Storytelling

After Nari could no longer see the car anymore, she turned around and walked back into the house. Once she was back in her room, she sat on the couch at the center facing the big screen TV. She ended up falling asleep since she was tired. Besides, her father would be back home from his trip in a few hours, so she needed to conserve her strength and energy if she wanted to pester him non-stop later.

After three hours had passed, a tinted black branded car entered the compound with two black jeeps following behind. The cars went round the fountain and towards the garage. A few more minutes went by, and a man in a black mature suit stepped out of the car along with a few bodyguards. The moment Mrs Chen spotted the convoy entering the compound from her balcony, she rushed into the elevator, headed down, and quickly walked over to the front door to greet her beloved husband.

Daryl Chen opened the door and was eagerly greeted with a warm hug from his darling wife as she smiled up at him. "Welcome home'', she said briefly before pulling him into the house and towards the dinning room. "What took you so long? Gosh, you must be tired from all the work, did you eat yet?", Mrs Chen asked all at once making her husband to chuckle a bit. "Mm, no not yet I _". "Great! I've prepared dinner already, it's all your favorites so you better eat up", Mrs Chen said interrupting her husband. She was really happy that she could see her husband again.

Her heart was always troubled whenever he would have to travel about visiting royal households, and other important places, especially since his life was constantly in danger. She knew nothing could harm him for now, but she still didn't like taking chances like that.

"Say, where's Nari? She would've been crushing me with her hugs by now", Daryl asked as he glanced around. Mrs Chen's attention was immediately drawn back to the present, and she started putting various dishes on his plate. "Oh yes, I already told Mrs Nam to wake her. She'll probably be down by the time you're done eating", Mrs Chen replied. "Okay, tell her she should come meet me in the ancient library when she's done", Mr Chen said and Mrs Chen nodded, "Okay I will". Mr Chen finished up his meal, kissed his wife on the cheek and headed for the ancient library while Mrs Chen waited for her daughter to arrive so they could eat together.

...

Mrs Nam knocked on Nari's door, but when she didn't hear any response, she slowly opened the door and stepped in. Behold, Hinari was sleeping on the couch with her both legs on different sides of the couch. Her head wasn't even on the couch anymore, it was dangling from it and her hair was sweeping the floor. Mrs Nam let out a silent sigh, the young miss had always had an unruly sleeping habit. She walked towards her but paused. Hinari looked like her parents a lot. She got most of their cute features which made her appear really adorable. She had emerald green doll like eyes and light freckles which she'd gotten from her mum. She also had fiery red shoulder length hair which she'd gotten from her dad. Her features along with her vibrant personality made her appear really cute. That's why although Astrol was the prettiest of them all, Hinari was undoubtedly the cutest with her baby angel like face.

"Young miss wake up! Wake up, your father is already home", Mrs Nam ( the housekeeper ) spoke; She had been the housekeeper for them for years and had already served the Chens for decades now. She had even served Daryl's father when she was younger. Daryl's father had saved her and helped her out a lot so she owed her life to him and served him and his family with loyalty. She was faithful to the Chens and they respected and valued her a lot. "Is dad really here now?", Nari asked with drowsy eyes . "Yes young miss", Mrs Nam replied. As those words left her mouth, Nari fell on the floor with a thud because of her bad sleeping position. She quickly recovered, stood up immediately and dashed for the door.

Mrs Nam followed her and led her into the dinning room. Nari looked around and frowned slightly when she couldn't see her father. Mrs Chen shook her head amused at her daughter's reaction. She moved towards her and guided her to one of the empty seats. "Let's have dinner first, your dad is in the ancient library. You can go see him once we're done eating, hmm?", Mrs Chen cooed as she served the food. The two chatted a lot till they were almost done eating. "By the way dear, your cousin Nicholas will be coming over soon_" "What! Nick is coming over?!". Her cousin Nicholas Yang was one of her many male cousins. In fact she was the only female child from both her mother and father's side.

Which was why she had a lot of male friends, she grew up surrounded by boys. This never influenced her girly attitude at all though. She was still so petty and fragile. Nari loved all her cousins, but she didn't fancy Nicholas that much. He was so painfully annoying to say the least. He was also extremely smart unlike her that barely managed to be an average student since she had zero interest in academics. He never missed an opportunity to tease and belittle her with his knowledge. Nicholas was also her mother's brother's son; "Why? You don't like your favorite cousin?", Mrs Chen teased. She knew how much her daughter didn't want him to come. They always bickered a lot when they were kids, and she wondered how things would be now that they were slightly older. "Hmph, fine, he can come if he wants to. I don't really care. I'm going to go see dad now", Nari mumbled, before excusing herself and going into the elevator.

...

The ancient library was an underground library. Mr Chen was busy going through a large history book which contained the histories of varieties of empires in South East Asia. Nari sneakily snuck up to him and hugged him tightly from behind his chair. "Daddy!", Nari squealed and Mr Chen stood up and turned to hug her back. After the hug, Nari got a nearby stool and sat down next to her dad as he was flipping the history book in front of him. "What do you want me to talk about today my dear?", he asked sliding the big book in Nari's direction. Nari went through the book and her hand paused on a particular page. Mr Chen looked and saw that she had stopped and was staring at the page related to the Hae empire. "The Hae empire again?, why are you so interested in that empire these days?", Mr Chen asked; "Oh...Uhm, well it's_". "Is it because of that friend of yours, Hae Mirae?", Mr Chen asked and this time Nari's eyes went wide in shock as her face paled. "How...how did you know?", Nari stuttered. She couldn't believe her dad knew Astrol's true identity when he'd only met her once. "Did you forget that your dad is the royal history keeper my dear?", Mr Chen asked with a light chuckle.

"The Hae empire is actually one of my current works", he added and Nari finally relaxed. It was true, the royal history keeper knew everything concerning royals. They were a major part that helped in maintaining the balance between various empires, timelines and generations. They normally had visions which would reveal key things and everything important and significant to each empire. They would then compile and document them into books which would be kept safe and recorded till they were needed as reference or help to the future generations; "You know ever since the young princess disappeared, I've been trying to know what exactly happened to her but I never had any visions relating to her. I tried meditating a lot too, but that didn't help either. However, a few days before you introduced her to me, I finally got a vision of her. It wasn't so clear but it was something. That's why the moment I met her, I recognized her. My visions eventually became clearer after the encounter, and I finally got to know what happened to her over the years", Mr Chen explained. Nari was shocked, she didn't know that the special ability was that powerful.

"Dad, how come you haven't been attacked yet. I mean royal families know about your ability, and some empires have really dark history that they wouldn't want anyone to know about", Nari inquired. "Who says I haven't been attacked. Dear, my life is in danger all the time and I have seen death in the face multiple times as well. However, apart from the special ability, history keepers are immune to death, meaning that we can't die until we've completed our own part of the story. Our families are also under such protection to avoid being blackmailed ". "So you mean no one can harm you?", Nari asked surprised. "Yes dear, no harm can come to me until I've completed my own part of the story and hand over to you as the next history keeper".

Nari stayed quiet for a while, and her gaze fell onto the book in front of her. She read through a paragraph of the Hae empire record and she creased her eyebrows. "Dad it's not possible for them to die like that. It can't be a coincidence that their entire bloodline got wiped out in such a short amount of time. I don't think it was an accident or misfortune either", Nari stated. "Mmm", was all Mr Chen gave as a reply when a thought suddenly popped up in Nari's head as she turned to face her father.

"Dad" "Yes honey" "You know the mystery behind the deaths don't you", Nari said more than asked. Mr Chen's face darkened momentarily before he replied, "Yes dear, I do. In fact, I had a vision of King Hae's death before it even happened, and yet...I couldn't do anything about it. As a history keeper, I'm not allowed to interfere and change the story or the course of destiny. You know Ayra Kim is a very good friend of mine, and she was Mica's best friend. She'd suspected the same thing as you did and she struggled so hard to uncover the truth. I watched her go through all that when a single word from my mouth could've solved everything. I feel even more guilty when I think of King Hae. He was also a very close friend and I watched him suffer in anguish as he tried so hard to save his vanishing bloodline, until he became a victim himself. He knew he could've asked me, he knew that I knew the answers to what was going on.....but at the same time, he knew that I would never answer him", Mr Chen clenched his fists as the brief memories flashed before him.

"Do you know what it feels like to know that you could've saved so many lives, that you could've saved a precious girl's childhood? I could never imagine you experiencing what Mirae went through...and yet I couldn't help her", he concluded with a cracked voice. Nari pulled her dad and hugged him tightly. "Hey, it's not your fault, that's just how things are meant to have turned out. You're the best history keeper dad, sometimes I get so scared that I wouldn't be half as good as you", Nari consoled. "What are you saying, you'll do an amazing job, okay?", Mr Chen said and Nari nodded a bit hesitantly, "Okay''. "Now enough of the storytelling, let's go out before your mum gets worried. We've been down here for too long already", Mr Chen said, a small smile blooming on his face ....