A tremendous roar shattered the still of the morning calm of the Serengeti. To any herbivores, it was the unmistakable bugle call of their top predator. To intruders, it was a loud warning call to not transgress the territorial boundaries. But to the lions of the Sun Lands Pride, it meant only one thing.

"Our "king" is awake, Zafina." A lioness groaned sleepily.

"No need to remind me, Asmara." Zafina said in a groggy voice. None of them were in the mood to get up anytime soon.

The roar came again. Louder, this time.

"Damn." Another lioness put her paws over her ears.

A third roar sounded off.

"YES! WE HEARD YOU THE FIRST TIME!" Zafina roared back suddenly, jarring the lionesses around her out of their sleep.

"Ugh." A small cub near her feet cooed. "Mom, why are you yelling?"

Zafina's angry face softened when she caught sight of her daughter. "It's alright, Zambia. Go back to bed." The matriarch turned to the others. "Alright, girls. Let's move. Wouldn't want to keep "his majesty" waiting."

With collective groans and yawns, the lions got up and ambled out of the den to meet their patriarch, who waited for them in his usual stern-faced demeanor. Zuba was a large and powerfully built lion in his prime with a thick mane mane and tufts of fur on his elbows. They were a sign of his strength and virility to any would-be challengers.

"Good morning, Zuba." Zafina greeted her husband and patriarch in a bored and disinterested voice.

"Where is our son?" Zuba asked in a booming voice as powerful as his body, not even bothering to say good morning to his wife and matriarch.

"Right here." A small voice said from behind the great lion, causing him to jump. Sitting behind him was a male lion cub.

"Goodness, Junior! Where were you?" Zuba snapped, indignant at being caught off guard and losing his royal bearings for a moment.

"I was here the whole time." Zuba Junior aka Junior said in a matter-of-fact voice that clearly showed he was used to his father's grandstanding.

"You know what day it is, don't you son?" Zuba said, puffing up his chest as he regained his regal stance.

"It's the day you take me to the big pointy rock." Junior said.

"Exactly. It is a very special day, son. One exclusively reserved for the king of this pride and his crown prince. Let's move!" He started to leave when the female cub from earlier ran out of the den between the legs of the lionesses and towards her father and twin brother.

"Hey, dad! Can I come too?" The female cub asked.

"No, Zambia." Zuba said, scowling.

"Why not?" Zambia pouted.

"It's a father-son thing." Zuba said. "Junior! Let's go."

Junior looked at his sister and shrugged before continuing on his way with their royal father towards the destination in question.

Zambia pouted. "I never get to go anywhere."

"You're better off not going, daughter." Zafina sighed, yawned, and stretched before she turned to the lionesses. "Alright, ladies! Let's move! Wouldn't want to come back with empty paws and be in another royal tongue-lashing from his highness."

The lionesses groaned and grumbled, but did as their matriarch said as they embarked on another hunt for the day.

Zuba and Junior traveled deep into their territory through woodlands and across streams and great fields of gold until they reached the heartland of Zuba's kingdom.

"Here we are! Behold!" Zuba proclaimed in a dramatic voice.

In the distance, towering over the landscape was an enormous and unusually shaped rock formation divided into three parts. The first one stood straight up like a tower. The second jutted forward from the first and ended in a promontory overlooking the plains. A third column supported the second part and prevented it from falling.

No one knew how long the structure had been there. It was probably long before the first lion appeared in Africa. Frankly, none of the lions of the pride cared for it. Not so with Zuba. The structure was Holy ground.

"Kneel! Bow!" Zuba commanded before bowing low before the structure.

Junior hesitated, but did as his father said.

After a good minute, his father stood and told his son to do the same. "It is the custom of all lions to bow before the King's Tower. It is the symbol of the lion's power in Africa and what makes the Sun Lands higher and mightier above all other kingdoms in Africa." Zuba continued in what he hoped his son thought was a charismatic and impressive voice. "Six thousand years ago, Kilimanjaro, the first King Lion and the father of our race, ruled from this very tower. All lions who have since ruled from this very place are his direct descendants.

"Um. Okay, dad. It's impressive, I guess." Junior went along with his father's fantasies reluctantly.

"Come! Son! We have much to do." Zuba said as he strode towards the tower with his son trotting behind.

It was going to be a long day.

They slowed as they neared the ground and Zuba had him bow again. "The very soil on which we now tread is Holy."

The ascended stone stairs leading up to the 2nd level of the tower and entered the cave inside only to find someone had scribbled atrocious drawings of what the pair barely recognized as lions.

"What manner of blasphemous sacrilege is this?" Zuba snarled in indignation. "What scoundrel dares to defile the altar of the great kings?"

"Are you asking me? It's my first time coming here. I also don't think we have opposable thumbs. So, it can't have been one of us. Maybe it was a monkey playing a stupid prank." Junior suggested.

"Son, we are going to erase it immediately." Zuba said.

But they couldn't. No matter how hard they scrubbed, the drawings could not be removed from the walls. Zuba snarled.

"I do not know who is responsible for such a sacrilegious act of vandalism. But be assured, my son. As your father and this land's king, I will not let this irreverent act go unpunished."

The pair exited the cave and then ascended a path that bent around the dizzying height of the huge tower until they reached its summit where they were treated to an impossibly magnificent and panoramic view of the sun-drenched Serengeti below.

"Wow, uh. Nice view." Junior admitted. "I can see why you didn't want to share this with mom and my sister and the others."

Zuba promptly launched into another speech. "Everything the light touches is our kingdom. The king's time as ruler rises and falls like the sun. One day, the sun will set on my time and will rise with you as the new king."

If he was expecting a response, he got none. All he got was awkward silence.

"Were you talking to me, dad?" Junior asked.

Zuba was flummoxed. "Do you see anyone else up here with us?"

Junior turned to look behind him. Having snuck up on the pair of lions completely undetected was a leopard yawning and scratching his ear with a hind paw.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING UP HERE!?" Zuba roared, causing Junior to cover his ringing ears from the force with which his father yelled.

The leopard was unfazed. "I was just enjoying the view, like you two."

"YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO BE HERE! ONLY THE KING AND THE CROWN PRINCE ARE ALLOWED TO COME HERE!" Zuba kept roaring.

"Wait, what? Really? Could have fooled me. I didn't see a sign saying only kings and princes were allowed up here." The leopard said, still totally unfazed by the roaring lion three times his size.

"YOU HAVE FIVE SECONDS BEFORE I THROW YOU OFF THIS CLIFF. ONE, TWO, THREE…" Zuba started.

"Dad, it's just Larry." Junior interrupted.

"What?!" Zuba asked, interrupted out of his fit of royal indignation.

"You don't remember me? We kind of met before once." Larry said.

"We?!" Zuba asked.

"Yes. We. Well, not the two of us specifically. But I met your kids. They got lost once and I happened to be nearby so I took them back home, but I left before you, his royal father, appeared because I was told that he didn't take kindly to uninvited guests. I see now that my hunch was right."

Zuba turned to Junior.

"It's true, dad. My sister and I once wondered off a few days ago when you and the other adults were asleep and we got lost, but Larry was nearby and took us home. It turns out we weren't that far away, so nobody really noticed."

Zuba glared at Larry, still not wanting an intruder up at the tower with his son at such an important moment.

"Alright, well. I'm clearly not welcome here. In which case, I'll be taking my leave. Have a brilliant day, your majesty." Larry did a fake, but convincingly reverential bow before leaving as they watched him go.

"Where was I?" Zuba asked.

"You said everything the light touched is our kingdom and that one day, I am going to rule it all."

"Ah! Yes, of course! So, as I was saying…."

"What about the part the light doesn't touch?" Junior interrupted.

"What?"

"We don't own the sun. We don't tell it where to shine its light. Its light shines on lands far beyond our kingdom, but they are just too far away from here to be seen from this tower. So, are they part of our kingdom, or are they not since they can't be seen from where we are?"

Zuba had no idea how to answer.

Junior then noticed a shadowy place to the north. "What's that?"

"What's what?"

"What are those shadowy ruins over there beyond the northern border?"

"They are not part of our lands, son. You must never go there."

"But I see the light touching there enough for us to see it."

"It's beyond my lands, son. We cannot go there."

"Why not? Aren't you the king?"

"Of course, I am!"

"Well, then. Why can't you go there?"

"It's beyond my borders."

"Can your borders be extended? As long as nobody is living there, you can claim it as your own."

"The hyenas live there." Zuba scowled at the mention of their hated enemies.

"Hyenas?"

"Yes. Hyenas." Zuba snarled again.

"So, in other words, not everything the light touches is our kingdom."

"I…. that's a good point, son." Zuba said, appearing awkward for a moment before he regained his royal bearings. "Anyways! We should move on."