White Dragon Stories

Beautiful soul

As child he had been a beautiful ray of sunshine. Almost all day he had smiled and laughed. He had been a happy child with a wonderful family. Judar had been envious of him. Yes, the priests gave him all the attention he wanted and he was allowed to do whatever he wanted, but in the end he still had felt lonely. No one wanted to play with him, because they thought of him as scary, and with him traveling a lot, he also barely had time to develop a friendship. Therefore he told himself that he did not need any friends and that he was better than the other kids. However, he could not fool anyone with it. It was painfully obvious that it bothered him, yet the priests did not care about it. Why should they? A friendless Magi was better for their goal. Heartless!
So whenever he had time, Judar tried to spend it with Hakuryuu, the youngest son of emperor Hakutoku. At first the two had a few problems with getting along, since Judar preferred rougher games, but Hakuryuu did not like to get hurt – well, no one liked to get hurt. But soon they had found many games they both enjoyed. Judar's envious grow only bigger during that time, because Hakuryuu often stopped playing with him, when Hakuyuu and Hakuren were around. They were more important than Judar and this was something he could not bear. Well, he also had problems with it, when Hakuyuu and Hakuren played with them. He liked the two princes, especially Hakuren was fun to play with, but it showed him that he was alone and had no one. The priests were pretty boring and never played much with him, because a Magi should not behave like a normal child, there were more important things he had to take care off. Things he did not care about at all. Training was boring!
Once Judar had asked Hakuryuu to give one of his siblings to Judar. Hakuryuu did not need three older siblings! He never could play with all of them at the same time! Friends shared with each other, right? So sharing siblings was fine. A flawed thinking, but it just showed how lonely Judar felt and actually was. Of course, Hakuryuu did not share his siblings, because he loved all of them very much. This caused the two boys to not speak with each other for a few days – Judar was angry and disappointed with his one and only friend. Hakuryuu, on the other hand, did not understand what Judar's problem was.
Thinking back about his behavior back then made Judar laugh. How childish he had been! At the same time it was also very amusing to think about how naïve and pure Hakuryuu had been as child. Not only had he thought that trading siblings was a thing, Hakuryuu had thought so too and had feared to lose any of them. If he had given one of them to Judar, wouldn't that mean he wasn't able to play with them anymore? Thinking about it rationally, it was obvious that it was not the case at all. However, back then they had thought that way, which had caused Hakuryuu to suggest to ask his mother Gyokuen, whether she had an idea how Judar could get his own siblings – Gyokuen could only laugh about the children's naivety. Obviously she hadn't had an idea and thus the two had searched for someone else for help. Unfortunately, they hadn't found anyone. Hakuren and Hakuyuu also had not been much of a help, although they tried to explain the two kids that it was not possible to trade siblings and that this was not necessary anyway, because there was no rule that forbid them to play with whoever they wanted. Consequently Judar did not need to be a sibling of any of the royal members to be allowed to play or interact with them. Moreover Hakuren and Hakuyuu spent a lot of their time with Judar and Hakuryuu, whenever they were home, and further they already saw Judar as a younger brother, because he often attended the family dinner, where he acted as if he was a part of the family – no one complained about it. Sadly Judar did not accept this reasoning and so he and his only friend searched further for a way for Judar to get a sibling. Since Judar was still an only child, it was clear that they had not found a way and gave up on it one day.

Judar wondered how many people would have kept up with him and his crazy ideas. For others this was not a question at all, because he still was on his own and Hakuryuu was still his only friend – one could count Kougyoku as friend as well, since she saw him as that, but he refused to call her one, so it was safe to say they were no friends, because the feeling of friendship was not mutual. Most were annoyed by Judar and were not ready to keep up with his harmful game suggestions and pranks. Hakuryuu endured it all and Judar took it for granted. Sometimes the young prince would complain about the other being too reckless and rough, but nothing more. Only once Judar had made such a grave mistake that Hakuryuu decided not to interact with him anymore. At first Judar hadn't realized it, because he was causally talking to Hakuryuu, who would not respond, while Hakuyuu and Hakuren were near – consequently Judar thought Hakuryuu was ignoring him because of the two older princes. Slowly he had understood that Hakuryuu was angry – of course, he would not think about himself as the reason – and tried to find out what was wrong or who had wronged his friend. Weeks had passed without any changes and in his despair Judar asked Hakuyuu and Hakuren, who he hated at this point, because he still thought they interrupted his friendship with Hakuryuu and both had refused to become his siblings, what had happened to their younger brother. Thanks to that he finally had understood that he himself had done something wrong and needed to apologize. Apologizing was something Judar only had done once in his life and this was, when Hakuryuu had started avoiding him. Fortunately the two kids could clear the matter.