Fahlyn, King of Lucortha

The world as you know it, as I know it, is ending.

It's been going on for a while now, people have noticed that something is wrong but they already know they can't stop it.

Yet they try. 

Why?

What's the point of it all, when you know you will fail?

Humans seem to prefer to cling to false hope and fake ignorance to escape reality. 

They linger in their own little fantasy world, mumbling to themselves over and over -

"This couldn't happen to me. It couldn't possibly. It can't it can't it can't it can't..."

Like little, worthless broken records.

I can see it, though, the world crumbling all around us. 

My eyes aren't clouded by foolish visions of paradise.

I don't believe we can save this reality.

It's too far gone.

And so, as I sit here, staring off into the red, red sunset, I wonder -

Is this really all there is?

Is this crumbling, rotting universe all that is left?

Was there anything else to begin with?

If I tried, could I escape this ruined planet, this fractured reality, and find somewhere new?

With these questions swirling around inside the abyss of my mind, I stand, stuffing my hands into the pockets of my torn coat and turn away from the blazing sunset, turn my back on the dilapidated remains of the city in which I had lived most of my short life, and look towards the darkness that slithered and snapped hungrily at me from every shadowed place along the line of trees marking the beginning of the Black Forest. Somewhere off to my right a flock of crows suddenly lept from their perch on the branches of a dead evergreen tree, cawing, startled by something. I'd ignore them for the most part, though, and begin towards the trees, ratty old boots crunching through the dead grass and fallen leaves with each step, breaking the still silence of dusk. My breath clouded in the air in front of me, the frigid coldness of the approaching winter clawing through the thin cloth of my trench coat and seeping through the clothes beneath. The shadows chirped and chittered at me as I got closer to them, swirling around my ankles and hiding up inside the bottom part of my trench coat where the normal shadows lay in order to hide from the dying light of the sun. I'd stop just inside the tree line, still as a statue, and wait wordlessly.

"Fahlyn." A voice. My mother. Slowly I'd turn my head in her direction, eyes sliding over the shadowed body of an old woman. She was a tiny thing, skin and bones, flesh as black as ink and eyes to match. Her hair was wound in a tight bun on top of her head, each strand like a wisp of starlight. Her face was drawn, cheeks sunken in and bags under those dark eyes, her expression cold and sour even to her only child. She was hunched over, a cane held in her gnarled left hand, the dragons' head carved into the back side of the curve of the handle snarling at me from the darkness, ruby eyes glittering, looking as if it was about to detach itself from the cane and lunge at me.

"What do you want, Vanessa?" I'd murmur, voice barely loud enough to be heard. Speaking too loudly in this forest could and probably would end up getting you killed, and I knew that very well. The scar on my face made sure of it.

"The council is demanding your presence. There is talk of your execution being hastened." Her wispy, soft voice revealed nothing of how she was feeling or her thoughts. I clenched my jaw and curled my left hand into a fist inside of my pocket, glaring at my mother, my anger raising to the surface.

"You already know I'm not planning on going back to die, Vanessa. The only way I'll go back is if they drop the charges or I'm already dead." She knew this. What was she trying to do, convince me to go back somehow? We had never been close; there was no way that she could talk me into going back peacefully. 

By the look on her face now, she knew that.

Movement in the corner of my eye caught my attention and I narrowed my eyes at my mother, a split second later a horrible screeching noise, metal on metal, similar to the dying howl of one of those disgusting cyborg wolves, sounded to the right of my skull, just out of my line of sight. The shadows screamed from the confines of my coat, furious - they knew. 

"Sending your unholy creations at me will do you no good. You know that, mother, stop coddling me. Treat me like the adult that I fucking am." I snarl at her, my golden eyes flying wide open as soon as the red sun finally dips below the horizon, bathing the Earth in the darkness of a new moon night. This was my domain; she stood no chance against me when there wasn't any light around for miles. The shadows snarled at me, at her, at everything - suddenly detaching from my form and pouring over the expanse of woods between my other and I in a massive tidal wave of all-consuming, inky blackness even darker then the night already was. 

She made no noise as they layed into her, chewing through her skin, stripping her clean to the bone. I turned my head to the side, staring at the massive, slightly glowing, silvery metal wolf laying limp a foot or so away from me, a long, rather thin black blade punched through its bottom jaw all the way through the top one too, keeping its horrible maw pinned open forever in a horrendous, soundless death scream. My body relaxed and the blade wiggled a bit, slipping out of the beasts' maw and returning to my side, hovering a few inches from where my left hand would be. As soon as it was safely by my side again I turned my attention back to my silent mother, the shadows dissipating as soon as my golden gaze focused on them once more. 

What lay there on the ground where my mother had once stood didn't resemble the woman who birthed me at all. All it was was a skinless, nearly muscle-less corpse, one eye hanging out of its socket over the side of her face, the other completely missing. Had I been closer I could of likely seen right through into the cavern that had once held her brain. Her innards lay scattered around her in a growing puddle of tar-like blood blacker then her skin had been. My footsteps were silent now as I glided to her side, the shadows crowding around my feet and silencing my steps. I kneeled in the gory puddle at her side, my dark coat stained ever darker by her thick blood. I stared at what was left of her face, wordless for several long moments. My sword, Orokana, slipped back into its sheaf on my back as I stared at the dead body before me, thinking. 

She had never been a very good mother to me. She was always how she was before she died - cold, emotionless, cruel. Expecting so much of me, too much. She had always been incredibly frail, though; no one even began to suspect her for the murder of my father. She had been a power hungry creature, using my father for all he was worth, spinning lies with that silver tongue of hers, swaying everyone with ease. Except for me. My intelligence had astonished the entire kingdom, as did my ability to see through even the most well told, believed lies. my mother knew this, they all knew this - but my mother had them in those tainted claws of hers, controlled them like marionettes. They much rather believe in their beloved Queen then the strange, dark-loving prince. It didn't help matters that I had attempted to assassinate my own mother, though, I suppose - even if it had happened well before the murder of my father.

"I finally succeeded in killing you, mother. May The Great Moon reject you and send your rotten soul down into the bowels on The Under to suffer for all of eternity for what it is that you have done." I stood quickly, swiping up her dragon cane from the ground near her and snapping the offending thing in half, the shadows plucking the rubies from the dragons' eyes and embedding them in the hilt of Orokana where my own sapphires and my fathers emeralds already lay, glittering brilliantly in the darkness. Tossing the broken cane to the ground I turned in the opposite direction, starting deeper into the forest, whispering my directions to the shadows that lingered on my every order, eager.

Lucortha would be nothing but ruins in the morning, destroyed by the last remaining royal blooded creature. 

Destroyed by their own king. 

It wasn't long before screams began to echo in the distance.

A rift opened up a few paces ahead of me, the pulsating darkness inviting me. I walked up to it, placing my hand on the thin veil that surrounded the portal and digging my silver claws into its surface, glaring and baring my fangs at it. This, if it would allow me to, would take me into another universe. i wanted out of this one it was dying, collapsing in on itself, and I didn't want to be in it when it finally ceased to exist.

"Rift, allow me passage." I snarled, enraged. 

"Fahlyn, King of Lucortha, you are not the last of your kind. One yet still remains somewhere where the sun kills off all the darkness. He holds power that is opposite yours; his light is destined to obliterate your darkness. He is to leave this world, not you, unless you are able to snuff out his brilliant light." The rift spoke - no, not the rift. This was The Great Moon, the deity of this collapsing world. 

"Where would I find my opposite?" I was nearly breathless. I wanted to leave - there was not much time left for this place, just a few more months at best, a single month at worst.

"You will find him in the lands where my brother, The Great Sun, reins. In a valley kissed with golden light where the darkness cannot tread during the light hours." I'd take a deep breath, nodding slightly to acknowledge its words, and let the hand still sitting tense against the rifts' veil fall to my side. The rift would being to slowly fade from my sight, The Great Moon speaking only once more before dissapearing completely.

"May the fates guide your path and lead you to the destiny you are meant to fulfill."

Wordless I'd move through the space where the rift had just been, trembling in anticipation, headed in the direction of the Valley of the Sun.

Where my last obstacle lay.

I would not die here.

For my father, I would live on.