Dragon Gem: Venas and the Hidden Era

By Vanessa Xu

 Dragon Gem 1

Venas and the Hidden Era

Venas had always dreamed of a place out there full of life other than planet Ea

• Language: English
• Publisher: Vanessa Xu
• Release date: Sep 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9781649708632

Book preview

Dragon Gem

Dragon Gem

Dragon Gem

Venas and the Hidden Era

Vanessa Xu

publisher logo

Copyright ©  by Vanessa Xu 2020

Cover, text and illustrations Copyright © by Vanessa Xu

The moral right of the author has been asserted

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission to the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First Published 2020

I thank everyone who supported me during the production of Dragon Gem volume one.

I thank Alex B.

  Shi Wei

and Weylan,

who were the first to know. 

Thank you

Natalia G.

Pablo F.

And thank you

for choosing this book :)

Our Adventure Begins

You are about to enter the 

 World of Martial Arts and Magic

Contents

prologue The War of Tomorrow

Flame 1 Timeless

Flame 2 Portal into the Past

Flame 3 Fireproof

Flame 4 Fall of the Mortal Fire

Flame 5 The Magic Shop

Flame 6 The Big Reveal

Flame 7 The Blood Elf

Flame 8 The Hunt for Oracles

Flame 9 Strike of the Autumn Sun

Flame 10 The Return of King Ocean

Flame 11 Elixir Awakening

Flame 12 Final Strike

Flame 13 The After Effect

Flame 14 The Nevelean’s Schemes

Flame 15 Thunder

Flame 16 Royal Blood

Flame 17 The First Disciple

Our Main Charas

The World of Andromeda

MAYBE THERE REALLY IS MORE LIFE OUT THERE MAYBE IT'S HIDDEN AND DOESN'T WANT T0 BE DISCOVERED

prologue

The War of Tomorrow

15-Aug-2015 - London 

Venas read out loud from page five of her storybook, The Age of Time, Chinese edition whilst seated by the window where she was surrounded by big brown boxes waiting for the big move. For Venas, it felt like it was the 100th time she and her mother were moving to another place. For the past week, it's been non-stop, put this over here, and move that over there. She finally packed away the rest of her things, a stack of Harry Potter books and the films that she never got to watch since there was no T.V. or DVD player to watch them on and the pile of watercolour pencils that she was using last night.

She whipped her long black hair out of the way, clipping her side bangs back as she tucked the rest of her clothes stuffing into her purple suitcase, the small one, of course, the big one was lost amongst the boxes on the other side of her oversized bedroom that she shared with her Mother. The room was extremely bright as the curtains were no longer hanging in front of the three large windows displayed before her, along with the small window beside it, the light reflected onto her hazel eyes and warmed up her red, long-sleeved top, decorated with a cute white collar on the v line. Her denim jeans were also getting a bit warm but the sun doesn’t seem to be staying long as more clouds approached, but it did bring out her clear, smooth skin. She placed the last of her things into her backpack including her sketchbooks, iPad and searched behind and under her sheetless bed to ensure nothing was left behind and took a glimpse at the shelves, into her wardrobe before hearing the greetings of the moving-truck man from outside the window.

Morning, Ma’am, these boxes right here?

Venas leaned over her window sill with the surface area of the table and peered over Mason Avenue street where a big white vehicle parked in front of door number 15, her door. Venas didn’t live in a house, it was the place over her mother’s takeaway, Golden Fountain, a flat rather than a house. 

Lao Da, come move the boxes down, Venas’s mum called her from downstairs addressing her position in the family, Lao da meaning the eldest child in the family.

Quickly, she took the closest box and placed it at the bottom of the stairs as another man appeared from his bedroom also carrying a box in his hands with an unlit cigarette sticking out from his mouth. It was uncle Chen, one of her mum’s takeaway employees, the one that stayed for the last two years of the takeaway opening, the other employees always come and go, Venas could never get used to constant strangers living under the same roof. Uncle Chen was moving with them, he had a tri-shaped hairline with short black hair, had tanned skin and was a head taller than Venas. 

Is that everything, her mum waved goodbye to the truck man as uncle Chen entered the truck on the passenger's seat.

That’s everything, she gripped her backpack and suitcase tightly and took a last look at the takeaway before following her mum to the Harrow and Wealdstone undergrounds catching the train to Gatwick Airport. 

Venas’s mother also trailed behind her a vintage suitcase, she had short brown hair parted from the left, the same coloured eyes as her daughter and wore black skin-tight trousers and a leopard print top. Before venas meets her new home, her mother planned a trip to Ireland, where Venas first came into the world to visit their old house in Mitchelstown, Cork. Venas didn’t know what for but wherever her mother goes, she goes. 

Ten days later, Venas stepped off the high-speed train of the East Midlands service at Ashford International, she tried to keep her eye on her mother past the busy crowd of people who all stepped off the train at once, rushing down the stairs.

Lao da, her mum called her by the exit, she followed her closely through the ticket doors and called a taxi to Kennington Bockhanger court, behind a Chinese takeaway named, Mr Peter, the takeaway that her mother bought, the difference between this and the last one was, this takeaway was built separately to the flat above.

Everything was already in the flat but there was no uncle Chen as he has a temporary job in Croydon, London. Venas walked past the three small bedrooms on both sides of a small corridor, a toilet to the right separate from the bathroom, the last bedroom was locked with an old padlock as the former owners still had their things in there. At the end of the corridor was the kitchen, next to it was an old ripped up couch and behind it, a large freezer where the takeaway stores frozen food. This flat felt smaller than the last one. There was nothing to do at the moment, Venas watched the weather from the balcony connected to the kitchen, she looked rather disappointed, all she could think about was the day she parted with her friends, one by one, giving her a goodbye hug.

They say it’s friends who come and go… in my world, I’m the one that comes and goes.

Soon, a thunderstorm erupted from the grey skies above. Venas’s mother was busy maintaining the new takeaway downstairs so she decided to release a little friend of hers. 

Petal? She took out her ruby gemmed amulet and started talking to it when a ruby- red baby dragon, the size of her hand, shimmed magically out in a bright light. 

Petal jumped and landed on her bed, the thunder was getting louder and louder.

"Don’t worry, it’s just a storm, it’ll go away soon. 

Petal tilted her tiny, little head, blinking her large, moon coloured eyes watching Venas pull out a brown wind instrument from her luggage, her flute decorated with a red tassel. Petal’s head followed the swaying of the tassel and ended up falling sound asleep listening to the traditional tunes that soothe her ears. Night fell, as Venas falls asleep waiting for her first day back at her new school.

Flame 1

Timeless

01 - Sept - 2015 Kent  

An intensive beam of light hit Venas in the eyes through the curtains waking her up before her alarm clock strikes. The kitchen, looking better than when she first moved in, was saturated with the sound of sizzling eggs as Venas, with a slice of bread jammed between her lips, made her breakfast, retaining the noise level down but judging by how small the flat was, her mother was probably already awake. As for uncle Chen, he was still sound asleep snoring into his 7 am dreams.

The neighbourhood in Bockhanger court was always reserved in the mornings. She noticed a school directly next door, Phoenix Primary School, where she expected a lot of noise to rise soon but there was no movement. Even at fifteen past eight when school starts in half an hour. She switched on her laptop on the dining table and gave Petal a piece of her brown bread to munch on.

She wiped down her sky blue shirt and neatened her yellow striped, blue tie and sat down, pinning two gold achievement stars upon her right collar, the ones that she earned from her last school, Harrow High. The news appeared to have interested her this morning, her eyes were stuck to the screen reading the headlines on Kent Live.

Every word the report lady was announcing stuck into her head.

... no sightings of the culprit have been spotted, we don’t know whether it's a man or a woman and unfortunately not a single CCTV was able to catch any evidence, it seems that they’ve all been destroyed. Police and investigators have made assumptions that this damage was caused by mutants, is it true that there are more rogue mutants in the UK? The destructions have reached schools near Ashford town centre including North school, Ashford boarding school and John Wallis. The all-boys Knatchbull grammar school and the all-girls Highworth grammar school after opening for two days last week have reclosed until further notice, we’ve had hundreds of injuries and deaths in the few days and the new school year for the following schools have been postponed for later November, a screen appeared with the list of primary schools including Phoenix Primary school. The majority of the schools listed were primary schools.

Venas arrived at the reception of Pillar High, enrolling through large, automatic, glass doors where a monitor screened the news wavered over her, displaying evidence of property destruction.

Do you think they're gonna close Pillar down? said a passing student.

I wish- I slept through 7 alarm clocks today, I just wanna go back to bed, said another.

Venas’s judgement on the whole situation was: Since reading books and articles on the ancient Muman's war 500 years ago, 1514 in the centre of London, there was a possibility that mutants still roam till this day, she loved researching the history of the war between mutants and humans where the humans somehow managed to defeat mutants by outnumbering them. If it was mutants, what would the mutants be looking for and why would they come here to Ashford, mutants were situated in London, they wouldn’t come here just to destroy some schools... all the way from London?

Every fellow student was discussing how every secondary school in the area of Ashford town centre was closed and complained about how Pillar High was so far away from the town centre, this became the topic of the day.

Pillar High School was a rather new secondary school with the aesthetics of white and blue, made up of different buildings, each building was named and separated for different subjects. On each side of the school systematised a section for outdoor sports, a basketball court on one side and a 3G football pitch on the other planted with synthetic grass and trillions of tiny black grains. A collection of students in their 10th year of school made their way to the sports hall for a start-of-the-year assembly, receiving the vice principal's welcome talk and more boring rules that never existed last year, it feels that they were more focused on the school dress code than their actual education when the vice principal announced that whoever was to be caught wearing anything unacceptable will be sent home. No trainers, uggs, flip flops, heels, denim, makeup, things that made Venas want to start lessons already. The morning pips sounded loudly assigning the students to their classroom.

The science room, numbered DA2 in the Darwin building was soon crowded with top set peers, all sat in alphabetical order with Venas at the back.

Look there's a new girl, said a tall, boy with dark, black skin wearing glasses to his friend who was sitting on the opposite side of the classroom by the entrance across from the teacher’s desk.

The boy glanced over amongst all the people wandering between them conversing about today's hot gossip, settling down to the first day back. The boy had blond, wavy hair with the sides trimmed, leaving the middle bit rested on his forehead. He was rather skinny and tall, his blue eyes were barely able to see the new girl.

Markcas, here, his friend in glasses passed him a new exercise book.

Cheers, he took a pen out of his neatly ironed navy blazer and scribbled Markcas Black on the front cover.

I think, they're gonna close the school, what do you think?

Same, the summer went well quick, ah I feel so tired, I was nearly late again, yawned Markcas.

Dude- you're always late, this is actually the first time you're not late-I remember-

Good Morning everyone, I am Mrs Stone and I’ll be your science teacher for the year, the teacher walked in with a joyful look on her face, she had rather fair, mushroom-like hair was quite chubby and handed a GCSE textbook to every table for the first lesson about space. The books were old and tore and some of them were scribbled by previous students.

After everyone was seated, Markcas could finally glance a look at the new girl who already started writing on the first, fresh page of her exercise book.

The date… umm title? Venas thought to herself and looked up to the board which had a screen projected upon. The title was Today’s Solar System.

...and Venas Xoular? Venas jumped out of her seat.

Yes? Everyone laughed even Mrs Stone grinned.

Don’t worry dear, only taking the register.

Oh, h- here… she slowly sat back down and felt a bit of embarrassment along the way.

Then she sighted a new face, she saw Markcas who held a smile trying not to look at her whilst she was looking at him.

The Solar System was formed around 4.6 billion years ago… Mrs Stone flicked through a simple slideshow covering the basics of the eight planets to jog everyone’s memory, Markcas stared at the board with his pen pressed against his lips, from where he was sitting, the board was at an angle but it was still clear. Then he noticed Venas with her head rested on her hand, dozing into dreamland.

The whole school day was packed with gossip and debates about the school invasions during lunchtime.

They didn’t even touch Knatchbull, said a girl passing by.

The first one reported was Highworth, they did start the earliest, said another.

love how Pillar decided to continue the school year when we're in the middle of a crisis, one complained. 

Venas’s progress with making friends was gradual, despite her happy nature, she was quiet and after the separation from her friends, she became shy. It became more difficult for her to make friends since everyone already had their friend circles. She sat at the canteen dining tables shaped like an oval, built on wheels that split in the middle made for them to fold in half at the end of the day. Each blue table was connected to twelve blue stools. The canteen of Pillar High was twice the size of her last school and looked cleaner too.

Hey Black, wha ya looking at? Com on, everyone’s outside, first day back- we needa catch up, Markcas’s friend swung his arm around his shoulder and led him to the exit through the crowded queue under two large canopies where the rest of his friends were as they stood and chatted.

And then he said, are you mad! You don’t wanna mess with those, said one of his buddies.

Right, he didn’t make it in the end, he let it go back into the lake, laughed another one.

Markcas looked back at Venas and walked away. But she wasn't alone, earlier in the morning after entering the sports hall for the assembly, her welfare manager assigned her with a buddy, someone she needed to follow to her classes until she becomes more familiar with the school's environment. Her name was Charlotte, she was a fairly skinny girl with fair hair to her shoulders, held a big, black handbag like all the other girls. Her circle of friends were very loud, most of the girls were cheerleaders and all the boys were part of the school's football team. Venas didn't think she fit in very well with them at all but still hung out with them at the table.

Hey, you're the new girl right, what's your name? said a boy enthusiastically. 

Venas, she said quietly.

Ah cool- can I call you V?

Uh, yh sure, she replied.

My name's Alfie, nice to meet you, he shook her hand firmly, Alfie had fair, curly hair with freckles dotted on his tanned face from playing football outside during the summer. 

Venas actually liked her new nickname, she's never thought of it before. slowly, she met almost everyone on the table and familiarized their faces. Throughout lunchtime, she became very confused to see one of the girls exit through the main door and come back from the other side only seconds later when it takes quite a while to circle to the other side until lastly, she realised that they were twins, Liv and Holly, their friends called them. Her year had a total of four twins, the most twins in the whole school.

She stuck a piece of cracker in her mouth and noticed there were only five lessons a day lying on her timetable, each lasting one hour and her last lesson was science again, Mrs Stone had a simple experiment set up for the class. On each table sat a rocket-like bottle containing a white tablet, the task was to launch the rocket successfully to the ceiling. The groups were split all around the room. Venas’s contribution to the task was small as her classmates took over.

FIZZZZZZZZZ

All eyes flew to the corner where Markcas’s group was standing, Abu the tall boy in the glasses had his face covered in white foam from the explosion of the rocket