anything special.
"You're father left a set of instructions on how to raise the egg properly with me." Miss Agnes said and tapped the white bracelet on her hand as a holographic interface appeared above it and she tapped it and Bryan felt his hand vibrate and looked at the device on his hand.
The Terminal. That was the name of the device that had replaced mobile phones in the past years. Almost everyone had one in this day and age including Bryan.
Shifting the egg to one side, he raised his left hand where he placed the Terminal and saw a glowing red light signifying a notification but he didn't tap it and looked at Miss Agnes.
"This may be a bit rude to ask but why didn't you take the egg for yourself?"
"Why should I? I'm quite satisfied with Maya." Miss Agnes smiled softly and stood up.
"There is a lot to be said but sadly, my break is almost over." She said and Bryan stood up and accompanied her to the door.
"We'll talk at length later." Miss Agnes said her goodbyes and left Bryan with more questions than answers.