String Lights

Prologue: Welcome to Chronicles

It was strange just how easily things could change.

Things like seasons. Things like friends. Things like time and age and emotions. They all changed without us knowing.

If you walked the streets of Chronicles once upon a time, your eyes would have been opened to a breathtaking, new world. Home to the most intelligent people in the universe, Chronicles was for a time a very popular site for foreign tourists. There were many who came not just to meet the extraordinary natives, who were famous for their brilliance, but also to put aside the dreary aspects of their daily lives and relax. Back then, Chronicles was called the land of peace. It was known as the place where anyone could lay back in the therapeutic environment and find inner comfort. Perhaps it had had the same effect on the people of Chronicles themselves, because foreigners had often described the Chronicle citizens as the happiest people in the universe.

I was sorry to say, however, that that was all truly "once upon a time."

If I were to go back in time to the year of my birth and tell my people that the biggest period of tumult and disorder in the entire history of their country was approaching, no one would have believed me. This was fifteen years ago, after all, and fate was only just beginning to make its first discreet changes to our small and quiet world.

We say now, there must have been signs, hinting at what was to come. But if there were, every last one went unnoticed, and as people often say, many terrible happenings tend to sneak up on you without a warning. And with this terrifying era would come along three of the most terrible changes that could take place in life: changes in rulers, changes in people, and changes in trust.

The origin of these changes began on our side of the vast and beautiful universe, where a planet named Premus lay. It was rumored to be the mysterious twin of the even more mysterious blue-green planet on the other side of the galaxy. Aside from the shape of the land and the different organisms these planets each held within their borders, they were supposedly indistinguishable.

Premus was divided into five continents, all of which resembled enormous islands: First there was Stanzonia, where it was cold all year round; then there was Phosphene, divided into two separate nations after a civil war; then Vodrinth, the continent run under an oppressive dictatorship; then Caelum, whose name meant "heaven" and consisted of highly religious people called Caelists; and finally, my homeland Chronicles, slightly smaller than the rest but home to natives who were more intelligent than anyone in Premus and beyond. If anything, the word "intelligent" was an understatement, a word which fell short of describing them properly. That was because the people of Chronicles were, simply put, geniuses. Each person's area of interest was different, of course, but everyone made important contributions to their own field. And considering the number of ideas and theories that could be brought possible and alive through one billion ingenious minds, it was no wonder that they were able to make discoveries so quickly. Although to them, their unusual abilities to perceive and understand were just one part among the many in daily life.

Unlike all of the other Premus continents, Chronicles had neither a political leader nor a religious one. Battles between towns for land or supplies might have been an issue if the citizens of Chronicles had been bloodthirsty people, but they were so busy quenching their thirst for books and education that they had no time whatsoever to spare for engaging in fights.

Even without a head ruler, the people of Chronicles were clearly able to fend for themselves just fine. If anything, they found it was more peaceful to live based on their own decisions, and so they were immensely proud—proud of the fact that they were living in a country with no warfare or dictatorship, proud at the belief that they had founded the most harmonious way of government in the universe.